This is both the last of the four cover illustrations I submitted to a forgotten zine back in 1990 and it’s the last illustration from the 1990 sketchbook that I’ve scanned. My next series of posts will feature sketches I’ve done THIS YEAR. I know, shocking.
Smiley Glasses 2010
Third of four redrawings of images I originally illustrated in 1990. See previous posts for more details.
Smiley Glasses 1990
Third of four illustrations from 1990. See previous post for more info.
Headed Off 2010
And this is the second of four redrawing of those cover illustrations that I submitted in 1990 to the zine whose name I have forgotten. One of the difference between the 2010 redos and the 1990 originals is that I now use Photoshop to tweak my illustrations. I couldn’t have done that 20 years ago. Computers couldn’t do anything remotely like what they can now. And I didn’t own one anyway.
Headed Off 1990
This is the second of four cover illustrations I submitted in 1990 to a zine the name of which I have forgotten.
Black Suit 2010
As I was scanning that sketchbook from 1990 it occurred to me that it might be fun to redraw some of the images. I decided to redo the four illustrations I’d submitted for the cover of the Forgotten Zine. When the idea first hit me I thought I’d redraw them in the same style that I used in 1990, brush and pen and ink with stippling and crosshatching for the shadows. After thinking about it a bit I decided to just redo the images in the style I’m using today. Number one, I haven’t done much stippling in years. Number two, it’s a fairly time consuming process. And number three, stippling was part of my style in 1990 and it’s not in 2010. If I’m going to redraw an image now I might as well draw it the way I draw today.
One of the first things that hit me when I was sketching out the image was that I know more about anatomy now. I can’t just copy and improve on what I did twenty years ago. I had to start from scratch.
Black Suit 1990
Once I’d discovered the small press underground I was pretty active. From 1989 until about 1992 or 1993 I published 19 minicomics and contributed to countless minicomics and zines. (I also drew five issues of Misspent Youths in 1990/91.) I should have samples of most of that work in the stack of boxes that sitting my “library”. If I ever sort those boxes I might find the title of the zine this illustration was submitted to. It and three others (to follow) were submitted for cover illustrations. I know at least two of them were used but I don’t remember which two.
Lifeforms Unlimited 1990
This was a logo done in 1990 for a friend for a t-shirt design. Lifeforms Unlimited was … not exactly a company. It wasn’t a club or an organization. It was sort of the handle of a group of people who hung out and partied together. I still know most of them. The friend who commission the logo however, him I’ve lost track of.
Mother and Child 1990
This is the last of the Factsheet Five submissions from that sketchbook. It’s not the last piece of art from 1990. I’ve still got a few examples to show you.
Heartless 1990
By now it probably looks like most of my submissions to Factsheet Five were horror themed. A lot of them were. A lot of them weren’t. The ones that weren’t were not in the sketchbook I scanned for this set of posts. Of course, if you’ve been reading this blog for any length of time you know I am a big fan of monsters and icky things. Not much has changed since 1990. Heck, not much has changed since 1967 or so, the year I found out about dinosaurs. I’ve got drawings that my mother saved from the really old days. But I’ll spare you those. At least for now.
