Staz Johnson.com Newsblog

From The Archives #11: Zero To Hero

2011-07-15T03:46:00.000-07:00

I'm sure some if not all of you are aware that I was involved in a TV show called Zero To Hero back in 2003/4. For those not familiar with it, the show was a kind of combination of Scrapheap Challenge & Gladiators.... what a heady mix.

Anyway, regardless of the show itself, which came & went without much of a fanfare, this post is to show some of the artwork I did to be used on the show itself, & on the website dedicated to it at the time.

The pencil pieces were done to be used as set decoration for a portion of the set which was supposed to be the comic artists studio. It would have taken an eagle eyed viewer to see them in the background, & since the show had problems attracting ANY viewers, eagle eyed or otherwise, I'm sure this is the first time anyone will have seen them. I did 15 or more of these things, but the ones shown here were the only ones I could locate.

The colour images were done for the Zero To Hero website, & were given away as prizes in online competitions. They feature the designs the costume design team & I came up with for the superhero costumes featured on the show. At the time, I had just purchased my first computer, & knew nothing about colouring using Photoshop to colour, as a result, the artwork was all done in markers, but with a few Photoshop filter effects added on top in attempt to mimic the computer coloured look of American comic books. It wasn't a technique that was particularly successful, but needs must. Where possible I've tried to include the original colour marker drawing prior to any Photoshop filter jiggery pokery.

For those who wonder what the heck I'm blathering on about, there's a few You Tube videos to give you a flavour of the show.

From The Archives #10: Stunt Storyboards

2011-07-14T08:22:00.000-07:00

Despite how they may appear these storyboards weren't done for an actual stunt, but rather they were done for a book to illustrate how a stunt is put together, including the storyboard stage.

It would be nice to do some of this kind of thing for real though.

From The Archives #9: WNBA

2011-07-12T15:10:00.000-07:00

This was a piece done two or three years ago, for a project which (in a similar way to the wrestlers image I posted a couple of days ago) was aimed at trying to get a sporting governing body interested in promoting their star athletes as comic book stars, in this case, the Women's National Basketball Association, the WNBA.

Unlike the wrestlers image, I only pencilled this one, the inking (& possibly the colouring too, if memory serves) was handled by my old chum James Hodgkins.

As far as I am aware, nothing ever came of the project.

From The Archives #8: Batman Private Commission, 2001

2011-07-12T08:51:00.000-07:00

This was a private commission I did for a collector in the States. He originally wanted to buy a particular page of original art from the Batman/Aliens II book, however, when I told him that page wasn't for sale, he asked me to produce 'something similar' as a private commission.

If you'd be interested in something similar, the price for a commission of this type is £300 + p&p.

From The Archives #7: Teenage Mutant Hero Turtles, 1991

2011-07-12T03:46:00.000-07:00

Hero Turtles?... HERO Turtles?? Yes indeed, the Turtles comics in the UK in the early '90's were aimed well & truely at the 'juvenile' end of the market & it was decided (by whoever decides these things) that back then the children of Britain weren't ready for the concept of Ninjas. The idea was deemed to be too violent, & would apparently induce 9 year olds to start wearing black pajamas & those funny little shoes with seperate toes, & start beating each other to death in the playground..... or something. But anyway, whatever the motive, the TMNT became the TMHT for the UK market with storylines focusing on fun & adventure rather than violence & fighting, which meant Michelangelo had to give up his nunchucks, they too were designated as ultra violent & a bad influence, although why Leonado's samurai swords & Raphael's extremely stabby Sai daggers past muster, I have no idea.

However, be that all as it may, the fact was that Fleetway were publishing a comic, which as far as I was concerned meant work, & since at that time I had just spent 2 years working on all manner of licensed properties, from GI Joe to Transformers, & Thundercats to Manta Force (huh?), I figured it would be a breeze.

So I produced a sample page, showing both my pencil work, & my colouring style, & sent it off. All the colouring was done on the boards with inks & gouache, no Photoshop back then boy. The sample impressed the editor sufficiently for him to offer me a strip, shortly followed by another. However, it turned out that the Turtles license holders were much more fussy than any others I had previously had dealings with, & even after pencils had been approved, I found the finished coloured strips returned to me for additional alterations.. a LOT of additional alterations. And when I saw pedantic notes like "reduce the size of Turtles head by 2mm..." I decided to cut my losses, & got the heck outta Dodge.

Anyway, here's the sample page I did, & a couple of pages from the two published strips I drew.

From The Archives #6: Games Workshop, 1990

2011-07-11T05:07:00.000-07:00

Back in '90, I heard that Games Workshop were considering branching out into the comics publishing business, & were planning on producing a comic which would rival 2000AD. The plans were very much in the early stages of the magazine, but I contacted them, & was sent a proposal for a strip & was asked to produce some designs for the major characters. These are some of the designs I did.

Nothing ever came of the comic at the time, although as I'm sure you know, GW did eventually get into the market a few years later.

For what it's worth, although they did like these designs, they felt that they didn't look 'Games Workshop-y' enough, & art editor John Blanche made extensive suggestions on tracing paper overlays to show how I should ammend the designs. However, I had already gotten wind that the comic might not go ahead, plus I wasn't being paid to make these sketches/ammendments, so I decided to call it quits, & moved onto another venture. More of which in the next post.

From The Archives #5: Marvelman

2011-07-11T04:57:00.000-07:00

Done some time last year, if I remember correctly, this wasn't exactly a private commission, but was rather a drawing done for someone as a thank you..

Marvelman was one of my favorite characters in the early 80's, mostly due to the fantastic art by first Garry Leach, & then Alan Davis in Warrior magazine. Like most people do (I imagine) I find the fact that the character is now owned by Marvel comics (considering all the acrimony surrounding the character & that company) to be a supreme irony.

And for what it's worth, he will ALWAYS be Marvelman NOT Miracleman to me.

From The Archives #4: Emma Frost Private Commission

2011-07-10T04:28:00.000-07:00

This is a commission I did almost ten years ago, infact, I have a feeling it was the first private commission I ever did. This was long before I even owned a computer, & as a result this is a scan of an old colour photocopy. The original was done with markers.

From The Archives #3: Voldermort

2011-07-09T15:13:00.000-07:00

Something vaguely topical, what with all the Harry Potter final movie nonsense all over the news at the moment. Here's a couple of pics I did for some HP related project about a year ago. Not sure what they were for, not sure if they ever got used.

From The Archives #2: Cop.

2011-07-09T15:04:00.000-07:00

Another piece done a couple of years ago. I don't even remember what this was for exactly. I have a vague recollection that it was part of a recruitment drive by the NYPD, in which they wanted New York cops depicted 'heroically'.. or something.

From The Archives #1: Wrestlers...

2011-07-08T17:47:00.000-07:00

In the absence of anything new that I am allowed to show, I decided to post some of the stuff that is clogging up my hard drive that never got shown on here, either because I did it before I started this blog, or because it was never meant to see the light of day at the time. So to kick things off, this was a piece done a couple of years ago, a kind of cover 'mock up' thing for a proposed comic featuring American Professional Wrestlers. The project never got off the ground.

Batman/Aliens II on Ebay.

2011-07-05T07:30:00.000-07:00

Just a quick post to let you know that there is a bunch of pages from the Batman Aliens II graphic novel (among others) available on Ebay currently. In a change to the way I usually sell on Ebay, these pages aren't up for auction, but are on a 'first come first served' Buy It Now basis.

Among them are these pages....

Rogue Trooper/Major Easy Commission

2011-07-03T15:19:00.000-07:00

I was contacted recently by Eric Moore, author of the rather fabulous AIEEEE! blog, when he asked me to produce for him a private commission of Rogue Trooper & Hellman Of Hammer Force (from the gloriously violent 1970's comic, ACTION). His idea was to combine a character from the past with a more contemporary one. It could be argued that both Rogue & Hellman are old, but since Rogue has had a few brief outings in recent years I figure Eric just about gets away with it. Now anyone who has read this blog on anything approaching a regular basis will know I don't need asking twice to draw Rogue, & since I was a HUGE fan of Action when I was 11 years old, the opportunity to draw Hellman was tempting to say the least.

Anyhoo, I went ahead & did an initial pencil rough of a scene I thought would work, mainly just the figures with little costume detail, but then had to put it aside for quite a while due to deadline commitments. By the time I had come back to the piece, Eric had changed his mind, & now he wanted Major Easy instead of Hellman. This was an easy (pun intended) fix, since I realised when making the few changes necessary that Easy & Hellman have an almost identical silhouette, I even decided it wouldn't be necessary to change the gun I had given Hellman (a German MP40), since I figured Major Easy was the type of unconventional guy who wouldn't be a stickler for using regulation firearms all the time. So this was the final pencil layout, about 13 x 17 cm.

