Photo Research

Today i met up with Daniel in Newcastles city centre to take photographs for the three page strip i'll be doing for 'Sugar Glider Stories 2'. We had to take alot of photos of streets and landmarks to give the strip the right feel of how deeply rooted this comic is into it's northeast setting.
 I also painted over the cover of my sketchbook project book and i'm now half way through completion of the book which i'm very pleased with.

Lost in Tunnels

I finished doing a front cover today for my ThoughtBubble comic. The comic will be a collection of my best work so far, so a kind of one person anthology. It will contain both Tracks and both Gretchin sketches plus some new material. The idea is that rather then having lots of little bits on sale at the comic con i can have just one bumper comic showcasing my work. Since most of my comics have sold around the NorthEast i dont see a problem with re-using some old stuff to sell in Leeds. I've given it the title 'Lost in Tunnels' I started drawing it at PaperJam the other night and finished on my break at work!

ThoughtBubble

I'll be attending this years Thoughtbubble comic con in Leeds. I'll be sharing a table with the very talented Martin Edan creator of the comic 'Spandex'. You can view all exhibitors on the thoughtbubble site http://thoughtbubblefestival.com/exhibitors/saviles-hall/ it's really exciting as i have two pictures on the exhibitors page. As well as i Simon and Sundial picture linking to this blog i also created the logo for Cottage Industry Comics.
 This will be the first year exhibiting my own material as last year i worked the 'Paperjam comics collective' table which exhibited all the artists from our group in the NorthEast.
 I've also been working today on a pitch book for Simon and the Sundial to hopefully send to possible publishers. Of coarse the real work will be between now and November when Thoughtbubble will be.

The Point

So whats been happening in May. Well i made a start on my sketchbook for The Arthouse Sketchbook Project. The cover i kept simple with just the two main characters of the story, the boy Oblio and his dog Arrow. Again i wanted to draw in a simple way to give it a childrens book theme. My initial inspiration was a character that resembled Link (legend of Zelda) Ico and the Moomins and Noggin the Nog. I don't normally colour and the inside will be wholly black and white but i wanted to colour the cover, sticking to the animated version of the point for the colour of Arrow.
 I also joined http://www.mypoppedart.com/ and i was asked to take part in a vending machine art project based in London. I'm slowy working away at Bostin Heroes (two pages complete!) and i've done some more drawing for Simon and the Sundial.
 I hope i've not taken on too much and that i can meet all deadlines! If others out there have huge workloads share your burden and feel free to unload, I'm right there with you!

Simon and the Sundial to be online comic

I met up with Daniel yesterday to discuss more on this project. Daniel has written out the story in scenes and we went over all details before we start to script it. It was also decided that we would make it into a online web comic although i'm not sure yet how this will be done.
 We'll be posting it in segments so i will post links when the first part of the comic is finished.

Sketchbook Project 2012

Last year i signed up to do the Sketchbook project for the Arthouse in Brooklyn. The idea is that you fill a moleskin sketchbook with a chosen theme and post the book back. It then joins all the other sketchbooks on a tour across galleries in America before coming to its final stop in the Arthouse libiary. All the books are barcoded so you can see who checks your book out.
 Last year i didnt finish my book and i blamed chosen a random theme and getting 'things found on resturant napkins'. The truth is though that i put other projects before it and let it fall to the waste side, but this year will be different, i've chose my theme this time around. My book is titled 'Fill me with stories' and i will be completed a visual story to Harry Nilsons album 'The Point'. I already have some good ideas planned out and want to merge a style similiar to Joshua W.Cotter's 'Driven by Lemons' and Taiyo Matsumoto's 'Go Go Monster'
 If you want to join me on doing the sketchbook project you can find out more at http://www.arthousecoop.com/ Good luck.

Recent News

I've been asked to draw what will be the fourth issue of 'Bostin Heroes' an online web comic about a group of four superheroes granted power by mystrious T shirts! It's written by Matthew Craig creator of the comic 'Hondle' and has featured various artists over it's past issues. You can subscribe or read online at http://www.bostinheroes.com/ . Also this week i joined the communcation crazyness that is Twitter and completed this little promo poster for 'Simon and the Sundial'. The picture includes all six main characters which are from left to right - Momma Moonbeam, Mapman, Sundial, Simon, The Captain and Stuart.

Art Exhibition

Last week 'Made the Newcastle' the pop up shop on Grainger street had a exhibition in it's gallery space showcasing local comic book artists. It was organised by Paul Thompson 'Tales of the Hallow Earth' creator and featured some great art pieces. I was lucky enough to have two strips in the display. The first was my Eclispe piece which i posted on my blog the other was the history strip i did for the Paper Jam Anthology 'History and Stuff'. The exhibit ran for a week and i believe a lot of comics were sold.

