Travis Charest

[Dolemite]

Anyone familiar with the work of this amazing comic book artist? Known equally for his astonishing detail and for missing deadline after deadline, some of his previous work includes doing Wildcats for Image comics, not to mention the beyond-awesome X-Men/Wildcats "Golden Years" crossover book (with Wolverine and Zealot). Travis probably did the best rendition of Wolvie in that book I've ever seen any artist do:



He's currently working with writer Alexandro Jodorowsky on a series of graphic novels called The Dreamshifters. Some of Travis' art that has been released from the book is his best yet:



Damn, a "comic book" with art like that? Hell, yes. However, he's running late as usual, as the book was originally supposed to be out November 2001. Holy shit. Still, if every panel of every page looks like that, the wait'll be worth it.

Here's the link to The Official Unofficial Travis Charest Art Gallery. Cool site, it's got art, a detailed FAQ, a message board (Travis himself posts there sometimes answering questions, giving art tips, etc.), a bibliography, the works. Check it out.

[jonas]

One word: sweet.

The armor rendering is incredible. The one thing I noticed was the ailing mouth in comparison on the right figure. Hardly something to turn your nose up at, though.

[Dolemite]

Eh, as for the mouth, Travis sometimes will mess up a certain bodypart, or not have his proportions right, but overall he's a god. And that mouth ain't that bad at all. As for that armor, keep in mind that he does not use a computer for anything- he's all paint, airbrushing and colored pencils.

[negitoro]

Until the bastard learns to keep a deadline I will NOT acknowledge him as a quality comic artist.

A person like that, with sense of responsiblity to his fans or his company, shouldn't be working in illustration for ANY periodical.

Personally, I feel totally betrayed by him.

[Jester]

That's some awesome work there, but I second Negitoro's hate for the missed deadlines. It's drawing comics, man. It's fun and you get paid for it, pick up the pace, slacker! Why are all the good ones so lazy?

[Josh]

Originally posted by negitoro
Until the bastard learns to keep a deadline I will NOT acknowledge him as a quality comic artist.

A person like that, with sense of responsiblity to his fans or his company, shouldn't be working in illustration for ANY periodical.

Personally, I feel totally betrayed by him.

Oh Jesus... You just came off like a schoolgirl mad at a memebr of a boy band for getting a girlfriend.

[APC]

my fav

[negitoro]

Originally posted by 88mph
Oh Jesus... You just came off like a schoolgirl mad at a memebr of a boy band for getting a girlfriend.

LOL... I guess I sound a bit...

But seriously... why do these people choose a profession where they can't perform their regular job functions ?

Can you imagine going to work and say, miss a meeting you're supposed to lead, because you felt your notes needed an extra week to prepare ? Or how abot filing your taxes 3 weeks late and then telling the IRS "but damn, I bet you've never seen a tax return as complete and organized as this!" ?

It just doesn't happen. I have great respect for the man as an ARTIST. Pure and simple, he's great. But as a comic book penciller, the man is just a slacker. He doesn't deserve to be in the industry. If he was a freelance illustrator, he'd be revered and worshipped. If he drew graphic novels in complete form and relase them, he'd be an industry legend.

But if he chooses to do a periodical, and take our money for it, he needs to hold the responsibilty to his publisher and to his fans. As a fan, I'm willing to say "Oh, it's aweek late this month, it's cool... maybe he got the flu or something". I'm not willing to tolerate it month after month when he's 2 or 3 weeks, maybe a month or two, late!

Remember Wildcats vol 2? He was headlining the high profile re-introduction of the Wildcats. The pushed it back to a BIMONTHLY (ie. once every two months)... the book was less than 20 pages thick. What happened ? By issue three, it was like 3 weeks behind schedule. By issue 6 or 7, 'guest artists' were doing fill-in work. Before the first 10 issues were done, he was just gone. What the hell ?

The matter of the fact is that it's a waste of my time and money. Was the story line all that great ? Maybe. But I bought it for the promise for great visuals. I bought into the project due to the quality they promised and even broke the schedule convention to give it to us. When he doesn't like to the promise so shortly after it was made, why did I bother collecting it in the first place ? There's no coherence in the work now, not even a story arc done by a single artist.

In short, I feel he took my money and ran... kind of like the guys who promise you a great piece of property with a small down payment and then disappear.

