Art Highlight: “Shadow Sentry” by Eric Ninaltowski

Posted on September 3, 2020 by Blake Worrell One comment

Today I’d like to take an in-depth look at some art by Eric Ninaltowski, who is currently working on an independent comic book project Shadow Sentry. Ninaltowski was kind enough to send me the below artwork after I entered a contest on social media.* I won fair and square, bitches. I didn’t promise him anything in return before being announced as the winner.

So what are we looking at here? The artwork features a character named Marcion, who is a villain from the Shadow Sentry book. According to Ninaltowski, the name Marcion means “first born of Satan” and he is the first of the “Hell Born.”

The artwork is pen and ink on 8.5 x 11 paper. It arrived well protected and in good shape.

Brightening up the whites and cranking the contrast a bit, we start to see the finer details pop quite nicely

Marcion has a classically sinister face. I get vibes of Ares, Serpentor, Magog, and the Shredder

I love some well-placed black tones in comic inking. Some artists simply outline their pencils and let the colorist do the rest, but pristine black tones help define the image and add a sense of depth that colors can’t always match.

Back to the face. The inks around the back of the head help separate it from the background, and you can see some white-out pen used to create light hatch marks on the right fin of Marcion’s helmet. George assures me that this won’t stick to glass when framed…

…and it does look great framed. I’ll be finding a better, more permanent spot for Marcion soon, but my *AvP* Yautja will be looking after it in the meantime

Thanks again to Eric Ninaltowski for being generous enough to give away something so impressive. While I may have the original artwork, you can still enjoy it for yourself if you back the Shadow Sentry book on Indiegogo. The Marcion portrait will be used as one of the trading card stretch goals for backers who buy into one of the physical levels (starting at $20), which you can do here.

Thanks for reading! This “Art Highlight” is a new kind of post for The Splintering, so love it or hate it, let me know what you think in the comments!

*Disclosure: Eric Ninaltowski held a contest to win this artwork via his Twitter page. I was one of several to enter, and had not backed Shadow Sentry or covered the project on The Splintering prior to that time. I chose to highlight the artwork in this post only after being announced as the winner, and I later backed the Shadow Sentry project, as well. Take that as you will.

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