LOONEY TUNES #219 Cover Art: From Concept to Final Art!

From the concepts to final art, I thought I'd post the full process of a Looney Tunes comic cover I did! Recently, I was going through my archives and saw I had pics of everything that would show the full process. I'm a process junkie myself and thought it might appeal to others out there.

Here are the original 4 concepts I came up with when I was asked to create a cover for the Looney Tunes comic series. This is an "icon" cover that features The Road Runner and Wile E. Coyote. Above, is the scan I made of the original thumbnail sheet and this is what I sent to DC Comics who then sent it to WB Global Publishing for approval. There was no specific art direction so I had free reign to come up with fun scenarios. I did light, loose pencil sketches to plan things out and did a quick ink over my penciled lines. Once I erased my pencils underneath, I added some gray magic marker to show separation and add some depth. It's a simple trick to help sell your rough ideas as thumbnails are smaller, but it helps as it keeps the elements of the design from blending together and looking flat.

Not all my thumbnails are this tight. In fact, these are super, super tight! More often, my cover concepts are loose enough to play with or add to them. This was kind of locked down from the beginning.

Here's a photo of the thumbnail sheet itself which I created to make the process quicker. I made a little comic page grid (which is to scale) and printed them 4-up on cheap copy paper. I saved the file and can print them out when I need them. Great for doing comics and covers as they have all the specs on them that the full comic art boards have. I also have a digital version I created of the art boards as well for full digital art.

Once the concept was picked and approved, it was time to move to the full-size pencil art! 

I do my roughs on cheap 11x17 copy paper and label them at the top "ROUGH". The black border is to spec and was done with a black Sharpie marker. Then I enlarged my small thumbnail to full size and printed it out. I take the printout and place it under my clean bordered sheet of paper. I use my light table to work over my thumbnail as I pencil and refine the image at full size. Again, these thumbnails are really tight, so there wasn't much more I could add or change to it on the fly. Once I have it penciled, I take my Micron Pens and do a quick ink to the rough. When I do this I really refine and lock in the final image. It seems like an extra step that is not normally needed for comics, but with any licensed work I try to make my art clean and defined.  

Below are a scan of the final rough cover art and a photo of the actual sheet. The scanned art is what I send back to DC Comics who then sends to WB again for final approval. I'm showing the photo of the rough as you can see the pencil lines under my inked ones. The end benefit to doing all this is that I also have something else to sell at a convention or to a collector later on. 

The art is approved! No changes! Time to move to the next step and do the final inked art! Again, I use my light table and place the rough art underneath a clean sheet of DC Comics Cover Art Board. I tape my rough behind the art board to hold it in place and then ink the final art. This is why my final original inked art is so clean when you see them in person as you don't see any pencils underneath! One of the major benefits to working this way is that the digital clean up after scanning is practically zero. This is a huge time-saver!

Side Note: if you do ink directly over your pencils on an actual image, and  wait for the ink to dry, then you'll have to erase the pencil lines underneath. When you do, even softly with a kneaded eraser, you'll pick up some of your ink along with it causing some fading of the line in spots. You then have to go back over and re-ink the areas again to freshen them up. Been there, done it, don't like doing it. 

In a sense, I am retracing my art yet again, but now I'm adding the line depth to it. Every licensed property has its own look and you have to match the inking style to it. The Looney Tunes inks are the same as Scooby... in case you were wondering.

Below is the scan of the final inked art and the photo of the actual art itself. When I scan the final inks, I don't scan as an RGB because it would pick up any white paint corrections I might have to make and all the blue grid lines of the DC Art Board would be seen. I just want the black line art only. I always scan the art at 600dpi for my archives. There are times, not always, where I would scan an RGB version just for my personal records. There is something about seeing it "all there" as it were.

Once the art is all scanned in, I then do any final digital tweaks to the art I might see that got picked up in the scan. When I'm happy with it, I save the file and then have to format the art to DC specs. I take the art and resize it and then place it into the final art file that DC's Production Department provides to all artists. You resize the art to actual printed comic size and make sure it all lines up in the grid lines of the Photoshop file. 

You then save the art as a TIFF file and label it to their labeling specs. In this case, the file was labelled "LT Cv219.600_BW". 

LT stands for Looney Tunes, Cv219 means it's the cover for issue #219. The 600 means the file is 600dpi and BW means it's in Black and White. If it was a final colored file it would be "LT Cv219.600_COLOR". 

Here is the formatted file looked if you printed it out (without my blog info, naturally). 

Just for giggles, I took a low-res screengrab of the formatted art file in Photoshop so that you can see the blue grid lines. You can see the everything lines up in the live area, trim, and bleed lines. The top third line shows where the logo and other cover elements would go. There is a little mark on my little thumbnail grids as well, because you have to plan everything out in the beginning so there are no issues later on.

