Tribute to my favorite show of all time!

Cylon Pin-Up
Pen & Ink & Marker

Not only did I finish the 50 more JLA/ Rittenhouse Archive Sketch Cards this weekend, I was able to finish the inks and tones on the Cylon piece I promised! Let me tell you, I did a LOT of drawing this weekend! Whew. It feels really good though. I just put on Abott & Costello Meet Frankenstein (thank you Mike Carlin), and JLU Season 2 DVD's, and worked my butt off.

Since I've been on Twitter, and have a lot of comic book artists I'm following, you can tell from their updates, that they work their butts off, and have a crazy work ethic. It feels good to match some of these artists, and I've been using them as motivation to keep at it. I definitly want to keep going at this pace. Now that the Cards are finally all done, and no new freelance on the horizon for now, I want to make sure I continue to work hard and keep drawing every day.

This blog has been great in that sense, to keep me drawing even if it's not for pay, and have things to post every day or every other day. I hope everyone who checks out the blog can see how much I've been working, and I will do my best to keep up that dedication!

So I hope you enjoy the Battlestar Pin-Up, and I just wanted to say that I LOVED the ending of the show, and can't WAIT until the spin-offs and movies add to the series. It is by far my favorite show of all time, and boo to all the naysayers who didn't like the ending. I say to them... "You LOSE... GOOD day, sir!"

Corey

Invincible WAR!

Invincible Pin-Up
Pen & Ink, Marker & white Out, & Photoshop

I know I said I was would have a Cylon drawing for you by the end of the week, but I finished this Invincible piece first! I did the drawing in pencil, then inked the figure and did him up in my Prisma Color Markers. I then scanned it in, and touched it all up in Photoshop. I had some yellow highlights on the figure, but it didn't look right, so I painted them out in Photoshop.

Then I did the background. I drew the box and colored it in gray Letraset Markers, and splattered it with marker and white out. Then I scanned that in, and changed the color to a nice subtle orange. Then I placed it in back of the figure, flatened it, and there you have the final piece above.

I am done with the Cylon drawing, but I want to do that one up in the grey markers too, to make it look REALLY cool, so I needed more time with that piece. I will try to finish it this weekend, inbetween my 50 new cards I'm handling.

Hope you like the Invincible pin-up, and I hope you are reading the book. Big things went down in the latest issue, that change everything about the book, and it continues to be one of, if not the best super-hero book on the market. Go back and get the trades and catch up, I highly recommend it!

Well, it's off to watch the Syracuse Basketball game, and then get home and start on the cards again. I'll be back with the Cylon pic...

Corey

Inks on Figure

Inks on Background

P.S.- SPECIAL THANKS goes out to the kids at Isaac E. Young Middle School, where I taught art classes yesterday! What a great school, and AMAZINGLY talented kids! This was the third time teaching there, and the BEST yet! Thank you to the school, Scott Misner, and the children for having me as a guest, and I hope to do it again soon!

These are a few of my Favorite Things...

Above- Final Design for My New Tattoo

Before I post new art by the end of the week, I thought I would just talk about some of my favorite things in entertainment. I wanted to give people an insight into what TV shows, Movies, Comic Book Artists, Comic Books, Novels and other things that I enjoy. I hope it gives you an idea of what excites me, and influences me, and you can see a little bit of where I'm coming from. These are the things that get me to dream and create and say, "that was amazing, I need to feed off that, and try and use that to make myself better." Let me know what you think, and if you agree or disagree with any of my picks! Warning you now, there is a LOT I like!

