A-Sketch-a-Day-Until-Hera #66

Olympians Book 3, Hera: The Goddess and Her Glory is finally coming out July 19th. To commemorate this momentous occasion I will be posting a drawing from my enormous cache of sketchbooks every day until Hera hits the shelves. I'll be going through them chronologically, with today's piece coming from a sketchbook from February of 2007.

Now I know I've posted this drawing before-- I've posted this drawing all over town. That's because this drawing is one of my favorite drawings ever. I like this drawing so much I actually named it-- "Impetuous Zeus". This was the first time I ever really "got" the character, my version, of Zeus. So even though I've posted this other places before, when I came across this in my sketchbooks again I just had to post it chronologically with all my other sketches. So take that.

A-Sketch-a-Day-Until-Hera #65

Olympians Book 3, Hera: The Goddess and Her Glory is finally coming out July 19th. To commemorate this momentous occasion I will be posting a drawing from my enormous cache of sketchbooks every day until Hera hits the shelves. I'll be going through them chronologically, with today's piece coming from a sketchbook from February of 2007.

 I was skimming through my sketchbooks when I happened upon this drawing with some amusement. An evident early pass at a Gigante, with tongue planted firmly in cheek, it appears.

A-Sketch-a-Day-Until-Hera #64

Olympians Book 3, Hera: The Goddess and Her Glory is finally coming out July 19th. To commemorate this momentous occasion I will be posting a drawing from my enormous cache of sketchbooks every day until Hera hits the shelves. I'll be going through them chronologically, with today's piece coming from a sketchbook from February of 2007.

 

 

Today's sketch is Zeus getting all lightningey and stuff.

A-Sketch-a-Day-Until-Hera #63

Olympians Book 3, Hera: The Goddess and Her Glory is finally coming out July 19th. To commemorate this momentous occasion I will be posting a drawing from my enormous cache of sketchbooks every day until Hera hits the shelves. I'll be going through them chronologically, with today's piece coming from a sketchbook from February of 2007.

A double page spread from the sketchbooks today. showing a little bit of my creative process. I tend to draw a lot of these 'key scenes', and next to them I jot down pieces of connected text. Asa writer who also draws, this has proven to be the best method for me to work that I've discovered so far. When I've filled up about a million or so pages with this sort of thing, I pull it all together into a thumb-nailed book with a more or less completed script.

A-Sketch-a-Day-Until-Hera #62

Olympians Book 3, Hera: The Goddess and Her Glory is finally coming out July 19th. To commemorate this momentous occasion I will be posting a drawing from my enormous cache of sketchbooks each weekday until Hera hits the shelves. I'll be going through them chronologically, with today's piece coming from a sketchbook from February of 2007.

Today's sketch is a worm's eye view of a Titan. Well, given how tall Titans are, it might be a bird's eye-view as well. Suckers used mountains for their thrones they were so big.

A-Sketch-a-Day-Until-Hera #61

Olympians Book 3, Hera: The Goddess and Her Glory is finally coming out July 19th. To commemorate this momentous occasion I will be posting a drawing from my enormous cache of sketchbooks each weekday until Hera hits the shelves. I'll be going through them chronologically, with today's piece coming from a sketchbook from February of 2007.

Getting so close I can taste it! Today, a bunch of marker studies of Zeus as a young god.

A-Sketch-a-Day-Until-Hera #60

Olympians Book 3, Hera: The Goddess and Her Glory is finally coming out July 19th. To commemorate this momentous occasion I will be posting a drawing from my enormous cache of sketchbooks each weekday until Hera hits the shelves. I'll be going through them chronologically, with today's piece coming from a sketchbook from February of 2007.

Today's drawing is a sharpie sketch of Kampe, the dragon whom Zeus must defeat to gain entrance to the Underworld. I was obviously looking at some lizard reference for this drawing.  Also, as an added bonus, if you look carefully at the top of the drawing, you can see some pencil studies of Zeus's first wife Metis trying to turn into a bird-- this was from a scene that was cut from Zeus: King of the Gods, but was eventually inserted into Athena: Grey Eyed Goddess.

A-Sketch-a-Day-Until-Hera #59

Olympians Book 3, Hera: The Goddess and Her Glory is finally coming out July 19th. To commemorate this momentous occasion I will be posting a drawing from my enormous cache of sketchbooks each weekday until Hera hits the shelves. I'll be going through them chronologically, with today's piece coming from a sketchbook from February of 2007.

Yet more sharpie sketches, this time of a Titan and a Cyclops. It makes sense, looking back, that I would do so many high contrast marker sketches of these characters who spent so much of Zeus: King of the Gods cloaked in shadow.