Originally, I planned to have have the Road Runner say "Beep Beep" but we really didn't need it. There is also plenty of room if DC wanted to add a blurb or burst of text somewhere if they wanted.

Once the file is formatted and saved, you then upload the file to DC Comics via their file server and you are done. Contact the editor and send them your invoice! If I'm not coloring the image, I will load another page (or contact the colorist) with any notes or color ideas or effects I was thinking of. 

To move comics along, we work in a pipeline assembly. I prefer to color my art if I can (if time allows as you get paid for it, naturally) but I'm not adverse to working with someone to keep things moving. I worked a lot with Candace Rock (formerly Candace Schinzler-Bell) who worked for Heroic Age Studios before she went solo. She worked for DC as a colorist on Scooby and Looney Tunes for a long time and would color most, if not all, of my DC covers starting around 2010. She did the final colors for this cover! 

After I loaded up the final art to DC, I would directly email her my thoughts and any notes on it. I would sometimes send her the art file as well to save her the time of downloading it from DC. The pipeline at DC would move slower at times and we'd get a jump on things by just working directly.

The benefit to working with someone you can trust and like is that you can keep moving on a project or go on to the next to keep a workflow going. Candy was a huge help to me on several projects over the years! Sadly, she (like many) have moved on in life and stopped doing comics as the comics industry was changing and the work just wasn't as plentiful as it once was.

Below is the final colored file she emailed me to see what I thought. I'd make a comment here and there but she never disappointed me and I was usually always fine with everything she did. She delivered the final colored art to DC's production where the cover elements were added by a designer. Then the editor and art director would look at it to make sure it was all good and then sent it to WB for a final, final approval. 

Remember, I said I made notes that I loaded up with the file to DC directly? That was so the designer on the back-end would know to add "OUCH!" to the Coyote's sign. Keep everyone in the pipeline when you can! It's important! 

Here's the final printed cover when it hit the comic stores! I'm quite happy with it still! I hated that version of the DC Comics logo though. Thankfully, they went back to the classic DC Comics "bullet" logo! 

Finally, for those that made it to the end, here is a pic of the package of original art I sold to a collector! This is the benefit of working on actual paper! It's one-of-a-kind art and it's original production art! You have something to sell and make money on the back-end of a low paying comic industry. I sold the thumbnails, final inks, and a signed printed comic to a collector (with a Certificate of Authenticity that they got it from me)! 

Sometimes I will sell the rough pencil art and final art separately. Most high-end collectors just want the final inked art (as it's what the general public sees) and a copy of the book. Some collectors like the rough art with all its flaws, paste-overs, and creative energy. I sold the rough art and a signed printed copy of the book (with a C.O.A.) to another fan.  

If you have to work digitally, it's fine and I have... but I usually always try to have something on paper if I can. My Strawberry Shortcake work was all digital, but most of the roughs and preliminary work were all done on paper! I may be "old school" but I still love physical art!

REPOST: Drawing SCOOBY-DOO video!

For newer followers! A repost of a video I shot drawing Scooby-Doo. It was shot way, way back with an HD Flip camera that hung precariously above my drawing table. A close up headshot of Scooby I drew in real time. Drawn on cheap copy paper. It's a bit light at first since I use a 5H for initial breakdowns but it gets darker when I tighten it up. Inked with a Pitt Brush Marker.

Click here to watch the video here on Vimeo!

BLAST FROM THE PAST: Cartoon Network Cartoon Cartoons #20 cover art!

It's a HOT one out there today in my area! Around close to 98 degrees! Yikes! We never get this kind of weather on the East Coast this soon in the season! 

Thought I'd post a cover I drew of the Eds trying to stay cool during a hot summer! I'm ready to build me a slip n' slide to cool off! 

Happy 25th Anniversary to Shrek! / Some of my work I did for the franchise licensing

Happy 25th Anniversary to Shrek! The first animated film was released today back in 2001. Hard to believe it's been that long! I thought I'd post some art I did for Shrek The Third and Shrek Forever After (Shrek 4 was still the working title it was called at the time I did art for the property). All the art I'm showing was done back in 2007 and 2010. Didn't do a whole lot for the 3rd film, but did a LOT for Shrek 4. It was my first time drawing these characters and working DreamWorks licensing and their approval process. While a lot of art had backgrounds, I had to keep a lot of the elements separate so that things could be mixed and matched if need be.

 

As a bonus to this post, I thought I'd post a piece of art and all the steps it took to get to the final version. 

