The consummate villain, Green Goblin! This is another character who I’ve always felt either works incredibly well, or can be overwrought and silly.

For the artwork, I wanted to play up the horror elements of an unhinged, costumed villain. Went with an up close perspective, lots of dramatic lighting and maniacal laughter. As this project stemmed from a daily drawing challenge in October, Green Goblin appears on Halloween, so the pumpkin bomb had to make an appearance.

This one had to go out with a bang, pun intended, so it is a real combination of all the other elements I’d used in different variations throughout the other pieces. I really liked how this turned out, and really enjoyed capping things off with this piece. Dramatic, dimly lit pieces have always been my favourite and I hope that shines through in this one.

Labels: Ditko, Ditkoctober, Green Goblin, Pentel, Photoshop, Spider-Man, Steve Ditko

The man himself, and arguably Ditko’s most recognizable character. I know Spider-man has consistently been one of my favourite characters and has historically had one of the most excellent rogues gallery, with a lot of recognizable villains.

For the artwork, I wanted to pay homage to another classic Spider-man moment, the cover of The Amazing Spider-Man #33, “The Final Chapter!”. I have always gotten a kick out of drenching a piece in details while still maintaining the narrative, which I hope to have accomplished here.

Colouring this piece was a lot of fun but also quite a bit of a challenge. I needed to ensure I didn’t over work everything with so many little details in play, but also wanted to push the depth so the piece made sense. Really tried to limit this to just a shading layer, with variations of flat colours doing most of the heavy lifting on the water elements and in separating the different planes in the background.

Labels: Ditko, Ditkoctober, Pentel, Photoshop, Spider-Man, Steve Ditko

I absolutely loved the galactic characters in the Marvel roster as a kid, particularly Silver Surfer. Characters like Galactus and Eternity always struck a chord with me so getting to draw this one was a lot of fun. In particular, I got a lot of positive feedback about this one which was really encouraging.

Art wise the character does all the work and really the only thought I had to keep in mind was striking a good balance of universal elements and negative space.

From a colour perspective, this one did all the work for me. All I had to do was ensure I wasn’t clashing elements together, that each individual piece was readable, and that the colours all popped. I include some straight forward shading for depth, and not much else was necessary. Sometimes with a piece with a lot of elements, less is more when it comes to colour.

Labels: Ditko, Ditkoctober, Eternity, Pentel, Photoshop, Steve Ditko

I always got a kick out of this costume as a kid. Revisiting it as an adult and while nostalgic, it is an interesting look to say the least. I just went completely overboard on the electrical current on this one. The electricity based villains have always been relegated to the sidelines, but I have to imagine in the right hands that power could be very dangerous. I wanted to channel some of that here and create the idea that nothing surrounding someone like Electro would be safe.

This colour scheme surprised me, but when it was done I couldn’t argue with the results. I had no intention of leaning into this pale lime green, but in my opinion it worked well to bring the yellow and green of Electro’s costume together. Very basic shading and colour holds here. For a this piece, and a few others, I actually just doubled the colour layer, set the new layer as a multiply layer, and used a mask to bring the highlights forward. Previously I’d always selected highlight colours, or shadow colours, then had to add colour adjustments to bring them together. As I’d worked through these, I started to find ways to get good results quicker.

Labels: Ditko, Ditkoctober, Electro, Pentel, Photoshop, Spider-Man, Steve Ditko

Doctor Octopus has always been a favourite Spider-man villain, and this is hands down my favourite of the group. I had the idea of casting Doctor Octopus as a disenfranchised genius, radicalized online and using his intellect in a misguided attempt to right his perceived wrongs. I was rather proud of how this turned out, even just using simple, stark shading and some claustrophobic framing.

I had to keep the existing shadows in mind when colouring this, so not too many colouring tricks here. Just some choice colour adjustments in the pink glow, some blurred effects on the light sources, and the digital blocks in the background. I pictured him either in his own lair or having broken into some high tech lab, about to become one step closer to world domination.

Labels: Ditko, Ditkoctober, Doctor Octopus, Pentel, Photoshop, Spider-Man, Steve Ditko

This is not a character I spent any real time reading in the comics, although I was aware of the resurgence in popularity of the character with the more recent series and all of the fan art that came out of it.

I got a kick out of putting Squirrel Girl in a tree. I have to admit, I didn’t put much more thought into it than that. I gave her a sort of confused look just to say “I’m a girl... whose also a squirrel”.

I leaned heavy into the autumn feel of Squirrel Girl’s colour scheme and just made this a fall themed colour palette. Kept things very minimal with basic shades, some colour holds for background branches, and a blotchy brush for clouds in the background. Actually really liked how this turned out and decided not to add anything further as not to overwork it.

Labels: Ditko, Ditkoctober, Pentel, Photoshop, Squirrel Girl, Steve Ditko

Another character I came to late, I believe around the time the mantle was being picked up by Renee Montoya, although I knew of them from the pretty stark, faceless design.

I wanted to play with the typical “The Question appears from a cloud of smoke!” elements often seen in the comics. I added the smoke trailing off into a question mark as a nod to the character’s name and mystique.
I just love smoke elements. I love adding the colour and subtlety, adding the colour holds and grit, and just how they add to a picture. Nothing too drastic on this picture. I’d already added pretty defined shading at the inking stage so I just extended on that a bit and focused on adding some depth to the whole piece.