1. Favorite Comic Book Artists
- Joe Mad!
- Chris Bachalo
- Juanjo Guarnido
- J. Scott Campbell
- Humberto Ramos

- Joe Quesada
- Mike Mignola
- Oliver Vatine
- Josh Middleton
- Skottie Young

- Ed Risso
- Dustin Nguyen
- Art Adams
- Ed McGuiness
- Neil Adams

- Adam Hughes
- Ryan Sook
- Mark Buckingham
- Steve McNiven
- Ryan Ottley

- Todd McFarlane
- Ed Benes
- Duncan Rouleau
- Mike Ringo!
- Jim Lee

2. Favorite Comic Book Writers
- James Robinson
- Geoff johns
- Pete Tomasi
- Paul Dini
- Robert Kirkman

- Anthony Johnson
- Greg Rucka
- Jason Aaron
- Rick Remender
- Dave Sim
- Mike Carey

3. Favorite Comic Book Series of all Time
- Starman Series
- Blacksad Vol.1
- Star Wars Heir to the Empire Adaptation
- Spider-Man Kraven's Last Hunt
- Cerebus Vol.2

- Absolute Watchmen
- Absolute Sandman Vol.1
- Elephantmen: Captain Stoneheart
- The Witching Hour
- Superman: Brainiac

- The Walking Dead Vol.1
- Green Lantern: Sinestro Corps War
- Daredevil: Guardian Devil
- Danger Girl Series
- Battle Chasers Series

- Batman Year 1
- Hellboy Vol.1
- Black Adam: The Dark Age
- Northlanders Vol.1
- Invincible Vol.3

- Tellos
- Arrowsmith
- All- Star Superman
- Cerebus Vol.1
- Spider-Man: Torment

4. Favorite Modern Comic Books
- Green Lantern
- Green Lantern Corps
- Fables
- Sky Doll
- The Walking Dead

- Invincible
- Geoff John's Superman
- Wasteland
- Elephantmen
- Dark Tower

- Captain America
- Daredevil
- Black Panther
- Rick Remender's Punisher
- Fear Agent

5. Favorite Comic Book Characters
- Snake Eyes & Timber
- Starman
- Batman
- Hellboy
- Cerebus

- Blacksad
- Green Lantern
- Invincible
- Gambit
- Spawn

- Spider-Man
- Witchblade
- The Sandman
- Rorschach
- Black Panther

- Daredevil
- Robin
- Nightwing
- Sky Doll
- Moon Knight

- Deadpool
- Wolverine
- Green Arrow
- Silver Surfer
- The Goon

- Savage Dragon
- Leonardo of TMNT
- Nightcrawler
- Ekos
- Conan
- Red Sonia

6. Favorite Video Games
- Final Fantasy VIII
- Zelda: Oricina of Time
- Final Fantasy VII
- Final Fantasy X
- Final Fantasy IX

- Final Fantasy XI Online
- Tomb Raider
- Devil May Cry
- Street Fighter 2 Alpha
- Madden '07

7. Favorite Movies
- Braveheart
- 300
- Star Wars
- LOTR
- Pirates of the Caribbean

- The Dark Knight
- Gladiator
- Amadeus
- Indiana Jones
- Pans Labyrinth

- Phantom of the Opera
- Disney's Hunchback of Notre Dame
- Princess Bride
- Die Hard
- 12 Monkeys

- Edward Scissorhands
- Master & Commander
- Moulin Rouge
- The Matrix
- Minority Report

8. Favorite TV Shows
- Battlestar Galactica
- Lost
- Rome
- Band of Brothers
- MI5

- Veronica Mars
- BBC's The Office
- BBC's Coupling
- Pushing Daisies
- Curb Your Enthusiasm

9. Favorite Musicians
- Pink Floyd
- Sigur Ros
- David Gray
- Bruce Springstein
- DMB

- The Arcade Fire
- Alanis
- Led Zepplin
- Peter Gabriel
- Meat Loaf

10. Favorite Composers
- Hans Zimmer
- James Horner
- Howard Shore
- John Williams
- Brian Tyler

- Bear McCreary
- Klaus Balet
- James Newton Howard
- Michael Kamen
- John Debny

- Tyler Bates
- Alexandre Desplat
- Danny Elfman
- Harry Gregson-Williams
- Vangelis

11. Favorite Cartoon Series
- GI Joe
- JLU
- Batman The Animated Series
- Looney Tunes
- Transformers

Told you... What can I say, I like a LOT of things!