Having completed the layout, I scanned it into Photoshop, enlarged it to the right size, then printed it out & traced it through to the final board on my lightbox, using my usual Sharpies fine liners.

I was going to leave it at that, but at the last minute I decided a little touch of grey marker would help to really make the image 'pop'.

And hey presto, there we are, two characters who are never likely to meet, duke it out mano a mano... or something like that.

Eric plans to make the 'someone old someone new' a regular theme in his commission collection, & as such has started a blog to show them all off. Click the link below, take a look, & tell him I sent you. There's some really nice stuff on there already.

Someone Old, Someone New Blog!

If you're interested in something similar, an A4 'marker sketch' is usually £65 +p&p, but contact me with your requirements & I'll be able to give to a definite price.

Transformers & Heroes art on Ebay.

2011-06-20T04:57:00.000-07:00

In addition to the whole heap of Marvel & DC art I put on Ebay at the weekend, I also have decided to offer up some of the pages I did for the HEROES strips (as in the TV show). I recognise that as these are drawn in pencil, & not inked, they may be an aquired taste, but there they are nevertheless, similarly, the work I did on the Titan Transformers magazine a couple of years ago, these are currently on Ebay also.

Here's a selection of the pages, & click here to see the full list of what's available.

They think it's all over...... It is now!!!

2011-06-18T06:45:00.001-07:00

No, not a post relating to England's epic victory in the 1966 World Cup, but rather just to let you know that the graphic novel adaptation of Dracula that you & I long thought complete, in fact wasn't..... but now is. "Wha.....?" I hear you mutter. Well, it goes like this. I had thought that my work on said volume was finished over a year ago, but recently, the publishers asked if I would mind producing an additional six pages of artwork, to "fill in a few continuity gaps". After having produced some 130 pages for the book already, I certainly didn't want another artist coming in at the eleventh hour to provide pages which would inevitably be different in style, & a visual jar in the final published book. And so I agreed.

The new pages don't contain anything of real dramatic import, but are rather best described as bridges to fill certain storytelling gaps, & will be interspersed throughout the book. So what's on these pages? Well, more of the same really... blokes dressed in black, & ladies with their boobs hanging out... which pretty much sums up my entire comic career for these last 30 years. Convenient.

Here's some of the raw images prior to being cleaned up digitally & formatted into the actual finished pages. All of these are inked with Sharpies over bluline printouts of pencil layouts.

Ebay!!!

2011-06-18T06:40:00.000-07:00

Hi, just a quickie post to let you know that there is currently upwards of 40 pages of my artwork for sale on Ebay, click here to check out what's available.

First Ebay of 2011

2011-02-17T04:19:00.000-08:00

I havn't had anything on Ebay since before Christmas, so I figured it was high time I did. Among the stuff on offer this week is the cover art to an old Transformers comic from the old Marvel UK days, back in 1990, as well as the usual mix of Batman, Spiderman, X-Men etc etc.

Here's the link to the stuff up for grabs, & to the left is the Transformers cover art I mentioned.

Judge Dredd Megazine #307

2011-02-15T07:33:00.000-08:00

Just a quickie post to say that the current issue of the Judge Dredd Megazine (#307) carries the first part of a three part Judge Dredd story I have been working on. The story also features the return of former Chief Judge Hershey to Mega City 1.

It's a real pleasure to get a chance to work in the world of Dredd again, I really feel at home.

Anyway, here's the listing of the issue on the 2000AD website, & a few bits of the art, pencil pages, inked bits etc. Pick up the issue to see it all coloured up by Chris Blythe.

Just to explain what these are. I pencil out each page at roughly A4 size, then scan it into my computer. In Photoshop I enlarge the pencils, & convert the grey to a pale blue. I then print the blue pencils out in sections (since I don't have an A3 printer) onto regular printer/typing paper, & ink the 'bluelines' with a combination of Sharpies, various other markers & Pentel white out correction pens. This process is a recent innovation for me, though I know lots of other cartoonists use a similar method. I do find it frees me up somewhat at the inking stage (which tends to be the stage I would normally provarocate at), knowing that if I mess it up, I havn't destroyed the pencil, & can just print out another bluline.

I then scan the inked sections back into Photoshop, where clean them up, & I combine them into the final pages.

2000AD Prog 2011

2010-12-16T13:57:00.000-08:00

Prog (short for 'programme'... 2000AD speak for 'issue') 2011 of 2000AD, hit the shelves yesterday, it's a 100page monster, & among the 10 stories in there, is the Rogue Trooper strip I drew recently.

Check out this link to read a 'round table' interview I took part in with Rogue' writer Gerry Finlay Day, 2000AD editor Matt Smith & Pat Mills (the creator of 2000AD & champion of GFD).

Rogue Trooper preview

2010-11-27T02:34:00.000-08:00

As brought to my attention by the superb AIEEE! blog, a Rogue Trooper strip I drew recently was previewed in the mighty 2000AD last week.
I managed to track down a copy (which wasn't as easy as I'd anticipated, but ASDA came to the rescue yet again), & for those of you who don't pick up the Galaxy's Greatest Comic, here's a scan. As you can see, the strip was written by the original writer of the strip Gerry Finlay Day, so it was a huge thrill for me, being a massive fan of the character from way back.

This particular prog, marks the return of another legend, art droid Brendan McCarthy to Dredd after a 20 year absence, so it's well worth picking up.

I'll post a proper look 'behind the scenes' at the Rogue strip as soon as I get time.

Christmas sale of artwork on Ebay.

2010-11-23T03:11:00.000-08:00

I have a bunch of artwork on Ebay currently, any of which would make an excellent Christmas gift...*hint* *hint*

Click here to see what's on offer, & in the meantime, here's a bunch of images from the art for sale.

Judge Dredd?...... Really?

2010-10-04T16:25:00.000-07:00

This was done as a bit of fun for a thread over at the 2000AD message boards, when people were asked to submit what they thought Dredd actually looked like under the helmet. Here's a link to the specific thread.

My helmetless Dredd is probably a good bit younger looking than he actually should be, since I believe that Dredd actually ages inreal time, making him now in his mid sixties (assuming he was around 30 when he first appeared back in '77). But anyway, here he is.

A new post... finally.

2010-09-18T15:36:00.000-07:00

Wow, it's been so long since I posted on here, I almost forgot how!! In my defence, I was waiting on some photographs from the evening's exhibition at The Hepworth gallery. Sadly, the pictures never arrived, (I'll keep trying) so in order to kick start this behemoth, let's just go with what I've got.

First to say, the evening went surprisingly well, attendance on the evening was up around the 500 visitors mark, which is pretty incredible for an exhibition which only ran for 5 hours!

My peice seemed to go down well, with lots of punters taking the opportunity to create their own drawings. The idea was that in exchange for a drawing, they'd be able to take away a print copy of my piece.. the ultimate art swap, if you will.

So what was my piece? Well, if you can cast your mind back far enough, my self & four other local artists were ivited to create something in response to Barbara Hepworth's 'Mother & Child, see this post for all the details. Given that 'art' as opposed to 'illustration' is completely out of my comfort zone, coming up with a decent concept proved to be somewhat difficult for me. However, after much deliberation, I decided to do a piece which was about my notions of the relationship between a mother & their child, rather than a reaction to the Hepworth sculpture specifically. The idea I wanted to convey, was that a Mother in many ways is EVERYTHING to a child, from carer to policewoman, from confidant to authoritarian. So, I made a comic strip which uses only the words 'mother' & 'child' for all the dialogue, this seemed like a neat idea at the time, but on reflection it may have stretched to point to far, nevertheless, I think it conveys my overall idea. The decision to make the strip as a faux vintage piece akin to comics from the 60's, was made to suggest that (for me at least) , that was the period when I had experienced that Mother/Child relationship with my own mother.

To the image itself. Aping the drawing & colouring style of the 1960's proved to be trickier than I'd imagined, but I was happy with the end result.

Anyway, here are a few pictures from the evening, & a scan of the piece that the local newspaper ran about the event (trust me, despite what these pictures might suggest, there were people actually there!), & I'd just like to take this opportunity to thank everyone at the Hepworth, & Richard Wheater for inviting me to participate in the evening.

Wakefield Art Walk

2010-07-19T14:03:00.000-07:00

On the 28th of this month, I'll be taking my work into a wholly different (& quite unexpected) arena. The artists community of my home town have for some while now organised a regular event called The Art Walk. As the tile suggests, the event constitutes a tour of various locations around the city, where 'art' in many forms is exhibited &, performed. For the Art Walk at the end of this month, I was invited to participate.. I know, crazy, right?.

