David Aja

Happy Days

2011-12-23T09:12:00.003+01:00

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Secret Avengers #18 Preview

2011-10-24T12:32:00.001+02:00

Out October 26 from Marvel.
Written by Warren Ellis, with Art by me and Raúl Allén.
Lettered preview at CBR.

Wolverine: Debt Of Death First Preview

2011-08-19T14:07:00.003+02:00

Out September 07 from Marvel, a Wolverine 34 pages one-shot.
Written by David Lapham, Drawn by me and Colors by Elizabeth Breitweiser.

Updated 27 August 2011 with 5 more pages. Full preview here.

Secret Avengers #18

2011-07-26T07:38:00.004+02:00

Out this October from Marvel.
Written by Warren Ellis,
Art by me and Raúl Allen.

France Comic Con' 2011 Sketches

2011-07-06T19:32:00.001+02:00

Some of my favourites fast-free-sketches on last France Comic Con' 2011.

Wolverine: Debt Of Death

2011-06-16T06:42:00.001+02:00

Out this September from Marvel.
A 34 pages one-shot, Written by David Lapham,
Drawn by me and Colors by Elizabeth Breitweiser.

Valiant Entertainment Promo Picture

2011-06-15T06:37:00.010+02:00

Promotional image for Valiant Entertainment.
Official press releases here and here.

Red Skull Covers

2011-04-27T08:53:00.016+02:00

Red Skull: Incarnate is a five-issue miniseries, written by Greg Pak with art by Mirko Colak and colors by Matthew Wilson, out in July from Marvel.

Editor Alejandro Arbona asked me to do five covers including design and logo. It was not intended to be a typical super hero comics, so it shouldn't have anything like typical cover art.

The series is about how a young German boy turns into Red Skull, in a story that parallels the rise of Hitler and the Nazis in pre-war Germany, so I thought it would be a good idea to try to get that historical aspect on the covers. I tried to approach the artwork as if they were real posters, newspapers and Nazi propaganda from that time, kind of in a documentary style.

I did extensive research into historical documents for the styles. In order to make that work, I used different typographies each issue, emulating different typefaces in real work; so I needed a uniform tone, technique and color in the finished art to identify all the covers as a whole collection.
These are some of the tons of real posters and stuff I based my work in:

Quotes by Frederick the Great and Friedrich Nietzsche in covers #1 and #3 were actually used in nazi propaganda.
At last was decided not to show swastikas on covers, but we thought readers' brains would fill blanks on issue #2.
Thanks to editor Sebastian Giner for helping us with German on issue #4 cover.
Here are some of the sketches I did during the process:

Official press release up on Marvel.com and CBR.

Green Arrow #12 Variant Cover

2011-02-15T09:24:00.003+01:00

Green Arrow #12 variant cover.
Out this May from DC Comics.

5 Ronin Psylocke Cover Process

2010-12-27T12:19:00.007+01:00

5 Ronin Psylocke is #4 issue in a five-issue weekly-shipping limited series, written by Peter Milligan and drawn by Goran Parlov, out in March from Marvel.

Editor Sebastian Giner asked for this: "Maybe her kimono is slipping off her shoulders, revealing her tattooed back. A sensual and sexy cover, but there's also something very dangerous about her."

All I can say about this cover is that much probably is my favorite one.

This is final cover sketch.

Main picture's whased inks (left). Pencil for aditional figure lines and mask, and inks for some kind of nature Sumie paints (right).

Final art in Photoshop and final design with texts and logos:

5 Ronin Punisher Cover Process

2010-12-27T12:19:00.006+01:00

5 Ronin Punisher is #3 issue in a five-issue weekly-shipping limited series, written by Peter Milligan and drawn by Laurence Campbell, out in March from Marvel.
In first sketches of this cover I was drawing Punisher with a bow and I did not get with right shot. Till I understand The True. Wanna go right with Punisher? Give him a firearm and place him under a light. Black costume is replaced by a white kimono, white being the color of death in Japan. At this point in time Japanese warriors used matchlock rifles called “Tanegashima”, one Punisher has on picture.
This is final cover sketch.

