In order to satisfy my mania for drawing ink is squandered

AND FOR WHAT? A poor quality sketch of gold age (1991-93) superhero Subvertman. He got his power from drinking radioactive cider and would patrol the rooftops looking out for muggers to help whilst singing Discharge lyrics to himself.

However, times change. Nowadays superhero comics are primarily aimed at adults and yes, I won't lie to you: Alan, Frank and me do feel a bit responsible.

(runs away)

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A couple of drawings for a possible project.

A quick sketch to make you vomit onto your own thighs

Nazi Scum

Vinyl Underground issue 9 is in shops this week, there's a beautifully inked page from it on Ryan Kelly's blog. Here's a coupla pages of pencils for issue 11.

PARIS review

Richard Bruton of the excellent Forbidden Planet International blog reviews Paris here. Thanks, Richard!

Spoilers

Speaking of Graphic Classics, here's a panel from The Shadow Over Innsmouth, published in their Lovecraft volume...
... and a few from The Adventure of The Engineer's Thumb, published in their Conan Doyle book.
The very day before I started drawing this strip I happened to walk past a shop window displaying a book of Victorian photos chronicling all the Sherlock Holmes locations in and around London. It felt serendipitous until I realised this particular story was one of the few to take place in a fictitious location. Grr. It did enable me to name one of the villages on the map after the original Holmes illustrator though. If you follow Sidney Paget's Wiki link it's pretty amusing to see how he first got the gig!
Anyway, I was thinking that there are numerous parallels between this yarn and Hergé's The Black Island. Both feature a murderous and mysterious German dude residing in a mansion in the Southern English countryside, a mansion that proves rather tricky to leave but that ends up burning down, both are engaged in counterfeiting, both...

Reader?



Reader...?

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Coloured version of an image used in Paris issue 4.

Birth of Metal

Old picture for Classic Rock magazine (overhead light © Picasso).

The Smoke

Two pages from Vinyl Underground issue 8, expertly inked and coloured by Ryan Kelly and Guy Major respectively. Primrose Hill and the Aquarium. Behind the latter is some Dali museum or something, but I decided to go with a different artist, as readers of Paris might note ;)

Joey Esposito kindly reviews issue 7 here.

Free comic

I got my Graphic Classics: Special Edition comps today and they're lovely. They'll be available from your local comic shop on Free Comic Book Day, though it'd be worth pre-ordering one. A few panels from my contribution to it above and a discarded version of one below.

Cider country

Ink wash and Tipp-ex. I regretted adding the latter but couldn't apple-z.

Another of these things

Today I drew this.

Also: Graphic Classics: Special Edition - for which I illustrated Conan Doyle's John Barrington Cowles - is being published for Free Comic Book Day on May 3rd. There's a run down of all the featured adaptations and contributors in this Newsarama review. It's a generously whopping 64 pages and to reiterate: is free! If you'd like a copy, please do visit your local comic shop to pre-order one, and y'know, buy something there too.

Pencils

Leah from Vinyl Underground in her undies, surrounded by lilies. Well, how do *you* surf the net?

Ah - Shh. Ahh - Uht! Btt... Ah! Ahh! Shht - nht... Don't spoil it for me, reader.

Waffling

Here's my take on Picasso's numerous portraits of Sylvette David, with my apologies to both - it's only for fun. It wasn't supposed to be her at first - having drawn the face, figure and clothes I was just stuck for "good hair" and her famous ponytail popped into my head. From there I felt I should add some Picasso-esque ceramics given that they met in Vallauris, the lovely town in which he made his pottery. Sylvette is an artist herself.

Although the inspiring commercial illustrators of the mid 20th Century borrowed much from Picasso, I think the influence for this was also some Kaffe Fawcett paintings I saw in an exhibition a couple of weeks ago, here in Bath. I liked his still lifes of decorative china - like this one - more than the china itself, also displayed.

Also: check out Ryan Kelly's blog. He's awesome and I'm honoured and lucky that we're sharing art duties on Vinyl Underground. I haven't seen the fruits of his labour yet but will be sure to post some. I eagerly await The New York Four, the fourth-coming Minx book he's drawn too.

Beatnixed

I was too quick to scan this in and didn't realise I was unhappy with it until it was on screen. Originally she was bare-skinned under her dress, but it didn't really give her the confident sorta look I was after, it just looked crude. So I doctored her wardrobe on the computer and didn't bother drawing the background I had in mind. Still, at least we get to spend this time together, reader!

I drew this today.

Some recent reviews:
Steve Higgins at PLAYBACK:stl on Paris
Martijn Form at Comics Bulletin on Paris
Brian Cronin on Vinyl Underground issue 5
Win Wiacek on Meet John Dark

A two part interview with me by Broken Frontier's Bart Croonenborghs here and here.

My many thanks to these fine folks.

Going Underground

Been admiring Cameron's inks and Guy's colours on Vinyl Underground 5, in stores at the start of February.

I was accused of being a terrorist by a group of security types when I was photographing a tube station for this issue, it got a bit heated. I tried to explain that I was a cartoonist, but that just made them angrier.

Doodles

I'm not good at maintaining a sketchbook, but wish I was. Those hardcovers are intimidating. I'll doodle on A4 sheets of printer paper though, fill them up and then scrunch them up. I broke that last rule to scan and post these from yesterday evening. Ideally having them online will force me to improve - to search more whilst drawing - rather than absent-mindedly regurgitating the same generic faces and poses!

Original art

The following are drawn by the mighty Jonathan Edwards. They're pages from his comic Aunt Connie & the Plague of Beards which is available to buy on his website. They're cherished possessions which I hadta take out of their frames to scan for you (badly, given I didn't go so far as to remove the card mounts too). Jonathan once said to me "I'm getting illustration work from this magazine and I think the art editor would like your work too - send him some samples". I didn't get any work from the fucker but was touched by Jonathan's unselfish gesture. I guess he knew I was never gonna be serious competition!

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I was recently asked to draw Subvertman's better half and as it was being supplied digitally added some half-tones. Hadn't drawn her since '95. The Subvertman comics were collected in Punk Strips, which if you're Stateside and into punk rock, is available to buy from Marc Arsenault's Wow Cool. Marc has a cool blog there too.

That reminds me - when I was holiday a while back someone next to us in a restaurant was wearing a shirt with one of my designs on, a picture of a punk and copper drawn for Riot fanzine and reprinted in Punk Strips. I don't know who makes and sells them but should they read this - and I know it's a long-shot - perhaps they'd consider spreading the joy by donating a few for another thrilling competition ;)

Okay, I hope you had a good xmas reader, and I wish you a very happy 2008. I had good comics for xmas as it happens: the latest Scott Pilgrim and Adèle Blanc-sec, Aya de Yopougon, Tamara Drewe (the graphic novel of the year) and as crimbo presents to myself, The Last Call and Zombies Calling by fellow SLG-er Faith Erin Hicks. I also had perfume, but the less said about that the better.

As ever I'm behind with my correspondence but will endeavour to catch up asap.