Rags Morales
Morales at the 2008 New York Comic Convention.
Born	Ralph Morales
Nationality	American
Area(s)	Penciller, Inker
Notable works	Identity Crisis, Countdown to Infinite Crisis

Ralph "Rags" Morales is an American comic book artist known for his work DC Comics' Identity Crisis, Countdown to Infinite Crisis, Batman Confidential, and Hawkman, Turok Dinosaur Hunter for Valiant Comics and Magic the Gathering: Dakkon Blackblade #1 from Armada/Acclaim Comics.

Morales is the co-creator, along with Brian Augustyn, of the 1990s version of Black Condor.

Contents 1 Education and career 2 Art style 3 Bibliography 4 Notes 5 References 6 External links

[edit] Education and career

Morales attended a number of vocational art classes, and is a 1988 graduate of the Joe Kubert School. After graduating, he worked for a silkscreen company in Linden, New Jersey. After losing that job, he went to New York City, where he met writer Barbara Kesel, who got Morales his first professional work, pencilling 19 issues of Forgotten Realms with writer Jeff Grubb as part of the TSR line of books. Following Forgotten Realms, Morales co-created and pencilled Black Condor.^[1]

Morales left DC Comics to do work for Valiant Comics, including Turok, Archer & Armstrong and Geomancer. He also did some licensed work on a Sliders comic book, and work for Wizards of the Coast. After Valiant closed, Morales was unemployed for about a year and a half. He returned to his TSR roots, doing work for Dungeons and Dragons magazines and novella work for Harper Collins, such as Isaac Asimov's Robotics and pen and ink work for Margaret Weis' Testament of the Dragon. He also taught anatomical illustration at a vo-tech school.^[2]

Morales eventually called his friend, and fellow Valiant alumnus, writer Tony Bedard, who was now Dan Raspler's assistant editor at DC Comics. Raspler had wanted to work with Morales when Morales was exclusive with Valiant, and after a short while, Morales was given work on DC's on Hourman, and then on Hawkman with writer Geoff Johns as part of a year-long exclusivity deal with DC. As the end of that year loomed while on Hawkman, Morales, who enjoyed working at DC, lobbied for it to be renewed with a multi-year exclusivity deal in order to secure his medical insurance for his family's sake,^{[citation needed]} and received a three-year exclusivity deal.^{[citation needed]} It was also on Hawkman that he first worked with inker Michael Bair and they have worked together on most of their projects since. At the time Morales said "when I saw the magic that Michael Bair added to my work, I knew I had to stick with this dude".^[3]

After Hawkman, DC and writer Brad Meltzer, who were impressed with the quality of his work, offered Morales the limited series Identity Crisis, which was the first time Morales felt he had been offered a project of that level of prestige.^{[citation needed]} Because of the importance of Identity Crisis to DC's ongoing company-wide storyline, and because of the number of characters in it, including minor ones that had barely been seen in years, Morales used copious amounts of reference materials for character studies, including the use of famous actors' faces to give the characters unique facial features, and sometimes updating their costumes in the process.^[2] The series was eventually selected by The Young Adult Library Services Association (YALSA)'s 2007 recommended list of Great Graphic Novels For Teens.^[4]

Morales is currently working, with Bair, on Peter Tomasi's run on Nightwing.^[5] He is also working on Superman/Batman from issue #53 for at least four issues.^[6]

In 2009 he will be contributing to Blackest Night in the form of the three issues mini-series, Blackest Night: Tales of the Corps.^[7]

[edit] Art style

Regarding his figure work, Morales finds stock, poster-like standing poses difficult, preferring the more communicative movement seen among characters in narrative sequences, a forte he feels helped him attain the Identity Crisis assignment.^[1]

[edit] Bibliography

Comics work includes:

• Hawkman #1-12, 15-17, 20-25 (pencils, with writers Geoff Johns/James Robinson and inks by Michael Bair and John Dell (#24), DC Comics, 2003-2004)
• Identity Crisis (pencils, with writer Brad Meltzer and inks by Michael Bair, 7-issue limited series DC Comics, 2004-2005)
• Wonder Woman #215-217, 119, 221, 223 (pencils, with Greg Rucka and inks by Michael Bair and Mark Propst (#216), DC Comics, 2005-2006)
• JSA: Classified #19-20 (pencils, with writer Scott Beatty and inks by Michael Bair, DC Comics, 2007)
• Nightwing #140- (pencils, with Peter Tomasi and inks by Michael Bair, DC Comics, 2008-ongoing)
• Blackest Night: Tales of the Corps (pencils, with Geoff Johns and Peter Tomasi, additional art by Chris Sprouse, Ivan Reis, Doug Mahnke and others, DC Comics, 2009)
• First Wave (pencils, with writer Brian Azzarello, 6-issue limited series, DC Comics, 2010)

[edit] Notes

[edit] References

[edit] External links

• Rags Morales Blog