Friday 6 August 2010

MAKING OF A ZARJAZ COVER!!!

Right, here's a brief departure from my usual stuff...

Around 6 months ago Dave Evans, editor of the 2000AD fanzines "Dogbreath" and "Zarjaz" contacted me about doing a cover for "Zarjaz" issue 10 (out in October) based on one of the interior stories.

That story was "FLESH: Extinction" written by Mark Howard, drawn by Chris Geary, and inspired by my current writer Pat Mills' classic "FLESH" series for 2000AD.

So I came up with this rough, based on the main creature....
...but then Dave informed me it was actually a DOUBLE SPREAD they needed, so after cursing his name I figured out the other side, that involved as little extra drawing as possible.
As you can tell, my pencils were pretty rough, and I realized that the perspective was completely wrong when looking at the ground area. I was trying to have him on the edge of a cliff, but it wasn't working, so I redrew it as I inked.
Alot better me thinks! Plus adding the tentacle in the foreground on the left gave it a nice sense of depth I thought...
Finally, colouring! Not much to add here, though I'm not sure if I prefer the black and white version. Pretty happy with it though, and it was nice to draw something completely different to my usual stuff!

11 comments:

Stephen Mooney said...

Fantastic piece Leigh, great sense of scale and depth which is down to the excellent staging.
Prefer the colours meself, lovely foreboding orange.

Leigh G said...

Ah thanks Mr Mooney. I'm honoured that you took the time to visit my humble blog on your wedding anniversary...

Will Sliney said...

You just used this post as an excuse to put up a photo of your arse

Leigh G said...

I knew it was the only way to get you to visit my site Will.

Emperor said...

It is a stunning cover - can't wait to see it... in the flesh (OK on paper but that wouldn't work so well).

Leigh G said...

Oh the gags....cheers very much Emperor!

Edward Kaye said...

Holy crap! How did I miss this update!

You really should get on Twitter, so you can tweet your updates!

I absolutely love this cover! The perspective is fantastic, and the scale and depth is perfect, making the looming creature truly manacling!

You draw a hell of a monster! The style is sightly Guy Davis - esque, not that I'm saying that it is derivative, of course.

This means that I'm going to have to get a copy of Zarjaz shipped over to Canada, doesn't it. Oh well, I've been meaning to get a few copies, so this is a good excuse :)

Leigh G said...

That's very kind of you Ed. Nahh, never going on Twitter--have enough distractions to my deadlines as it is!

But I do appreciate you linking it on there yourself mate--cheers for that!

Leigh G said...

By the way, just to make clear, the design of the monster is based completely on the interior artist's version.

Colin Lorimer said...

Great composition Leigh.
Love the colour!

Leigh G said...

Cheers Lubbert!