The image below is of Shrek taking his morning mud bath. It's fairly simple in design and not much seems to change from image to image. Most of it I nailed first time out, and then it was fine-tuned in spots. My original sketch had him enjoying his bath a bit more and I tried to capture the nuance of the facial acting that was shown in the first film when he took a bath. That was changed though in the approvals to convey a  more "commercialized" look to all the scenes and characters. Any nuance was changed to show simple broad emotions that were clearly defined in each image. 

I would initially draw a bunch of images based on the art direction and scan them in submit them as JPEGs. All these were drawn on cheap copy paper. I photocopied the border grid on each page so I knew the exact space I had to fill. DreamWorks licensing would then review and do a redlined corrected version, meaning that they would draw over my art in red and made any corrections they wanted. I would then do new, clean, revised versions and resubmit the art batch again. As each batch of 10 images went to the approvals, I would always keep drawing or revising to keep it all moving. Some times it would be approved to go to the next phase (maybe 1 or 2 drawings at most), but most of my Shrek 4 stuff went through multiple revisions. All this on a deadline that kept getting closer and was being slightly tweaked.

With Shrek The Third, it was all fairly clean cut as the film was done in the can. Not so much with Shrek 4... There were many things still in flux and changing daily. Every time I submitted a piece with Rumpelstiltskin, he would come back looking slightly different from the reference I kept getting. Same for the witches and ogres. Fiona's "battle" outfit when she led the ogres had some minor tweaks to it. I will say that DreamWorks gave me a lot of great reference but you didn't know things had changed until you got the sketches back. I felt like I was the last person in the pipeline at times, but it sometimes goes like that. 

Not all, but for most images, there were around 3 or 4 revisions for each image. I kept each version and labeled them as it was needed for me to keep a record (as I got paid for revisions) and it made it nice to see how a piece of art progressed.

So, this piece just changed Shrek's facial expression. I originally drew his teeth the way they look, but they then wanted a more simple clean look to his smile. I did that, and then they saw it and went back to showing his individual teeth. He does look better that way. 

Keep in mind that this was an easy one and only had the initial drawing and two revisions. 

Once the final approvals came through (in batches) you moved to the inking stage. Once the inks were done, there were never any further tweaks done. Everything was always nailed down at the pencil stage.

I inked a bunch myself, but I had artist Dan Davis help me out with the inks (as our styles are close). Dan was a big help, and to be honest, I was burned out on seeing the same images over and over. The work had to be super tight and it felt like you were doing everything four or five times. You had to keep your enthusiasm up, which was hard at times. I don't think there were a lot of "cooks in the kitchen" at DreamWorks then either. It all went smoothly and nothing sat for too long. I think this was mostly a case of trying to do licensing for something that wasn't completely nailed down. 

I will say that it was a far cry from the way Disney moves these days. You submit something to Disney and it sits for months. Literally.

After this work, I think the next DreamWorks thing I worked on was the spin-off for Puss in Boots. From there, it was Kung Fu Panda 2, MegaMind, and Madagascar 3... though I'm not sure of the exact order at this point.

Somewhere in there, DreamWorks Licensing offered me future work internally. I turned it down at the time, or kept the offer open-ended, as I'm not sure what was going on then in my life. I might have had new Scooby work or something...  

 

BLAST FROM THE PAST: Cartoon Network Cartoon Cartoons #27 cover art!

Another cover that I liked doing! Cartoon Network Cartoon Cartoons #27 featuring Dexter's Laboratory. The two standout things that I remember most was that the UPC box is in the vertical position when I originally designed it to run horizontal. That's why my signature is in the exact spot that it is in. We had some control with covers and could request that certain static elements like title, logos, UPCs, etc could be slightly tweaked for the sake of art. Of course, these requests could get lost in the pipeline of production like this one. It still works for me though. Also, it gave me a big space to sign copies at conventions.

The other major thing that I remember is asking what was a good color that would represent a radioactive glow? The green I originally did and submitted wasn't working. I remember the editor laughing about it. She made inquiries and sent me a CMYK breakdown for a proper "radioactive" green. Up to that point in my career I never had a project that required a green color that looked "radioactive". Looking at the cover now, I wonder why I didn't consider coloring Dee Dee all green as well? The editor never mentioned it as an option. Possibly, in terms of licensing, they didn't want that for a cover and the character should look the way they normally look.

I did the whole cover from thumbnails to final color for DC Comics (this was back when DC paid you for thumbnails, too!). Sold the original final art that was inked on DC art board a long time ago. Still have the memories though and a copy hanging in my studio. 

 

BLAST FROM THE PAST: Cartoon Network Cartoon Cartoons #17 cover art!

Been a long time since I originally posted this Cartoon Network Cartoon Cartoons #17 cover on my socials, but I recently sold the last few copies I had of this book! They've been sitting in my comic con boxes, which I would drag to shows to stock my table. Recently, I've been selling stuff online to clear some stuff out.

