It's Christmas Time!

Batman Christmas Gift Tag
Batman © DC Comics
By Corey Breen
Pen & Ink & Photoshop

This is a card tag I did for my coworker's Secret Santa gift I got. I got my coworker Katie a couple of Zombie books (How to Draw Zombies Manga Style, and Zombie CSI). It was supposed to be a Secret Santa, but my card tag above kinda gave that away, LoL.

It was a great day in the office though, as we celebrated the Holiday Season with our annual toy raffle. This year, after some swapping, I walked away with a Bigby Wolf/ Snow White Statue, a 1966 Replica Batmobile, an Adam Hughes Zatana Statue, and a Damien Scott Batgirl Statue! Awesome SWAG! It's great too because I have the other Fables Statue, Rose Red, and I have the Batman Begins Tumbler Statue, that will go along great with my now new Statues I got yesterday! The raffle is my FAVORITE day of the year, and we all had a GREAT time in the office celebrating the holidays and thanking each other for another great year!

I know I haven't posted anything in a bit, and I apologize for that. Just got really busy the last two months. But these next few weeks will have a BUNCH of updates from me, so keep checking back in! More Christmas Images, an Avatar pin-up, and a Freelance Portrait of the cutest twins you will ever see!

Until Then,

CjB

My JLA Cards are on EBay!

Hate to plug someone's ebay postings, but the fact that they are selling my cards is just to cool to pass up! Stop by this link to buy some of my JLA Rittenhouse Archives Cards:

http://shop.ebay.com/?_from=R40&_trksid=p4684.m38.l1313&_nkw=corey+breen&_sacat=See-All-Categories

Hopefully I will have some that I will sell on my own real soon, but if you just can't wait to get one, please feel free to buy/ bid on some of my cards from dealers around the world!

Thanks

Corey

And all it's Green Lantern Parts...

Hal Finished Pencils

Sinestro Sketch

Spread Layout Sketch

Kilowog Sketch

Kyle, Soranik & Sodam Yat Sketch

Spread Pencil Linework

Green Lantern Spread Drawing Process
Green Lantern © DC Comics
By Corey Breen
Pencils

The Justice League Cards are HERE!

JLA/ Rittenhouse Archives Trading Cards
32 of 250 original sketch cards shown By Corey Breen
Pen & Ink & Prisma-Color Markers

After a long, long wait, the set is FINALLY out tomorrow, November 18th, 2009! Run, don't walk to your nearest comic & card shop to pick up a boxed set, and try to score one of 250 ORIGINAL cards done by yours truly!
Above is just a sampling of some of the cards I completed for the set. Below, you can find the original pencil sketches that I did in preparation of doing the finished cards. My process was pretty simply. I knew that completing 250 in a about a month would be tough, but came up with an assembly line type process that helped me organize and pace myself to complete.

I started with drawing mock ups of the size of the cards we had to draw on, which were about 3 x 4 inch cards. The drawing area was even smaller then that, about 2.5 inches by 3.5 inches. I drew about 8 boxes per page. I closely followed the guidelines of the project, because they were very specific in what they wanted on the cards. We were allowed to draw only the JLA characters listed in our contract, and only in costumes they've appeared in throughout the years, but NO alternate universe material. For example, we were not allowed to draw Batman Beyond.



JLA/ Rittenhouse Archives Trading Cards
Original sketch card sketches By Corey Breen
Pencil

After I had about 22-25 original pencil sketches, I bought some carbon copy paper. The cards for the set we were giving were 2-ply bristol, and pretty thick, where it would be tough to lightbox. Also, on the back of the cards were the logo for the set that took up all of the drawing area. Therefore if you did try to lightbox it, the image would see through, and you could not see my drawing to copy. So I decided to use carbon paper, and transfer the cards that way.

I wound up transferring about 7 or 8 versions of EACH pencil drawing onto the 250 cards! That took about an entire week, working about 4-6 hours a night after working all day. After I had all 250 drawn and transferred on the cards, it was time to ink and color them. I made it easy on myself and did each according to character. I took the 7-8 Green Arrows, for example, and inked all of them in a row. Then I took my Prisma-Color markers, and colored each one down the line, like a factory. I repeated that process for the rest of them.

If all of this sounds like it was monotonous, then you are totally right. But to make it more barable, I popped in my entire DVD collection of the Justice league cartoon to get me in the mood and pumped up to draw these characters and cards. It totally worked, because when I needed at least a little break, I looked up and watched some of the BEST cartoons EVER made. Then it got my inspiration back, and I forced myself to pump out the cards. I wound up doing about 14-18 finished cards a night, and was done earlier then even I thought, way above the deadline. It took a little less then a month to complete. I was actually originally commissioned to do 200 cards, but since I finished early, and some artists bailed on the project, they asked me to do 50 more. Did a couple more sketches and transferred them on to the cards, and finished them up like the other ones.

This was an AWESOME project to do, I had a GREAT time doing them all, and I'm really excited to begin to show you what I did. It was not easy, and VERY time consuming, and as anyone who does these types of cards know, it is very rewarding when it is done. I hope very soon, there will be more sets like this one, and I can be hired to do more. BIG thank you to all of DC Licensing Department for believing in me and some other of my coworkers (who were kind enough to recommend me) to work on the project!

There are a bunch of sites dedicated to the collecting, trading, and selling of the cards, and they are listed below:

http://scoundrelpublishing.com/spart/viewforum.php?f=9&sid=10debcf62a1626145dcb364697fbeaca

http://www.sketchcards.com/artists/

Hope you like!

CjB

Indigo Glow!

Indigo Tribe - Green Lantern © DC Comics
By Corey Breen
Pencil

If you are not reading Green Lantern and Blackest Night, then you are not a comic book fan. Ever since Green Lantern Rebirth, all the Green Lantern titles have been must read, steller comics. Geoff Johns and Pete Tomasi have been able to capture the most amazing blend of Sci-Fi, Horror, Action/ Adventure, Romance, and Super-Heroics into flawless entertainment.

I've been saying it for the past three or four years now, that Green Lantern, Green Lantern Corp and now Blackest Night are the best comic books on the stands today, and continue to get better! If you feel you are behind and that is the reason you are not reading, please go back and buy all the trades starting with Rebirth. Then get all the Green Lantern trades, and Green Lantern Corp trades. Then pick up the Green Lantern/ Sinestro Corp War trades and side stories (they're all worth it), and now finally, Blackest Night, and you will be all caught up.

The above characters are new to the universe, and they are called the Indigo Tribe. An alien race that we know little about... music to my ears, I LOVE them already! So many possiblities and Geoff Johns just keeps creating AWESOME characters out of his ears. I love me some new characters, and these guys are really cool so far, so I had to draw them! Love the main character Indigo-1, and the bird dude, the Salacious Crumb looking guy, and the wormy guy! Great stuff.

And I consider myself so lucky to work on these books on a daily basis, and when you see what is coming up in these Green Lantern books, you will NOT be disappointed! This book has been so well written, with Johns being so good at plot and character arcs, plus Tomasi being so good at pulling on your heart strings, what is coming up soon during Blackest Night will BLOW you away! I cried just a little reading the latest Green Lantern Corp issue, it is THAT good!

Hope you like the Pin-Up, and I'll see you soon in the funny books!

Cor

Just One More Walk on the Wild Side!

Where the Wild Things Are © Maurice Sendak & The Sheldon Fogelman Agency
By Corey Breen
Pencil

I'm 'Around the Net'!

Seems like I was all over the internet yesterday. My "weekly" column over on http://masterdigitalcolor.com/ got worldwide recognition! In my column I wrote about the process we here in DC Comics' Pre-Press had to go through to remaster Watchmen for the Absolute Edition, and all future reprints! Below is the link to the column itself, and also where it was featured all around the comic book internet world! I was very proud and honored to be featured on Newsarama especially, for I have been a follower since almost it's inception. To be able to be recognized on that site has always been a dream of mine, and I'm glad I got the chance thanks to columnist David Pepose! Thanks David!

Original Article:

http://masterdigitalcolor.com/2009/10/who-cleaned-the-watchmen/

Newsarama Feature about my column:

http://blog.newsarama.com/2009/11/04/who-remastered-the-watchmen/

Other links to my column on various sites:

http://www.collectedcomicslibrary.com/2009/11/03/collected-edition-blog-brow
sing-on-tuesday-afternoon-5/

http://www.downtowncomics.com/events/event/show?id=1973330%3AEvent%3A16265&p
age=1

UPDATED: Now on The Beat, (by Hedi McDonald, old coworker) as well:

http://pwbeat.publishersweekly.com/blog/2009/11/05/kibbles-n-bits-1152009/

Hope you like the column, and realize how much work we put into Watchmen to make it look the BEST it can. All of us who worked on it are really proud of it (me, Aaron, Emily, and Hank), and hope you learned something you didn't know about what went into producing the new reprints including the Absolute Edition!

Before I go, I do have art to show, but it's not MINE! It is a piece my wife drew for one of her classes. She is taking a drawing class, and a design class this year, and although I'm trying to teach her a lot myself, and help her, as you can see below, she doesn't need much help at all! This piece was for her design class believe it or not, and it is an illustration of the classic "Hanged Man"! Hope you like it, and let her know what you think!

The Hanged Man
By Kristy Breen
Pen & Ink

VERY PROUD of you Kristy, GREAT job!

I will have more stuff to post soon, including another drawing of Max from where the Wild Things Are, and a drawing of my favorite clan of new Lanterns, the Indigo Tribe, from Blackest Night, later this week!

Until Then,

CjB

Where Are the Wild Things?

Where the Wild Things Are © Maurice Sendak & The Sheldon Fogelman Agency
By Corey Breen
Pencil & Photoshop

Carol © Maurice Sendak & The Sheldon Fogelman Agency
By Corey Breen
Pencil

Max © Maurice Sendak & The Sheldon Fogelman Agency
By Corey Breen
Pencil

Even before the movie came out, I knew I wanted to do a drawing of the characters from the new movie, Where the Wild Things Are! Just the look they achieved from the original trailer with the amazing acoustic version of The Arcade Fire's hit song, "Wake Up". I thought the trailer was amazingly well done (as are most trailers theses days, which actually turn out better then the movie themselves), and stayed in my mind for a long, long time. I didn't get around to actually doing the drawing after the trailer, and waited until after I saw the entire movie.

I wont go into a full review of the movie, except to say I recommend it. I thought it was very well done, and the characters were all flawlessly translated to film from the original book. It was actually uncanny in this aspect, if you go back and look at the art. The use of actual costumes and puppetry, mixed with minimal CGI, really worked here. When done right, it proves once again that you can still do a movie with puppets, and still have it look incredible (someone please tell George Lucas that, please). As for the movie itself, I think it will be studied for a long long time, in not only film classes, but even more so in child psychology classes. The movie was very deep, and stays with you for a long time after the viewing. So much so, that you don't really know if you actually liked the movie after seeing it, til much later, when you've had a chance to think about. That's the thing with this movie, because it was not really a movie that was all that entertaining. It's a movie that makes you think about various aspects of a child's mindset, and what makes a child act or be the way they are. What aspects of a child's psyche can you most identify with, and why the various aspects of Max's mind were represented the way they were, are what you really start thinking about after this movie. I can see this film being studied for years, especially from someone like my wife, who is a 1st grade teacher, who absolutely LOVED the movie.

I definitely recommend the movie, and think in time it will be considered a classic. As long as you keep an open mind going in, and let the ideas overtake you, and let your emotions be involved in the film, you will really like the film. The casting was great (the voice-acting), the kid was perfectly cast, and I have to admit, was almost brought to tears in some parts. It made all audience members really feel like you are Max, or have been at some point in your life, and in that aspect, this movie really succeeds.

Look at that, I said I wasn't going to review the film, and I did. Ok, I'll shut up now...

Until next time,

CjB

PS- A LOT of stuff I gotta buy, and you should too (thank god XMAS is on the way!):

Battlestar Galactica: The Plan DVD
Star Wars: Clone Wars Season 1 DVD
GI Joe Cartoon 2 DVD
GI Joe Resolute DVD (BEST GI Joe EVER made!)
GI Joe: The Movie DVD (I know it kinda sucked, but it's GI Joe, & I must own it)
Haunt #1, #2 by Image Comics
The J Scott Campbell 2010 Fantasy Calendar

Green Lantern Piece Finally Unveiled!

