This Is Not News

Snakebite is the colorist/compositer/digital painter on Image Comics’ The Red Star, a title we’ve talked about once or twice on this site already. It’s his job to bring the computer models and Chris Gossett’s pencils together to create seamless images. (Check out some before-and-after shots from Snakebite’s portfolio.) Snakebite also teaches at The Animation Academy in California, working with artists looking to break into animation. He has strong views on art and its intersection with commerce, and isn’t afraid to share them in his own inimitable style with anyone who asks.

DT: What motivated you to get into coloring? What motivates you to keep doing it?

S: Linda Medley and Lynn Varley were my first two inspirations to color back in the late eighties. I feel the most comfortable when I’m coloring and when you’re a colorist you get to work on many different artists . . . it works well with my A.D.D.

DT: What are the skills you needed to learn to do the job well? How did you go about learning them?

S: Contrast and composition, in my opinion, are the two most important things when coloring. Knowing color theory is important as well, but everyone sees color differently. Like everything mileage is key.

DT: When you first start on a page, what are the first things that go through your mind? What are the initial creative choices you make to set the direction for the finished product?

S: Where’s the focal point and emotional message? These are the two most important questions I ask myself.

DT: What do you think comics readers should look for when they look at a page, in terms of coloring, in order to fully appreciate the work?

S: If they get the emotion and story telling, then I’ve done my job.

DT: What do you think differentiates ‘good’ from ‘bad’ coloring?

S: If it makes you physically sick . . . it’s bad, he he. Subjectivity fucks up any real chance to answer that question.

DT: What of your own works are you particularly happy with? What is it about those pieces that you like?

S: I like my latest work and since that hasn’t happened yet, I couldn’t tell you why, he he he. I’m constantly experimenting and my A.D.D. never lets me like my work for too long. I’m just happy and blessed that I have been able to live off my art for the last 9 years and that I’ve put myself in a position where I can grow as a human and artist.

DT: Can you take us through the process a little bit? What’s it take to get a page or an issue of The Red Star done?

S: I’m the last guy to touch everything minus dialogue, Mr. Starkings and crew [from Comicraft] handles such deeds. Although Goss has always included me in the rest of the process from layout to design, I receive the pencils and the 3D assets to composite in a shot, under the guidelines of Goss’ thumbnail layouts. Pages do not come to me like a typical comic page. Almost every element is its own asset (illustration scan or 3D model).

Once I acquire the 3D models and the pencil illustrations are scanned into my hard drive, Goss comes over to my home studio (MEAT PRODUCT, providing essential creative juices that are lacking in today’s boring corporate diets) for a “COMP” session, or “The Dance” as I like to call it.

It goes like this, each page has many different layers (in Photoshop). Each layer is an asset, a lot of the time (although we’re getting better) not to scale to one another. We move everything around, transform it to fit the layout of the original thumbnail. Although when actually collaborating with another you find other paths and the finished product sometimes finds a new conclusion . . . which is one of the many rewarding aspects of this particular project. It’s not about a dictatorship . . . it’s about creating and growing as artists and individuals.

When the “Dance” is completed the preparation work is far from done. I still have to clean up the pencils. When working with a medium like graphite you’ll always have clean up. A lot of the time smudges assist in the integration between the D’s. I then have to flat the illustration — ‘flatting’ is a process used by us point and click bitches to paint using Photoshop. It is ideal for editorial changes. The last few issues I have had the pleasure of a Flatter, Aaron “Strawberry” Horvath who is a student and instructor at The Animation Academy. This job is bone head work and his skills far surpass the task but it’s nice not to have to do it anymore, he he . . . and it’s nice to give out work to a brutha or sista.

From there the fun begins, I FINALLY GET TO PAINT!!! At this point there’s no one way, I approach it from many positions and try new angels all the time . . . I like to think of it as The Kama Sutra of Digital Painting . . .hmmmm, maybe I’ll write a book one day . . . Anyhoo, so I approach the page with fundamental questions always in mind. My teachers say “If you can find the right question, the right answer always follows.” . . . Or was that a dream? . . . Yoda? . . . In any case, it works. Of course education, experience and mileage really help one find the questions . . .

I approach the 2D and 3D the same way, as far as painting . . . just slap the color right on top, no fear. I’m not held back at all by Goss, he encourages me to go further, push it more . . . until the deadline gets closer, he he. People who have ego problems just couldn’t work with us. No sensitive artist types around this book, except for the crying and hugging — but that’s a different story, he he. It’s gotten to the point where I do all the texture mapping on the 3D as well. We have great 3D crews, John Moberly and more recently KGB (these bruthas are under cover), and they lay down some kick ass rendering and sometimes they push the textures but ultimately this book is printed turning it 2D, so there’s no point in bruthas doing extra work for nada. It takes less time, for our schedule, for me to do it in Photoshop then for us to wait for the rendering process . . . although it puts more on my plate . . . I have a healthy mental appetite so it works out. I like how Goss puts it, “You can’t argue with the end results.” He’s right, I haven’t been this satisfied with a project since I can remember and the extra work we put in, although my eyes could argue with me, is soon forgotten by our bodies and what’s left over lasts forever.

