Interview with Colorist JP Jordan
Interview by Xenia “Xenon” Honchar
While other Irish kids were dunking basketballs, JP spent his free time dunking on them with his art skills, winning art competitions from a young age.
Nowadays, when JP isn't being an absolute beacon of support for other creators online, he can be seen coloring works such as VR Troopers, High on Life, Star Trek: Strange New Worlds, and so much of the amazing indie comics scene on KickStarter.
Colorists are often the unsung hero of a hit deadline, crunching long hours to make sure a book goes to print. Comics are a team effort and JP has some incredible insight on the coloring process and what goes into the role he plays helping tell amazing stories.
JP has a wonderful selection of work in books coming out later this year such as SNIP, Hallowed Ground, and more to be announced!
Xenon Honchar: JP thank you so much for taking the time to meet with me. To start off, what exactly got you started as a comic colorist?
JP Jordan: So I initially started coloring as a stress reliever and was using my phone at the time. Then a friend of mine, Jordie Bellaire, saw (my work) after I posted some of them just for fun. She had asked me "Is this like a thing you want to do? Like actually want to try and make a go of it?" And I told her that I had never really even considered it as an option but I was down for trying to.
So actually, she gave me a bunch of tips, advice, and critique on stuff I put up. She was shocked that I had been coloring them on my phone and so then when she was moving back to the US, she actually gave me a computer and a tablet of hers to sort of try and make a go of it properly. I would not be doing this if it wasn't for Jordie, wholeheartedly.
You do absolutely beautiful work and recent books like Star Trek: Seeds of Salvation, From Parts Unknown and Dog Tag show off a really nice blue, green and orange color palette. How do you go about building a palette and approaching a page?
If it's the first time I'm working with a particular artist, I like to see how they've been colored before and look for overlaps in choices, as that displays something the artist potentially likes in terms of a color approach. Then I take what I learn from those and pair it with how I personally feel like I can highlight their particular artstyle in terms of a color and storytelling approach.
In terms of palette choice I think a lot of the time I'm subconsciously being influenced by books that formed the foundation of my comic reading growing up. For example in Dog Tag #2, I think it can seem, at least to my eye anyway, that I was very much on a trip down memory lane. Influenced by the color choices of Paul Mounts on Ultimates or Alex Sinclair on Hush, whereas From Parts Unknown definitely pulled in places from Dan Kemp's work on Amazing Spider-Man
Seeds of Salvation
Do you have any pages in your recent work where you felt particularly proud of your work when communicating narrative?
Ooh that's a good question. I think in terms of recent work it would be for the upcoming issue of Grawlgore & Shanks (alongside John Lees, Joe Mulvey and Shawn Lee). We have a few moments of a character recounting the events that brought them to their current situation. I got to convey memory as nearly 100% flat color, in what is otherwise a fairly texture-driven rendered book. I really enjoy the idea of memory being reality with the rough edges sanded off (and that's why it can be so fallible), and taking that to the coloring approach seemed like a fun idea.
What is one thing that you would suggest to anybody thinking of becoming a colorist.
Find an artist whose work you like, more than anything it’s because you want to start with coloring something that you inherently enjoy. Working with artists you love is motivating. When I was starting out I found a bunch of John Romita Jr. Spiderman pages who's one of my favorite artists.
Don't just do pin-ups, do sequentials. You're doing three to four pages of a book to show why you could do a whole book rather than do one thing on one page and then go for something wildly different on another. Go in intentionally trying to practice storytelling, it’ll give you a lot of experience figuring out what does and doesn’t work by the end.
Also don’t just have it be just superheroes. Have it be the quiet moment stuff, your crime noirs, your romantic comedies, all of this, show that you have range. Also if you don't like painting, for example giant metal robots, don't put them in your portfolio. It's all you’ll end up hired for.
Is there anything you wanted to specifically shout out work you have coming out this year that people should be looking out for.
I'm working on a series now called Snip. which is basically Crowded meets Minority Report and exploring the idea of what if you had the power to remove problematic people from ever existing. It's written and lettered by Adriano Ariganello and it's drawn by Riccardo Faccini. It is a lot of fun and it's on Kickstarter now, but it's also going to start coming out in the direct market later this year.
And then we'll be continuing with Sink Your Teeth In throughout the year as well. What Zoe and Lauren and Jodie are doing is unreal. Then recently the three of us did a piece in Witching Season (Lovegraft) which goes full tilt horror.
Because comics are a huge team effort, is there anybody you want to shout out?
Jordie Bellaire, she has done, even just within Ireland alone, so much for comic colorists. Dearbhla Kelly, Rebecca Nalty and myself were very much taken under her wing and we wouldn't be working in this job if it wasn't for her today.
Michele Abounader got me one of my first gigs in comics, and has always pushed for me to get other work as well when she knew of people who needed a colorist. She does amazing work and an amazing eye for pairing creatives together.
Heather Antos and Cassandra Jones have been running the Star Trek line for years now and just killing it across that line, I don't think I've ever seen so much excitement for Star Trek in comics
Then David Mariotte who brought me on to VR Troopers who really went out of his way and pushed for me for that book and I really appreciate that.
Jodie Troutman who is just letterer supreme and probably the person I’ve worked with the most. She's so quick it's ridiculous. Aaron Losty and Becca Carey as well. I truly cannot stress enough that I would not be doing comics if it wasn't for them. Aaron is a fantastic cartoonist outright and Becca is an incredible letterer and designer. We did a whole OGN together called Ploughman and that book continues to get me work.
Tango is one of the most supportive people I’ve ever met in comics and also one of the best people for pushing me to do better and better work - a legend and so goddamn talented.
Final question, and arguably the most important question, JP, what is your favorite color?
I love a blue, a really nice robin's egg blue but I've been looking at a lot of Tyler Crook’s work lately, and he has these absolutely gorgeous yellows.
Star Trek: Strange New Worlds
Support some of the amazing projects mentioned above on Kickstarter!!
Hallowed Ground - https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/deathline/afterlife1
SNIP - https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/pestocomics/snip-1
Sink Your Teeth In - https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/deathline/syti1
Witching Season - https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/philfalco/witch-anthology
JP Jordan is a colourist/writer working out of Ireland. You can find his work in VR Troopers, Star Trek: Strange New Worlds, Scream, High On Life, Ploughman, Sagas of the Shield Maiden, From Parts Unknown, Grawlgore & Shanks and more TBA. You can find him at @jpjordan.bsky.social on Bluesky, or @jpthwip on Instagram. When he's not making comics, he can be found drinking a chai, whilst buried in books. To this date he's still 50/50 on if shoebills are real.
This interview was written by Xenia “Xenon” Honchar. All quotes were edited for clarity.