David Baillie's Web Journal

2012-01-03T16:24:00.005Z

Well first off: Happy new Year!
I trust 2012 has treated you with the respect you deserve.
So far, at least.

I thought I'd start the year by writing a process blog post on the very last illustration I produced in 2011. (A year we've already forgotten.) I've tried to keep it kind of brief - I occasionally lecture on this sort of stuff and so I started to slip into that mode a bit and had to reign myself in. Next time I do one of these I'll try and snatch more informative mid-process screengrabs (most of those below were taken at the end).

The Movie Dredd Xmas Drawing

Pete Wells, who runs the fabulous 2000AD Uncovered blog, emailed and asked me if I fancied contributing to the 'pros' section of the 2000AD Advent Calendar. I told him I'd love to - in fact it'd be an honour - and then put some thought into what I would draw. I'm ashamed to admit I had a bit of artist's block...

Then Pete told me who else was going to be in the 'pro' section of the calendar.

Other than me, it was more or less every genius artist currently working on the comic.

So now that the pressure was off - I couldn't hope to compete with whatever they came up with! - my stupid block cleared and I decided I'd take a stab at drawing Judge Dredd as he's due to appear in the new movie Dredd.

If you do a Google images search for "new movie dredd" you'll see the six or seven photos I had to work from.

I put them all up on screen and tried to piece together the movie uniform. This was actually loads of fun and reminded me of doing exactly the same thing with old comics and superhero costumes when I was about five.

I settled on the first pose I came up with, because it felt a bit like something either Mike McMahon or Jamie Hewlett would draw - the relaxed arm and nonchalant kick.

You'll see that I shifted his left leg a bit to bring his centre of balance back. I thought I was making the figure more dynamic but in retrospect I think it was a mistake - it was more interesting and anarchic as it was.
Alas.

I inked the drawing using a combination of fineline and brush pens, leaving the spot black areas to be filled later on the computer. I usually do this as it's faster but it also means I can change my mind later on and maybe hatch or something instead.

Then I scanned and plopped it in Photoshop.
After a few minutes of clean up (nothing too drastic) I laid down flat colours on a new layer beneath the inks. These colours can be anything you like and don't need to be anywhere near where you finally want to end up. Manga Studio has an automated - randomised colour - flatting process, but I haven't had a chance to explore that yet.

At this point I usually duplicate the flats layer, hide it (keeping it as a sort of 'save point') and start applying some shadows and gradients. I decided, because the figure doesn't actually take up a lot of the composition, that might make it too fussy - so I skipped that and went straight to some cell shading.

(Here I just created a new 'multiply' layer and, using the brush tool, painted some contour and drop shadows in a muted green-grey colour. I deliberately avoided being too neat with this.)

The side shadows on the 2, 0, 1 and 1 didn't work for me and I didn't want to go any darker, so I added benday dots.

(If you don't know how to do this play with the options under Filter->Pixelate->Colourhalftone)
I liked the dots so much I used them in the background too.

Then I changed my mind and used a Photoshop-generated cloud pattern and some transparency sweeps to make a new one that balanced the drawing better.

I also ditched my hand lettering, as it was slightly too sloppy. It would have been okay for dialogue but I should have been more careful with it at this scale. The font I used instead was courtesy of the excellent comicraft - picked up in their annual New Year's Day sale a few years ago.

In a few months' time I'm probably going to discover that this is nothing like what the movie uniform actually looks like. But, just like 2011, everyone will have forgotten by then.

Hmmm... I already think I should have made the body armour bulkier.

Anyway... I hope that was either interesting or useful.

Happy 2012!

2011-11-11T14:59:00.011Z

Even though we're slowly slipping into winter's grasp, the sun still shines...

Last week saw my debut in Mega City One... That's right, Tharg let me loose on the Judge Dredd universe!

(Megazine 317 - cover by legend Mark Harrison)

The Unfortunate Case of High Altitude Albert features art by the fiendishly talented Joel Carpenter and lettering by master craftsman Simon Bowland. It's part of a brilliant lineup in this month's Judge Dredd Megazine (that's right - available all month from good newsagents and comic shoppes the world o'er) including part 2 of a cracking Judge Dredd tale by Michael Carroll and John Higgins, Pat Mills and Clint Langley's creator-owned American Reaper and the next sizzling chapter of the adventures of Cursed Earth Coburn by fellow-Scot Gordon Rennie and Dredd-creator Carlos Ezquerra. There's also a brilliant piece on Henry Flint's new artbook Broadcast: The TV Doodles of Henry Flint by my mate Matt Badham and a revealing Interrogation of Jim McCarthy by PR Droid Mike Molcher!

Speaking of Judge Dredd - gad-about-town Ade Brown asked me to contribute to the Halloween art auction for his Just 1 Page charity and I came up with this:

That's an A4 rendering of an Undead Dredd, in sepia and red ink. Ade will be at Thought Bubble this weekend, looking for dosh - so if you fancy having this hanging on your wall please feel free to approach him with hard cash. (All money raised goes to Macmillan Cancer Support.)

This brings back fond memories... Valeria Ferrari (the co-ordinator and guru on The Casita Variations project we worked on in Paris with Danny Goodbrey) has plopped a video of the installation up on YouTube:

This week I'm mostly reading One on One by Craig Brown and Player Piano by Kurt Vonnegut - both highly recommended. But I'll leave you with some quotes from my favourite itinerant mathematician, Paul Erdos - they're all great.

(His biography, The Man Who Loved Only Numbers, is a must-read!)

2011-07-05T09:21:00.005Z

Last week was a sad one as the London comics community said goodbye to Dangerous Dan Lester who's off to South Korea for a while. ('Laying low until the heat dies down' apparently... Whatever that means.)

The page below represents the only tangible evidence of our last beer-sodden co-writing session. (The good bits are censored but I quite like the Judge Viking guy I drew.)

Anyway we all got together and made him a farewell card which was presented to him at Self Made Hero's fabulous launch party for David B's new book, Black Paths.

He's drawing a diary comic of his experiences, which will no doubt appear on a blog, webpage or lamp post near you soon.

It was a busy week for comic parties, launches, lunches and farewells and I have just about recovered in time to prepare to leave The Cave and be social again - this time it's the BBC Writers' Festival in Leeds.

There's a great line up (including Jimmy McGovern, Hugo Blick, Toby Whitehouse and Alice Nutter) and I'm really looking forward to it. I have to get up at The Crack of Doom tomorrow for the trek north and running out of business cards means I had to schedule a mad dash from train station to printers to hotel before it all kicks off... So check back in a few days for embarrassing tales of how I made an arse of myself due to sleep deprivation and exhaustion.

Some links for you:
John at downthetubes conducts a great interview with Jesus Redondo.
(Speaking of which - I hear from Sally Anne at Mega City Comics that the 2000AD our story was in sold out in record time!)

Cartoon Style Fighting Kids (I think the title says it all.) I reckon this would be a great way to make a low budget action movie.

Lift - A Portrait of Life in an East London High Rise - an amazing short film made round the corner from me by Marc Isaacs.

2011-06-09T10:00:00.001Z

Speaking of 2000AD...

I was reminded a couple of weeks ago that 2000AD fans are a breed apart and probably the friendliest, coolest and most handsome people in the world.

It was barely a minutes past 10am and I'd just shown up at the recent London Comic-Con KAPOW! to set up my table and display my wares. This is something I hadn't done for a few years and for a few moments I honestly couldn't remember why I ever did. Creating comics is very different to selling them and while I'm not usually shy, neither am I a natural salesman. Anyway - I texted my co-exhibitor Dan Lester and asked him to bring wine as this was going to be a long day. He replied and said he was still bed. It was now four minutes past ten and already things were looking bad.

And then something wonderful happened. A troupe of 2000AD fans showed up, said hello, asked for sketches and bought my stuff. Suddenly the world seemed like a brighter place and I was lifted out of my, frankly inexcusable, pit of self-pity.

Then Dan showed up with Chinese lychee wine and it got even better.

KAPOW! itself was brilliant. It was constantly busy, but the organisers kept the crazy queues for signatures and screenings well away from the main floor. The crowd consisted of fans young and old, male and female and there was a heartening number of families wandering around taking it all in.

A select few (about 60) of us even made it into the Guinness Book of World Records - twice!

(Quick aside - if anyone has a scan of any of the thousands of sketches I did on the day, drop me a line at webhello at davidbaillie dot net and I'll put them on the blog. I remember being quite proud of the Mean Machine and Strontium Dog ones...)

Photo of me and The Lester taken at KAPOW!

by and (c) Ms. Isla Rae Shortland.

(Also hello to Kev if you're reading this!)

KAPOW! came in for a bit of stick on the Internet, mainly because the pre-publicity and guestlist were quite superhero-centric (and so mostly male) but that wasn't at all reflected in the attendance on the day.

I think some of this was simply down to the figurehead for the convention, Mark Millar (if you don't know his name you'll definitely have heard of the films based on his comics - Kick-Ass and Wanted) raising some hackles with his enthusiastic self-promotion. This brand of hucksterism has a long tradition in comics, stretching back to the legendary Stan Lee himself - but does upset other creators who believe humility to be a virtue.

I don't know Mark but I did once spend an evening with him. (This isn't is kiss-and-tell, I promise!) It was at a meeting of the now-infamous SCCAM club in Glasgow in, I think, 1996. I was still at university and Mark was writing various strips for 2000AD and Aztek for DC with his then-writing partner Grant Morrison.

I wasn't yet twenty and a wee bit starstruck at suddenly being surrounded by names I knew from my own comic collection. (This despite a sternly painted notice above the stairs descending to the SCCAM basement bar announcing 'No fanboys!') Knowing no one, I stumbled up to the bar and counted out the change in my pocket to see if I could afford a pint. Mark, who happened to be standing next to me at the time, saw this and offered to buy me a drink. I declined, but spotting that I was both skint and a newbie, he got me one anyway. Then he took me under his wing, introduced me to other creators and sat with me for a few hours sharing anecdotes and advice about breaking into comics.

Now before I tell you what happened next I have to show you something. This is a scan from the inside cover of 2000AD Prog 849.

Now, if you look at that bit I've highlighted, you can see that Mark suggests that Peter Milligan is merely a pseudonym he uses. I didn't know at the time that he was joking. And Peter Milligan (who is a real person and not in any way a penname for Mark Millar) just happened to have written my favourite comic of all time - Hewligan's Haircut. As I sat down to drink the beer he'd bought me, I started gushing about Hewligan's Haircut and how I couldn't believe that I'd met the writer. (No fanboys, remember.) Not once did he flinch or correct me, knowing how embarrassed I'd be.

Whenever he talked about things he was working on (he was writing the Superman story Red Son at the time) I would say 'But is it going to be as good as Hewligan's Haircut?' When he asked what sort of comics I wanted to one day create I said, 'Something that makes people feel the way I do when I read Hewligan's Haircut.'

And when the evening was over, he wished me luck. And I thanked him again for writing Hewligan's Haircut.

The moral of the story? Even if you don't like people who take every opportunity to talk themselves up... I reckon Mark Millar is definitely a nice guy.

I was reminded of this story when I saw the photo below, which was taken on that very night. It was scanned from the SCCAM newsletter scanned by artist supreme - and one of those names I knew from my comics collection - Alex Ronald. He talks about his own memories of the club on his blog.

That's me with the 'I'm a star!' thought balloon attached to my head. (Yes, I had hair - loads of it! So much I had to tie it back in a ponytail.) Just north east of me is Martin Connaghan (writer of the new Burke and Hare GN), beside me Lorna Miller, over her left shoulder Dave Gordon, in the middle of the front row is Tommy Sommerville who ran SCCAM, peeking over his left shoulder is Frank Quitely, next along is Grant Morrison and he's pointing at Mark Millar.

(You can maybe see why I told the story about how humble and generous he was with his time before I showed the photo.)

2011-06-08T12:22:00.004Z

A couple of weeks ago I attended The Eagle Awards - the UK comic industry's answer to the Oscars. There was free beer and the ceremony was presented by the guy who does Bender's voice in Futurama but that's not what I will remember about that night. For me the highlight was undoubtedly when Tharg (the alien editor of The Galaxy's Greatest Comic - 2000AD) leaned across the Twigglet-strewn V.I.P. table and said, in a booming voice of course, 'David - did I tell you that Jesus Redondo is drawing your Terror Tale?'

For those not in the know a Terror Tale is a four-page black and white horror story in 2000AD. And Jesus Redondo is one of the most legendary comics artists of the last three-and-a-bit decades of British comics. He drew the most lauded of Alan Moore's Future Shocks / Time Twisters as well as many other pivotal strips from the dawn of 2000AD - MACH 1, Nemesis the Warlock and The Mind of Wolfie Smith. (He also illustrated the incredible Mind Wars for Star Lord - well before my time!) To have him draw one of my stories - and in 2000AD no less - is a genuine honour.

2000AD prog 1737 also features a great Dredd strip by Gordon Rennie and Lee Carter, the next chapters in the Harry Absolom, Red Seas and Young Judge Anderson stories and sports a cracking cover by Sean Phillips. It's on sale now in all good newsagents, comic shops and available digitally from 2000AD's own website.

THARGFACT: Prog 1737 - 4/5 written by Scotsmen!

I answer some questions about Future Shocks, Turtles and other stuff over at Marvelous Matt Badham's Writing blog.

Come back tomorrow for another blog post (two in one week - what's going on?) about KAPOW!, SCCAM and possibly some topics that don't consist entirely of capital letters.

