THE GAME IS AFOOT...

Right. Big news. I've started work on my next graphic novel for SelfMadeHero and their Eye Classics imprint. I'm rather excited to be working once again with Ian Edginton who's recent book "Stickleback: England's Glory" was described by SFX magazine as a "modern-day Victorian classic". Over the coming months I'll be updating this blog with sneak peaks, probably a few tutorials and the like, all pertaining to the production of this book. The name of the author who's book we are adapting is my favorite author, Sir Arthur Conan Doyle. And the title of the book is The Hound of the Baskervilles. But that's not all. We're adapting The Hound of the Baskervilles with a view to adapting all the books. We're doing the lot. The Hound of the Baskervilles is just the first in a series which if all goes according to plan will be released semiannually from 2009.

The game is afoot.

DEATH STAR OVER SAN FRANCISCO

Thanks to Col for the heads up.

IT'S NOT POLITE TO HIT A LADY

This has 'epic' and 'kick ass' stamped all over it:

37, 42, 6, 2.

More numerical homage on the WKRR? Going from The Mothman Prophecies Number 37 to The Prisoner AND Battlestar Galactica's Number 6 right the way across to the end of the universe with The Hitch hiker's Guide to the Galaxy's meaning of life the universe and everything with 42 and finally back to The Prisoner again with Number 2. Numerical nonsense aside, "Dickie Bird" is slang in this neck of the woods for "word" (so she's saying 'not a word' basically, for those not up on their cockney rhyming slang and not of the British Isles) and a reference to the fact that all the characters in this scene when they're not referring to one another as numbers are actually named after birds.

I wanted to keep the inking effects very 'in camera' as they'd say in the film business, with regard to this plate. Basically, the frantic cross hatched shading level has moved from being something I would normally have dropped over the background on an overlay channel to being part of the actual finished inks (likewise speech balloons).

THE KIRKMAN CRUSADE

A call to arms.

MWIP

I need to do more black and white work.

Following Nigel Parkinson's wonderful curve ball on the WKRR? I stumbled upon this idea just as I was waking up this morning with an somewhat unexpected and quite ferocious hangover. 'Wake up, Number 37' is a pop culture reference type thing (pertaining to "The Mothman Prophecies" wherein a character called "Indrid Cold" (aka The Mothman) who seemingly exists out of time, says it as a warning to one of the characters in the film. It must have got lodged in my brain because as I was waking up this morning it sort of popped into my head like a booming voice. Like the echo of a dream that somehow overlaps into the first few seconds of the waking day.

The number 37 is of course loaded with meaning as is every number and everything if you chose to follow the white rabbit down the hole. From the number of plays written by Shakespeare to a bad year for Antioch. From the first irregular prime number to the number of the beast (37 is 666 divided by its digits added together [37=666/(6+6+6)] ... and technically speaking, its the 'number of a man' associated with the beast, but that would mess up the lyrics to "The Number of the Beast" by Iron Maiden). 37 means everything and nothing at all.

Will be fun to see who or what 37 is, presuming Nigel picks up on that as he's Huzzah'd the next turn.

Watched 'Maestro' for the second time last night. A new 'celebrities making complete asses of themselves' tv show from the BBC but unlike previous 'celebrities making complete asses of themselves' tv shows, I rather enjoyed this one as it was about one of my favorite subjects. Classical Music. And it proved that conducting an orchestra is not unlike driving a ruddy great big tank laden with very large guns. Wonderful stuff.

MAY THE DANCE OFF BE WITH YOU...

I love the Darth Vader Thriller dance. You'd have thought they would have let the Wookie win, right?

Which reminds me...

LAST THREE PLATES FROM WKRR? AND AN EXQUISITE CORPSE!

Here's the last three plates I did for WKRR? which oddly, when put together, even though they're divided by other contributors plates in the actual story, read straight through. Out of context, the three plates still wouldn't make much sense, but I do wonder if I'd tried this from the start if I'd been able to pull it off, having one through line in the story that could be read entirely on its own. Inspired by Dave Taylor pasting his plates together over on his blog.

And whilst on the subject of being inspired ... here's something pretty awesome:

'This is a game. It is inspired by the project "Round Robin" in where a series of professional comic artists join to create an unexpected history'

The work over on Cadaver Exquisito really is quite exquisite, so please do go check it out. I was able quite easily to work my way through the story with a translator widget (that's the glory of comics, not a lot of text).

Their contributors include Bachan, Edgar Clement (both of whom have contributed thus far), Humberto Ramos, José Quintero, Patricio Betteo, Lucas Marangon, Francisco Herrera and Tony Sandoval.

FOR THOSE ABOUT TO ROCK!

