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I may get shot for this...

Started by marko10174, 23 April, 2017, 09:52:14 PM

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Dog Deever

For me, Carlos just has an incredible understanding of human form and the way it works. I'm not talking so much about simple proportion, more the way figures stand, how their weight distributes and the way they move in his work all seems very natural and dynamic. Even a fairly static, front on piece of two figures walking above has a sense of natural movement and the figures have poise and presence that can be hard to achieve and comes about through underpinning knowledge and talent.
I love John Burns' stuff- he's a great artist, vastly experienced and great with figure work, he's another one of my 2000ad favourites. But even he has the occasional stiff, awkward looking poses where it doesn't quite work.

Carlos' work just never gets old for me, I love his trademark 'untidiness', he's been my absolute favourite comic artist, since I first clapped eyes on Portrait of a Mutant. I love a lot of artists work a lot and for many varied and sometimes conflicting reasons; but I just love his more. :)
Just a little rough and tumble, Judge man.

positronic

Quote from: JayzusB.Christ on 25 April, 2017, 05:30:13 PM
Quote from: positronic on 25 April, 2017, 03:27:37 PM
Quote from: JayzusB.Christ on 25 April, 2017, 03:15:13 PM
i kind of miss his painted work.

Any examples you can post? I'm trying to think if I've seen this, or merely color painted over his penciled-and-inked pages. I'm sure it does exist, I'm just trying to remember where I've seen it.

Well, I was referring to the painted ink drawings.  You can't have missed them.




I think what I was trying to get at there (and I may not have been clear) is that I was thinking of pages in which Carlos himself clearly used a brush to paint the color over his original pencil lines, and thus is an integral part of the original art page.

In the first example you've shown, that seems like it could easily be the work of another artist (a colorist), working from a scanned copy of Carlos' penciled and inked original pages.

In the second example below it, it's harder to be certain. The color in that one looks more like it might well be on the original art page, although it's hard to be 100% sure. I would assume if the color is photographed from the original art page, then it's almost certainly the work of Carlos himself.

positronic

This is probably going to seem like a strange comparison to most people. When I look at Carlos Ezquerra's artwork, I am reminded of some of the best aspects of both Joe Kubert and Robert Crumb.

As for Ron Smith, well... he certainly drew a LOT of Judge Dredd. Somehow I never felt like he "fit in" with the other great Dredd artists, though (diverse though they may be). I think ultimately the most telling indictment of his work to me, was when I read in Thrill-Power Overload that he used to set himself a specific amount of time to work on each page, based on his page-rate from 2000 AD. When that time elapsed, he was done, regardless of what the page looked like at that point. Apparently it was a system that worked for him, in justifying his page-rate, but it seemed a bit mercenary to me, and hard for me to respect from the point of view of the-artist-as-craftsman.

Robin Low

Quote from: positronic on 26 April, 2017, 05:14:07 AMAs for Ron Smith, well... he certainly drew a LOT of Judge Dredd. Somehow I never felt like he "fit in" with the other great Dredd artists, though (diverse though they may be). I think ultimately the most telling indictment of his work to me, was when I read in Thrill-Power Overload that he used to set himself a specific amount of time to work on each page, based on his page-rate from 2000 AD. When that time elapsed, he was done, regardless of what the page looked like at that point. Apparently it was a system that worked for him, in justifying his page-rate, but it seemed a bit mercenary to me, and hard for me to respect from the point of view of the-artist-as-craftsman.

Hmmm. That will probably cause far more offence than the OP.

Ron Smith absolutely was a craftsman. He was making an honest living by producing something to order for a customer in a timely manner. The fact that he did this to a pretty consistently high standard just demonstrates he was a very good craftsman.

Was he a great artist as well as good craftsman? Well, the proof lies in the admiration people still have for his work long after he stopped crafting it.

Regards,

Robin

Fungus

'Indictment of his work' ?!  :o
Sheesh.

I, Cosh

Quote from: marko10174 on 24 April, 2017, 10:45:36 AMAfter reading Dark justice, I just thought to myself "oh man, could you imagine if all the Dredd stories looked like this?"
As nobody has really jumped in with two feet, I'll have a go: "Twelve weeks of that was boring enough, thanks very much."

Horses for courses, innit? I can see what it is that people admire about Staples art, but it's not really for me. Striving for some kind of photo "realism" is just as much of a stylistic abstraction as stick figure minimalism but, as with computer game art, I prefer things which are more obviously imaginitive [NB not intended as a dig, just struggled to express exactly what I meant there.]