2011-04-08T09:42:00.004Z

Spring!
I love the sun.

Every now and then I think 'should I be doing something more honest and worthwhile with my life?' This usually happens after I meet someone who reminds me of the kind of stuff I used to do.

For example, last year I met an old lecturer from my University at a party in The House of Lords (no less). We got chatting about all sorts of stuff, not related to work, and guzzled the bubbly. Then he asked what kind of engineering I had finally decided to specialise in. And as I puzzled over how to break it to him, I wondered - is writing and drawing really any kind of job for a thirty three year-old man? Should I instead be elbow deep in grease, solder and resistors?

And then the sun comes out and I remember that I can do this job in the park.

This week I've been writing stuff for The Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles magazine, which contains short prose stories and two-page strips featuring the billion-selling heroes. Two pages isn't a lot of space to develop a story and, since it has to be translated, I have to keep the scripts free of gags and wordplay that might only work in English. It also has to be snappy and interesting enough to captivate the younger readership. The restrictions are usually what makes a gig interesting and this one has been loads of fun.

Anyway here is one of the comics, drawn by the fabulous Abby Ryder:

I'm a bit hop-a-long this week as I injured myself running the Newham 10k last week. It hasn't slowed down my work at all (which is just as well as I have deadlines up the wazoo) but I'm feeling a bit blubberous after two weeks of little activity.

Is that how you spell wazoo?

Next item: Tripwire magazine goes all-digital with its next issue, which is out now and free to download at the official site. It has loads of great stuff in it, including a five-page spotlight article on the British comic 2000AD which Karl Stock and myself collaborated on.

Speaking of 2000AD - FunFact: I once appeared on a cover alongside Judge Dredd. Or at least a character based on me did. Or at least based on what I look like. Or at least what I looked like when I spent an evening drinking with artist PJ Holden in a dodgy downstairs bar in New York a couple of years ago.

PJ sent me the art for the first episode of the story as he was drawing it and I couldn't help but notice that he added quite a beer belly to my shirtless doppelgänger before it saw print.

I took up running shortly afterwards.
PJ talks about the process of creating the cover at the Uncovered Blog.

(And yes... Judge Dredd did shoot 'me' in the head in the final episode.)

And finally - if anyone is attending this weekend's KAPOW! Comicon, please swing past table 88 (two along from the Burlesque girls and Bleeding Cool and not too far from the Tardis apparently) where myself and my partner in crime Dan Lester will be selling our wares.

I'll have the last few hardback copies of Tongue of the Dead, BASTARDS 1 and 2 and maybe some original artwork.

I haven't done this for a couple of years so be gentle with me.
And don't mention the weight gain or the limp.

2011-02-15T09:54:00.003Z

I was up at 6 this morning to run up a few hills and round a pond and now it's all I can manage just to keep my eyes open. I'd forgotten that I have to go out again later to drop books at the library and pop into the gym, or else I might have killed the alarm, rolled over and gone back to sleep.

Coffee #3 at the ready...

And cold pizza. 'Cos I'm sure that'll help.

I'm trying to split my work days this week between organising myself (just general workspace stuff - so that deadlines don't surprise me and I can find my brush pens when I need them) and giving the final shove to bits of work that have been languishing in my desk drawer. I need to do this every few months or risk ending up with an infinite number of spec projects sitting here not paying my rent.

The other day I was watching a documentary about Spike Milligan that I was really enjoying, but I knew that Rebel Without a Cause was about to start on another channel. I couldn't decide between them so instead I recorded the remainder of both and went outside to fiddle with our satellite dish and add another cable. This broke the television signal long enough to kill both recordings stone dead.

I have a Masters degree in this stuff, you know.

Some links:
The Back to the Future photo project (not what you're thinking)
The Today's Inspiration Blog (Dave Gibbons is always linking to this on Twitter and it is really good.)
An old article at the Indie about Tom McCarthy.

Come back later in the week to see some lovely Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles art (I'm allowed to say it was lovely as I didn't draw it) and hear me complain about Spam and how it's ruining my morning routine.

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Now playing: L7 – Baggage
via FoxyTunes

2011-02-10T11:36:00.004Z

some dude with an ipod - ballpoint pen, 2011

Happy 2011!

Wait... What happened to January?!?

I drew the sketch above while on the funky, shiny new bit of the London Overground which I really like for two reasons:

It's clean. (For now, anyway.)
It gets me to lots of bits of London without going through Zone 1, and so saves me money.

I was on my way to The After School Club in Camden, which was really good even though we didn't win the drawing competition. The prize - a bottle of wine - was instead wasted on a non-drinking victor.

I went to see the King's Speech a couple of nights ago. You've probably already heard that it's good, so no need for me to say so here. I don't usually like films about royalty (unless they're based on something written by Shakespeare) in much the same way that I don't think I'd like films about people with too much chocolate, who did nothing to deserve all that chocolate and don't seem to appreciate all the chocolate they have.

I liked The King's Speech though.

I've decided to blog again in 2011, after pretty much taking 2010 off. That was partly an experiment to see whether the work would dry up any if my internet presence ran silent for a while and partly just because I was getting sick of the 'sound' my own 'voice'.

You can draw your own conclusions from my decision to return to the blogstone.

Some links for you, while I'm here:

- A lovely old Alex Toth comic.
- 20 Reasons it's Kicking off Everywhere @ the BBC
- My new design website.

2010-11-12T15:59:00.005Z

Terrible weather, huh?

Being freelance is fabulous in the summer. It's more difficult to keep the enthusiasm pumping when it's grey outside and you're rationed to just five hours of proper sunlight every day. On days like these there's nothing like (unsolicited) kind words to spur you on.

Earlier this week a friend emailed to congratulate me on some comics of mine that he'd just read.

Left musing that at some point you're going to create one of the great British graphic novels; something contemporary probably, about life, death, family, friends, love and all that shit...

Which is maybe the nicest thing anyone's ever said about my work...

Two other guys who are far kinder than they need to be about my stuff are Joe and Richard at The Forbidden Planet Blog. I love the blog - it's a one stop shop for comics news and criticism, especially if your tastes lie a little outside of the mainstream.

Last month they asked for artists to contribute something to celebrate National Poetry Day and I couldn't resist.

(Warning - partial nudity coming up... Actually - not that partial now I come to think of it...)

Ae Fond Kiss is one of my favourite poems. Good old Rab.

I'm going on bit of a trip next week. Tuesday is the grand opening of the Frankophilia! exhibition at Salford University, which promises to be great fun. It even made it to the BBC News website.
(Mine is the second picture in the slideshow... My name even pops up if you hover your mouse over it...)

Then Saturday is the Thought Bubble comic convention in Leeds, which is always worth that long trip north. It seemed a bit daft to come back to London between the two, so I'll be staying up there partying, hopefully saying hello to friends and family and working on the move.

Speaking of which - the first wave of BASTARDS nudey commisions (see below if this doesn't make any sense) are all done, dusted, packed and posted now, but if you're going to be at Thought Bubble next weekend I can bring along any purchases and hand-deliver them - as long as the order comes in before Monday evening.

PAYPAL buttons:

BASTARDS 2

£10 - sgned and accompanied by a nude drawingof the celebrity of your choice.

(Just fill in the name of your desired celebrity in the details box below.)

BASTARDS 1&2 bumper pack

Same as above but with last years BASTARDS collection added in - all for just £14!

(And speaking of The FP Blog here is their review of BASTARDS 2)

2010-10-26T14:12:00.021Z

Here is Richard's great review of BASTARDS 2 over at the FP Blog.
And here comes the capitalism...

BASTARDS 2 - for sale here!

Yes indeed! It's £10 in the shops and it's £10 here. But if you buy it here you get:
a) It signed. By me. Which will be worth a fortune. If I become famous and then die.
b) The nude celeb drawing. (Yes - this is a serious offer)

Just fill in the name of your desired celebrity in the details box below.

BASTARDS 1&2 bumper pack - for sale here!

It's true. You can buy the first and second BASTARDS collections - for a full pound less than in the shops (which comes in at £14) + free p&P and the now legendary naked famous person portrait.

I'll be mailing stuff out as soon as the orders come (flooding) in or I can deliver by hand at either this weekend's MCM Expo or Leeds Thought Bubble.

2010-06-21T17:18:00.002Z

Frank Sidebottom RIP
Great Jon Ronson piece about him here.

And from robertflorence's Twitter:

"Please take this from Chris passing - that silly thing you want to do that people think won't work? It might make you immortal."

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Now playing: 4 Non Blondes – What's Up?
via FoxyTunes

2010-04-16T19:04:00.006Z

I've just finished the first week of my residency at the absolutely fantastic firstsite and apart from being exhausted I'm also delighted with how it's going.

For one thing, because it's the second week of the schools' Easter hols, kids & parents have been flooding in and helping me out.

Having been commissioned to produce a comic work about Colchester and its people, I was really keen to get everyone who walked in the doors of the studio involved. The first phase of this plan required interested participants (and there has been no shortage of them) to produce short autobiographical comics.

How I've been coaxing people into drawing comics...

I'm in awe of how creative and hard-working all of the artists involved have been. This morning a mum and her son stayed for over three hours toiling away on their pieces, and it was absolutely worth the effort as both were incredible:

This was the artist's first time painting since school!

This is what the studio looks like in a rare quiet moment. I'd have taken photos when it was manic but I was too busy talking about comics and being covered in paint. Such is the life of an artist...

And this is my window. Drawing in the glass comics panel attracts quite a crowd. And I've already been told off once for leaving a bracket unclosed (many thanks to the young lady who sorted that for me).

Other amazing things that have happened to me this week include meeting Pat Mills (lovely bloke), being privileged to hear some absolutely great talks - all part of the WHAAM season here in Colchester - and hilarious, delicious, outrageous meals with Jes and Cath of firstsite, Martin of ACE Comics and Simon Grennan of Grennan and Sperandio.

That's it for this post. I'm back at my B&B and gearing up for a Friday night in Colchester.
I'm back in the studio tomorrow, so if you're in the area please pop in and say hi!

(Oh and if you're going to the Fleece Station party tomorrow, I'll hopefully see you there!)

2010-04-10T18:54:00.002Z

Anyone walking down Short Wyre Street in Colchester might well have noticed my name in large dayglo pink letters in the window of firstsite's fantastic headquarters. This is because I'm the artist-in -residence there for the next few of weeks.

I'm not in the studio every day, but if you do want to catch me at t5he moment I'm scheduled to be in on the 12, 13, 15, 16, 17, 21, 22, 23, 24, 26, 27 and 28 April. I'm also running a masterclass on comics storytelling on the 24th - places are limited so book now!

2010-02-13T14:12:00.003Z

I got back from the Phonogram wake in town last night to find this in my inbox. Isn't it brilliant? Kind of makes me wish that I'd asked Oliver Lambden to draw the whole of Tongue of the Dead. I reckon it would have looked amazing!

Oliver is the art brains behind Tales from the Flat, Curtis Terrorist, BLOC and the Dan Lester Mysteries. He's also a gangster of the highest order and a top bloke. This is his blog and this is his web site. Next time you see him beg for the chance to buy some of his comics. He's that good!

2010-02-12T10:50:00.003Z

Sometimes I do a morning sketch to loosen up before a day at the drawing table. Today I decided to make it a tribute to Walter Frederick Morrison who died on Tuesday. I hadn't heard of him before reading this, but he sounds like a great guy, invented the frisbee and took a mean photo. No really - click on the link and see the photo, it's great!

Today I'll be mostly working on two pitches. Not for TV or comics though, weirdly.

Oh and designing a logo for a well-known indie band who are making a comeback - although that's not a done deal so if I never mention it again I didn't get the gig.

Have a good weekend!

2010-02-03T21:32:00.002Z

So this Monday was Hourly Comics Day.

I did one, but didn't quite finish it until the next day, when I realised that I hadn't really followed the rules at all. (Mostly because I hadn't read 'em.) So this is my pseudo-Hourly Comics Day comic strip.

It's green.

2010-01-29T08:27:00.002Z

Morning all.

I'll finish the posts about the Casita Variations soon, but I've been caught in a fight to the death with some deadlines this week so I'll just offer some links instead...

I generally hate motivational self help books/websites but I really like Tiny Buddha. For example I enjoyed reading this post about Living Your Life Out Loud. But, as with most lists with more than four or five items, it kind of runs out of steam before the half way mark. (Your mileage may vary.)

Something else I quite like is Twitter. I keep meaning to talk about it here (which I suppose is what I'm doing now) but rather than drone on I'll just link you to Clive Barker, whose tweets are never less than interesting. He delivered the following over three messages this morning from L.A.

The great German actress Lotte Lenya told a story about her life that I've always believed contained an undeniable truth. She worked furiously to become a success. Finally she saw her name on a huge bill-board.'Is that all ?'she said. 'I feel nothing.' My experience is the reverse of that. As a young man,success felt empty. Now, I equate it with having a presence in the lives of others.

How to Keep Your Brain Smart.

Please, please, please visit the Sleep Talking Man blog. You can thank me later.

I'm going to risk looking like a self help junky and also link to the best Zen Habit posts of 2009.

The best Simpsons quotes of all time.

And (I dunno if I posted this already, but its good) - an artist takes acid.

Oh and Melissa Auf der Mar. Yup.

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Now playing: Melissa Auf der maur – Followed The Waves
via FoxyTunes

2010-01-12T07:20:00.002Z

The Casita Inauguration and Operation Glasgow

the artists relax at Jardin du Luxembourg

and a pigeon

and a lovely statue

The Casita Grand Opening yesterday went very well indeed. It was fantastic to see our work on the walls of the hospital and to hear stories about how the panels have been used and received by the psychiatrists and patients.