Rage incarnate indeed. Love how Hulk makes short work of Asgard's equivalent to the riders of Rohan by flying through the air and punching them off their horses. Nice work. See, you don't need a herd of stampeding Mûmaks after all.

BATMAN: THE BRAVE AND THE BOLD

I'm looking forward to seeing this. Batman's going to be regularly teaming up with the likes of Aquaman, The Atom, Black Canary, Blue Beetle, Booster Gold, Doctor Fate, Fire, Flash, Green Arrow, The Green Lantern Corps, Huntress, Red Tornado and Plastic Man, with Diedrich Bader providing the voice of the not-so-dark Knight. It's also great to see Jaime Reyes as the Blue Beetle.

LION OH LION

Another Plate for 'Who Killed Round Robin?' This time hopefully further tying the Creature Constabulary and the Magical Hat into Zoctarian origins. This time introducing the not so cute and not so cuddly Kodoradomidion bounty hunters. As I currently see it they ride around the deserts of Zoctar on giant lizards hunting bounty.

Initially I was working on this plate in blue, but I eventually figured that Zoctarian moonlight would be red, as you do, so I washed everything through with red photo filter. Also, dropping the old paper texture over the top (which has a yellowed newspaper look about it) and playing with color burn channels really made the lines around Uncle Tulpa zing.

THE WRITING IS ON THE WALL

With all this talk of Gods and revelations I thought it only fitting to open this next WKRR? plate with writing on the wall (Daniel 5:1–31). Carrying on the unclaimed log entry from the previous two pages, I was sort of wondering when I did those if anyone would associate them with the character Penney or attribute them to somebody else. And I've been wanting to bring "the Detective" back into the story for quite a number of pages now, and suggest perhaps how such a story could have such a thing as a Creature Constabulary and magic hats.

When I first introduced 'the detective' (who has a name of course, Captain Noah Arkright), I actually had planned to introduce three. Basil Rathbone, Margaret Rutherford and Sidney Toler alikes, getting under one another's feet... but that would have been a nightmare so I'm glad I didn't venture further beyond the signs saying 'turn back, that way madness lies'. I settled for a cross between Basil Rathbone and Gregory Peck instead ... sort of.

Oh, one last thing - there's a joke hidden away in this one... it's written in Zoctarian across the ship as it passes overhead in the second panel.

If you've no idea what I'm on about then you've not been reading 'Who Killed Round Robin?' Shame on you.

WATCHMEN TRAILER!

Who watches the Watchmen? Well, pretty soon we'll all be watching the Watchmen as it hits cinemas March, 2009. I don't think I've ever watched a trailer so many times over. Wow. The Doc Manhattan transformation scene is really quite something.

Go and watch the Watchmen trailer for yourselves.... thanks to Apple.

PROCESS

"I put my heart and my soul into my work, and have lost my mind in the process."

-Vincent van Gogh

Right then. Here's the process I used to create Plate 2 of Page 26 of "Who Killed Round Robin?"

Starting with the concept - I wanted to elaborate more on what happens to people who witness the birth of an Outer God without the proper protective eye wear and seized my chance when I noticed that because of Woodrow Phoenix's perception of what I'd drawn earlier he'd drawn a previously faceless character with a face again ... and from that I got my idea. How we perceive one another's contributions is obviously just one part of what shapes the story, with people interpreting what has gone before in ways that a contributor might not have imagined in the first place. So I figured I'd find a way to cement the original intention a bit more concretely (excuse the pun).

Also I wanted to reintroduce a concept contributed by Colin Fawcett all the way back on page Page 15 (plate 3). We'll likely catch up with Cockrell and Stone's progress at some point (one would certainly hope), but I quite liked the notion that people could be used like trained circus fleas. So I started sketching. And as with most of my WKRR? contributions I just have time for one shot at it, so pretty much what you see is more or less what you get. Straight out of the tin, as 'they*' say.

Once I got the general idea down I then inked it thus ...

.... using Manga studio for the nice big brush lines. Manga Studio is all levels of awesomeness. Try it out. Took me about fifteen minutes to ink fully then on to the crosshatching.

Basically, creating a new layer I went Robert Crumb Crazy. Manga Studio organizes your work into layers... much like photoshop, which is handy as I'll explain in a minute. I then worked into the cross hatching with an erase tool and erased small ember like dots. more on that cross hatched layer in a mo...

