Batman- My Process

 Hello there everyone,

Today I am posting my most recent piece, a commission of Batman- Arkham City.  Now, this is not a completely faithful following of the artwork for the game (which I find to be amazing) but my own version of Bats and friends.  Now, you may be wondering 2 things( probably more) why only these characters and why are the photos so shitty?  Great questions!  The commission was basically free reign for me, all that was requested was Batman and Nightwing from the game with one color integrated into the black and white.  So I basically decided to use the characters which I know are in the game and that I personally like and thought of something fun to draw and to try something different stylistically for a change (which I hope to keep building on more).  As for the picture quality... well thats what happens when you drop a digital camera several thousand times, the several thousand and first time creates an awesome grid effect on our photos every once and a while (which I personally love for experimental photography, which I may post a few of the cooler ones on here sooner or later but sucks because you never know when it will work now).  Anyways, here are some basic descriptions on how I got from pencils to finished scan, enjoy!

Pencils, this is mostly 4h with some 2h added in for some of the areas i wanted to emphasize.   But this is mostly a flat drawing on high end watercolor paper.  most of this was lightened even more after the photo so the pencils will not overpower the ink wash or paint.

Ink wash one, mostly a Winsor & Newton  mop brush with a #6 round for the areas i didn't want to bleed. 

More is ink added to my tub of ink and water to help create a little darker tone for the wash.

Added another layer of grey with a splash more of ink to help create definition.  Batman is inked with an even smaller Winsor & Newton round brush and Speedball nib (sorry, I can't remember which quill point it is but it's small, for good line control) 

Batman is defined a bit more and then I work my "one color" into the "dream state" or "collage" or whatever else you want to call it background.  I like dream state because I was going for the "who the hell can I trust/ beat the crap out" of  mind set of Batman.  This is first a layer of phthalo blue and sky blue mopped over the grey tone with hints of green and permanent rose.  the lines are straight indigo blue.





 

Final Scanned image.  Some of the defining colors of the friends and villains are dabbed in and Batman's cowl and gauntlets are darkened a bit more with ink wash.