Green Lantern © DC Comics
Pencils by Corey Breen
Inks by Mike Sellers

Green Lantern © DC Comics
Pencils by Corey Breen

Over at my column on Master Digital Color I unveil my long awaited Green Lantern Double Page Spread! Go on over and check the entire process of the drawing as I take you through it step by unconventional step!

Soon the site will be posting the final image colored by HiFi Studios, exclusively at:

http://masterdigitalcolor.com/

Enjoy,

Corey Breen

Cave Drawing Ink Sketch Contest!

Buffy the Vampire Slayer © Fran Kuzui, Rubel Kuzui & Kaz Kazui
By Corey Breen
Pencil

This is a drawing I did for the fine folks over at Cave Drawing Ink!

http://cavedrawingink.com/

My coworker is a part of their crew, and they have some amazing artists and writers whose only goal is to make great comics and great artwork! They have a weekly sketch contest going, and they needed a fill in this week. I stepped up to the plate, and hope to contribute more on a weekly basis if they continue to have them. It'll not only get me to stay fresh and loose by doing a drawing at least once a week (which I do anyway, but sometimes it's tougher then other weeks, and this will make sure I do it).

Each week they have 3 or 4 artists do their rendition of a theme. It's kinda like the Iron Chef of sketch book entries. This weeks theme is Buffy the Vampire Slayer, one of my all time personal favs, so it was not hard for me at all to enter this weeks contest. It took a little while to get her face right, but once I felt I nailed it, I really like how this piece came out.

Now it's all a matter of fan opinion, as the fans of the site vote on which one they think is best! So PLEASE visit the site, and vote for my drawing. Or Dezi's or Ed's for that matter. Don't care who wins, because all three entries in this week's contest RULE! But go to the site, vote, check out the other artists and they're AWESOME work. Cave Drawing Ink is a great site, and a great group of artists, who I'm sure you will be hearing much more about in the future!

Until next time,

Peace OUT!

Corey


FROM CAVE DRAWING INK:

10/9/09 Sketch Contest!

Hey Everyone,

Back again for another round of sketch contests. Since it's October and were edging closer to Halloween our guys decided on Buffy the Vampire Slayer as our next theme. So here we have three sketches to choose from below. Remember to vote for your favorite in the comments section at the bottom. Make sure to put your e-mail address so we can contact you if you happen to win the free sketch!! So sink your teeth into this weeks sketches and keep giving us your ideas for future sketch contests!

"One more thing, I'll control my own brain thank you very much... Let's do this."

Zartan vs. Sorm Shadow © Hasbro

By Corey Breen
Pencil

Just a random Pin-Up of yet another of my favorite characters from GI Joe! Can never get enough of these characters, as most are some of my favorites of all time. Nothing beats GI Joe, and I always love drawing them! I go to go to the comic store and pick up some of the new stuff, just to get my fix. Hope you like it!

CjB

Trick 'R Treat!

Trick 'r Treat © WB
By Corey Breen
Pencil & Cintique

http://www.dccomics.com/wildstorm/graphic_novels/?gn=12949
Cover by Breehn Burns

In our weekly stacks, we got this comic book from Wildstorm called Trick 'r Treat! I put it on my reading pile, but kept putting it off for some reason. Finally got a round to reading it and it was AWESOME! I actually kept it because Mike Huddleson was drawing one of the stories, and I love him, wish he was on Batman. But I always keep books he draws (if you can, check out the Man-Bat series he did like last year - AMAZING!). So I read it last week, and the story was really great. It was an anthology yet every story was interconnected, which was a great tool. It was very much like the great House of Mystery stuff back in the 70's. Well, anyway, I highly recommend this prestige book, and I can't wait for the DVD now. It comes out today, and it's getting GREAT reviews. Don't know why it wasn't realized in theaters, especially when SAW is up to like movie #7 or something. But I totally am putting this at the top of my buy list for DVD's. Even if it sucks as a movie, it's got Anna Paquin and the comic book was AWESOME!

One of the other reason's I loved the comic was because of the villain. I never really liked horror movies all that much, but was always intrigued by the villains. LOVED the villains like Mike Myers, Freddie, and other bad a$$ guys (although not a fan of Jason...). Above is my drawing of the 'little dude', who has quickly become a really cool villain in my book. Can't wait to see him in the movie, because he was so SICK in the comic!

So go pick up the comic, the movie, and enjoy my pin-up! (Wow, I sound like a BIG ad for DC Comics, Wildstorm and Warner Brothers right now, but oh well, I like what I like, it just happens to be my company too!)

Oh, and HAPPY HALLOWEEN!!!!!!

CjB

Available November 18th, 2009 in comic shops everywhere!

It's HERE! Finally a release date is set for the JLA/ Rittenhouse Archives Trading Cards!

"This fall Rittenhouse Archives will release Justice League of America Archives, an historical retrospective on the legendary DC Comics team.
This set will cover the team’s history from 1960 to 1969, starting with their first mission together in “Brave and the Bold” #28.
Each box of Justice League of America Archives trading cards will feature a
hand-drawn, hand-colored sketch card from one of 39 different artists. This series is limited to just 6,000 boxes!"

Sketch Artists (Quantities) featured in this set include:

• Al Bigley (100) • Kate Bradley (190) • Corey Breen (250) • Pat Broderick (133) • James Bukauskas (200) • Mark Dos Santos (200) • Neil Edwards (200) • Brent Engstrom (250) • Mike Fiorentino (200) • Joel Gomez (200) • Matthew Goodmanson (200) • Kevin Graham (200) • Fred Haynes (225) • Don Hillsman II (110) • Aaron Houston (200) • John Huan (200) • Brian Kong (250) • Jim Kyle (200) • Cully Long (200) • Warren Martineck (200)

• Rich Molinelli (200) • Chris Moreno (200) • Nathan Ohlendorf (200) • Rhiannon Owens (200) • Dennis Pacheo (200) • Andy Price (200) • Harvey Richards (225) • Tone Rodriguez (250) • Ronald Salas (200) • Michael Sellers (200) • Dezi Sienty (250) • Uko Smith (250) • Jason Sobol (200) • Mark Spears (200) • Bobby Vala (200) • Tom Valente (225) • Justin Vandemark (200) • Steve Wands (225) • Nathan Watson (200)

Look for these Insert Sets:

• 18 Super Friends Cards – Direct from the classic cartoon series!
• 7 Founding Members Cards – The original founding members of the JLA
• 6 Other Earths Cards – Versions of our heroes from Earth 2 and Earth 3!

Each case includes an exclusive autograph card signed by Murphy Anderson.

Murphy Anderson was the inker and penciler on many of the first JLA covers.

For every 3 cases purchased, you will receive a one-of-a-kind hand-painted
card by artist Felipe Massafera.
For every 9 cases purchased, you will receive a one-of-a-kind hand-painted
card by artist Bard.

For every 18 cases purchased, you will receive a Justice League of America Archives Archive Box containing one sketch card from
each of the artists inserted into the packs for a total of 39 different sketch cards!

Fans and collectors will also be able to store their collection in a custom designed collector’s album which contains an
exclusive promo card.

Set Configuration

5 Cards Per Pack

24 Packs Per Box

12 Boxes Per Case

Available November 18th, 2009 in comic shops everywhere!

TM and © DC Comics

http://www.bzzurkk.com/2009/09/justice-league-of-america-archives-trading-cards/

http://www.scifihobby.com/products/dccomics/jla/

Better Late Then Never!

Wolverine vs. Quasimodo

By Corey Breen
© Walt Disney Company
Pencil

Wow, has it been that long. I am so, so sorry. The end of the summer got really, really hectic for me, what with getting married and all. I thought I would have a lot more to post and talk about, but time really just flew by. I have a list of things I want to draw and have started, but because of personal issues, couldn't get around to any of it until now. I finally have just a little free time to catch up on things.

The first of which is my Marvel vs. Disney Pin-Up. I know this is old news, and I'm probably the last to contribute, but how could I not. I'm sure no one has thought to do anything with The Hunchback of Notre Dame, but since it is one of my favorite Disney flicks, I thought that would be a very original idea to draw, since everyone and they're mother has come up with all the different combination's to this merger.

I myself am very, very excited about the possibilities here, and really hope that they get some crossovers done here, in movies and comics. Some of my ideas, getting some great creators on some books, are the following:

The Hunchback of Notre Dame by Adam Kubert
The Little Mermaid by J. Scott Campbell
Tarzan by Jason Aaron & Humberto Ramos
Treasure Planet by Joe Madureira
Beauty & the Beast by Neil Gaiman Andy Kubert
Alice & Wonderland by Chris Bachalo
Adventures of Robin Hood by Mark Buckingham
Pirates of the Caribbean by Lucio Leoni (who did the Disney Adventures Art)
Toy Story by Mike Kunkle
Aladdin by P. Craig Russell
Mulan by Bart Sears
The Lion King by Neko Henderson
Snow White & 7 Dwarfs by Terry Dodson
Bambi by David Finch
Gargoyles by Ed McGuiness
Gargoyle Nights by Ed Brubaker & Michael Lark
Atlantis by Mike Mignola
Tron by Jonboy Meyers
Finding Nemo by Salvador Lacorcia
The Jungle book by Oliver Vatine
The Great Mouse Detective by Juanjo Guardino
Lilo & Stitch by Sean Galloway
Sleeping Beauty by Dustin Nguyen
Hercules by Oliver Copiel
Pocahontes by Ryan Sook
Black Cauldron by Mike Huddleson
Sword & the Stone by Stewart Immonen
101 Dalmations by Dale Keown
The Rescuers Down Under by Michael Omening
The Fox & The Hound by Frank Quietly
Peter Pan by Karl Kerschl
Fantasia by Alessandro Barbucci
The Adventures of Icabod & Mr. Toad Crane by Gregg Capullo
Pinocchio by Joe Quesada
Lady & the Tramp by Duncan Rouleau
Winnie the Pooh by Pascal Ferry
Cinderella by Travis Charest
The Emperor's New Groove by Skottie Young
Dumbo by Francisco Herrera
Tailspin by Ryan Ottley
Darkwing Duck by Art Adams

Hope you like some of those ideas. Big thanks to Tom & Dezi on some of their suggestions! I think some of these books would be MAD cool! Let me know what you all think, would lOVE to hear some of your ideas.

Other then that, I am trying to finish up a Pin-Up of Zartan that I am drawing right now. Then I hope to FINALLY have the GREEN LANTERN SPREAD to show! It has been FULLY inked by the great Mike Sellers and is currently being colored by one of the BEST colorist in the industry! Just WAIT until you see it!

Until then, I remain,

CjB

The Dollhouse

Sky Doll © Alessandro Barbucci & Barbara Canepa
By Corey Breen
Colored with Cintiq in Photoshop

So I got a new toy at work. A Wacom Cintiq! Still getting used to it, but so far, I really, REALLY like it. It' just yet another tool to work with, and it takes some getting used to, but the precision is pretty close to drawing with a pencil. I was able to zoom in real close and redraw a lot of the lines on this piece with the tablet, that I would have had a lot more trouble doing with a regular Wacom Tablet. I hope to keep using this tablet and try and save up for my own one day (if I ever hit the lottery), so I hope to get a lot better. I REALLY want to try Manga Studio Pro, but don't know if work would let me order it here, even though I would totally pay the $30-$40 for it myself.

The piece above and below is a character from the AWESOME book from Soleil Productions, called Sky Doll, and it is one of my favorite books, especially now that Marvel Comics is translating it from French! Please check it out if you haven't already, and there are links to the artists' blogs below (Alessandro Barbucci & Barbara Canepa)!

Oh, also be sure to check out, no, BUY the Wonder Woman Animated Movie! I can't tell you how AWESOME this movie is, and it proves that, one, you can make an amazing animated movie once again, if you have a really good story to tell, and two, that Wonder Woman IS a great character and can be done really well.

So be sure to check out Sky Doll, and Wonder Woman Movie, and save up that money for a Wacom Cintiq (http://www.wacom.com/cintiq/cintiq-12wx.php)! I gotta get back to work on the comics, and start a new drawing of more AWESOME Geoff John's created characters, the Indigo Tribe!

Below is the tones and pencils to my Sky Doll Pin-UP. Enjoy!

