Friday, December 08, 2006




Just a couple rough sketches for an upcoming storyline. I hope you like ping pong.


40 comments:

P. Sternberg said...

Gorgeous pencils! The figures are so dynamic; the last time I remember seeing your drawings have that kind of motion was in the CTS storylines.

Anonymous said...

Ah, ping pong. You are truly living white and nerdy.

I must agree. The dynamic poses look great. This makes me realize how great an expansion to the PA UFS would be.

Anonymous said...

I like ping pong.

And I agree with the previous comments. You are indeed really freakin' talented. Good hustle.

Willows said...

I'm not sure anybody in their right mind can dislike ping pong. Can't wait to see how you work it into PA.

Anonymous said...

Hmm... Rockstar's Table Tennis or Pink Pong (ie Love * Ping Pong!), that's the question.

Either way, the ping pong gods will be pleased.

Bill said...

Is there any chance that you could post a larger version of these for people to color, I think it would be fun.

Anonymous said...

Just so people can say I'm picking apart your work again (cause I love when they get all bent out of shape over little shit,) I have to say at first glance, I thought Tycho was looking into a booze bottle (which later, I realized was his paddle.) Still there was something funny to me about Tycho being a hopeless drunk looking for that last drop.

Will B. said...

looks like its gonna be an interesting story. i wonder who will win?


im taking bets!
ONE NIGHT ONLY: GABE VS TYCHO
two men enter, one paddle leaves!

Anonymous said...

It'd be funny (or at least random)if the Ping Pong ball had a design on it like Pac-man or something.

Mordicus Hopkirk said...

I hope there'll be references to Ping Pong Club. The low brow humour would fit so nicely.

Blake said...

I agree with Elizabeth, I was going to post somthing similar about how sweet it would be to work in some pac man dots and that famouse little guy munching his was around gabes wrist via "sweat band"

Risingred said...

ping pong > sex

it's a scientific fact.

ジョン said...

I concur that the figures appear very dynamic, and I like the intensity of their expressions. As usual, well done.

Anonymous said...

I have to also agree with Stu. At first glance, I thought Tycho was staggering, angry and drunk... I guess that'll be fixed up when you redraw the lines, and colour his paddle-bottle. And just to be picky, how come Gabe's paddle is round, yet Tycho's is trapezoidal?

Overall though, the sketches are fluid and dynamic, with a look of intense concentration in their eyes that really sells it. This is Ping Pong. Competitive sportsmanship at its finest.

TankHammer said...

I don't like ping pong Gabe. You have failed me as an artist. I hope you're satisfied with yourself.

Anonymous said...

WII SPORTS!

Tycho and Gabe are imaging themselves when the are playing the wii tennis

Why I assume that because they look to much athletic (and Tycho a lot more)

Anyway I like the way that Penny arcade uses a lot of posses instead of being just there


( I didnt like the questionable content vespa girl story because it was an action story and the characters didnt do a lot of dynamic poses just being there standing up)

Jackson said...

these look super-great. with bated breath I await the sweet ping-pong action.

John Denmat said...

looks kickass. has tycho been working out? haha

Andrew said...

I love that Gabe wears a glove to play ping-pong.

Great work!

Richard H said...

Is it just me or are your drawings getting more and more Disneyish in quality? I remember you saying you red John K's blog quite a while ago, and in it he seems to go on and on about the old style, fluid drawings, and I've noticed yours getting more and more like that. Is that the influence...?

Anonymous said...

oh man I can't wait untill this one comes out. Gabe's gloves remind me of Mario's gloves. You guys should work in some obscure mario tennis joke. Keep up the good work.

Anonymous said...

I know you don't need it, but a bit of friendly constructive criticism:

The form of Gabe is nice, but I think her can be more dynamic like Tycho. The foreshortening is making his left arm a bit awkward, maybe changing the scaling of his hand, perhaps so it's more in the foreground would compensate for the awkwardness. Arms that extend forward always look a little funny to me.

Looks good!

FDisk said...

Your art has come a really long way in the past few years Mike; great job!

