I have opened a shop to make buying a copy of Longship easier. I am also selling a limited number of prints, here's one I have framed myself to give you the idea. Because I haven't paid weebly an annual subscription I can't do swanky things like add shipping, so it isn't obligatory. I would like you to own my art so we won't worry about shipping if you're in the UK. If you are overseas a donation for shipping would be appreciated but isn't obligatory if you are stretching to buy something. Please use the social media buttons to get things out there, help keep me in pens and cat food! Thank you for all your support!
Part five of six! Lawrence is a dude. He allows me to really enjoy what I do. He gives me just enough so I am not wondering what he wants but a huge scope in terms of how and what and where and who! It is a fine art, believe. If you are enjoying this, you are going to love Longship. Hope you are.
Part three of six (story by Lawrence Rider bearded Pharoah and part time Toad) Page One of two is complete! see it as a full page.
The Pharoah ordered an 18 panel monument so that we could awe the competition into submission, I mean enter a competition and thereby raise our profile in anticipation of the great launch of our Longship. So I'll be working on this for the next few days and rather than deprive you of evidence of my labours, we decided to share it as I go. This is part one of six therefore, and if you haven't listened to the music by the Orb you should.
That is my news. Weeeeeeeeeee. Bereft of a role in life I am scouting about for other useful things to do like rearranging the contents of my garage. Ugh. I loved drawing Longship I hope you will love reading it. I have yet to meet up with Steve and Lawrence so there could still be changes but I am hopeful that it will be printed soon and readable by people other than me and my cat. It was a nice feeling to read it, I printed it out and concertinaed the pages together and got happy. Here is a picture of me doing that. I didn't actually think about it becoming a book and that is the fun part now, out of my hands, off it goes. I think I will do some painting! O yes. When I said the last preview was the LAST preview, I was once again incorrect. THIS IS the LAST Preview. If you saw the earlier ones now you can play spot the difference! (That is what all adults do for fun is it not?)
Longship may or may not have one or two familiar faces hidden in the background. It's probably just my imagination.
My first published artwork for the graphic novel Longship, written by Lawrence Rider, is very nearly ready for print. This month I will be meeting with our publisher Steve Tanner of TimeBomb, so I hope you have saved up your spare coins so you can have a look at where I have been for the last couple of years! Yes. It has taken a long time, but I have been learning as I go.
Here, then is the (probably) final cover design -Click- to go through to the final (final final) preview. Also you can -read on- to see the comic building, plank by plank; or was the frogspawn analogy better? I look back at the first stage and think it has a clarity of its own, but it couldn't hold up for long without collapsing? Also the colours have stayed very much the same - just moved, gradually into their appropriate places). I have learned a great deal drawing this story and enjoyed it enough to stick at it for 18 months or more, so I hope you will enjoy reading it, though for each half-minute it might take you to read, it took me a month of my life to create. Not so different from animation then (that is what got me drawing comics in the first place). All I can say is - I put my heart into it and I am lucky to find something that allows me to do that! You'll be able to order your copy as soon as they are printed, directly from Steve's site timebombcomics.com or from me. Thanks to Steve for supporting us and making such a print run possible. Here is an updated preview of the comic I am drawing for Steve Tanner (TIMEBOMB comics) and Lawrence Rider (BEARDED writer). It has been through a fair few iterations which I could post here, though it's a bit like looking at frogspawn and watching it grow into a vertebrate creature which is kind of amazing but then the jelly stage is a little disconcerting. Longship is a 52 page graphic novel about a Viking burial. It will cost around the £6 mark and it will be costing you that very very soon, so start saving your pocket money. Here is a link to six full size pages of Longship: IAMTHELINKCLICKME ...but only in a good way. The earlier blog post cheerfully declaring a half way point with my drawing of 52 pages of Longship wasn't the half way point at all, not even nearly. I was clearly just encouraging myself with imaginary milestones, which I think is fairly acceptable. So anyway, I am now, still... not yet even... really... half way, but getting into inking. I am inky. I have laid down the pencils and I have the whole story in rough form. It exists and that is a very nice thing I can tell you. So in a way I have the fun part now - working on it. Just thought I'd update you, you the 200 Russian ping bots that visit my page. Hello you lovely binary bits, kissy kissy. Also, I am quite sane - clearly. Being a-cartoonist-at-home is awesome. O yes it is.
I reached page 26 in my pencils the other day and decided to go back and consolidate my progress so far. I draw pretty much every day now and am improving all the time, finding better ways of doing things. I'm getting to know the lead characters better and the ship too, so it's evolved. It feels like the lens on the camera in my head has been focusing, and just recently I got the Longship in sharp relief. I found that in order to draw 52 pages of story I can't be colouring every page like a painting before its all finished so I have temporarily done away with colour. It is quite refreshing to be working in black and white, it makes it easier to concentrate on the forms and proportions.
So if you'd like to see, I have updated the 6 page preview. The link is just here. Becs. |
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