28-year DC veteran Alex Sinclair expands his horizons with Amazing Spider-Man and more

Alex Sinclair
(Image credit: DC)

Longtime DC-exclusive colorist Alex Sinclair has decided to branch out and begin regular work with outside publishers for the first time in his 28-year career.

Page from Amazing Spider-Man #64 (Image credit: Federico Vicentini/ALex Sinclair/Joe Caramagna (Marvel Comics))

Sinclair tells Newsarama that it was his decision to end his 'exclusive' relationship with DC after the publisher reduced the number of regular assignments he was offered. Sinclair plans to continue coloring for DC, but also "a bunch of other folks." Those folks include Marvel, as Sinclair started as Amazing Spider-Man's regular colorist with this month's Amazing Spider-Man #63.

Sinclair broke into comics in 1993, as the first digital colorist at WildStorm (then operating as Homage Studios). He quickly became the company's lead colorist, establishing Wildstorm FX - an in-house coloring department that proved to be a training ground for many of today's top colorists including Laura Martin, David Baron, and the late Justin Ponsor. When DC acquired Wildstorm in 1998, Sinclair was promoted to be the now-DC imprint's art director - and in 2003 he segued to editing comics himself. 

In 2006 Sinclair decided to resume coloring on a full-time basis to spend more time at home with his family. DC quickly signed him to an 'exclusive' deal, which has lasted until early 2021. For the past 15 years, Sinclair has been the primary colorist of the company's flagship artist Jim Lee (who also serves as the company's CCO/publisher) - in addition to other high-profile coloring assignments as Blackest Night, Identity Crisis, and Astro City.  

(Image credit: John Timms/Alex Sinclair (DC))

Sinclair's upcoming DC work includes Infinite Frontier, Green Lantern, The Flash, and Crime Syndicate.

While his new gig on Amazing Spider-Man means this will be the first time Sinclair has gotten a paycheck from Marvel directly, it's not the first time he's colored a Marvel title.  He was the lead colorist on WildStorm's 'Heroes Reborn' titles in 1996 and 1997, but for that, he was paid by Wildstorm for his work.

Sinclair is joining a long line of amazing artists to have created art for Spider-Man - here's our list of the best Spider-Man artists of all time.

Chris Arrant

Chris Arrant covered comic book news for Newsarama from 2003 to 2022 (and as editor/senior editor from 2015 to 2022) and has also written for USA Today, Life, Entertainment Weekly, Publisher's Weekly, Marvel Entertainment, TOKYOPOP, AdHouse Books, Cartoon Brew, Bleeding Cool, Comic Shop News, and CBR. He is the author of the book Modern: Masters Cliff Chiang, co-authored Art of Spider-Man Classic, and contributed to Dark Horse/Bedside Press' anthology Pros and (Comic) Cons. He has acted as a judge for the Will Eisner Comic Industry Awards, the Harvey Awards, and the Stan Lee Awards. Chris is a member of the American Library Association's Graphic Novel & Comics Round Table. (He/him)