I’d just like to take this opportunity to thank the great folks at Casita and Hopital Avicenne for giving us this chance to work on such an exciting project and giving us the most amazing amount of creative freedom. It was a fantastic experience, both professionally and personally, and I’m absolutely delighted with how it turned out.

I’ll hopefully get to write part 3 of my dissection of our creative process before the end of the week.

I’m just about to head out and try and catch an early Eurostar back to London, from where I’ll be catching a train to Scotland because on Wednesday I have a meeting with the BBC in Glasgow.

You may or may not know this but I’ve been trying on and off for a couple of years to break into the world of television. The commonly received wisdom (especially among what has come to be known as the blogosphere) is that talent-spotting competitions are one of the best ways of doing so.

About eighteen months ago I was shortlisted for the prestigious Red Planet Prize, run by Tony Jordan, who regularly appears on annual top ten TV ‘movers and shakers’ lists. The first round of the competition required the first ten pages of a script, whch could wither be a film or serial episode, as long as it was original. It was the first television script I’d written, but I felt quite comfortable taking what I’d learned writing comics and working in a new medium, so I happily dashed off a scene and sent it in. I was thrilled when my entry was selected to proceed to the next round but also shocked to find out that they wanted the next forty pages right away. Flustered, I asked if I could have 48 hours to polish what I had (which of course was nothing at all) and spent the next two days in a coffee-fuelled frenzy breaking the back of the story and spewing it onto the page.

I didn’t win (and that should come as no surprise) but was one of a handful of writers selected from, I think, two thousand, to be invited to a meeting with Red Planet and Tony Jordan. At the time I hadn’t really seen much recent television – schoolboy error, right? – and sat baffled as my peers discussed bodice busters and soaps, the names of which didn’t even ring any bells for me. What I remember most is that Mr Jordan explicitly said that each and every one of us was definitely good enough to write for television and should be talking to, for example, the guys at Eastenders. I floated back to London on a bubble of contentment.

I started writing a new project, hoping to pitch it to them, but unfortunately it was about the Global Credit Crunch and every time I came up with some fantastic turn of events reality would outfox me. I tried my hand at another project and was gutted to hear that I’d been beaten to the punch by just-about-appear FlashForward, which was using an idea similar enough to mine that there was no point in me continuing.

The script that got me in that door also got nominated and shortlisted for another couple of things – the most recent of which was the Bafta Rocliffe Forum Award at the Cheltenham Screenwriting Festival a few months ago.

Then along came Scotland Writes, which is an initiative designed to find new writers either born or living in Scotland. The brief this time was to write a sixty-minute opening episode for a drama that in some way reflects contemporary Scotland. Although it was very definitely on my radar, I was busy with other (bill-paying) stuff right up until a couple of weeks before the deadline and wasn’t sure if I’d have time to do it justice. Also, I’m ashamed to admit, a little bit of self-doubt was sabotaging me. Nevertheless I continued to make notes whenever inspiration struck me and slowly an idea formed.

One morning I woke up to find that I had a structure, characters and, I think, an engaging controlling idea. Cue a few days of feverish writing and the usual last minute crisis where I think it’s crap and want to throw it all out. I handed it in to the BBC Writers Room office with 6 minutes left on the deadline clock. The lady on reception, recognising me from the last couple of times I’d shown up breathless, sweating and clutching a script at 1654 on a Friday, laughed her arse off.

This is my life.

So anyway, I didn’t win this one either, but I have been invited to Glasgow to meet with the Head of Scottish Drama among other BBC Scotland luminaries. I can’t wait. I hope it’s the start of something like a career in television. And I hope I actually get there.

Bloody snow.

2010-01-11T10:10:00.002Z

The Casita Variations 2

Yesterday I decided to take a run through Paris before breakfast. Valerio, our gracious host for the weekend, suggested a leisurely jog around Jardin du Luxembourg. Unfortunately it was closed so I headed for the river and ran along the bankside. It being completely new running territory and I wasn’t sure how far I’d gone at any point or where I could reach without collapsing, but it was fun seeing places I’d visited on previous trips last year like the Musee Dorsee.

All the while the Eiffel Tower sat there, tempted me. I suppose it would be a shame, I thought, if I don’t make it there. It didn’t look too far.

But no matter how far I ran it didn’t seem to be getting any closer. And it’s like waiting for a bus that never shows up – you’ve waited an hour, what’s another ten minutes?

Eventually, after much exertion, I made it. I was so elated at reaching my destination, I decided that instead of taking the direct return route, I’d go zig-zagging back through the streets. Of course I got lost about a dozen times and had to ask direction in my terrible, breathless French. Google maps reckons I ran about six miles. My aching body agrees.

And it was so cold that when I got in the shower, I noticed that any skin that had been exposed to the elements was glowing bright red. Is that bad?

Today is the grand opening of the Casita Variations. Being here again, and looking over the work for the first time in months, brings back very fond memories of how it all came together.

After receiving our brief and meeting with the attending psychiatrists it was an interesting task to try and pin down this ethereal project and decide on specifics. How many images? What size and shape would they be? Would we have recurring characters and if so how many? It was decided that, since part of the selling point of the proposal was that it would provide a sense of visual continuity through the hospital, we would restrict the narrative to four of five characters, who would occasionally interact. The characters had to represent a variety of ages and ethnicities so we created Mr Cat Suit, Birdy, Old Man Kansas, Space Girl and Goggles.

(please ignore the slightly wonky anatomy, these weren’t intended for public consumption)

Goggles unfortunately didn’t make it due to a non-human character suddenly being preferable. I can’t remember if we gave TV Dog a name, but he’s a dog with a TV for a head.

Our location, the Casita, was originally the house of, I think, the director of the hospital, and as such had some very un-hospital-like elements to its design and architecture. We were determined to use these distinct features and fittings in the art, and to contrast them with a more fantastic and surreal landscape which could be sometimes seen through a window or behind a banister.

I used Google’s SketchUp to model the corridors, doors, railings and floor of the Casita so that I could be sure they would look consistent throughout the pieces when I used them from different angles and distances.

I have to stop now so that we can head off to the opening, but if you come back tomorrow, I’ll have some photos and a (probably slightly hungover) report of how it all went.

I’ll also shed some light on why, on Tuesday, I’m leaping straight from the Eurostar to a Glasgow-bound train headed for BBC Scotland.

2010-01-10T12:44:00.003Z

The Casita Variations

About 18 months ago Daniel Merlin Goodbrey, drinking buddy, web comics auteur and writer of Iron Man 2020, asked me if I was busy.

I was, since this was before the credit crunch destroyed the finances of freelance Britain, but asked what he had mind anyway. Hard cash and the chance to visit Paris was the answer. So I made some space in my schedule.

Mr G had been approached by virtuoso architect Valerio Ferrari about a proposed art installation in a Parisian hospital. His idea was that it would take the form of something like a web comic, but one that would be navigated by physically travelling through a space rather than clicking in a browser. The patients of the hospital were typically aged between twelve and twenty two and the psychologists commissioning the project were actively seeking something surreal, weird and thought provoking. It sounded too good to be true. But it wasn't.

So we visited Paris a few times, meeting the hospital staff, chatting for hours with Valerio and his glamorous colleague Virginie, and working through ideas. It was a demanding process, not least because we all wanted to produce something really special, and that meant refusing to settle for those ideas that come easily.

In the past I've had nightmarish experiences working on comittee-based projects, especially those were the boss comes in after weeks of work and throws the whole thing out just because he had soggy cornflakes that morning, but luckily that's not what this was at all. With Valerio and Virginie's expertise in physical installation (they'd just completed an Operatic stage design in Eastern Europe among other projects), Dan's understanding of interactive media and 'generative' storytelling and my own... erm... skills... We all brought something different to the table and inspired each other to leave our comfort zones and create something we couldn't have done on our own.

The project has been hanging on the walls of Hôpital Avicenne for a few months already but the grand opening is tomorrow, and Dan and I are both really excited to finally see it.

I’ll do another post later in the week with character designs, our process and show you some photos.

But enough about me. How are you?

2010-01-09T12:19:00.000Z

2010...

The year we make contact?

Well I haven't done this for while.

I kind of took a break from the whole online thing last year (Twitter, Facebook, blogging) mainly because I was feeling sorry for myself and I didn't want to turn into one of those people who use the internet as their personal whinging machine. Once in a while is fine, I suppose, but any more than two 'Oh God - poor me!' status updates and you can bet that 'friends' will start either blocking you or ignoring you. Which is exactly as it should be!

(I should probably point out that I haven't actually cheered up any, but I realise that if you don't appear online at least once a week these days people think you've died. And as much as it'd be nice to have some flowers in the house, I'd rather not find out just yet if I'd merit an obit on a comics website.)

(Although it was awesome to have my birthday noted on The Comics Report blog last year, an ambition of mine for the last few years!)

So 2010, eh? Can't believe we all made it. Apart from impending bankruptcy, my face wrinkling so quickly you'd think I'd been lying in a bath for a month and me still not experiencing anything that feels vaguely like success, I can't complain. It's always going to be a mixed bag, eh?

On the plus side I've lost a bit of weight and can now see my genitals without the aid of a mirror.

I'm currently on my way to Paris to see the grand opening of The Casita Variations, an art project that I worked on last year. And, despite the apocalyptic weather, the train has now left the station.

That's not a metaphor. I mean the train has actually left the station.

So my only new year's resolution is to be less fucking miserable. I turned 32 last year, not 102! If you see me in the back of a pub, raging about something completely inconsequential, please remind me of this.

I just wish the French guy in the seat next to me would stop farting. I'd move but the train is absolutely packed and the only other available seat has a flush. I'll be mainly holding my breath and admiring the blizzard outside for the next couple of hours then...

Oh - and here is my 'Roundup of the Year' type thing at the (absolutely awesome, even though they let me in) Forbidden Planet Blog.

(If you click through the blog you'll find far more enlightened opinions on what was the best stuff of 2009 from people you might actually have heard of!)

2009-10-27T13:38:00.002Z

Hi there

The blog might be quiet for a few weeks as I struggle through a ton of work and start thinking about what I should be doing with myself next year, but in the meantime - some things:

If you're fast you'll still be able to catch this month's Judge Dredd in shops. It looks like this...

and contains an interview I conducted with legendary ABC Warriors artist Kev Walker. (My fifteen year old self would have exploded at the prospect!) It also contains articles by my good friends Matt Badham and Joel Meadows, and some ace comics. (I especially liked Gordon Rennie's new Bat Loco strip).

Also keep your eyes open for B.A.S.T.A.R.D.S. - a chunky new anthology of comics from some of the people who used to make up LUC. Fingers crossed it'll be on sale at next year's Angouleme festival in France, but it will also be available from contributing cartoonists at the Comiket event taking place on the 8th of Nov at the ICA.

It's a fiver and sports a brilliant cover by the immensely talented Francesca Cassavetti.
(And yeah - that's me with no top on leading the charge.)

OK - I'm off to return to my early mid-life crisis (or late quarter-life crisis), but before I go I'll leave you with this:
How to open a banana like a monkey

It'll change your life.

2009-08-30T20:08:00.000Z

Beautiful sunset right now.
Kind of makes me wonder why I ever get stressed about anything...

2009-08-29T22:21:00.000Z

PART TWO

This was the proposed route. It was foiled only by curry and beer.

The creepiest ice cream van in the world?

National War Museum (old Bedlam)

Luckily there was a pub at this corner of the pentacle

Tower of London

People on the bridge

Losing the light as we hit the DLR

The Canary Wolf

Limehouse

The Mission

Penultimate Hawksmoor

Soup Kitchen

Christ Church, Spitalfields

And with that we were done.

2009-08-26T21:33:00.002Z

PART ONE

Earlier in the week, armed only with a copy of From Hell and some maps, Ade 'Surprise Truck' Brown guided John, Rohne and myself around the path of the fifty mile pentacle that Gull and Netley travel in chapter four.

These are some photos of that trip.

Beginning at 74 Brook Street - Gull's House

Handel and Hendrix: next door neighbours

Demolished

(but they left the chapel standing)

The first victim lived above this shop (we think)

Water at the British Museum

West End Hawksmoor - back

West End Hawksmoor - front

Surprise Truck in action

Doesn't serve food on Mondays

Memorial at Embankment

Cleopatra's Needle

Riddle me this...

A photo of John taking a photo of this sign

Wm Blake's own blue plaque

More photos later in the week.

2009-08-16T19:32:00.000Z

Aaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaargh!

2009-08-14T19:28:00.001Z

Say La Vee

2009-08-12T18:45:00.003Z

Pimping

Four books I'd like to pimp to you, now that I have your attention...

First up is Western - an anthology put together by the insanely dedicated guys at Accent UK.

It's remiss of me not to have mentioned this more here, especially since they're facing an uphill battle with international distribution through Diamond due to the effects of the Credit Crunchie.

Western features names that will be familiar to the UK-Indie-comics-savvy among you, names like John Reppion and Leah Moore, Dave Hitchcock, Indio, Dave West, Andy Bloor, Keiron Gillen, Kate Brown, Douglas Noble, David Hailwood, Colin Mathieson, Kevin Mullins and David Baillie (me!). It also features an awesome strip by comics legend Steve Bissette.

If you need any more convincing then here's a great review of it by Hypergeek genius Ed Kaye.

