The Kingpin And His World

Daredevil #116 page, 2009.

Secret Avengers #5 Layouts

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

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

Immortal Iron Fist #16 cover

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

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)

Pipe Dream Of The Convenience Door (III)

Pipe Dream Of The Convenience Door (II)

Pipe Dream Of The Convenience Door

Daredevil: Black and White #1

On sale this Wednesday from Marvel.
Preview up at CBR.















Cover art process here.

Immortal Iron Fist #4 cover

Issue 4 (2007) was a little bit our own "Empire Strikes Back"; it featured a lot of revelations and the bad guys as prominent characters and things were really starting to get dark for the heroes.
I tried to reflect that by pushing the contrast between black and white to the limit with a touch of color. It's the first "design-heavy" cover I did for Marvel, and honestly, I was doubtful this style would be accepted.
It remains one of my favorite covers.

Immortal Iron Fist #1 cover

When I started doing Immortal Iron Fist #1 cover (2006), I tried to stablish a common design for first whole arc with white prevailing.
It was a new series and I had to think of some trick to make it stand out on store racks. Most superhero comics it would be sharing space with tend to have covers full of elements or rendered in pictorial styles, so I decided to go with large swaths of white. I've been told it worked, everybody knew when a new issue had come out and it could be seen from the entrance to the shop.
This is the final rough, and, as you will notice it was going to be a limited serie.

I inked Iron Fist and K'un-Lun background in two separated boards:





















As I did with colors. Incidentally, when I created this cover I still hadn't designed the definitive Iron Fist chest tattoo that would change so much in the interiors and on further covers.























I also designed the logo in such a way that it could be used anywhere on the cover to help the composition. The Chinese characters obviously mean Iron Fist and they change color in each issue.

NBC The Cape

The Cape back cover.
Comic based on the NBC Universal new series.

Secret Avengers #5

Out in August from Marvel Secret Avengers #5, written by Ed Brubaker with art by Michael Lark and me.
I am working hand to hand with one of my favorite artist these days, not drawing issue as usual, though, I am doing layouts and Michael is finishing pages.
Some work in progress has been shown at CBR in an interview with Marvel's Editors Tom Brevoort and Axel Alonso. Click on Picture to see a four pages preview.

4th Letter!

Great article by David Brothers at 4thletter.net on my work: 7 Artists: David Aja.
Lots of pictures and really nice words.
Thanks David!

More 3 Jacks

Roughs and pencils of a couple of pages shown on last post.

Daredevil: 3 Jacks

First four pages of 3 Jacks, a short story I did back in 2009 for Daredevil #500, written by Ann Nocenti. Opening scene was a classic fight, Daredevil vs Bullseye. When I was kid I used to re-read once and again all fights between these two in Frank Miller's Daredevil issues. I always wanted Bullseye to win. Yes, I'm evil.


Colors by Matt Hollingsworth.

Less is more

Daredevil #111 variant cover, 2008.

Thor and the Cap's Kooky Quartet

Pages for a short story I did with Stan Lee in Thor #600, late 2008. I had the chance to choose the Avengers team, so I went with my all-time favorite one.

Colors by Matt Hollingsworth:

Immortal Weapons: characters sketches

I co-create these guys with Matt Fraction and Ed Brubaker for Immortal Iron Fist series. Their debut was in issue #8, first part of he 7 Capital Cities of Heaven arc.