However, the plot thickens even further. As of next year, a new massive & spectacular art gallery will open in the city, affiliated with The Tate Gallery, the new Hepworth Gallery (named after the sculptor Barbara Hepworth) will bring exhibitions of contemporary art (rarely seen outside London) to Yorkshire. Now, while the Hepworth won't open proper until next year, it will be opening it's doors to the public as a part of this art walk, & trust me, the building alone is well worth a look. The works displayed in this new space will be part of an 'art swap', since elsewhere on the walk (at Westgate Studios to be exact), a rarely seen Barbara Hepworth sculpture, Mother & Child, will be on display for the first time in many years, & five local artists ( Victoria Lucas , Andy Singleton , Richard Sweeney , Richard William Wheater & yours truely) have been asked to display a piece at the Hepworth. That's right.. my work, in a gen-u-ine bon-a-fide art gallery... I'm still thinking they are confusing me with someone else. The five of us were each asked to create a piece of work which was in some way a reaction to the Hepworth sculpture.

For my piece (the specific details of which are under wraps for now) I have come up with an installation which combines projection, & printed matter, with a healthy dose of audience participation, because just as the five exhibited artists have been asked to create something in response to the Hepworth sculpture, the attendees of the art walk, will be asked to provide their own reaction to my contribution, those who accept the challenge, will be rewarded with a different kind of 'swap'.... intrigued? You should be!!

Below is the Barbara Hepworth sculpture which will be on display at Westgate Studios, & a couple of pictures of the room within the Hepworth Gallery where my piece will be displayed.

Caped Crusaid 2

2010-07-12T05:15:00.000-07:00

Last year I contributed two sketch cards to the AIDS charity event Caped Crusaid. The even is being organised again this year, & I was happy to contribute once more.

Last year, the sketches were put on display at Orbital Comics in London, & auctioned vis Ebay. I imagine something similar will be the case this year too.

Anyway, here's my two for this year, Black Widow, & Shanna The She Devil.

Poles apart.....

2010-07-12T05:04:00.000-07:00

I was recently asked to do a comic strip for Polish newspaper Fakt. I was provided with the script.. thank goodness, sine the strip they wanted was satirical look at the Polish general election, & my knowledge of the Polish political system is somewhat limited...

Anyway, dont ask me to explain the finer points of the vitriolic satire on display here, because even tho I was provided with a translation, most of it still escaped me.

By the way... finding a font with Polish letter characters suitable for use in a comic strip.. not so easy to find!! Who knew!

Rocket Girl!!!!

2010-07-12T03:27:00.000-07:00

Long time no post.... oops. Anyway, here's a quickie. I was asked to contribute a pin-up illustration in a 1950's space pulp style to volume 2 of StarShipSofa Stories.

I'm a huge fan of Al Williamson & Wally Wood's scifi stuff, so not surprisingly, some of those influences came thru in this piece. I added the Zip-a-tone/Lettratone effect in Photoshop, to give it a slightly more retro feel. I used to use no end of sheets of that stuff on my black & white work back in the 80's.

Now all I have to do is come up with an origin story for her, & issue one of Rocket Girl will be in the stores before you know it.....*ahem*

Quick sketch

2010-06-25T14:55:00.000-07:00

I haven't posted anything on here for ages again.. I'm falling into my old habits.. So in order to alleviate the issue (caused by the problem that everything I have on my drawing board is covered in NDA agreements), here's a quick 'mood lighting' sketch I did earlier today. Sharpies, & Sharpie fine liners.

Bristol Comic Expo 2010

2010-05-25T05:42:00.000-07:00

The last minute nature of my decision to attend this years Bristol show was (I'm sad to say) reflected in my complete unpreparedness for the event. So my check list for the weekend read something like this....Hotel booked right on the opposite side of bristol to the con?..check! Mobile phone/camera battery not charged up?.. check! No organised location to sign & sketch?..check! That'd be a full house then.

As a result of this, my dissection & debrief of the event, is somewhat lacking in images. After only a couple of clicks, my phone scoffed at me when I pleaded with it to take pics of the sketches I'd done. So here are all i have, plus a couple I stole or had sent to me.

The naked comic character sketches were done for Ivo, a collector from Belgium, who has this as his theme for the sketches he has done by me. The girl with the Spidey face background is Mary Jane, & the other one is Wonder Woman.

Bart, another Belgian, asked me for the Lord Vader sketch.

Wynn Ryder is currently collecting trading card size sketches of James Bond, which being a massive Bond fan I was happy to do, & Sam Gardner asked me to sketch his girlfriend Chloe as Star Saphire.... I embarrased myself, & displayed my complete lack of comics knowledge by asking.."What's a star saphire?", Sam's withering stare said it all.

Thanks to Wynn, Sam & Chloe for the pics.

The One That Got Away.....

2010-05-21T08:19:00.000-07:00

Recently I was asked by a manufacturer of interactive museum displays to contribute to a pitch for a contract to produce new exhibit for a major museum, which would feature comicbook style artwork. The artwork once drawn, would be animated & viewers of the exhibit would be able interact directly with it, in some way I don't actually understand.... (technical luddite here!)

Anyway, for purposes of the pitch I was asked to provide a loose storyboard, to demonstrate my 'comicbook artists' eye. I was provided with a basic synopsis of a real life story, which I had to interpret as a 14 panel storyboard.

There wasn't a lot of time & absolutely no money, but I took a day out of my schedule, & drew up the storyboard. As you can probably tell, it tells a story of British soldiers in combat.

However, after sending in the artwork I was informed that due to a mix up in terminology that when they asked me to draw a storyboard, what they actually meant was a comicstrip. So at the eleventh hour I took the 14 panel storyboard, & rejigged the panels in to a three page comicstrip. You can see the result further down this post.

Sadly, the company's pitch was unsuccesful, & the contract went to a rival provider. In an ironic twist, this was the second time in recent weeks that I had been involved with projects relating to our armed forces abroad which fell at the final hurdle.

In A Change To The Advertised Programme.......

2010-05-20T08:30:00.000-07:00

Due to a last minute change, I am now going to be attending this weekend's Bristol Comic Expo sorry for the short notice.
As I'm sure you know, usually at these affairs I'd be sat for a good while behind a table signing & sketching... however, I'm not sure if the organisers will be able to squeeze me in, & as a consequence I don't know if that's going to be possible this time. So if you want a sketch, grab me as you see me wandering aimlessly & lost & if it's possible to find a nice quiet corner of the bar..err, I mean convention hall, to sit down, I'm sure we can work something out.

In the meantime, here's an old Darth Vader sketch done with a double ended Sharpie. You can't buy this kinda entertainment!

Spiderman Sketch

2010-05-12T16:04:00.000-07:00

Here's a Spiderman sketch I just did for a collector in Poland.

R.I.P. Frank Frazetta.

2010-05-10T14:52:00.000-07:00

As I type this, I have no doubt that anyone who follows a blog about a comicbook artist will already be aware of the news that the greatest fantasy artist of all time, has died today aged 82. However, I couldn't let his passing go unmentioned.

Frank Frazetta was a massive influence on me, just as he must have been on every other 'fantasy' artist of my generation, & probably of the previous generation too. At 16 I painted a copy of his 'The Destroyer' painting on my bedroom wall... I studied every single one of his paintings & drawings I could find, just in the hope that some of his genius might rub off on me. Of course, it didn't, but it didn't stop me looking.

You know what, I'm gonna stop talking.. Frank Frazetta was simply the greatest there ever was. That's it.. that's all there is.

From The Archives.

2010-05-08T05:17:00.000-07:00

I realise it's been a few days since I posted anything. But at the moment the only stuff on my drawing board is either Dracula, or covered in multiple layers of non disclosure agreements... as one client said to me when I asked if I could put some of the work I had done for them on here..

"you know Iran's nuclear program?"
"err.. yes..?"
"well, this is more secret than that!"

Taking that as a 'no' & while not wanting to let this blog fall back into a coma, here is some really old material... & when I say really old.. I mean it. We're talking High School here..

As I have often told whoever could be bothered to ask me, when I was still at school, the prospect of being a comicbook artist had never even occoured to me, that all seemed a world & an ocean away, done by guys who lived in America. Rather, I wanted to be the guy who painted the Iron Maiden/Motorhead/Rainbow/Whitesnake/Ted Nugent (etc, etc) record sleeves, so as such, when looking thru a sketchbook from my school days, I didn't find lots of drawings of Batman & Spiderman, rather it was lots of drawings of guys with guitars, or lead singers etc...

