From the Hip

I've talked about doing this series 'from the hip' a few times.  While some of the images would be in my head upon starting a page or panel, most of the time the image comes when the ink hits the paper.  I like to do straight ink as opposed to penciling first, for this kind of art anyway.  Give it a try, using ink, paint, what have you.  I always end up surprising myself, drawing something that I don't even understand.  You may end up surprising yourself.  I'm going to be continuing with #32 soon but currently I'm still swamped with projects.

31 Days of Art

 Coma's End
Art Series by Christopher Michael Carter

Coma's End #31

This will actually be the last one for a short time as I'm currently swamped with projects; Dennis & I are hard at work on our monster comic Tourniquet and I'm working my ass off on a secret surprise project for my friends at 52 Weeks of Horror.
Tentacle creatures, shapes, a flower thing with a fetus in the center, and more.

This was a photo I took partway through.  The creature coming from the mailbox was in my head the moment the pen touched the paper.  Next came the demon/monster head thing looking down in the second panel before adding these mountainous shapes.  Then the fetus was the starter for the third.  I didn't really know what would be joining all of these images until they came from the pen.

If you have one tiny image in your head, draw it, and then shoot from the hip on the rest of the image.

Coma's End will return very soon but, as I said, I'm currently swamped with some important projects.

Coma's End #30

Now, let me preface by saying this was originally the last piece of the series until it was reopened.
This piece has everything from the overhead light in my office, a collage of randomness of which had kinda been seen throughout, and the scribble man at the foot of his bed praying or looking into a dimensional vortex of some kind.

If you're ever stuck of something, just look around you.  The center of panel 1 is the overhead lamp in my office at home, distorted on paper, and then the solid black extra was added.  Just use something simple, distort it, and then add from there.

Panel 2, it's as mentioned, a lot at random but the type of stuff that had become the norm in Coma's End; i.e. abstract shapes, tentacles, parts of faces, etc, etc.  Even though I had spoken about the plus sides of self appointed perimeters, you STILL even then don't have to be locked down as you can see in panel two is a little bit of everything, making barriers within barriers.

Panel 3 is much like Panel 1 in which it's a normal setup that's distorted with little things.  The top bit is from the top closet spots in my office but then they get distorted with a cat tail, etc.  The rest of it is your typical bedroom setup with the scribble man at the foot of his bed looking into this...gateway type thing.  Since it was, as said before, a comic of sorts, this last panel was to represent the character finally waking from the coma.  HOWEVER, after it was all done, every page was rearranged when lettered so this WASN'T the last page.

This is now #30 in what will be an ongoing series.  At this moment, Coma's End remains endless.

Coma's End #29

Candy and weaponry!
Aliens!
Lines and dots!

With Panel 1, I had that vision of snacks and candy with knives and guns scattered throughout. It came out fairly similar to what was in my head.
Panel 2 was very simple once I did the first alien head I just felt that I should do the rest of the panel with a few more alien things.  Sometimes all it will take is some simple notion.
Panel 3 came in a wave of different tracings with random items I can't remember.  I went through tracing the different lines and dots and once the panel was done it didn't grab or captivate me at all.  I then saw it in a different way, adding textures such as the diagonal stripes on the right, the look of Philips head screws in the center, and then the black and white contrasts on the left.  Once these changes were made, I felt more from it.

Coma's End #28

Sometimes I don't really know what I'm drawing until it's done and even then I'm skeptical.  I take the first panel as theater actors.  While the dragon and its eggs in panel three are quite simple and bold, the second is the story of life to death.  One of the fun things about doing these scenes is that some of them can tell a story.

Coma's End #27

Broken pyramids, snakes, guitars, creepy scribble hands, and an octopus with a silly mustache - don't be afraid to just have fun with pieces.  Not everything has to be a serious moving picture.  You can still be a serious artist and do something others would find silly.   

Coma's End #26

Panels one and three are definitely from the hip and while panel two is essentially as well there's a sort of craft to abstract shapes and patterns.  Panel two is definitely my favorite here.  You can say so much with just such abstract things.

Coma's End #25

A full page of horror though it wasn't planned as every page is from the hip.  I was doing the doll from memory of a Raggedy Ann doll my wife has on a shelf when I decided to black out the dace but then put the face in a different spot.  The person hanging from the tree was an afterthought that I felt worked well.  The overall image is very peaceful and homey, which are always great templates to use for the little creepy things.
The second panel is simple yet says plenty and sometimes simplicity and minimalist works best.  A dinner table with two coffins stood up beside a fire place says more than anybody coming out of said coffins.
The demon like face in the third panel actually served as the back cover for when this was originally a comic.  And of course it's surrounded by abstract shapes.

