Fantomah

 Fantomah

Another bizarre Fletcher Hanks creation I've been meaning to do something with for a long, long time (and may do something again in the future).  Fantomah was first published in "Jungle Comics #2" in 1940, which beat out Wonder Woman as one of the first female, um, superheroes (?).  Mostly, like his other creation, Stardust the Super Wizard, Fantomah would discover evil-doers, show up, and dispense a vaguely ironic and/or monstrous sense of justice.  The End.

I've always meant to do an updated repanel of her transformation sequence, and probably will one of these days...

There is something so bizarre about the stories and characters he wrote and drew, you almost can't look away.  It is a strange amalgamation of competence and ineptitude that I find oddly compelling.  The comic book equivalent of Ed Wood, I suppose.  

A beautiful lady who turns into a blue-skinned, skull-faced woman with long, blonde hair wearing a one-piece, black bathing suit with a transparent short dress?  What's not interesting about that?  Then again, there's no accounting for taste.

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STEP ONE:  Here are the digital pencils, done in Clip Studio Paint on a 1,500px x 2,250px @ 300dpi canvas. 

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STEP TWO:  I then used a white, 15pt brush to go over top the pencils as a sort of digital scratchboard.  I always liked scratchboard--both the traditional art method, as well as the digital version.

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STEP THREE:  A Multiply Layer was created, over which the colors were painted.  From some reason, the reduced size of the rather large thumbnail here has made the colors shift a bit darker on the screen.

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Done digitally in Clip Studio Paint

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Stardust the Super Wizard

 Stardust the Super Wizard

Quite a while back, I read the book "I Shall Destroy All Civilized Planets!", which was a biography and collection of some of Fletcher Hanks' comic book creations, the most famous (infamous?) of which are Stardust and Fantomah.  There is a certain goofy, Ed Wood-esque charm to both the stories and the art.  I always intended to do something with the character--a panel or page recreation for "Repaneled" back when that was a Blog I contributed to on the regular before it lamentably closed, or something along those lines.

Stardust the Super Wizard would discover bad guys, show up, and mete out some sort of vaguely ironic and appropriately horrifying justice, end of story.  Sort of like DC Comics did in the mid-1970's with "The Spectre" by Michael Fleisher and Jim Aparo, where Spectre would show up, turn crooks into wood, and then run them through a table saw, etc. 

And another example of Fletcher Hanks' art style and Stardust's version of "Justice"...

I find something compelling about his work.  His art is strangely competent, but there is an underlying weirdness and crude simplicity.  If you'll forgive the anachronism, it reminds me of a strange cross between modern(ish) comic book artists Kevin O'Neil ("Marshal Law" and "League of Extraordinary Gentlemen") and Frank Quitely ("We3" and "All-Star Superman").  I am a fan of both O'Neil and Quitely, but Fletcher Hanks style is a weird mixture.  I mean, I like hot dogs and I like ice cream, but a hot dog sundae... I dunno. 

(Heh, while looking for a couple images of Stardust for the Blog post, it looks like Kevin O'Neil had done a couple drawings of Stardust in the "League of Extraordinary Gentlemen".  After I saw the images, I vaguely remembered the panels in question... "Oh, yeah!" (I have all issues/books of "LoEG".)  However, I think the reason I was reminded of Kevin O'Neil's art has more to do with some of O'Neil's grotesque anatomical distortions, rather than these particular panels.)

Hey, Kids, Kevin O'Neill's version of Stardust the Super Wizard!

and 

Image Comics also did a "Next Issue Project" in 2008, which picked up where "Fantastic Comics" left off back in in the 40's.  I was intrigued and got the issue when it came out, which had a Stardust story written by Joe Keatinge with art by Mike Allred.  So, that was a fun surprise for me.

From everything I've read, Fletcher Hanks was a rather terrible human being: an abusive alcoholic who's wife and kids all disowned him and were glad when he left the family behind.  He died frozen on a Manhattan park bench and was basically homeless  Given all the abuse he had apparently heaped on his family, I'm not sure if that would be a Stardust type of justice or not.  (Hmmm, this got darker than I intended.)

While looking into Stardust again after a long while, it looks like the character may be in the Public Domain?  I noticed a few people doing projects with the character.  Hmmm, makes me think it may be fun to do something with the character, too, if he actually is in the Public Domain, that is...

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STEP ONE:  I created a document in Painter 2020 and did the digital pencils.  Unfortunately, I wasn't paying attention and it was a 1,000px x 1,400px @ 300dpi.  I should have created it a bit larger, methinks, and then shrunk it down for the Blog.  Oh, well.  

Also, I choose the costume from the first appearance, rather than later ones which had a square-shaped collar.  Speaking of the costume, it always reminded me of Marvelman/Miracle Man.  So, that's cool.  

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STEP TWO:  I mostly digitally painted this in Painter 2020, but then saved it as a .PSD and then imported it into Clip Studio Paint.  I'm just too used to using certain brushes within Clip Studio Paint.

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STEP THREE:  Here's the finished image.  I threw on some digital airbrushing to give more of a glow.  I mean, he's named "Stardust the Super Wizard", after all.  Oh, and some shadow, as well.

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Done digitally in Painter 2020 and Clip Studio Paint.

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