#173: Thunder-Turtles

PROJECT NEWARK revealed, PROJECT WESLEY begins

May 27, 2025

Welcome to DECLARATIONS a bi-weekly newsletter by artist/writer Declan Shalvey.

This is a regular workblog featuring exclusive peeks at upcoming projects with advance releases of original art/merchandise.

ALL THE LATEST

Greetings Decolytes, been working away, had to take a break for some family stuff, but getting back on track now. Here’s my Worklog for the past two weeks:

Did lettering notes for THUNDERCATS #16
Did lettering notes for TERMINATOR #8
Did TAPE DEC interview
TAPE DEC meeting with audio editor
Did layouts/colour script for PROJECT WESLEY
Prepped/lightboxed pages for PROJECT WESLEY short
Pencilled cover for secret Dynamite crossover
Pencilled/inked THUNDERCATS cover
Pencilled/inked THUNDERCATS LOST cover
Pencilled/inked/ coloured secret THUNDERCATS cover
Wrote script for ~~PROJECT NEWARK~~
Wrote/compiled material for Declarations process section

-I had to cancel my trip to Croatia last minute. Unfortunately there was a sudden family bereavement so I didn’t feel comfortable leaving at this time. The convention organisers were very understanding and the plan is that I’ll be at the show next year.

-~~PROJECT NEWARK~~ revealed! IDW Publishing revealed in AIPT’s Turtles Tuesday last week that the THUNDERCATS team of myself and Drew Moss will be working together on the final issue of MUTANT NATION. I’ve finished the script and Drew will soon start working on it around his THUNDERCATS work. It was actually Paramount initially who approached Drew about this months back. Drew asked if I would write a Turtles story for him [I think Paramount were into us working together too] so I said of course. I was very happy to scratch my Turtles itch last year with the TMNT: BLACK WHITE & GREEN short story, but to get to write something a little more meaty is a great opportunity, especially to do it with Drew. Not to mention, it also takes place within the current Jason Aaron /Juan Ferreyra story-line which I’m loving. Below is my cover for the issue [#9], the MUTANT NATION series has had a host of amazing creators telling one-shot stories in the Turtlesverse. Is ‘Turtlesverse’ a thing? Anyway, here’s my quote for the press release…

“I’m beyond delighted to write a Turtles story to send off a great series like Mutant Nation. Not only do I get to work with my ThunderCats collaborator Drew Moss, but we get to tell a story that weaves through the amazing epic that Jason Aaron and Juan Ferreyra are currently telling while also bringing back some past TMNT legends. Doesn’t get more fun than this.”

Here’s my cover for the issue…

-I took a short writing gig. It’s a 20pg one-shot, not a huge committment or anything but it’s with a very big artist— probably the most high profile artists I’ve ever gotten to work with, which is pretty damn class. Have some research to …the point of this job is to write something that really showcases them, so I’m a bit nervous. It’s a cool challenge though. Gonna call this PROJECT SILENCE.

-I’m about to draw some pages! PROJECT WESLEY is all worked out in the layout /colour script stage and I’ve lightboxed all the pages. I’m gonna start pencilling later this week [taking a day to see the new Mission Impossible!], I hope it’ll all be inked by the next Declarations post, but it’ll definitely be pencilled. Here’s the layouts for the first 2 pages.

-Have some new timelapses, one of the MOON KNIGHT bone/ghost-punching armour.

And another for MR KNIGHT.

-Humble Bumble currently have an offer on Warren Ellis’ Image comic work. All brilliant masterpieces like TREES, CEMETERY BEACH, FELL and of course; INJECTION. Do have a look here.

-This has been solicited but not shown yet so thought I’d sneak it in here. It’s my variant cover for DEADPOOL KILLS THE MARVEL UNIVERSE ONE LAST TIME #4.

-My good friend Matt Wilson took part in this video of for Marvel, describing the craft of colouring comics. Matt is an absolute master so if you’re interested in colouring, this is a must-watch.

-I got the [below] beauty in the post the other day, The X-Men Art of Andy Kubert. I can’t wait to dig into this, Andy Kubert was my guy on X-MEN, so much of his work is in my DNA, I’m looking forward to reconnecting with it.

ART DECO

My Spring/Summer Commission list is now open! With exclusive first notice to you Decolytes!

I had such a great time working on the last batch of full figure commissions for C2E2, that I've decided to open up another small list for my upcoming appearance at GalaxyCon New Orleans in July. But good news for those that can't make it- mail order slots are also available and we'll ship anywhere!

These will be done on A4 paper with limited background added. I'm only taking five in total, so the opportunity is extremely limited and likely to sell out.

And on the off chance you're looking for one of the head sketch slots, those are going to be done only at conventions for the foreseeable future.... so make sure to catch me at a show sometime! Or send a friend, I'm not picky about who I draw for. Not THAT picky, anyway

Full figure A4 commissions

TAPE DEC

New TAPE DEC! Watch it first here before it goes public tomorrow. This episode features Colin Craker, who has been the unsung hero of THE TERMINATOR as series colourist, but has also illustrated all of the next issue.

If you have interest about breaking in as an artist, this one should be pretty relevant as Colin has got some professional credits in the last year after working hard in the indie/crowdfunding space. We talk a good bit about Kickstarter, his goals and what his strategy for making hi own name in comics is. Colin is a lovely guy, was very easy to talk to.

NOTE, we talk about his latest Kickstarter, it ends in just FIVE days so ye should check it out here asap, at the moment he’s just about €500 shy of hitting his goal.