So in order here.. Rob Halford of Judas Priest, in the days when everyone was still pretending to not know he was gay, Ronnie James Dio of Rainbow & finally, Motorhead.... the band who, if they moved next door to you, your lawn would die.

While I was at 6th form college, I became an avid reader of 2000AD, & shortly afterwards WARRIOR magazine. It was reading these comics, combined with meeting a guy called John Watkiss, who now is a world famous anatomist & concept artist, but back then, he was fresh out of Brighton Poly, & had just landed some work with 2000AD, that made me realise you didn't have to be from New York to work in comics.
At that moment, in a surge of youthful single mindedness, all I could see was the desire to draw for the galaxy's greatest comic, so spent hours trying to hone my drawing ability & style to one which would be fit to be seen within those pages.
With these first three 'biker punk' pieces, it is easy to see the influence that the movie 'Mad Max 2' had on me. The post apocalyptic setting, & the 1982 17 yr olds assertion that nothing is quite as cool as a Kawasaki Z1000.

The brief meeting I had had with John Watkiss, had been enough to instill in me the need to learn human anatomy if I wanted to make comics my career. And although I still believe this, & looking back there is perceivable a growing understanding of anatomy, & a growing confidence in drawing it without the use of reference or models, it is clear that I gave little truck to the other neccesary disciplines... on some of these there is almost no suggestion that I gave any thought to backgrounds at all.

This 'Marvelman v Captain Britain strip is something I did just for fun back in 1983.

At the time it seemed an obvious coming together,they were the biggest two characters in British comics back then, & the were both being produced by the team of Alan Davis & Alan Moore, but at the same time given that the two were published by rival companies who were demonstrating no lack of animosity for eachother, it also seemed a meeting which would never take place. However, in recent times, what with Marvel's aquisition of 'The Big Blue Banana', we may yet get to see Britains best two superheroes slugging it out.

As you will be able to see from these pages, I always had a fondness for Rogue Trooper, so I'm sure you can imagine how thrilled I was to eventually get to draw him (in his original Nu Earth guise) some twenty years later.

Regarding these three Rogue pages, they were done at a time when I was heavily influenced by Dave Gibbons, & while doing them I was intentionally working within a 'WWDD' (what would Dave do) frame of mind.. but obviously without an ounce of his skill, so mostly I took very superficial things from his work. What is evident to me now, looking back at these pages, is how little regard I still gave to environment & location. Even given the future war battlefield setting of these pages, there is scant regard given to making the backgrounds believable.

This page was part of another sample strip I did in order to try to get work at 2000AD. Clearly I'm still being influenced by Rogue Trooper here, but it would seem that by this time, I had finally realised that there was more to drawing comics that just drawing people. The backgrounds, even thought they are bombed out ruins, do at least look as if I've given the notion if location some passing thought. The character represented here is basically a dead rip of Stallone's 'Rambo', & came out of a conversation in the pub with a friend, where we compared the 'Rambo 2' to Rogue Trooper. Hence this Rambo in a future war setting.. I even drew him with a faux AK47 assault rifle.

WWE Magazine Cover.

2010-04-28T08:00:00.001-07:00

A couple of months ago I was asked to provide the artwork for the cover of issue #4 of WWE Heroes Magazine. For those who don't know, that's a mag devoted American pro wrestling.

The artwork I had to produce depicted the actual wrestler Chris Jericho, I confess I wasn't familiar with him, but then the whole professional wrestling thing just seems like so much pantomime to me, rather than an actual sport, so it's not something I follow.

Anyway, the editor provided me with a basic cover layout & reference photos of the guy & I came up with this initial sketch. The monster is supposed to be the guy's 'inner demon' taking physical form...or something. When I submitted this, the editor quite rightly said that the pose of the main character looked more like he was screaming in anguish rather than exhulting in his transformation, & requested I alter the pose slightly to emphasise this.

So I did this figure study, which captured the correct feel I think. I pasted this into the image in Photoshop, printed it out & using that as the pencil stage, I worked on my lightbox tracing thru with my markers & Sharpies.

This is the finished inked stage, which was approved.

Here is the final cover as it with appear, will color & logos etc. You can see this & the alternative cover to this issue done by series artist Andy Smith on the official WWE website here. The issue hits the stands on June 22.

Wales Comic Con pictures.

2010-04-27T15:18:00.000-07:00

As mentioned (& incorrectly named) in a previous post, I attended the Wales Comic Con on Sunday. This was my second time at this show, & like the previous occasion, it was a fun event. The title of comic convention is something of a mis nomer, since the actual comic part pales into insignificance compared to the movie/TV element of the show. However, I didn't find that a detriment, on the contrary, the presence of well known faces from Torchwood, Doctor Who & Star Wars (amongst others) drew a crowd with a much wider demographic than would attend a purely comics event... I believe.

I was positioned inbetween the uber talented twin strikeforce of Neils Roberts & Edwards, both of whom are gentlemen of the first order. I was kept busy most of the day drawing the sketches you see here, & participating in a Q&A session about comics, which some might say was lightly attended, I'd prefer to call it intimate....

My highlights of the day though both came in the guise of unexpected surprises. Firstly I was amazed to find that Neil Marshall (director of Dog Soldiers, The Descent & Centurion, among others) was a last minute announced guest. I'm a huge fan of his work, & managed to say hello to the man himself. He seems a genuinely decent bloke, & the fact that as I made my babbling fanboy approach he seemed to be checking over my shoulder just to make sure that the security guys were close by won't make me change my opinion. My second highlight was meeting voice actor Marc Silk.. he does a few of the voices in a couple of my daughters favorite TV shows (Fifi & The Flowertots & Roary The Racing Car), he gave me signed photo's for both my kids, & his Patrick Allen voice had me giggling to myself for hours afterwards.... a genuinely funny guy.

Anyway, hope you like the drawings, & if you were there I hope you enjoyed the show as much as I did.

Captain Britain Cover art on Ebay.

2010-04-26T08:34:00.000-07:00

I have made a conscious decision of late, to not clog up this blog with endless notifications of what I have on Ebay. And although I do intend to continue that, I felt that on this occasion I should mention this particular item... since it has been the subject of two previous posts recently.

The original artwork for the Captain Britain trade paperback cover is currently on offer. This is the inked artwork in it's raw state before I did a little Photoshop tweeking prior to submitting the final art file to Panini. I should have included a scan of the art in this form in my original 'process' post.., but you know what?.. I forgot.

Anyway, here it is, & here's the link to the auction on Ebay.

Wales Film & ComicCon

2010-04-22T04:57:00.000-07:00

I'll be appearing as a guest at the Wales Film & ComicCon this coming Sunday. The event takes place at Glyndwr University, Mold Road, Wrexham between 10:00am & 5:00pm. As well as yours truely, there'll be a host of guests from the worlds of comics, & TV & movie fantasy. Click the link for a full guest list.

I'll be doing the usual stints of signing & sketching, & as is now also customary at these events, I will be making a small charge for sketches. I addition to this, I'll be doing a Q&A session on drawing comics for fun & profit... but without the fun part.

Here's one of last year's happy customers, brandishing his booty.. that's in a 'pirate' sense.. not a girls buttocks sense.... jeeze, this post is turning out to be harder work that I'd envisioned..

Just be there, ok? And bring your cash!!

Captain Britain Trade release date.

2010-04-21T16:08:00.000-07:00

The Captain Britain trade paperback for which I supplied the cover art (see a previous post) has a release date, according to Bleeding Cool News. Read the details here. Happily for me, they also have a shot of the final colored art, the first time I've seen it.

Classic 70's Blade: Private Commission.

2010-04-10T03:48:00.000-07:00

Here's another post showing something I did last year. This was commissioned by a fan in Germany. As you can see, it's Blade, as depicted in the classic Marvel series 'Tomb Of Dracula'. Unfortunately, it appears I didn't take a scan of the pencil/layout stage, so you'll have to make do with this, the final thing.

If you're interested in something similar, they're now £65 +p&p.

Quick Roman Legionary Soldier Sketch.

2010-04-09T16:35:00.000-07:00

I know, I know.. I'm already slipping with my promise of a regular schedule of posting.... so sue me. Actually... don't... that wouldn't be good....

Aaaaanyhoo, here's a quick sketch I did of a Roman soldier, so in the absence of anything else.... this will have to do. If I get a chance, I'll sling some ink at it.

Quickie Batman Sketch.

2010-04-01T15:16:00.000-07:00

This post does exactly what it says on the tin... a quick sketch, made with a rapidly drying up Sharpie..

Dracula Teasers.

