The Ross Campbell appreciation thread (IDW, WE WANT HIM BACK!)

[CyberCubed]

Originally Posted by DrSpengler

That's one of the best things about IDW's TMNT books; when it comes to the art, we are really spoiled for choice.

When the Raphael micro came out, I was like, "IDW! Gimme more of this guy!"

Then when the Donatello micro came out, I was like, "This dude! More of him!"

And now that the Leonardo micro is out, I'm like, "No wait! I want more of THIS guy!"

I think its telling that you skipped over the Michelangelo micro artist.

[FlawedCoil82]

Yea Michelangelo got the shaft for sure when it came to the art. I feel bad for his fans.

[Andrew NDB]

I dig the Michelangelo special art, but I felt it was too unpoliced. I'm OK with varying, even eclectic Turtle art styles suiting the different stories and genres and feels... but a Turtle probably shouldn't ever be in-panel crouched next to a human looking like if he stood at full height, he'd be 9 feet tall.

Ross Campbell does some pretty good art. If he was the guy drawing the "definitive" IDW TMNT, I'd be very OK with that... I agree he brings a certain A.C. Farley-like soulfulness (in intent, not actual artwork likeness) to the Turtles, a certain wonder that plays well. Would I take him over guys like, you know, A.C. Farley himself, Kevin, or Peter? Absolutely not, but with just a small amount of material to date he's already carved a place very, very high on my list, and I'd be all for him being given more material to spread his wings.

I'd be very interested to see what would have come of this IDW Leo special had Eastman done layouts for Ross' art. That seems the weak point of the action on the page here... the actual quality of artwork is high, but the action doesn't really ever seem to flow quite as organically as it should. It may be a victim of what Viacom/Nick allowed and what they wouldn't allow, 11th hour changes or something (who knows what goes on behind the curtain, really) but strong, well-choreographed swordfight layouts would have been a huge boon here... I mean, if ever there was a place for Eastman layouts, this would have been the place.

[marcelangelo]

hey man, I may have already expressed my views on the michelangelo micro art-and this is certainly a thread dedicated to ross campbell's turtles-but I fell with the idw turtles editors checkin in on our oppinions here I MUST repeat myself(im summary)...I LOVED the look of the michelangelo micro, I know what pannel you guys are referring to here with michelangelos bulkyness but I eel lke this hype about one lousy(or two if you will) pannel in a book is not worth my time caring about it.it had some extremely well drawn action art in it and I just liked it very mucho...so...that's that...
I haven't received my copy of the book but had to re-gaze at the preview pages many times, because I think they look so beautiful...I kinda agree with andrew here, it reminds me a bit of the deep soul that craig's turtles used to give me...so, bring him on any day I say!

[DrSpengler]

Ross Campbell replied to my review at TMNT Entity and provided an interesting view point on the lack of blood and whether or not Leo killed anybody:

Ross said...
Ross Campbell here! thanks for the overall great review!! i'm glad you like my stuff for the most part.

the scenarios are different so it's not a 1:1 comparison, of course, my issue has way more ninjas so it's slightly more cartoony, but Leo never visibly drew blood in the Mirage Leo issue, either. his swords never connect with anyone and he appears to never kill any of the ninjas, so i wanted my issue to reflect that and be all-ages like the old Mirage stuff (though some Mirage fans may argue with me on that one, heh).

i think you have to meet this material halfway a bit on some level; there's no visible blood but Leo does kill in this issue, at least in my mind, i mean on page 6 he clearly throws a couple ninjas off the building to their deaths, he's definitely hitting them with his swords later on even if there's no visible blood spray or severed limbs (although there is blood spatter in one of the later panels, just not colored red, can't remember which page number), we see Foot bodies laying around and i intended them to be dead or dying, it's just not R-rated death.

i'm not saying you're wrong to interpret it how you did, if it didn't work for you it didn't work for you, but this is just my two cents.

anyway, i definitely need to work on my action-drawing skills, it's something i've always struggled with. sometimes i get it, sometimes i don't, but i definitely always try my best!! if i ever do another TMNT interior gig i'll try to do better.

sorry for the long comment!