And that’s what art is about, The Red Star and The Animation Academy constantly challenge the roles of the artist in our world to be more than just T&A commercial whores (although a lot of those bruthas work real hard to draw spaceships and girls with great bodies and broken backs). We want to be apart of the movement of artists taking back the industry that affects so many people. The visual medium is a strong one when it comes to education and communication and we should feel responsible for what we put in the collective minds of our world. Don’t get me wrong, I like the occasional porno, it’s the balance, but come on there’s only so much porno a person needs (subjective I know). But let’s define success differently so that it means uplifting people and making them more aware so that they can ask the right questions and find the answers that work for them. This is what makes my artistic journey complete at the moment. I say “at the moment” not because I want to move on just because life has this way about it, so I enjoy what it gives me . . . at the moment . . .

DT: What do you need from your collaborators in order to do your job to the best of your ability? How well do you feel comics companies and creators have given colorists the support and respect they deserve?

S: The Red Star has been the only true collaboration that has been printed in the comic industry that I’ve had the pleasure of working on. I work with a lot of great artists at The Animation Academy and just in general, but this book has been my only gig to see print that is a true collaboration. I don’t get a script but Goss walks me through every page . . . with sound effects, he he. I pick up a lot of my color inspiration from the passion he shows in walking me through the story .

As far as the industry is concerned . . . as a whole (’cause I’ve met individuals who aren’t this way) it can eat a dick as far as its respect for colorists. For the most part it has been dependent on colorists. A lot of artists use colorists as a crutch. We can make or break a book. We are the last ones to touch it and for anyone that says “you can’t polish a turd” I would like to invite them to the “Shiney Shit” exhibits in our industry’s archive. Colorist are always saving the collective asses of the people that come before, i.e. editors, artists, inkers.

Ever hear of the “we’ll fix it in post” attitude? Well, in comics colorists are considered “post”.

I’m not saying colorists are key, but we’re damn close to it.

Colorists are artists and should be treated like one. Anywhere you see a penciller credit or inker, you should see a colorist. We should get paid the same amount as everyone else . . . in some cases more. If you go anywhere to get any service on a “rush” basis you pay more. Well . . . colorists are always getting rushed and our paychecks always seem to come late and light. With technology the way its going, colorists are pulling off color stunts at a caliber that pencilers just aren’t capable of doing. What makes comics these days cutting edge is us point and click bitches, without a doubt. Without colorists Image would not have been as big of a hit as it was in the early nineties. Without colorists everything would be black and white . . . I’m not bitter, I’m just aggressive and tell it like it is. I see a shift of the attitude. More artists are making themselves more savvy and therefore more compassionate to our position in the creating process . . . now if we could only get the editors to see the light of day.

DT: When you say that colorists often have to fix the errors of those that have gone before them, can you be more specific about what kind of errors colorists might have to correct?

S: Deadline is always screwed by the time it reaches us. Now I’m not a cry baby, deadlines are screwed all the time when dealing with artists on any level. The mere fact you associate yourself with a artist screws up your deadline right off the bat, he he he.

I won’t get into past artists’ attitudes I’ve experienced, but usually problems arise from lack of exposure to other aspects of production. Since colorists are digital we live in the myth that we can click away any problem with our Finish-dis-Shit button.

I like to point fingers on a individual basis, he he, so I’ll just say that color is just as if not more essential when conveying an emotion and/or story and should be looked at with that kind of respect.

DT: Following up on ‘colorists are artists too’ — do you think the creators’ rights movement in comics has overlooked colorists? What can be done about that?

S: Hells yeah. I tried to rally the troops on many an occassion but most of the time the troops don’t want to rally so I’m goin with Gandhi when i say I’m just gonna be the change I want in this industry. If theres something I don’t like goin on I’m just gonna step up to the plate and do my best not to be apart of what i don’t like and focus on the otherside of the spectrum….Keep creating!!!

DT: What type of stuff are you doing at the Animation Academy?

S: As of November 26, 2001, The Animation Academy in Burbank has been certified and its program approved by the Bureau For Private Postsecondary Education of the State of California. This is very exciting for us, we are now capable of offering transferable units for students who want to continue their training at other schools to gain degrees (although we have students from other prestigious schools coming to us, as well as from other countries). The state certification allows us to give out Certificates when the student completes our program. Next, on the list for the school, is to be able to offer associate degrees. Considering that the owner, Charles Zembillas, started in the back of a restaurant a few years ago this is quite a accomplishment..

The Animation Academy has two student-art-directed-by-instructors productions under our belt. The first was an original animated concept by Charles Zembillas, he did everything up to key frames and had his students do the in-betweening over the course of a few years. Recently he just had a handful of students finish the coloring on it and it competes across the board. Six minutes of solid animation.

The second production was a Flash short and we negotiated the deal ourselves with the investors. This is one of the points we try to convey in our classes, artists can make deals. Now with this production we were just manual labor. The designs, storyboards and script were completed previously and by a different artist. The school and the students did the production but we did pay the students close to industry standard (which most studios don’t even pay these days). How many schools can offer education, experience and good pay? Not many, it’s old school Frank Lloyd type of thinking but it’s a classic brain frame that I’m glad to be a part of reviving . . . We are all working on that being a regular thing.