In other news, I have taken on 50 MORE JLA/ Rittenhouse Cards! Since I finished my 200 early, another artist pulled out of his 200, and I was given the opportunity to do 50 more cards. I just finished drawing the 6 new ideas that I will use for these next ones. I can't wait to show everyone all my drawings and the final cards for this set! I can't wait til I can tell everyone to go out and try to get one of my ORIGINAL drawings in the set as well! So exciting! I can't believe I took on MORE of these cards (you think I would be sick of them after 200), but I will just put on more of my JLU cartoons, and bang out 50 more! WOO HOO!

More ALL NEW drawings to come by the end of the week! I'm working on that Cylon pin-up I told you about, and a drawing of one of my favorite charcters. See if you can guess which one from above!

I'll talk to you then!

Corey

Some of the work I do for DC Comics-Part II

As I stated in Part I, the best part of my job is when I get to actually contribute to the art in a book, and do significant corrections to a freelancers work that they either don't have time to do, or just don't want to do. A lot of the time, a freelancer is already working on the next issue or two of their book, and it's very difficult to backtrack, and do a revision asked of them by their editors.

Such was the case with the upcoming issue of House of Mystery #12. Drawn by Luca Rossi, the book is a new favorite of mine, and a pleasure to work on. Very nice figure work, and shadows, and Luca really captures the mood of the book. The page above is pg.21 of the issue, and the editor informed me that she needed corrections. At first, she asked the inker, one very talented Jose Marzan Jr., but he was just too busy. So it fell to me.

The editor needed the main character of the page to not be wearing his button-down shirt, and instead still be wearing his t-shirt, like all the previous pages of the issue. I was told to remove the long-sleeve button-down, and replace it with the t-shirt in all panels of the page.

Using my Wacom tablet, I went in, erased the button-down in all the panels, and carefully re-drew, in the style of Luca, the t-shirt that was needed. I had to redraw some of his arms, back and neck, as well as add some detail and shadows on the figure and new t-shirt.

Above is the final colored image, used off my new revised file, by the master himself, Lee Loughridge!

Above is yet another page of the same House of Mystery #12 issue. This is page 21 and 22. Again, my job was to remove his button-down shirt and replace with his t-shirt. Here I had to also fix most of his right leg, and detail in his pants that the button-down was covering, that is now shown, once I drew the t-shirt on. That was tough, because the figures are small, and sometimes that's harder because the shadows can become awkward looking. In that case, you have to keep zooming out to make sure it is working within the entire image like the artist had before the correction.

Above is the final, approved revision that was sent to Lee to color.

Above is the final color by Lee Loughridge. I think he did a great job with this spread. I think it looks amazing, and really creates quiet the depth and atmosphere the page needed. All because of my art correction. LOL Just kidding... GREAT job Lee!

So there you have it. Another example of some of the work I do on a daily basis here at DC. I really enjoy working on these books, and doing this type of work. Otherwise I would not be doing it going on nine years now. I like to tell people who come to visit on tours or demonstrations, that my job is to not exist. And by that I mean, if I do my job correctly, and good enough, the reader is not supposed to know that I changed anything. What they see is the final page of the comic, and what they think the artist of the book had drawn. If I did my job correctly, you should not notice that I actually did go in there, and make art changes.

Whether it be redrawing Superman's chest emblem (which everyone draws wrong), or changing a character's clothing, my job is to not know I changed anything. Hopefully, I matched the style of the artist well enough, so you, the reader can not tell when and where I made changes to the art. But in reality, on pages I do art revisions, it is actually a combination of the freelance artist, and myself.

I hope you enjoyed this little two-parter. I will get back to some of my originally artwork now. Every once in a while, I will post some cool things like this House of Mystery stuff, to show you what it is I'm working on. Unfortunately, since we are not like Marvel, I do not get credit in the book for doing the work I do. Marvel credits their production artists, we do not. That is something I hope will change one day, but for now, is what it is. I do understand why they don't though (so many people work on a book in various aspects, that it would be too hard to credit everyone).

