Laatst kwam ik werk van niemand minder dan Robert Atkins tegen, met een hommage aan George Pérez. Niet 1, niet 2, maar 3 covers van de oude comic Civil War van IDW. Het hele verhaal hierachter was te lezen en zien op zijn blog. Dit heb ik integraal overgenomen. De uiteindelijke covers waren niet te zien op zijn blog, dus deze heb ik er zelf bij gezocht en toegevoegd.
Prachtig verhaal met drie waardige covers als resultaat. 👌🏽🔥❤
Voor de oplettende lezer moet Hot Sauce direct opgevallen zijn bij het zien van de Duke cover. Deze cameo van Atkins komt dus ook voor in de hommage aan George Pérez. 😎
About a month or so ago IDW asked if I would like to do 3 covers for their GI JOE line. I agreed immediately, it's always fun to do more GI JOE. Plus it extends this crazy cover run I've done with them. As of now I've drawn 47 covers for the GI JOE line at IDW! 4 years goes by quick.
Well this time around I probably should have asked what they wanted first. They needed them turned around pretty quick, and once I found out what they wanted....I realized quick was not going to be an option.
IDW has run a few homage covers lately, where they take their characters and place them in similar compositions as classic comic covers. i.e. this Transformers/ Uncanny X-Men #1 homage.
So they had another classic cover in mind for me. The Crisis on Infinite Earths cover#7 (1985) by none other than George "I can't draw too many lines" Perez!
Now this cover has already be homaged to death...no pun intended....seriously it's been done a lot.
Though in an interesting twist this Uncanny X-Men Cover by John Byrne was done 5 years previous (1980).
This is where I come in. I had just got done talking to someone about how I don't really appreciate homage covers, because I rarely feel like the new version does the original justice. What can be brought to the table the improves on the original? Well I hunkered down and got started anyway.
My initial prelim sketch, this is about 3 inches wide.
GI JOE COVER - 092
This sketch was approved and I started on the pencils. I quickly realized this was taking forever and I had to submit the unfinished pencils for approval if I was going to get it done in time.
I ended up finishing most of the line art for the cover in the inking stage going straight to inks for a lot of the background characters. I didn't have time to sketch out the details first. Luckily I really know these characters and vehicles and it wasn't that difficult.
We brought on Mark Roberts to color this cover for us, as well as the other associated homage covers. If you remember he colored up my Thundercats images for that themed week. After running through that gauntlet for me, I knew he was up for the task. This is his first IDW, GI JOE work!
Now before anyone FREAKS out, Scarlett does not die in this issue!! It is just an homage and she was an appropriate female to fit the pose. Please don't send me hate mail for killing Scarlett. I've already gotten emails about this. heh.
After the process, I still feel like I didn't add anything to the original. I mean seriously that cover is regarded as one of the best and most influential cover in comics. But I can see the appeal now. Seeing the characters from a property that the fans love, in such a classic composition and/or pose has a fun nostalgic feal.
In the end, it was a ton of work. But certainly worth the time and fun I had doing it!
Posted 5th October 2011 by Robert Atkins Art
Here is the second Crisis Homage out of the 3 I did. My previous post about the homage and the process can be found here:
1. SnakeEyes would be concerned if Helix died, but he wouldn't be showing the kind of agony that is portrayed in the other covers. Not that this directly reflects the interior events of the story, but still I think it would be a weird image to draw considering they aren't "That" close.
2. Snake Eyes has a mask on, and I wouldnt have been able to get the full effect of showing the expression anyway.
3. The GI Joe Cover was such a direct homage, I didn't feel it was so necessary to recreate it all over again. Plus SE wouldn't be surrounded by all the other Joes since he is on separate missions. I liked the idea that instead of a mourning cover, that SE Iceberg, and Alpine are about to be attacked. SE has to lay Helix down (in that classic homaged pose) and is turning to make their last stand.
So here are some process images and a final colors by Mark Roberts!
Something about the tilt of SE's head I liked better in the pencils.
Inking the rock in front was cool, and I flipped Helix's body pose to change it up.
I added a few more troopers before sending it on to Mark to color. You can see them up on the ledge.This cover just recently sold. For those interested in my cover art. I currently only have 1 cover left. It is the cover to Snake Eyes #8. If you're interested, email me at: Robert@RobertAtkinsArt.com
Update: SE cover to #8 is SOLD. I will be doing SE covers for 9-12 in the next few months. I will notify when those become available. They go quick, so if you are interested in a future SE cover let me know now and I can put you on an email list. Thanks!
Posted 17th October 2011 by Robert Atkins Art
I promise this is the last one, heh trust me by this time around I was getting pretty sick of this layout too.
So like these other GI Joe related homage covers:
Still, cool to draw all the IDW versions of the Cobra guys with this cover. I have only had the chance to draw a few of these while I've been on the main title or on Snake Eyes.
Layout sketches to get approved of the Snake Eyes and Cobra covers.
My pencils weren't as tight and I left the black areas to be filled in during the inking stage. That's what the "X" markings stand for.
Inks by Juan Castro (GI JOE, Snake Eyes) .
Colors again by the amazing Mark Roberts! He had to color this in a couple of hours for it to be on time!
Posted 22nd October 2011 by Robert Atkins Art
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