It's been both a privilege and an honor to have been invited to take part in the final two volumes of Flight, an anthology that gave a lot of young artists their start in getting their works published. Huge thanks and congrats go to Kazu Kibuishi who created this series, brought so many amazing artists together, and introduced me to a whole crew of fantastic new friends and inspiring creators. Flight has definitely been a positive force in my life for which I am so very grateful!
In this book, my brother Steven ("Shaggy") Shanahan has written and I've illustrated a short story called "Buttons and Jim: What's Stopping the Gravy Train?" To celebrate the book release I thought I'd share the step by step process of how I create a page from start to finish.
I do my roughs on a wacom cintiq, it's fast and easy to make fixes. At this point I was happy enough with the set up so I printed the pale red "pencils" onto 11x14 Strathmore windpower smooth bristol...
I tighten up the pencils and move on to inking. On this comic for the most part I used a windsor&newton series 7 size 01 brush and super-black speedball india ink. For the character's faces I used micron and prismacolor premier markers, nothing bigger than a size 02.
I've heard from other artists that microns are no good and copic markers are the way to go, but I've never had a problem with microns on bristol and when I bought a pack of copic they wouldn't put down a consistent line. May just have been that particular set of markers, but I'll stick with what works for me.
Print! I have nothing to do with this stage of the game, but I can't wait to get MY HANDS ON THIS BOOK! (that's Jason's hand in the pic). So yes! Flight volume 8 is now available on amazon, in book and comic shoppes, and hopefully soon at your local libraries. So be sure to keep an eye out for it :)
Cheers guys!
Still in the reading mood? Here are some blog posts about the final book from a few of my inspiring Flight peers:
Cheers guys!
Flight 8 is available at amazon.com & amazon.ca