CjB

Sky Doll © Alessandro Barbucci & Barbara Canepa
By Corey Breen
Tones done with Copic Markers

Sky Doll © Alessandro Barbucci & Barbara Canepa
By Corey Breen
Pencil

My new Fantasy Football Logo!

My Fantasy Football 2009 Team Logo
Papa Smurf © Hanna-Barbera Productions
By Corey Breen
Pen & Ink & Photoshop

It's football season, and Fantasy Football Season! Wish me luck in my draft this year (August 29th), and on my season! I pick 12th this year, so I got the wrap-around picks! Got my stategy down already...

GO 1556er's, and GO GIANTS!

Learning from the Master!

MASTER DIGITAL COLOR

Hi everyone!

One thing I have found out about working in this industry we call the Comic Book Industry, is that you make some really good friends. We really have quite the little community established, and for the most part, everyone is really friendly. For the MOST part. There have been so many people I have meet and talked to, either by phone or email, that I have worked with to some capacity, who I now know I can also call a friend.

And what do friends do for each other?, but help each other out. One such friend I have made is a colorist named Brian Miller. Brian Miller is the founder and owner, along with his wife, of HiFi Colour Design since 1998. Since then, he and his company have been producing some of the BEST, high quality color in comics in the industry! I have worked with Brian probably since I started at DC Comics in 2000, and maybe even interning in 1999.

It wasn't until much recently that Brian and I started getting closer through email. I have yet to meet him or his wife in person, but am sure to remedy that very soon. Brian has been nothing but nice to me, supportive of my job at DC throughout the years, putting up with all my emails everyday, and he has also been a HUGE influence in my personal artwork and career. He has given me tremendous encouragement, advice, and support for a while now. Whenever I talk to Brian, he is always so upbeat, so enthusiastic about his work, that I knew I liked working with him for many many years to come. I like to think that if you can still be enthusiastic about working in this comic book industry after two years in the business, then I would like to know you better, because it is not an industry for the weak of heart. It is very demanding, very competitive, and very, very time consuming. I knew Brian was someone who I could look up to in that sense (him being one of the most relied upon colorist in the biz), and work harder and harder everyday to just try and accomplish at least a smidgen of all the things he has already accomplished in the industry!

On that note, Brian had asked me recently, to contribute a weekly column on his NEW website, called Master Digital Color. It is a wonderful site filled with not only comic book news, opinion's, and insight, but other entertainment media as a whole. Brian and his team have put tremendous care and skill into this new site, and it can only grow from here. I was honored and thrilled to be asked to contribute to the site, and I want you all to not only check out the site, but read all the stories there-in. In return, I'm hoping Brian will color my huge Green Lantern Spread for me, which you haven't seen yet, because it is still being inked! I'm hoping it looks something like this snippet of a double page spread, which Brian colored for Final Crisis, Legion of 3 Worlds #5:


My column is going to be a weekly column about, what else... COMICS! I want to talk about a lot of things, but mainly focus on the aspect I know the most about in the industry, and that is Production/ Pre-Press! I have made a career here, working at DC Comics for the past 9 years, in Pre-Press and I thought it high time to start talking about what it is I do exactly, and how other artists should know how to do what I do.

I hope you follow the column every week, and make comments, and ask questions on the site, and also on my Blog right here! I want to thank Brian Miller again for giving me the chance to get my voice out there, and contribute to his site. I love comic books, I love talking about comic books, and I love talking, period! So if you like my babbling here, why not check out more of what I have to say, here:

http://masterdigitalcolor.com/

Thanks,

Corey Breen
CjB Productions

PS- Apparently the JLA/ Rittenhouse Card sets are NOT out yet, so I'm STILL holding off on showing you all the work I did on those. I think it was pushed back a bit, so I will find out whats going on with that, and let you know as soon as I know more info about it!

PPS- More art to come soon. I haven't picked up a pencil in over a month because of my Wedding/ Honeymoon, so I'm DYING to get back to the drawing table!

Lookin' Sharp Again!

Project Rooftop Wolverine Look Sharp Contest

By Corey Breen Pencils

Here is another drawing of my redesign of Wolverine for the Project Rooftop Contest. I didn't enter this one, it was just another drawing I did of the design with a couple of tweaks. I don't know about you, but I really dig this look! Hope you think so too!

CjB

I'm BACK, BABY!

Wolverine: Look Sharp Project Rooftop Contest Entry
By Corey Breen
Final Colors in Photoshop

So, yes, I'm BACK from my Wedding, Honeymoon, and Vacation! As great as it was, I definitely missed everyone at work and all my followers here on my Blog and Twitter! I have so much catching up to do, but I wanted to just give a BIG thank you first to all my family, friends, coworkers and everyone who wished Kristy and I all the best! We had an amazing time in Hawaii, and we will never EVER forget it!

But now that I'm back I have so much to get to. I thought I would start things off by FINALLY posting my entry to the Wolverine: Look Sharp Project Rooftop Contest. They announced the winners, and while I did not win anything, I had a BLAST doing this, and can't wait for the next character contest! It's a great thing they do on that site, and I've been following it since the beginning, and finally got a chance to enter. I really like my redesign of Wolverine above, but there was some great entries that won out over it. Congrats to the winners and honorable mentions, and hopefully my image will be shown on he site at some point when they show all the other entries! Please check it out at:

http://www.tencentticker.com/projectrooftop/2009/07/18/wolverine-look-sharp-winners/

I have so many other things to post, and I'll get to all that very very soon. Until then, check out my process below on the Wolverine Redesign, and be sure to keep tuning into the site as I get back in the groove of hings! I have so much to do, so I'm trying not to pull myself in too many directions at once. Just do one thing at a time, and this is a good place to start.

Hope you enjoy, and thanks again to everyone who wish me and my wife well wishes!

Peace!

CjB


Wolverine: Look Sharp Project Rooftop Contest Entry
By Corey Breen
Final Colors

Wolverine: Look Sharp Project Rooftop Contest Entry
By Corey Breen
Final Inks

Wolverine: Look Sharp Project Rooftop Contest Entry
By Corey Breen
Final Pencils

Wolverine: Look Sharp Project Rooftop Contest Entry
By Corey Breen
Initial Sketch

Please Leave a Message After the Tone!

See you when I get back!

Please don't forget,
JLA Rittenhouse Archive Cards drop on July 22nd, 2009!
When I get back, I will begin posting artwork from the set.
Lot's of CjB art to be posted upon my return.
Wish me luck on my marriage and honeymoon!

Corey

Riding high on the loose leaf!

Red Monica from Battle Chasers © Joe Madureira
By Corey Breen
Pencil

I'm really happy with this piece! I had a ton of fun drawing it. It started out as just a simple pin-up on an 8 1/2 x 11 piece of laser copy paper, but started getting bigger and bigger. God how I miss Joe Madureira and Battle Chasers! Maybe someday, he will return to it!

My favorite thing to draw on is regular loose leaf laser color copy paper. A lot of people give me slack for that, but I do not care. Artist Skottie Young was talking about this on Twitter not too long ago, for he likes to use it too. He gave many good reasons as to why, and I feel the same way. With loose leaf paper, I don't feel as constrained as if I drew in a sketchbook or directly on nice bristol board or comic board. I love to just sketch freely and erase and make mistakes. I like to fix my art as I go, and with regular copy paper, I find it easier to do. Drawing in a sketchbook makes me feel I can't make mistakes, as funny as that sounds. If I don't like a drawing I am doing on loose leaf, then I just throw it out in the trash. If I don't like a drawing in my sketchbook it lingers there, and haunts me, and I wind up ruing my sketchbook by ripping it out, or something. Sketchbooks are things to show and have a series of great drawings in. But I can't always be perfect, so I don't like to have something that has drawings in it that I love AND hate. My OCD-like qualities just wont let me do that.

I also like to press down pretty hard with my pencil when I draw, and if I drew on "better" paper right away, or in a sketchbook, it leaves an impression in the paper that doesn't go away, and therefore it's a bigger pain to make a coorection. It just feels more finite to me. It sometimes takes me a while to get what I want, and sometimes I redraw whole arms or legs til I get it right. Much easier to do on the smooth loose paper. So I tend to save the higher quality paper for light boxing or inking a piece, after it's fully drawn on the loose leaf. BUT, I try not to ink on color copy paper, because it's too smooth, and the ink tends to bleed. Just pencils.

Some artists find drawing on this type of paper very, very hard to do, because it is very slick, almost like it has a gloss over the paper. I don't mind. I actually find it easier. I love the way my pencil just glides over the smooth paper, and I think I get a really nice tone from shading on it. You can't really do a full on rendering with pencil shading on this kind of paper, but for comic book pencils, I think it's perfect. Comic art really turns out to be "color by numbers" once you get to that stage of pencils where you have to "fill in the blacks".

As you can see from the Red Monica piece above, I think it works really well. But to each artist, their own, and just because I like to draw on laser color copy paper with a mechanical pencil, doesn't mean I'm telling you that you should too. It just works for me, and I wind up doing my BEST pieces on it. If I want, I could always transfer it over to that "better" paper or board!

The only other thing I want to mention with this piece, is what happened when I ran out of blank page on the 8 1/2 x 11 piece of paper I started with. I was going to just leave it cropped, as I sometimes do, and call it a day, but I really wanted to draw the shark! At least his head. So, very ghetto-like, I just taped more paper to the end of the sheet, and presto, I had more room. LOL Kept drawing. Just like putting together a two page spread from comic book boards. Just add more paper. It does leave a little gap when you finally scan the image in, but you just clean that up in Photoshop, and you're good to go!

Oh, I was going to also explain what I started talking about last post, about being influenced, and style, and the fine line between being influence and flat out "aping" someone's style. But this post is already too long, and I'll save that for another time!

Have a great weekend, everyone, and hope you like the Red Monica pin-up! I have a MILLION things to do before I get married on Friday, and go on my honeymoon til early August, but I will definitely be posting more before I take a little hiatus for all of that!

CjB

Seeing Red!

Mary Jane © Marvel Comics
By Corey Breen
Pen & Ink & Photoshop

Went to draw Sam Keith's The Maxx, and this is what came out. Sometimes, you go to draw something, and all of the sudden, you are TOTALLY drawing something else. Not that I mind drawing Mary Jane, but it was definitely NOT what I intended to draw. Oh well...

This drawing actually made me promise myself that I REALLY need practice drawing women and the female form again. Maybe even go to some figure drawing classes or something. I realized I am really rusty at drawing woman, as you can see, and need to practice, practice, practice! Sometimes I get to used to drawing one gender, and I get really out of sorts on the other. So I think I'm gonna try to limit myself to some females for the next couple of sketches. I saw a TOTALLY kick a$$ drawing of Joe Mad's Red Monika on the Wildstorm Blog the other day, so I wanna take a crack at that character. You can see what I'm talking about here:

http://gelatometti2.blogspot.com/

Awesome, right?! Especially the one by Nuñez, even though it is a little bit too close to Joe's style. You have to be careful with that. Joe is my favorite artist, but his style is so distinctive, that even if you come close to it, you are called a Joe Mad clone (even though Joe Mad got his whole style from tons of Japanese Anime). But that's a whole another blog entry entirely! LOL

I'll get back to that topic someday...

In the meanwhile, check out what I got! Yup, I finally was able to hit the parlor, and get that tat I designed like over a year ago, that I posted way back when. I love and hate getting tattoo's. I love it when I get them (then always want more), but then I hate that I make it such a process to get one, what with designing it myself little by little (and trying not to over-do it). And it costs a lot of money. LOL

But check out the final skin job below:

Tattoo Design © Corey Breen

Tattoo by
Sweetie @ East Side Ink
97 Ave B
(btw 6th & 7th St)
NY, NY 10009
www.eastsideinktattoo.com
212.477.2060

Best tattoo shop in NYC, East Side Ink and my second tattoo by Sweetie, a former coworker at DC, now one of the best artists in the city (and I just get easy tribal-like designs, you should see his more artistic tats)! Definitely hit them up if you want a tat, they are the best!

Original design again:

Tattoo Design © Corey Breen

Well, that's it for today. I still haven't gotten around to posting and blogging about a lot of work already completed. I'm really just waiting on things like inks, colors, and release dates to work themselves out. Wish I could just show you everything I got in the cannon, I just got to be patient, and I'll get to show you all that stuff soon! It'll be worth it, promise! I'll do my best to get you something by 20th, before I leave for my Honeymoon. Just so you think I'm not lying, I am waiting to post:

The Green Lantern Corps Spread
The JLA Rittenhouse Cards
The Project Rooftop Wolverine Redesigns

Saint Walker Colors (still need to finish)
Batman & Robin Inks & Colors (still need to finish)

More Examples of the work I do at DC Comics!

