Category: AoM&A 1 Preview

Adventures of Men and Angels # 1 Premiere Page 12

The halo or aura colors of our characters are hints to there particular expertise and personality.  Perhaps we’ll be able to delve into that in a future story line. Primarily, as we said yesterday, it’s just an artistic indication of a supernatural character in the story which cannot be seen by human eyes when the halo or aura is present. This is not inconsistent of the use of halos in classic art dating back centuries we just have a different take on it. There is no mention of halos in the Bible.

That’s a good lead into the next point being: this art, like the art of the masters in antiquity through our modern age are works of the human imagination. Like parables often employed by Biblical writers and used heavily in Jesus teachings are meant to give the listener or reader an idea of eternal beings and concepts. That doesn’t mean everything in scripture is symbolic. Some things are literal and some figurative. The attempt to classify all things literal or all things figurative is in error as Jesus once said of such, “Your mistake is that you don’t know the Scriptures, and you don’t know the power of God.” ( Matthew 22:29) The characters in this book are fictional with heavy reference to the Biblical descriptions. But since it is a work of fiction artistic license does apply just as with fictional characters and tales of angels and demons used in books, art and media down through the ages.

Now, with this page we end our special digital premier and preview of AoM&A #1. Hope you enjoyed it and will purchase the 32 page first issue which contains 30 pages of story and art.

Watch our blog for the announcement of the release date and where to purchase. Thanks. – Mark

Adventures of Men and Angels # 1 Premiere Page 11

Now a new angel enters our story and cast. Oxel is his name and we find out the first angels name is Manuel, his captain.

Tip in reading Adventures of Men & Angels: By default, angels and demons can’t be seen by human eyes unless God allows them too. Such was the case, briefly, with Glinda when she saw the battle between Captain Manuel and the large demon warrior. A little tool we’ve employed in the art of our tale, to remind eagle eyed believers as to what is going on, is the colored outlines around the supernatural characters of our cast when they are in human range of sight. Each halo or aura is a different color which denotes that characters forte. The colors have significance to their particular expertise or calling nothing else. More on that later.

See you next post, folks! Thanks. – Mark

Adventures of Men and Angels # 1 Premiere Page 10

Angels fight for us, not against us, because God is for us, not against us. As the angel said, prayers had been made to God in behalf of Glinda. She doesn’t realize it yet, but the best way to help in the battle is to get in agreement with God and His will.

See you next post, folks! Thanks. – Mark

Adventures of Men and Angels # 1 Premiere Page 9

Angels who serve God are loyal to Him.  They draw on and display His attributes. They serve the Almighty and minister to the citzens of His Kingdom. They will do no harm to humankind who likewise give their allegiance to God. Those who are allies of darkness may find the angels of God formidable foes. But the real fight is never with flesh and blood but with the agents of darkness and chaos.

Demons are tormenting spirits. They do not have any compassion. They mean only harm, not good in any way. They will try to trick folks into thinking they will do good and even serve human beings. There are angels who have fallen into evil but no fallen angels who have been redeemed back to good.

Some in literature and art have depicted demons as antiheroes. That is someone who  lacks traditional heroic values but somehow saves the day in the end. Such concepts are contrary to what demons represent, which is evil. Evil cannot be good any more than dark can be light. Darkness is the absence of light. God often will take the traps set by the agents of darkness and turn it to His peoples good.

These are the patterns to be found in Adventures of Men & Angels.

See you next post, folks! Thanks. – Mark

Adventures of Men and Angels # 1 Premiere Page 8

Drawing The Unseen Realm. Depicting the dimension of eternity has had many approaches over many centuries. Angels and demons have been a fixation in the realms of literature and art for thousands of years. Some of the earliest angels images date back to the days of Moses. Angels were part of the imagery of The Tabernacle and the Ark of the Covenant which God instructed Moses and the children of Israel to construct according to the first books of the Old Testament.

The art of angels in culture are often depicted as weak looking, even children. Most angels in the Bible are described as warriors some look like men some like animals. I took a more warrior approach to the Angels Four with a dose of Jack Kirby style and the Book of Revelation in mind as well.

Demons have a wide range of imagery in culture. Some are depicted as outright monsters especially these days. The demons as I have drawn them were largely inspired by a 1964 Jimmy Olson reprint in a Superman 100 Page Spectacular issue I read in the early ’70’s  as a kid. The art was by Kurt Schaffenberger and was cartoony but sinister looking at the same time. They were not too scary but they were evil looking. Not nearly as sinister looking as something you might see drawn by many modern comic book artists.