For now, I think it will be nice to share on my blog from time to time. Let people have a "behind the scenes", sneak peak into the DC Bullpen. And I will do it to remind my friends that I don't just surf the internet all day, I actually work my butt off too. In closing, this is what it is I do here all day, and hopefully, the next time you pick up a DC book, know that I will be in there somewhere...

See ya in the funny books, and I'll have a new piece posted to the blog by the end of the week! Thinking about doing a Cylon pic, to celebrate my favorite TV show of all time coming to an end this past weekend Yes, it was the best. Followed closely by Rome, Band of Brothers and Lost. Til next time,

Corey

Some of the work I do for DC Comics - Part I

I've been at DC Comics now for nine years, and a Pre-Press Artist for eight. I work mostly on all of the weekly periodical "floppy" comics, with the occasional TPB or Hardcover collections. I do any art and/ or lettering corrections that the editor, art director, or freelance artist themselves, need. For example, an editor comes to my desk and says they need a panel swapped, a balloon added with text, or someone's eye color changed from blue to green. It really all depends on the book and the editor, how many corrections are done on a particular book. The correction could come at any stage of our production of the book as well. In the B/W art and scan, or the final colored page. For example, for books like Green Lantern or Supergirl, the editors have a lot of sound effects color changes, and lettering corrections. I'll go into that more when I post examples of that in the future.

One of the corrections that comes across my desk is art/ color corrections. These are the corrections that are the most fun for me, and the easiest to show because this is when I actually get to contribute to a piece from a freelancer. The above piece is a wonderfully drawn and colored cover of an old Superman/ Batman issue, by Ethan Van Sciver and Moose Bauman that an art direct gave me to make corrections on for the hardcover collection. The art director is going to use this image as the cover, much like the other trade collections of Superman/ Batman that have come out. The first thing I was told to do was to separate Superman from Batman. Superman would be on the top, followed by the logo and title of the trade, followed by Batman on the bottom.

I was told to separate the two characters, and then make some art/ color corrections to the now two pieces. I was told to get rid of the light in the phone booth. Extend the art on the Superman piece to have more room on the right side of the image with more glass. Then with the Batman piece, I was told to get rid of all the glass in the background, and the artists' signature.

What I did was crop the image in half, saving the Superman piece and the Batman piece, separately. Then I took out the light, just filling it with the same color as the inside phone booth. Then I extended the art, and carefully cloned and redrew the glass and the orange background to match the rest of the piece. For the Batman piece, I cut out Batman from the entire image, so that Superman's torso and the glass were gone. Then I cloned and re-painted the background to match.

Below you can see what the final images that will go on the cover look like.

Next, for the interior design pages, where the credits will go, I was given this image below drawn by Ian Churchill. The corrections the art director needed on this piece, was to remove the background, including the top of the building on the bottom that batman is jumping off of. Then extend the piece lengthwise, and finish Batman's cape.

The final corrected image is below, where I finished drawing Batman's cape, and colored it matching the rest of the shape and color of the cape that Ian had drawn. I selected all around the characters, and deleted the background.

These are just a quick example of the type of things I do at DC. Some, like these, are very simple, and straight forward. Some are way more complex, and extensive. I hope you liked it. If you have any questions, don't be afraid to ask, and I hope I explained it well!

Next, in part II, I will show you some corrections I had to do on the upcoming issue of House of Mystery #11 over freelance artist Luca Rossi!

-Corey-

The Angel of Death Awaits You!

Azrael: Death's Dark Knight by Corey Breen

Battle for the Cowl - Azrael: Death's Dark Knight #1 pg.20 Art by Frazer Irving

Above is my version of the ALL NEW, ALL DIFFERENT Azrael!
I love this character. For some reason, back when Denny O'Neil and Joe Quesada came out with this mini-series call The Sword of Azrael, I took to it right away. I have loved the character ever since. I even loved him when Batman broke his back and took over. Yet I only liked that when he had the huge claw gloves, and not when he fully took over with the new tech suit. That suit didn't work as Batamn or Azrael. It was like Red/ Blue Superman.

