Cover Redo

Since starting the comic back in 2018 my style has been changing a bit so I thought it would be fun to redo the cover to issue # 1 in the new style.  Here is the redo and below is the original.

Been A While

I know there's been almost no content coming from me the last few months, but things are looking up! 

Back in May my brother and I were in a car accident, not our fault, that totaled our car and we both got injured.  The injuries healed, but the problems it caused has taken me a while to move on from.  Back in July I was able to get the annual out, but that was because most of it was done and I just had to force myself to finish a few panels and then I needed to focus on other things.  

During my time away I've had some time to think a lot about the comic and I've been practicing with some new artistic styles.  I've put a few samples up and I'll include one here: 

I'm attempting to bring more depth and realism to the comic, yes it will probably slow me down as I get more comfortable with this style, but I think the end result will be worth it. 

By the way, this is a sample panel from the next issue which I'm hoping to get out by the end of November if all goes well.  

It will be Ultra-Origins # 2 which will feature the origin of the villain Coil.  

As you may have noticed, I'm striving for more of an "Alex Ross feel" to the book.  Of course, I'm not him and I can't match his style, but I think it has a certain depth to it that was clearly lacking in my current art.

I've always said about comics, "good art can carry a bad story, but bad art can't carry a good story" and I think that was the case with me.  With every issue I see where the art hasn't been good enough for myself and I've lacked consistency in making the faces appear the same - hopefully I can get better at that too!  Time will tell!  Like anything, I'm still working on perfecting my 'look' and hopefully it will be worth the wait as I plan to do all issues like this.

I've also decided on changing the size ratio of my issues.  When I started the comic it was originally geared to be on YouTube (and it still is), but most of my followers are on Instagram and I've struggled with the fact that when I put the issue on Instagram it make the text very hard to read as it's condensing it down to fit; so I've decided to change the ratio to optimize it for Instagram, and yes - it will still be on YouTube as well, but they'll just have more of a border on the sides than before.

I've also started to take some classes on doing 3-D art, but I'm nowhere near ready to show that off yet - but it will be coming next year!

By the way, with Coil, he was one of the original villains I created for the team and he's looked pretty much the same since I first drew him:

Here's the first time I drew him back in the summer between 5th and 6th grade!  At the time I called him Coil Man, but later dropped the man.  

To be totally honest I never created an origin story for him, he was just there!  I decided it was time to create one and the origin story that you will read in the next issue actually only came to me earlier this year!  

I've also decided to change his design as it used to be all right to draw him from time to time, but now that he appears regularly, it's really a pain to draw the coils each time.  I haven't figured out what his final form will be yet, but like my art style, his development is also a work in progress! 

More updates coming soon!  

Art Style

 

Here is a portrait of Crossbow that I did in a different kind of art style.  I was modeling the style off of Alex Ross' very distinctive comic art.  

When I was an art major in high school, I focused a lot on portraits and usually I can do them better than whole body drawings.  I've also struggled a lot with digital art and keeping proportions correctly aligned, but I'm toying with the idea of doing more artwork like this for the comic.  I will slow me down, but the quality will be much better if I go this route. 

Annual Number 1

Our first ever annual is out – and here’s the link:  Annual 1

A little behind the scenes: When the last issue came out, it was the April/May issue and the annual was planned to be the June issue, but my brother and I were in a car accident in May (not our fault) and that pushed things back quite a bit and as a result there was no June issue.

In the past I’ve done a few posts about my creation of the characters and I want to do that here for the characters that appear in the annual.

Power Boi

Now Power Boi’s origin hasn’t been revealed in the series yet, although I’ve dropped quite a few clues about it, although I’m not ready to reveal it fully yet.  I originally created him when I was in eighth grade with basically the same powers and a costume very close to what he wears now.  Power Boy (the way I spelled it at the time) had a different origin, in the original version he was another really good friend of Titan’s and got his power through him, and he was straight.  I toyed with the idea of having a love triangle between Titan-Crossbow-Power Boy and I wrote several drafts of that storyline, but it just wasn’t working well for me.

Then I got the idea to add a layer of complexity and made Power Boy bisexual and again I wrote several drafts, but nothing in that storyline worked for me so I dropped it all together and then made him a gay character.   He was actually the first LGBTQ+ character I created.  Of course in my comics you’ve already read about Phantom, who’s bi and Water Wonder, who’s gay, and while both of those characters were created before Power Boy, it wasn’t until I was prepping this series more than five years ago before I decided to make them queer characters.   It was also about that time that I changed the spelling to Power Boi as well.  

