Williamson started inking to make some extra money and he was first inking Curt Swan at DC but Marvel was higher pay for the same amount of work and big royalties so he moved over there.
9:11 the depth of the savage world drawing on the left is phenomenal. few panels give me that feel. its that technique where they make the camera level with the ground that you guys talk about.
I first became consciously aware of Williamson when Dark Horse rearranged the Star Wars strips into the Classic Star Wars graphic novels in the 90s. I was absolutely smitten.
That Savage World strip you mentioned you wanted to do its own video for - it appears in Death Rattle #10 (which I think is the "Kitchen Sink" one you mentioned). That one is particularly a good reprint because it has a breakdown identifying specifically who did what on each panel.
This is so beautiful. Truly inspiring. Illustrators really used to know their trade before digital and AI dumbed everyone down. Thanks for sharing this, guys! 👏👍🏻
Man, he is on par with Wally Wood or Frazetta in my mind after this. I was aware of him for sure, but now I have to do a deeper dive into his artwork. Thanks, Jim and Ed
re: distractions. In the Cerebus guide to self-publishing, this is the reason Dave Sim doesn't own a TV, doesn't listen to the radio and uses a fax machine for communication. This all helps to cut down on distractions and get the work down
I don't know if it was the richness of their culture or good taste, but these guys took inspiration from some brilliant sources. Williamson name checks master movie stuntman Dave Sharpe as an ingredient for the movement he put into his figures. For prehistoric studies they went to the prime dinosaur visual artist Charles Knight, who was still alive. Famously they had access through Krenkel to the masters of ink illustration like J. C. Coll and for grandiose historical reference they pored over Fortunino Matania and Cecil B. De Mille movie stills. They were all Raymond/Flash Gordon fans and did a few pieces for the comic based on Flash star Buster Crabbe. That Savage World piece was intended for the Crabbe comic but it was cancelled. In order to print the art in Witzend, they had to change the story to avoid rights issues. The reason why all the balloons are paste-ups is that Wallace Wood rewrote the text to fit in the existing balloons (quite a trick in itself) and completely changed the story from a romantic science fiction adventure to a pretty dark and cynical commentary about the ugliness of humanity.
Love Al Williamson! Also - I'm pretty sure that first tool you guys pointed at was indeed an old cast iron mechanical pencil sharpener. I used them for a brief time in my high school drafting class.
As far as time consumption of things that take us away from the page… I straight up told the mother of my daughters that I’m just not going to respond durning work hours!
I have this book and poured over it so many times and stole from it a lot too! surprising that the biggest flash Gordon piece he made isnt in it though.
I wish you gave your insights on how they used photo reference, knocked out pages quickly, but had to wait for the photographs to be developed. I mean, they would've had to get the script and plan out the panels for the next month's book while they were working from the shots they took for the current month's book.
Great video, guys! I met Al a couple of times over the years and I asked him about just inking comics and told me that he could ink some monthly comics to allow him to still do illustration work,kind of side hustle I’d guess? P Craig Russell would ink early Mignola and Ditko Rom comics! Mark Schultz wrote a couple of Flash Gordon marvel comics in early 90’s! I have a couple of really beautiful HC’s Al Williamson Adventures and Al Williamson’s Flash Gordon,a lifelong vision of the heroic. Both books are chock full of B&W stories and the reproduction is excellent! Al’s art is very creative and intimidating but standing out like a beacon of disciplined focus and labor of love and inspirational to the future generations! Godspeed to Al Williamson and Archie Goodwin 🙏❤️🎯⚡️👍
The tool you referenced at around the 4 minute mark is a pencil sharpener for mechanical 2mm leads...I have a few. I love drawing layouts with that sized leads (2B-6B for me, and F for cleanup). BTW>>>love your channel and what you guys are doing. Thank you so much.
I feel like I started reading comics yesterday when I listen to these episodes. I think this episode should be required watching for comic scholars. Love your guys' input and breakdowns. I really feel like I've learned from osmosis from this channel. Just the techniques featured blows my mind.