I even liked him when he grew his hair long and had the half mask, all white outfit. I had a hard time drawing that suit, I remember, so I never did a full drawing of it. Still liked it though.

But now this is the newest incarnation of the Character, and it's pretty cool. I hope once Battle for the Cowl is over, and this series finishes it's three issue run, that it spins off into it's own title again. It's a cool premise, and you could totally make it connect with the old series, maybe bring back the old order and Jean-Paul Valley too. Could be a cool Da Vinci Code, Opus-Dei thing, mixed with the action of say, the Highlander or something. I've always loved Knight Templar stuff, so Azrael is a character with a lot of potential. And who would EVER not like a guy who weilds a FLAMING SWORD?! I do hope if they bring the book back to a monthly, that the old costume rears it's head at some point. Joe Quesada's designs on that were AWESOME!

Great work in this new series by a REALLY cool artist named Frazer Irving. So glad he is back here at DC, after I loved him in Seven Soldiers Klarion a couple years back. Also, coworker, Sal Cipriano on letters in this book... GREAT work Sal!

That's it for now, but be sure to check back REALLY, really soon, where I am going to post some examples of the type of work I do here at DC in the bullpen. I never got a chance to show everyone on my main site, so I think this blog is a great place to show people "what it is I do HERE, exactly". LOL

Til then,

Corey OUT!

In Case You Missed It!

Haunt Image by Corey Breen

Todd McFarlane & Robert Kirkman's Haunt - Advertisement by Ryan Ottley

Prince of Persia Image by Corey Breen

Superwoman Image by Corey Breen

Some new images from my website that you may have missed!

Since Haunt is someone you may not recognize, I posted the AWESOME art of Ryan Ottley, who will be the artist on the title. Can't wait for this one, even though I'm STILL waiting for Spawn/Batman from December 2006... Todd?!

Enjoy!

Will have some newer stuff, yet unseen, by this weekend... I hope!

Masters of the Universe!

Always been a HUGE fan of He-Man. Besides GI Joe, that was my favorite Cartoon and the toys I played with the most. Something about He-Man and Battle Cat and Orco was just too cool not to play with.

I began working on a Jam piece with Steve again, where I would do a pin-up of all the heroes of Masters of the Universe, and Steve would do the villains. I got as far as pencils on He-Man, Orco, Stratos, Teela, and Fisto, until the freelance JLA/ Rittenhouse Cards came up, and I had to put this on the back burner. I'm really happy with the He-Man and Orco images, so I hope to finally put them all together and finish the final piece. I'll have to talk to Steve and see if he is still up to doing the second part of the jam piece, but if not, I'll have a cool He-Man heroes pin-up.

If you like these, and other 80's cartoon characters, be sure to check out my site (www.cjbpro.com) where I have various pin-ups of GI Joe, COPS, Thunder CATS, and even Strawberry Shortcake!

Speaking of which, I can't WAIT for the GI Joe Movie this summer, I don't even care if if it sucks (yes I do-it better be good). It is gonna be the biggest dream come true! I am currently looking for cheap copies of all the old cartoon episodes, but they are out of print and really hard to find at a good price. Let me know if anyone has any luck in finding these, or knows someone who has them I can burn from. Dying to relive all those classic episodes!

I heard movies are being made of Thunder CATS and another remake of Masters of the Universe, so I hope that comes true too. But I just really hope, like GI Joe, they take all of the properties seriously. I know they are really just nostalgic memories from my past, but they had such a HUGE influence on my life, I want the coolest movies they could make. Guess we'll find out soon with GI Joe. With that movie, as long as there is an uninterrupted 20 minute sword fight between Snake Eyes & Storm Shadow, I will be as giddy as a school girl! Please don't mess that up, PLEASE! LOL

Well, got to get back to my JLA Cards, which I should finish tonight... I only have 12 cards left! 12! That's 188 done in one month! I still have to label all of them and scan them all, but I am so looking forward to finishing the final 12 tonight! So excited!