Also, after what, over a YEAR [?!], I’ve gotten the rebooted podcast episodes up on Spotify, so if listening to your shows that way is more your speed, now you can get on board [you can also watch them via Spotify too, that option is available]. My worry with an audio version was that you’d lose the visual element but this way you can do both.

TAPE DEC on Spotify

PROCESS

One of mu faourite personal pieces of the year came out last week, the cover to Mark Waid, Chris Samnee and Mat Lopes’ BATMAN & ROBIN: YEAR ONE #7. Thought I’d talk about the process behind it, I don’t share process stuff here as much as I like, after all.

DC Comics editor Andy Marino reached out to see if I’d like to do some covers over there, which I was very happy to be asked about. I don’t get a lot of DC stuff my way, so there’s lots of room to play with characters I haven’t played with before. This one was a real treat, as I’ll draw Batman at the drop of a hat, but also I was very excited about this book in particular. It also felt like an opportunity to do a piece like this old fan piece, but actually do it for real.

Fan art via 2011, colours by Jordie Belliare

I got to get a read of the first issue and an image popped into my head immediately. I decided to try for an iconic shot, but prioritize Robin, and keep Batman himself as more of a kind of protective bird, soaring above and behind. A great way to use that cape.

Below are the roughs, you can see I worked out the whole colour scheme in this stage of the process. It was approved by the editor, so moved onto pencils.

Above, the pencils and inks. I see my own pencils as fairly scratchy, but all the details are firmly laid down. Some background elements might be looser, as I’ll end up fleshing them out a little more in the inks. I also end up refining some of the drawing as I ink.

When it comes to colours, there’s only so much I can show without getting too repetitive. Colouring this actually took a LOT of time, I really wanted this one to sing, especially Robin.

Stage A: is the flat colours I get from my flatter/production assistant Tatjana Segelken. I tend to go in and tweak some stuff here and there but Tat will have colour-picked the colours from my roughs that I also send her so there’s not much to do.

Stage B: is where I pop a couple of overlay colour blocks over different elements, as for this piece it was probably over the main characters. I likely popped a brighter overlay on top of the building in the foreground too. I do this in order to tweak overall values and reflect some local/atmospheric colour bases that I’ll then render on top of. Then, I did all the rendering for the buildings at the bottom of the piece. I did a LOT of rendering on the buildings, all done with a brush at 100% opacity, then I’d lower the opacity of the layer, then build up another layer of light, rinse and repeat.

Stage C: Same approach with Robin, in building up layers of rendering on Robin, then dialing back the opacity levels, then maybe adding a couple of highlight layers. Both Batman and Robin have some yellow light hitting them from the bottom [much less on Batman] and some pink light from the right. I have a bit of green on Batman but keep it off Robin, as Batman’s cape is blocking it to some degree, and I want to keep focus on Robin with all the yellow light. If you go back and look at the rough, you can see I already have that worked out. That’s why colouring the roughs really work for me, I can work out most of the elements in that looser stage, then have a roadmap for the final piece, also stopping me from second-guessing myself over and over.

Stage D: Was where I did all the sky painting, which was a lot of fun, with a looser and more painterly digital brush. I also pushed those building back with some atmospheric colour, and added in all the colour holds. I generally work out the colour holds along with the flats actually, but this is where they’re fine-tuned and refined to match how the overall piece has developed.

As I was hinting above, each of these stages have multiple layers that I will try group together in order to keep some elements seperate [I suck at labelling layers as I go]. I try not to go mad with layers, but did not succeed on that front with this piece. My Buildings group had 17 layers, my Robin group had 14 layers, my Batman group had 6 layers [not as much rendering on him, with all the black area], my Sky group had 8 layers of painting with the digital watercolour brush I have, playing with layer modes a bit and I had a Green group of 4 layers, adding that third light-source from the back. Couple of colour-hold layers too.

So yeah, that took a while. I was thinking a short video going through the layers might be better/ more time efficient than writing all this out and screen-capping the stages? Let me know in the comments.

THUNDERCATS

The Knights of Thundera era for the THUNDERCATS begins next week in Issue 16. I’m really enjoying the open range of stories we can get to, with that initial first year relaunch now established.

Don’t have any proper preview pages availble yet, but here’s a little tease…

And here’s the first page for Issue 17, that series artist Drew Moss is currently working on.

Last week, Dynamite announced the third collection in our Thunderian saga, THUNDERCATS Vol 3: APEX, out on August 27th.

THUNDERCATS VOL 3: APEX trade paperback cover

APEX collects #11-15 of the series, which is the final part of my original three-arc concept of introducing the THUNDERCATS to a new audience, as well as re-introducing the to the original audience. The series blossomed since the initial launch [due to the huge support/sales], meaning this arc also introduced new concepts to expand the story as well as new characters, such as APEX himself.

One of my favourite moments of Vol 3, from #13

The volume also includes the CONAN-inspired #15 with art by Joe Mulvey and colours by Dearbhla Kelly. More info via The Beat.

TERMINATOR

Issue Seven finally came out last week. Here’s some preview pages in case you missed them.

Issue Eight is out next week, with art by Colin Craker. Here’s a peek at Page One…

Joe Mulvey is currently starting on pencils for Issue Nine. He’s got a big job ahead of him as it’s a pretty nuts issue. Here’s a page of his layouts for Page One…

Luke Sparrow is close to wrapping up his issue [#10] and the final issue of the series. By god, look at the glorious storytelling and composition here.