Wish this book had better distribution in the UK, had this on pre-order for ages and it never turned up. I did see a single copy and I should have snapped it up then. It looks an amazing book !! Just had a quick look to see how much this volume is, the lowest price is nearly £500 ... sigh !!
In the SAVAGE WORLD story, Frazetta didn't necessarily draw all the women.. But he DID draw the guy's face throughout most of the story. The guy's face was based on actor Buster Crabbe - a Fleagle fave - because he starred in all of the FLASH GORDON movie serials..
Classic Al story…I was delivering furniture that he had my friends dad reapulster furniture,so we go in his house in Bethany PA (we didn’t know how he was) and he had all these Star Wars and Flash Gordon art work on the walls.He says yeah I work for a comic book company,so we’re th8nking he works for peanut butter and jelly comics, and he’s like yeah I’m working on the marvel title of ghost rider and daredevil right now…say whattttt,so in the end he gave us but loads of comics and signed them,who wants to buy them is the question,such a nice guy and talented for sure p,I’m bummed I don’t get his Star Wars and Flash Gordon stuff,I should have kept in contact hahaha
Huge Al Williamson fan…for more Flash Gordon work of his (and other stuff) you should check out the. Ok Flash Gordon: A Lifelong Vision of the Heroic. Shows a lot of his fascination with the character and reverence for Alex Raymond’s character work.
Have this book! AL is the MAN!
Williamson started inking to make some extra money and he was first inking Curt Swan at DC but Marvel was higher pay for the same amount of work and big royalties so he moved over there.
9:11 the depth of the savage world drawing on the left is phenomenal. few panels give me that feel. its that technique where they make the camera level with the ground that you guys talk about.
Holy shit, the more I watch the more I realize that Al Williamson is the fucking badass of all of those badasses. Damn
I first became consciously aware of Williamson when Dark Horse rearranged the Star Wars strips into the Classic Star Wars graphic novels in the 90s. I was absolutely smitten.
That Savage World strip you mentioned you wanted to do its own video for - it appears in Death Rattle #10 (which I think is the "Kitchen Sink" one you mentioned). That one is particularly a good reprint because it has a breakdown identifying specifically who did what on each panel.
This is so beautiful. Truly inspiring. Illustrators really used to know their trade before digital and AI dumbed everyone down. Thanks for sharing this, guys! 👏👍🏻
Man, he is on par with Wally Wood or Frazetta in my mind after this. I was aware of him for sure, but now I have to do a deeper dive into his artwork. Thanks, Jim and Ed
Al Williamson, another great artist y'all showed me! As always thanks for the share!
I love watching these video breakdowns of artists who’s work I’m not acquainted with but it’s absolutely gorgeous. Thanks for the videos guys.
At 12:01, on the top right page, Frazetta was obviously the model for that head shot.
this man was a wizard! I love his sci fi space opera stuff!
re: distractions. In the Cerebus guide to self-publishing, this is the reason Dave Sim doesn't own a TV, doesn't listen to the radio and uses a fax machine for communication. This all helps to cut down on distractions and get the work down
If you guys don’t have the Williamson sketchbooks that Flesk also released they are next level.
I don't know if it was the richness of their culture or good taste, but these guys took inspiration from some brilliant sources. Williamson name checks master movie stuntman Dave Sharpe as an ingredient for the movement he put into his figures. For prehistoric studies they went to the prime dinosaur visual artist Charles Knight, who was still alive. Famously they had access through Krenkel to the masters of ink illustration like J. C. Coll and for grandiose historical reference they pored over Fortunino Matania and Cecil B. De Mille movie stills.
They were all Raymond/Flash Gordon fans and did a few pieces for the comic based on Flash star Buster Crabbe. That Savage World piece was intended for the Crabbe comic but it was cancelled. In order to print the art in Witzend, they had to change the story to avoid rights issues. The reason why all the balloons are paste-ups is that Wallace Wood rewrote the text to fit in the existing balloons (quite a trick in itself) and completely changed the story from a romantic science fiction adventure to a pretty dark and cynical commentary about the ugliness of humanity.
