It’s just odd because you keep disagreeing with me and you keep pointing out things that confirm my hypothesis. The parts that work were closely referenced from porn. The parts from the porn that were inconsistent with ‘climbing up onto a building’ had to be redrawn. And they were. But not well.
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I’m not confirming your hypothesis. I’m saying this artist dialed-in this cover, and really did a lousy job on it. He’s normally an erotica illustrator, but that doesn’t mean he shouldn’t be able to draw the female figure. What it actually means is that he should be able able to draw it better than most.
In fact, all you have to do is look at the side-by-side comparison posted by @Thebarton_Gamer - it shows that he can position a correctly twisted head at angle on a titled torso (that one is in the position you described). For all we know, the editors requested a front face shot of Spider Woman for the cover (they frequently do), and he had trouble accommodating.
He made lots of errors on this pic - including the hair beard mentioned in The Mary Sue’s comments! I haven’t discussed all the problems I found. I just pointed out some basic structural flaws on her - and no, they really aren’t explained by saying “Oh well, he went from a porn pic to editing this concept” because a good illustrator, doing his job well, would still be able to do that - no matter the image source. He barely made an effort on this pic. The background buildings don’t even have any kind of consistent perspective - or change in shading from the foreground. There’s no depth. The errors are not limited to the figure.
Well, let me put it this way, then. Everything you’ve said aligns perfectly with my hypothesis.
A good illustrator working in comics or animation doesn’t need photo reference. The way in which he ‘barely made an effort,’ in my opinion, was to take a porn photo and tweak it. And every observation you make supports that hypothesis.
I have to ask, do you even know who Milo Manara is?
He’s one of the best erotic illustrators out there. This wasn’t done from a photo. This was him not bothering to use a model or a photo. He could do this badly half awake with a hangover.
Here’s a set of Marvel covers. These probably used models.
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I think you would enjoy this: http://www.themarysue.com/controversial-spider-woman-covers-redrawn/ “After seeing Milo Manara’s recent, erm, anatomically improbable Spider-Woman variant cover, plus the regular cover by Greg Land, artist Karine Charlebois was compelled to take her to blog Less Tits N’ Ass, More Kickin’ Ass to do a little corrective work.”
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I had a stack of Heavy Metals in my bedroom as a teenager in the 70s.
Yep, there’s a whole series of articles over there!
I’d already noted so many problems before The Mary Sue got linked through. Both variants of this issue have really got lousy covers!
Yeah, I’ve been a fan of Minara for a while, and this doesn’t look much like his style. Like maybe he just sent them some old crap he hadn’t used.
Aw, yeah, you did.
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I greatly appreciate your efforts to lighten up the mood in this thread.
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The slideshow in themarysue’s site linked above is excellent. Really does a good job of redrawing the covers – mostly the real cover.
This Manara cover aside, the real cover is just terrible. When the frack happened to her legs? I mean, it would be awesome if Spiderwoman became a comic about a disabled woman kicking ass, but I think it’s not meant to be…
It looks like something right out of Photoshop Disasters.
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The internet ain’t gonna run out of Spidey gifs any time soon, like. Have at it @funruly 
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Really?
Folk are complaining,
That a picture drawn by Manara,
Milo Manara,
features a female with prominent, sexualized buttocks.
OMG, heaven forbid they catch sight of a Robert Crumb illustration!
Criticise the choice of Manara as a guest artist for a mainstream (?) comic if you must (I’d still stongly disagree, but understand your opinion) - but you should never expect anything but that style of art from an artist whose fame includes that style of art.
- still, this is a sad example to have highlighted. Manara does much better, and much sexier, much better, than this throw-away piece.
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Yes, exactly. People who judge first.
As I said, there are much better examples. That’s from a 5 minute Google search. I’m sure someone who was actually into comics would be able to give you a much better rundown.
But please, by all means, join the furor over something comparatively benign. I’m sure that’s the best use of your energy and time; that most in the comic book subculture will take you seriously when you display a lack of familiarity with their passion by missing out on the far more rampant objectification and examples where male characters show up in similar poses. It’s a great way to foster an us/them insider/outsider defensive combative dynamic.
Here’s a pose of a female superhero kicking butt. I can barely see the objectification anymore.
I’ve seen some idiots do that.
The potential difference–and forgive me, I don’t know if they made a new character for Tor or not–is that Spider-Woman is a different character.
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Oh, God, that link about Wonder-Woman. Because women IRL never have breasts that large. And superheroes never have unrealistic body types. But that third one…holy Christmas, what the heck is going on with that pose?
And the original cover…holy crap. I’m sorry, but it just seems worse knowing who did the art. Not only did they get an erotic artist to make their Strong Female Superhero™, it looks dull, uninspired, and amateur, especially compared to some of his other work. I have, not joking here, seen better work on Deviant Art by amateurs.
A surprising numbert of people are not complaining about that. They are actually denying that it has occurred. I’m not complaining about it, either. I’m just saying it’s obvious to me that it has happened.
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Lots of good (imo: Alex Ros, Stuart Immonen) comics illustrators use photo references. Lots of Pixar animators, too.
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