Nightwing #100 P.14 SPLASH with Dick swinging through the streets by Javier Fernandez

Paris Fan Festival 2023 gave me the opportunity to catch up with one of my favorite people in the comic book business: Javi Fernandez. I met him back in 2016 at FACTS, when rolling into this hobby & I've never left since - probably partially thanks to his kindness when meeting one of my idols.

Javi was a prime reason to go to the Paris show, as I absolutely wanted to avoid shipping this expensive piece of art & wanted to add to the experience by picking it up personally. The second I went up to Javi's table & he saw me, he got up & gave me a long hug. We'd been talking for a while now, and he remembered it all. Even from years ago.

Talking about "a few years"... I've been wanting a cover quality commission from Javi ever since 2016. I love how Javi's work oozes dynamism & fully matches what you want on a character like Nightwing - he feels like a modern interpretation to McDaniel & especially Leonardi. Specifically, I wanted a Nightwing wrapped up in the city scapes of either Gotham or Blüdhaven, carelessly moving around & showing (contrary to Batman) how much he enjoys being a hero.

I've sent requests to his reps through the years, but it never happened. Luckily, I saw Javi post a couple of pages from his limited work on "Nightwing" #100 a couple of months ago. I reached out on Instagram to check if they were for sale & went for the "big one" of the bunch. Javi offered to hold it for a while, so I could think on it. Not that I needed a lot of thinking...

Because this full splash from the seminal anniversary issue of "Nightwing" covers exactly what I wanted from my commission - both in idea & execution. A happy & confident Dick Grayson in an epic action shot with plenty of background!

So this is not a commission, but a published page. Pro? Exactly that. It's a published page from an important issue. Con? This is blueline inks, as that's how Javi works. Actually, he does most of his work fully digital, while he sometimes inks traditionally for some pages. Happy he chose differently for this gorgeous page.

This splash was picked up directly from Javi & is 11x17, done in digital pencils & inked traditionally. It also features some screentone. There's no traditional pencils that exist, as is with all of his work.