OH, and speaking of which...

The JLA Rittenhouse Archive Card Set drops July 22nd, 2009!
More info as it gets closer...

All my best,

CjB

I want to be a Blue Lantern!

Saint Walker © DC Comics 2009
By Corey Breen
Pen & Ink

Saint Walker © DC Comics 2009
By Corey Breen
Pencil

Some Freelance Work & Other Stuff

Father's Day Caricature for Private Client
11 x 17 Comic Board
Pencil, Illustrator & Manga Markers
By Corey Breen

Religious Tattoo Design for Private Client
Pencil & Photoshop
By Corey Breen

And a SPECIAL TREAT! A drawing by my brother, Christopher Breen years ago, of the Cheshire Cat and the Mad Hatter. My mom found this and I just HAD to share, because I think they are really AWESOME! Nice job, Chris, you totally need to get back to drawing, I really miss your work!

Alice in Wonderland Characters
Pen & Ink on Post-It's
By Christoper Breen

And a very, VERY Happy Father's Day to my Pop! I love you Dad, and would not be who I am today without you. You always taught me to follow my dreams no matter what anyone said, and I know that you are on my side always, hoping I can be the best artist I can be. I hope I am doing that, and I continue to make you proud! You are the world to me, thank you for supporting me!

Lots more art to come soon, so stay tuned! I got a bunch of stuff just waiting to be posted!

Corey

"And Where, is the Batman...?"

Batman & Robin © DC Comics 2009
By Corey Breen
Pencil

"...He's at home, washing his tights!"

This is the final pencils for my Batman & Robin Pin-Up! I was gonna wait to show it until I did the inks and put a Chicago skyline in the background, but I am very impatient and wanted to post something since it's been a little while!

I had a lot of fun drawing this one, and I am really happy with how it came out. I originally wanted to draw all the Bat characters together, but I was very happy with these two, that I decided to end it there. I love when I tap into my Joe Quesada/ Todd McFarlane style, so I felt I really nailed what I wanted o draw. They are my two favorite Batman artists of all time besides Neil Adams and Jim Aparo!

I was gonna quit on all the Bat characters, since I was kinda getting sick of them, but after watching The Dark Knight on TV again, and with the release of Batman & Robin #1 in stores, I got the bug again!

In a previous post, I expressed my displeasure with the Battle for the Cowl issues, but everything was made better by Batman #687 and Batman & Robin #1. Judd Winnick and Ed Benes knocked their issue out of the park, and I felt THAT was what Battle for the Cowl should have been. It had characterization, plot, action, and despite uneven colors; GREAT artwork! I love Ed Benes, especially on Batman, and this issue was exactly what I wanted in terms of passing on the mantle to Dick Grayson.

Then Batman & Robin #1 came out, and finally the world got to see what I saw early when I worked on the book getting it ready for print. The issue blew everyone away, and further solidified Grant Morrison & Frank Quietly in the eyes of fans. I know it's only a three issue run for these two together, but they really know how to handle Superman (in All-Star Superman) and now Batman. Great stuff in this book... wait til you read issue #2! The suspense and pacing are perfect! Well done getting Batman on track FINALLY, DC! Big ups to Janelle Siegel and Mike Marts, two great editors to work with! It's really hard to make Batman fresh and interesting, but when it is on, it reminds me why it is my favorite character and book in comics.

Great stuff coming up in the future, starting with Batman & Robin, and the HUGE summer blockbuster, Blackest Night! It's gonna be a great time to be back into DC Comics, you will see, trust me!

More blogging to come soon,

CjB

NEWS from around the internet!


I don't where on the internet this is from, but it is freakin' HYSTERICAL!

More Finished Freelance Gigs...

Two Girls Baking © Christine Breen

Designed by Christine Breen & Jonathan Breen
Final Image by Corey Breen
Photoshop & Illustrator

Red Bear © Jonathan Breen
Designed by Jonathan Breen
Final Image by Corey Breen
Photoshop & Illustrator

Three Lady Bugs © Gretchen Mancuso

Designed by Gretchen Mancuso

Final Image by Corey Breen
Photoshop & Illustrator


These are three logos I recently re-designed for private clients. The three logos were all originally designed by the clients themselves, but were given to me to re-draw in Illustrator CS4 and Photoshop CS4. I just imported a low res image they provided, and then re-drew and traced that image to create a high res, perfect image file that they can use for anything they need. It was all designed already, it just took me a while to translate them into artwork. Just goes to show the wide range of things I am asked to do, and what can be done to make even a simple sketch like the the ladybugs, into a full functioning, finished logo.

Please feel free to visit the sites of the companies above to see what they are, and what services they provide!

http://www.twogirlsbaking.com/home.html

www.redbearadvisors.com

http://www.threeladybugs.com/

Corey Breen

May flowers bring June SHOWER... for my girl!

Kristy's Wedding Shower Wishing Well Logo & Tea Tags
By Corey Breen
Photoshop & Illustrator
Cheshire Cat © 2009 Walt Disney Productions

Kristy's Wedding Shower Wishing Well Logo & Tags
By Corey Breen
Pencil - Pen & Ink
Cheshire Cat © 2009 Walt Disney Productions

My fiance, Kristy had her wedding shower yesterday, and this was the cartoon I drew for her wedding party, to display at the restaurant! I usually don't do straight up cartoons anymore, so this was a lot of fun to go back to that style after so long. It's definitely not as easy as it looks, but it is still as much fun as I remember!

Kristy loves the Cheshire Cat so much, so I hope she enjoyed the piece, and her shower as much as I had fun contributing to it! I want to thank all her female friends and family, and soon to be extended family for throwing her such an amazing party, and literally showering her with so many gifts!

We can't wait to see all of you again for the wedding next month!

Love you Kristy,

Corey

And the winner is...

...NOBODY

Nobody won the Contest, because, well, no one entered! It's all good though. One less thing for me to do and send out. I will try another contest again one day, when I know I have more followers. I thought I had enough people checking out the website that at least two or three people would enter, but I guess I'm just not ready for that yet. It just gives me more incentive to go out and market myself more, and spread the word about my site.

Next time I try something like that, I'll make sure I have more of following. In a sense, it was a test for me to see how many people check out the site, since I can't really go by the Blog's "FOLLOWERS", because a lot of people don't subscribe to Google, or just don't know how to "follow" it. To "follow" my Blog, you need to click on the "follow" button on the RIGHT side of the website, just under my Profile, "About Me".

So now I just have make sure I get the word out about the Blog! [You would think the 386 people I "know" on Facebook, I would have more of an audience, but I guess it just means I have a LOT more work to do.] LOL

I will be posting some FUN, personal art later today, so be sure to check back in. And just in case you want to know, the answer to the Slave Leia contest is below!

Huttesse-
"Oto Chuba Tah Panwa Ta Chik Youngee, Murishani, An Jedai Coo sa SHAG LEIA!"

English-
"I want you to enjoy the dancing girl, bounty hunter, and Jedi, who is Slave Leia!"

CjB

PS- Some people have said that there is a problem with the video on the site, and I am looking into it. It is saved as a Quicktime mp4 file, so I'm not sure why it is telling some people that is it "temporarily unavailable". I will look into why this is, and/or try to upload it as something other then how you import it in Blogger!

Oto Chuba Tah Panwa Ta Chik Youngee, Murishani, An Jedai Coo sa SHAG LEIA!

Princess Leia © 2009 Lucasfilms
By Corey Breen
Final Photoshop Color

THE CONTEST!

To win an exclusive, FREE sketch by me, all you have to do is correctly guess the translation of the title of this Blog entry... "Oto Chuba Tah Panwa Ta Chik Youngee, Murishani, An Jedai Coo sa SHAG LEIA!" I will randomly draw one winner from the people with the correct translation! So please send in your entries in an email or comment on this Blog!

The winner will receive a small 5-10 minute sketch of any ONE character of their choosing. I will have to get the address of the winner so I can send it out to them. Contest only open to United States residents, and the contest is NOT open to immediate family and coworkers!

The winner will be selected on Monday, June 8th, 2009, at 1pm!

CjB

Oto Chuba Tah Panwa Ta Chik Youngee, Murishani, An Jedai Coo sa SHAG LEIA!

PART THREE

Princess Leia © 2009 Lucasfilms

By Corey Breen
Pen & Ink & Copic Cool Gray Markers & Photoshop Touch Ups

Here are the final tones for the Slave Leia Pin-Up! I did the tones in Cool Gray Copic Markers, with a Colorless Blender, and Whiteout Pen. Above is the tones that I touched up in Photoshop. The original scan of just the markers, without any touch up, is below!

Music by John Williams, "Across the Stars"

Here also is the VIDEO of me working! I think this came out GREAT! I used my iMac G5 to film this, and used CS4 Adobe After Effects to edit the video, and speed it up! I love learning a new program and can't wait to do more of these! Took a long time to put an audio track on it, because I needed to watch some tutorials on how to do it, and it just took me longer then expected to learn that part of the pre-compression! When I do more of these, I will get better and better at it!

I hope you enjoy the video, and be sure to watch around the 4 minute mark of the 5 minute video, where you'll see what I have to put up with every time I draw! It's quiet the surprise, and it's very funny!

Special thanks to Mike Sellers for teaching me some video editing skills, and Julio Herrera, for letting me borrow his laptop to work on it and finish it up today! Thanks guys!

Final Color Image to be posted this weekend!

And don't forget:

THE CONTEST!

To win an exclusive, FREE sketch by me, all you have to do is correctly guess the translation of the title of this Blog entry... "Oto Chuba Tah Panwa Ta Chik Youngee, Murishani, An Jedai Coo sa SHAG LEIA!" I will randomly draw one winner from the people with the correct translation! So please send in your entries in an email or comment on this Blog!

The winner will receive a small 5-10 minute sketch of any ONE character of their choosing. I will have to get the address of the winner so I can send it out to them. Contest only open to United States residents, and the contest is NOT open to immediate family and coworkers!

The winner will be selected on Monday, June 8th, 2009, at 1pm!

CjB

Princess Leia © 2009 Lucasfilms
By Corey Breen
SCAN - Pen & Ink & Copic Cool Gray Markers

Oto Chuba Tah Panwa Ta Chik Youngee, Murishani, An Jedai Coo sa SHAG LEIA!

PART TWO

Princess Leia © 2009 Lucasfilms
By Corey Breen
Pen & Ink & Photoshop

Here are the final inks for the Slave Leia Pin-Up! Tones to be posted on Friday, along with a video of me drawing the tones in with Copic Markers!

THE CONTEST!

To win an exclusive, FREE sketch by me, all you have to do is correctly guess the translation of the title of this Blog entry... "Oto Chuba Tah Panwa Ta Chik Youngee, Murishani, An Jedai Coo sa SHAG LEIA!" I will randomly draw one winner from the people with the correct translation! So please send in your entries in an email or comment on this Blog!

The winner will receive a small 5-10 minute sketch of any ONE character of their choosing. I will have to get the address of the winner so I can send it out to them. Contest only open to United States residents, and the contest is NOT open to immediate family and coworkers!

The winner will be selected on Monday, June 8th, 2009, at 1pm!

CjB

Oto Chuba Tah Panwa Ta Chik Youngee, Murishani, An Jedai Coo sa SHAG LEIA!

PART ONE

Princess Leia © 2009 Lucasfilms
By Corey Breen
Pencil

Over the next three Blog posts, I will be showing the stages of my Slave Leia Pin-Up! The first of which is the finished pencils. I gave a sneak peak of this when I was drawing it, on my Twitpic Site. Now you can see it here for the first time! It will be followed by the inks, and then the tones, and finally, the colors!

I am also holding a small CONTEST! To win an exclusive, FREE sketch by me, all you have to do is correctly guess the translation of the title of this Blog entry... "Oto Chuba Tah Panwa Ta Chik Youngee, Murishani, An Jedai Coo sa SHAG LEIA!" I will randomly draw one winner from the people with the correct translation! So please send in your entries in an email or comment on this Blog! The winner will be selected on Monday, June 8th, 2009, at 1pm!