All this for only £7.99 / $12.99? Pre-ordering through your local comics shop using Diamond order code JUN090671 will help a great deal in ensuring the book gets the distribution it deserves!

The second book I'd like to mention is the result of much hard work from my mate Joel Meadows - the Tripwire Annual 2009.

I was lucky enough to pick up a copy this week and it's a really great read. Brilliant interviews with Scott Allie (about Dark Horse's Robert E. Howard comics), Guillermo Del Toro (among other things talking about his new novel The Strain), Bill Morrison on Bongo and the Simpsons' 20th anniversary and Phil Hale about his painting. Special features on 70 years of Marvel and Batman and 30 of Alien round out the 156 action-pages.

£9.95 or $15.95 - Diamond order code APR097907.

Book #3 is the newly relaunched Redeye. Issue 2.1 hit the internet last week and if you haven't laid down your digital cash for it yet you really should!

Editor Baz Renshaw has been responsible for the recent injection of funk into Comics International and he's worked just as hard on this collection of news, features and interviews with the hottest names in indie comics - including an in-depth discussion with Garen Ewing about his awesome new Rainbow Orchid collection.

Which is book number 4!

Garen's more than paid his dues in the trenches and greatly deserves his big break. As you read this The Rainbow Orchid Vol One will be flying off shelves all over the UK. Make sure you don't miss out!

The Rainbow Orchid can be bought from all good book and comics shops or online from the official website (signed!) here.

2009-08-08T17:44:00.000Z

Seven interesting things

Last week I saw Seth MacFarlane sing songs from MGM Musicals at the Royal Albert Hall.
(Also singing were Kim Criswell, Sarah Fox, Sir Thomas and Curtis Stigers)

Cost a fiver - isn't London brilliant?
Interview and photo here for the interested (Hi James!)

And shortly before that I attended the grand opening of the Mile End Ancestors exhibition, which I'm very proud to be a part of. If you haven't popped in yet, you still have time - the Arts Pavilion is open 12-6 daily until Sunday the 15th August.

It features some brilliant work. I was particularly interested in the pieces relating to the Matchgirls strike of 1888.

The gallery is a surprisingly large, beautifully-lit space and it's well worth the visit. [Google map link]

The Ancestors Exhibition is being curated by the immensely talented Matthew Krishanu. Said talent must be genetic as I found out that his brother Richard is an actor and has appeared in, among other things, a Britflick called Heroes and Villians, which also featured James Corden.

And that's not even the most interesting thing about them! They also appeared in Judge Dredd Megazine as characters in the story Black Siddha, when they posed as models for the much-lauded comics painter Simon Davis.

I was to be part of the opening creative lineup of an ill-fated anthology comic a couple of years ago, along with Simon Davis.

Other names attached to said enterprise were Mike Carey and Paul Cornell.

Caption 2009 happens this weekend in Oxford (website here).
I'll be there, as will most of the UK indie scene who aren't at weddings or at home with swine flu.

My other half, Jen, worked on a musical about the Matchgirls Strike last year in Hitchin. It was written by Bill Owen, who played Compo in Last of the Summer Wine.

I have a bit of a cold.

2009-07-26T13:30:00.001Z

Drawn while supposed to be doing something else

I've actually been on holiday all week and these posts have been robotically scheduled. So if I haven't responded to any emails you've sent, that'll be why...

Also - a quick reminder that the Mile End Ancestors exhibition opens today.

2009-07-24T17:28:00.001Z

Life could be so simple.

Couldn't it?

2009-07-22T17:23:00.000Z

I seem to be exhibiting work roughly once a year. Last year it was the Jam Factory in Oxford and almost 12 months later I'm in Mile End.

The Mile End Ancestors Exhibit runs from the 27th July until 15th August.

The Arts Pavilion is exactly where it says on the map. Admission is free and it's open from 12-6pm Monday to Saturday. Why not take a look and then lounge around in Victoria Park afterwards?

2009-07-19T17:21:00.001Z

Books and comics I am reading/gave read in the last couple of weeks:

Asterios Polyp – David Mazzucchelli
The Unwritten # 3 – Mike Carey and Peter Gross
The Writer in Disguise – Alan Bennett
Comedians – Trevor Griffiths
Passing Places – Stephen Greenhorn (which, coincidentally, was the first play I ever saw)
Ticket to Ride – Dennis Potter
7th Annual Edition of The Year’s Best S-F (1963) – Ed. Judith Merril

2009-07-16T17:17:00.001Z

ars longa, vita brevis

I once saw Ken Cambell in a train station café chatting with a throat singer I had met in a Colourscape installation. I wanted to go over and say hello, but they looked deep in conversation so I didn’t. I regret that now as I find out that Ken died last August.

whatsonstage have a great write-up of his memorial service:

There has never been a funeral like it. Warren Mitchell told a Jewish joke. Someone recited a speech of Macbeth in pidgin English. And a clearly distraught former colleague rushed the coffin, trying to tear off the lid. The dead man’s daughter said that her father used to make her learn poems whenever she asked for a pair of new shoes.

Ken Campbell was buried yesterday in the heart of Epping Forest, removed to his silent resting place among tall trees by a sled drawn by his own three dogs and followed by several hundred mourners and a clarinettist in a kilt.

2009-07-14T16:59:00.001Z

Places I have been recently:

Up a mountain in Sardinia

In a theatre watching Ian McKellen and Patrick Stewart play in Waiting for Godot

House of Lords

Trafalgar Square at Night

In a toilet with a spider

PS. All photos taken by my shaky hand.

2009-07-09T16:32:00.001Z

Top three rumours I have to dispel on a regular basis

1. I am not writing any of the new Marvel anime films
2. Schmurgen Jonerhaffs is not Sean Azzopardi
3. I am still here

My seven favourite Arnold Schwarzenegger films

1. Conan the Barbarian (with the audio commentary ON)
2. Total Recall
3. The Running Man
4. True Lies
5. Predator
6. Cars (uncredited vocal performance)
7. Scavenger Hunt

My diary currently looks like this:

2009-07-02T13:03:00.001Z

I woke up this morning to find a truck outside bearing the slogan 'delivering supply chain solutions'.
That means 'truck', right?

My second thought of the day came much later, as I sat on the tube trying to read Dennis Potter's Ticket to Ride (trust me, not before breakfast!) :

People who chew with their mouths open should be beheaded.
Or at least imprisoned.
Forever.

I'm not even in a particularly bad mood.

Some links for you:

Proof that we're living in a William Gibson novel

Gigapan an ant today (well worth waiting for it to load if it's slow)

The wages of Sinfest - interview with one of the best comic creators the www has ever seen

I didn't know the Irn Bru recipe was Top Secret?

The totaldickheadblog (which, if you haven't guessed is about Philip K Dick) is always interesting, but a few weeks ago they posted this awesome open-shirted interview from the archives. (Worth it just to see the photos!)

----------------
Now playing: Album Leaf - Twenty Two Fourteen [SomaFM]
via FoxyTunes

2009-06-25T00:13:00.000Z

Have I mentioned...

Also - 176 this Saturday!!!

2009-06-20T23:47:00.000Z

If you hop on over to www.thesequential.com you'll find my fantasy graphic novel Tongue of the Dead unfolding a page at a time.

I'll be updating every Mon and Thurs, except this week when I'll be putting up a new page daily in anticipation of the London Underground Comics event 176 this Saturday.

The Sequential is a group blog showcasing the work of LUC comics creators, and if you subscribe via RSS you can expect to see the finest comics from Sean 'Necessary Monsters' Azzopardi, Douglas 'Avengers' Noble, Oli 'Doctor Who' Smith and Jake 'mates with Warren Ellis' Harold.

On the front page right now, as well as the first few pages of Tongue of the Dead, you'll find episode 9 of Sightings of Wallace Sendak by Azzopardi and Noble, DHSS Assessment Blues by the incredible Francesca Cassavetti and A Guide to Breaking Your Toe by me.

If you get a chance to mention this on a blog, to a friend or even mumble it in your sleep I will be forever in your debt.

2009-06-13T22:31:00.000Z

I'll be posting more stuff over at The Sequential shortly... Here's my first 'thing':

2009-06-11T09:04:00.000Z

You know, before I got a WACOM tablet I used to draw using a mouse / touchpad thing all the time. I think I may have lost the knack. Although the more I look at this the more I like it...

(Inspired by Sean Appozardi'a Thumb Painting series over at PhatCatz)
(I used by index finger)

2009-06-08T09:58:00.003Z

I can't decide what makes me more miserable - my complete inability to figure out a script I was slaving over all weekend or the fact that I can't seem to walk through doorways without doing myself some sort of damage. (Exhibit A - broken foot resting on table in Market Theatre Bar, Hitchin)

One of my toes was pointing in completely the wrong direction by the time I was finished. It looked like something out of a bad 50s B movie with no special effects budget. It wasn't too sore until I looked at it, and from that point on I was in agony. The Doctor called me at two in the morning to say that she'd forgotten to give me crutches, by which point I was too far away from A and E, and too tired to go back. Unable to return to base, today's scheduled work has been postponed.

But thanks to the magic of Google Docs, I can fail to finish off this script anywhere!

2009-06-02T22:55:00.004Z

A couple of weeks ago I was lucky enough to be invited to the opening of the Manwha 100 exhibition just off Trafalgar Square - I wrote a glowing report of the evening for downthetubes, which you can read here.

And some photos:

In other news artist PJ Holden has finally owned up to nicking my visage and giving it to a character called Leon Lutz in his and Gordon Rennie's new Judge Dredd tale, which is a) brilliant and b) in shops right now. Not sure how many episodes 'I' survive, but I have my fingers crossed that 'I' get to appear on a cover...

Is Dredd really that tall? Plus, I reckon PJ''s also added a few pounds as well...

I was going to link to the new Guitar Hero / Beatles advert, but the video's been removed from youtube... If anyone has a better link let me know. If you get a chance to check it out definitely do (I'm guessing it'll be on TV and maybe in cinemas) - it is fantastic!

Instead here's a video link (and some commentary from Comic Reporter's T. Spurgeon) which you should only click on if you know who Grant Morrison is.

----------------
Now playing: Morcheeba - Trigger Hippie (Groove Salad: a nicely chilled plate of ambient beats and grooves. [SomaFM])
via FoxyTunes

2009-05-26T14:12:00.000Z

2009-05-22T21:22:00.002Z

There'll be nothing left of Stratford by the time they're done!

All set for the bank holiday?
Yeah - I bet you are!

I'm going to be offline for the weekend, but just before I go, a couple of recommendations for you:

Manwha 100 near Trafalger Square - I was at the launch party on Wednesday night and it's awesome! (Review coming soon)

Man Saves Ducks! - a heartwarming, if mystifying, video at the BBC

Absolutely amazing photos taken from Hubble, which I believe was running on two flat AA batteries and a servo motor from a Japanese Transformer toy knockoff until until Astro Mike got there! (Also from the BBC)

----------------
Now playing: Miles Davis - If I Were a Bell
via FoxyTunes

2009-05-15T16:51:00.000Z

This year's Bristol Expo was a resounding success despite impending financialgeddon and the inevitable downsizing that brought. In fact I enjoyed it so much I wrote a seven-point evaluation for downthetubes here. There was only room to run a couple of photos so I thought I'd post some others here. These mostly taken at Mallory's absolutely fantastic adjacently-run SPExpo, which I've heard will be returning next year.

Tim Keable draws West LIVE! for fans

Phil 'Ninja Bunny' Spence and Claire 'Bogus Baby' Power

Those crazy cats at Itch Manga - Dan Hartwell, Karen Reubens and Willie Hewes

The inimitable Los Bros Goodman

The Godfathers of UK Indy comics - Paul Rainey and Peet! Clack

Dave West of Accent UK, the only publishers in Britain with a proper business plan!

Team Murky Depths caught on a break!

Accent UK's second outpost back at the Ramada - see, I told you they had a plan!

Selina holds fort at the Factor Fiction table while Jay parties at the SP Expo

Andy Winter, standing strong against charges of misogyny
(He is later heard threatening to take a critic round the back
and misogynise them if they don't write him a good review.
That's all you need to know about the small press right there!)

2009-05-08T22:46:00.002Z

I just got back from nine fantastic days up a mountain on the East coast of Sardinia. I have to get ready for tomorrow (see bottom of this post) so no time for proper blogging, but stay tuned for updates on the Parisian Casita project I've been working on with Dan Goodbrey, late night radio, 80s transfers, John Byrne (not that one), harp guitar and photos of a mountain.

When I was away I automated some messages to my Twitter feed using (the occasionally shaky) futuretweet. This seemed to confuse everyone - clients thought I was online and friends thought I'd swallowed a little book of Zen. (Hi James). Oh well...
The quotes were all from here.

Some stuff and links and things:
Awesome bike
Awesome scrolly comic (via everyone in comics)
Awesome article (via cracksh0t)
Awesome new comic by Jason
Awesome review of Stewart Lee's Comedy Vehicle (by Stewart Lee)

I'll be at the Bristol Comics Expo this weekend if anyone's looking for me. I'll be co-writing a report on the comics mega event for downthetubes. If you want mentioned do something outrageous in my general vicinity. Just do it quietly - I'm feeling serene.

2009-04-12T09:27:00.000Z

2009-04-07T02:31:00.000Z

2009-03-14T12:23:00.000Z

Animal roundup time. Awesome Animal Kingdom news stories from the BBC, this week:

Zoo chimp 'planned' stone attacks
Indian police enrol rat recruits
New leg for mine blast elephant

Snoop Dogg is on Twitter. Yes...