This just blew My mind, thanx again from Colombia!
Love Al Williamson! Also - I'm pretty sure that first tool you guys pointed at was indeed an old cast iron mechanical pencil sharpener. I used them for a brief time in my high school drafting class.
As far as time consumption of things that take us away from the page… I straight up told the mother of my daughters that I’m just not going to respond durning work hours!
Superb I have loved his work so much thru the years. Thanks for this video!
I have this book and poured over it so many times and stole from it a lot too! surprising that the biggest flash Gordon piece he made isnt in it though.
Picked this up a few months ago and haven’t stopped lookin at it
I wish you gave your insights on how they used photo reference, knocked out pages quickly, but had to wait for the photographs to be developed. I mean, they would've had to get the script and plan out the panels for the next month's book while they were working from the shots they took for the current month's book.
Great video, guys! I met Al a couple of times over the years and I asked him about just inking comics and told me that he could ink some monthly comics to allow him to still do illustration work,kind of side hustle I’d guess? P Craig Russell would ink early Mignola and Ditko Rom comics! Mark Schultz wrote a couple of Flash Gordon marvel comics in early 90’s! I have a couple of really beautiful HC’s Al Williamson Adventures and Al Williamson’s Flash Gordon,a lifelong vision of the heroic. Both books are chock full of B&W stories and the reproduction is excellent! Al’s art is very creative and intimidating but standing out like a beacon of disciplined focus and labor of love and inspirational to the future generations! Godspeed to Al Williamson and Archie Goodwin 🙏❤️🎯⚡️👍
The tool you referenced at around the 4 minute mark is a pencil sharpener for mechanical 2mm leads...I have a few. I love drawing layouts with that sized leads (2B-6B for me, and F for cleanup). BTW>>>love your channel and what you guys are doing. Thank you so much.
nice timing, just picked up one of the IDW X-9 volumes of his stuff
I feel like I started reading comics yesterday when I listen to these episodes. I think this episode should be required watching for comic scholars. Love your guys' input and breakdowns. I really feel like I've learned from osmosis from this channel. Just the techniques featured blows my mind.
man.... skill, love and care
his work on flash gordon was crazy good
Thank you very much! Loads of interesting information I
didn't know. Well done!
So goooooood!
Wish this book had better distribution in the UK, had this on pre-order for ages and it never turned up. I did see a single copy and I should have snapped it up then. It looks an amazing book !! Just had a quick look to see how much this volume is, the lowest price is nearly £500 ... sigh !!
Thank you for this vide-poches.. Do you make a vidéo of Dave Stevens Production ? -sketchbook,album ?
In the SAVAGE WORLD story, Frazetta didn't necessarily draw all the women.. But he DID draw the guy's face throughout most of the story. The guy's face was based on actor Buster Crabbe - a Fleagle fave - because he starred in all of the FLASH GORDON movie serials..
Classic Al story…I was delivering furniture that he had my friends dad reapulster furniture,so we go in his house in Bethany PA (we didn’t know how he was) and he had all these Star Wars and Flash Gordon art work on the walls.He says yeah I work for a comic book company,so we’re th8nking he works for peanut butter and jelly comics, and he’s like yeah I’m working on the marvel title of ghost rider and daredevil right now…say whattttt,so in the end he gave us but loads of comics and signed them,who wants to buy them is the question,such a nice guy and talented for sure p,I’m bummed I don’t get his Star Wars and Flash Gordon stuff,I should have kept in contact hahaha
fire
This video causes extreme Williamson envy.
Anyone know what screen tone was used for the page at 15:22 ?
Huge Al Williamson fan…for more Flash Gordon work of his (and other stuff) you should check out the. Ok Flash Gordon: A Lifelong Vision of the Heroic. Shows a lot of his fascination with the character and reverence for Alex Raymond’s character work.