What Does It Take To Be A TOPPS SKETCH ARTIST? Pop Cards Pop #6

Welcome, everybody, to another episode of Slab Stocks Pop card Pod. I'm here today with a special guest. We got Daniel Riveron. Is that correct? That's right. All right, Daniel. Daniel's a sketch artist for Topps, and we're going to get a little bit of the behind the scenes, find out what it's like to take on assignments for all the cars that we rip and the sketch cards that we all chase and get a little bit of background on Daniel. So first of all, Daniel, why don't you introduce yourself to the Slapstocks audience? Hello. My name is Daniel Riveron. I am a art teacher here in Florida, But I also, on the side, work for Tops Upper Deck in Cryptozoic. I draw contracted characters and licensed characters for these companies, and I'm very proud to have been doing that for the better part of 12 years now. Holy cow. So you're well experienced at it. I know I've probably pulled a couple of years over, over the years, but now, do you have one of those signatures that's very recognizable when we pull your cards? Believe it or not, my signature has been the same since middle school. It's not really recognizable. It's just a D with an R with some squiggles in it. That's about it. Some people see the number two on it. So, like, that's how, you know it's mine. Where I can see, like, a number two in there because of the R, it makes like a number two. So it's just DNR, though, right? Yes, just dnr. All right. I'm gonna be looking for that from now on. You know, sometimes I can read them, sometimes I can't. So I wanted to get that down. So. So. And then. And then my shorthand, it's changed a little bit. So I'm going to cover, you know, some things here, but you can kind of see, like, that's where it's at now. You can see definitely the D. So I'm trying to just put Dan because that's the way to, you know, draw signings very quickly. That's pretty cool. So let me ask you, ask this first question. Did you gravitate to being a sketch card artist, or did being a sketch card artist find you? Both. And that's. I leave that to my students. My second job at a middle school, my first in a middle school, but my second job in a different school, I was starting to draw more characters. Like, I got. I found a passion for drawing again. Before that, I was just building, you know, lightsabers before I was Just building a bunch of lightsabers and that didn't end up working out for me. And I. Comic books came back into my life at that, at that point. And when I started reading comic books again, then I started drawing again, then students were asking me to draw characters. So it was mostly like Star wars characters, you know, Marvel DC characters, sometimes Disney characters. And then long story short, one of the students went to a comic book convention at that point. I've never been to one. We're talking 2017, 2016 around there. And my kids go, hey, I saw some of the artists that were drawing and you draw better than they do, why don't you have a table? And I said, ah, I don't know that that's, that's another career. I have this, I'm fine here. Next thing you know, parents and some other students got together and bought my table for Florida Super Con in Miami. And it, it just started from there. And then I started looking for how I saw like people drawing on cards. I'm like, that's probably better and probably easier to store and you know, sketch cards. At that point, it's just been taking off in the 2016, 2017 area. And I enjoyed drawing in little, you know, card stocks. And I was drawing it for kids because I could draw, you know, 11 by 17, 24 by 18, I could draw that size. But it takes a long time. Sketch cards are quicker. So as I kept going with and going with, I kept sending out, you know, my samples to tops and upper deck. And of course for a full straight year, nothing, no, you know, just basically crickets. And about a year, a year and a half later, I get my first response saying, hey, this is good, but we need you to do something else, like more shadows, more details, this and that. I did what they asked. I didn't get upset about the criticism. I just took it and, and I, and I used it. And then about another four or five months later, the first job came into my plate, which was Upper deck with Marvel and Marvel Flare. And I was, I think it was 2018, Marvel Flare. When they came back, there was like a hiatus from flair. And I enjoyed being on that side because I used to collect those cards as well. So I was so happy to get that job and that was my first one. And ever since then it has been non stop for about a good year, year and a half. I was just drawing Marvel and then I wanted Star Wars. Star Wars. Star Wars. That's what I wanted, that I'm known for drawing these characters at work and, and when I go to now convention, now at that point, I've been going to local conventions ever since I went to that Super Con one, because now I got the bug. All right, well, congrats to you. I know it's a hard road. There's a lot of competition out there, you know, tough to get noticed. There's over 300 plus artists drawing on these sets. Wow. Like, if you, if you see the list of names, you know, if you ever see the checklist, it ranges between 100 to 300 names, you know, easily on those. And very often I just see a list of 200, you know, and I go, yeah, okay, so if I'm Daniel and I'm in a list of 200, I contributed to a set, how many sketches am I actually contributing? I. They, they give us a minimum amount. It goes. And then you get to choose based off, you know, how long, you know, you take to take to draw a card and what time that you have, you know, for the set. So it ranges between, you know, 30 and up. Wow. And I'm not consistent with the number. I. Sometimes I'll draw 30 because I'm drawing another set for another company and. Or I'll draw 80 and then, you know, and then 20 in another set, you know, for another company. Like, I, I have right now. I'm actually doing three sets right now. Three sets. We speak three sets as we speak right now. I can't say what they are, but three sets for two different companies. How long. How long does it take you to complete a set? You know what I mean? Like, if you get an assignment, how long is that assignment for? And so for me, if. If they give me references, it could take me a week to