A-Sketch-a-Day-Until-Hera #58

Olympians Book 3, Hera: The Goddess and Her Glory is finally coming out July 19th. To commemorate this momentous occasion I will be posting a drawing from my enormous cache of sketchbooks each weekday until Hera hits the shelves. I'll be going through them chronologically, with today's piece coming from a sketchbook from February of 2007.

Another sharpie drawing of a Titan. I've noticed people seem to like these sharpie sketches, and the particular sketchbook I'm going through presently is chock-full of markery goodness, so please enjoy.

A-Sketch-a-Day-Until-Hera #57

Olympians Book 3, Hera: The Goddess and Her Glory is finally coming out July 19th. To commemorate this momentous occasion I will be posting a drawing from my enormous cache of sketchbooks each weekday until Hera hits the shelves. I'll be going through them chronologically, with today's piece coming from a sketchbook from February of 2007.

Back to pencils today. A couple of studies of a Cyclops, and a shot of Zeus to boot. I really dig the bottom Cyclops-- looks like he's going "whatchu looking at?"

A-Sketch-a-Day-Until-Hera #56

Olympians Book 3, Hera: The Goddess and Her Glory is finally coming out July 19th. To commemorate this momentous occasion I will be posting a drawing from my enormous cache of sketchbooks each weekday until Hera hits the shelves. I'll be going through them chronologically, with today's piece coming from a sketchbook from February of 2007.

Yet another sharpie sketch, today being a shot of a Titan picking up a mountain he's planning to hurl at a pesky Olympian. I drew so many pictures of Titan's throwing mountains it's not even funny.

A-Sketch-a-Day-Until-Hera #55

Olympians Book 3, Hera: The Goddess and Her Glory is finally coming out July 19th. To commemorate this momentous occasion I will be posting a drawing from my enormous cache of sketchbooks each weekday until Hera hits the shelves. I'll be going through them chronologically, with today's piece coming from a sketchbook from January of 2007.

More sharpie goodness, this time a sketch of Zeus as a young god, looking out of the darkness of his cave into the light.

A-Sketch-a-Day-Until-Hera #54

Olympians Book 3, Hera: The Goddess and Her Glory is finally coming out July 19th. To commemorate this momentous occasion I will be posting a drawing from my enormous cache of sketchbooks each weekday until Hera hits the shelves. I'll be going through them chronologically, with today's piece coming from a sketchbook from February of 2007.

 More of me playing around with sharpies and pencil sketches, this time drawing the fall of Hera to earth after her regurgitation by Kronos. The reason why she's saying "room # 1402/03" as she falls has been lost to the rigors of time. I actually will do this a lot, write down some temporarily important piece of info in a word bubble coming from a  doodle's mouth (especially in this particular sketchbook, for some reason) and it often makes for a confusing/amusing read later.

A-Sketch-a-Day-Until-Hera #53

Olympians Book 3, Hera: The Goddess and Her Glory is finally coming out July 19th. To commemorate this momentous occasion I will be posting a drawing from my enormous cache of sketchbooks each weekday until Hera hits the shelves. I'll be going through them chronologically, with today's piece coming from a sketchbook from February of 2007.

Today's post is the first from a new (old) sketchbook, this one from February 2007. I noticed immediately upon opening this sketchbook again that it was drawn while I was in the thick of doing layouts for Zeus-- lots of lots of thumbnail layouts for pages. I also noticed that I had broken out the sharpie markers, as I do from time to time, to whip out some fun black and white compositions. Here's a study of a worried looking Kronos, as well as the omphalos, the stone that Zeus's mom Rhea fed to his father in his stead.

A-Sketch-a-Day-Until-Hera #52

Olympians Book 3, Hera: The Goddess and Her Glory is finally coming out July 19th. To commemorate this momentous occasion I will be posting a drawing from my enormous cache of sketchbooks each weekday until Hera hits the shelves. I'll be going through them chronologically, with today's piece coming from a sketchbook from January of 2007.

This very early sketch of Kronos made it into Zeus: King of the Gods almost without a change. It's one of my favorite pages of that book...

A-Sketch-a-Day-Until-Hera #51

Olympians Book 3, Hera: The Goddess and Her Glory is finally coming out July 19th. To commemorate this momentous occasion I will be posting a drawing from my enormous cache of sketchbooks each weekday until Hera hits the shelves. I'll be going through them chronologically, with today's piece coming from a sketchbook from January of 2007.

More early Titaney goodness--the second Titan I ever drew. I wish I nailed everything like this right out of the gate. So much less stress...

A-Sketch-a-Day-Until-Hera #50

Olympians Book 3, Hera: The Goddess and Her Glory is finally coming out July 19th. To commemorate this momentous occasion I will be posting a drawing from my enormous cache of sketchbooks each weekday until Hera hits the shelves. I'll be going through them chronologically, with today's piece coming from a sketchbook from January of 2007.

