Image Transferring with Y: The Last Man

You guys know I'm a nerd, right? Just check out this article I wrote about the comic book Kill Shakespeare for the On the Danforth magazine.

If you need any further convincing, today's post is about a drawing and painting I made that are recreations of Massimo Carnevale's cover for issue #55 of Brian K. Vaughan and Pia Guerra's Y: The Last Man.

 Y: The Last Man was a fantastic series. After a mysterious plague simultaneously kills off every male mammal on the planet, the only survivors, Yorrick Brown and his Capuchin monkey, Ampersand, set off to try to find out what happened and save the world from extinction. Brian K. Vaughan is pretty much a genius, and this cover by Massimo Carnevale really stood out for me. I decided I'd like to try drawing it, and here's what came from it:

I think my Yorrick looks a little more hopeful than Carnevale's

I slowly layered the pencilling up to a 9B, which is how I got it so dark. I was happy with the end result, but felt that the bright, soviet red (this issue takes place in Russia) really helped make this cover. I decided that I would transfer the image of my drawing onto a painted canvas to get this effect. Read the step-by-step to find out how you can do this yourself, using a photocopier and gloss gel medium:

The final result

1. Paint the canvas your desired background colour.
2. Make two photocopies of your image: one in the original orientation, and one mirrored. If you have a laser printer, you can print any image you'd like.
3. Take the photocopy of the original orientation, and using a sharp paper knife, cut out the sections that you'd like to appear white (or whatever colour you'll be using).
4. Place the cut photocopy onto your canvas, and trace all the areas that you'll be filling in.
5. Fill in those sections with your desired colour, being careful to stay within the lines you traced. Let it dry thoroughly.
6. Cover your canvas with a gloss gel medium, like this one from Golden.
7. Place the mirrored photocopy onto your canvas, ink side down, being careful to line it up with the painted areas you previously traced and filled in. Smooth out the paper with your hands, ensuring that it is making even contact with the gel. Make sure not to slide it around! Let it dry overnight.
8. Using a sponge or spray bottle, wet down the paper. Let the water soak in for a while, and then carefully start rubbing away the paper with your fingers. If it doesn't come off cleanly, spray some more water and let it soak in some more. You will probably have to do this in several stages. Don't be too aggressive with it or you'll end up removing the image as well.
9. When it's done, cover the canvas with a matte gel medium. This will protect your image and cover up any gloss medium that wasn't covered by paper (and is still shiny, unlike the rest of your canvas).

That's it! Transferring images is fun, if a bit time consuming. This will also work with photographs, just remember that you must mirror your image and always use a laser printer.

I'm really happy with the way my Y: The Last Man painting turned out. As you can see from the vertical lines, some of the ink did rub off with the paper, but I actually quite like the effect. I think this was the perfect technique for this project, because it allowed me to keep the precision of drawing while incorporating other elements.