The Best Offense is a Good...Weight Distribution

I had just drawn a pin-up of Green Lantern, and wanted to do another. So I went back to a sketchbook page with lots of different pose ideas roughed out and saw this one. I sketched it out at 6"x9", and scanned it in. Once I started pencilling it out on its full size, I started to feel like the image didn't have enough energy or power to it.

My first thought was that it was a matter of line work, and that it might be solved as I draw it out. But just in case, I set up my camera and struck the pose with some energy behind it (quick movements and flexing muscles--how the character would theoretically be moving).

At first, the result frustrated me. When taking the picture, I put my weight on the wrong foot and the pose was completely inaccurate. Then I realized that my photo was better than my drawing.

The original pose is actually not a bad or incorrect pose. The problem was with the fact that I was trying to communicate energy and power, and that pose wasn't doing it. It's because the weight was distributed on the back leg, rather than the front one. The layman might not think that an important issue, but ask any dancer, athlete, or fighter, and they will tell you that distributing weight on one foot versus the other changes a lot. One of the main things that weight distribution effects is direction. You can't move in any direction without putting your weight towards that direction. In this case, Green Lantern is blasting an energy bolt out of his power ring. I want him to look like he's making a powerful attack. With his weight pushed back, he looks like he's defending or retreating, whereas with it pushed forward, he's really moving forward. This pose is essentially a punch. An energy blast from the hand will have more power behind it if the body is a part of that blast.