2010-03-30T03:49:00.000-07:00

It's been a couple of day since I posted anything, & because I promised myself that this time I would try to update the blog at least once every three days, here's a few selected panels from the upcoming Dracula book (which you will be pleased to hear is almost completed now.. just a handful of pages left..phew). All these are inked with a combination of Sharpies & various other markers/fine liner pens.

Captain Britain Cover.

2010-03-27T15:50:00.000-07:00

You may be forgiven for thinking that all I have done recently is covers for Panini trade paperbacks... that's not true, & to demonstrate how inaccurate that is, here's a cover I did recently for a Captain Britain trade paperback... errr... anyhoo...

As usual I was given a list of characters which needed to be included in the art. Due to the nature of these kind of collections, I'm sure the list of actual appearances was vast, but editor Brady Webb condensed it down to the core group.

As you will have seen from previous postes, when faced with this kind of commision, my usual approach is the old 'movie poster' look. However, when I saw the references that Brady supplied me with, the image of the barbarian hoard jumped out at me, so I elected to rip off someone else for a change, & decided to go for a Frazetta-style barbarian rumble.

First of all I did this quick A4 rough to show to Brady. He liked the basic concept, but quite rightly just asked that I move the faces of Cap Britain, Jaspers & The Fury up a little so they wouldn't be so obscured by the figures in the foreground.

While I was making the changes requested by editorial, I decided to change the pose of the Black Knight figure. Rather than do this on the layout, I sketched out the figure seperately, tightened it up & pasted it in using Photoshop.

I submitted this ammended rough, which was approved.

I then printed it out full size, and working on my lightbox, treated it as the pencil stage & went straight to inks. The inks were done with markers & fine liner pens (mostly Sharpies).

Finally, incase some of you may not be familiar with what the inspiration for this was, here's Frank Frazetta's painting 'The Destroyer'. Nobody has ever done barbarian rumbles better than this.

Marvel Atlas Covers

2010-03-24T07:57:00.000-07:00

I mentioned in the previous post a couple of covers I did for Marvel for their 'Atlas Of The Marvel Universe. It was my intention to link the mention to where those covers appeared earlier in the blog. Apparently, I never posted them.. so to avoid any confusion, here they are. As you can see, both of these fall into the 'montage' poster style.

Panini Wolverine & Deadpool covers.

2010-03-24T06:07:00.001-07:00

So I mentioned in my last post that this entry was going to be about 1970's montage movie posters... well it is, & it isn't. What I'm showing is a couple of trade paperback covers I did for Panini last year, one for a Wolverine collectuion, one for a Deadpool collection. Since both covers were for books featuring half a dozen unconnected stories, there was a LOT of characters which needed fitting onto the cover art. To my mind, the way this has always been done best is in those montage movie posters I mentioned which were at their peak in the 1970's. This is a style of composition I've used before, most notably on the two covers I did for Marvels 'Atlas of the Marvel Universe' books a few years ago.

Anyway, to the first one of the covers. As you can see there was lots of subsidiary characters that had to be put on the cover in addition to the obligatory 'hero' shot of Wolverine. The only real thing of note in the pencil, is that you will notice I left Logan's claws out at this point, I always knew they were going to be there, & that I wolud add them at the end.

With the Deadpool cover, I was playing around with various idea's for the main character pose..(there's only so many ways you can draw 'character leaping out at the camera' so may times before you get mind-locked) & getting nowhere. When this happens, I take a piece of paper & just fill it with lots & lots of stick figure pose ideas, hoping that one will spark my interest. When one does, I develop that into a more finished sketch. I then scan it into the computer, enlarge it in Photoshop print it out. This was the pose that appealed to me on this project.

Then it was just a matter of fitting in all the rest of the characters, but all the while trying to not make the composition look jumbled or cramped. This was done at a similar to print scale.. so it was easier to take in the whole composition at one glance as I refined it. Once the layout had been approved I again scanned this into the computer & printed it out at the correct size, then using a lightbox, transfered it onto the artboard adding tone & details as I went.

Sometimes I do this stage in ink, treating the layout as the pencil stage, sometimes, like here, I develop a more finished pencil stage first, just to iron out any problems I may feel are happening. Once that was completed, I went ahead with the inks.

With both of these pieces, the trick to a successful cover image in this style lies in the basic composition. With a cover image featuring ten or more characters it would be dead easy to make the image look disjointed & unreadable. This is where (I feel) the beauty of the montage style comes into it's own. It gives the artist the freedom to play with scale. The classic trick is to have one character fill the 'Darth Vader role', which is to say, a large looming presence which oversees the rest of the group, & the main character playing 'Luke Skywalker' (look at the Star Wars poster here to see what I mean).

So , enough of all that bollocks, time to sit back & enjoy some of my favorite examples of the kind of movie poster which influence this style of composition. Honestly, I could do a whole blog about these, I just love the style. It's nice to be give the opportunity to pay homage occasionally in some of the artwork I do.

Magenta Wilde: #8, #9 & #10

2010-03-22T18:06:00.000-07:00

These are the last three episodes of the Magenta strip. The only thing really worthy of note is that in episode 10 I inserted a photograph to serve as my 'pencils' for the hotel lobby background in the first panel. I prefered to do this, rather than insert a photo at the end, at least this way, I only used it as a guide to help me ink the b/g, which made the final result less jarring visually..

Anyway, here they are.. hope you've enjoyed these. Next post... an insightful look into 70's 'montage' movie posters.. no, seriously. It'll rellevant, trust me.

Magenta Wilde: #4, #5, #6 & #7

2010-03-21T05:04:00.000-07:00

More of the Magenta Wilde stuff, the layouts, inks & final version of 4 more episodes. A note of mild interest.... in episode 5 , rather than draw the Paris skyline, I imported a photograph, thinking it would save time, in fact what with all the messing about finding a suitable photo, I would probably have been quicker to just draw it.. this added to the fact that I wasn't particularly happy with the result meant that I didn't use this technique on any of the subsequent episodes.

Magenta Wilde :episodes #2 & #3

2010-03-20T07:08:00.000-07:00

Hi again. Following on from yesterdays mammoth post, here's some more of the Magenta Wilde material. The process was much the same as with the first episode. A rough pencil layout, which once approved was converted to a blueline in Photoshop, printed out, then finished/inked directly onto the printout. The printouts were just done on regular typing/printer paper, but since I ink with Sharpies & other similar marker pens, I find that kind of paper works just fine. Ok here are the pencil rough, ink & final colour stages for episodes #2 & #3 of the strip.

Magenta Wilde.

2010-03-19T06:30:00.000-07:00

Last Autumn I was contacted by the Sunday Times Style Magazine, & asked to create a comic strip to run for 10 weeks & featuring a strong female character for them. My suggestion of a story which was a cross between Sex In The City & a female James Bond seemed to excite them, so I recruited writer pal James Peaty, & we set about thrashing out a premise.

It was my intention to do another major art dump in the style of the earlier Agent Provocateur post, with all the art from the full 10 episodes of the strip. However, there it soon became clear that there would be simple too much material, so I'm going to split it up into a few smaller posts.

So first of all...here is my initial sketch of the character that I did to give the editors at STYLE a basic flavour of her..

After this & James' initial plot synopsis & first script were approved, I did a basic pencil layout of the first episode. James & I felt that we needed to start the strip with something which was as close to a splash panel as we could, in such limited space, something to establish the look of the character. Hence the full figure opener. Since I was to be both penciller & inker, I didn't feel the neccessity to do a more finished pencil stage, prefering to take this 'layout' & do much of the actual drawing at the inking stage.

I had decided that since I was dealing with editors who had little or no experience dealing with flaky comicbook artists, that I should continue to get approval at every stage of the process, so as to avoid any nasty surprises later on (oh the best laid plans......).. I took the pencil layout, & printed out a copy of that as a blueline, & inked directly on the copy. Once this was approved, I went ahead with the coloring.

This was the stage where things got..'interesting' for me. Up until that point, I had never colored any kind of comic strip using Photoshop, sure I had done one off illustrations, but never an actual strip, so I was on the steepest of learning curves. The process never feels natural to me (when it comes to artwork, I'm only really at home with pencils, ink, paints and a piece of paper), & as a result, it took me a lot longer that it would have taken a professional colorist. But I was fairly happy with the result.

It was right about now that everything went a little 'arse over tit' (to coin an old RAF phrase). It appeared that due to a breakdown in communication in the STYLE office, I had been given the wrong dimensions for the final artwork, which meant the artwork had to be re-formatted to some extent. Now that wasn't too big a problem, however what was a significant issue was that despite the artwork being approved at every stage along the way, someone now decided that they didn't want the full figure shot of Magenta in the strip. So at the eleventh hour, I went back to the original ink drawing, & started to add bits to widen the frames, in order to fill the space vacated by the removal of the full figure shot. Since I didn't have time to re-color the whole thing, I just dropped this new black linework layer onto the existing color layer, & just patched the color up around the edges. Again, not an ideal situation, but given the circumstances, the end result was satisfactory to me.