a week and a half for a set of 30 to 35. Whoa. And is that just pounding through? You're just like, pounding through. Like, I, I give myself a number. One day is. Is set up. One day is like, I. I'm looking at the references, and then I go to Photoshop and I do a layered effect. And then in my layered effect, you know what? I can show you one of my old ones. Man, is great. I can show you one of my old ones. This is from an old artist proof here. So. Wow. So for. To get to that, I go to Photoshop and then I break it down to like a graffiti. Layered it, because I used to be a graffiti artist where I take stencils and I place them on walls and spray them. And I always told myself I could draw these things. Why am I Taking hours, cutting out the stencil. And this was before the Cricut was ever made. I need to figure out a way that I could use the layers and just sketch it. So I practiced and practiced for hours and hours until I got comfortable making it. Making it look like the actual actor. So when you do Star wars, when you do spongebob, what are some of the sets you've contributed to that have already been released just to get so breath? Like a handful of different Marvels. We're talking Marvel flare, Marvel annuals, if I remember correctly. A Marvel. Oh, Guardians of the Galaxy. Fantastic Four was the Most recent one. SpongeBob set. SpongeBob. Awesome. SpongeBob did SpongeBob. And then Star Wars. It's been basically Star wars masterworks. The Book of Boba Fett, Mandalorian finest Star wars, finest Star Wars Quorum, and the list goes on. Because there's so many, I can't remember all. Remember all of them. I do have the scans of all my cards, and now I'm needing a new hard drive because I filled up my 500 gig hard drive of cards. Holy cow. So I noticed you kind of switch styles up, right? You know, like, Star wars has definitely a very. Maybe it's just a new style you tried. Like on the Instagram post that you do, when you complete a set, you kind of post your stuff. Spongebob had a very different look. You know, how do you decide what kind of personality you give the sets? So what we also have, when we get our contracts, they tell us exactly what they're looking for. So I couldn't do my layered effect for spongebob. That would have get. That would have gotten rejected. Even if they liked it, that would have gotten rejected. So I had to look like it came from the show. So in that one, I just try to replicate the scenes of the references that they gave me so that I. So that I could send it off. Now, if I do a single character, let's say Squidward, if I got. If it's just Squidward and I don't make the scene itself because on the cards, there's only two and a half by three and a half of workspace, then I get to decide on the background. I did have a couple questions. Some of the, you know, behind the scenes, I'm sure everybody wants to know what the sketch part. Sketch card process is like, right? Okay. So do they tell you what subjects to do, or is that something you're picking yourself? So as long as it's within the realm of. Let's say Star Wars. It has to be within the realm of the films and shows I cannot draw. It depends. Sometimes they do let us, sometimes they don't. But it states it clearly in the contract. For example, the Clone Wars. Not the Clone Wars. There is an animated series, Clone wars, where it's 2D animation, not the 3D animation. There were some sets that I was allowed to draw those, and some said I was not. So they'll give us clear indication of what we're allowed to draw and what characters we are not allowed to draw and in what way we are not allowed to draw them in. For example, I can't say this. I don't think I'm gonna be in trouble for this, but I'm not allowed to draw Vader with his helmet cracked open. So that's one of them. And then. And then, obviously, for. Because kids do collect cards, we can't have any weapons pointed at the viewer. So I can't have a lightsaber pointed at the viewer. I can't have a. A blaster point at the viewer or a machine gun or anything like that. So they'll give us clear indicators of what we can and can't draw. Do. Do they tell you Daniel gets these characters we want you to concentrate on so that you got 300 sketch artists. Not everybody's doing Anakin Vader. Nope, nope. We don't get that. What we do get is people that we can't draw. And since there's so many of us doing it, everyone has their own different interpretation of how to draw that character. So since mine is a layered effect, you know, I could draw maybe six or seven Anakins or. Or Luke's, and it could go through because, I mean, we're talking 300 people with 30 plus cards per set. You know, that's. That's a lot of 300 plus people with 30 cards per set. That's a lot of cards. And yeah, you might see a lot of Luke's, you might see a lot of Anakins or Darth Vaders, but everyone's artistic interpretations are different. So. And. And these are one of one. So, yeah, that's why they're highly sought out. More so than the autographs. Now that I've noticed, I see people get more excited for the. On the breaking shows of the sketch cards more than the autographs. When I hit a card for somebody and it's a sketch card, the first question from the community in the chat is always, who is it? Who is it? Flip it over. We want to see who who sketched it, you know, so people do follow the artists, you know, to see which ones. And I'm sure there's some that have cachet. You talk about going to the shows. Are they Comic Con types of conventions, or do you actually go to the sports card shows and connect with people there? Comic Con. I'm more known in the Comic Con industry. I have drawn for sports cards. I have drawn for tops, baseball sets and basketball sets. So I have done that, but I don't get as many contracts for that. I'll get one of those contracts maybe once every four years if. Because four years ago I had basketball. This year, no, sorry. For your baseball. And then four years before that, basketball. And those were the only sports sets I've ever drawn, which I enjoy, because that's a complete different thing compared to Star wars and compared to, you know, the comic books. Now. Now, you said you teach full time, right? I teach full time. I teach full time middle school, and I. I teach kids. And my classroom is basically a Comic Con in there. Yeah. You