The winner will receive a small 5-10 minute sketch of any ONE character of their choosing. I will have to get the address of the winner so I can send it out to them. Contest only open to United States residents, and the contest is NOT open to immediate family and coworkers! So, go back to your lettering cave, Mr. Wands! LOL

Good luck, and be sure to stay tuned for Part Two of this series, with the inks to the above piece. I just received my Gray Copic Markers in the mail and will be starting the tones for Part Three! I am also going to try and film myself doing those tones, and post that as well, so everyone can see me in action! No promises on that though, since I'm not even sure I can figure out HOW to do that just yet. But I will try... Then shortly after I hope to throw some cool colors on the piece in Photoshop. I'm hoping everyone follows along this process, which shows how I like to work on a piece from pencils all the way to finished color! Hope you enjoy!

Dobrah Nenoleeya,

CjB

PS- Congrats to Geosette (http://3.bp.blogspot.com/_dR2Rf1BJRJ8/ShXAEVSSPAI/AAAAAAAAATU/xJuyqmVo74o/s1600-h/kuta(fan_art_concours).jpg), the winner of the Kuta Art Contest, that was held by Sean Galloway at http://cheeks-74.deviantart.com/journal/24824258/! He may even make a Kuta Tribute Book with all the entries, since they were FANTASTIC! Show support for that idea here:

http://gotcheeks.blogspot.com/2009/05/kuta-card-contest.html

To Boldly Go Back to Where I Had Been Before... Comic Book Movie Adaptations

Old Spock © CBS Studios, Inc. 2009
Pencil Rendering
By Corey Breen

Much like video games based on movies, comic book movie adaptations and prequels have been nothing short of terrible. They usually make these adaptations with the original scripts, and the final printed story is actually quiet different then the movie itself. That is the first thing that never seems to translate well from a movie to a comic adaptation. And when doing a prequel comic to a movie, the story is never as exciting or well told, if there is a point to doing it at all. It tries to lead up to the movie it is based on, but it always seems that the comic is just filler, trying to cash in.

I am always tempted to buy these adaptation, especially if I love the movie it's based on, hoping it captures that same feel at least. I did this a lot with the Star Wars movies, and although the art was better then most, it still felt like it was just there to exist, having no merit or value otherwise. I have gotten burned by X-Men movie adapts, as well as ones for Superman, Constantine, Terminator, Spider-Man, Battlestar Galactica, among many others. I have since stopped picking up these adaptations and prequels, and just wind up enjoying the movies, for no comic could ever really live up to them. I have also tried to pick up the art of books of movies I really enjoy, because I seem to get way more out of them these below average comics.

That was until I went to Barnes and Noble this past weekend and picked up Star Trek: Countdown, the prequel to the movie. It was right next to a comic prequel for Terminator: Salvation. Both are published by IDW. I skimmed through the Terminator one, and saw awful art, bad dialogue, and what seemed like a boring, terrible story (same as the movie; LOL). Same old crap on a stick. I put it back, and was glad I don't get suckered into buying it as per my reasons above. But then I flipped through the Star Trek one, and knew immediately that this one was different! I decided to take a chance on it, and buy it.

Star Trek: Countdown TPB
By David Messina

Boy, was I glad I did. The art and coloring jumped right off the page at first glance! The page layouts and wide panels made it feel like a movie all to itself. It was AWESOME! The story was FANTASTIC, and the art was INCREDIBLE! This is how all comics based on movies should be done. It really was that good. It was written off of a story by Roberto Orci & Alex Kurtzman, by Mike Johnson & Tim Jones. The fantastic art was by David Messina who drew it and colored it along with Giovanna Niro (with color assists by Paolo Maddaleni). It also had three letterers.

I HIGHLY recommend this comic book prequel to any and ALL fans of the movie, and comic books in general. Just taking it along as a comic, it was fun, energetic, fast paced, great action, great sci-fi, a totally great plot, and much like the movie; very, very well made. This whole book seemed to be done with a lot of care and detail, and it really shows. It feeds off of all the strengths of the movie, and I must commend everyone involved in the making of this book. IDW may have failed with the Terminator prequel, but this book was stellar. Trust me on this one, and go out and grab this book! Put on some soundtrack music while you read it... heck, play the Star Trek Movie Score like I did, and really get into it! Dorky, I know, but it totally gets you into this great story. I wont say much more about it, content wise, because it is totally worth the suspenseful read!

I just want to finish this all by plugging the artist, who is now on my list of tracking down all his previous works, and I'm going to be buying anything he works on in the future!

http://davidmessinart.blogspot.com/

This is the wikipedia page on the book, if you really must know the story:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Star_Trek:_Countdown

So go out and grab this trade, and let me know if you agree with me. I give this book 4 1/2 stars out of 5. Hope you enjoy my little rendering of Old Spock! Til next post, thanks for reading...

CjB

Kuta Art Card Contest

Kuta © Sean Galloway

By Corey Breen
Photoshop Final Colors REVISED

Kuta © Sean Galloway

By Corey Breen
Photoshop Final Colors

Kuta © Sean Galloway
By Corey Breen
Photoshop Final Flats

Kuta © Sean Galloway
By Corey Breen
Final Tones

Kuta © Sean Galloway
By Corey Breen
Final Inks

Kuta © Sean Galloway
By Corey Breen
Final Pencils

This is my entry for the Kuta Vinyl Contest being held by Sean Galloway, aka Cheeks, on his Blogspot, http://gotcheeks.blogspot.com/2009/05/kuta-card-contest.html

Above is my entire process for the submission.

CjB

Jason Todd All Over Again?

Robin © DC Comics 20009
By Corey Breen
Pencil

So Battle for the Cowl has ended, and the new Batman and Robin have finally been revealed! Turns out it is in fact, Nightwing becoming the new Batman, and Damien (Bruce's son with Talia Al Ghoul), the new Robin. Bruce is still stuck in time in Final Crisis (we all assume), so this is the new direction for the Bat-verse.

I am a little bit excited about this. It could be cool. I am always a big fan of costume changes, and changes in character and direction. The problem is, is that I am a HUGE Bruce Wayne fan, and like him second to only Snake-Eyes. In my mind, no one will ever replace Bruce as Batman. But I am going to give this story a chance. I think this could be very cool. And I trust the editors and creators on the books right now, that I look forward to seeing what happens, and also working on the books as they come in.

One of the things I do like in comic books, is progression. Even more so then that, are legacies. I like when the mantle is passed on, and the their seems to be a "real time" aspect to comics. It was always unexplained that Dick Grayson grew up to become Nightwing, yet Bruce never ages? Made no sense. And some of the best Batman stories are the ones where it's the end of Bruce's career. He gets older; how can he continue (Batman Beyond & The Dark Knight Returns); blah, blah, blah.

It's like the X-Men, Days of Future Past storyline. If that's the future, then when will we finally get to that future? It has to start somewhere. And maybe, if DC can keep this new Dynamic Duo together for more then a year, it will seem like Batman and Robin can move on from all those old stories and ties to the past, and make new ones. But it could also really backfire. I REALLY didn't like how Bruce was "killed" off, honestly. I also really didn't like Battle for the Cowl. It was just bad, art and story wise. But let's see if it gets a lot cooler now that Ed Benes is drawing some issues, and then the Morrison & Quietly issues start. Much like Captain America at Marvel, I'm keeping my hopes up for this one. And if it does fail, so what... they tried, and it'll be worth it, even if you have to just bring Bruce back. I just want some consistency, that's all.

Actually, the best Batman stuff has been within the last year or two. That has been the Detective stories that Paul Dini and Dustin Nguyen have done. THAT is Batman to me. Just awesome stories and art that focus on characterization, lots of action, fast paced, Sherlock-Holmes-ish mystery and detective work. It was very noir-ish, and brilliantly written. If you missed out on ANY of those stories, then pick those up! The GREAT news is, Dini and Nguyen are still going to be working in this new Bat-verse. They are doing a book called Batman: Streets of Gotham, and that is the book I am looking forward to the most behind Batman and Robin.

(Also the Superman/ Batman issues by Allen Burnett, and Dustin Nguyen are TOTALLY worth picking up, too!)

On another note... just saw two bad movies in a row, which is rare for me. Last night I finally got around to watching Benjamin Button on DVD. I thought it was ok, but I got bored half way through it. It was too long (needed an editor, lots of scenes cut), predictible, and really the only good thing about it, was the effects and Cate Blanchett. The soundtrack was great too, but I've had that for months, and it didn't save the movie. Pitt was just ok, and it kinda seemed all pointless. What was the point? We all die alone? Awesome.

The next bad movie I saw was tonight, and that was Terminator Salvation. I need some Salvation from this movie. It wasn't as bad as Wolverine, but it was a failure to me just the same. I will never own this movie, and thats a shame. I love Sci-Fi movies, and I love Apocalyptic movies. So you would think this movie would kick all kinds of a$$, right? Wrong. It was boring, pointless, had no story, and was just lame. There was nothing memorable about this movie. No cool fight scenes, no cool dialogue, no cool time travel conundrums. No good philosophical mumbo-jumbo that I LOVE about the Terminator movies. WHAT WAS THIS MOVIE FOR? Nothing was really redeemable about this movie, and I rather have saw Star Trek again or something. Sorry, but T2 AND T3 were better then this movie. This was neither a popcorn flick like T2 was, nor a philosophical mellow thinker like T3.

I would go on about why I didn't like these two movies, but they aren't even worth it. I will just move on, and look forward to Transformers II, and be glad that Star Trek and Angels and Demons were really good. they can't all be winners.

One last thing before I go... How much does my cat, Sebastion look like the dude from Labrynth, Sir Didymus? Kristy and I finally figured it out tonight. I knew he looked like some Brian Froud like creature, but also thought he looked like that Grey Ewok, or Salacious Crumb, Jabba's pet. But no, it's Sir Sebby Didymus! What do you think?

Hope you like the Robin pic. I think I have a couple more Batman Characters I will still try out (ie- Red Robin); maybe. Got other to show you too, just waiting for the right time, so stay tuned...

CjB

My Cat Sebastian Bathazar vs. Sir Didymus from labyrinth

Red Hot!

Batwoman © DC Comics
By Corey Breen
Pencil & Photoshop

And the NEW Batgirl is...?

Batgirl © DC Comics 2009
By Corey Breen
Pen & Ink Wash & Whiteout

Pen & Ink & Photoshop

Pen & Ink & Photoshop

Pencil

I know who it is under the mask, but I'm NOT telling. Confidentiality Agreement and all that. Bummer, huh? LOL

But I can say that it's REALLY cool, and that a lot of Batman fans will be psyched! It will all be announced soon. I love when new characters take over or new costumes revealed, especially when it is a mystery as to who is under the mask! I don't think the mystery will be a part of the story, but as of right now, I can't say who it is. Any guesses?

I will actually shut up now, and just let the art speak for itself. I talk too much sometimes, and for this Blog entry, I'll just let you enjoy the art. It was really fun to do, and very experimental for me. I tried a whole bunch of inking techniques, and after becoming very frustrated, I think I finally came out with something very cool. Let me know what you think! Do you like the ink wash final more, or just the straight up inks? Or maybe just the look of the line art? Or should I have never inked it the first place, because my inks suck, and I should stick to pencils? LOL

More Batman family goodness later in the week! Happy Hump Day! Happy Comic Book Day!

CjB

"I like this ship! It's exciting!"

Kirk & Spock from Star Trek © CBS Studios, Inc. By Corey Breen Pencil

I was never a Trek fan. I had watched the old shows here and there, for various reasons throughout my life, but just never got into it. It seemed lame and really dorky. Star Trek always seemed to me to be a series that just went on and on and on, and there was no beginning, middle or end to it. There was all these various incarnations to it, and reboots, and different characters, and such, that I just never became a fan. I love science fiction so much, but the reason I never got into Star Trek was mainly because it wasn't a story that I could wrap around that had a beginning, middle and end to like Star Trek or the new Battlestar Galactica. I like things I can get in from the ground floor and be a part of the whole thing, not bits and pieces. Star Trek was just too big for me.