It's an epidemic that plagues the industry. These are grown men, getting paid to do enjoyable work, something they dream about since they were like 4 and picked up their first crayon. They should buck up and work for their money like the rest of us.

Just because he's an artist or an entertainer doesn't mean we should hold them to different standards. Quite frankly, if like Michael Jordan missed a playoff game because he wanted to perfect the fadeaway shot he had planned to shoot the buzzer beating game winner, he'd be a ass and labelled as such. If your favorite band delayed his concert 3 hours after everyone got in their seats because they needed to rehearse their song a few more times, people would be rioting.

[Dolemite]

Originally posted by negitoro
If he was a freelance illustrator, he'd be revered and worshipped. If he drew graphic novels in complete form and relase them, he'd be an industry legend.

Good point, I think this is the route (graphic novel) he's currently taking with his latest project. He's already admitted in interviews that it's pretty obvious that he'll never be a "monthly guy". He should just stick to one-shot stuff like the X-Men/Wildcats book (which took him just under a year to do) and the upcoming Dreamshifters.

Remember Wildcats vol 2? He was headlining the high profile re-introduction of the Wildcats. The pushed it back to a BIMONTHLY (ie. once every two months)... the book was less than 20 pages thick. What happened ? By issue three, it was like 3 weeks behind schedule. By issue 6 or 7, 'guest artists' were doing fill-in work. Before the first 10 issues were done, he was just gone. What the hell ?

Yeah, I remember that nonsense. I was all happy to finally have him doing a semi-regular book again and *poof*, it went up in smoke. He still did the covers for a bit after he stopped penciling, but no longer. I kinda liked that series. A shame.

Overall, however, you're taking this a tad too hard. I don't think he's a slacker, I just think he's slow as ass. If he rushes, the quality of his artwork takes a nosedive, as shown in the last few pages of the X-Men/Wildcats book. You can tell he was probably getting close to deadline and had to kick up the speed a notch, and as a result the the art at the end of the story wasn't nearly as tight as it was for the rest of the book.

Here's a good example: First, let's take a look at that pic of Wolverine's face again:



That was about in the middle of the book, and was about as good as the artwork got (which was amazing). Now look at this shot of Wolvie's face, from the last page or so:



Still better than a lot of stuff out there, but the HUGE downgrade in quality from the earlier pic is very noticable. What a shame.

[negitoro]

Perhaps I'm over reacting a little... But I absolutely agree with you... the man, should not be doing periodicals. He definitely qualifies skill-wise as an illustrator... he needs to pick and choose his job more carefully.

Really, the whole thing that bugs me is that he is a great illustrator... he doesn't NEED to draw comics... he WANTS to draw comics. But when he draws comics he doesn't seem to realize that the deadlines and time requirements are inherent in the job.

Is he lazy ? Is he a slacker ? Really, that's only something HE can tell us. To tell you the truth, I go to art school and I have friends in the illustration department... they can churn out great looking stuff -- as students, nonetheless -- in a day or two...

Are they as good as good as Charest ? Perhaps not. But regardless, he shouldn't be failing to deliver 20 pages in a two month time frame. Basically, in his mind, faced with pushing himself to work a 80 hour week or missing his deadline, I'm thinking he chose to miss the deadline.

And this is a PRO illustrator. A man who had plenty of experience before he even started Wildcats. He should be well aware of his ability and his speed. Being an illustrator is not just about drawing... it's about knowing your limitations and knowing where to take shortcuts in your work to achieve the best overall results.

Is that last panel a downgrade from the first one ? Yes, most definitely... Really, if he can't maintain that pace, he should work on different drawing conventions... he doesn't HAVE to show us each and every wrinkle for it to be a great piece of visaul art and storytelling. But if he took a year to draw the book, as you said, why did he plan his work so poorly ? THAT is the reason I'm calling him a slacker.

I have far, far more respect for people like Mark Bagley... who's work is far less sophisticated, but is still technically solid and he has shifted to a BIWEEKLY schedule and still delivering his work on time, consistently. To me, these people are truly comic book artists... and not people like Charest, Madureira and (my recent peeve) Brian Hitch.

Saying that, I am looking forward to seeing his new work. I do appreciate his art. I just wish he would keep his promises for once.