The Animation Academy practices the fundamentals of art but we also practice the fundamentals of artists’ legal rights with classes like “Business Law for Artists” with Randall J. Kelley, Esq., an attorney with 20 years’ experience with copyrights and contract negotiations for major art publishers and studios. Randall is a personal friend of mine and I truly believe he offers precious insight for anyone that pursues art as a career. Although our main focus is on solid drawing, with instructors from just about every major animation studio in Burbank – Jose Lopez, Thomas Perkins, Gregg Davidson, Kristen Sych, John Nevarez, Richard Chavez, Alan Simmons and Stephen Silver – we still stress the importance of good business sense and sensibilities . . . after all this is a business . . . I can’t think of another school that offers Business Law class as part of their full time certified programs

We also have an offspring site called animationnation.com. It’s a message board with some of the most talented, knowledgeable people in the art industries, who are all willing to share their knowledge. I love them all, even the ones I can’t stand, he he. It’s a fun online place to learn and find out what the real deal is in the art industry….and not just animation, we have members from all walks of life and all over the world…our thousandth member just registered tonight and we have thousands more who just read

On a personal tip, I feel at home when I’m at The Animation Academy. There’s a brotherhood there, the knowledge passed through there lifts people up to the level they want to be at. Sure I’ve seen people filtered through the school to never return…but that’s the way of things. I can’t find the right words of appreciation to communicate where I’m coming from . . . I guess it’s all about walking a mile in a brutha’s shoes.

DT: What other projects are you working on?

The Red Star and The Animation Academy take a lot of my focus, but my A.D.D. keeps me desiring collaboration with others constantly. One thing I would say to the peeps just starting out is to keep yourself versatile but not stretched too thin. Finish what you start, the obvious cliche for a reason. Learn every aspect. Comics used to be the cheapest way to test a multi media property on a market, now it’s the internet. Sure the internet doesn’t make you any money, well neither does comics. They’re both two different ways to do the same thing, market yourself for potential future investors.

If you’re a creator, you ultimately have the power and if you’re willing to make the journey across the desert to reach your destination, your destination will be worth the long trip . . . or short, depending on life, he he.

But I can’t stress the power of the internet enough. With Dot-Com-Failures it could seem bleak, but those fuck heads approached the whole thing wrong and with too much money . . . kinda like what we saw happen in the mid-nineties in comics . . . BOOM!!! “Why my lip all busted up, and where’s my money?”. It’s all about solid content.

Paul Mounts is the colorist for Marvel’s The Ultimates, Black Bull’s Just a Pilgrim, Image Comics’ Tellos, and Vertigo’s SCI-Spy. (Check out two covers for Just a Pilgrim: Garden of Eden. He has been an artist in comics for over fifteen years, and currently heads up his own studio, Bongotone. ) His cover for The Ultimates 2 is the basis of this update’s cover image.

DT: What motivated you to get into coloring? What motivates you to keep doing it?

PM: After spending three years drawing and coloring storyboards and animatics for television commercials, I needed a change. I saw what the advertising world does to people — art directors at age 40 looking 65 and drinking at 9:30 in the morning-and was really bored spending entire days drawing dog food, cereal flakes, and deliriously happy people eating Big Macs. I’d always loved comics, and at that time there were a few publishers in here in Chicago (First, Now and Comico) that I could pencil, ink letter and color for. Then one day an old high school friend who was drawing for Marvel (Tom Morgan) was working on a series that they need higher-end coloring on, and showed the editor (Howard Mackie) some of my storyboard work. I helped Marvel get setup with a local service bureau to make the blue-lines form the original art (since at that point the only higher -end coloring that they had done was either on the original art or on greyline stats). After that series got published, I was suddenly known as a colorist, so that’s the work that kept coming my way. It’s paid my bills for quite a few years now, and when you’ve got a wife, kids and mortgage, that’s motivation.

Beyond that, however, I think that I can bring something to the books I work on that is unique, and that feels good. And I still pencil and ink sometimes — I’ll have a pinup in Just A Pilgrim: Garden of Eden #4.

DT: What are the skills you needed to learn to do the job well? How did you go about learning them?

PM: The time I did storyboards was boot camp. You can learn more in 6 weeks at a good studio than you can in 6 years of art school. You learn to concentrate on the basics, the storytelling. You learn how to lead the eye through a scene, and how to trick the viewer into seeing exactly what you want him to see. How lighting affects mood, and the importance of the basic contrasts: Light against dark (the most important!), warm against cool, saturated against unsaturated. When I was freelancing for Continuity Associates, Neal Adams once gave me an afternoon crash course in the importance of these three contrasts that’s stayed with me in all the years since. The important skills are in threes — the three contrasts, the three levels of importance when approaching a scene, and the three things you need to have/be to succeed. The skills are: 1) Tell the story (the most important); 2) set the mood (important, but subordinate if it obscures the storytelling); 3) render it up pretty (relatively unimportant, often unnecessary). You need at least two of the three things to succeed: 1) be on time; 2) be really good at what you do; 3) be a really nice/easy person to work with.

DT: Could you take us through the evolution of coloring a little bit from your perspective? How have the tools and the processes changed?

PM: When I started, fully-painted blueline color was just getting going (middle 1980’s). We went all digital in the fall of 1994, and it was perfect timing, as right when we got computers the blueline work started drying up overnight. Which was fine; after airbrushing Dr. Martin dyes and gouache for so many years, I was sneezing rainbow colors from inhaling all the fumes. (And, yes, I had a large industrial air cleaner/filter attached across the top of my drawing board, but that can only catch so much . . .)

We never used the vector-based coloring software that Steve Oliff developed; I’ve been Mac and Photoshop since day one. Viva le Mac! The operating system for those with superior taste and intellect. Death to the PC traitors!! (I’m kidding! No flames, please!).

DT: When you first start on a page, what are the first things that go through your mind? What are the initial creative choices you make to set the direction for the finished page?

