As a last bit of special awesomeness, we’ve got a little bit of a treat for you today. Out in stores right now (seriously, go look) is “Catalyst Comix” #2, the second issue of Joe Casey and Dark Horse’s revival of the Catalyst comic line featuring work by Dan McDaid, Paul Maybury and today’s spotlighted artist Ulises Farinas as three interwoven tales of the apocalypse are given from three very different perspectives.
Ulises section, featuring the Agents of Change, was a real highlight of the first issue. It’s easily the zaniest story of the issue, featuring a skewed group dynamic and larger-than-life characters who all battle for attention on the page both figuratively and literally. It’s highly entertaining, and if you’ve read the first part then let me go ahead and spoil something about the second: it’s just as good, if not better. (I’d say better.)
So to celebrate Artist August, “Catalyst Comix” and Ulises, we have a behind-the-scenes look at the formation of this particular portion of the issue and one page in particular. Take a look:
I find it really interesting to see Ulises process put on display like this, from the simplistic thumbnails to the highly detailed finish. It’s always interesting to get a look into the process of how portions of our favorite books are put together as each one is like a thumbprint, unique to the creator in question. In Ulises’ case, the color-coding is particular interesting as a tool I’ve not personally seen in use before, and it goes well for keeping track of the story being told in these roughs.
As we look at the roughs of the page, it’s pretty clear how heavily Ulises draws from the initial thumbnails, as the pencils show just abotu the same thing. It’s interesting to spot derivations as they happen, but with the attack of the Mech here the roughs show us a more finely-tuned iteration of the initial doodles, improving on the angles and perception of events with just one major change in storytelling.
Finally, the finished page that shows how Ulises builds off the rough layouts is just — oh, who am I kidding? No need to prosletyze; we can all see it’s fucking awesome.
I don’t mean to be curt with discussing it, but really, just look at it. The top panel is a monster in and of itself with the amount of rubble being scattered around the Agents of Change, and the bottom two panels show a fine eye to the details that define the robot character via intricately laced lines to define his metallic body. As a fan of robots and robots who fire missles at superheroes, it’s not difficult to just sit back, breathe in and murmur quietly to myself: “…cool.”
“Catalyst Comix” #2 is on sale right this very second in comic stores everywhere and if you don’t get it then you’re doing something wrong.