Well the big news this week is that the SugarGlider Stories comic is available for purchase. This brilliant anthology tells the back stories of Susie aka Sugarglider. The comic is available from http://cottageindustrycomics.bigcartel.com/ and can be bought with the first issue as part of a saving deal. Some amazing artists have worked on this comic and i too have a poster art piece at the back of the comic. Also this week i've downloaded 'Hive' issue 5 which has some amazing art and features local artist Andy Waugh.
 I've been practising my art for the up coming Simon and the Sundial project this picture is just playing around practising a possible eclispe scene. I think my sun needs some work still!

Character design of Simon

Here are two more character design drawings i did for 'Simon and the Sundial' both being of Simon and his girlfriend Sundial! The image with the partners linked has Sundial in the classic Superman pose with the twist that she has her hand playfully linked into Simons arm making him the masculine figure and her the more submissive. Im quite happy with both drawings and its nice to see the characters starting to come to life

Simon and the Sundial

Well we now have a working title 'Simon and the Sundial' for the project im doing with Daniel. Today i submitted two character designs for our superhero family but i must stress that this is not a superhero comic. The main female role of Sundial was fun to design. The concept was always to draw people who just looked like they happened to have costumes on, so she is typically attractive, but i've stayed away from the big bossomed harlet and broken up that perfect smile with making her a little too toothy. Sundials brother Mapman is as simple a design as it looks, the outline of a body drawn over a series of maps. He's like a geographic rawshak!

I had my first comics interview

As i have mentioned i've been lucky enough to have contributed to the 'Sugar Glider stories' comic featuring other comic artirts like Martin Eden (Spandex) and Graham Pearce (Sgt Mike Battle). My role was a poster page and with the poster finished and submitted i was asked a series of questions on the project my Gavin Jones co-host of 'The Sidekick Cast'. The full interview along with the interviews of other artrists on the comic can be viewed on Daniel Cliffords blog (writer of Sugar Glider) at http://danieljamesclifford.tumblr.com/

I started playing around with some styles to bring to this comic that im drawing with Daniel. I liked the idea of putting characters drawn on white paper on a black background to give the images more pop. In pitching my idea i drew a couple of scenes that showcase this style. The arm doing the punching i made bolder to give the image more action. In the bar scenes i tried two different looks the first with only the two main characters in white, so that the 'extras' of the scene would blend in with the background. In the second scence i drew all the characters on white paper. I personally prefer the second image having all people on white. I made this image by drawing the whole thing one white paper and photocopying the image, that way i could cut out with a craft knife the parts i wanted to use.

Dinner and a idea!

Yesterday i met up with 'Sugar Glider' writer Daniel Clifford for something to eat and to discuss ideas for doing a project together. Having recently finished the SG poster for their anthology i was keen to work with Daniel. This will be the first time i have had someone write for me and the work will be fully fictional. Although the ideas are still in the early stages i believe we have a solid story and we plan on a finish date of May. This will be a stand alone comic and i will keep the blog updated with its progress.

TRACK 2 is out on the shelf

Today i got to release 'Track 2' into the shops. Tracks is my first solo comics project. The idea is that ten short stories released as singles will eventually make up an 'Album'. Each comic will take its influence from different areas ie. film (Track 1), peotry (Track 2), music, TV and art. Each comic contains a B-side on the back.
 The comic went on sale in Traveling man in Newcastle but im looking to expand on were i can get it sold, so watch this space.

Sugar Glider Poster

The start of the new year has seen the release of 'Track 2' and the other project i've been working on is a pop poster for the 'Sugar Glider' comic. I really wanted to take on a graphic design approach to this poster and apply the elements i found stand out the most from the SG story. What i love about Daniel and Gary's comic is the Newcastle landmarks playing such a key role in this superhero story.
 My first step was to practise drawing the character, having not drawn a costumed character before. The sketches (one of which can be seen here) were placed on the fan art section of the SG facebook page. My approach for the poster was to marry to two key elements of character and city. I tried doing a sketch of the centre of life with Susie running across the roof but the character element was lost in the scenery and it became a picture of the building rather then Sugar Glider.
 What came next was the idea of climbing, so as research i got myself a copy of a very good magazine called 'Climb' and went searching for buildings to use. Daniel took me down a alley! and showed me a great building with a beautiful art decor arch with a vampire rabbit above it. This will be the focal point of the picture hopefully blending both Susie and the rabbit!