ECCC Portfolio: PLATYPUS

Here are is the "finished" line art for my 12-page "Bill the Platypus" short I'm including in my comic book portfolio for the Emerald City Comic Con. I plan on showing these (and some more traditional superhero stuff I hope to finish this weekend) to as many artists, writers and editors at the big comics publishers as I can. The ultimate goal is to eventually earn a living illustrating comics and while I've got a long way to go, I feel like I've worked with more focus in the last three months to improve my drawing than I have in the last three years. Please be brutally honest with your critique, I've still got some time to polish these before I print them off and head up to Seattle for ECCC.

A few things to keep in mind. People looking at these won't know these characters (and neither do you, really) so this is sort of an introduction to what a "Bill the Platypus" comic might look like, without being a proper origin story. Hopefully you can follow the action, even without the dialogue (which I may add later). Feel free to point out specifics that work or mistakes that need fixed (like in page 9, first panel, guy isn't wearing  a jacket).

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 Text would be: 3 weeks later, somewhere in Mexico.
Dialogue is Mr. Goodfellow (glasses, works for Bill's boss) introducing Bill (platypus, bounty hunter) to Dr. Sanchez (hat, veterinarian/paranormal investigator). They are here to capture a creature that is slaughtering livestock. Locals are calling it the "chupacabra".

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 Dialogue: Sanchez tells Bill he was attacked by the creature. Says it's twice the size of a grizzly bear. They are driving out to the site of the last attack.

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 Bill: Think the doc might have been exaggerating about your size a bit.

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 Originally the Doctor wasn't a character, there was just the farmer, so that's how I forgot to draw his jacket on this page. Will fix before comic con.

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 I'm not sure what sound a tranquilizer gun makes.

12

So this is the condensed version of a full 24-page comic script I wrote. Eventually I'll add a flashback scene of Dr. Sanchez's first encounter with the creature (spooky, cliche horror movie night scene) and a few pages at the end of the Doc getting a blood transfusion, thanking Bill for the help and Goodfellow's men packing up the chupacabra's to be transferred to a research facility.

Bill vs Chupacabra pages 1-5

  

p1

p2

p3

p4

Mama Cabra!

Every page I've done has been an experiment in defining a "style"/work flow/methodology. I plan to come back to these later to tighten them up and color them. Please give me your honest critique - point out everything I've done wrong before I take these to the "inking" stage. Pacing, anatomy, rendering, inconsistency - if you spot something that bothers you, let me know! Also, if there's anything you think turned out good, I wouldn't mind hearing that either.

Below is a small example of the many design sketches I did to design the "Mama" Chupacabra. The two in the top left are fairly recent, the one in the bottom right was done a few years ago. I think the expression of the guy in the middle is the best.

Bill v Chupas p4

I'm not sure why Bill beating the crap out of these little goat suckers cracks me up, especially the one he punches in mid air. Probably got the idea after watching this video a few years back.

Hey how'd that farmer guy get upside down?

Bill vs Chupas p3

A fun but slightly more involved page layout. The line art is still sort of a mess, but I have to keep posting a page each week and moving on to break the bad habit of redrawing the same page over and over again. Yes I know his tranquilizer gun disappeared in the bottom panel, I will have to draw that in later.

Bill vs Chupa p.2

Experimenting with different rendering techniques in Photoshop. I've been toying around with this little story idea for a while now. I love drawing the chupacabra, I've got a lot of sketchbook doodles of him. He's sort of a mix of bush baby, vampire bat and feral cat. Below is the original second page from a few years back, drawn in pencil.