"still on set...this might be a fast day...lets all prizzle"

And a weird Lewis Trondheim flash game. Really weird. But... Yeah.

2009-03-11T12:13:00.002Z

I'm locked in mortal combat with two big projects at the moment and have abandoned all secondary functions until I'm done. This means reduced service on the going out, eating, breathing and answering email lines. All other lines are operating normally.

(If you don't live in London that won't make much sense to you, so here's a picture instead.)

Garrison Keillor tells me that today is both the 191st anniversary of Mary Shelley's Frankenstein and Douglas Adam's 57th birthday.

----------------------------------------

(Currently listening to Brad Mehldau on last week's Jazz Library via iPlayer)

2009-02-26T14:32:00.004Z

In the last five weeks I've been in London, Paris and New York.
In the last fortnight I've seen both Steven Berkoff and Derek Jacobi on stage.
In the last few days interviews with me have sprung up on the internet and in print.
In the last few hours I've drunk two cups of coffee and eaten a bowl of cereal.
I hope to go for a swim tonight.

I've talked about Paris already, but New York was also very cool. I was, of course, there scouting for work at the NY Comic Con. It was a pleasure to meet so many fine people, pimp my wares, and then relax afterwards with other UK comicy people also chasing the big dollar. I ate the 'finest tiramisu in Little Italy' and came home with blisters on my feet the size of CDs.

Twelfth Night and On The Waterfront were both fantastic. I think they're both close to sold out, but if you can find cheap tickets make sure you grab them.

RE: The interviews...
The episode of Alex Fitch's Panel Borders in which I blether for half an hour can be downloaded or streamed here.
And apparently a 'mini interview' with me appears in the latest (and last) issue of Comics Foundry. It's by Mad Matt Badham, and sometimes I wonder if anyone would have ever heard of me if it wasn't for him. Comics Foundry is an absolutely awesome magazine and it's a real shame that it's not-much-longer for this Earth.

The only two magazine that have really impressed me recently have been Comics Foundry and Wired (US, I haven't seen the UK relaunch yet) both of which I read cover to cover and thought afterwards that I got my money's worth.

And in other news...

Friend and fellow Scot Douglas Noble is starting a new story next week. He's one of the most interesting comics creators on the block, he writes a mean Jarvis and this is free. What more do you want? www.strip-for-me.com

Now lunch.

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Now playing: Sigur Ros - Svefn-g-Englar
via FoxyTunes

2009-02-19T13:58:00.002Z

I completely forgot to mention that I was interviewed by the eponymous Alex Fitch on Monday evening for his Panel Borders show. Given that Alex is the premier comics audio journalist of our age, it's actually on the radio this afternoon! 5pm to be precise. If you're in or near London then Resonance FM can be heard by tuning into 104.4 FM, anyone less fortunate will have to listen via the magic of the Internet at www.resonancefm.com

And if you're reading this after the deadline there will be a podcast. Hopefully I don't make too much of an ass of myself. The interview took place during the consumption of a single bottle of organic cherry beer, so I should at least be sober.

And also tune in this evening when Alex will be talking to someone far less famous than I - Bruce Campbell. Apparently he was in the Evil Dead trilogy... And the Spider-Man Trilogy... And Xena. And he has a fan club. Or something.

Alex talks to someone else less famous than I - Dave Gibbons, whose graphic novel the Watchmen film is based on.
(Do I really need to tell anyone reading this that?)

2009-02-18T19:57:00.002Z

Neck deep in work and stuff at the moment, but here are some distractions:

A photo story previously found at Elephant Words...

Other recent stories (by me) can be found at these links:
* Scary Girl in the Shop
* flight
* tweet in the tale
* Two Blocks Of Ice
* Thumpstone
* Matt Wakes Up

The other writers at that site are even more talented than me so you really should click over there and start reading.

If you're in the UK you can listen to an incredible Harold Pinter double bill of Moonlight and Voices at the BBC. (For the next 4 days anyway).

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Now playing: Bob Dylan - Thunder On The Mountain
via FoxyTunes

2009-02-10T02:04:00.000Z

Yup... Still in New York.
Back soon though.

No, not now. Later.
It seems that Vikings are the new zombies... This is my first stab at a new Viking character. I think I'll call him Bob.
Bob Thumpcarcass.

2009-02-09T02:03:00.000Z

Still in New York.

2009-02-07T02:02:00.000Z

In New York.
I posted this from the past - for you to read in the future.
How is the future?

2009-02-05T01:53:00.002Z

Packing while listening to Gershwin. Off to New York in a matter of hours.
Goodbye. (Unless you're going to New York too?)

2009-01-24T13:58:00.000Z

Nick Abadzis is awesome. I've thought this for years. He recently serialised a story called The Trial of the Sober Dog in The Times, and it was awesome. It's now up on his website!

Ross McDonald is awesome. (He is dead now, but his awesomeness transcends mortality, and so that last sentence will remain in the present tense.) Here are some great quotes from a few of his novels.

Scott Adams is awesome. I've raved about him and his cleverness here before. This is a recent interview with him, which is awesome, and which I really enjoyed reading. In said interview he mentions 'affirmations'. He demonstrated his awesomeness and cleverness when discussing the idea further in a blog post a while ago. I think that blog post has now been removed (and publishing in a book) but it was quoted over at MindHacks.org.

Edward Gorey is awesome. A lost gem of his called The Recently Deflowered Girl was posted about the Internet recently - I think it'll remain up here for a good while.

Awesome.

2009-01-17T11:51:00.002Z

'Hello. Sorry to disturb you. We are talking to people this morning about the Bible and the End of Times.'
'Thanks but I'm working right now.'
'The world is ending, sir.'
'I'd better get on, then.'

The Google Alerts service has suddenly become a lot less useful for me. In case (somehow) you didn't hear, Google made headlines last year when it employed roughly three thousand Argentinian pensioners to continually 'Google' search strings submitted by users. When new results appear, a leathery OAP emails the result to the interested party. They really are the smartest, fastest old folks on the planet, and I don't see what all the fuss is about.

Anyway - I registered the phrase "david baillie" comics with Google Alerts, so that when my name appears on a website or blog along with the word 'comics' I receive an email alert with a link and can go and check to see if I'm being praised or, more likely, slandered (or is that libelled?). Unfortunately the wrinkly ones are sending me links to any and all new posts containing the word 'comics', if the blog links to me in its sidebar.

Does anyone have the email address of one of the oldsters so that I can request that they change their settings?

Here's more of me messing about with vectors - it's a redo of an original image I drew for Accent UK's Westerns anthology (which you'll see if you scroll down and check out the October 11 2008 post).

Whatever happened to Miki Berenyi?

In other news...
Harper days are here again!

2009-01-14T14:51:00.000Z

I should have really posted an English wiki link last time I was here - Le déjeuner sur l'herbe. Is it better known to non-French speakers as The Luncheon On the Grass? I don't know - I'm a Philistine and not versed in the classics at all.

But I know what I like.
As they said.

"Painters, and especially Édouard Manet, who is an analytic painter, do not share the masses' obsession with the subject: to them, the subject is only a pretext to paint, whereas for the masses only the subject exists. ”
— Emile Zola, 1867

More about Matta here.

2009-01-13T14:39:00.002Z

Holed up in Paris working on a very cool project. We're staying in the left bank studio/atelier of renowned Chilean surrealist Roberto Matta, which means that Dali was also probably here at some point.

I've been working on a variety of different vector styles for the project, which has got me really fired up. I usually just use Adobe Illustrator to letter comics pages and design 'stuff', but I suppose, given the name, I should have guessed it would be a very useful drawing tool also.

This morning we wandered around the Musee D'orsay, taking in their Masques exposition and a weird gallery full of Picasso's obsessive responses to Manet's Le Déjeuner Sur l'herbe. (Not sure how to capitalise it in French, in fact I doubt I've even spelled it right).

Anyway - back to work.

2009-01-11T19:38:00.000Z

You know how I said the other day that I was going to try running twice a week? I might not start this week.

The route I'd run along, if I were to run, is alongside the canal, which cuts through Victoria Park and brushes past the funky new outdoor gym that Adidas has built for the youth of Tower Hamlets. Great for running along - picturesque, peaceful, the whole deal. There's even wildlife - ducks, some (very hardy) fish and I swear I once met a family of turtles down there. (No one believes me, of course).

Anyway I just walked across a footbridge crossing said canal and spied a solitary Canada goose. It looked a bit baffled, and now that I took the time to stop and look, something did look out of the ordinary. After a short while I realised that it was wondering why
a) it was having trouble getting below the surface of the water
b) what the big cuboid-ish thing in its way was.

And so was I.

The answers of course are...
a) the canal's bloody frozen
b) someone had scooted a wheely bin onto the icecube canal, and it has stopped halfway across and just sat there. Bet it wasn't their own.

PS. New style - bet you can't even tell the difference, can you? Why do I bother?

By the time you read this, I'll probably be in Paris, working away on The Paris Job, so I'll leave you with some stuff to be getting on with.

A selection of columns by Frankie Boyle for the Daily Record
A selection of George Bush's greatest hits up at the BBC
A brilliant wall painting animation

2009-01-07T11:53:00.001Z

Willy Nelson's version of Careless Whisper is just awesome. If you're not listening to it right now you really should be. I can't get enough of it.

Something odd has happened to the road I live on - since the dawn of '09 it seems to have become the location of a permanent traffic jam. This is odd because there is absolutely no reason for anyone to drive down it, never mind lots of people. I suspect that some dashboard-navigation system or other has started recommending it as a shortcut to somewhere exciting. Certainly the people in expensive cars currently stuck outside the laundrette seem surprised to be there.

Although what really made me laugh as I walked past the scene this morning was the drug dealer whose most recent transaction had gone badly. I got the impression that normally he'd speed off, leaving his bummed-out customer in his rear view mirror, but instead he's stuck in a procession of confused drivers all tapping their Tom Toms, as a man rants at him through a shut passenger window. He'd turned up his stereo, but I bet it wasn't helping.

Recent Elephant Word stories for your reading pleasure::
Defenders of ???
Summing Up A Man
Rejection
All Time Is Now
Last Will and Testament

Now where did I put my orange juice?

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Now playing: Willy Mason - Careless Whisper
via FoxyTunes

2009-01-05T20:18:00.004Z

Bloody hell - I just realised I didn't post anything on the blog for the whole of December. Not even a Happy Jingle Xmas message! No wonder people have been wondering if I'm okay.

Of course I haven't been. I'm currently recovering from the worst cold I've ever had. Well I say cold - the symptoms where oil-black vomit, delirium, biblical headaches, photophobia... Oh and I was coughing and sneezing. I wouldn't be all that surprised if someone told me it was the first stages of a new Black Plague.

After the first sleepless night of obsidian puke, I decided to consult Google, which fearlessly informed me that I had yellow fever. Of course that's a disease usually contracted from mosquitoes in tropical climes, and I'd just returned from Scotland in December, where it was too cold for aeroplanes to safely fly never mind plague-carrying insects. While surfing America's finest hypochondriac-baiting websites I discovered that the rest of my symptoms matched those of someone with early-stage meningitis. Fabulous! Cue me standing in a bath tub three hours later, the warm shower that had been promised as a cure-all elixir having no bloody effect whatsoever, as I inspect my aching, unresponsive body in a shaving mirror for suspect rashes.

All of this was contracted from my four and half year old nephew, who when he had it, barely complained between heaves and coughs. Am I getting old? Answers on a postcard...

I don't think it's any co-incidence that my second-worst-cold-ever was caught from my friend's eighteen month year old son last year. I thought it was funny that he was determined to stick his fingers in my mouth all the way through the picnic. I wasn't laughing twenty four hours later when his baby snot had transformed me into thirteen stone of whimpering man meat.

Today I can just about make it across the room to the laptop and see that I've missed any opportunity to send Xmas / New Year messages to anyone (oh well). I can also see that half the world has sent me an email. And I don't mean a collective one saying 'hello'. As usual, as if I need to repeat this here again, I'll get around to responding to almost everything in my inbox at some point in the next couple of weeks. Or years. Or something. Didn't any of you take time of for Christmas and all that?

I don't know if anyone reading this (is anyone reading this?) read the diary column thingies I used to write for Judge Dredd Megazine, but I seem to remember writing one about how only idiots make new years resolutions. Well here's one in the eye for my younger self.

My New Year's Resolutions for 2009:

Finish the Belly Button strips this year. 7 to go, you'd think this'd be easy. Stay tuned!
Run (at least) twice a week. I'm always bloody running in the aforementioned autobiographical comic strip, but that doesn't correlate with my real-life recent fitness regime.
Be nice. You may be surprised how difficult this can be some days...
Be a bit more like the people whose lives I admire. Nuff said.
Not die.

(this Paul Newman picture and the London skyscape above were both sample illustrations for a project I'm working on in Paris with Dan Goodbrey. I'll get round to mentioning it here soon, probably. Oh wait - I just did.)

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Now playing: Willy Mason - Careless Whisper
via FoxyTunes

2008-11-28T00:31:00.003Z

New Belly Button! Posting Episode 41 at the end of November doesn't bode well for my goal of finishing the entire set of 52 before the end of the year, but you never know...

Elephant Word stories which I haven't linked to from here:
Vibrator on a Stick
Help (as written on the 2312 to Upper Strangwich last Friday night on the way home from Claire’s party)
and my seven part 'epic', The Jigsaw Floor: Parts 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6 and 7
This week's 'story' will be appearing at elephantwords.co.uk at 0101am this Saturday!