I still like the cover a lot (it also hangs framed on my studio wall) as it had the Cow & Chicken and Johnny Bravo welcoming Dexter's Laboratory to the mix. Dexter's Lab had its own comic series (which ran for 34 issues or so) but when sales slowed they decided to cancel it and move Dexter and his adventures over to the Cartoon Cartoons comic.

  

One that got away: Care Bears

Back in 2003, I did an audition for the Care Bears. I didn't wind up getting it and not sure why it didn't go past this initial sketch at this point. It was for a book project and you can see the open gap in the center that would go into the fold of the book spine. You can't have anything important get lost in spine of the book so you really have to design a complicated layout well. Each bear was to be doing something in the shot and the art direction would tell you what else was to be drawn.

Overall, I still like it. It was all to be done as vector art (like my work for Strawberry Shortcake) and I think I got this audition either before or during the early stages of my work on Strawberry as other potential future work either down the line or in-between. As I mentioned in a previous post, you try out for stuff and some things you get and some things you don't. I was probably relieved that I didn't as doing it all as vector art would be really time consuming! My Strawberry Shortcake art was extremely complicated vector art though I'm proud of all that stuff and how it turned out.

For you process junkies, the art was drawn on cheap copy paper and then I lightboxed it onto a clean sheet of copy paper by inking it all with a Micron pen to finalize the art. With licensed work, it had to all be there and "on model" first time out as license holders usually do not want to have to go back and forth with revisions and lose any time. If you can nail it the first time with minimal instructions, it's all good! American Greetings owned both properties at that time and if you got in with them they would just keep feeding you work, which is always nice!

 

Have a Smurfy Day!

 

POWERPUFF GIRLS To The Rescue!

One that got away: Despicable Me 2

 

One IP that I did an audition for but didn't get was for Despicable Me 2. I did these sketches back in 2012 and while I thought they were fine, they didn't go to another phase. Never heard more about it and I moved on. I'm not sure why I didn't get it, but you do a lot of auditions and keep moving. Or you get the reverse of it, I was approved and was on the artist list to draw Sesame Street material but then just never got any work due to where I was in the pecking order. Ultimately, if you get a gig, it's great... but just keep moving and stay open to new opportunities!

These were also done by hand on paper. Yes, they are really clean and tight for being roughs and I inked the line to match the thin line look they wanted. It was a fast, rough ink just to pick out and fine tune my drawings for the initial approval process as that's how licensing goes. I also inked them in black, but once I scanned them in, I lowered the opacity on them to make them a light gray to simulate a pencil look. I used to do this from time to time.

Last thing about these... Not sure why I did two versions of Margo, but they did give me a plaid pattern to see how it would look as a skirt, so I'm guessing it was done to show them a more detailed look as opposed to a simplified one. Enjoy!

 

KUNG FU PANDA 2 - Art Icons & Elements

I thought I'd post these unique pieces that I did amid the work I did for Kung Fu Panda 2. These were done in November of 2010 as the film was released in 2011. These are art icons or elements that are created to accent a project or style guide! 

These were unique in that I did them with the pen tool in Adobe Illustrator at the time. Dreamworks gave me reference to work from and that made it easier as I didn't have to create anything out of my mind and deal with revisions. These were a fast turnaround and I think they came out looking cool! 

HAPPY EARTH DAY 2026!

 

In the immortal words of Stan Lee... 'Nuff said!

COMIC BLAST FROM THE PAST: Ed, Edd n Eddy in "An Ed For An Ed"

Here's another Ed, Edd n Eddy comic I did that was a lot of fun. It was titled "An Ed For An Ed." It was a busy script with a lot going on even though it all took place in Ed's basement bedroom. Page 2, panel 5 took some time in planning out as I had to draw multiple Edd's cleaning Ed's room which was a single background plate. As with any Eds script, there's a ton of "squish and stretch" exaggeration going on at all times. 

Drawing the Eds took some time but I normally could do a page/a page and a half a day. Inking the art was much faster as you had to match the loose "boiling line" look that the cartoons had and I could ink it all in a day if I had to. Everything, including panel borders, were done by hand. No rulers needed and that made doing the Eds comics a lot of fun! Usually I would ink half the story and then scan those pages in, digital clean them if needed, and then format them in the template. I liked breaking up the job into segments to keep things fresh. Nothing is more boring than a full day of constant scanning and file prepping.

Here's the whole story for your reading enjoyment!  

HAPPY EASTER: SCOOBY-STYLE!

For Easter, I thought I'd post this rare drawing most have never seen! 

In my archives, I recently uncovered an alternative sketch to the Scooby-Doo "Sneaky Easter Thief" project which was complete and never saw the light of day. I posted about it in June of '25. 

This was just another concept for the title/credits page that didn't get used.