Some of my designs I've really had to work at; others arrived like a bolt out of the blue, fully realized and rendered. That was the case for my Titans-- all I knew was that I wanted something to evoke the beauty and grandeur of Greek Vase paintings, and this is what came out. With the exception of a one-off drawing or two of a human-looking Kronos (for my proto-Olympian project) the above piece is the first drawing I ever did of a Titan. Done!

A-Sketch-a-Day-Until-Hera #49

Olympians Book 3, Hera: The Goddess and Her Glory is finally coming out July 19th. To commemorate this momentous occasion I will be posting a drawing from my enormous cache of sketchbooks each weekday until Hera hits the shelves. I'll be going through them chronologically, with today's piece coming from a sketchbook from January of 2007.

Today's sketch is me starting to figure out how to depict certain scenes. This is a visualization of the time that the Goddess Athena spent living inside her father Zeus's head (notice his headachey pose). I ultimately went with a very different depiction of this scene in Athena: Grey Eyed Goddess, but I did like the dynamism of her pose here.

A-Sketch-a-Day-Until-Hera #48

Olympians Book 3, Hera: The Goddess and Her Glory is finally coming out July 19th. To commemorate this momentous occasion I will be posting a drawing from my enormous cache of sketchbooks each weekday until Hera hits the shelves. I'll be going through them chronologically, with today's piece coming from a sketchbook from January of 2007.

Whoops! Should've ran today's post last week when I was showing all the rejected portrait covers for Olympians. Here revealed is the original title for Zeus, which was dismissed by my editor with a "What does that even mean?" .  I have to admit that "Zeus: King of the Gods" is a much more gripping title.

A-Sketch-a-Day-Until-Hera #47

Olympians Book 3, Hera: The Goddess and Her Glory is finally coming out July 19th. To commemorate this momentous occasion I will be posting a drawing from my enormous cache of sketchbooks each weekday until Hera hits the shelves. I'll be going through them chronologically, with today's piece coming from a sketchbook from January of 2007.

I've often told people that my design for the Cyclopes is one that exists since my childhood, and that is true, but that doesn't mean that I didn't tweak the form here and there along the way. Here is a rather hulking hunchbacked specimen of Cyclops I played with for awhile.

A-Sketch-a-Day-Until-Hera #46

Olympians Book 3, Hera: The Goddess and Her Glory is finally coming out July 19th. To commemorate this momentous occasion I will be posting a drawing from my enormous cache of sketchbooks each weekday until Hera hits the shelves. I'll be going through them chronologically, with today's piece coming from a sketchbook from January of 2007.

Nothing much to say about today's sketch, except for that I think this shot of the God of War is pretty kick-butt.

A-Sketch-a-Day-Until-Hera #45

Olympians Book 3, Hera: The Goddess and Her Glory is finally coming out July 19th. To commemorate this momentous occasion I will be posting a drawing from my enormous cache of sketchbooks each weekday until Hera hits the shelves. I'll be going through them chronologically, with today's piece coming from a sketchbook from January of 2007.

Today's sketch is a melange of drawings of Pallas, the goat-like Gigante adversary of Athena in Athena: Grey Eyed Goddess. I included this mainly because I think giant goat monsters are cool beans.

A-Sketch-a-Day-Until-Hera #44

Olympians Book 3, Hera: The Goddess and Her Glory is finally coming out July 19th. To commemorate this momentous occasion I will be posting a drawing from my enormous cache of sketchbooks each weekday until Hera hits the shelves. I'll be going through them chronologically, with today's piece coming from a sketchbook from January of 2007.

Continuing from yesterday, here's a bunch more Hera cover ideas. I do love to draw me some Hera.

A-Sketch-a-Day-Until-Hera #43

Olympians Book 3, Hera: The Goddess and Her Glory is finally coming out July 19th. To commemorate this momentous occasion I will be posting a drawing from my enormous cache of sketchbooks each weekday until Hera hits the shelves. I'll be going through them chronologically, with today's piece coming from a sketchbook from January of 2007.

Continuing my theme from the past few days of self-rejected portrait covers from Olympians, here's a batch of Hera portraits. Looking at them now, I wish I had included those few loose curls in her final design.

A-Sketch-a-Day-Until-Hera #42

Olympians Book 3, Hera: The Goddess and Her Glory is finally coming out July 19th. To commemorate this momentous occasion I will be posting a drawing from my enormous cache of sketchbooks each weekday until Hera hits the shelves. I'll be going through them chronologically, with today's piece coming from a sketchbook from January of 2007.

Now I know you've been following my Olympians sketches every day with bated breath, right? Well, the last few days I've been showcasing the self-rejected portrait covers I initially conceived of for the series, as well you all know. Well, today's piece is what I thought of for the back cover of the Athena portrait from yesterday.