Swol

As I mentioned in an earlier post, when I left high school, got my first job and started college I kind of moved away from my characters, although they never left my head I didn’t have the time to work on them.  In that time I created about five new characters, but didn’t really do anything with them. I only created what they looked like and their powers; I created no back stories or real names.

One of those characters was named Rapture, and there he sat on that drawing for years when I really didn’t know anything about him.  When I was prepping the series and got to how Power Boi was going to fit into this series I knew I wanted to have a boyfriend for him and I didn’t want it to be Phantom as I had other plans for him.  So I looked at Rapture, a blank slate, and worked up a back story for him and the rest kind of wrote itself.  As for the name, well there wasn’t any real reason for him to be call rapture, so a few months before his debut in the comic I changed the name to Swol to reflect the times and his powers do make his body swell up.

One of the things that will play out is that there is a contrast between Power Boi/Swol and Phantom.  Power Boi and Swol are looking to be a committed, monogamous couple; whereas Phantom knows that his powers protect him from getting any sexually transmitted diseases, so he is perfectly happy with the hook up culture. 

Edge

Edge is a character I created in high school.  At the time he was just more of an acrobat/street fighter who joined the time and while I liked the costume I created, he didn’t play a very big role in my series.  By the way, his costume is the exact same as how I created it, I never modified it from the first time I drew it.  The last time I drew my characters in college, I realized that I made a mistake with Edge, I drew the torso like a male figure, but the hips and legs like a female and had him in more of a feminine position, both of which were unintentional.  As I looked at the drawing I decided to make him a female-to-male trans character. 

At the time Edge had long hair, but as I became more aware, or perhaps more educated, I learned that most FTM trans people kept their hair on the shorter side, so I gave Edge a haircut and he was ready to go!

Major Hole and the DLHS

Major Hole was created when I was prepping this series a few years ago and I had no real back story for him from back in the day, although in this series he is moving up the ranks and playing an important role with the Preventers, and now we learn he’s part of the DLHS as well (not sure what that means? – please read the annual). 

As for the DLHS, I originally got the idea to do the annual in late summer of 2022 and that’s when I started to create the characters.  I actually created two additional members, but decided to hold them back for now and use them in the future.  When I originally wrote the first draft of the annual the team’s leader, Limp Lisp, was going to be killed by Vitikus, but I changed my mind and didn’t kill him off.

Gay Titan, Magno and Crossbow

One of the long running subplots in the series is Phantom’s infatuation with Titan, who is totally CIS straight.  In order to get over this, Phantom decided to find an alternate Earth where that Titan was gay and that is who we meet in this annual. 

The idea for these characters came to me in October of last year and originally I wasn’t sure where I was going to use them, but then I decided to bring them into the annual.

Vitikus and Arson Parson

Vitikus came to me last summer when I was writing the annual and originally he was going to be the only villain in the story.  However, as I started to draw the annual (which I started in late April of this year) I came up with the idea of the Arson Parson (truly, I only created him about three weeks ago) and here we are. 

Both of the villains are CIS straight characters and in fact are the only two non-queer characters in the issue.  That is why in the opening panel you see Power Boi on his phone with his cousin (Warmth), but you don’t see her in the issue.  I originally had a back and forth scene with the two of them, but decided that the only straight characters in the book would be the main villains, so the cousin has to stay “behind the scenes” as she’s also straight.

I hope you like the issue and I’m already working on the draft for next year’s annual! 

Upload and Update

I actually published the newest issue a few weeks ago and forgot to make a post about it!  

Here is a link if you want to check it out Issue 40

As for the update, this issue was supposed to lead directly into our first ever annual in June.

However, my bother and I were in a car accident, not our fault, and while we have both healed, this has seriously pushed back my production timeline.  As a result, there won't be a June issue and Annual # 1 will now come out in July. 

Coming up!

In the next issue we meet a new hero who goes by the name of Kicker.  Here's a preview of her debut...

We'll be doing an April/May issue to cover some ground before our first ever annual in June!

More on the annual later!

Issue 39

The new issue is up and here's a link - Issue 39

In this issue we meet a new character named Swol who will be one of the stars of the first ever annual this summer!

We also get a visit from the D'Squared Squad and a few other story lines move forward in this fast-paced issue!