The newest Amazing Spider-Man artist talks about his latest artistic endeavor!
By Brett White
Paolo Rivera has produced some of the most gorgeous pieces of Marvel art in recent years. Through his work on the Mythos series of one-shots, Rivera got to show off his own stylish depictions of Ghost Rider, Captain America, Hulk, Spider-Man the Fantastic Four and the X-Men all in their formative years. Now with the epic Mythos project behind him, Rivera is looking to the future. This month saw the release of Amazing Spider-Man #577, which debuted an all-new, non-painted side of Rivera's talent. Wizard caught up with Rivera at this year's The National comic convention in New York City where we discussed this amazing new project.
WIZARD: What was it like working on your recent issue of Amazing Spider-Man?
RIVERA: It was great. It was a nice opportunity to try my hand at doing pencils and inks.
You've only done painted comics up to this point. How did the transition to pencils and inks come about?
RIVERA: It's something I've always wanted to do but I never really had the chance to. Mythos was such a large project and it ended up taking a lot more time than I anticipated. I eventually did one pin-up, the Wolverine and Colossus "Fastball Special," which I showed it to Marvel. They liked it and said, "alright, let's try an issue."
How does the painted work compare to the pencil and ink work, time-wise?
RIVERA: [Laughs] There's a huge difference. It takes about a third of the time [to do pencil and ink pages]. The average painted page takes five to six days. The pencils and inks takes about two days or less, so it's about a third of the time.
When you did the issue of Amazing Spider-Man, did you notice any differences between your painted work and your pencil and ink work?
RIVERA: Certain things are related just because it's still me, but I definitely think differently when doing pencil and ink because I only have two options. It's either black or it's white. That automatically affects the way that I compose images because you can only overlap certain things. You can't do things like atmosphere and perspective and those kinds of technical issues. But overall I enjoy working this way much more. It's a lot faster and I feel like I get a lot more done, which helps motivate me.
Since you normally paint your own work, what was it like working with a colorist on Amazing Spider-Man?
RIVERA: I did the colors on the cover but that was the only thing. They asked me who I'd like to color the interiors, so I picked Javier Rodriguez and Dean White picked up the second part. I was very happy with how it came out. It was the first time I've worked with anybody else. It was definitely different because I'm very picky and I go over this stuff over and over again in my head [when I do it]. But I was very happy. It was nice to get one part of it done and say, "okay, do what you will."
Did you feel any pressure having your first non-painted artwork in Amazing Spider-Man?
RIVERA: There was an aspect of that but the main thing that made it easy was that it was the same editor, Steve Wacker, who I worked with on Mythos. It was an easy transition.
Do you have any more work on Amazing Spider-Man coming up?
RIVERA: Yeah, I'm going to do another issue coming out in January. I haven't done much of it yet [laughs], but it should be fun. It's an eighteen page short story starring Spider-Man and Wolverine.
Are you eyeing any other Marvel titles to work on?
RIVERA: I'm pretty much hoping to stick with Amazing Spider-Man. As long as they'll have me I'm going to keep doing issues of that. No big arcs or anything, just an issue here and an issue there.
And after his spectacular debut issue, the other Spider-Man artists definitely have a new peer. Be sure to friend our new MySpace page and facebook page so you can get up-to-the minute updates about all our shows!
