Hulk Smash! Last Chance!

I've already mentioned The Hero Initiative and their Ultimate 100 Hulk #1 Cover Project. My first cover raised over $700.00 for a great charity. But that is nothing compared to these two! The legendary John Romita Jr. donated two killer sketches which I was asked to embellish and color. What an honor, I grew up on John's stuff, I never thought I'd get to touch his original art! The first one below sold for over $1,000.00! The one above is being auctioned off now and ends soon! Please bid here if you can!

The First Five

Whew, that was fast! The Marvel Masterpiece Artist Proof cards sold out in less than two days! If you still want a sketch card commission, you can get on the list for the Series 2 Artist Proof cards which I should be getting soon from Upper Deck. I can also do plain old sketch cards as well if you want one of those. Email me for details at aaronsowd@mac.com. The Marvel Masterpiece Artist Proof cards are very limited, they only give 10 to each artist. Here's the first five of my commissions:

Thor for Thorsten in Germany!A recreation of Uncanny X-Men #141 for Kevin in California. I grew up on Byrne/Austin X-Men, so this was fun. Hard to fit all that detail on a tiny card, though!
A double shot of Wolverin and the Hulk for Billy who is stationed in Iraq. Hope you like them. Come home safe and sound and soon!
And a recreation of my recreation of Hulk #1 by Jack "King" Kirby for Paul in Maine. That's a lot of recreational recreation. OK, I'll shut up and get back to drawing now...

Hulk Cover/Kirby Tribute

The Hero Initiative is putting together The Ultimate 100 Hulk #1 Cover Project. They picked 100 of the best comic book artists like Neal Adams, Jim Lee, Todd McFarlene, Dale Keown, Jae Lee, Bill Morrison, Joe Benitez, George Tuska, Bob McLeod, Sean Phillips and many more (yeah, I don't know how I got on that list, either!). Each artist did an original, one of a kind sketch in pencil, ink and marker (or some variation thereof!) on a blank variant sketch cover of Hulk #1. I think only 100 variant covers were printed especially for The Hero Initiative. A rare collectible if you can get one! They will be actioning them off a few at a time at comic conventions and on ebay. I'll try to post a link when mine goes up for auction. Please bid if you can, it's for a great cause! You can see a bunch of them on Marvel's site.

The Hero Initiative (Formerly known as A.C.T.O.R., A Commitment To Our Roots) has had the good fortune to grant over $200,000 to the comic book veterans who have paved the way for those in the industry today. They are a not-for-profit corporation dedicated to helping comic book creators in need of emergency medical aid, financial support for essentials of life, and an avenue back into paying work. It's a chance for all of us to give back something to the people who have given us so much enjoyment.

I decided to go old school with my sketch, I love the original gray Jack Kirby Hulk most of all. He was huge and more of a creepy Frankenstein's monster than a straight-up super hero. I went back and looked at Kirby's original cover and decided a homage to The King was in order!

Thanks to Jim McLauchlin for getting me involved! It was a blast!

Happy Hulking New Year!

Happy New Year! Hope you're having a great 2008!

Sketch cards are all the rage with the kids these days! They're more popular than POGs! Hmmm... wait, POGs were never popular. But you get the point, sketch cards are big. Fun to do, too! Unlike a full sized commission which can get put on the back burner and then back up for months and become daunting simply because of the time involved, you can crank out a little sketch card in an hour or so. I try to put a little more work into them then a con sketch. These were for collector Mike D who has a cool gallery you can see here.

Sometimes they turn out pretty cool. The main thing I have to do is loosen up on my inking! Having been an inker for so long, I immediately gointo inking mode with a pen and try to make lots of pretty lines! I need to knock that off! Sketchy and loose is the way to go! That's my #1 New Year's resolution for 2008: forget everything I know about inking so I can draw better! Resolution #2 is to actually draw better! What's your New Year's resolution for 2008?

Hulk Sketch Card

Abomination and Leader Sketch Card