After seeing the latest movie though, I am now officially converted. The movie was AMAZING! It had everything I loved about Sci-Fi, and more. It was accessible, it was action packed, the cast was perfect, the story was awesome, the acting was really good, the SFX were top notch, and I could just go on and on. Like I said above, I have liked Star Trek here and there, but I was always a Star Wars nerd. I have to admit, I really liked Star Trek Nemesis though. That was the first Trek I saw in theaters, and I liked it because it wasn't really a typical Star Trek feature. Trek fans seemed to hate it, and I think that is part of the reason it took to me. It kind of just told a

straight forward sci-fi story. and I got into the villian and the story pretty easily. But after seeing this new movie, I was completely BLOWN away. Starting with this movie, it now is on par with Star Wars and Battlestar.

I now feel like I am on the ground floor of this, and I love that fact. I saw the movie on a digital screen, and I really felt like I was IN outer space. Everything from the sound editing, sound mixing, the clarity and color of the film, and especially the cinematography of the film, was supurb! I loved the pacing of the film, and the dialogue was just a great mix of action, adventure, intrigue, mystery, and revelations, and they treated the material with respect. They didn't go into it thinking it was silly in any way, and much like Battlestar, treated the material with high quality, well written, well directed enthusiam. The first 10 minutes of the film, I was speechless, and it tugged at my heart, and hooked me right away. I knew that I now had yet another favorite sci-fi experience and francise to add to my list of things I love. The time travel stroy was wonderful, and was like Lost-Light! The creators of Lost, did what they did best with that show, and added it to Trek, to make a simple, yet sensible time travel story that quiet frankly, ROCKED! They made it accessible to all audiences (Kristy, my fiance, LOVED it too, and she just bascially puts up with my sci-fi love).

I must give props to everyone who created this movie, and I look forward to seeing it a second, third and forth time, and owning on DVD, the day it comes out. I totally want to do more drawings of it too, I was that inspired! Kudos!

Last thing before I go, I wanted to mention that this past friday, not only was I in awe of the movie, but when I got home, I caught J Scott Campbell, my third favorit artist, behind only Mad! and Bachalo, on his twitter, doing a LIVE, streaming art demostration! I stayed up til about 4am, watching this AMAZING artist tone a drawing of Poison Ivy, take requests, answer questions, talk with other professional artists, and draw, from scratch, Michael Scott from The Office, and Sawyer from Lost! I can't thank him enough for doing this, and I can't believe I got to watch something like that. It was beyond inspiring, and he is one of the nicest, mellow, INCREDIBLE artists I have EVER seen, and to watch him draw so something I will always treasure. I can't wait until he does it again, and he is a MASTER! He even revealed that he will be going back to Danger Girl after he is done with his Spider-Man project!! That just made me giddy!

So enjoy my Star trek drawing, go check out some J Scott Campbell art, go watch the Star Trek movie, and go be inspired by something that you love. I'm telling you, there is nothing like seeing and doing things you love to do, that really makes you happy.

Next up, are those Batgirl drawings I did. Then even more stuff throughout the week.

All my best, and happy Mother's Day mom, I love you!

CjB

PS- Next up for movies, Angels & Demons, and then Terminator IV. GOOD I love the summer movie season!

War of the Witchblade!

Witchblade © 2009 Top Cow Productions
By Corey Breen
Pencil

Sorry for the delay in posting this. I wanted to do a 10 minute sketch, kind of like a warm up exercise that people like Skottie Young and Eric Cante do. But, much like I always do, it turns out to start becoming too complex, and takes me a hour or two to do instead. I wanted to draw Witchblade for the LONGEST time, and finally got a round to it, so I'm very happy. I have been loving Chris Bachalo's covers for this series for the past couple of years now. He has been doing covers for the series on and off again, and when he does, it ALWAYS blows me away! Some of his best covers ever have come on this series, and I am just in awe of him. The detail, the designs, the composition.. he just makes Witchblade so so freaking cool! The book has been really good story wise too. I'm not really a fan of the interior artist, but every time I read it, the book is definitely worth picking it up! The storyline now, War of the Witchblade, looks very promising, too!

I tried to not do my usual big, figure drawing for this one. I sometimes tend to draw very large and then realize I take up to much of the page. I draw on 8 1/2 x 11 laser paper most of the time, just because I am used to it. It's not the best paper, but I am comfortable on it, and like the way I can manipulate my mechanical pencil on it. It's very VERY smooth, so the lines just glide on the paper. I can create very solid under-drawings and gestures on it. My friends and coworkers ask me all the time, "why do I draw on such paper, and not something heavier like Bristol," and I tell them that I just work best that way. If I want a more finished, higher quality, inked piece, that's when I transfer the pencils to Bristol. But I always start out on the laser paper. Not afraid to make mistakes on it, too, so I am able to be more free. I think I get nervous on Bristol, because I usually use that for more finished pieces, like I said.

So, a little background on my method. I had nothing to show for the last week or so on the blog, because everything I have worked on lately, I am just not ready to show yet, which has been a bummer. I decided that I want to just do a lot more pieces exclusively for the Blog, that way I always have something to show every week for you guys. The Green Lantern spread, I want to show so badly, but I just can't yet. The reason being, I have found a professional inker, AND colorist to finish the spread, and am going to wait until it is all done. I am so EXCITED about this, I can barely contain myself! Wait til you hear who I got to work on the piece over me! You will be BLOWN away. It's gonna be so cool. Both have been in the comics industry for a long time now, and have done some SERIOUS work for so many top notch books! The piece is gonna look so professional done, and I hope, when it's done, to make posters of it, and give a ton away at the next convention and right here through the Blog! Just be patient on this one, hen it is ready, it's gonna be so cool!

Besides that, I can't show you the Wolverine, Project Rooftop drawing yet, because that was submitted to the website, and hopefully I will be chosen to be shown on the site. I like my redesign a lot, and feel it's original enough to maybe even win a top honor. Maybe. I know there are going to be a lot of entries by top notch artists, so we'll have to see. Once that contest deadline is over on May 15th, and they post the winners to the site, I will post all those drawings I did for the designs right here on the Blog, for sure!

Since I didn't have those to show, I wanted to make some art just for you guys, and yesterday, and today I started doing that. Fellow artist, and inspiration, Chris Samnee, gave me some advice, and told me that he picks one day a month and does drawings EXCLUSIVELY for his Blog, and that way he never runs out of new stuff to show. I want to do this. I need to pick a day to just do like at least five new drawings and then I can post at least one a week! This got me so pumped, that I already started! I am working on a series of all new Batman character drawings based on all the changes from Battle for the Cowl! There are so many changes in the book right now, I wanted to start drawing some of them! Right now I am working on the new Batwoman, and the new Batgirl! I hope to do more, including the new Batman, Robin, and Red Robin. I already did the new Azreal! Then I will post each one by one, in the coming weeks.

I hope you stay tuned and check for those, and I will keep everyone update, as usual! I got REALLY inspired last night when I saw through Jim Lee's Twitter page, that he did a free 8 1/2 minute sketch for a random Twitter follower. The winner got a free drawing of Gambit, and Jim did this AMAZING piece in pencil, pen & ink, and white-out in just uner NINE minutes! WOW! Check it out at http://gelatometti2.blogspot.com/2009/05/8-min-gambit.html!

He totally inspired me to do something similar, because I love his technique! He has gotten so AMAZING lately, I have been in awe of him as well! I knew he was the master, but he has been ON FIRE recently. Have no words for that guy, he is an AMAZING artist, and I am luck to even know him, because he is a GREAT guy too!

Well, I wrote enough for today. Be sure to check out the links I gave you above, and the Jim Lee video for his gambit piece. And then stay tuned for a lot more drawings from me. Thank you for visiting my Blog as always, I am appreciative!

Corey Breen

Stupid Movie, but I still love Gambit...

Gambit © Marvel Comics
By Color Breen

So I saw the crap-fest called Wolverine. If you wanna know what I thought of it, you need to re-read my first sentence again. Yeah, I didn't like it. But, "Corey," you say, "how can you not like it, it had your favorite X-Man, Gambit. And you love Wolverine and the X-Men, too..." Well, just seeing these characters on the big screen is just NOT enough anymore. Yeah, it's cool to see comic books characters that I loved growing up, in movies, but we are so used to that now; the movie has to be good! And Wolverine just wasn't.

Hugh Jackman is a great Wolverine, don't get me wrong. He looks the part and it doesn't come across as lame when he plays it, which it easily could. But in this movie, it was all just fluff. He was not the bad-a$$ Wolverine us comic fans know and love. He was, quiet frankly, a pansy. At times, the fight scenes were cool and "action-packed", but then they ended so quickly and abruptly, it was hard to get into them. Wolverine was about as exciting as an old episode of
MacGyver.

The plot twists were actually my favorite part of the movie, although they were just thrown in there to have the main character do something besides run around naked. I liked the way they tied together his origin, but they did it so quickly, and carefree, that it wasn't the focus of the movie. I got the sense that it could have been so much cooler, had they treated the material more seriously. My point being, that they failed to tell Wolverine's ORIGIN!

I refer back to Barry Winsler Smith's Weapon X tale in Marvel Comics Presents back in the 80's. How AMAZING was that? It made Wolverine creepy, and mysterious, and for 20 years after that, it made readers clamor for his REAL origin. How and why was he experimented on, and why were his memories erased. The movie made nothing out of all those nice aspects of the comics. They included aspects of the really cool Jenkin's/ Kubert/ Quesada Origin comics, and stuff like Silverstri's Wolverine #50. But it was NOT the comics come to life. No suspense. No horror or creepiness. I mean, come on! Where's the mad scientist aspect of the character?! WEAK!

The movie was a mess; boring, and pointless. Totally pointless. Gambit was cool, yes, for the five seconds he's in the movie. He did absolutely nothing in the movie, and I hated that he was there in the end. It made no sense. The way Wolverine loses his memories is retarded, and just dumb writing. All the other characters they show too, are just lame and have nothing to do in this movie. Deadpool was a great effect, and fight scene; but an after-thought. It was too predictable in the sense that there was no threat what-so-ever. Wolverine was just a patsy and got played the entire movie, so you knew Deadpool would just be a quick fight scene, just cause they had to have him DO something in the end.

I HATE that the movie made 85 million dollars this past weekend the MOST! Now they will call this movie a "success". To me, it was an utter failure. They made Wolverine a wussy, and now they will make a sequel to this stupid movie, instead of just giving the rights back to Marvel Studios because it bombed so badly. If it had bombed, maybe they be like, "oh, ok, we tried, here's Wolverine and the X-Men back so you can make a good movie, Marvel". Now if Spider-Man 4 is terrible (AGAIN), it's just gonna be more of the same with the two franchises. I wish it could all be given back to Marvel, re-booted or something under their studios, so that can make something like Iron-Man, and then tie them all together like they want to.

Well, I ranted for a long time on this one. I still love Gambit though. And Wolverine (even though he sucks in the comics for the past five years too). So who cares, really. The real kick a$$ wolverine movie is much better in my head and in my dreams, so at least I have that.

Lastly, why do I have the feeling that I will be repeating this review in August when I will just replace the words Wolverine, with GI Joe?! Ugh... At least I have Transformers II, Harry Potter, and Terminator 4 to look forward too. Oh- and Star Trek and Green Lantern Cartoon DVD to look forward too. And Angels and Demons, of coarse. Wow, look at that, I forgot all about Wolverine already. Nice!

CjB

PS- I did finish my Project Rooftop Entry for the re-design of Wolverine. I will be turning it in on Monday, after I get some final thoughts form my coworkers to see if I should tweak anything on it. I now have three things I have to show you soon, so DON'T let me forget.

1. Green Lantern Spread (coming this week)
2. JLA/ Rittenhouse Archive Cards (coming in July)
3. Project Rooftop Wolverine Re-Design (coming soon)

iPhone Brushes Application!

Wildcat © DC Comics 2009
By Corey Breen
Color "Finger Painting" done in Brushes Application for iPhone 3G

My coworker called me over to his desk late yesterday, and told me to check out this image he found on the AWESOME Vertigo artist, Cameron Stewart's Blog. It was a Hellboy image that was done ENTIRELY on the iPhone 3G! Since I love my iPhone more then life itself (well, maybe just a little less then my Fiance), I was BLOWN away. I read on the his blog that he used a program called Brushes, which cost about $5.00 in iTunes. I immediately brought the program, because I just had to try and do something as cool as what Cameron had done. With just his finger, he created an AMAZINGLY detailed, yet loose, almost full-fledged Hellboy painting. I was very impressed, and had to see what this app was all about, and see if I can do it.