PM: I guess I answered part of this in the last question. The first and most important thing-what’s the point of the cover/page? What’s the story it’s trying to tell? What was the penciller/inker trying to accomplish? And how can I amplify that? On the Ultimates 2 cover, it was, at its heart and for all its detail, a relatively simple scene showing the power and mood of Iron Man; basically, to create a sense of wonder in a superhero that’s been seen hundreds of times before in various incarnations. The background had to fall back, both to pop Iron Man forward and to create a sense of darkened-lab drama. The drama on the figure comes from the various lights playing off of the armor. (See a side by side comparison of the line-art and colored versions.)

DT: What do you think comics readers should look for when they look at a page, in terms of coloring, in order to fully appreciate the work?

PM: I like well-chosen simple color rather than overly rendered art that makes no sense and confuses the eye. I also appreciate a colorist that’s not scared of color. There’s a growing trend to use really grey, monochromatic schemes in an attempt to be “mature,” but if comes off as dismal if not handled correctly. The grey scenes have much more punch if contrasted with colorful scenes. Uninterrupted unsaturated colors are as harsh and diluting to the eye as uninterrupted bright color.

DT: What’s the work process like? What stages does the piece move through?

PM: We either get scans on disc or from an ftp site, or the original art is sent to us for scanning. My assistants resize and format the scans and lay in flat color. Then I take the pages and rework the palette and render them up.

DT: What’s your work environment like? How many books are you working on at a given time?

PM: Like any good artist, my studio is generally an ungodly mass of clutter, from toys, plots and comic reference to old coffee cups and food wrappers. (Because all the best food is wrapped for you sanitized consumptive pleasure!)

In the studio this week: SCI Spy 3, Just a Pilgrim: Garden of Eden 2, Ultimates 3, the cover for Ultimates 6, the cover for Just a Pilgrim 4, the covers for SCI Spy 5 and 6, X-Factor 1, a Dragon Tales children’s book, a Superman Playstation magazine cover, thirteen Superman Gameboy screens, a 10 page Rogue/Wolverine story for Unlimited X-Men, promo artwork for Garth Ennis, Amanda Conner and Jimmy Palmitotti’s Pro, the next Tellos book, and lettering on a pitch for a new comic by Todd Dezago and Craig Rousseau. Whew . . . lucky I only sleep about 4 hours a night! But I have two assistants, Ken Wolak and Jeff Engert, that keep things moving through the pipeline.

DT: That workload sounds insane. How do you keep it up? In an ideal world, would you do that many books at once?

PM: That sounds a bit ridiculous, I know. But they’re not all getting done start-to-finish in one week, obviously. Some jobs are coming in, some are going out, but it’s all in various stages of completion during this week. One of the tricks of the freelance life for any artist is juggling projects and budgeting time — just as valuable a skill as the artistic ability.

Admittedly, you caught us at a busy time. I really have been going round the clock lately and just not sleeping. If you go to the ComicColor web site, you’ll see that I’m not the only one. Scheduling can be tough, and everything can get backed up if even one penciller/inker is late with pages, or if something hits you unexpectedly (covers that need to be done immediately for solicitation, etc.).

In an ideal world, I’d be a reclusive billionaire.

DT: What do you need from your collaborators in order for you to do your job to the best of your ability?

PM: We all need to learn that sleep is for chumps.

I like to stay in contact with the pencillers on the books I color. I talk with Bryan Hitch regularly on Ultimates (even though he gives me an unbelievably free hand to do what I want). I also need the plot of the book I’m coloring. Which sounds really basic, but I’ve seen some colorists do entire runs on books without once looking at a plot.

I also need time. If I get the line art the day before a book goes to press, there’s no way I can do my best work. The letterers and the colorists are the end of the line, and any time lost by the writer, the penciller or the inker has to be made up by us.

DT: How well do you think the comics industry recognizes and fulfills those needs?

PM: It’s not always (never?) perfect, but I’ve had very good luck generally, working with artists and editors who really are trying their best. It’s very rare that I’ve run into someone who unabashedly abuses the system.

DT: How much time do you need to do your best work, from start to finish?

PM: Even after all these years, I have no idea how to answer this. Every project is different. It’s an artists’ maxim that if we have three weeks to do a job, it’ll take three weeks. If we’re told we have four days, we’ll do it in four days. The project will expand to fill the time allotted to it. That, combined with my rather anal-retentive and control-freak personality is probably why I’ll never be enough of an efficiency expert to run a big factory-type studio.

DT: What work by other colorists do you particularly enjoy?

PM: Well, obviously the others that you’ve interviewed here, plus Lee Loughridge, Guy Major, Richard Isanove, Matt Hollingsworth, Liquid. That’s off the top of my head; as soon as this is out of my hands I’m sure I’ll be kicking myself for forgetting about 10 others I should have mentioned. Also artists who color their own work, like Michael Golden and Dave Johnson, and Japanese and European artists like Yoshitaka Amano, Moebius, Bilal, and Daniel Torres. Also, movies (City of Lost Children, Citizen Kane and Double Indemnity (black and white, but the tonal storytelling –wow!) and any of the cinematography of Jack Cardiff) and comic strips (the Sundays of George Herriman and Bill Watterson), and most importantly, real life.

