Comic Cons!

Howdy, So far i've booked myself into 3 cons this year with a table and all. first up is going to be the DemonCon held in the Exchange studio, Maidstone on the 22nd April.
i'm down as a DemonCon virgin and general all round convention sketcher virgin, so if you come along be gentle!

Next up is the Bristol Expo on the 12th May held at the Brunel old station-passenger shed & at the Ramada Hotel. i'm going there as part of our new team 'Improper Books' were launching the preview of our first book 'Porcelain' and the first episode of 'Butterfly Gate' both drawn by me! Writer Benjamin Read, Editor Matt Gibbs and My partner in crime and who is later this year having a book coming out through said imprint Laura Trinder (and she'll will be popping her comic convention cherry too)

So come on down to that to get sketches and signed copies of our limited preview prints. and hear what were planning to do and the stories we've got in the works!
Also DreamSolver wise i Think writer Luke Foster is due to be there too so i'm sure you can find either of us to ask any questions or get sketches for that book too!


And finally Thought Bubble held in Leeds at Saviles Hall on the 11th -18th November.
and Porcelain is due for ultimate and total completion for then (eek!) so we are due to launch the full graphic novel then warts and all so expect the whole Improper Books team to attend that too!

So come along and please do drop by the tables and say hi and see if i'm ok and not too freaked out...

In the works..

Hi all, sorry for the radio silence on here, the past few weeks i've been storming away at the inks for Porcelain and have just got chapter 1 finished up, two more to go. Here's a little medley of my photo feed on twitter which i often post on daily, it has a bit of mix a of all the stages.

And yes the idea is somewhat shamelessly stolen from Becky Cloonan's own blog but it's a pretty neat idea if you post progress on twitter alot. so full props to her influence on this post.

Tribute to Moebius

When I got the True Grit job I instantly hauled in as much Blueberry as I could get my hands on and throughout the whole project i had at least one book constantly on the desk. Since then I've referred back to his books time and time again, so I have a lot to thank fr in terms of influence and wanting to be a better creator and Jean Giraud was a creator of the highest order.
One such piece I looked to constantly whilst working on True Grit was this and still do on practically every comic I work on now..

Taken From Blueberry Book #1

A big thank you to Jim Campbell who lettered the piece for me, the very man who lettered the True Grit comic that got me delving deep into Mr Giraud's sea of work..

Background Piece

This here is just a quick sketch for some backgound detail in Porcelain, but i kind of liked it a bit so thought id share.

Creator Owned Day 01/03/12

Phew!,I think i've just made it into the Creator owned day.

Now i've admittedly cut a few corners with my C.O.D pieces. (doesn't sound right does it)
mainly due to time and the ever long battle of an artist with his self esteem.
my original intention of my post was a sketch for each book i'm working on at the mo as the characters are all completely owned by myself and the writer, and then i was going to do my own character, stupidly i'd left it all until the day so i was a bit rushed. mainly for the new character. the concept was there but his face just wouldn't come out.. humph, so i've settled with just the characters of the books i'm working on. I had intended to do one of each but the inks for one just completely went fubar so i scrapped that and have used a piece i've shown before but still rather like.. as i say each are from a book i'm currently working on all of them i'm equally proud of and equally honored to be working with the writers/team that accompanies working on them. i'm just giving you the titles as more will be announced for all soon.

so here goes, i'll start with the two new pieces..

'Porcelain' Writer - Benjamin Read :


'DreamSolver' Writer - Luke Foster:



'Butterfly Gate' Writer - Benjamin Read :


And here's the best thing that came for the original character. i think i'll re visit him later this week or next! think what you will from this:

Creator Owned Day 1st March 2012

Finally I've remembered i have a blog and shall endeavour to get some interesting posts on the go. meanwhile I thought i'd pretty much repost an idea/event thought up by fellow comic artist Stephen Downey and other artists through Twitter. I'm most definitley going to be taking part myself, it should be great fun! so read on see what you think and join in!





Creator Owned Day is 1st March 2012.

The challenge:

Create a sketch of an original character or concept and and post it on your blog Thurday 1st March. It should be a concept completely owned by the artist (or co-owned with the writer/collaborators permission to post).

Why? A number of reasons:

1. A lot of reader and creator focus is on characters owned by larger corporations. Let's bring a little spotlight on creating brand new, creator owned concepts.
2. Bringing a little awareness to the business side of co-creating original content. Take a look at Jeff Parker's article and follow up comments on the subject. Co-creators can take this opportunity as a little trial run, just make sure to have a mutual agreement in advance.
3. Fun! A few creators discussed the idea on Twitter and thought it was a great opportunity to create something entirely new, while bringing attention to these sketches.

The details:

1. Create an sketch of a new character/character you own. We're doing this primarily to get our imaginations running, so a concept specifically created for Creator Owned Day is probably ideal. It should NOT be a character owned by either a company eg. Marvel's Wolverine, OR owned by other creators e.g. Todd McFarlane's Spawn. It also shouldn't take distinct features from characters owned by others e.g. Wolverspawn You must own the character.
2. Post it on your blog, or Facebook, Twitter etc.
3. Share your post using the Twitter hashtag #CreatorOwnedDay.
3. Help us spread the word by retweeting your favourite new characters.

Sound like fun? Let's do it!

"May I kill him?"

Ah Lisbeth Salander.. warm up sketch taken into Manga studio for inking then touched up on Photoshop. The Fincher Version is such a good Movie and Rooney Mara's Lisbeth seemed like a good way to break the blog into the new year.