Hope you enjoy!

If you haven't had enough awesome for one day (or night, depending on when you're reading this) - check out these classic Mad fold-ins.

And to finish off, here's a couple of great photos from my mate Joel Meadow's blog.

Have a weekend!

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Now playing: Nerina Pallot - Confide in Me
via FoxyTunes

2008-11-19T22:02:00.004Z

OK first up - new Belly Button!

Everything's been a bit late this week, because of the juggernaut of a weekend I had.

On Friday night Matt and Leon were kind enough to entertain me oop north. First stop was a performance of the fantastic Peacock Boy by Crystal Stewart and the Boojum Theatre Company @ Contact. If this show comes on tour to a town near you, you really, really have to get out and see it - I was astounded by how good it was. After that there was the usual wandering round town, sampling of strange northern beverages, late night comics DJing and a veggie Chinese meal at 4am.

Of course, Saturday was the Thought Bubble festival in Leeds, which has been hailed, by some, as the greatest comics convention held on British soil. I think having the after party in a Casino was an inspired decision. Not only was there beer available for less than three pounds, but it also meant there was a dancefloor exclusively for comicy folk and the PA system could be plugged into an iPod. (Thanks Al).

I can't comment on the wrestling or all-night horror movie watching, although I'm guessing the people involved might not be able to either.

OK - next up in my rollercoaster comics diary is Comiket at the ICA. This Saturday everyone who survived last Saturday, and lives within decent travelling distance of the Queen's house, will be displaying their wares in the Nash and Brandon rooms from 1pm.

Be there or stay in bed.
It's up to you, really.

OK - you've read last week's 2000AD, you've read this week's Belly Button, what next for the bored, but discerning, reader?

Elephant Words, of course! My latest story up there at the moment is called How To Make a Golem and can be read here.

Some more stuff for you:

STUFF TO READ
Man tries to pay bills using drawings. (This has occurred to me before)
Dr Who documents released by the BBC
More about Boxing Chess... And it's taking place near me!
Scott Adams talks to the New Yorker

STUFF TO WATCH
Esbjörn Svensson Trio - Serenade for the Renegade (Live) - 9m 16s of beautiful music
Parallel Worlds, Parallel Lives - the missing link between quantum mechanics and rock band The Eels. (link will only work for the next week or so)

STUFF TO PLAY
Stickman Madness

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Now playing: Metallica - The Day That Never Comes
via FoxyTunes

2008-11-07T01:27:00.003Z

Every week, without fail, for the past sixteen and a half years I have bought 2000AD. This week I did not. Let me explain why...

I'd been peripherally aware of 2000AD for most of my youth, but didn't really take notice of it until I was about twelve or thirteen. The comic itself came into existence seven months before I did, February of 1977, so I missed out on grabbing issue (Prog) number 1 and I hate coming late to the party.

I remember having the mumps when I was about seven. Before the pain and discomfort kicked in, I was actually quite pleased with my latest viral acquisition. Three weeks off school - it was like a dream come true. I even got to read comics in bed all day. My mum bought me the first couple of issues of The Best of 2000AD, a bumper reprint magazine. I devoured it. And then ate some soup.

In those comics I met Abelard Snazz the man with the two storey brain, Strontium Dog and Judge Dredd himself.

Years later I'd pick up an issue of 2000AD in the newsagent near my Gran's house (run by a man called Jim, who I was always a little bit scared of) because Strontium Dog Johnny Alpha was on the cover. Unfortunately he died in that episode. Horribly.

He was gutted by a giant dragon monster.

It was Esther, the lady who ran (and still runs) the local corner shop who gave me my first 'run' of 2000ADs. Someone had ordered the comic from her but failed to pick it up, meaning that she had a dozen or so (sequential!) copies lying around the shop. Memories of Johnny Alpha screaming in agony flooded back as she handed me the generous bundle of gifts. I was grateful, but a little bit wary. Did they murder major characters every week? Luckily they didn't (although now I think of it, that's not a bad idea).

It was the Barras Market in Glasgow that made me a fanatic. I have always loved markets, old fusty markets with books and comics and bits of stuff that no one wants. That's where most boys of a certain age are likely to find find treasure, and that's where I used to pick up most of my comics. You cannot imagine how excited I was when I discovered a stall in an enclosure near the world famous Barrowlands that was selling hundreds of 2000ADs... For ten pence each!

I'd recently taken up boxing to beef up my skinny frame and it was just as well. Not because I had to fight anyone for the comics, but it meant I could carry more home. I remember that walk to the bus station felt like it was going to take forever, my rucksack jammed full and the handles of eight plastic carrier bags, pulled into razor wire by the sheer weight of what I'd bought, slicing into my iced, numb hands.

And so I began to build up a collection of old 2000ADs, stretching back to when it (and I) was only a couple of years old. After I drained that stall of its stock (multiple visits were required), I hunted down other venues for cheap back issues, rarely having to pay more than thirty pence for a single Prog.

A few weeks later I was waiting in Buchanan Street Bus Station with my mum. We were off to Manchester to visit relatives, and I was looking forward to the five hour coach journey. My travel bag contained a spare t-shirt, some underwear and a hundred or so 2000ADs. If the driver had suddenly announced that the journey was going to take ten hours, I'd have probably thought, 'Great I might be able to finish all these!'

While we waited for the bus, something caught my eye in the newsagent kiosk window. Something explosive, glamorous and with a familiar logo...

I had to have it. Even though it cost fifty pence. And I did - Prog 780 was my first weekly purchase. I kept the free plastic wallet that came with that issue - it held all my fake IDs when I went to University - until it dissolved years later. Ennis and Gibson on Dredd, Kola Kommandos, Kev Walker's gloriously painted ABC Warriors and a Future Shock by Jeff Anderson (who I knew from Transformers comics) - it was an absolutely amazing package.

I can chart most of my life through 2000AD, and remember exactly what I was doing and what was going on when any given story was running. Rifling through my back issue collection when I visit my parents is like picking up and dipping into the diary that I never wrote.

And so, sixteen years later, Prog 1611 has just hit the shops, and I'm not going to buy it.
Why not? Because they sent me comp copies last weekend, so I don't need to.

My first story for 2000AD is called The Lie and it's drawn by Nick Dyer, whose stuff I've admired in Futurequake productions for ages now. I couldn't be more proud of it, and hope you like it if you get a chance to pick it up and read it for yourself.

It was great to have something in Judge Dredd Megazine for most of last year, but to have my work appear in 2000AD, a comic whose history is so entwined with my own, feels incredible. It's like I've joined a rich comic tapestry that also includes Dredd, Alpha and Bix Barton, Hewligan's Haircut and Time Flies, Joe Pineapples coming out while I sat on the community centre wall talking to my mate Joe, finding out that the Dead Man was Judge Dredd while listening to Atlantic 252 in my gran's spare room one summer, discovering Slaine, Halo Jones and Hap Hazzard, Alan Moore, Grant Morrison, John Smith, Peter Milligan, Pat Mills, John Wagner, Alan Grant... I know my story is but one stitch in the gigantic thirty year rug of 2000AD, but what a thing to have a stitch in!

2008-11-01T09:04:00.003Z

Greetings fellow Internet travellers.

A couple of things worth talking about today... First up is the (almost, just, kind-of-in-time-for) Halloween treat I received in my InBox today from animator and comics raconteur David Hailwood. Fans of Accent UK's annual anthology books might have happened across my Zombie Interviews a couple of years ago - well David has taken it upon himself to animate them. I was excited when he told me about his plans and nearly had an embolism when they showed up. That's how good they are.

Here, for your enjoyment are the first two (he's hoping to crack on with another couple, I think, when he has time):

Zombie Interview 1

Zombie Interview 2

Superb, huh? Animation is even more labour intensive than comics, and David tells me that the 'render processing' took over three hours alone.

The other thing I have been long overdue in mentioning on here was a review that Richard Bruton very kindly posted of my last few comics on the Forbidden Planet website.

"I’d recommend checking out his work for yourselves. Ever changing, always trying something new and different. A great artist making great stories."

I read the piece when I got back from the BICS shindig a couple of weeks ago and, in my shellshocked and shattered state, it actually brought a tear to my eye. So thank you very much, Richard!

If that's not enough, I'm lead to believe that next week some of my work will be invading UK newsagents. Stay tuned.

2008-10-20T12:45:00.003Z

Some of us are still recovering from Saturday night.

If you weren’t there, you missed it and if you were there you probably don’t remember it, but Saturday night was the night we celebrated a year of London Underground Comics by hiring out a whole pub* and disrupting any attempts at drawing a 24 Hour Comic**.

I ended up with the usual battery of cartoonists on my couches come nightfall, and it’ll probably take me weeks to hoover up the debris… I don’t think I met anyone who wasn’t having fun, which means that yet again I managed to talk only to the right people.

I have a million emails to respond to and five years of work to get through this week, so I’m going to leave you with a couple of sketches to gawp at, from a tea, cakes and drawing session at hostess supreme Karrie F’s house.

grey colouring by Sean Azzo - although my scanner seems unable to pick up the lightest shades

* A number of 'random punters' showed up, and were shown the door after failing to answer basic comics-related questions posed by the barman.

** Many were started, none were finished. Shame – they were probably among the best being attempted around the world.

2008-10-11T12:40:00.003Z

I've just emailed off my strip for this year's Accent UK anthology, Western. If you've read my contributions to Accent's fine books Robots and Zombies you won't be surprised that it's called The Cowboy Interviews. The book's not out until next year, but here's a quick peak at some sketches of the main characters...

As soon as this is posted I'm going to pack for a weekend in Scotland- it's Dashing Douglas Noble's wedding! Dan Goodbrey is the best man, and I think Dan Lester and Sean Azzopardi are playing in the function band - so it's going to be like another comic convention. That'll be my thirty five hundredth of the year then!

Anyway, can't wait, but I'm dreading the cold. I always forget that Edinburgh is firmly inside the Arctic Circle and temperatures rarely rise above three degrees C.

Hello to anyone I met and said hello to (or even completely ignored) at the Birmingham International Comics Convention. A great time was had by all.

(photo courtesy of Mike Rouse Dean)

Apologies to anyone waiting for the next instalment of my Belly Button Bubble Chronicles, it's been a crazy month - what with my birthday, holiday, conventions, weddings, paying gigs and other stuff, and I decided to take a break for the sake of my sanity. There will be a new chapter next week and my plan is to wrap up all 52 episodes by the end of the year.

Although I also planned to be a world famous writer by the time I was thirty, so maybe take that with a pinch of salt...

See you in the funny papers.

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Now playing: Led Zeppelin - Houses Of The Holy (Weegle)
via FoxyTunes

2008-10-03T10:39:00.002Z

I'll be at The International Comics Show at Birmingham this weekend, if anyone wants to track me down. I should have new work appearing in the guest artist issue of Monkeys Might Puke and The Girly Comic and I'll be sharing a table with Sean Azz and Dan Monkeys.

(not actually a portrait of Newman, just drawn while he was on TV)

I was very sad to hear about Paul Newman passing away this week. I've been a fan of his since I saw him play Butch Cassidy when I was five or six. We've been feasting on Paul Newman classics over the last couple of months - Harper, The Sting, Somebody Up There Likes Me and Butch - and they've all been great.

The BBC had a nice round up of Newman quotes, and the obit is here.

2008-09-01T20:25:00.004Z

I'm going to be offline for a week and a bit so please don't panic / think me rude when I don't respond to your emails.

PS. Happy September!

2008-08-29T01:48:00.002Z

This is what happens when my scripts stop making sense and I can't figure out how to fix them. I fixed this bit, but three pages later there's a cartoon of Batman. He says "aw crap" too.

Aw crap.

2008-08-27T00:01:00.002Z

A quick sketch of Sean Azzopardi for the LED Portrait page, which is part of the promotion campaign for next Saturday's Low Energy Day. (If you have no idea what I'm talking about click some of those links).

Today's BBC weird link of the day: Priest drops his Nun Beauty Contest Idea...

New Elephant Words (since I last listed them here):

Once Upon a Time

She’s Only Nine

Space Rabbi

Things I Can See from This Side of the Chain-Linked Fence

Prime Number$

That's a lot of reading!

I walked past Jerry Sadowitz in the street a couple of weeks ago and wondered, well first I wondered 'is that Jerry Sadowitz?'. Then I wondered what he's up to these days. When I got home I asked Google and came across this fascinating interview with him in The Scotsman.

That's it from me - see you later.

db

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Now playing: Radiohead - Jigsaw Falling Into Place
via FoxyTunes

2008-08-26T01:50:00.000Z

Willy Miller - a Scottish cattle farmer - remarked: "I've never noticed that my cows all face the same way."

Sounds like one of my Elephant Word stories, but it's actually a BBC news item.

I completely failed to make it to the Edinburgh fringe this year. Sorry James and Neil, if you're reading this. If not, I'm still sorry. Bugger.

Last week a few London cartoonists debunked to Karrie Fransman's mansion in deepest, darkest North London for a day of drawing and cakes. In the absence of anything witty to say or link to, I'll be posting the sketches I drew there here. Does that even make sense?

The Joker:

I'm going to bed. Next up a robot and some Elephant Words I did write.

