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Anthony J Lombardi
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Posted: 25 February 2008 at 10:54am | IP Logged | 1  

"There's no way they spend 40 hours on one page unless they're insane."

Thats unbelieveable. I know i'm slow but damn.

Back when i was trying to make my break into the comic biz. When i was doing full penciled finished pages. I was doing a page and a half in a 8 hour period. I use to think i was still to slow. By todays standards  i'm faster then some of these guys. Thats real bad
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Martin Redmond
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Posted: 25 February 2008 at 10:58am | IP Logged | 2  

Well they sure make it sound like they've spent 40 hours on a page. I'm glad I deducted early from Wizard interviews that they were really just sitting on their asses spending their cash. And I don't care if someone talented wants to waste their gifts eating cereal all day, but don't bullshit that it's done to make your art better.
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Fred J Chamberlain
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Posted: 25 February 2008 at 11:06am | IP Logged | 3  

I've spoken to Tom Derenick, well known for his speed, about issues of timliness in the business and one of the most striking aspects of those conversations is that he stated that his work would look much different and polished beyond belief if he took several days per page. I've seen pieces that he has done on the side as well as being privy to seeing preview pages, etc and getting his holidayt cards.... The guy puts out some amazing pencils, but he'd outshine most (If not all) of these guys if timelines were not a factor.
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John Byrne
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Posted: 25 February 2008 at 11:19am | IP Logged | 4  

This only plays into the "growing roses" bullshit. Back in my X-MEN days -- you know, the "old stuff" that was "better" -- Shooter asked me how many pages I did in a day. When I told him three, he asked "What do you think would happen if you only did two?" My response: "I'd finish earlier."

The notion of putting anything less into a page than one is capable of putting into the page is anathema to me. If one needs more time to do a proper job, then one should take more time, and not work in monthlies.

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Fred J Chamberlain
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Posted: 25 February 2008 at 11:23am | IP Logged | 5  

Don't get me wrong. I think Tom does a proper job, but he can add more detail and attention into a piece that he spends a week doing than he does on a piece that he spends a day on.
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Gerry Turnbull
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Posted: 25 February 2008 at 11:27am | IP Logged | 6  

Ron Smith, 2000 AD artist on drawing Judge Dredd

" i know my page rate.i know how much i want to earn per hour.So i set my alarm clock and start drawing a page.When the alarm goes off,the page is finished ."

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John Byrne
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Posted: 25 February 2008 at 11:31am | IP Logged | 7  

I think Tom does a proper job, but he can add more detail and attention
into a piece that he spends a week doing than he does on a piece that he
spends a day on.

••

So, when you buy a comic he's worked on, do you feel content paying for
75%?

I had this discussion with a fellow artist decades ago, and it was an eye-
opener for me. We were discussing page rates, and he said that Marvel
paid $50 a page, while PLAYBOY paid $1000 a page. So Marvel was
going to get $50 worth of work, while PLAYBOY was going to get $1000
worth of work.

"But," I asked, "what if that fifty is Marvel's top rate, and that grand is
PLAYBOY's bottom rate. If PLAYBOY doubles your rates, can you give
them twice the work?"

He had no answer. But I did -- and I resolved at that point that the job
was the job, and the amount paid for it was not of consequence.
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Fred J Chamberlain
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Posted: 25 February 2008 at 11:55am | IP Logged | 8  

I enjoy Tom's work and am happy to support him. He does good stuff.

Your work is gorgeous. If you took a regular commission piece and took a week to lay it out and fiddle with the pencils over that time, then took a few days to ink it, do you believe that there would be a dicernable difference in detail, etc?

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John Byrne
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Posted: 25 February 2008 at 11:57am | IP Logged | 9  

If you took a regular commission piece and took a week to lay it out and
fiddle with the pencils over that time, then took a few days to ink it, do you
believe that there would be a dicernable difference in detail, etc?

••

Nope. I draw what I draw.
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Paulo Pereira
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Posted: 25 February 2008 at 11:58am | IP Logged | 10  

From what I've seen of Derenick's work, it's detailed enough and if he can produce that on time, then why the heck would he ever want to add more detail?  Detail is overrated.

Edited by Paulo Pereira on 25 February 2008 at 11:58am
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Knut Robert Knutsen
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Posted: 25 February 2008 at 12:05pm | IP Logged | 11  

Well, with Derenick's work, just so I'm clear, you're not by any chance talking about "Well, his work is as clear and detailed in what he considers the breakdown stage as the full pencils of some other artists, but if he spends more time he can take it to full pencil stage and it will be even more detailed." As opposed to "Well, once he's done full pencils, he can add more detail and rendering and it'll look even better."
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Bruce Buchanan
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Posted: 25 February 2008 at 12:09pm | IP Logged | 12  

I'm no artist, but with just about any sort of work, there's a point where spending extra time isn't going to make the project better. It just becomes "paralysis by analysis."

Obviously, you don't want to feel rushed. I'm sure even JB wouldn't want to do that "17 pages in a weekend" schedule on a regular basis! But at some point, you have to say, "I've done the best I can do, so let's move on to the next page/issue/project/whatever."

I encountered this "growing roses" mentality as a newspaper reporter. I was lucky enough to cut my teeth in a small daily newspaper, where writing 3-4 stories a day wasn't unheard of.

When I got to a bigger paper, I met colleagues who would obsess and struggle over a single story. Usually, their hand-wringing did little or nothing to improve their stories and often, they overthought things and actually hurt their work. I took the John Byrne approach -- I did the best I could and when I was finished, I turned it in and moved on.

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