-ross.

[DarkLightDragon]

^That's pretty cool of him to respond to you.

Like most have said already, I'd be awesome to have Ross back again. Looking at the concept renders really blew me away and it makes me appreciate the issue more.

[Andrew NDB]

I like your response to him, too:

Originally Posted by DrSpengler

You bring up a good point about the original Leo micro I hadn't considered. I think by that point there'd been so much blood and death in the Mirage comic, I took Leo killing those Foot Soldiers as a given, even if we never visually see him offing anyone. By that same token, as we'd never seen the Turtles kill anyone up to this point in the IDW series, I was left with the impression that he was beating the Foot Soldiers by just "knocking them out".

How true.

[Sophie Campbell]

thanks, everyone!!! and thank you in particular, Vader.

i wasn't going to jump into either thread at first, i think people should be able to discuss honestly without the creator being involved at least initially, "death of the author" and all that, but what the hell. i'm not going to get involved in the travesty that is the Leonardo issue thread, though, haha.

anyway, i appreciate everyone's honesty, even the negative stuff! i know my work isn't everyone's cup of tea and that's okay, and i'm the first one to admit that my action skills need work. i don't know if i was the right artist for this Leo issue since it was mostly all action, but i couldn't pass it up.

i grew up on the Mirage comics so i've been itching to do something like this for decades. i did Raphael covers and a couple pin-ups for Mirage years ago but what i really wanted to do were interiors, and i almost had an issue in Tales vol. 2 which didn't happen, then i was going to be the regular artist on a TMNT monthly ongoing for another publisher before IDW got the license so that also fell through, so this Leo issue was like some kind of shining beacon of hope, haha. whatever its technical flaws, the issue was like me opening up the floodgates that had been stopped up over all those years of waiting and pouring it all out on paper. i did my absolute best and then some on the Leo issue, whatever my shortcomings as draftsman, and at the risk of being totally corny, i put all my heart into it.

i'm not gonna lie, and i'm not trying to make anyone feel bad for their opinions here, but i was pretty upset by some of the response but this appreciation thread truly means a lot to me!! this isn't my first rodeo, i've been working in comics professionally since 2003, i've had a big range of response to my work over the years, it comes with the job, but it never gets any easier dealing with it, especially for this Leo issue which i feel like i'd been waiting to do since i was 10 years old (i'm 32 now). that said, though, i wouldn't trade all this for 100% positivity, it's like two sides of the same coin, so thank you to those of you who spoke their minds and offered criticism as well as praise. i wouldn't have it any other way.

i don't know if i'll ever do more TMNT interiors or not, as much as i'd love to it's very emotionally-draining for me because i get too invested for my own good, heh. this Leo issue took a lot out of me and i was losing sleep and blah blah blah, not sure i'm cut out for it, but you never can tell, right?

thank you so much again!!!

[Sophie Campbell]

me again! here's a Raph i just drew.

[Andrew NDB]

Fantastic.

[marcelangelo]

cool, their tails are back!!!!!finally!!!!...thanks for your openess, ross and here is hope that your fingers will be itching when the next opportunity comes knocking on your door to do turtles interiors!!....it was worth it though, right?

[junkboy]

Damn. That Raph is great...
What a pity have not been able to read Leo Micro yet.
On its way to me...

[Toby Barrett]

Damn, I love that Raph pic! So envious of your work!

[Venom]

I'm surprised no one has noticed and mentioned how Ross took Nick's TMNT designs and made them badass.

The influence is clear as crystal, and it was that aspect that drew a lot of respect from me because he proved that even with a "tamer" look to the Turtles, they still have plenty of room to be awesome.

[marcelangelo]

yeah, I thought that, too last night you know...since I don't have my copy yet I just shut up about it, but the thought has crossed my mind, too...I think the nick designs were already cool, but a picture of the leonardo figure somewhere on this frum from the last couple days reminded me very much of the beautiful artwork I have seen of this ross campbell leonardo book.

[Samhain]

More like Nick took the ''design'' from Ross. He's drawn like that for years.