ever have a kid walk in with one of your sketch cards that so. Yes and no. Sketches that I've done in my classroom from years ago, and all of a sudden it pops up because there's siblings is the one I originally drew it for. Okay. And then their little siblings end up with the card or with a sketch, and then they come up to me, hey, I have this. And like, oh, my God, I haven't seen that in years. So it's. It's cool to see that. And here's an example of a baseball one that I have from. Oh, man. Yeah, I could see your style you're talking about. That is beautiful. Amazing stuff. Daniel, this is an artist proof. They don't do that as much anymore with the artist proofs, but I still have my three baseball artist proofs from that set top. So I love to do. Hang on. I love to do show and tell. So I like the examples you're showing. I'm gonna do something. I got show and tell of what Papa Slabs has done in the past. My name's Jeff, by the way, but people on our. On our breaking platform know me as Papa Slabs. Found this the other day. Okay. And this is something I was always. I always explained that, you know, I do a lot of pop card stuff that we do here, and I always explain to the audience, I say, hey, I was a way better doodler sketcher creator than I was an athlete. You know what I mean? So in my day when I was a kid, I was doing this kind of stuff just for fun. I did this when I was 12 years old. That's really good. And I dug it up. I. What's more amazing than, I mean, I know his bicep and shoulder is way over proportioned, but what's amazing is that I could find it this week when I knew I was meeting with you. This is 50 years old this year. I remember it was. I did it on the bicentennial year. I was in my family's trailer just for fun, sketching with another kid who like comic book art, you know, and I could tell which artist you were imitating there. There you go. Who was I imitating? John Romita Senior. Now that's amazing. That is a cool fact because I didn't even know who I was imitating. It was probably just whatever comic book I had in front of me. Well, you gave me the time frame. You gave me the time frame and I could tell with the eyes, the lenses that you drew for Spider man and it hit me right away. Well, that's fantastic. You educated me. And like I said, I'm just more impressed I could even put my hands on it. After 50 years, somehow I still had that piece of paper. So it means something to me. And I'm sure some of the ones you created over the years mean something to you. What's your favorite one that you sketched up? Is there one that's near and dear to your heart? I have a. There's a cover issue when I was a kid of Scarlet Spider looking like he's going to fight Spider Man. And it's a famous cover issue drawn by Sal Buscema. And I drew that for a language. See, I still remember this. I drew that for a language arts class in middle school and it had something to do with the lesson that we were doing. But then I just made it comic books. And I didn't get a good grade because it had nothing to do with the lesson. But she loved the artwork and had me send it off to the art teacher. And then that's when I got to the art classes, is when she saw that. And it was a mat, it was a poster. So I made it larger and the proportions are still a little off, but I still love it. I still have it to this day. It's in my classroom now where my students can see that, yes, I was still doing this even at middle school. When you, when you create something you like and have a connection to it burns into your memory, you know, I mean like where you were when it was. I mean, 50 years later, I remember that. And you, back in middle school, remember exactly the post. And you kept it just like, yeah, I still kept a lot of my high school artwork and early college artwork. I still have those in in my classroom, and I bring those out as examples for a specific project. So I use old class projects from when I was younger, and I bring them back for the students at this day and age. And what's cool is I'm teaching at a high school level, at a middle. In a middle school, because I feel like they can do it. And if. If I had that kind of direction in middle school that I got in high school and college, I'd be a better artist than I am now, because all it takes is those little skill sets, those little nuances that can project your artwork further. And I feel that if I teach at a high level, then they're going to learn at a higher level, therefore, their artwork is going to be at a higher level. So I enjoy what I do. I actually wake up in the morning and I am excited to go to work and excited on the projects that we have. And I'm working on Tops and Upper Deck at the same time while I'm teaching. Yeah. So they get to see. They don't see the titles of what I'm doing, but they kind of see my beginnings. And then they ask me questions like, why'd you choose this? Why'd you do that? Why'd you use that color? And this is all teachable moments that are perfect for students and that they can see that there's a professional working artist right in front of them. He obviously knows what he's doing. So let him teach me so that I could, you know, make a career out of this. And that's important. You are living the dream. I could tell you're passionate about it. I appreciate the time you shared with us today. And before we go, tell us your socials so people can follow you and. And see what other sets you're creating along the way. Awesome. Thank you so much, Dan. Sketch art is my social media handle on Instagram, Facebook, and whatnot. I do whatnot sales of my sketch cards every other month. I do about 80 cards for that. And I'm working for Tops and Upper Deck and Cryptozoic on the side, so. All right. If you can find me and you can direct message me for commissions as well, I do take those as well. All right, man. Fantastic. Thanks for taking the time and have a great day. There you go, everybody. There is some behind the scenes on a top sketch card artist. We appreciate that, Daniel Riveron, for joining us today, giving us some of the background on what it's like to be a sketch card artist. Obviously, you must have felt his passion because I did. It was great to have him come on and introduce him to you. I hope everybody enjoyed this episode of Pop Cards Pod. And we'll see you next time. Take care.