Brandon McKinney is the artist on two upcoming graphic novels from AiT/Planet Lar: the superhero Planet of the Capes (written by Larry Young) and the SF Switchblade Honey (written by Warren Ellis). He has adapted Star Wars Episode II: Attack of the Clones into a big-little book for Chronicle, and a coloring book (Heroes and Villains) for Random House. The Star Wars works will be out in May; the graphic novels are scheduled to come out this year. Both of the GNs are black and white, which might raise the question of what he’s doing in a feature on colorists. McKinney essentially ‘colors’ his own pencil work in Photoshop, using graytones instead of a full color palette. The result is much more textured than black and white art typically is. (Check out page 3 of Planet of the Capes.)

DT: What’s your training and background?

BM: I’m mostly self-taught, but I received a B.A. in Fine Art at UCLA. I was also fortunate enough to apprentice under Gil Kane and Steve Rude while I was down there. I learned a lot from both of them.

DT: How did you get involved with comics?

BM: Ever since reading them as a kid, I knew I wanted to draw them. My first job was in high school with SilverWolf Comics in Sacramento. Didn’t get paid much but got a taste of the business. In college, my buddy Darick Robertson hooked me up with Innovation Comics to do some Child’s Play comics. That led to my meeting Andy Mangels, a writer who got me involved with Elfquest and Lucasfilm. Darick also introduced me to Larry Young who I’m working with now on Planet of the Capes.

DT: How would you describe your art?

BM: I’ve heard my art descibed as “traditional”, in the sense that I didn’t jump on the Jim Lee bandwagon or do Manga-style faces. No disrespect to either of those influences, but they weren’t me. I grew up on Ross Andru and Gil Kane’s Spider-Man, John Byrne’s Fantastic Four and George Perez’s Teen Titans. Those are what stuck with me. I just try to draw in a dynamic straight forward sense that suits the story.

DT: How and why did you develop the techniques that you use?

BM: The black & white tones I’m using for Planet of the Capes came as a result of knowing the book would be in black & white and I wanted to get as much out of the art as possible. I’d started doing it for an Elfquest project, since I knew that would be in black & white as well, and I liked how it was going. I figured I’d use the same process I’d started on EQ with Larry’s book. It’s easier that doing full color since I just have to make value judgements (which areas should be shaded darker or lighter) and my color sense is still in its early development.

DT: What advantages and disadvantages do you think B&W art has over color art? How do you attempt to maximize the advantages and/or minimize the disadvantages?

BM: I think the B&W art has advantages in that it can be easier to read. Bad color can distract from the artwork and thus the story. I don’t think I could do a color book as well as I could a B&W book right now, until I gain more experience. But a well colored book can be mind blowing. I think the stuff that Laura DePuy, Moose Bauman and Paul Mounts produce is gorgeous — they really know how to set a mood with their color choices and themes. In attempting to maximize the advantages and/or minimize the disadvantages, I just try to apply the same principle of using more or less shading to create a mood or an atmosphere. I may not be able to show the reader the difference in the characters’ costumes, but hopefully the book will look better than if it were just B&W line art.

DT: When you say you ‘wanted to get the most out of the art’ in black and white, what exactly do you mean? Does using the graytones offer up any new storytelling tools that might be harder to use with line art? Or does it come down to the mood and atmosphere you mention?

BM: Most black & white comics are printed just that way: Black & white. Doing the gray tones allows a broader palette to work with. I admire the great artists who can use black & white effectively: Alex Toth, Steve Rude, Dave Lapham and Dave Sim to name a few off the top of my head. They know you to make the art interesting without any color or greys at all (well, Steve Rude used zip-a-tone, so he should get credit for cutting all that stuff out!) I find the tones just make my art look better than if it were just black & white. I can make things darker for scenes that take place at night, less if it’s a day scene. It does help the atmosphere.

DT: Does knowing that you’re going to tone the art yourself affect the way you do the line art itself? If so, how?

BM: It definitely does. For example, I won’t ink in a night sky because I know I’ll fill it in with a dark grey. I’ll do less shading on faces and skin, less texture on rocks, streets, metal, etc. because I know I can make it look better when I work on the pages in Photoshop.

DT: When you do line art and then give it to someone else to do full color on it, what kind of communication goes on between the penciller and the colorist? In an ideal world, how would the penciller, inker and colorist interact?

BM: When I did just pencil art, I would (and I know other pencillers do this) make notes in the margins to the colorist about if I’d want something a certain color, or if I wanted a certain line or set of lines to be changed to another color. In an ideal world, either the three artists (penciller, inker & colorist) are in phone contact, work in the same office, or they are the same person. I know there are times when I’ve picked up a finished issue of a book I worked on and been pretty disappointed by how the colorist finished the work. I’ve been pleasantly surprised in some cases, but that isn’t as common as the opposite reaction. I really like that I get to finish my own work. It stands or falls on its own merits.

DT: Could you perhaps describe in some detail how you go about creating the tones? What tools do you use, and when you’re looking at the page, what kinds of things are you thinking about?

BM: I’ll answer this assuming that the reader has a basic knowledge of Photoshop (which is all I really have anyway!). I basically use the Paintbrush, Pencil, Airbrush and Fill/Paint Bucket tools to do the basics. When I discovered how to use the Lasso and the Magic Wand tools, that opened up a world of possibilities in the art. You can get a variety of great effects by selecting an area and using the Gradient tool to create a blend of dark to light (or light to dark) tones that can help show a light source very well.

