Coming Full Circle

Very few know my origins as a small press comic book creator, so I'm going to share where I began now because as of last week, I've come full circle.

Back in 2003, Dan Berger (now managing editor at Mirage Studios home of the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles) was publishing his Gutwallow comic via Digital Webbing. He had just finished a 3 issues mini series and was collecting it into a TPB and needed a colorist for the cover (that's not the final colored image to the right). Publisher, Ed Dukeshire, posted the cover in the Digital Webbing forums with an open call for colorist to color it. Being a Gutwallow fan since Dan's earliest efforts with the character, I decided to dust off my copy of Photoshop and give it a try. This was my first effort ever to color anything using the computer (no that's not my effort to the right either). I didn't win the contest, but I believe I was in the TOP 3. The winner did a much better job than I. However, within a mnth or so, I was contacted by Ed to lay down some grey tones on an upcoming issue of Digital Webbing Presents and have continued to receive regular work inking, coloring and adding gray tones since.

Last year, Dan Berger contacted me to grayscales for a TMNT story over Andie Tong's art. This year at Heroes Con, Dan mentioned that Gutwallow was returning in an issue of Tales of the TMNT. (Okay Dan told Deanne that Gutwallow was returning because Deanne is Gutwallow's #1 fan. She has a Gutwallow tattoo design by Dan on her left shoulder blade.) Dan contacted me again last week and asked me to do the grey tones for the Gutwallow appearance in Tales of TMNT #51. I signed the contract and received the first 10 pages of the story today.

Upon receiving the pages, the very first thing I did was single out the panel with the largest image of Gutwallow to experiment with how I wanted him to appear. The result is below.


And with that my minor comic book career has come full circle.