The Last Vampirella Art Return Card

I really didn't think I'd be selling the last of them a day after I started listing these art return cards, but I am.
This one is my favourite as I think it gets closest to Frazetta's model of Vampirella with her cute little belly!

The auction is here: ebay.

~R

Bettie and Vampirella Sketch Cards

The Vampirella auction I listed earlier went much quicker than I expected with Buy It Now, so I'm putting up another of the remaining two cards on ebay.

And I also put up another of the oversized 4.5"x 6.25"  Bettie cards to replace the one sold yesterday on ebay.

It looks like I'll be doing a fair bit of ebay-ing into the future, so I popped a link to my ebay ID page so anyone can easily see what I may be selling at any given point.

Vampirella Artist Returns!

So I did a number (four) of Vampirella Artist Return Cards a little while back, then completely forgot about them.  I found them while working on some new cards and decided to start sharing them here:

Here's the first of them:

I think I learned a great deal about making sketch cards and working with Copics while doing the Bettie Page cards and it's paying off here.

The above card has already been sold, but you can check out the auction for one of the remaining cards - -this one:

Over at ebay here.

In case you're interested, this is what the backs of the cards look like.

Vampirella Sketch Card 01

San Diego is over and I'm pretty sure Breygent has doled out all their exclusive Vampirella cards, so i should be in the free and clear to share the rest of them now.

Planning to drop these one-a-day as I can as I usually do, so look forward to a few weeks of red bathing suited cheesecake.

~R

A Colour Vampirella Sketch

I guess drawing all these Vampirella cards has played on my affection for the character to the point i'm drawing her for warm-ups as well.  I mentioned I did a Vampirella sketch based on the Black Cat card-puzzle -- this is it, but coloured a bit in Pshop.

Now I'm tempted to redraw this as a two-card Vampirella sketch card -- I think if I draw this pose enough I'll get good at it!

The Vampire Cassandra

I've described the aborted Vampirella mini-series before, but I just found this piece in that stack of old art. After reconstructing the cyborg vampires from the future idea I'd written for Blade at Marvel (which got cancelled) into the cyborg vampires from the future for Vampirella at Harris (which got cancelled) I was left with a large pile of story and plot elements dealing with cyborg vampires from the future.

Considering that the only thing in common between the two stories were time travel, vampires and hover-cycles, I had quite a bit of developed material to play with and I considered yet another new story, but this time spinning out of a few plot elements and one of the characters, Cassandra, I developed for the Vampi series. I did a few sketches, the above drawing, did a little writing and then got really busy doing something else.

I just realised this makes yet another instance of a vampire project I put some effort into.

I don't mind the costume so much, but the arms and hairstyle would certainly have to go if I ever dusted this off and the drawing itself shows my limitations at the time. The scan is from a photocopy -- if I find the original I'd probably makes some changes before posting.

Vampirella Study

I had other things I could have worked on right now, but I felt like drawing something sexy. So I started doodling different thumbnails based on gestures from my sketchbook until something stuck.

As I started working out anatomy and, being a comic geek, figured it was going to be a Vampirella drawing. Guess I'm kinda hooked on the character.

It reminds me of an unfinished Red Sonja piece I started a long time ago. I might try and turn this into a painting for the upcoming Hobbystar convention in August.

Sketch Card for May 7 - Vampirella 5/5

And with that Vampirella week ends. I really, really enjoyed drawing these and, based on the hits my blog received this week I think it's safe to say a number of people enjoyed looking at them.

All of these cards were created on 2.5x3.5" on Strathmore bristol plate with Copic markers.

Since I started these sketch cards I've had a number of requests to sell them, either individually or as a group. Deciding on a price is always somewhat stressful for me, so I've decided to let the cards determine their own value at eBay. I've listed three of the more popular sets today and I hope they find fine new places to live. You can click on the set names to go directly to the auctions

Batman set:

Buffy

And this week's Vampirella cards

See you all next week.

~Richard

Vampirella Pin-Up Pencils

I keep forgetting that I drew this.

A couple of years back I just wanted to draw Vampi again and I started this for the hell of it. I got really busy teaching and never got around to finishing the pencils (more dead ivy on the ground as well as some metal studs and bolts in the doors) or inked it.

I might go back and finish it, colour it and make a print of it for the Toronto cons this summer.

~R

Sketch Card for May 6 - Vampirella 4/5

Tried for a pin-up style pose, and managed to flip the armband and forearm bands she wears -- oops! Good thing this isn't in panel to panel continuity.

Did a quick search through my blog history and found that I have talked about the cancelled Vampirella mini series I worked on.

Sketch Card for May 5 - Vampirella 3/5

Only two more days to go.

I could do a Vampirella month, I'm enjoying this so much.

Sketch Card for May 4- Vampirella 2/5

I like the idea of Vampirella being more mysterious and a little alien rather than many of the alternate takes on her that've been floating around over the years. My visual touchstone is still that first Frazetta painting.