If I find I’ve toned a figure or panel and it isn’t dark enough, I can create a new layer, set it to Multiply and go over the art with a light Paintbrush to push the tones darker. I also like using the Motion Blur effect to create the illusion of movement. It gives panels a very cinematic appeal (see the bottom panel on page 5).

When I do the tones, I’m mostly thinking about light sources. I know painters do this more than line artists. I want to pick where the light source(s) are coming from and emphasize those. I also want to think about emphasizing or de-emphasizing foreground objects from background ones. I can do this by coloring one darker than another, or blurring one and keeping the other sharp. With line art, an artist usually puts a thicker outline around a foreground object and/or adds more spot blacks to it. It’s basically all about choosing where you want the readers’ eyes to go in the panel or the page.

DT: Any final thoughts?

BM: I hope people respond well to Planet of the Capes despite its lack of color. Larry Young and I hope that it has the same appeal as film noir — that the readers can use their imaginations to fill in the color if they so choose. I really enjoy the look of it and I hope it provides an alternative to the mainstream super-hero comics that are out there.

Laura DePuy is the colorist for CrossGen’s Ruse as well as the art director for Sequential Tart, an outstanding webzine that focuses on comics, including but not limited to the role of women as creators and characters. She has been a staff member at Wildstorm FX and a freelance colorist, working on books like Planetary, Authority, and JLA. Warren Ellis made a point of requesting her in his initial Planetary proposal, and I’m glad he did — her work makes that excellent book shine. Now, along with writer Mark Waid, penciller Butch Guice and inker Mike Perkins, she’s bringing the Victorian-esque world of Arcadia to life in Ruse, a highly entertaining mystery series. (Check out the cover to issue 2.)

DT: What motivated you to get into coloring? What motivates you to keep doing it?

LD: I was in my junior year at college, and as a graphic design major, I was looking at a possible career in advertising, print layout pre-press and/or presswork. Not a bad gig, if you can get it. But deep down inside, I really wanted to pursue something more artsy. Getting into comic books hadn’t even occurred to me, until a friend said, “Hey, you know . . . you could do comic books!” And suddenly, a light bulb went off . . . the world of illustration and digital painting opened up to me.

In some ways, the fine art aspect is what drives me. Digital painting gives me more of a creative outlet than graphic design. Painting is a chore in humility: the more you do it, the less you realize you know, and the more you strive to understand. The same goes for digital painting. I learn something new every day, and it’s never enough.

DT: What are the skills you needed to learn to do the job well? How did you go about learning them?

LD: Someone wishing to become a colorist really should start off with an inherent talent toward art. With that raw talent in place, anything else can be taught and honed with art classes, self-study, and plenty of practice. The first and foremost skill is the ability to visually interpret objects in space: a colorist must be able to create form and depth from a two-dimensional image. A good understanding of color theory is also necessary. And finally, a colorist should have some understanding of the pencilling and inking process, as he or she is not the sole artist on a project and therefore must be able to communicate with his or her penciller and inker to achieve the correct impact. Again, however, these skills can all be taught.

DT: When you first start on a page, what are the first things that go through your mind? What are the initial creative choices you make to set the direction for the finished product?

LD: The first thing I do is consult the script and/or the penciller. I’ll get the basics down: Who are these characters? What happened on the page before? What time of day is it, and where are the light sources? And perhaps the most important question: What mood and impact do I need to convey in this page? I might also seek out reference material if there’s something I’m unfamiliar with. Once I’ve got those pieces of information, I’ll approach the page very simplistically, blocking in the basic colors and establishing a color scheme for the scene. From there, it’s all in the details.

DT: What do you think comics readers should look for when they look at a page, in terms of coloring, in order to fully appreciate the work?

LD: What a great question! There’s so much to be appreciated. First and foremost, I’d like readers to appreciate the time and effort involved. I can’t tell you how often I’ve heard the phrase, “I don’t really pay attention to the coloring.” Ack! That’s like saying, “I don’t pay attention to the spices in the chili. I’m just there for the beans.” How can you NOT pay attention to the color!

Beyond that obvious request, though, I’d like to think that readers can appreciate when the coloring marries the art to the story, and describes the scene properly. Not everything is seen in “local” (natural) color. For instance, a sunset will tinge the whole world in oranges and pinks. A heavily overcast day will pull color out of the environment, leaving it gray and dull, whereas a bright sunny day will saturate the world with color. Colors aren’t “local” when viewed at night or in shadow. That’s the kind of sensitivity to scene lighting that I look for as a reader, and while I certainly don’t expect everyone to have as critical an eye as I have, I’d like to think that the everyday non-art-trained reader can appreciate the differences from one scene to another.

DT: What do you think differentiates ‘good’ from ‘bad’ coloring?

LD: See above. 🙂 All kidding aside, there are two things that separate a good colorist from the pack: one, the ability to create a mood, and two, the ability to define light sources and volume, to create depth and shadow where there was none. The first is based on color theory; the second, on visual interpretation of the black and white artwork. Beyond that is simply a difference in skill levels.

DT: What of your own works are you particularly happy with? What is it about those pieces that you like?

LD: The toughest ones are always the montage images, because there is no background, so there’s no point of reference with which to establish a space/volume relationship between the characters. I have a harder time getting those to “read” right, so when I have a successful piece, I’m quite thrilled. The covers to Stormwatch: Final Orbit and The Authority: Relentless were two of my favorites, as was the cover for JLA: Heaven’s Ladder.

Sometimes it’s a single element that makes the whole piece work. Miranda’s upper back on the cover of Ruse #2 sells that entire piece.