On the other hand, Ezquerra wouldn't have been in my top ten when I was a kid in the 80s. I appreciate him a lot more now but, given the choice, I'd always take a Henry Flint Dredd.
We never really die.

Spikes


SIP

More sacrilege!!! Don't start on Ron Smith now as well.......😭

It's not mercenary to have a time limit for your pages - the man has to eat! The draughtsmanship on those pages is incredible.

SIP

Quote from: Dog Deever on 26 April, 2017, 12:08:15 AM
For me, Carlos just has an incredible understanding of human form and the way it works. I'm not talking so much about simple proportion, more the way figures stand, how their weight distributes and the way they move in his work all seems very natural and dynamic. Even a fairly static, front on piece of two figures walking above has a sense of natural movement and the figures have poise and presence that can be hard to achieve and comes about through underpinning knowledge and talent.



I couldn't agree more Dog Deever.  It takes incredible talent to produce convincing weight and natural form. He's an absolute master at it. The fact that he makes it look so frustratingly effortless only increases his brilliance in my eyes.

Jim_Campbell

Quote from: SIP on 26 April, 2017, 08:27:16 AM
More sacrilege!!! Don't start on Ron Smith now as well.......😭

It's not mercenary to have a time limit for your pages - the man has to eat! The draughtsmanship on those pages is incredible.

I was more astonished by the revelation that after a while, Smith more or less stopped pencilling and went straight into the pages with ink...!
Stupidly Busy Letterer: Samples. | Blog
Less-Awesome-Artist: Scribbles.

TordelBack

#100
Trying to stay out of this aesthetic willy-measuring ('mine's at least an inch more detailed than yours'), but have to strongly agree with the comments on Ezquerra's mastery of mass and pose - his figures (and vehicles) often seem like they'd fall out of the page if you gave it a slight shake: everything is just on the very edge of balance, the exact point of transition between potential and kinetic energies: it's why every panel is exciting, and believable, and leads you through the story.

And as for Ron Smith - how anyone can look at Judge Child, Black Plague, Sob Story, Shanty Town, Graveyard Shift and not just gawp open-mouthed at the insane genius of the man...

Conversely, if there was a dullness to Dark Justice, it wasn't anything to do with Staples' art, which really reached the pinnacle of the painted realism style. It's not usually my thing, but that was something special.

JOE SOAP

Quote from: positronic on 26 April, 2017, 05:14:07 AMI think ultimately the most telling indictment of his work to me, was when I read in Thrill-Power Overload that he used to set himself a specific amount of time to work on each page, based on his page-rate from 2000 AD. When that time elapsed, he was done, regardless of what the page looked like at that point. Apparently it was a system that worked for him, in justifying his page-rate, but it seemed a bit mercenary to me, and hard for me to respect from the point of view of the-artist-as-craftsman.

The fact that is true makes his level of artistry even more astonishing.

CalHab

Ron Smith was doing Chronos Carnival when I first started reading the prog. It took a long time before I could disassociate him from that in my mind. I appreciate him more now, but he wouldn't be particularly near the top of my list of favourite Dredd artists.

JayzusB.Christ

Quote from: CalHab on 26 April, 2017, 09:06:48 AM
Ron Smith was doing Chronos Carnival when I first started reading the prog. It took a long time before I could disassociate him from that in my mind. I appreciate him more now, but he wouldn't be particularly near the top of my list of favourite Dredd artists.

Whereas i grew up with his Dredd. I miss him. Nobody did Mega-Citizens like him, and his pimply juves were as much an essential part of the city as McMahon's cactus-shaped blocks.
"Men will never be free until the last king is strangled with the entrails of the last priest"

I, Cosh

Quote from: JayzusB.Christ on 26 April, 2017, 09:16:48 AM
Quote from: CalHab on 26 April, 2017, 09:06:48 AM
Ron Smith was doing Chronos Carnival when I first started reading the prog. It took a long time before I could disassociate him from that in my mind. I appreciate him more now, but he wouldn't be particularly near the top of my list of favourite Dredd artists.
Whereas i grew up with his Dredd. I miss him. Nobody did Mega-Citizens like him, and his pimply juves were as much an essential part of the city as McMahon's cactus-shaped blocks.
Same. I started reading in the late 200s when there were crowds of Ron Smith muties and weirdo cits as far as the eye could see. Lovely stuff.
We never really die.