My attempt is above, in the Wildcat piece. This was all done with my stubby little finger. No where NEAR as good as Cameron's Hellboy finger-painting, but I'll get better. This was my first attempt, and I can see how you can really get better at the program. You just need a TON of patience because it is dificult to do with a finger, as well as control the line and zooming in and out. But with practice, maybe I can do something really cool with it. I think Cameron has MASTERED it though, as you can see from his piece below!

Hellboy © Mike Mignola 2009
By Cameron Stewart
Color "Finger Painting" done in Brushes Application for iPhone 3G

Thanks for the inspiration, Mr. Stewart! Be sure to check out his new Seaguy book, out in stores now! In my links section on this page, you can see his Blog!

I'll be back sooon, have a great weekend everyone! Enjoy!

CjB

JLA Cards Coming in SUMMER '09!

Ad in May 2009 Previews for JLA/ Rittenhouse Archives' Card Sets

The event of the SUMMER is HERE!

In July, the JLA/ Rittenhouse Archives' Card Sets drop, and you will finally be able to buy, sell, and trade exclusive hand drawn, original Sketch Cards by dozens of artists, including myself, Corey Breen. Search high and low for my cards, and cards by my coworkers, all of whom are amazing artists! Steve Wands, Dezi Sienty, Michael Sellers, Thomas Valente, Harvey Richards, and Fredrick Haynes all contribute to this amazing set! Be one of the lucky ones to get an ORIGINAL, FULL COLOR CARD!

All of us were lucky enough to do 200-250 sketch cards, along with other professional artists around the world! I hope that in July, you will try and pick up some of the cards, and hopefully, you'll get one drawn by me!

I hope to have more info as the release date gets closer, as I will definitely be posting most of my cards on this blog! That way you can see what they look like, even if you don't collect them and chase them down in stories! I also get to have five cards that I am allowed to sell straight up, so maybe you would be interested in getting one of those from me personally if you can't seem to get one the old fashioned way!

My coworkers and I are very excited about the release of the set, and very proud of the work we put into the cards. We can't wait to show everyone, and closer to the release date, once we get the a-ok, we will do so. Keep a look at right here, and I'll be sure to let everyone know when that is!

Pass the good word, and be ready come JULY!

Corey

Re-enter the House of Mystery!

House of Mystery © DC Comics 2009 - Pin-Up
Corey Breen
Pencil

House of Mystery © DC Comics 2009 - Pin-Up
Corey Breen
Pencil

Since I still do not want to share my Green Lantern Spread (soon, I promise), I wanted to make sure everyone got a chance to see my House of Mystery Sample Splash Pages I did not too long ago! I thought since I had a previous post about one of my favorite Vertigo series about how I had done some art corrections on the book, I wanted to show some of my original artwork and how I would portray one of the best characters in that series, Cain. Cain has been around for a long, long time. If you are reading the current series, and like it, I have to suggest you go out right now and purchase the House of Mystery Showcase Volumes! It reprints all the old, classic tales from the late 60's, early 70's. There is some GREAT stuff there, and some amazing artwork too, especially most of the art by Bernie Wrightson and Neal Adams!

One of my favorite stories is in Volume 1, issue #186, called The Secret of the Egyptian Cat, followed right after by a story called Nightmare. the artwork above is my take on those two stories, with Cain (the storyteller of the House) and the Faun, and this Igor-like character that was drawn originally by Serio Aragones.

If you are in search of some great fables, look no further then the old and now new House of Mystery tales! Be on the lookout for the latest issues of the new series, House of Mystery #13, where you will see some brand new art by the old masters from this series, in Neal Adams, and Sergio Aragones!

Hope you like the images, especially if you haven't seen them yet on my main site, www.cjbpro.com! I did these as samples to show the editor some of my work. It would be so cool to one day do something like a back-up tale or short story in the new series, since they always have guest artists come in and draw some pages. I was hoping with something like these two images, I'd start to get my foot in the door on that.

Anyway, Check back soon on this very blog for more new stuff soon, and hopefully I'll finally post my JLA/ Rittenhouse Cards and also the Green Lantern Spread. Or should I hold off on that til the debut of Blackest Night next month, just for the hell of it?!
LOL Hmmmmmm, maybe...

Corey Breen

You'll just have to WAIT!

Deathstroke & Ravenger © DC Comics
By Corey Breen
Pencil

I know I promised the Green Lantern Spread I have been working on, but I changed my mind, and I don't want to post it just yet. I'm really proud of how it came out, and the finished piece; that I wanted to hold off on revealing it just yet. I want to show it to a few people around the office, see what they think. Not that I expect anything to happen with it, although I think it would make a KICK A$$ poster, I decided to hold off for just a bit longer. Maybe I can get some professional inker and/ or colorist to make it look really killer, you know. I'll see what I can come up with!

So, just because I felt bad that I wouldn't be able to post it today, I decided to do a drawing to hold everyone over! I'll build up the anticipation for the 60 Green Lanterns vs. Sinestro drawing just a tad longer, make people wait it out. People want what they can't have, so the long I don't show them, the more they'll want to see it. HA HAH Just Kidding!

Til then... enjoy this Deathstroke and Ravenger pin-up for the time being. Just did this up quick yesterday, but I really liked how it turned out!

Check back soon, see if I'm ready to unleash the spread! LOL

Cor

The Force Unnessarily Unleashed!

Ahsoka © Lucasfilms 2009
By Corey Breen
Prisma Color Markers, Pen & Ink, Pencil & Photoshop

For Christmas this past year, I got the book and the video game, Star Wars Unleashed. Much like Shadows of the Empire, this was a multi-media release of a story set within the Star Wars chronology. The book was based on the game, and tells the story of Darth Vader's secret apprentice, named Starkiller. It takes place after the Clone Wars and order 66 after Revenge of the Sith movie. In it, Vader is hunting down the Jedi that fell through the cracks, and upon killing one of them, realized he now orphaned a small child strong in the force. Instead of killing the child like he did the Younglings in Revenge, he decided to take on this child as his apprentice, hidden from the Emperor.

Now, I have to say, I love ALL things Star Wars, and try to read as many expanded universe things, because I usually enjoy all of it. My favorite being the Heir to the Empire Trilogy, and the Hand of Thrawn books by Timothy Zahn. But this book, upon reading it, was just plain AWFUL! It's made me go off on a complete nerd rant, and I thought I would share why.

First of all, the main character in this book is named Starkiller. Starkiller?! Come on, that is the WORST name ever. My favorite character is called Luke Skywalker in Star Wars, so why name this idiot Starkiller? So contrived. Second, why in the world would Darth Vader take on a SECRET apprentice? It makes no sense, because there is the rule of two with the Sith, and Vader just went through all the prequels to become the Emperor's second, so why take on a third? He is Darth Vader, he doesn't need a secret assassin. He can do the job himself.

The book sets it up so he can use Starkiller to hunt down Jedi and kill them for him, so he doesn't have to. Would he think for a second that this would not work out? Oh well. Anyway... turns out, he betrays the apprentice after he tells him he wants to take out the emperor and take over the galaxy with him. He betrays him because the Emperor finds out about Starkiller. This is fine, whatever, since there is 200 more pages in the book, we know he lives. So in secret again, pretends to join the newly forming rebel alliance under Vader.

But turns out in the end Vader and the Emperor used him to get the new alliance out in the open to crush it. They kidnap Bail Organa and Mon Mothma, and others and take them to the under construction Death Star. But struggling with the dark side, Starkiller tries to save them. THIS IS WHERE THE AWFULNESS REALLY MAKES ME MAD! He proceeds to kick the CRAP out of Vader, AND the Emperor! WHAT?! Come on! No WAY! It's bad enough that Vader has this "son" that he raised to try and take over the galaxy (hello- that's the whole point of Luke Skywalker later on- why do the same story, and lessen the point of his REAL son??). UGH. So this loser is stronger then the both Vader and the Emperor? No way! Then, he saves the alliance, and they flee, but not before he sacrifices himself in doing so by throwing himself in front of the Emperor's Sith lightning. Stupid death scene. Could have been better if it was Vader, since this book just made Vader a weakling, where Vader should have been, "look kid, you have failed me, I will destroy you," and put a lightsaber though his chest. UGH! Then it ends with the alliance honoring this tool, and they use his family crest as the freakin' symbol of the Rebel Alliance. WHAT? So dumb.

This book spit in the face of Star Wars history, and I hope to god it is not recognized in the real chronology. I've read some bad Star Wars books, but this one is completely unnecessary, and dumb. It made Vader a weak loser, and the Emperor a fool. And the creation of the Rebels is because of this tool? And he is never mentioned ever again? Please. The problem I had the most is that the entire Star Wars story rests on the idea that Anakin Skywalker went from hero to fallen soldier to death bringer, and that he needed to be resolved of his sins by his son. His REAL son. The point of Star Wars overall, was his redemption through and by Luke, and that is what holds the most meaning. It is all about his downfall and redemption. With this new character, you completely lessen those ideals, and make everything with Luke redundant and makes it have less impact. Also, why did the new Rebel Alliance not do anything about the Death Star, or tell anyone for that matter? It took them 15 more years to finally talk about it? UGH! LOL

Well, that's my rant. I will play the video game. Maybe that will at least be more fun then the book. But I am not counting this stupid series as in Star Wars continuity. It was a complete failure, especially compared to the AMAZING Shadows of the Empire, which besides the Dash character, completely worked within the time period it took place. I think that was the problem with this. It tried to create a story and jam it into the history. Shadows just filled in the gaps that were missing. Worked much better.

So, now you say, why did I draw Ahsoka, from the Clone Wars cartoon? Well, if you got this far in this post, there is a reason. Unlike Stupidkille-- I mean, Starkiller, I actually like Ahsoka. At first I hated the idea of Anakin having an apprentice. For much the same reason as Darth Vader not needing one, it seems forced. But the cartoon has been amazing in it's first season, and she has grown on me. I still think she needs to die a horrible death, and that will make it just one more reason that Anakin starts turning to the dark side. He never experiences a huge death of someone close to him, and this could be that person. Usually, the downfall of people reaching rock bottom is the death of someone they love. Ahsoka could be that person. And you can explain her not being mentioned ever again (one of the problems of characters like her and Starkiller), is that her death hurt so much, he told people NEVER to talk about her. It could be a complete denial thing, and something that is a painful inner psychological issue. Makes sense, right? Doubt they will do that but, I can hope, right? We'll see what happens to her, because something has to, because obviously, she is not in Revenge of the Sith.

Why do I even care? HAH

The drawing above was done in pencil, pen & ink, colored in Prisma Color Markers, and touched up in Photoshop. Hope you like it. You know... I just realized that the position of the arm is similar to the Snake-Eyes drawing I had done last week. That was by total accident. Oh well, just goes to show you how hard it is to come up with new positions to draw super-heroes in.

Below is the original inks and pencils.

Ahsoka © Lucasfilms 2009
By Corey Breen
Pen & Ink, Pencil

Ahsoka © Lucasfilms 2009
By Corey Breen
Pencil

PS- I am still working on the HUGE Green Lantern Double-Page Spread! It looks amazing. I have finished the complete layouts, and now am working of finishing the pencils. It's gonna take a little while though. It has 35 characters. This is one of my biggest attempts at doing what someone like Ivan Reis and George Perez have done, fitting a TON of characters on one or two pages. I want to make it as good as I can. I'll keep you updated on it, and will post it as soon as I am done. It's the reason why there was no new drawings or Blog posts until I took a break from it to draw this Ahsoka piece. So if you don't hear from me for a little while again, this spread is probably why. But I'll try to post stuff in-between finishing it, must like I did today.

Time to read Satr War: Outcast, too. God I hope this book is better then the Force Unleashed.

Later all,

Corey

UPDATED - My biggest critic, my Fiance, Kristy, made me tweak a lot of the background colors because she didn't like them before. She said it was all clashing together, and you couldn't see the figure. I didn't agree, til I tried some color changes, and once again, she was right! Thanks Kris!

Now Back to Our Regularly Scheduled Program...

Snake-Eyes by Corey Breen
Pencil

When I started to draw Snake-Eyes last week, I did some gesture drawing to try and get a position down that I wanted to draw him in. In the previous blog post, the drawing of Snake-Eyes was my second attempt. Above is the first attempt. I started drawing this one first, and then abandoned it, because it just wasn't really working for me at the time. It was just too straight forward. So I started a second drawing, and that is the one I finished.

