Sneak Peek-- Apollo!

Just arrived home from lunch to find this nice surprise on my doorstep.

Luncheon on the Grass, Olympians style

I was pretty happy with this panel from the upcoming Apollo: The Brilliant God so I thought I'd share. If it looks familiar, its composition is based on the famous painting Le Déjeuner sur l'herbe, by Edouard Manet, who in turn lifted the composition from a drawing by Raphael (not the turtle).

OLYMPIANS POSTER! A complete walkthrough

The upcoming Olympians poster is as finished as it's gonna get. I thought you might like to see this step-by-step process of how it was made, from the finish all the way back to the sketch.

finished color

finished inks

pencils

sketch

A-Sketch-a-Day-Until-Hera #25

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 sometime in latish 2006.

Today's sketch is a near-complete assemblage of the gods. Unfortunately, as you can tell, I drew this across the spread of my sketchbook, so we have a big ol' crease running down the middle. From left to right we have Poseidon, Dionysos, Ares, Aphrodite, Hephaistos, Hera, Demeter, Apollo, Artemis, Hermes and Athena. At this point in time I was toying with the idea of Hestia not having a human form at all, but just being personified by a hearth (that's her in the middle). Eventually, I compromised and made her a humanoid figure composed of flame. Conspicuously absent is Big Daddy Zeus himself-- that's because this drawing is done from a Zeus eye view. We're viewing this family get-together from his seat at the table.

A-Sketch-a-Day-Until-Hera #12

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, oh. let's say September of 2006. I honestly don't remember right now.

Today's piece is a kinda groovy group shot of a bunch of the Olympians. It's kinda loose, but I think I can make out, from left to right: Demeter, Poseidon, Hera, Athena, Hephaistos, and I think that's Artemis and Apollo on the end. The figures up front would seem to be maybe the Muses. Kind of a neat little drawing, if I do say so myself, somewhat reminiscent of the illustration in the header of this very blog.

A-Sketch-a-Day-Until-Hera #4

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, and today's piece is from a sketchbook dated August 2006.

Today's piece is of the Divine Twins, Artemis and Apollo. Both of them are looking quite similar to their eventual appearances in the Olympians books, but it seems that since I drew this they've both visited the hairdresser. Artemis has two, count 'em, two moon pieces going on in her hair (the published version retains only the one in the back) whereas Apollo looks as if he actually lit his hair on fire. In keeping with the ancient Greeks' view of Apollo mainly as the god of the arts and a protector of young men, and not as the embodiment of the sun (a view that comes much later in antiquity) I've shifted that flaming 'do to Helios, the Titan who quite literally is the sun. I also dig the little bow on the front of Artemis's dress. What was I thinking with that?

The Divine Twins vs. The Wonder Twins

As I do from time to time, I share appropriate warm up sketches I draw with my friends here on the Olympians Rule blog. Today our topic was "twins", so I drew everyone's favorite twin deities, Apollo and Artemis, vs. the old cartoon superheroes the Wonder Twins.

Apollo and Artemis won.

Sketchbook Sneak Peek: Apollo and Artemis

This installment of the sketchbook sampler is a shot of those divine twin archers, Apollo and Artemis. So far in the series they haven't had that much to do, storywise-- unlike, say Hermes or Athena, they tend not to be "guest star" gods in other myths. A myth that features Apollo or Artemis in it tends to be all about Apollo or Artemis. Their own books aren't scheduled for a few installments down the line, so for now, they will tend to be background characters. I like to keep in shape drawing them, though, because when the time comes to tell their stories, oh man, you'd best believe they'll shine.