If I didn't already love Jim Lee, this would make me. His kids are huge Teen Titans fans and this is his daughter's birthday gift. I'll paste his entire comment below, but you can also read it on his Facebook (which I recommend following for tons of awesome art).
I am booked up with so much real work these days that I rarely do a piece for fun or for a friend...but this piece was an exception. My kids are big fans of the Teen Titan's animated show and with one of their birthday's coming up this weekend, I made time over 4 days to make sure I got this done so it could get framed.
Their least favorite character is Robin (how could you tell heh) and
their favorites are obviously Starfire and Raven. I wanted to do something in the style of the show but also with some of my own quirks in there (otherwise why bother drawing something original...could have just lightboxed an existing cartoon drawing or even simpler, just buy a retail Teen Titans poster!)
I knew that as a cartoony drawing, the line weights and the spotting of the blacks would be crucial in terms of giving the piece 'weight' and the feeling of being complete and also making sure it looked clear and understandable in one or two glances. Without the benefit of color, one has to resort to composition, and again line weights and spotting blacks.
In the end, I went with the starfield but didn't overdo the star splatter and kept the action lines to a minimum. The final image is roughly 22"x 17" and took a bit longer than I thought it would--the cartoony, simplified style relies so much on line control and placement that it takes longer than one would imagine! Hopefully she will get a kick out of being placed in the ranks of the Titans!
What a great dad.