But before I filed this first drawing away in the 'never-used-drawings' folder I have; I decided to keep working on it. I fixed the head and totally reworked the body. The thing I loved most about this drawing was his left arm and the sword. So I kept that and just started to shade the hell out of the piece. I really just put him completely in shadow.

Then I just added a generic design-y background, added some foliage (if you know my drawings at all, you'll know I LOVE drawing foliage!). Then I threw in Timber down at the bottom, and BLAM, I had my second Snake-Eyes piece in the span of a week! Even though it was the first drawing of him- Oh, you get the point!

I hope you like it, though! Now I will go and continue to pray to the Lost monster that the movie will not suck, despite what EVERY one of my friends is saying. I have an ex-coworker working on the style guide for the movie and he claims there is no hope. BUT, I'm not gonna listen to him. LA LA LA LA, not listening. I am gonna run to see the movie, and even if it sucks, if they do Snake-Eyes justice, I will be happy!

I will leave you with that, and with this AWESOME image I found on the web recently. I don't really know what it is from, and I am kinda sick of Zombie super-heroes (although Blackest Night is ok; cause Geoff Johns is the master), but this pin-up is so COOL! I love the art, the movement, the expression... EVERYTHING about this image is SWEET! Great job by the artist. It reminds me of the amazing Stelfreeze cover of the Flash issue #244 with the bees!

Zombie Flash by Cinar

That's it for me this week. And here I thought that i wouldn't have anything to post this week! Silly me. I am off tomorrow, so I'm gonna enjoy that, and I'll be back soon. I actually have more cards to do. No, not really. We just get 5 extra cards for the JLA Series, that we get to keep on our own. We can do 5 cards, and either keep them, sell them or whatever we want with them. After doing 250 of them, I think it's kinda cool they let us do that, and at least have 5 to actually keep for ourselves.

After that, I am trying to draw a huge Green Lantern Cover, that I will have my coworker and ex-inker extraordinaire, Mike Sellers to ink over my pencils! Much like how I work with Steve Wands, I want Mike to use his amazing inking talents to see what he can do with one of my pieces. He requested either Invincible or Green Lantern, and since I just drew Invincible, I thought I'd do a kick a$$ Green Lantern for him to ink. It's actually coming out really cool so far. And unlike the He-Man piece I never got around to finishing, this shall be done!

Happy Easter and Passover everyone,
Peace out!

CjB

Some Work For DC - Part III

Supergirl #35 Page 22 by Jamal Igle & Keith Champagne

Going back a couple of months, I thought I'd show you a correction I did on a recent issue of Supergirl. Above is the original page drawn by Jamal Igle and inked by Keith Champagne. Since this was the introduction of the NEW Superwoman, this was a very important page of the book and the Superman Universe in general. The only problem was that Jamal had drawn in another Kryptonian character on the page. The editor wanted that character removed, so that only Superwoman was featured; for this was the big reveal, after all!

So, it was my job to remove the extra flying figure in the lower left hand corner, and finish all the art and buildings that were now missing from the art. Once I took out the figure in Photoshop (erasing and selecting around him), I had to zoom in real close, and carefully redraw the buildings where he used to be. I did it all digitally on my Wacom tablet, just using the pen freehand. The final corrected art that was sent to the colorist is below. Hopefully I did my job well enough where you can't tell that there was ever a figure drawn there originally! Like I said before, my job is to match the style of the freelance artists so that you never know that anything was ever changed, if changes are needed. When there is an art correction, I must make it seem that thats what the original artist had drawn.

Supergirl #35 Page 22 Correction

So how did I do? It should look like that figure originally drawn had never even existed. WHOOSH, it's gone... MAGIC! The redrawn buildings is all that is there now! Bet you never knew that this page originally had a another character on it!

The now corrected art file is sent to the colorist, in this case the amazingly talented Nei Ruffino, to be colored in Photoshop. This completes the final image as seen in every issue of Supergirl #35!

Supergirl #35 Page 22 Final Color by Nei Ruffino

Hope you enjoyed this quick look behind the scenes in the DC Bullpen, and into my daily job as a Senior Pre-Press Artist. What a great way to make a living, huh? I get to work on comic books all day, and sometimes draw and contribute to all our weekly periodicals. I wonder what I'll be working on today? I hope it's more of stuff like this...

Have a great day!

Corey Breen

PS- House of Mystery #12, with some of my art corrections seen here on my Blog, out TODAY! Check it out! GREAT story and AMAZING art!

Uh Oh, it's Magic...

Efron Designs © Corey Breen 2009
Pencil

Above is a character I designed. It was gonna be for Zuda Comics' launch, hence the card it was drawn on. But I did a Batman one that I sent it instead that was posted on their site a while back. Didn't want to give Zuda a character I created on my own. Anyway, this is a character I named Efron, who is an elf of sorts, and I kind of dig him. He looks cool with his Final Fantasy-esqe water-sword.

I have a TON of creator owned characters and ideas that I'm always working on, but never seem to have the time to just create them. I always start by trying to create a "bible" for the ideas and design a book like it was a video game. But I always seem to only get so far, and then move on to another idea, drawing, or project. My attention span is way too wavering sometimes. I need to just focus on one idea, one book, one character, and sit my a$ down and create it. I hope to do that with SaricH, and just write, and draw it, and stop procrastinating. I have the idea, the plot, and a bunch of designs for characters, so it's just a matter of doing it. I'm hoping working on the sculpture will help get into doing the book.

If I do a book, I can just print it myself as a graphic novel someday or something (obviously after I don't work at DC anymore). But I need to start now. Just focus on SaricH and try to get a book written and drawn. I know I can do it, I just need to start. Much like everything else in my life, once I start something, I have to see it through til the end. So I know if I start a book of my own, I wont stop until I finish it. If it takes five months or five years, I will do this. I wanna follow in the footsteps of one of my comic idols, Dave Sim. If I can have something like the first volume of Cerebus or something, then I will be beyond happy with myself.

I just need to stop being so "lazy" with my creator owned projects.

CjB

Below is some art by Brett Booth that I found from his deviant art site (link found in my links on this page or at http://demonpuppy.blogspot.com/). I really LOVE these drawings. They are so AWESOME! Brett gets a bad rap from a lot of people, and I think it's a little unfair. Yes, he has a very stiff style sometimes, but when he creates characters like this, I think he is AMAZING! I absolutely LOVE anamorphic characters, and I hope to create some just like these below for any book I do.

Thanks for the inspiration Brett! Awesome Designs! Make me want to just create characters for a living, like a lead character designer for a video game or movie ( my DREAM job). It may be too late for me to do that, but if I can use inspiration like this and put it to good use, I'll be content. Enjoy!

Lioness © Brett Booth

White Lion © Brett Booth

Sculpt This!

Designs for SaricH Statue by Corey Breen

Pencil

So, I've been working on these designs to make a statue of one of my creator-owned characters named SaricH. I got myself some Sculpey from an arts and crafts store, and tried to do it straight up. I was working off the initial colored piece I did, that you can see from my first ever blog post, last month. I tried to do it without any designs, or even a wire frame. Bad idea...

It didn't work out so well. I did some nice things with it, but the Sculpey I used was not the right material I thought it was. This was like kid's Sculpey or something. It was too malleable and soft. I couldn't keep any shapes down, and there was too much volume. I was adding too much clay to the piece, and it wasn't what I remember using in college when I tried to make an action figure. The Sculpey I remember was pink, and was a lot more easier to work with. And without the wire frame, I had nothing to go by, and the figure turned out five sizes too big. When I put him in the oven to dry, he kind of sagged too.

So my first attempt at this failed, as you can see above. Oh well... back to the drawing board, literally.

This time I am determined to do it right. I did the new designs, I went to the art store, and got all the materials I remember. I got wires, tools, the Sculpey I remember. I also got some helpful hints from my buddy, Amos (who is an amazing sculptor... check out his link below)! I'm ready to try to make that image of SaricH that you always see associated with me; a professional, cool-as-hell looking statue. I want something I can bring with me to conventions, and have on my desk, and be proud of.

I have a lot of work to do. I'm not a sculptor by any means, so I'm gonna have to really cross my fingers and see if I can gather up all my artistic strengths and make this a reality. If not, I will pay Amos to make it, and I KNOW that it will be amazing, and exactly what I want.

But I'm gonna give it a go again myself, see what I can do. Wish me luck!

Tune in tomorrow for more art! Turns out I have a LOT to show and tell this week after all!
More GI Joe, more "What I do at DC", and more creator owned characters!

CjB

Please Make a Good GI Joe Movie! PLEASE?!

Snake-Eyes & Timber by Corey Breen

Pencil & Marker

In anticipation and wide-eyed optimism I am still holding out hope that the GI Joe Movie will fulfill all my dreams. My favorite TV show as a child, my favorite toy as a child, my favorite comic book series as a child... is being made into a live-action movie much like transformers was. But Transformers was pretty freakin' cool. GI Joe is my all time favorite property, period. IT BETTER BE FREAKIN' GOOD! Please God, let this GI Joe Movie be good... Please...

It goes without saying that I am really, really nervous and yet very excited for the movie. Some things I have seen look cool. Some things I have seen look beyond awful (cough, cough Cobra Commander, cough). I just hope that the movie treats the franchise with respect. And by respect, I mean, stay true to the essence of the original content. The TV show, although silly, treated it like it was real. The comic book, even more so. All I'm asking is that the movie portrays the characters as they should be... as creator Larry Hama made them.

Obviously, Snake-Eyes is my all time favorite character. Even more so then Batman, and Spider-Man. I'm not kidding. How could you NOT love Snake-Eyes?! He is a mute ninja. He doesn't need words! He needs two swords and a WOLF! (Growing up I wish I could meet a wolf and be friends with him and he would go where ever I went. I had my dog Rusty, but he was far from a wolf.) Snake-Eyes is one of the BEST, if not the coolest characters ever created.

Above and below you will see my Snake-Eyes pin-up. Above is in pencil, and toned-up in my Letraset Tria Marker Set (12 Pantone colour markers - cool gray). Below is the initial pencil drawing. Let me tell you though, Snake-Eyes is NOT easy to draw. I've been working on this piece for about 3-4 days now. Props to Mike Zeck, Andrew Wildman and J. Scott Campbell for drawing kick-a$$ pics of him in the past, that was my influence!

Snake-Eyes & Timber by Corey Breen
Pencil

Hope you like the piece. Before I go, I had to share some things I came across this week while reading some comics and surfin' some internet. The first comes from the AWESOME Robert Kirkman of Invincible and Walking Dead. This is a page from the Brit comic that he co-wrote, and it's a comic page that I just had to share. It's not everyday you see a superhero grab his baby boy by the legs and smack down a super-villain with him. Panel two of Brit #12 must go down in comic book history as one of the best panels I've ever seen. HILARIOUS! Enjoy!

Brit #12 © Robert Kirkman

Another cool tidbit I want to pass along. Below is an image from the DCU Blog. That's right... DC Comics finally got their OWN Blog! Yes, finally, DC can reveal exclusive content and news through their own site. It's about time, I'll say, and great work by Alex Segura, Ian Sattler, and everyone else involved! I totally have it at the top of my bookmarks now, and I hope everyone puts it on theirs. Some awesome Blackest Night teasers there right now, so check it out!

http://dcublog.dccomics.com/

Last but not least is one on my favorite sites on the internet... the funny folks at the Onion News! They recently ran this story as to why Barack Obama is depressed, and I think they are RIGHT on! Frakkin' A! Enjoy!

http://www.theonion.com/content/news/obama_depressed_distant_since?utm_source=a-section

I have a ton of family obligations this weekend, so I don't think I'll have much of anything to post by early next week. I could try to post the designs I have done for my statue of SaricH © that I am in the process of making. I am trying to sculpt one of my creator owned characters named SaricH © (actually, the little Leopard Cub from my 1st post, if you scroll down). I tried one attempt, but the clay was too soft, and I tried to do it without a wire frame, and it was just too big and clunky and not what I wanted. So I'm gonna try again with better Sculpty, and more experience. (If I can't do a great sculpture, I'm gonna hire my amazing sculpture friend, Famos Amos!) But, I did do these design drawings (a full 360 turn type deal), so maybe I'll post those on Monday.

We'll see... Til then,

CjB