Dr. Dinosaur Is Back
So what did happen after Robo opened that Igloo cooler full of hand grenades?
Find out this Wednesday, when Atomic Robo Vol.4 #3 drops!
I’m pretty psyched to see this issues drop. As many of you know, I hate drawing Dr. Dinosaur. It’s not because he’s not a great characters, it’s just that in general I feel like I do a crappy job of it. It’s kind of hard to explain. I think my fellow artists out there will understand though. You have this vision of how you want a thing to look. And then you have whatever skill you happen to have. These two concepts, what you want to draw and what you can draw, are like little Tron Lightcycles that can’t turn left or right, and just travel parallel to each other forever and ever, right over the horizon of your two-point perspective comic book panel.
What you might end up with is probably just fine. But because it’s not as good as you wanted it to be, it’s also a constant source of frustration.
This is also any automobile made before 1936.
Or airplanes.
Or evil (possibly) de-computers.
Or ancient South American ruins.
Or the NYC skyline.
Or anything that Brian might happen to put into a script.
He hears a lot of bitching and moaning. But at the end of the day, I really appreciate the challenges. Robo is a book that refuses to let you sit in your comfort zone and get stale. The only constant in Atomic Robo, is Atomic Robo. Everything else is fluid, and subject to change at a moment’s notice. And, I can look at what I drew last week and compare it to what I drew last year, and I can see huge improvements, as well as plenty of ways that I can keep improving. Which is both satisfying and annoying all at once. Ha!
I’ve often been envious of those artist who think that they are awesome. Who think that they are always bringing their A-game, and anyone who criticizes their work is a moron. But then I remember that usually these guys and gals are huge fucking douches who could use a few weeks at art school boot camp. The humiliation and physical punishment would do them good, and get them out of general circulation for a while, thus giving the rest of us a break from their brand of Awesome.
It’s not that I never like what I draw. I’m really proud of the covers to 4.2 and 4.3. I love the cover for the Vol.4 TPB, which I will share as soon as 4.4 drops. But even in these, what I see the most are the fuck ups and mistakes. And I think that’s probably a good thing.
Not that I think I suck, mind you. But I don’t think I’m that good either. I think I’m competent. I think my storytelling chops are better than a lot of people in the industry, and my art is firmly planted in the middle of the road -not awful, but not great either. I think I’ve got a pretty objective understanding of my own strengths and weaknesses.
When some d-bag of a blogger reviews our book and calls the art, “second tier work, at best. . .”, I want to tell them they are wrong, and they are stupid, and (probably) they are ugly in the face. But I’m no Paul Pope, or Adam Huges, or Bryan Hitch, and because of the age at which I got into this racket, and my total lack of schooling, and resources/time to get more education, I never will be. That dick who called me out on the Internet, and who probably can’t draw a fucking stick figure, is probably right. But it still sucks to hear that kind of thing. I think it was more his tone than his words that pissed me off.
Man . . .
Now I’m depressed. Why did I go there . . .? =(
Where the hell was i going with all this . . .?
Oh yeah, I remember now. I hate Dr. Dinosaur. I decided to play a little game with myself in 4.3. Because off all the stuff I said above I decided to hide as much of Dr. Dino as possible, in every single panel, as I thought I could get away with. There are one or two panels where a full body shot was required for emotional impact reasons, but for the most part I treated Dr. D. as though her were a cast member of the Muppet Show, where clever camera work was required to keep the muppeteers off screen, and to maintain the illusion that their characters were real and alive.
Don’t tell anyone I did that though.