Anonymous said...

The drawings are sweet, as usual. For hardcore gamers, however, they look too athletic! Tycho is "...thinner than that. More gaunt. Like a mummy." And considering that you can see Gabe's nails, I'm pretty confident that he's not wearing gloves...just a sweatband.

Clutch said...

love the poses, i think they capture the intesity of the game, and i love the intracate finger hold that tycho is using, hands are a bitch to draw so i appreciate the work that went into that

possibly malignant said...

Indeed, the penhold grip from Tycho is an excellent variation.

The only thing I can advise on is Tycho's wardrobe. Keeping with the table tennis norm, the shirt seems a bit loose. The shorts, while fabulous, could benifit from that horrendous little triangle cut in the hem that screams "loser at summer camp."

Nothing personal, just saying...

TankHammer said...

Tycho's pose is awkward but from my limited experience with table-tennis/ping-pong/futuresport it seems accurate to the kind of facial expression/posture one tends to see. My only legitimate complaint is the neck-head connection (looks like he's attached at the chin, rather than the base of the skull) and the focus in his eyes (where is he looking? At the ball? At his opponent? At a dog off to the side?)

Gabe is perfect imo. Great depth and focus in that one.

Constructive criticism get!

Anonymous said...

Looking forward to it. Would love to see some special techniques come into play (Hyper-fireball, Super Jumps, Hadoken, etc).

acrylicana said...

Boy howdy do I ever!

tlebon said...

That reminds me of all the good times getting whooped in Rockstar Table Tennis and then slow-moing to watch it again. Are Tycho and Gabe supposed to be the Chinese Guy and the German guy, respectively?

Unknown said...

Hey my friends and i are trying to start a webcomic too, id love to see what people think of it. (the art and the site in general) please check it out and gimme ur opinion, im a big Penny Arcade fan and i want my comic to appeal to people with the same interests ya know? thanks guys!

http://www.bacmedia.blogspot.com

Spherical Time said...

Saw the new Wandering Age: The Hawk and the Hare over at PA.

Wow. The second cell almost made me cry. I must be depressed or something.

You know, if you didn't live 1,300 miles away, I'd beg to be an unpaid intern with you guys.

Anonymous said...

I've never played ping pong. Why does it hold such fond memories for me? O_o
Anyhoo, great sketches (as always).

Fedora Guy said...

I had to comment after today's Penny Arcade edition (the 4th of the "Hawk and Hare" CTS story) - the result of all your work on the hare is worth it. The second panel, in particular, is my fave (and current IM image, if that's okay...). I look forward to the next CTS if it'll mean more art like this.

J(original) said...

I really love you blog.


I'm portuguese.
Sometimes I come here to search for pictures to me to draw.

I hope you don't mind.

Keep going.

Joana

Shawn "the girl" Murray said...

Dude, I don't know when it happened but I have to say I've been enjoying PA for years, and the thing I've REALLY noticed lately are the facial expressions. It just FEELS like you're capturing emotions/ideas better than ever.

Seriously, did you recently sell your soul to Satan or something 'cause I'm REAL impressed in recent months.

You rock.

Anonymous said...

Awesome work as always, sir. Though i gotta say, it's weird for me seeing Gabe and Tycho out of uniform. It's like watching a turtle walk on it's hind legs.

umm...yeah.

Anonymous said...

Gotta agree with Stu and cristian, at first glance I thought Tycho was drunk. Of course, since I play a lot of DOA and recently watched the first Drunken Master movie with my friends, I had some great initial imaginings of Tycho on some kind of drunken Odyssey beating the crap out of grammatical heathens. But the ping pong thing is cool too. Damn, now I want to play. ::wanders off to find someone with a table::

Digital-Bushido said...

They look like screenshots from Rockstar Table Tennis for the X360. Awesome work as always.

Izzy Medrano said...

I really dig your line work, man. And the simplification on the characters I've seen in your comic is fantastic. So clean, and full of life. I was surprised to see that you do all you inking digitally. That's pretty amazing! Keep up the awesome work!