Which leaves us with this, the final version, which was printed in the magazine. Now is it just me, or does that seem like a helluva lot of work for five frames? That's ok, it's just a rhetorical question....

More Magenta Wilde shenanigans next post.

Agent Provocateur (part 2)

2010-03-18T04:47:00.000-07:00

As a follow up to the previous post showing the working proccess of the Agent Provocateur art, here is the art as it was finally printed in the AP catalogue. Compare & contrast with the black & white images in the previous post, to see how some pages got chopped around & re-edited after I was done with them. Many a slip twixt cup & lip... as my Mum used to say.

The reasons fot the changes were varied.. from at one end of the scale, it was felt that the demise of one of the bad guys was too graphically gory (top of page #8), to the fact that AP simply didn't like what I'd drawn (page #12). These things happen from time to time.

Script by Brady Webb, colors by James Offredi.

Agent Provocateur: New World Order.

2010-03-16T09:23:00.000-07:00

During the summer of last year I received a call from an editor & old pal of mine Brady Webb, asking me if I'd be interested in working on a comic strip series for the cutting edge lingerie manufacturer & retailer, AGENT PROVOCATEUR. Brady laid out the basic premise, that this was to be a story told in four parts, which was to run in the company's four seasonal catalogues over the subsequent 12 months. Despite my initial concerns that it seemed like I would be squeezing a lot of additional work into an already tight schedule, I decided that it was too good an opportunity to turn down, & hey, you only live once.. right.

The story revolved around a squad of female 'superheroes', each of whom wore various AP outfits as their superhero costumes.

I'll not go into the story in too much depth, basically because after completeing the artwork for the first part of it, I decided that it would be best if I pulled out. Some of the minor problems that I had foreseen prior to starting the gig, had started to manifest, & in even more significant ways than I had suspected. So I never saw the whole story, & the artist which followed me didn't either, since shortly after the second part was completed, the whole management structure at AP changed, & as I understand it, the project was pulled, & the completed second part was never even published.

Anyway, enough of such matters, this post is supposed to be a major 'art dump'.. so here it is, everything I can find on my computer relating to the project. From the initial 'warm up' sketches, designs for a spaceship, layouts of the pages themselves, the finished art, & the original versions some pages which after completion had to be changed. Hope you enjoy.

Comics For Cures Sketchcards

2010-03-13T06:21:00.000-08:00

It's been a long time since I posted anything on here, I only hope that there's still someone out there paying attention.

Anyway, for my first post back, here are some sketch cards I did just this week for the Comics For Cures cancer charity. Click the link to see detail of the auction, in which these cards (amongst many others) will be sold to raise funds to help fight this horrible disease.

My next post (if things go the way I have planned), will be a retrospective post, covering all the major projects I have been involved with since last summer.. which was pretty much when I stopped posting on here. Fingers crossed.

The Wales Comicon

2009-09-05T02:48:00.000-07:00

Coming up at the end of the month is the next event in this years convention calender. The Wales Comicon takes palce on 27th September at Glyndwr University, Wrexham. I'll be there obviously..(why else would I be mentioning it, right?), but along with yours truely, there will be an impressive guest list from the world of fantasy film/TV (LOTR, Star Wars, Harry Potter, Torchwood, Doctor Who etc) & comics.

I'll be doing my usual stint of signing & sketching (sketches, like the one shown here, will be charged at 10 of your Earth pounds).

Hope to see you all there.

Panini Wolverine cover

2009-08-30T14:33:00.000-07:00

I did the cover to a new trade paperback collection of Wolverine stories recently. I'm not sure what the trade was called.. or when it's out.. but I do know that the cover kicks ass.. & here it is..

Also, the original art is currently up for grabs on Ebay.. here's the listing.

The Caped Crusaid & Hero Initiative

2009-08-30T08:02:00.000-07:00

Recently I have been asked to participate in a couple of events for charity. Namely.. producing sketches to be auctioned off to raise funds.

For the Caped Crusaid (an AIDS charity) I did 2 sketchcards, Supergirl & Wonder Woman.

For The Hero Initiative I did a Wolverine sketch cover, for their Wolverine 100 project. The Hero Initiative raises money for former comic book industry professionals who have fallen on hard times.

Any similarity between Wolverine & Marcus off of Big Brother is entirely coincidental.

Captain Cymru Private Commission

2009-08-30T07:48:00.000-07:00

It's been way too long since I posted anything on here..& there's a lot of stuff to post.. so let's get to it..

First up, here's a private commission I just did for Justin Gillett. The character is Captain Cymru, who is (I imagine) the 'Captain Britain' or maybe 'Captain Wales' from some alternate reality in Marvel's Universe... if I sound a bit vague, it's because I am...

A similar commission will set you back £50 + postage. However, I give no guarentees that I'll do it in color.. I just go with the flow, & do whatever feels right to me at the time..

Old Artwork #4

2009-05-31T05:40:00.000-07:00

Continuing the theme of 'blasts from the past', here's a thing I did back in 1988. At the time I was producing comic strips & short story illustrations for an independant role playing magazine. The editors offered me a half page spot to run a promotional advertisement piece... I think as a 'payment in kind' sorta thing, since they didn't pay that well.

The piece shows a bunch of the characters I had drawn for the magazine, & a couple from another side project I was working up with a writer friend, Paul Hayes.

Amazingly this didn't generate any new commissions whatsoever..lol

The other pieces are various charater 'spot' illustrations I did for fanzines, between '84 & '87

Old Artwork #3

2009-05-27T09:14:00.000-07:00

Back in the late 1980's I did the cover to a record by British heavy metal band Excalibur. Sadly I dont have a copy of this work of genius to show you. However, the fact that this album sleeve featured a painting of a female back side in a thong did mean that a few other bands came to me & asked for 'a cover like the one you did for Excalibur'.

Around 1988-89 I was asked to do a cover for a record by another British heavy metal band, this time called Wraith, & guess what.. they wanted something like the Excalibur thing. I completed a whole series of color roughs, all of which were based on the original premise provided to me by the band, via their record company. The record was to be called either 'Control Yourself' or 'Scarred for Life'. In the end, I didnt do the finished art, & as I understand when the album finally surfaced, the band had opted for a photograph of themselves as the sleeve image. As was typical.. I was never payed for the roughs I did. Here's a few of them, all done in a mixture of ink, colored ink, some colored pencil, conté crayon & gouache.

BTW... like I sad.. it was the 80's.

Old Artwork #2

2009-05-18T04:47:00.000-07:00

Back in the early 80's, when I was 'working' (I use the term losely, because no payment was involved, but it was superb practice) fairly regularly producing strips & illustrations for fanzines, I decided one day that I needed to try to work the way the 'pro's did.... that's to say.. working fast!! So I set myself the task of producing a page of pencils & inks per day.. as an exercise, to see what standard I could ahieve with those time constraints.

So I took an episode of Rogue Trooper, & reverse engineered it to come to a reasonable approximation of what the working script may have been, then gave myself a week.. Monday to Friday, to produce the five pages of art... just like I knew my primary artistic influence (Dave Gibbons) could do & did.

Truth is, I didn't complete the full five pages. There was bits & peices on all that needed finishing up. A backgound that needed inking here... a face that needed redrawing there etc. But despite that it was a useful exercise, & a good learning experience.

Here's one of the pages from that experiment.

Old Artwork

2009-05-17T08:54:00.000-07:00

I havn't posted anything in a while, so I've decided to show you a bunch of old stuff. From the 80's & early 90's. Starting with this piece.

This was a character design thing I did for a RPG back in '92-ish. Painted in acrylics. If I remember rightly, I was turned into a lifesize standee for store displays... not that I ever saw one.

Big Ebay sale

2009-04-30T05:03:00.000-07:00

Just letting you guys know that theres a massivesale of my work on Ebay currently.
Below is a selection of some of the pages on offer.

More stuff on Ebay

2009-03-26T17:08:00.000-07:00

Hiya,

In a break from all the private commission nonsense, here's a heads up that I have a bunch more material available on Ebay again. Including this unusual piece. When I drew part of the Spiderman 2 movie adaption a few years ago I was asked to do a rendering to show how the 'movie version' of the Sidey costume could be represented in comic art. This is what I came up with.