The fun ones are when there’s a very distinct, very harsh light source that obliterates all natural colors. The Authority #7 was a great example of that: one scene is lit entirely in yellows and greens, while the next is harsh reds and blues. It’s jarring, but it was a real lesson in dynamic lighting. That’s probably my favorite example.

DT: What do you need from your collaborators in order to do your job to the best of your ability? How well do you feel comics companies and creators have given colorists the support and respect they deserve?

LD: The best thing that I can ask for is feedback. I want the comic book to be a collaborative effort, where the penciller and inker both have an idea of what I can do in order to help them set up the page initially. Once the page is done, I like hearing back on it; I always learn something new about the penciller’s approach and thought patterns, so that I can incorporate that into the next page. If my interpretation of a scene is completely different from what they had in mind, I want to know.

Support and respect have been uphill battles — no doubt about that. But we’re gaining ground, thanks to some of the newer publishers accepting computer colorists as part of the creative staff. Prior to the advent of Photoshop, coloring was part of the production process. In some companies, that’s still how they’re interpreted. But as colorists improve their approach to both the comic and Photoshop, and creators recognize the difference between styles and colorists, and publishers realize the worth of a good colorist, our position in the comics industry improves.

DT: What impact has the CrossGen working environment had on your work? (Most CrossGen artists and writers work at the company’s Tampa studio, and extra time for artists is built into the production schedule.)

LD: I’d say the impact has been pretty noticeable. I’ve had the luxury of working very closely with other teams (Authority’s Warren Ellis/Bryan Hitch/Paul Neary and Planetary’s Ellis/John Cassaday), whom I got along with famously; but we never physically worked in the same area. Also, we fought the age-old deadline problem: for whatever reason, I would receive the script or the art late, which meant that I would have to work like crazy to meet the deadline. I was proud of the work I did, but I can only sit back and wonder how much better it would have been had I taken more time on each page.

At CrossGen, the proper amount of time was built into our schedules from day one. While I wouldn’t call our pace “leisurely,” as we (Butch, Mike, and I) work hard on every page, I’d say the schedule is much less hectic, leaving us to concentrate on doing the best work of our careers. I know it’s working for me. On top of that, the creative environment at CrossGen allows us all to experiment, to push our skills to the next level. It’s become a friendly, healthy competition among the creative staff; we’re all constantly trying to outdo each other. It’s a beautiful thing.

DT: What work by other colorists do you particularly enjoy? What appeals to you about those artists and those works?

LD: Oh wow, that’s a huge question. I feel bad naming names, because every colorist is an influence on me in some way, and I don’t want to leave anyone out.

Naturally, the CrossGen guys are great. They’re among the best in the field. And I’m not saying that because I work with them — I’ve had my eyes on these guys since they started publishing. They’re constantly experimenting with new media and styles; that’s what is really exciting about their work. I have to fight just to keep up with them!

Richard Isanove (Origins) continues to flabbergast me with his ever-changing approaches. He’s always five steps ahead of everyone. I’ve been pleasantly surprised with the work from the Hi-Fi guys (New X-Men) — they’ve really stepped up to the plate and are making the Marvel books look good. I don’t know how the coloring process goes, whether it’s digital or hand-done, but Ladronn’s work (Inhumans) just blows me away. Jeromy Cox (Promethea) has the most pure palette of anyone I know. And he does pretty clouds. And then there’s Snakebite (The Red Star), who is the only colorist so far who (in my opinion) can convincingly blend 2-D coloring with 3-D rendering.

There’s a whole slew of colorists whose work affects me: Chris Ware, Brian Haberlin, Lynn Varley’s work on 300, the European painters for Metabarons and Raptors, and on and on. I really can’t name them all, and I know I’m forgetting someone major, so I’ll just stop here and say that there are far more than I can possibly name in one sitting.

If you look at any comics sales chart, one thing you’ll notice is that color titles far outnumber those in black and white. This is far from an earth-shattering observation, as the same holds true of movies and television. In most cases, though, movies and TV shows are filmed in color in the first place, and when someone tries to transform a black and white film into a color one . . . well, purists get kind of nervous. Most comics start out as black-and-white pencil-and-ink, so someone has to put the color in. That someone is a colorist, an artist whose contribution to the comic is often overlooked, even as the artform of coloring itself has grown tremendously over the last decade.

Up until the late 80s and early 90s, most of the most popular color titles were printed on inexpensive newsprint, so they had the quality and durability you would expect from your local paper — namely, not too much. Inks got smeared, pages were flimsy, and sometimes the things were darn near illegible. This inevitably affected the quality of comic book color. Comics (and most other publications) are printed in a four-color process, in which four dyes are mixed together to produce all the color that you see. This is often referred to as CMYK printing, for the four dyes in question: cyan, magenta, yellow, and black; a printed page actually goes through four presses, one for each color. (If you’ve ever seen a newspaper with a color photo that looks like one of those old 3-D movies, with a ‘halo’ of one color or another, it’s because the page wasn’t lined up perfectly as it went through one of the presses.) Each pass puts a series of dots on the page, which hopefully blend together to create the variety of colors we perceive. The smaller the dots, the better the blending. In the case of those old newsprint comics, the dots were often quite noticeable, and because the paper couldn’t hold much ink, the color was often faded.

