Weapon X

Weapon X, a major evolution in the character development of Wolverine.  Love it.  I wanted to take a crack at that weird helmet, and do a new/old design for it.  I also didn't want to limit myself to one portrayal of Wolverine, and also wanted to take the opportunity to challenge myself, in my digital work.  I do very involved compositions for my epic series of paintings, but haven't done that digitally since the Transformers : Continuum cover from 2009.  So here we go...

The thought process for this image started with that little sketch of 1st appearance of Wolverine leaping in the air towards the Hulk.  Then came the pose for Weapon X, and the others followed soon after that, after I broke the story behind the image, to feature moments in the long history of Wolverine.

This image was to complicated to keep up with the work in progress images, so I'll just dole these out and describe what each segment features.  This is the young James (pre-Logan name) discovering his claws at an early age.  He originally had bone claws, before the Weapon X program coated his skeleton with adamantium.  "'Does it hurt when they come out?'  'Every time.'"

Also shown is the background segment for Weapon X, and the finished background, with spatter texture in what will be visible spaces, and a ghosting of the Weapon X logo.

Next is a WWII era Loga, depicted with a sepia tone photo texture.  There's a bit of an easter egg for fans, with a bullet hole in his helmet, along with his signature cigar.

The ninja days.  Wolverine cutting through a swath of attackers, taking damage and immediately healing along the way.

Wolverine vs. Hulk - first appearance.  He's pretty small in this image, but I think I managed to get all the details of the kitty suit in there.  I was a little reluctant to put that much of the Hulk in the frame, but it anchored the color theme in green, working better on a technical scale.

Just a glimpse of the modern era Wolverine, I wanted this to be about Weapon X, and flashing on his history, so I didn't want to get two yellow suits going, along with the X-Men color theme of yellow and blue, so just the crazy eyes.

And now the final piece to the puzzle.  Weapon X has awakened, torn himself free from the experiment, and forges a bloody trail to freedom.

I really like this one, but it's so colorful and detail orientated, I worry that it may not read well enough visually..  I got some great advice from some friends to help me tweak it, but it finally came time to call it done.

Next up, I'm going to revisit a couple of paintings that didn't come out well enough in the end, but I really like the drawings, so I'm redoing them digitally:  The White Queen, Emma Frost, and the Apocalypse/Summers images from last fall.