RocketRoach: deannambrigman redraw I

RocketRoach submitted:

deannambrigman redraw

I felt this sentiment before, during all those Darkchylde “wake up” redraws, but not strongly enough to actually express it: sometimes (often) these bad comic book poses are simply un-salvageable.

I don’t need to explain on this blog how, a successful illustration should be able to communicate with the viewer even without words; and that posing, both in real life and (to a lesser degree) in art, is dictated by physics, anatomy and gesture/intent, right? 

Well then, what the heck is Spider-woman (whom I know next to nothing about) supposed to be doing?



Is she flying/gliding? (figure 1): both her hair torso and head disagree.

Is she leaping off a building? (like Spider-man would, figure 2):  the motion blurred leg suggests that, but the her upper body and flame trail rule that out.

Is she dropping down on purpose? (figure 3): this is the only interpretation in which both her “wings” and hair make sense, but suicidal pose aside (trying to land or your feet is just not sexy, I guess), the motion blur is going in the wrong direction.

Trying to “fix” this train-wreck is like trying to make the Guernica anatomically correct without changing the composition: a waste of time.

Even for the sake of self improvement, (something I’m struggling with as well), I think that, sometimes, coming up with a completely new pose that actually makes sense would be much more useful, IMHO.

Sorry for the awkward English.

I think in the original she was meant to be diving during flight.  My original caption was that she was killed and fell out of a plane.  I still can’t see that picture as anything else. xD

I really like your breakdowns though, and how each possibility is confused by the contradictory motion blurring and hair/wing effects. Having a solid idea of the context and how that affects what you plan to draw is really important.