Rogue Trooper Private Commission

2009-03-15T06:48:00.000-07:00

Yeah ok, I know what you're thinking.."doesn't he do anything other than private commissions??"

Well, I do, but these are currently the only things I can show you.

So, Rogue Trooper marker sketch commission. Done in an attempt to evoke all those terrific Dave Gibbons black & white strips in 2000AD, hence the lack of colour, unlike my other marker sketch commissions. Something similar will set you back £50- plus p+p. Drop me a line if you're interested.

PSI Judge Private Commission

2009-03-02T16:57:00.000-08:00

Another new post..& another new private commission... getting to be a habit, this.

Anyway, as you can see, the subject for this latest piece is a lady PSI Judge, from Judge Dredd. However, there is more to this than meets the eye... no, she's not a Transformer.. although that would be cool, but no, this is a representation of the client's (Johns Burdin) wife as one of Mega City 1's finest.

John is a huge Dredd fan, & is very active online with all kinds of Dredd related 'stuff'.

The rate for private commisions of this type, is £50- +p&p, email me if you're interested.

Winona Ryder Private Commission

2009-02-17T03:29:00.000-08:00

Here's a look at another private commission I completed recently. The subject is Winona Ryder.

This piece was commissioned by Wynn Ryder (made up name?) and this is what he had to say about the finished thing..

"Staz, you are a genius! Thank you so much! I absolutely adore it. I'm completely in love with your style and this piece is one of the very best in my collection. I hope you enjoyed drawing her."

Wynn is obviosly a nice guy, who had been on the wakky bakky when he wrote that.

If you'd like to have a similar (marker sketch) piece, the price is £50- + postage & packaging.

Punisher Private Commission

2009-02-11T01:12:00.000-08:00

I just wanted to share this with you guys. Graham Clements (who is on my MySpace friends list.. add me if you haven't already) recently commissioned me to do this (A4)Punisher 'marker sketch' piece for his girlfriend's birthday.

If any of you would like something similar, the price is £50- + p&p.

Beat the credit crunch with Ebay!!

2009-01-16T07:07:00.000-08:00

That's right, you heard it here first. My ebay sale this week includes pages for sale at credit crunch beating super low prices. Batches of three pages for sale at £12-... thats £4- per page!!

Also on offer is a mixture of Batman, Catwoman & Captain America pages.. among others.

Click on the pic of The Joker to see all the pages for sale.

First Ebay sale of 2009

2009-01-04T14:58:00.000-08:00

That's right, the year is only 4 days old, yet first Staz ebay sale of this 'circuit around the sun' is already upon you!!

The artwork listed features a whole host of America's favorite crime fighters (Batman, Robin, Spiderman, X-Men, Captain America etc ).. plus one British one Judge Dredd.. although, he's American too, strictly speaking. Aaaaaaaanyway.........

Click the pic of Spidey to see the pages on offer..

Last Ebay sale before Christmas

2008-12-15T04:23:00.000-08:00

Currently on ebay, are the last pages I will have on offer before Christmas, the sale finishes on the 16th, so any purchases will hopefully reach you intime for those last minute gifts.

Included in the sale is an Avengers cover done for Panini, detail at right.

Thought Bubble:The Aftermath 3

2008-11-30T08:17:00.000-08:00

Just one last (unless you know different) postscript to the Thought Bubble event. Simon James was kind enough to send me a very good quality scan of the Batman sketch I did for him at the show. And incase you're wondering.. yes, the paper in Simon's sketchbook really is yellow!!

On Ebay This Week.

2008-11-27T14:44:00.000-08:00

This weeks ebay sale consists of mostly Marvel work. Including Spiderman (pictured at right) a couple of Deadpool double page spreads, some Avengers stuff (actually drawn for Panini) & Excalibur... among others.

Click here to see whats on offer.

Thought Bubble:The Aftermath 2

2008-11-21T01:49:00.000-08:00

Here's a quick addendum to the overview of last weekend's Thought Bubble festival. This is the Spiderman sketch that can be seen in last post's video. And was sent to me by the the video maker Russ Entwistle, so thaks to Russ for both.

Thought Bubble:The Aftermath

2008-11-18T13:42:00.000-08:00

So the Leeds Thought Bubble convention was a few days ago, & very succesful it was too. It was (at a rough estimate) around twice the size of last years event, & attracted some very notable names.

I was kept busy all day, sketching for the punters, sadly however, I kept forgetting to take pics of both the people & the sketches.... Fortunately, some enterprising soul thought to take their video camera along, & subsequently upload the result to YouTube, so presenting here, my single solitary photo from the day, & said video in which I can be seen completing a Spidey sketch... can you dig it??

[Edit] Adam McGechan has been kind enough to send me a scan of the Judge Dredd sketch I did for him.

Robin The Boy Hostage on ebay..

2008-11-18T01:12:00.000-08:00

Yep, that's right. A whole bunch of pages from my 3 year run on the book dedicated to Batman's annoying, er I mean endearing sidekick are currently on offer on ebay.

For me, working on one of the core Batman titles was a dream come true, & I'm very proud of the work Chuck Dixon (who was, I believe the best writer when it came to crafting tightly plotted action stories) & I did.

Anyway, enuff of the trip down memory lane, click this link to see the pages on offer, & if a 14 year old boy in green tights isn't your thing, there's pages from Catwoman & Spiderman for sale too.

Thought Bubble: Leeds Comic Convention

2008-11-12T14:33:00.000-08:00

Hi kids..

Just a quickie note to let all you crazy cats that I'll be appearing at the Thought Bubble Comic Convention in Leeds this coming Saturday. In addition to yours truely, there's an excellent line-up of comics professionals attending the event, including Mark Millar, Alex Maleev, Liam Sharp & many more.

This is the second year of this event, & is being held at the Royal Armouries. I'll be doing the whole signing & sketching thing, but if you're wanting something particulary obscure, either bring reference, or shoot me an email before hand to tip me off. Hope to see you down there.

Anyway, here's a Nazi-Werewolf preparatory sketch I did a couple of years ago (complete with spilled coffee stains..oh, the glamour!!) for a project that never came to fruition .

HUGE Ebay sale.

2008-11-02T16:37:00.000-08:00

Following last weeks return of the ebay sales, this week sees the biggest collection of material I've posted on Ebay in one go so far. Over 50 pages of artwork. With some stuff which dates from the very begining of my DC career, through to more recent work on the Spiderman 2 movie adaption.
And pages priced from as little as £8-.

Pages on Ebay.

2008-10-27T07:51:00.000-07:00

Hi everyone,

Just a quick heads up to let you know there's another bunch of pages on Ebay this week. It's been a while since I had anything on there, & the pages this week include Wolverine, X-Men, Spiderman, Punisher & Batman. Some of the 13 pages on offer are shown here.

If you have any questions regarding the sale, message me here, or email me here

Doctor Strange Private Commission.

2008-10-26T04:43:00.000-07:00

I recently completed a private commission for comic art collector Robert Turner, as you can see he wanted Marvel's Master Of The Mystical Art (how Stan Lee kept up the alliteration thing for 25 years I'll never know) Doctor Strange. Here's pencil sketch, & the finished piece.

If you want something similar, check out my MySpace page for details.

Leeds Sci-Fi, Comic & Card Fair report.

2008-10-19T04:10:00.000-07:00

As previously mentioned, yesterday was the Leeds comic & card fair. I spent a good few hours down there. It's been a couple of years since I've appeared at one of these events, I'd forgotten how much fun they can be. The crowd is more of a crossection of the public than Comic Conventions tend to be, no bad thing in my opinion, pulling curious passers by from the Saturday afternoon shopping crowd. Everyone I met was nice here's a few of them, & some of the sketches I did.

Birmingham International Comics Show 4

2008-10-19T03:58:00.000-07:00

Ok... this is the final disection of the B.I.C.S. show, & only because Wade Campbell sent me a couple more pics from the Flip Out event, including a better pic of Shane Oakley's Iron Man. Also a few more pictures of some of the cosplayers I found online. If I took these from your site, I apologise for not asking permission, but in my defence, I am a thief, so what do you expect?

Catwoman Sketch.

2008-10-15T16:23:00.000-07:00

Playing with my new 'double ended' Sharpies, & white out pen.

Birmingham International Comics Show 3

2008-10-15T08:19:00.000-07:00

In response to my request for photographic evidence of Shane Oakley's awesome Iron Man sketch at the B.I.C.S. Comic Artists Flip Out, user Mailman (sorry I don't know your real name) has sent me a link to a review of the weekend which features said proof.

I've included the pictures of the 'Flip Out event here, but I strongly recommend you read the review of the whole weekend here.