2008-08-08T12:51:00.002Z

Caption says:

From 6pm onwards:
Oxford Jam Factory & The Caption Comics Collective Launch Party
Launching off Caption Timewarp and the Comics Collective gallery exhibition running in Oxford over August.
The exhibit includes works by Deirdre Ruane, Terry Wiley, David Baillie, Jeremy Dennis, Andrew Luke, Sally-Anne Hickman, Jess Bradley, Ellen Lindner, Daniel Merlin-Goodbrey and D'Israeli.
The Jam Factory: 27 Park End Street, OX1 1HU, Oxford (this is near the train station)
For more info on The Jam Factory see: http://www.thejamfactoryoxford.com/upcoming.html
They do food, for menu see: http://www.thejamfactoryoxford.com/takeawaymenu.html
Later in the evening the festivities will move to the Angel & Greyhound, which is nearer to the Caption venue.
Angel & Greyhound
30 St Clements Street
Oxford, OX4 1AB

The 'first' launch was last week and great fun. (Let's not mention the bike that got thrown through the front door of the Jam Factory). Matt Brooker (D'Israeli) was multi-tasking as photographer and exhibitor, and keeping a record of the day as it unfolded. Matt is an incredible photographer - in fact he's so good he improves photos even by just being in them:

Matt's FlickR of the day can be found and ogled here.

I've just received a copy of the latest issue of BDZine in the post. BDZine is a great magazine about comics, distributed freely throughout France. It looks fabulous and I am honoured to be the featured creator in issue 19. I had to ask Jen to translate most of it for me, as my French is pretty basic, but I think that I am the first non-French creator they've covered, so I am in fact double-honoured.

On Friday night I was on the Central Line travelling East and I somehow managed to choose the sickest carriage on the network. The first guy I sat next to sneezed a river of green on his leg and then mopped it up with a London Lite. I moved. The lady I sat next to started to cough up an internal organ. I moved again. The family I joined next were rehearsing for some sort of synchronised coughing/sneezing event. I decided to give up.

The cold I caught on that journey knocked me out on Saturday, so on Sunday and Monday I spent a couple of hours burning evil germs out of myself in the steam room. Cured by Tuesday though.

Things have been a bit hectic this last couple weeks, but hopefully everything's going to calm down again soon. If you're in Oxford this weekend I'll see you there. It's 3 o'clock and I wanted to leave at 2. Oh well...

PS. New Belly Button up after a bit of a break.

2008-07-31T00:21:00.003Z

Live in Oxford?
Like Jam?
Like comics?

How about two out of three?
Cool! Then you should pop along to the Jam Factory in Oxford tonight (the 31st) for the launch party of the Caption Comics Collective Exhibition. I'll be there. So will others. I'm told it kicks off at 6.30ish.

"(The exhibition) runs the gamut from the autobiographical to the fantastic, in a broad range of styles and media. You'll find narratives to follow around the gallery, keenly observed slices of life, adventure, surrealism and humour."

So there you go. Creators at the show include Andrew Luke (who did all the legwork in organising the beast) Jeremy Dennis, Deirdre Ruane, D'Israeli, Terry Wiley, Sally Anne-Hickman, Daniel Merlin-Goodbrey, Ellen Lindner, Jess Bradley and me.

In other news:
New El Word - Dirty Dan is Looking at You
(my way of welcoming new writer Dan Lester to the site)

Congratulations to Portico Quartet on being nominated for a Mercury Award.

I mentioned them on here last September after seeing them on my birthday, playing a daytime gig in a park in town. The percussionist had a fantastic home-made hitty-box thing. He said he'd send me instructions on how to make it if I emailed him. I bet he's too busy now. Try to see them live before they become massive!

Funky new animated webtoon / game hybrid written by Peter Milligan for the BBC - meta4orce.

The only bad thing about summer...
I think something buzzy has bitten my bum.

2008-07-25T08:36:00.004Z

I do think Wall-E is one of the best films I've seen in years.
I do not want a moustache like the dude from There Will be Blood.
I do have a fruit smoothie in the fridge I need to drink today.
I do not think real men touch type.

Apologies to anyone searching the streets of San Diego for me this week - I had to chicken out and stay home in order to get some work done. If it's any consolation, it's just as hot in London this week as it is over there!

OK - I promised the lost Robot Interviews in my last post, so I'd better deliver. For those of you who don't know, Robots is the latest anthology from those boy-wizard-entrepreneurs Dave and Colin at Accent UK, and it can be got from the finest of comics shops worldwide - Diamond order code MAR083379. Last year's book was Zombies and next year we'll have Westerns.

Anyway I wrote and drew 7 Robot Interviews, but I think I only sent 6 and 5 saw print - which leaves us with two web exclusives!

New El Word: Short Bow Hunter

links
New Matt Badham blog - Family to Feed, Words for Sale!
Boston Globe: How To Nap (invaluable knowledge for freelancers!)

youtube links
Awesome animation about Baman Piderman
Rich Stevens and Meredith Gran give a talk at Google HQ

listen links
A couple of weeks ago Radio 3 broadcast a live edition of poetry program The Verb - and I discovered these guys - A Poem in Between People. The two tracks they played are up at Benin City myspace and are incredible, so go listen.

bbc links
Why dying is forbidden in Longyearbyen
Every week I seem to discover new and more impressive things about Phil Jupitus (he was on that episode of The Verb I was just raving about) - here he talks about satirical newspaper comic strip and the Radio 4 program Comic Love. (separate link for the show)
The lost tapes of Dr Who composer Delia Derbyshire

And that's all she wrote.

2008-07-12T00:20:00.004Z

Sometimes you can glare at the same empty page for hours and hours and nothing comes... And then suddenly inspiration strikes, and in the space of four or five minutes it's full. And it almost makes those hours of staring and waiting worth it.

Almost.

I've been trying to find ways around the waiting. It's not writers' block - I'm not blocked, I'm just waiting. I know it'll come eventually, my subconscious just has to process all the information and ideas I'm feeding it. I draw diagrams, I write a thousand notes, I make mind maps... But the bit of my brain that comes up with the clever stuff likes to take its own time.

I'm obviously only telling you this because I've just had one of those five minute spurts and a problem I've been mulling over all day with a story I'm writing has just solved itself.

"Writing is easy. All you do is stare at a blank sheet of paper until drops of blood form on your forehead." - Gene Fowler

Elephant Words you may have missed:
Burn Maybe Burn
TV Chef
New Granny

I'm really pleased with how most of these stories have turned out. I'm going to try something different with the next half dozen or so though, so stay tuned.

Links 4U:
Modern Monstrosity has an awesome new website! (and the best Publicity section in the whole universe)
Great BBC new story about a student who scored 7.4% in a GCSE English paper by writing only two words... Guess which two?
An interesting piece by Terry Pratchett about the wonder of the Universe (and not about God as the title would have you believe, although once you see who published it you might be thankful it wasn't even worse!)

I'll leave you with a poem:

Happy the man

Happy the man, and happy he alone,
He who can call today his own:
He who, secure within, can say,
Tomorrow do thy worst, for I have lived today.
Be fair or foul or rain or shine
The joys I have possessed, in spite of fate, are mine.
Not Heaven itself upon the past has power,
But what has been, has been, and I have had my hour.

John Dryden

Next week: Because you demanded it - The Missing Robot Interviews

2008-07-09T09:01:00.000Z

2008-06-25T13:30:00.005Z

Just got back from a few days in Scotland (my friends Steve and Louise, who are now sunbathing in Sardinia, got married in Bearsden last Friday) and slowly building up a head of steam. I turned off my spam filter when I was away because the last time I escaped the desk my mail server ate some client emails and, understandably, they weren't too impressed. The downside to this is that I've spent most of the morning deciding which of my thousand emails are scams and which are genuine offers of work/viagra/free holidays in the sun. If I could afford an assistant I'd spend the money on a trip round the world and a new pair of jeans.

Some stuff:
My new El Words piece - Draft – New Miniseries (No Title Yet)

Sunset over Mars (via boingboing.net)

(Can't remember what the story was... via BBC)

Other stuff:
A really good interview with grumpy old man Harlan Ellison at A. V Club
A great comic from Ryan Pequin: The Walk

Last night my mate Rob texted me with the offer of a last-minute-spare ticket for Radiohead, who were playing in our local park, so I didn't have much downtime after the train from Edinburgh docked. Really good gig, a veritable trip down memory lane - even though I'm not very old. Honest! Their back catalogue will be getting heavy rotation in the studio this week.

Studio. Hah... That almost sounded vaguely glamorous.

If you're chomping at the bit waiting for an email, phone call, work, words of wisdom or a new Belly Button episode you'll get what you want soon - promise!

2008-06-16T09:47:00.000Z

Greetings, my brothers from other mothers and sisters from other misters - things have been a bit crazy here and I've neglected the blog a little. I really should have mentioned No Barcodes here, but figured that anyone likely to turn up would know that it was happening and that I was going to make an appearance. I'll be back here shortly to drop some links and maybe some artwork but in the meantime:

A No Barcodes field report by me, over at Down The Tubes

A bunch of interviews I conducted with talented cartoonists to publicise NBC:
Dan Lester, Francesca Cassavetti, Andy Luke, Ben Powis, Josceline Fenton, Paul Rainey, Sean Azzopardi, Oliver Lamden and Tom Humberstone.

And, of course, my latest Elephant Words stories:
Hollywood Star - Live Tonight!
A New Start
Escape Real Life Through Use of Artificial Environments

Add to this my latest rock-out with your frock-out Belly Button episode and you really shouldn't be complaining.

2008-05-22T16:39:00.003Z

Hello again

A bit snowed under with stuff I should be doing, stuff I want to do and other stuff that I'll probably get done at some point. In the meantime - I don't think it's too early to start getting excited about NoBarCodes - the all-day Uk indie comics extravaganza at Camden Lock Market on the 31st of of this month.

That's 9 days time, kids!

In double celebration - of this awesome event and the debut of Tongue of the Dead in glorious hardback - I'm offering a special not-to-be-repeated deal.

Yeah - that's 20% off. Just print off the voucher and bring it along on the day.
I'll also have Mindy/Pool and Rocketboy on sale, for anyone who hasn't picked up those yet.

Look to londonundergroundcomics.com for more news about NoBarCodes.

New Elephant Word: Playground

STUFF:
John Carlin reports for the Observer on why Iceland is the happiest place on Earth. (I've been twice, and I can believe it).
A nice Jack Kirby piece in last Friday's Independent.
An Hour with John Pertwee on BBC radio 7, available until this Saturday

2008-05-16T00:49:00.003Z

Well I made it to the Comic Expo last week, despite not knowing until the last minute whether I could afford the time. In the end I was terrified of missing anything and went along for the Friday and Saturday, but instead of late night bar-surfing returned to the hotel and got some work done. I also found a stall in a market in town selling hundreds of old 60s and 70s sci-fi mags. I was (and continue to be) in geek heaven!

Hello to everyone I met / hung out with / didn't get a chance to hang out with.
Anyone who left without a copy of Andy Winter's Septic Isle, Bob Byrne's Mr Amperduke or Joel Meadow's Studio Space is either poor or a fool. (Poor fool is also an option).

I just got back from the DFC launch party - which was a fun filled affair (and another opportunity for hanging out - it seems to be all I do these days...). I just have time for a quick blog post, a Belly Button update (29! 29! 29!) and emailing in some work before catching about twenty minutes sleep and heading off for the weekend.

More nude sketches from the last time I joined Sean at his life drawing classes:

More Elephant Words:
Number 13
El Capitan
The Revenge of Suzanne

recommended entertainment while i'm gone:
To listen and read : As Befits a Man (as heard on A Prairie Home Companion last week)
To read: Outbreak of Violets (Alan Moore)
To watch: A Chris Ware animation from This American Life
To read and donate: A great Gene Colan story from Mystery Tales #1
(If you don't know; Mr Colan is very ill at the moment, and his family are struggling to pay the medical bills. Paypal donations to genecolan@optonline.net are being gratefully accepted)

2008-04-28T13:43:00.004Z

I was really sad to hear about the passing of Humphrey Lyttelton at the weekend. I only mentioned him here a few weeks ago. His jazz shows and his witty performances on ISIHAC will be sorely missed. (And I didn't know he was a cartoonist in his younger years - I hope some of his work surfaces online in the next few days).

Over at Elephant Words this week the team will be coming up with fiction magic inspired by this photo (which I took after a party last year).

Same Hat! Same Hat! (one of the best scanlation blogs on the web!) reports on the recent Shintaro Kago exhibition in Amsterdam. Scroll down for a photo of the Manga God with fellow Camden conspirator Dirty Dan Lester.

If you're at a loss for stuff to do tomorrow at about 4 in the afternoon, you could worse than listen to Word of Mouth on Radio Four. Among the guests invited to speak on the program are Posy Simmonds, Bryan Talbot, Martin Rowson, Alex Fitch, Paul Gravett and me.

To read:

15 Things Kurt Vonnegut Has Said Better Than Anyone Else Ever Has Or Will
(via my countryman Eddie Campbell's Blog)
How Big Sugar Money (may have) Killed The Miracle Berry

2008-04-24T13:04:00.002Z

Listeners to Resonance FM will be treated to an Oliver Lamden / Mile End Thing special edition of Panel Borders this evening, but due to the magic of the Internet it's ready to listen to right now!

Just click here to listen to brief interviews with such hilariously drunken people as Dan Lester, Oli Smith and Sean Azzopardi. I'm on there too, but I was sober (and a little gunky from the cold).

I'm also on Radio 4 sometime soon, talking about the language of comics along with Oli and Alex Fitch (who usually presents Panel Borders on RFM), but I'm not sure when that's going out...