Have a great day everyone...

Corey

Mock Batman "Hero" Cover

Back when The Dark Knight Movie and the Hulk Hero Covers for Marvel (where a lot of different artists did a drawing of the Hulk on a blank mock-up cover) were coming out, I decided to do something like that for Batman. I made a mock-up Batman cover, and handed them out to some coworkers to try and do our own, just for fun.

I started three different versions of a possible image for it. I tried doing one that was more in the line with the movie versions of the characters, in a tribute to Heath Ledger, but it just wasn't really working for me. I love drawing Batman characters, yet they are always a real challenge. It's so hard to draw something new that no one has ever drawn before for Batman, so it's tough coming up with a new idea.

I have always loved Batman Beyond, and wish the main Batman book would be more of a legacy book, where something like Dark Knight Returns by Frank Miller DOES come to pass, and/ or Bruce gets old and hands down the Mantle. So I decided to instead try something along those lines.

I tried a drawing with a "new" Batman Beyond type, and a new Red Robin sidekick. I think it would be cool if Dick Grayson finally took over for Bruce, and then Tim Drake became the new Nightwing, Robin went back to Stephanine Brown, the former Spoiler/ Girl Robin. Then Red Robin would be Bruce's son Damien, and then introduce Terry Gillam (the Batman Beyond of the future) as a little kid, that will one day take over from a old Bruce, much like the BB show did. Also I would keep Kate Kane as Batwoman, I like her, and Oracle stays the same, as well as Renee Montoya as the Question. Keep The new Blue Beetle kid, but make him like the Bat-crew's errand boy to deal with stuff outside Gotham. I don't know, just thinking. I could so go on and on, but...

Anyway, back to my drawings... These two are my Dick Grayson as Batman in a cross between Batman's costume and the black costume of Batman Beyond cartoon. I live for the Black Batman costumes like the movie and think it just looks more like he should then in the gray and blue, as much as I love that costume too. I just did the Batman Beyond costume and added a cape. LOL

Enjoy though. Maybe I'll try and finish these three, into finished pencils, but I just kinda let it go too long, and don't think I'll go back to them. I wanted to put a very crazy detailed skyline in the back of the piece with Red Robin, so maybe I'll finish that one...

Let me know what you think...

Corey

TMNT POWER!

I did this drawing of the Turtles a long time ago actually, but it's one of my favorites. I was able to convince my coworker, Steve Wands, to color another piece for me. I love Steve's colors, and I have been dying for him to color yet another piece of mine. He had previously colored a Batman/ Spawn image for me, and also a Hellboy/ BPRD image that is one of my all time favorites.

I think we really work well together, and I think his colors on this TMNT piece really kicks butt! He is usually very loose and free with his inks and colors, but since I was pretty tight with the digital inks on this piece, he decided to keep it simple. It really pops, and it really captures the Turtles that I really like. I like the Turtles that are colored very brightly, yet Steve was able to also make the piece very moody, which is hard to do. It doesn't make them too cartoony, which I think is key in depicting the characters. Great job Steve! When you have a new drawing done, I would love to return the favor and color a piece of yours!

Just for the hell of it, and because his Hellboy colors came out so well when I converted it to grayscale, I thought I would do that here, and post that too! Let me know what you think of it. Also, below, I'm posting the Hellboy colors done by Steve, so you can see what I mean!

More drawings and posts to keep coming daily, I have a LOT to show to kick off this blog!

Hope you like,

Later,

Corey

Welcome

Hi, and welcome to my blog. I hope you find this somewhat a companion site to my main site at www.cjbpro.com. I will do my best to try and link the two, and hopefully you will use this blog to go to my main site, and check out all the other things that are there. I'm new to this blogging thing, but I'm sure I'll get the hang of it, since I've been to so many different artist's blogs, and have seen what they are able to do with it. Please feel free to contact me with helpful ideas and hints to try and make this a success.

Thanks,

Corey Breen