free submit 1: The Green Hornet, Covered

Sunday, June 9, 2013

The Green Hornet, Covered

The Green Hornet #5 Cover. 2013.

Ink(ed by Joe Rivera) on bristol board with digital color, 11 × 17″.

Here's my latest cover for The Green Hornet, the 5th in the series by Mark Waid and Daniel Indro. There are a number of nice things about having a monthly cover gig. For starters, it's consistent and dependable with predictable demands. But aside from the work aspect, it allows for more explorations of a character besides the classic, iconic shot that most covers demand. The best part, however, is getting to use the sketches that fell by the wayside. (My other monthly gig is for Superior Spider-Man Team-Up, formerly Avenging Spider-Man.)

The covers also start to add up pretty quickly. I'm working on the 7th at the moment. These are all inked by my Dad, Joe Rivera, as is usually the case with my work from 2011 and later. I color them all in Photoshop, but I'm contemplating giving my Dad a crack at that too. If you'd like to see a step-by-step demo, I detailed the entire process for the 1st cover in a previous post. While that took about 17 hours, the rest clocked in at 14, (including preliminary work, but not inks).

On a final note, if you're unfamiliar with the Green Hornet, all you need to know is in the fantastic book about H.J. Ward by David Saunders. Ward is probably my favorite painter, and it turns out he helped to create the masked hero.