Quotes of All Topics . Occasions . Authors
I have a tendency to do the epic kind of long shot and put in everything that you need to know. And that's by design; that's the kind of approach I take to it.
Superheroes are modern mythological characters, so you're going to make them look impossible. Even my Krypto The Superdog is the idealisation of the canine form.
The video game market is huge, and the ability to tell stories, and tell different kinds of stories in the gaming space is quickly evolving and changing for the better.
As lifelong fans of comic books, Dan Didio and myself, we definitely have our own takes on what make for successful comics and the kind of comics that we want to publish.
From 'The Sandman' and 'Black Orchid' to 'Whatever Happened to the Caped Crusader?,' Neil Gaiman has provided some of the most memorable stories of the comic book industry.
Gene Colan was like no other artist of his generation. His ability to create dramatic, multi-valued tonal illustrations using straight India ink and board was unparalleled.
The great thing about having digital comics is that it is like having a comic-book shop on your digital device. It has turned comics from a destination buy to an impulse buy.
When you try to do something bigger and more grandiose, a lot of times it's more apt to fall apart. It's a lot easier to lay down a bunch of singles than it is to get a home run.
I try to do a lot of asymmetrical, triangular compositions - I find those work really well for comic book covers in that portrait mode, and I don't always see that in other artists.
Bob Harras' personal and creative integrity is respected and renowned throughout the comic book industry. As an editor, he provides invaluable insight into storytelling and character.
I think sometimes with new characters, you can kind of hit a creative valley, and it's important to recognize when you're in that valley so you can get back out and get back to that peak.
As a kid, I loved the whimsical Superman and Batman stuff, and as a teenager, Marvel was more angsty, and that appealed to me. Marvel dealt with more stuff I could relate to as a teenager.
Costumes are all about identifying which force in a conflict you're on. That's where banners and flags came from - so people rushing into battle knew who to follow and who was on their side.
Part of running DC Comics is that it's much larger than Image Comics is, or was. There's a challenge to being one of the industry leaders in that everything you do is scrutinized and watched.
I like having pairs of characters to play off each other. I love drawing Batman, but he's more fun with Robin. Batman charges ahead, Robin jumps off the walls. It's fun showing that contrast.
You can see how he changed on the surface. But at the core of it all, I think Superman has remained the same - a character with incredible powers but almost superhuman humility and restraint.
I played a little bit of 'City of Heroes' - they have a really great character generation system. I was pretty impressed with that. I played 'World of Warcraft' with my kids. That's a lot of fun.
One of the reasons I never had a problem handing over my characters to other creators is that I knew that they would add their own influences and takes on the characters and make them better for it.
If you look at the great superheroes in any universe, you will always find that they have the very best super villains opposing them. It's because they are foils; they are people that the heroes play off of.
I tend not to look at my work after I've done it. In fact, the only time I typically get to review it is when the fans bring up comics at shows, and I kind of flip through it and be like, 'Oh, I remember doing this!'
More often than not, the fans really gravitate towards who's on the cover as opposed to how it's drawn or how it's composed, and so, a lot of the time, what an artist likes will be very different from what a fan likes.
There's an obvious marketing component to doing something digitally where you're reaching out to new readers that you can't do in the existing print marketplace, or that it's difficult to do in the existing print marketplace.
Al Plastino helped redefine Superman in the 1950s. His work on Supermans Girlfriend, Lois Lane, Adventure Comics and pretty much any title in the Superman family will be fondly remembered for years to come. He will be missed.
Back in the '30s, '40s and '50s, you had clear-cut heroes, clear-cut supervillains. Today, you have more of a blend, more of a gray area between the two. You have the rise of the sympathetic villain and the rise of the antihero.
There is the intent of the writer and the interpretation by the artist. What the writer intended and what the artist interprets is not a 1-to-1 translation. It's a crossing of ideas that generates the stories that you see in print.
Al Plastino helped redefine Superman in the 1950s. His work on 'Superman's Girlfriend,' 'Lois Lane,' 'Adventure Comics' and pretty much any title in the Superman family will be fondly remembered for years to come. He will be missed.
There's also a lot of punch you get from doing an extreme closeup and have it just be that image with nothing around it. There's a clarity and precision and impact there that you sometimes lose if you put everything else in that background.
In the '50s, a lot of stories were built around radiation and the proliferation of new technology. In the '70s, there were a lot of stories that dealt with the Vietnam War. So comic books have always been a reflection of the times we live in.
There was a real sophistication and elegance to (Batman: The Animated Series). It certainly appealed to kids but had a depth that really made it fascinating and interesting to watch for adult fans. I think visually, it was stylistically stunning.
The first time I drew a Superman story was 'For Tomorrow' with Brian Azzarello in 2004. It didn't really hit me how important it was until I drew a scene early-on in the book that featured Superman crossing paths with a giant, intergalactic space armada.
Superman is the hardest character to draw. There are a couple of things that make him difficult. He's got a very simple costume and doesn't have the long cape like Batman. He's not a character that is necessarily always in shadow, and he doesn't have a mask.
There are a lot of global decisions that you can make as a co-publisher, and only publishers can make those kind of decisions. At the same time, there are some things you can do only as a penciler or creator. I want to keep my hands in both pots, so to speak.
As an artist, as I design and lay out a page, the less-important things, things I want you to spend less time looking at, I draw them very small, maybe even silhouette them. The more-important pivotal scenes, I draw them larger, maybe even a double-page spread.
Jerry Robinson illustrated some of the defining images of pop culture's greatest icons. As an artist myself, it's impossible not to feel humbled by his body of work. Everyone who loves comics owes Jerry a debt of gratitude for the rich legacy that he leaves behind.
The downside to becoming a doctor, I think, is it's a very long process; four years of medical school, three years of internship, two years of residency, umpteen years of specialization, and then finally you get to be what you have trained almost all your life for.
Nick Cardy's work helped define some of the things we see in comics today and take for granted. He broke out of the mold in terms of covers and layout and created a truly interactive experience for the reader that directly points back to his time with the Eisner studio.
'The Dark Knight,' 'The Rocketeer' and definitely the first 'Superman' movie by Richard Donner are the best. I tend to be softer in my judgment about what's a bad movie - I don't think anyone intends to make a bad movie, and sometimes it just doesn't click for some reason.
Once I started down the path of co-founding Image Comics, and even co-publisher, it just seems a lot more like a career path that isn't that atypical for someone with a college degree. Whereas, someone who draws comic books as a freelancer and lives from job to job is a more unusual story.
Prior to 'Action' and 'Justice League 1,' there was no label 'superhero' for a superpowered being. It's really the emergence of Superman and the Justice League that gets the public comfortable with the idea of people amongst us who have extraordinary power and that they've agreed to be our champions.
When a character has as wide an audience and as rich a history as Batman, it's truly exciting to see him introduced into an all-new storytelling medium. BATMAN LIVE will bring a completely new experience to fans of the character - it's great to be able to give them something they haven't seen before.
People ask me, 'What happened in your life that might have pushed you as an artist to get to where you are today?' I always felt a little on the outside. And as such, you're always observing things. So, I'd be kind of re-creating these things in my mind, and I think drawing it was a way to deal with that.
The way you challenge Superman is by having things happen very, very quickly in different places and then asking, 'Who does he save first? What powers must he use to save each person or stop each disaster?' That's one of the ways you make him interesting beyond the thematic and moral issues that make Superman.
It's interesting - a lot of what you accomplish in your lifetime either as an individual or as a company is determined by other people. I mean, you can do interview after interview and defend a point of view, but more often than not, the collective kind of opinion will be the one viewed historically and taken as gospel.