Perimeters

Setting the three panel perimeters actually ended up helping me.  I could've easily just started with a blank page but I loved the idea of three different scenes, ideas.  If you set these boundaries for yourself, forcing you to work within them, you can do so much more than what you realize.  Sometimes those perimeters can help.  You can do full scenes or collages of ideas.  It doesn't have to be three long panels but you can shape your perimeters any way you want.  Ideas will come when you see your allotted space and you get to just go wild.  I know what you're thinking though, 'Why put limitations on art?'  And there's no limitation.  By setting some boundaries for yourself, it's not limiting.  Once I had set my boundaries for Coma's End my mind went CRAZY with ideas, more so than I did when I was first looking at a blank white page.  So if you want to do something but you're having trouble getting started, just do a plus in the middle of the page making four squares and go from there.

Coma's End #24

Now, while the images in panel two may appear to be trees of sorts, what was in my mind was actually large drills.
Panel three features a large creature's leg stomping through a castle.
The first panel and all the other panels like it, at the time were these images drawn 'from the hip' so to speak and now when I look at them they seem to be animating before my eyes.  I can see how they move and pulsate.

Just do what's in your mind regardless of how it's taken or seen by others.  Art is subjective and it may mean or be something else to you, someone else is always going to see something different and feel something different.

Coma's End #23

The ghosts are back.  As I've mentioned before, I've always had a thing for the classic ghost look.

While the first panel is one scene, the third has it's own framework along with abstract shapes, little scribble men, and such shapes ended up making a face of sorts in the center.

Coma's End #22

Often times I'll start in one corner and spread from there.
Sometimes I'll be working on an image comprised of traces and something tells me to leave it intentionally unfinished.
Asymmetry is often my friend in a lot of things.

Coma's End #21

Coal black eyes are very attractive to me in art. Often times I'll read a comic or see some other similar art and see the eyes thinking 'This character would grab me more if they'd just have the eyes solid black or even white for that matter.'
There's something about aquatic life and insects that really grab me. If I didn't go into the world of writing and art, a second choice would definitely have been entomology.

You can always infuse the things you love and that are attractive to you but you don't have to replicate them directly; just keep the essence of said things and create something new.

Coma's End #20

Sometimes I'll have an image in mind as well as abstractions and so instead of doing two different panels I'll do the image and then fill the rest of the space with the shapes in mind.
Something like the third panel starts off by a simple childish image... and then it needs something else in contrast like said childish image being eaten by a monster.

So you can always do more than one of the ideas in your head. You can also start with something so silly and simple only to add just that one off detail as I do so often in this series.

Coma's End #19

Ah, the scribble man returns! Panel 1 is one of my favorite panels of the series.
After the shapes of the second panel I felt like it needed something and so I made the bar across the center. Sometimes it just takes something simple.

I think the third panel had started I believe it was with the top of one face and then decided on the rocket flare like bottom and then repeated this image before the wisps on top.
 

Coma's End #18

It's fun to play Dr. Moreau and I do it often as seen in the first panel.
The second panel was more of a merging of shapes.
And the third I was definitely having galactic thoughts.

Sometimes they start with a simple shape and sometimes it starts with a skewed version of an animal.

My Eraserhead

David Lynch's Eraserhead, a film I love, is often described as filming a dream or nightmare.  The best way I could describe Coma's End is that it's my Eraserhead.  It's a nightmare in a coma; images of simplicity and complexity in black and white coming at you scene after scene.  Even without the words, which are easily found on www.52weeksofhorror.com, I still keep that description in mind as I continue the series.

Coma's End #17

Still not sure whether panel 2 is flowers or explosions.
Bees with lady legs was an image that had come to my mind after already doing the bees.

Coma's End #16

When making the third panel, it was at first the wavy grid.  Then I felt it needed something else so I made the line patterns going in different directions.  But theeeeeen I found a smudge of my thumb in ink on the picture.  It sparked an idea.  So using the large marker I used for the panels' squares I repeatedly blackened my thumb and put my prints across the image.

Coma's End #15

When this was a comic, I had used the first panel here as part of the cover.  The simplicity of the miner still draws my eyes to it.  Then again, the FrankenFoot in the third panel draws my eyes to it as well.  Sometimes it's the simple things.