See you next post, folks! Thanks. – Mark

Adventures of Men and Angels # 1 Premiere Page 7

A Side-by-side panel showing Willie’s soul and body (face) was suggested to help with story telling on this page. Long time friend and  comics creator Ralph Ellis Miley came to the rescue! He saw the opportunity to use a technique used in comics from time to time to make it easier to understand what was going on in the story.  Willie’s body was barely conscious and near death laying on the sidewalk. In The Unseen Realm there was lot going on! Demon spirits were making claim to his soul. Needless to say they did not plan to usher him to the gates of Heaven. Seconds away from death in the physical realm Willie’s soul pleaded for his life first with the Angel warrior and then… a much higher authority! It looks like Willie may make it to the pearly gates after all! But everyone is not in agreement with that out come.

See you next post, folks! Thanks. – Mark

Adventures of Men and Angels # 1 Premiere Page 6

Depicting Willie’s soul self along side his body was a bit tricky. The use of some of the special effects in the digital art and publishing programs helped. Willie’s soul needed to be spirit like, for one thing: transparent. That was something which use to be hard to do in old school comics. Now, it’s built into the technology. Drawing it all out in real pencils on real paper was no different than the old school methods, I just had to keep in mind the way it would look in the digitally inked and colored art. Still it was a bit confusing to some of my pal’s who were looking at my original art. So one of my older, more  experienced comic creating buddies made a great suggestion for the next page…

See you next post, folks! Thanks. – Mark

Adventures of Men and Angels # 1 Premiere Page 5

Now, for page 5… The top of this page was redrawn about 3 or 4 times. The first panel originally depicted the demon having his head severed at the neck. But as the development went on and the script and the art was finished that did not seem to be a graphic suitable for kids. Sure it’s a demon, but the depiction of any being being decapitated can be a little unsettling. So the top of the page, originally two panels was sketched out a couple different ways then the action was combined into one large panel. The impact is there but the result of the violence has been played down for our General Audience promise.

Why do that? In our modern age adults have become jaded by overly detailed and even gory violence in media. It’s everywhere. It doesn’t even phase us any more. But if you encounter someone who has never seen it, it’s a little different for them. But regardless of that, it is not really needed to tell a story. Too much such detail detracts from the tale being told. There are other reasons as well which are too lengthy to go into here so we’ll have to explore those in a longer blog post later. For now let’s just continue the story of Adventures of Men & Angels #1.

See you next post, folks! Thanks.

Adventures of Men & Angels # 1 Premiere Page 4

Today we preview page 4! The battle gets more intense and more interesting as Glenda looks on with great awe as to what she is seeing on the city street where her stalled car is only a few feet away. To say the least, she has never seen anything like this except on a movie screen and even that pales in comparison to the real life drama she is witnessing. Has she lost her mind? Is she caught up in some kind of hallucination brought on by fearing for her life?

Another tip of the hat to the late, great Jack Kirby. Jack pioneered so many concepts in comics it’s nearly impossible to not see his influence in the medium to this day even more than 30 years after his death. His career spanned at least 5 decades longer than that depending on when folks can agree on exactly when his career started. The guy was doing art for pay when he was still a teenager! So in that time he embraced the budding comic book industry, understood the story telling medium and then renovated the whole thing, not once, but several times. One of his innovations of the ’60’s were these larger panels pages in 4 panel and 6 panel grids. I’ve adapted that format in this first issue. It really moves a story along or slows the pace depending on the number of panels used. Jack pioneered that and Marvel, then later DC artists, copied him. Not as much of it is used today overall in the industry and it is missed. But a few Jack Kirby inspired artists still use it today.

Adventures of Men and Angels Preview Page 3

Here we go with page 3! The action intensifies and Glinda finds herself going from a desperate, seemly life ending situation to the most unexpected intervention imaginable! She is feeling utter surprise, relief, and terror all at the same time! Imagine the adrenaline and cortisone levels she is experiencing! What she see’s she can hardly believe!

Kudos to the King of Comic Book Art & Storytelling: Mr. Jack Kirby! He inspired the images of the angel and demon with his many depictions of godlike characters in his work for Marvel and DC Comics in the ’60’s and ’70’s. Nobody could draw hand to hand combat scenes like Jack!