Love to hear everyone's favourite version of her.

Sketch Card for May 3 - Vampirella 1/5

Back after an unexpected and unwanted week off.

We're having a pretty severe allergy season up here and it literally put me on my back at the beginning of last week. I made attempts to do the sketch cards, but was pretty disappointed with the results and I was barely able to meet the schedule for my other assignments.

So, I decided to put aside my theme for last week for some other time and go to something a little easier on my still-itchy eyes! Vampirella. Love the character and I'd love to do something with her at some point in the future. I developed an interest beyond drawing her back in the 90s when Harris Comics tapped me to write and draw a 4-issue mini series. I think I might have described what happened on the blog before.

Vampirella - Time Bleeds

More stuff from the pile of old work. Since it's Friday the 13th, I figure I can discuss some cursed horror projects.

In the early-to-mid 90s Vampirella made something of a comeback in regular comics. At a New York convention I met Harris Comics's editor in chief, Melony Crawford Chadwick and pitched her an off-the-top-of-my-head idea: cyborg vampires from the future vs Vampirella. There was more to it than that, but that was all just details. It was an immediately green lit and I started writing it and it became something I was really proud of; it was certainly smarter than I thought it would be and I made up some really weird bad ass shit that would have been an absolute blast to draw; I had one scene where one of those cyborg vampires was speeding down a busy NY street on a hoverbike against traffic smashing Vampi into the windshields of the cars as he passed by.

The decision was made that there should be some sort of "zero" issue to help promote it. I figured I could play with a time stream cop character I created for the mini, a shark-toothed, dread-locked alien I named Bleak. I had just finished my one issue of Malibu's Rune and had a lot of that character in my head and hands, which explains the similarity of a few superficial elements (big mouth & weird jewelry), but I really dug the boots I designed for him.


So, here's Bleak and his Cthulhoid dog monitoring "Shimmerspace" -- I concocted an alternate dimension cloudscape that somehow was a nexus for all timelines and could be used to track disturbances in those timelines.



Dunno why, but I felt that the dog wouldn't really like Shimmerspace and had it throwing up on the deck of Bleak's ship. The weird monocled face on the screen in the second panel was the new incarnation of The Rook -- a recently revamped character and a time-traveller of sorts in the Harris Comics line. The idea being that Bleak was tracking someone in the "present" of the comics universe.



The two reverse tornadoes rising up and converging on Bleak were to indicate two alternate time lines being messed with by the events about to transpire in the upcoming mini-series.

Sadly, while starting to draw the next two pages, a double spread, I got the call that Crawford Chadwick was fired and all unsolicited books were on hold, which really meant they were cancelled.

The genesis for the cyborg vampires from the future came from another dead project. I had pitched the idea to the then editor of Blade as a fill in; the future these vampires came from was a radioactive hell so they had to travel back in time to obtain the uncontaminated blood they needed to survive. I managed to write the script before the series was cancelled. The last issue was the one my story was schedule to run, so I understood when the editor chose to give it to the main creative team.

More Vampi

Gah -- this early in and I already hit a hiccough in keeping the blog steady. Excuses? Why, yes, I do have a few. I turned 39 on the 12th, losing that weekend, and had my knee go kablooey midweek (actually, it sounded more like bubble wrap popping at it twisted). I'm seeing the doctor tomorrow about the knee, but there's nothing to be done about getting older.

I did do something for the blog, on top of teaching and freelancing:a pencil drawing of Vampi. I'm intending to ink this, which explains the lack of tone and odd white areas behind Vampi, but I'll probably post a few other things first to try and get my rhythm back while I break out the brushes and nibs. I might even colour it afterwards. If I'm happy with the end result, I might send it along to Fangoria.

I feel this Vampi is more traditional than the one I did back in '95 -- I do think I have more control over her facial features and proportions. I guess that whole experience thing does eventually pay off!

Feel free to comment!

~Richard

Moving and Shaking with Vampirella

The latest comics industry news that has me smiling from ear-to-ear is that Fangoria Comics has outright bought Vampirella from Harris Comics. The best coverage is at Heidi MacDonald's Blog, The Beat : http://pwbeat.publishersweekly.com/blog/2007/01/11/yet-more-on-vampi/

My favourite part is from a previous entry, though, where Jonathan Rheingold ends up looking stupid. It's a wee bit of Schadenfreude, but a long, long time ago, I had a project killed for no other reason than JR didn't want to bother with anything started before he took over things at Harris Comics. I know a few other people treated poorly by the man, but it's really up to them to discuss that.

I had written all four issues and was drawing a special preview thingie when it got killed. I've had higher-profile and better paying gigs killed over my career, but none for the reason that the project was considered an inconvenience.

Anyway, I had recently found this in my files while tidying my studio: it was the first piece of promo art for the Time Bleeds mini series. I had only started trying to ink (it shows) and the drawing was pretty much the all I was capable of way back then.

Maybe I'll do a new Vampi for my next entry here.

~Richard