Furthermore, the colorist could never be sure that his or her work would be exactly reproduced. The colorist might use paints or markers to color a black and white copy of the line art, but that colored page would then be broken down into a set of instructions for each of the four presses by a separator. These instructions could not be very complex — the printer could fill all of a given area with a particular color, fill half of it with the color, or fill a quarter of it. Colorists and separators only had a total of 64 combinations available, so subtle gradations in tone were impossible. (In contrast, my computer monitor can display millions of different colors, and even the stripped down ‘web-safe’ palette in my web design software includes 256.) Even when comics publishers used a higher quality paper to achieve brighter, more vibrant color, they were still limited to those 64 colors. Comics color, therefore, was very flat.

Today, better paper quality and advances in scanning and reproduction mean that the colorist’s work can be transferred directly to the printing presses. Separators are not confined to the 64 combinations anymore, and those colorists who work digitally can actually prepare their own separations, ensuring greater fidelity to the colorist’s vision. Pages can hold more ink, so colors can be deeper, more saturated, and more vibrant. The flat colors that used to be the end product are now only the beginning, as colorists can enhance the artwork with highlights, shadows, subtle gradations in tones, and special effects such as lens flares. In fact, some colorists employ assistants or subcontractors called flatters to handle the initial stages of the process. (Check out this side-by-side comparison of comic colors from different periods to see the difference.)

To fully realize the potential of this technology requires a highly talented artist, whether the colorist uses ‘traditional’ paints or does the work digitally through Photoshop as many of today’s colorists do. Either way, the colorist must be keenly aware of how light interacts with the world to create our color perceptions, and translate that awareness onto the page in a way that preserves (or enhances) the visual information needed to develop the narrative while also connecting to the reader on an emotional level.

“Bad color can distract from the artwork and thus the story,” says Brandon McKinney, a penciller who uses Photoshop to add gray tones to his line art, in essence ‘coloring’ the book in black and white. (The effect can be seen in the upcoming AiT/Planet Lar graphic novels Planet of the Capes and Switchblade Honey.) “But a well colored book can be mind blowing. I think the stuff that Laura DePuy, Moose Bauman and Paul Mounts produce is gorgeous — they really know how to set a mood with their color choices and themes.”

There’s more to the color theory that colorists must grasp than I could ever hope to describe, but there are three key factors, or colormaking attributes, that must be considered. (Check out handprint, an excellent resource, for more info on color theory.) Hue is what we would call the actual basic color itself. Value is the amount of light reflected or sent to the eye by a colored object — the lightness or darkness of the color. Finally, saturation is the intensity of the color — how deep or pure we believe it to be. The artist must know how to balance these variables to create the proper effects.

“There are two things that separate a good colorist from the pack,” says Laura DePuy, colorist of CrossGen’s Ruse. “One, the ability to create a mood, and two, the ability to define light sources and volume, to create depth and shadow where there was none. The first is based on color theory; the second, on visual interpretation of the black and white artwork.”

While colorists’ achievements are impressive, the comics industry itself has not been so quick to recognize the talents and contribution of these artists. If you look at the cover of most comics today, the writer, penciller and inker are usually credited, but not the colorist (or the letterer, for that matter, but that’s a topic for another time). There are exceptions — Warren Ellis makes a point where possible to credit the colorist on his books, and CrossGen Comics credits the colorist on all its titles. But they are few and far between.

This might seem like a trivial issue, but it’s one that fundamentally shapes the way people look at comics. I admit, until I kept seeing Laura DePuy’s name on the cover of Planetary, or Caesar Rodriguez’s on Sojourn, I tended to think of colorists as an afterthought — a necessary part of the production, and capable of doing some fine work, but not really a ‘creator’ in the same way as the penciller. Looking back, I realize that’s ridiculous. Just look at this month’s cover image. As great as Bryan Hitch’s pencils are, Paul Mounts’ colors are essential to the impact of that picture. (See a side by side comparison of the two pieces.)

Unfortunately, I’m not the only person to come to such ridiculous conclusions.

“I can’t tell you how often I’ve heard the phrase, ‘I don’t really pay attention to the coloring,'” says DePuy. “Ack! That’s like saying, ‘I don’t pay attention to the spices in the chili. I’m just there for the beans.’ How can you NOT pay attention to the color!”

It’s not merely a question of credit or recognition, important as those things are. The nature of comics today is such that many artists are freelancers, working far apart and sending pages around through FedEx or swapping digital files. The vision of pencillers, inkers and colorists don’t often get the chance to fully mesh, which can lead to communication breakdowns and other problems. As the last people to touch the art, colorists are often expected to make up lost time or clean up any lingering mistakes. (The message board at Comic Colors — another nice website with tutorials and other coloring info — is full of the late-night posts of colorists trying to stay coherent long enough to meet a deadline.)

“Ever hear of the ‘we’ll fix it in post’ attitude?” asks Red Star colorist Snakebite. “Well, in comics colorists are considered ‘post.’ I’m not saying colorists are key, but we’re damn close to it. Colorists are artists and should be treated like one. Anywhere you see a penciller credit or inker, you should see a colorist.”

“Without colorists everything would be black and white . . . I’m not bitter, I’m just aggressive and tell it like it is. I see a shift of the attitude. More artists are making themselves more savvy and therefore more compassionate to our position in the creating process . . . now if we could only get the editors to see the light of day.”

For more in-depth conversations with the colorists quoted in this article, and samples of their work, check out the full Q-and-As.

Laura DePuy
Brandon McKinney
Paul Mounts
Snakebite