[crashryan]

The face of the heroic soldier diving to cover the grenade with his body looks like Frazetta’s… or maybe I’m imagining things?

Frazetta and his friends shot lots of photos to use as panel reference. Many of them are floating around the internet: "Fritz," Al Williamson, Angelo Torres, etc., posing as barbarians, spacemen, manly heroes, and such.

Early Williamson:



60s (?) Frazetta:



Frazetta as Tarzan:



There are a lot more out there.

[Quirky Quokka]

The face of the heroic soldier diving to cover the grenade with his body looks like Frazetta’s… or maybe I’m imagining things?

Frazetta and his friends shot lots of photos to use as panel reference. Many of them are floating around the internet: "Fritz," Al Williamson, Angelo Torres, etc., posing as barbarians, spacemen, manly heroes, and such.

Thanks for the pics, Crashryan. I knew that comic book artists used reference photos, of course, but I didn't realise they had to stay in shape themselves so they could be panel models 

Cheers

QQ

[karl.birchcake]

His granddaughter Sara has a YouTube channel called Frazetta Girls talking about various periods in his life. Not sure if she's done anything about his work on New Heroic Comics, though.

Cited for Heroism – Nice art by the mysterious “JAB”.

Jack Berrill https://www.comics.org/creator/5748
https://www.lambiek.net/artists/b/berrill_jack.htm

He also created the Gil Thorp newspaper strip https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gil_Thorp

Ed Moore https://www.comics.org/creator/3810
https://www.lambiek.net/artists/m/moore_ed.htm

Cheers for the information on Jack 'JAB' Berrill. It's good to know the guy behind the cryptic signature!
And I absolutely need to search for and read more Ed Moore comics, he's become one of my favorite Golden Age artists.

Haha, I'm actually subscribed to Sara's channel, she has some quality content there. I remember watching a video on Frank Frazetta's favorite movies a few weeks ago! I've been a huge fan of his work since I can remember (started with the covers, obviously). I'm forever grateful to the good folks who scanned and uploaded (and host!) all these comics - first time I ever read a Frazetta drawn comic story, it was here on CB+ !

@crashryan

Frazetta and his friends shot lots of photos to use as panel reference. Many of them are floating around the internet: "Fritz," Al Williamson, Angelo Torres, etc., posing as barbarians, spacemen, manly heroes, and such.

Thanks for the links and photos, first time I'm seeing them, these are awesome! I knew he was in good shape back then, I saw one or two of his 50s photos but it was just a regular, casual one, not a dynamic, proper reference photo like these! I'm going to send links to a friend who's a Frazetta fan as well (who told me about the Frazetta Girls channel in the first place), I'm sure he will appreciate them too.

These days we just tend to google for reference photos and can browse through thousands of them, get inspired, "borrow" this or that pose or gesture, change it up and there are lots of photo reference books on the market, too - not to mention the generative AI which is still a fresh thing. Back then (and since the birth of photography, really) artists had to pose themselves or their models, set the light, not to mention the costs of paying for the film and its development etc.
I vaguely remember still shooting reference photos in the 90s with a friend and posing with some stick instead of a sword - having none of Frazetta's physique nor skills, of course;) Unbelievable, how so much have changed in just a couple of decades.

Thanks for the pics, Crashryan. I knew that comic book artists used reference photos, of course, but I didn't realise they had to stay in shape themselves so they could be panel models 

Apparently Frazetta is an example to follow not only when it comes to art He wouldn't be out of place in one of those Charles Atlas ads!

[paw broon]

My ignorance of these comics is embarrassing. I knew very little about any of them.  The ones I had a look at didn't appeal and I can't get my head around the appreciation of Paddocks work. I'm afraid I'm in a group of 1 as far as Heroic goes. 
Karl, great to have you getting involved.  Even though my response to the books is a bit negative, I'm very grateful to you for bringing them to my notice.
If it was in this section the Cap Jr/Hitler strip was discussed, my question is, why ruin such a wonderful artist's work by coupling it with Paddock? If that's what happened. 
If I'm  confused, it's an age thing.

[karl.birchcake]

My ignorance of these comics is embarrassing. I knew very little about any of them.  The ones I had a look at didn't appeal and I can't get my head around the appreciation of Paddocks work. I'm afraid I'm in a group of 1 as far as Heroic goes. 
Karl, great to have you getting involved.  Even though my response to the books is a bit negative, I'm very grateful to you for bringing them to my notice.
If it was in this section the Cap Jr/Hitler strip was discussed, my question is, why ruin such a wonderful artist's work by coupling it with Paddock? If that's what happened. 
If I'm  confused, it's an age thing.

Paw, it's nothing to be ashamed of - I don't think it's possible to know every title, even if one has been a Golden Era comics fan for ages! There's so many of them (I was completely unaware of Heroic (and New Heroic) Comics all my life until two months ago or so).

About Paddock - you probably mean the other thread, here:
https://comicbookplus.com/forum/?topic=26354.0

It's only natural we all have differences when it comes to artists and art (not to mention the writing, genres) - and there's not a single artist who was appreciated by everyone.
I'm relatively fresh fan of Golden Era comics - so I'm still feeling as enthusiastic about many (or most) of these artists as a kid who suddenly found himself alone in a candy store and wants to stuff himself with all the sweets until the adults come to drag him out
I appreciate the stories and art even more if I see something different I haven't seen or wasn't familiar with before. And if it's in some way wackier, weirder (as with those two Paddock drawn stories, "The Obi" and "Firetop", ), more surreal, less conventional etc - even better.

I confess I skimmed over that Hitler story, it was too much on the nose for me and too familiar - but I understand and appreciate the necessity of it (today, similarily, we need caricatures, posters, comic books, comedy films etc ridiculing Putin and the like). I thought the art was fine, but didn't impress me as much as Paddock's work in "Firetop" and "The Obi".