Speaking of the infamous Sean Azz, I went to a life drawing afternoon with him last week in Angel. Sean's an old hat at it, but it was the first I'd ever been to. I wish I could afford the time to go every week, because I'm sure my figure drawing would improve really quickly if I did. Who knew people had five toes on each foot?

New Belly Button up today talking about some stuff that's been happening recently which I'm really, really excited about - watch out for episode 27 dropping soon!

In other clicky news:
Overspill has gone into overdrive recently with excellent interviews with comedy double act Al Ewing and PJ Holden and Blank Slate's Kenny Penman!

----------------
Now playing: Three Days Grace - Never Too Late (Weegle)
via FoxyTunes

2008-04-22T11:26:00.004Z

He took a duck in the face at two hundred and fifty knots.

I just finished William Gibson's second newest novel, Pattern Recognition. My friend Big Dave bought it in hardback on the Monday it hit the shops and loaned it to me on the Wednesday, after he'd read it. I love Gibson's stuff, but for some reason the book didn't click with me - I hit about page 70 and let it rest on a shelf, meaning to finish it at a later date. Six years later Big Dave is living in Australia and I just picked the book up again on a whim. This time everything fell into place - I wonder if it was the clipped present tense prose that put me off before - and I inhaled it in about a week, travelling to and between gigs. I felt a bit let down by the penultimate chapter, but the final one sorted everything out for me.

Big Dave - if you're reading this - do you want your book back?

The Belly Button has been deliberately delayed for a double update this week, but if you're hanging around with nothing to read, my two new fiction experiments over at EW are:
Project Perfect and The Wisdom of Uncle Sammy.

Oh - and if anyone was expecting me to be in New York last week, I wasn't. I registered for NY Comicon, but then had to bail when other business came up here in the Uk. What did I miss?

This week's a bit manic as I'm all over the place for meetings and stuff, so apologies if you're waiting on an email or hoping for a back rub.

More before the wknd.

----------------
Now playing: Imitated by some, duplicated by NONE. We serve the FINEST mix of Chillout, Nu-Jazz, Lounge and Downtempo music. - Groovera.com (Groovera presents Low Mercury: (deepest chillout) No rap. No rock. No talk. 100% chill. Guaranteed.)
via FoxyTunes

2008-04-11T13:38:00.002Z

I'm eating a cream doughnut.
So there!

New El Word up: The Shifting Box
Hope you like it.

(photo[s] courtesy of SeanAzz)

The London Underground Comics exhibition at the renowned bookartbookshop in Pitfield Street, Hoxton, London begins tonight at 6pm. Be there or be elsewhere, as they've been known to say. The comics will remain for two weeks after the cartoonists have partied and departed.
Get them while they're hot!

While I'm busy here are some internet things for you to look at:
Clive James on aircraft telecommunications
Raymond Briggs' studio space
Mike Lynch - sad Peanuts
An awesome Ralph Bakshi interview - if you're short on time skip to the incredible last paragraph
You know when libertarians talk about the 'thin end of the wedge'? This is what they're talking about.

Maybe see you this evening. If not I'll be at Camden tomorrow morning - apparently Radio 4 are coming down to talk to us about comics or something...

2008-04-05T06:27:00.002Z

Good morning!

No - the time stamp on this post isn't faked or faulty, I'm up early.

I just thought I'd mention that LondonUndergroundComics is today under the stewardship of myself, Sean Azz and Oliver Modern.

Pop down and say hello!

2008-04-04T15:55:00.003Z

I can feel the beginnings of summer tugging at my kilt.

Winter wasn't actually that bad this year (last year was miserable!) but I'm still anxious for the first day of the year where I can take my work to the park and relax in the sunshine.

Two new El Words, for anyone who fancies:
The Man Who Came For Dinner and My Funeral

I met Jim Medway in the pub after all those London comix things last week and he was a really nice bloke. He speaks to Matty Badbacon at Overspill about stuff, most of which will be new to indie comics people. Well worth a read...

News of the Siegel estate's partial reclaiming of the Superman copyright brightened up my week (it's just a shame there's no one from the Shusters to take similar action). Mark Evanier's review of the NYT's reporting on the story highlights another (recurring) injustice.

The National Portrait Gallery is running a Vanity Fair exhibition until the 26th of May. This fantastic photo of Hilary Swank caught my eye...

I think I'll have to check it out.

Clickee things for the bored:

Royal Academy Summer Exhibition (I must do this one year)
Six Gay Geeks Who've Improved the Pop Culture Landscape
Wolverine Daily (these are brilliant!)
More MAD tutorials (all good stuff)

2008-03-27T23:59:00.000Z

This week's Belly Button is a couple of days later than I'd hoped, but over the weekend I had a head full of mucus and a house full of cartoonists. The story I relate in this episode comes from Brad Isaac's Persistence Unlimited blog, but I read it on Lifehacker.

Lifehacker's a blog for people who like inspirational quotes, but I still like it.
So there.

Anyone reading this in France, or who speaks / reads French or who's going to be visiting France any time soon should keep an eye out for the latest issue of BD Zine, which looks like this:

And features an interview with yours truly!

My latest Elephant Word story is called The Barbers Guild and can be read here.

Things you should look at this week:

The photo blog of Matt Brooker aka D'Israeli - this post in particular.
A list of Arthur C Clarke (r.i.p.) predictions

And over at the BBC's awesome iPlayer (and only available for the next couple of days - so be quick!):
Mark Lawson talks to Galton and Simpson
The Curse of Steptoe and Son

OK let's try this FoxyTunes thing again...

----------------
Now playing: Beth Orton - Shopping Trolley
via FoxyTunes

Hmm...
And during my redraft?

----------------
Now playing: Jay-Z And Linkin Park - Numb/Encore (Live)
via FoxyTunes

Yeah that seems to be working.

2008-03-17T16:06:00.002Z

Hello again

As mentioned in last week's Belly Button, someone's been kind enough to pre-nominate me for an Eagle Award in the Best Newcomer Writer category. While it's beneath me to beg, if you do feel like voting for me here's the link. (PS. Newcomer? Pfah! I been doin' this for years.)

Two new Elephant Words since last time I updated the blog:
Koan of the Space Buddha and 352.
Hope you like them.

I've just listened to Humphrey Lyttelton's very last The Best of Jazz show after 40 years on the job. I hope the BBC offer up some repeats from the archives to fill the void...

I've also just bought a book by James Tiptree Jnr on eBay. If the name doesn't ring a bell then you should read this... (A great author is often an engrossing story in their own right, and probably none more so than Tiptree!)

Some other stuff to keep you entertained:
A great article about Rudolphe Topffer (the great great grandfather of comics) by Chris Ware.
MAD cartoonist Tom Richmond teaches us all how to caricature (in three easy chapters!)
Frozen in Grand Central Station (YouTube video)
Why you should think twice about supporting China with your tourist dollar.
Another great essay from Clive James for the BBC (this time on privacy)
This guy is a ready-made character for any story you might be writing. Right?

And in other news I've started using FoxyTunes with Firefox and am pretty damn impressed. Although I'm not sure about its blog-appender. I'll give it a go...

----------------
Now playing: Boards Of Canada - In A Beautiful Place (Groove Salad: a nicely chilled plate of ambient beats and grooves. [SomaFM])
via FoxyTunes

2008-03-03T21:36:00.002Z

A couple of years ago I attended the San Diego Comic Con, armed only with a selection of my minicomics, an oat bar and a bottle of water, looking to score some professional engagements in the comics industry. For those that don't know, SDCC (as it is known, affectionately or not) is a four-day beast of a convention with no air conditioning and over a hundred thousand attendees, all wearing Green Lantern costumes that are four sizes too small. The hall is about a half mile long and walking from one end to the other, squeezing through narrow tunnels of green spandex, has been known to take up to nine hours.

The editors at SDCC are generally stressed and tired, and most don't have time to talk to some guy from the UK with a bunch of minicomics. It's easy to get discouraged and I did. One of the few things which lifted my spirits over those dark few days was meeting an editor who was not only happy to speak with me, but was enthusiastic about his work, my work and everything that was going on around him. That man was Mark Siegel and it was his first SDCC...

Mark is the head honcho at First Second, who have produced some of the most interesting English language graphic novels of the last couple of years, and he's also a talented cartoonist. Check out his account of meeting Moebius at Angouleme.
Isn't that great?

I'm in a bit of a Jack Johnson mood at the moment, and I just found this at the Internet Archive: a bunch of live recordings of his shows! (Tomorrow I'll likely be in a Metallica mood, but there's nothing similar for my favourite middle-aged rock moshers).

Some lovely photos at the BBC's Pictures of the Week selection a couple of weeks ago, and if you cycle along to #4 you'll be looking at one provided by FP blogger and all-round top lad Joe Gordon.

In other news, I only just realised that Joe is the same Joe who writes the infamous Woolamaloo Gazette blog... You know - the one that made every UK news outlet in the world when the author was sacked from Waterstones in Edinburgh for mentioning his workplace. Lots of people stopped shopping there as a result.

Bokononism.
Just in case you didn't click on it the last time...

One of my favourite cartoonists in the world, Shintaro Kago, is interviewed in the latest issue of Vice magazine. I couldn't find one (and I'm not sure if it appears in the UK version anyway) but luckily someone has scanned it and popped it up online.

This story about a new technological breakthrough meaning the end of the perpetual painting of the Fourth Rail Bridge gave me deja vu - it is the premise for Tom Stoppard's 1967 radioplay Albert's Bridge. I wish I could find that online somewhere...

Elephant Words since the last post : Mycophagist and Petrified Norman.
Hope you've been reading the rest of the entries though!

2008-02-18T11:57:00.003Z

Hello my neglected friends...

Busy, busy, busy week at Baillie Mansions... Speaking of which - if you change your religion on Facebook does everyone get a notification like they do when you change relationship status? I've given up on Facebook. Every time I log in I have a million invitations to look at crapbook or compare cats with someone. I mean - WTF?

While you're waiting for interesting things to happen you should go read this great short story, Wikihistory by Desmond Warzel. (thanks to MattyBad for finding it)

For fans of The Big Lebowski: this is a very funny (and not safe for work) re-edit.

I realise I haven't posted any tasty art here for a while, so here's the page I did for the awesome 24 Minute Comic at last year's Caption.

The rest of the comic can be found at Jinty's Flickr wotsit...

Now it's on to the blatant self-promotion section of the post.
(Hope you don't mind)

The boys at Indie Review have very kindly posted an in-depth interview with yours truly.
Their site has just undergone a revamp and looks great - it's a one stop shop for interesting stuff about the UK indie press and also has some great advice for new creators up there.

In other news you can now get more of me every week.
How? I hear you ask! Well... read on:

Elephant Words is the brainchild of Nicolas Papaconstantinou - a great burst fiction site which I talked about here when it launched, mostly because it features weekly work by my good friends Douglas Strip For Me and Andy Candy.

Last week they held auditions for a replacement for the legendary Rol Hirst. My piece went up along with a bundle of others (you can read it here, but I warn you now, it has lots of bad words in it!) and I was selected from a fine list of writers to join the official roster.

My new piece - The Sentry and the Centaur can be found here.
Hope you like.

2008-02-04T16:06:00.000Z

As anyone reading this week's Belly Button Chronicles will notice, I opted to scan the whole thing rather than rip out the pages.

Over at tysdiorbad Mattybum Badham interviews cartoonist Ellen Lindner.

Once you're finished reading that - two new comics for you to check out:
Friends in Spring, by my good friend Paul Fryer.
And Turtle Guitar by Ben Powis - which was brought to my attention by the lads at indiereview, and then I was pleased to see it turn at up at the stall on Saturday.

Speaking of the stall - you should really click here and check out the new video promoting that very same and awesome comics outlet. I star in this one... Although I might accept second billing to Alan Moore. OK, maybe third...

Oh my God - am I nothing but a bit player?

2008-01-25T16:50:00.000Z

Happy Haggis Day!

I have been in a terrible mood since getting back from holiday - the world is trying its best to make me blow my top.

Mind like water... Mind like water... Mind like water...

This story is great - a smoking, drinking, fighting soldier bear called Voytek. I'd read that book!

My good friend Nobbly Doug over at Strip For Me has conducted a bunch of great mini-interviews, which I only just caught up with. After you've read them, do yourself a favour and click on the 'comics' link at the top of the page and drink deep.

2008-01-20T16:41:00.000Z

Links for you.

I love Brian Ralph's stuff. Unfortunately it's quite difficult to find in Britain.
But now we can all draw like him (part one).

My main man Paul Fryer is back online.

While away I discovered Malta. Not the island. The drink. It's really nice. And my dodgy local corner shop has a stack of Nigerian Malta Guinness. Yum.

Check out Noah K's website. Then watch the results-so-far of his fascinating project in this YouTube video.

Matt Badham's tysdiorbad Blog has compiled all his interviews into an issue 0.5. Some really great stuff in there - Tharg! Rob Williams! Stuart Kolakovic! Go read.

2007-12-30T20:25:00.000Z

Right - I'm off for my usual New Year's vanishing act.
Be back mid-January.

If you find yourself missing me more than expected then the fabulous Matt Badham has interviewed me in three parts. Click here for ONE, TWO or THREE.

Happy new 2008!
Fingers crossed it's a good one...

2007-12-24T16:39:00.000Z

I've just emailed this out to you all, but I got a few 'mail server farted' messages back, so I'll post it here too.

Wishing you a very merry Christmas and a happy, healthy and successful 2008!