"Sponge Warfare" ("Dodgeball")
Old jokes don't die; they get recycled. At least that's the case with this picture where I have Erik in a gallant heroic pose, only to have his barn door wide open. I used it before in a sketch a few years back, even posted it briefly, but it was never anything I was proud of. So why did I use it on this one? To be frank, I have no idea other than I felt like adding that extra little detail. But you have to realize I did it before I even knew how this would turn out.
You see, there's always one piece in each year's gallery I try a different approach than normal. For months I had been studying the ways professional comic book colorists use Photoshop to do all their shading, so as an exercise I tried all the basic lessons I learned at that point with this. Sure, I still need to practice (I mean, can YOU nail down exactly where the light source is coming from because I sure can't) but compared to some of my other works, this isn't that bad. Actually, it's not really bad at all.
Who am I kidding; it blows. - Jake