Page Process : Phonogram 'A Black Parade'

Hey hey,

So finally I've gotten round to pulling together a post on some of my process. I'm aiming to do some more in depth posts than this one, as this project was just a 5 page short and I didn't have much to design. Anyway stay tuned for more process posts, I'll try and make more of a regular thing of it.

So this post covers my work on 'A Black Parade', a short story for back of issue #3 of Phonogram: The Immaterial Girl by Kieron Gillen and Jamie Mckelvie.

                                                 


I'm a fan of the Phonogram series and of both Kieron and Jamie's work in general. By chance I met Kieron at a con a good few years back, we chatted and he looked over my portfolio and asked me to join him on a B-side story for the upcoming 3rd book. A couple of years passed, the book was delayed but Kieron still remembered me and kept me in mind for the B-side.

I'm always grateful for this little job. Kieron not only kept me in mind but also has never forgotten my face when meeting in person. He's put me forward to publishers more than a few times, so the guy really is a true gent. *Salute to Mr Gillen*

Right so, without further ado.

Character Design sketches   

So first off, after reading the script, I'll usually work out the characters that need designing. In this case I had some existing characters to work from but also characters such as the girls Kohl and Kid With Knives are chatting to. 'The Were-Emo' also needed some working out before moving on to the pages. 

 

Thumbnails 

After those designs get a nod of approval I get going with the thumbnails. Typically these are 12 x 8.5 cm.

Page Process

Thumbnail

Pencils
I usually print off the previously seen thumbnails at nearly A3 size.
Then I lightbox the thumbnails, tightening up the line work and adding detail on paper.

Inks
The inks here are traditional ink on Bristol board. I print out the pencils in blue onto Bristol board and then ink over them with a brush, switching to fine liners for straight lines.

Colours
And here we have the magic of colourist Andre May. After inking I'll scan in the inks and clean them up and add any alterations in Photoshop.Then I send Andre the pure black and white inks.
Andre then works what I can only describe as colourful witchcraft.
And so here you have the finished thing!

The pages were lettered by Clayton Cowles. Lettering is itself a whole other art form and essential for the finished page. However, I'm usually not involved in this process. I'll skip it for this post but hopefully cover it more in other posts. 

This is a perfect example of Andre's genius and skill as a colourist. Page 4 really turned out to be something else with his work. In fact I'd say this whole set of pages became something much greater with his work on it.

* Inks for this page were drawn digitally using Manga Studio. At the time I wasn't confident in a heavy use of black on the figure, so I decided to do it digitally to allow for tweaking as I went. Funnily enough this was one of the pages that changed things for me and made me think of inking digitally more often.