[TheJ-manTurtleMan]

That Raph is beyond awesome!!!
I loved this issue! Ross's artwork is amazing! The turtles looked great, to me they actually looked like teenagers. Leo looked young and also not too human like. One of my favorite parts is where he ducks into his shell to protect himself from some knunchucks What I liked best about it was the slight differences in the closeups verses the far away shots, for example when Leo is struggling to fight the foot the look of it is sort of cartoony (in a good way!) but then there is that close up of Leo on the floor with the tear in his eye, The detail and emotion in that one shot is awesome! It still looks the same Leo, but in a more detailed, less cartoony, and more real way!

Thank you Ross!!!
Cowabunga!

[Sophie Campbell]

thanks, you guys!

Originally Posted by marcelangelo

cool, their tails are back!!!!!finally!!!!...thanks for your openess, ross and here is hope that your fingers will be itching when the next opportunity comes knocking on your door to do turtles interiors!!....it was worth it though, right?

thanks, marcelangelo! i love the tails the old Turtles have but i couldn't draw them in my IDW stuff, unfortunately, because it was too inconsistent with Dan Duncan's Turtles, even though all the artists on the various micros draw pretty differently there had to be some degree of continuity with the characters.

it was definitely worth it, i'm sure if i get another shot i'll jump right back into the fray, haha.

Originally Posted by Venom

I'm surprised no one has noticed and mentioned how Ross took Nick's TMNT designs and made them badass.

The influence is clear as crystal, and it was that aspect that drew a lot of respect from me because he proved that even with a "tamer" look to the Turtles, they still have plenty of room to be awesome.

thanks! i love the Nickelodeon designs, i think they're solid and stylish and i like that they look like teenagers, a lot of TMNT artists seem to forget that the Turtles are supposed to be kids. one thing i did borrow from the Nick Turtles was that Donatello is slightly taller than the other the Turtles, i really dig that, so i'll admit influence there! but other than that i wouldn't say i was influenced by the Nick Turtles, i've been drawing Turtles fanart, and some official stuff, for many years and the way i drew them in the Leo issue is pretty much unchanged. here's some older stuff to prove it, this one's from 2005: http://mooncalfe.deviantart.com/art/...tumes-23587780

or this one that i did before any of the Nick designs had surfaced publicly: http://mooncalfe.deviantart.com/art/...ikey-154011931

even my Mirage covers had a similar look to my Leo issue! http://mooncalfe.deviantart.com/art/...on-04-56517541

there's definitely a similarity, you're right, but it's more that coincidentally the Nick designs are very close to how i like to draw the characters! when i first saw them i was surprised at how close they were to my own sensibilities.

EDIT:

Originally Posted by Samhain

More like Nick took the ''design'' from Ross. He's drawn like that for years.

ha! i was in the middle of writing this post, you're way faster than i am. XD. i doubt they took anything from me, i'd be very surprised if they had seen any of my work much less be influenced by it, and i think our two designs do pretty different things despite their similarities. i'm sure it's total coincidence. great minds think alike, i guess! bwahaha

i'm really curious who did the designs for the Nick show, i want to know who the individual character designers are! i think it's the best the Turtles have looked in a long time (barring Kevin and Peter's late work, of course).

[Andrew NDB]

Originally Posted by Ross Campbell

thanks! i love the Nickelodeon designs, i think they're solid and stylish and i like that they look like teenagers, a lot of TMNT artists seem to forget that the Turtles are supposed to be kids.

Maybe, but I don't think artists need to overly worry about making them look "kidly," at least insomuch as it might apply to what we think when we think of human teenagers.

Because they're not.

one thing i did borrow from the Nick Turtles was that Donatello is slightly taller than the other the Turtles

Which might even be stemming from the old Palladium sourcebooks with the Turtles' stats. Don was the tallest there, too.

there's definitely a similarity, you're right, but it's more that coincidentally the Nick designs are very close to how i like to draw the characters!

Or maybe it's not-so-coincidentally.

[Candy Kappa]

I think I'm repeating my self now for like the fifth time or something, but your art is freaking amazing