Main picture's whased inks (left). Pencil for aditional figure lines and mask, and inks for some kind of nature Sumie paints (right).

Final art in Photoshop and final design with texts and logos:

5 Ronin Hulk Cover Process

2010-12-27T12:18:00.004+01:00

5 Ronin Hulk is #2 issue in a five-issue weekly-shipping limited series, written by Peter Milligan and drawn by Dalibor Talajic, out in March from Marvel.

Although is second book of the serie, is last cover I did. Challenge here was to draw Hulk without drawing Hulk itself. I went with a 'Bruce Banner-time after smashing' a post-battle scene (...the horror...the horror...). Japanese mask on the background would give the threat of violence and anger. Green would do the rest.
This is final cover sketch where editor Sebastian Giner gave me the clue of ripped clothing.

Main picture's whased inks (left). Pencil for aditional figure lines and mask, and inks for some kind of nature Sumie paints (right).

Final art in Photoshop and final design with texts and logos:

5 Ronin Deadpool Cover Process

2010-12-27T12:17:00.001+01:00

5 Ronin Deadpool is #5 issue in a five-issue weekly-shipping limited series, written by Peter Milligan and drawn by Leandro Fernandez, out in March from Marvel.

Although is last cover of the serie, is second one I did. Main idea was to show a classic ronin shot showcasing Deadpool's dual characteristics, someone was once a noble samurai driven insane by betrayal and war.

This is final cover sketch.

Main picture's whased inks (left). Pencil for aditional figure lines and mask, and inks for some kind of nature Sumie paints (right).

Final art in Photoshop and final design with texts and logos:

5 Ronin Wolverine Cover Process

2010-12-27T12:16:00.001+01:00

5 Ronin Wolverine is #1 issue in a five-issue weekly-shipping limited series, written by Peter Milligan and drawn by Tomm Coker, out in March from Marvel.

Wolverine cover is first one I did of the serie, and to be true, I was a little insecure with both technique and composition, was by far one I used more time with.
I based main Wolverine picture on Toshirō Mifune in Yojimbo. Not so happy with result, though, and I did not use references on next covers, where I think characters look much better.

This is final cover sketch.

Main picture is done in whased inks (left). Pencil for aditional figure lines and Samurai armor, and inks for some kind of nature Sumie paints (right).

Then, put it all together and turn colors in Photoshop.
I wanted to play with two main blocks of texts, one for the serie title (5 Ronin) and another for the character of the issue. I thought a quote of the charater will give some personality to each cover. I know what you are thinking, it had to be a serif typeface, and yes, you are right, I used a serif typeface.
I also add japanese numbers on top of the character name and I had the chance of turning Marvel logo into main color of the cover.

5 Ronin Covers

2010-12-24T06:14:00.010+01:00

5 Ronin is a five-issue weekly-shipping limited series, written by Peter Milligan and drawn by Tomm Coker, Dalibor Talajic, Laurence Campbell, Goran Parlov and Leandro Fernandez out in March from Marvel.
Official press release up on CBR and Marvel.
I had the chance to do five covers, whole design and create a new logo.
From the very beginning, I wanted to keep each cover down to two colors that indentify with each of the five characters. I also set out to come up with a design that would grab eyes from the shelves compared to the rest of the covers while keeping uniformity throughout the series.
But at last I thought was going to be so complicated and I just did the covers you see here.
I will try to upload a step by step of each one of the covers soon(er or later).

Black Panther: Captain America 70th Anniversary Variant Cover

2010-12-23T12:20:00.002+01:00

Black Panther: The Man Whitout Fear #516, Captain America 70th Anniversary Variant Cover, out in March from Marvel.

I did these two proposals for texts adapting Captain America 70th Anniversary logo to fit vintage look of the cover:

Happy Days

2010-12-22T11:26:00.000+01:00

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Expocomic 2010

2010-12-06T06:10:00.002+01:00

Hi guys, I will be in Expocomic, Madrid Comic Fair, this week, December 9-11th.
Signs and talks schedules in Expocomic site.
Come say hi!

