A-Sketch-a-Day-Until-Hera #74

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 April of 2007.

Today's drawing is not exactly the best thing I've ever drawn, but it was interesting for me, coming across this sketch and others like it. I had forgotten that there was ever a time when I contemplated Zeus growing to Titan-size for the final confrontation with his father. Glad I didn't go this route.

A-Sketch-a-Day-Until-Hera #70

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 April of 2007.

Well, I took a day off yesterday. IT WAS A FEDERAL HOLIDAY, SO SUE ME! I was actually busting my hump on a cool Greek Gods comic project that is not Olympians that you'll hopefully be seeing soon. But I digress. Here's a drawing of Hades and his dad.

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 #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 #17

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.

This was a very fun find for me. I had remembered it taking a very long time for me to find the look of my version of Hades, but I was evidently mistaken, as here was this doodle of the Lord of the Dead, looking very much like how he appears in Olympians, in one of my earliest sketchbooks of Olympians related material. Added bonus was Hades giving the heavy-metal devil sign, and an even addeder bonus was the drawing of a super-early design of Kronos the Titan (before I figured out to make him all enormous and shadowey). Fun stuff.

Sketchbook Sneak Peek: Zeus and Kronos, again

In anticipation of the release this week of Zeus: King of the Gods, here's another sketchbook sampler of the King himself locked in (im)mortal combat with his father, Kronos the All-Devouring.

Sketchbook Sneak Peek: Portrait of Zeus as a Young God

Seeing as how my last post was about Kronos, I figured that this one should be about his son, Zeus. The above is one of my favorite drawings of Zeus, the first one I did when I felt I really nailed his character. Eternally young, handsome, and powerful, but also a little brash, and a little dangerous. And with more than a little of his father in him. Zeus: King of the Gods goes on sale everywhere January 5th, an appropriate (if slightly late) date for the Baby New Year to Kronos' Father Time.

Happy New Year!

Happy New Year to everybody (those of you on the Julian calendar, at least)! Fun fact: Zeus's father, the Titan Kronos, is the origin of the familiar figure of Father Time. Think about it: big guy, flowing beard, carries a sickle-- they're the same guy! Every December in Ancient Rome, Kronos (under his Latin name, Saturn) was celebrated with a huge festival called the Saturnalia, wherein people exchanged gifts and made merry. Sound familiar? With his major festival coming so close to the end of the year, and as a god of time already, is it any wonder that Kronos became Father Time?

Hope you all have a wonderful and prosperous New Year!

Sketchbook Sneak Peek: Zeus and Kronos

Periodically I'll be cracking open the literally dozens of sketchbooks I've filled while working on Olympians and giving you a peek inside. This is a sketch I did of Zeus facing off against his father, the Titan Kronos.