Hue Kidding?, by Joe James – Twenty Tomorrows #3 | @MDWorld

August 21, 2015 Victor El-Khouri 5 Comments

I sat in the offices of DEFIANT and listened attentively as editor-in-chief Jim Shooter spoke with the co-creator of Spider-Man and artist, Steve Ditko.

Now, I’d been raised in a comic book shop, so I was very familiar with Steve Ditko’s work, not only on Spider-Man but also with Mr. A and The Missing Man. On this day he was visiting the offices of Defiant to discuss the work he was doing on Dark Dominion, one of Defiant’s flagship titles, also co-created by Shooter and Ditko.

As I sat there and listened to these two Industry titans talk shop, I found myself completely rattled by a discovery I made. Now don’t get me wrong, I’m not claiming any exclusive knowledge here—this fact had to be well known—it’s just that I’d never really heard of it before, and nothing could prepare me for the impact of it.

It was the mid-‘90s and although I was a penciller that had already done work for DC comics and Milestone Media, an opportunity arose to work full time at DEFIANT, publisher of Warriors of Plasm, War Dancer and Dark Dominion. This was a chance to work with Jim Shooter and learn first hand from the man who ran Marvel Comics in the 80’s.

Another way of saying this is that I met DEFIANT’s Creative Director Janet Jackson while I worked for Milestone Media. Janet, who happens to be an outstanding colorist, had set up Milestone’s coloring system and in due time she and I worked on a few logos for the DEFIANT titles.  It was Janet who opened the doors for me at DEFIANT and soon I was hired as a production assistant.

As a production assistant in a comic book company I did a little bit of everything—now mind you this was in the days before full-on computer production, which meant we did things mostly by hand. Like many robots are being presently trained to do. So my job consisted of preparing original art for coloring and printing, doing art corrections, running to FedEx, and assisting in any way I knew how.

I was also fortunate enough to also get some work penciling art for the Dark Dominion trading card collection. Steve Ditko had penciled the  #0 Issue of Dark Dominion and it was released as a series of trading cards (collect all the cards and you got a whole zero issue). On the back of the cards you had art that featured some of the characters from the series. It was a great idea, and once you had all the cards and the special binder to put them in, you had a pretty exhaustive intro into the world of Dark Dominion.

Ditko was lined up to draw the series for DEFIANT and he was in the offices that day to discuss the ins and outs of issue one. Thats when I made my discovery.

Ready?

Steve Ditko really did do that Spider-Man thing with his hands.

You know, the web-slinging hand motion where Ol’ Spidey would press the mechanism on his palm to release webbing?  That thing. Pressing ones two middle fingers directly into ones palm?

Ditko did it while speaking.

It was a casual hand gesture that streamed forth as he spoke. I found it so compelling that I could think of nothing else. I was hypnotized. And as a fan of his work I was utterly unable to move. I mean it was as though Gene Roddenberry, the creator of Star Trek, were ordering lunch and tossing off a few Vulcan salutes to punctuate what kind of dressing he wanted with his salad. It was just strange. No one else seemed to mind or notice—I couldn’t think of anything else. He even did it when I was alone with him getting his lunch order.

That was the entirety of my Steve Ditko encounter, but not the end of it.

On one afternoon Jim shooter asked me if I would take on the task of drawing Dark Dominion. And if I wouldn’t mind doing it in two weeks. Ditko had passed on the book and since I had already done some art for the series I was asked to step in and draw away. It was an incredible gesture by Jim and I didn’t hesitate to jump in and give it my best.

Thus I was shepherd into a room with a colorist from England named Tim Perkins for the task of drawing Dark Dominion #1.

I could not have done the book without Tim Perkins’ presence, advice, humor and stick–to–itiveness.  The fact that he had a wealth of experience that he was willing to share with me in his kind and patient way it made for an experience for which I am still grateful. And I recommend to any one out there that if you’re going to draw a comic book, do so in a room with your fellow creators.

I’d show Tim a layout and he’d say: “Let’s not ink that part of the frame, let’s paint that.” We began to collaborate on the look of the book, not just my part of the book or his, but the world, the book that became Dark Dominion. We became allies in world building. The experience was invaluable and fun. Colorists are awesome.

And it was not too far removed from playing space explorers in a tree house, or playing S.W.A.T. (Special Weapons and Tactics) in the playgrounds in the back of the projects, or jamming with a high school garage band, or sitting in a room with Steve Ditko and Jim Shooter watching them chat about “Fear being the root of all evil” and fighting monsters who live on the quantum stratum parallel to our world or…

Comic books are color books with two staples holding them together that tell a story. Ask anyone outside of our business. That’s what they’re buying, that’s what they’re reading. And colorists are a huge part of that.

Nothing is incidental. Nothing is an accident. Even the mistakes take effort, especially when you don’t know that you’re making them… But what’s being taken in by the reader is the complete product. Sure, as fans we favor particular artists, colorists, writers and letterers. But at the end of the day the comic book is one thing, a single work, telling one tale to one person at a time.

To my mind colorists bring it all together. Mood, tone, cohesion, texture. They are your allies, your saviors, in some cases. On more than a few occasions I’ve asked the colorist for help. It sounds somethings like this: “This page isn’t really working, can you help?” And you know what? They do.

And I’ve had the privilege of working with some of the best: Janet Jackson, whose colors graced the covers of Dark Dominion and who was in effect my editor while I penciled that series. Tim Perkins tolerated my Steely Dan fixation during long hours of drawing (the band, not the other thing). And recently David Hillman’s colors on some of the upcoming work that will be published by Axel Ink (but more on that in another blog).

Colorists are invaluable.

I hope we never get too old to let loose and talk about the proper motivation behind wearing a cape and if YR is exactly the right color for it.

Tim articulates the experience of the early days at Defiant rather eloquently in his blog; http://wizards-keep.blogspot.com/2009/05/dark-dominion-part-02.html. It’s really a fantastic document of the time.