Originally posted on 2 years 6 months 21 days. This blog is no longer being updated - you should come check out my new blog: Too Short To Be A Storm Trooper 
Okay so you know the drill, illustrate in comic book format the 100th page of the book I’m currently reading as per the Page 100 Project.
So this was interesting because the book Aliens: The Labyrinth by S.D. Perry is based on the Dark Horse Comics Aliens Labyrinth mini series which I thought I had read but I came to realise that I had only read one part of it and not the part that I had to illustrate. Actually I thought the completely wrong book was the base of the novel until I read it so happily I was not bound by my preconceived images of the characters.
Now here is my page:
Page 100 Project - Aliens: The Labyrinth
I took some artistic licence with the first panel because this is a standalone page I wanted everyone to know that this was an Alien related piece and needed to establish the xenomorph laying on the table. If this was part of an overall comic book the conversation would have started with a close up of the organ in question. Although now that I look at the original comic (you can see it down below) the first panel is very similar in that it’s the old guy pointing at the alien from off panel – just different view points!
In my piece I don’t think it’s established which organ they’re talking about either which is all good because I’m happy for you the reader to draw your own conclusions and imagine whatever disgusting organ you can from the mess.
I’ve also left the faces devoid of colour on purpose as I remember some old horror comics that were reprinted cheaply and the printer obviously only had a couple of colours to work from and left all the skin/eyes without colour which really stood out in my mind.
This was a really wordy page and I leapt into the script a little too quickly and carelessly but overall I don’t think it really detracts and besides this is more art than commercially polished 
I don’t have a text version of the book to reproduce here so I thought it might be fun to look at the original artwork from the comic book on which the novel was based:
The original panels from Aliens: Labyrinth
The next book I’m reading is non-fiction so this should prove interesting for the next page.
loved the blog..came across it via dans blog and need a bit more time to explore it
cheers john
Welcome to my place John! Great to have you over (wipe your feet though we’ve just had the floors cleaned).
This is, to me, your most ambitious work yet and, for the most part succeeds wildly. I really prefer your rending of the alien to the original comic’s. Especially the interior of the head. While your work is more stylized, the original organs feel like a cop out (all one color) while yours has the multicolred look of real viscera. Plus the table with drain is a nice touch.
The only part that bothers me is the blue text areas. I got the feeling that the first one was a thought balloon and I really liked that convention. However, I was confused in the later panels when the dialog didn’t seem like thoughts (confirmed by the original comic).
It certainly is a wordy section and not easy to do. The only convention you could have taken from the original was putting the ‘what is it?’ balloon in the first panel. This would have given you at least one panel’s worth of real estate later.
As far as issues like the text in panel five, one trick I’m attempting to use comes from Disney comic artist Carson Van Osten. He advocated putting in the dialog balloons first. Here’s a link to a cool, illustrated handout that was given to Disney employees: http://sevencamels.blogspot.com/2006/09/comic-strip-artists-kit-redux.html .
You’ll notice that two of my three P100s were wordless
Also, don’t forget an Ames Lettering Guide!
Cheers for that link -- I’m going to print that up and pop it on my desk because it identifies the problems I was facing in this page perfectly.
Cheers for noticing the drain, they didn’t really describe the room all that well so I went with practicality, the same with the suits that they are wearing. Although I admit to thinking I knew what they looked like from another aliens comic (which was way off) and trying to move away from that take -- which ironically moved me closer to what the actual comic’s look and feel was.
It actually pleases me that you picked up on the blue text panels because they are like that only because it was a mistake and the first one which is a thought balloon and the others are spoken but I messed up the balloon and was just trying to stick the text in there!!
They completely diminish the first one which I felt was really effective.
Cheers on my alien’s guts -- I was going to do this in black and white but as soon as I was thinking about the organs I knew it had to have yellow and green and the colour grew from that.
I was originally slightly let down when I saw the comic book version because obviously I have a style which is completely different and certainly not as neat but I reconciled that as a good thing.
Cheers again -- I’m working on a non-fiction one with a really hard page now.
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I really like your change in style compared to the original.