Leeds Sci-Fi, Comic & Card Fair report.

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

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.

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

Birmingham International Comics Show 3

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

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.

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

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

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

Birmingham International Comics Show

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

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

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

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.

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!!

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

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.

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

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

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.