Top to bottom: My big fat head getting in the way of Shane's awesome Iron Man sketch. Me drawing The Punisher. Mark Buckingham showing how a real artist does it. Finally, me again hogging the limelight & drawing Batman at the same time.... who says men can't multi-task!!

Deadpool Private Commission

2008-10-12T09:15:00.000-07:00

Here's a private commission I completed recently for Ashley Barron, as you can tell he wanted Galactus, but since I have no idea what he looks like, I drew Deadpool for him instead...ok, ok.. he wanted Deadpool.. jeez.

Anyway, if you'd like one of your very own, check out my MySpace page where you will find details of the various private commissions I do.

Leeds Sci-Fi, Comic & Card Fair.

2008-10-12T08:29:00.000-07:00

After something of an haitus, Golden Orbit are relaunching their Leeds Comic & Card events this coming weekend (18th October). I'll be there, doing the usual... signing, sketching & delivering witty (some may say 'hilarious') banter!

The shows have moved from their old location, & now take place in Leeds Town Hall situated on the Headrow in Leeds city center, five minutes walk from the rail & bus stations. In another break from tradition the whole thing kicks off an hour earlier than usual at 11:00am.

Sketches will be charged at a flat rate of £10-, & in true Blue Peter style.. here's one I did earlier, last week infact at the Birmingham Con. Thanks to Jaime for sending me this scan.

Birmingham International Comics Show 2

2008-10-09T14:24:00.000-07:00

So B.I.C.S. was last weekend. It was well attended, numbers I heard varied from 3500 to 5000, & fun was had by all I trust, certainly by yours truely. Highlights include Shane Oakley's Iron Man sketch at the Comic Artists Flip Out on Saturday morning (sadly I have no photographic evidence of it.. but if anyone does, please contact me & I'll post it on here), Dez Skinn's unusual hotel room arrangements (you had to be there... trust me) & the now traditional B.I.C.S. Saturday night over a meal discussion of Jean Claude Van Damme's contribution to world cinema.

Presented here is my paltry attempt to keep a photographic record of the event. Thanks to Sam (Superman) for providing additional pictures.

Imperial Stormtrooper Sketch

2008-10-09T14:18:00.000-07:00

Just a couple of quickie sketches I did earlier this week... thought you might like to see them.

Birmingham International Comics Show

2008-10-02T11:14:00.000-07:00

Hi everyone.

Just a quickie to let you all know that the Birmingham International Comic Show is this coming weekend. Star guests (other than yours truely, natch.... ahem..) will include the legendary Michael Golden, John Cassaday & Olivier Coipel.

I realise that most of my friends on here are in the States.. but for the few Brits, if you're in the area, come on by.

There's masses of fun events, including a 'Pop Idol' style talent search. The winner getting the chance to have a story published in 2000AD. And as usual, a hall choc fulla dealers selling everything from comics to... well, err.. more comics.

Aaaanyway, as is also usual at these events, I'll be signing & sketching at various points over the weekend. Here is a Spiderman sketch I did at a previous event. Hope to see some of you there... & incase you're wondering..mine's a pint!

Dracula; The evolution of a page

2008-09-14T11:10:00.000-07:00

Hi everyone,

I know I said I wouldn't be posting a new Dracula blog for a while, but I've added so many new 'Dracula virgins' recently that I thought I should. This page has already been seen on my 'Blogger' page, but I thought I'd take this oppertunity to show the process that goes into the making of one of these pages. The scene I'm using to illustrate the point, is the one where Harker meets Dracula's 'brides' in the castle.

So, first off, we have Jason Colby's script, adapted from Stoker's original text. As you can see I make my initial 'thinking on paper' thumnails actually on the script page.

On most pages, that would be all the development work I'd do..& from there, I'd jump straight into the actual artwork. However, I felt that this was a key scene, & the brides were significant characters, & as such I wanted to get them right, so I made a few sketches.

On the whole, I liked these, they captured the level of sexiness I wanted, but despite that, I felt they looked too modern. And since this was an attempt to tell this story as close to how Stoker would have envisioned it, the costume designs needed to be altered, & I chose to draw them as you see below.

Here is the page at a midpoint stage. You can see the level of pencilling..very lose, there is no point in drawing everything in pencil, only then to re-do it all in ink. So I just make the merest suggestions, indicating position of characters etc in pencil.. & then have at it with my Sharpies!! One of the downsides of this is that if I make a mistake, it's kinda permanant. Like here for example, the main bride wound up looking like her neck was too long, & in the wrong position. But fortunately, due to the wonderment that is PhotoShop, such things are relitively easy to fix, as you can see in the next pic.

Normally, this would be a finished page. However, in this instance, I was asked to tone down the level of female flesh that was on display. It was felt that given that the target audience for this book will include some fairly young kids (or more significantly the parents of some fairly young kids) that it shouldn't be too overtly sexual

Which brings us to this, final version of the page. I drew altenate versions of the brides dresses, & as with the blonde's head, pasted them in using Photoshop.

So, there you have it. From script to finished line art in 4 easy steps. All that's left from here is for the letterer & the colorist to do their jobs. Hope you enjoyed this small insight. If you have any questions, I'm all ears.... well, not all ears... that would be stupid....

Dracula Update IV

2008-08-31T07:54:00.000-07:00

Ok... one last update on the Dracula stuff (for a while at least.. gotta keep some of it underwraps, or nobody will buy the damn book!!.lol). Anyway, here's a splash montage page, chronicling the Demieter's journey to Whitby.

Dracula Update III

2008-08-27T04:04:00.000-07:00

Hi folks,

Here's another sneak peek at one of the pages from the Dracula adaption I'm drawing atm. Here is 'The Demieter' landing in Whitby harbour, & old Drac himself cunningly avoiding the 'anything to declare isle' by leaping from the ship under the guise of a Mr Al Sation.

Anyway, hope you like....

Hulk Sketch.

2008-08-22T08:07:00.001-07:00

Thought you guys might like to see this sketch of 'Ol' Greenskin' which I did this week as a favour for a friend.

Super cheap art on ebay!!

2008-08-22T06:42:00.000-07:00

The theme for this weeks ebay sale is 'pile 'em high, sell 'em cheap!' (a bit like Tesco's, but without the 17 yr old Goths stacking tins of baked beans). Yep, this week there is a whole raft of art pages, being offered for as little as £5- each.

If the thought of getting a bargain doesn't convince you, then consider this.. buying one of these pages will make you more attractive to the opposite sex, & increase you popularity amongst your friends. ** this is a lie.

Batman pages on ebay

2008-07-27T14:36:00.000-07:00

To mark the release of the new Batman movie, The Dark Knight, I'm making it a Batman & Joker art special in my Ebay sale this week. Pages on offer come from Detective Comics, Batman Aliens II, Catwoman, Nightwing & The Secret Origin Of Batman.

AutoAssembly: Transformers convention appearance.

2008-07-26T03:39:00.000-07:00

Hello, just a quick post to let you all know that I'll be putting in an appearance at a Transformers Convention on Ausust 2nd. AutoAssembly looks set to be a fun filled one day event, with guests from all aspects of the Transformers scene (not just the comics) & dealers selling enough Transformers related gear to keep any 'Auto-head' happy!

I'll be making a dramatic (cough*) entrance onto the stage at some point in the day, accompanied by rousing music... think WWE but with less muscles! If anyone has any suggestions as to what my entrance theme should be... I'm all ears! Suggestions for 'Simply The Best' will be considered, while 'Nellie The Elephant' will result in a flame war!

Anyway, I'll have what little pieces of Transformers artwork I have left for sale, & I will I'm sure be signing & sketching at some point too.

Dracula Update II

2008-06-30T08:37:00.000-07:00

Here's another quick look at some of the Dracula pages. The note of interest on these is that for reasons of modesty the vampire chicks are gonna need a little extra material added to their dresses, so make the most of these boobs.. you won't be seeing them again..lol

New Avengers cover for Panini

2008-06-27T02:58:00.000-07:00

Here's a cover I did recently for one of the Panini 'pocket book' editions. This is my take on a classic Avengers cover. Sowing here, the initial rough sketch, the pencil drawing & the final finished inked piece. Hope you like.

Batman Aliens double page spreads & Transformers on ebay

2008-05-15T15:30:00.000-07:00

Hi Everyone,

There are some real rareities in my ebay sale this week. Firstly, there are some of the double page spreads from the Batman Aliens II book I drew a few years ago, from even further back (1990-ish) there are two cover paintings from the old Marvel UK Transformers comic & from sometime in the mid 90's there is a Robin pin-up collaboration between myself & the late (& sadly missed) Mike Wieringo.

2008-05-07T08:29:00.000-07:00