Labels: Ditko, Ditkoctober, Pentel, Photoshop, Steve Ditko, The Question

The Leader is the ultimate mad scientist character with a design that can look very odd if not done right. A lot of the earlier iterations had a very interesting cone head. I opted for some of the newer designs where he had a literal big brain vibe.

The intent here was to have an under-lit, maniacal laughter/crazed look feel to this. The Leader here is overcome with the genius of his plans, and can’t wait to see them come to fruition.

This very dramatic lighting is very fun to work with. Added some more detail to this using a colour gradient from the bottom and a gaussian blur on the lit elements to give it a glow. Here The Leader is standing in front of his latest devious design, lit by its ominous glow.

Labels: Ditko, Ditkoctober, Hulk, Pentel, Photoshop, Steve Ditko, The Leader

This is another one I switched up a bit from the original. The first version of Shade was a man in another super hero type outfit of the time. I wanted to tap into the trippy possibilities presented in the Shade revamps that came out of Vertigo.

For the artwork I really just played with background and foreground elements with the character front and centre.

This was a blast to colour! Starting with that now signature coat and just expanding out from there. Actually not a lot of need to over render with this many elements in place, so just a few colour holds and gradients were used. I really liked how this turned out!

Labels: Ditko, Ditkoctober, Pentel, Photoshop, Shade, Steve Ditko, Vertigo

This is one of those characters that on paper could be really well done but for most earlier iterations came off as a bit of a caricature. I’m not sure how the character is handled in newer stories but hopefully he’s gotten some good plot lines more recently. I feel there’s lot of potential.

For the art I just wanted to lean into the animalistic, predator sense of this character.

This piece colour wise was pretty straight forward. I took the predator aspect of the character forward by making him see red and amped up his singular focus. Used a bit of texture in the background to amp up the grit, and a colour adjustment for the whole thing to bring it into that red space.

Labels: Ditko, Ditkoctober, Kraven the Hunter, Pentel, Photoshop, Spider-Man, Steve Ditko

This character’s always been a lot of fun, and it’s a true testament to the caliber of character Steve Ditko created that Spider-man’s rogues gallery is not only so strong, but translated so well into other media.

Art-wise this was another one that I think was tricky to translate to the size restrictions I placed on myself. Scorpion is obviously a lot of tail, and I tried to play that up a bit here. He’s also having a very bad day.

Scorpion has a pretty strong colour palette so I didn’t mess with it too much. I tried to stay in similar hues to let the injuries pop a bit. Again, just some use of texture and colour holds to add some depth. I was able to be a bit more liberal on the texture to add the grit to this one in tune with the very bad day Scorpion was having.

Labels: Ditko, Ditkoctober, Pentel, Photoshop, Scorpion, Spider-Man, Steve Ditko

I loved these characters as a kid! I had a handful of back issues I’d snagged in a yard sale and must have read and re-read them over and over. I know this is the duo more from the 80’s stories but wanted to add some diversity to the lineup, and these are the characters I remembered the most fondly.

Just played up the contrast on these two in the artwork; agility versus brawn, each facing a different direction ready to take on whatever comes their way.

This was pretty straight forward colour wise. Just some simple shadows, a pretty contrasted background colour, and some texture to keep it interesting. I like the pop art feel this has, even if there’s not too much dynamic colouring going on.

Labels: Ditko, Ditkoctober, Hawk & Dove, Pentel, Photoshop, Steve Ditko

I’m starting to sense a theme with these Doctor Strange characters in that I don’t know who they are, and they have some very interesting costume choices.

Once again, I leaned on the magic aspects of the character to create some fun effects, and focused in on the character’s face to make it more menacing.

Labels: Baron Mordo, Ditko, Ditkoctober, Doctor Strange, Pentel, Photoshop, Steve Ditko

As a kid I loved the character of Mysterio. He seemed impossible to defeat and led to some clever stories where punching your way out of the problem was not the answer.

For the artwork, I just wanted to play on the (wait for it)... mystery of the character by showing him appearing (or is he disappearing?!?) in smoke.

I struggled with this one a bit. Mysterio has a very distinct colour palette so I focused on not pushing the purples or greens too far out there and making the picture look too garish. Some varied smoke colours and textures here and there and we’ll call it a wrap!

Labels: Ditko, Ditkoctober, Mysterio, Pentel, Photoshop, Spider-Man, Steve Ditko

I feel like this character has always been a bit of a punchline, and while I was not reading comics at the time the Penance storyline came to be, I’m not sure if he’s ever been redeemed. I think a lot of these characters that were introduced as light hearted comic foils sort of lost their place in the grittier tones of the 90’s and even into the realism/movie tie-ins of the 2000’s. That being said, I did collect New Warriors for a time as a kid and recall Speedball fondly from that group setting.

For the artwork, I just wanted to show some of the dynamics of the character zipping into the panel.

I feel like the colour scheme of the character itself was pretty bold so I just stuck with that, along with some minimal lighting and colour holds. I chose a subdued background colour to let the costume colours pop a bit.

Labels: Ditko, Ditkoctober, Pentel, Photoshop, Speedball, Steve Ditko