Hola, estaré esta semana en Expocomic, el Salón de cómic de Madrid (del 9 al 11 de Diciembre).
Podéis consultar los horarios de firmas y charlas en la web de Expocomic.
¡Pasaros a saludar!

Invincible Iron Man Variant Cover Process

2010-12-03T06:46:00.002+01:00

I'm doing lot of cover-work lately, but as I cannot show anything by now, let's go with a process of an older one, Invincible Iron Man #6 Variant Cover, 2008.

Cover sketch and pencils:

Inks and halftone dots:

Background, texts, logos, and to finish, unfamous vintage effect:

The Kingpin And His World

2010-10-14T12:47:00.000+02:00

Daredevil #116 page, 2009.

Secret Avengers #5 Layouts

2010-09-30T19:04:00.001+02:00

For Secret Avengers #5 (written by Ed Brubaker) I worked hand to hand with one of my favorite artist these days, Michael Lark. I did layouts of the issue and Michael (with some Stefano Gaudiano help at the end) finished pages.
Here are some of these layouts:

Daredevil: Game Room

2010-09-28T10:00:00.005+02:00

Illustrations for Game Room, a short tale written by Ann Nocenti published in Daredevil Black and White #1, 2010.

Immortal Iron Fist #16 cover

2010-08-23T05:47:00.002+02:00

Issue 16 (2008) was the last issue of the series both for the writers (Ed Brubaker and Matt Fraction) and for me, a one-part story meant to serve as an end period and paragraph break, centered more on the character relationships between the protagonists than on the action.
I wanted to continue, naturally, with the white spaces and give the cover a certain seventies movie-poster style (not for nothing were the seventies the high point for these characters), and the text of "the partner," "the friend," "the lover," as well as the use of the pointillism I think heighten that feeling.
There are only two colors, the colors of the Iron Fist suit.
If you'll notice, the rectangles of the composition form the shape of the number 33, pretty subtly and in a way you only notice after reading the story.
I wonder if I succeeded in that.

The Seven Capital Cities Of Heaven

2010-08-20T07:14:00.011+02:00

The Seven Capital Cities Of Heaven is the title of the second Immortal Iron Fist story arc, written by Ed Brubaker and Matt Fraction, which includes issues 8 to 14.

For the covers of this arc, I wanted to preserve the use of blank space that had already become a characteristic of the series.

It's about a kung fu tournament between seven mystical cities and it would run seven issues. I wanted them to resemble vintage covers of an old pulp magazine. Each one of the seven covers would feature a portrait of each of the seven participants.

This is Immortal Iron Fist #8 cover (2007), first chapter of the arc.

The 7 in the story arc title "The Seven Capital Cities of Heaven" is a backwards 7 in Chinese. The chapter number of each part is also in Chinese numerals.

I designed some kind of map/representantion of the interdimensional encounter of the cities that would appear on each cover. This heptagon contains the Chinese animal names representative of each city and in the center, "Heaven and Earth."

Immortal Iron Fist #9 (2007) had Fat Cobra on the cover, one of the seven Immortal Weapons, wich will fight Iron Fist on the issue. Matt Fraction descrived it as a sumo fighter with ninja moves.

The art on his chest includes the words cobra, champion and part of the Bushido code. Turtle on his shoulder as it is the animal represenative of his city.

I imagined character as the only one in the tournament with Japanese cultural roots instead of Chinese, so the red detail seemed fitting to me.

This is the final cover.

And these are the cover sketch and the Fat Cobra portrait:

As I said before, each one of the seven covers would feature a portrait of each of the seven participants, but after the first three, somebody decided it would not be a good idea not to show the hero on the cover.

This issue 10 cover (2007) with the character Bride of Nine Spiders was never published.

The right stripped design remained on next covers of the arc, though.

Pipe Dream Of The Convenience Door (IV)

2010-08-17T12:28:00.001+02:00