I then exported the file into photoshop (you can export your work, layers intact, straight out of Manga Studio... did I mention how marvelous Manga Studio is?) and did a quick color rough which, when I'm doing round robin work is finished colors... but I do probably take a little while longer coloring than I do inking. It's the bulk of the work in fact. I basically color the whole thing quite baddly, with only a rough idea in my head of the contrast I want. So the colors will be quite primary to begin with. Then I isolate areas of the color and tweak them using 'photo filter' in photoshop. Which washes colors through with either a uniform warm or coldness etc. Cyan photofilter is great for deadening flesh tones if you're doing a zombie comic etc. I then pass the whole thing through a photo filter tonal wash to ensure the color is equally distributed. So the over all image feels either warm or cold or dead even. I enjoy this process way to much. It's my favorite part out of the entire coloring process. No idea why but its totally my bag. In the previous panel Penney has set the alien on fire so we loose the usual colors for this environment.

And then I take my cross hatched layer, remember that? Hopefully I haven't lost you by now with all my talk about photo filters... anyway, I switch that to an overlay channel and it burns over the image quite nicely. Then, on a layer over the original inks I drop the oppacity and work glow into the eyes of the damned and the lighting.

I add two additional layers, one with a texture over it which I put on a soft light with high contrast... it's basically a mottled texture that actually makes any overlap in the color seemingly bleed, so it gives everything a marker effect or water color effect giving the color a pinch more depth. I also have like an old newspaper texture which I drop over the whole thing on a multiply channel, which means that anything white is now creamy colored, like aged paper, and pulls the image together a bit more in terms of tone and depth and all those bells and whistles.

And lastly I add lettering, returning once more to the log entry of the previous page, describing in some detail what happens to the skin of a 'witness' who is unfortunate enough to see an Outer God being born (or to even meet one at all). I also use words of Yiddish origin for sound effects, quite specifically choosing schmaltz (which you may know as being used for 'excessive sentimentality' but is also the word for melted chicken fat, which I thought quite appropriate for the sound of someone's face falling off) and schlub (which is a clumsy, stupid, or unattractive person ... not very nice, I know).

For the finished thing, click here.

*more about 'them' later.

TELLING NOT SHOWING

Much of this post won't make sense unless you're reading the critically acclaimed (it's had some criticism and some acclaim, so technically speaking it's critically acclaimed*) "Who Killed Round Robin?" so either get yourself over there and start reading, or nod knowingly and pretend you know what I'm talking about.

Here's the inks for my new WKRR? plate (click here to see the full color version).

Riffing off of Woodrow Phoenix's opening plate for that page I decided not to stray too far from the designs Woods had laid down of the Lickey End House guests. After all, if it ain't broke...

I decided here not to show the Outer God - we've had glimpses of it so far, nothing too detailed, and I thought it more horrid at this point in the page to show the effects of looking at it rather than showing it. And of course the introduction of journal notes... although who's journal notes remains to be seen.

I named the burgeoning regenerating aliens "Dren". As in 'children', because they've always looked quite eerily childlike.

Also I was rather curious as to why Penney wore tinted specs. Well now we know.

(*next week I'll be calling it The New York Times Best Seller, and the week after that we're going for the Pulitzer)

THE ANGEL OF MONS AND ALL ...

With this week's Who Killed Round Robin? I snatched up the opportunity to follow myself again after poor Dave Taylor had to bow out at the last minute. Got to play around with the legend of the Angel of Mons, in which angels supposedly protected the British army during the Battle of Mons at the start of The Great War. Arthur Machen (an interesting chap - member of the Hermetic Order of the Golden Dawn) had a hand in creating the legend when he wrote The Bowmen (published in the Evening News a month after the battle), inspired by accounts he'd heard from the front line. In the story phantom bowmen from the Battle of Agincourt are summoned by a British soldier calling on the spirit of St. George.

The Battle of Agincourt again is of notable significance. It's incorrectly associated with 'flipping the bird', that most popular of obscene hand gestures. Apparently the French wanted to cut off the middle fingers of English bowmen so they could not use their bows (a cunning plan!). When the English won they displayed their middle fingers to show they still had them. Nonsense of course, but then so was the Angel of Mons. I thought it interesting though that bodkin point's (the arrows used by longbowmen at the Battle of Agincourt), were fired in sun blotting volleys at the French and yet St. George in Machen's story sent the very same bowmen to be allied with the French in order to defeat the Germans.

ALLONS-Y!!!

Who Killed Round Robin? has been going for six months now as we round the corner at 23 pages with no end in sight just yet. It's something that allows me to try something new - or rather hone a direction for my work. Of late I've been cross hatching like crazy which you may notice if you look very closely (click on the image above for a closer look). WKRR? also allows me to practice my use of color. Odd to also think that at Page 1, Plate 1, which I'd drawn last new years eve, I'd only drawn 5 pages of Dorian. I've contributed a total of 14 'plates' to WKRR?, over which time I've completed a 119 page graphic novel and have tentatively started work on another. These last 6 months have proved the most educational, I've learned a tremendous amount and am absolutely ravenous for more. Over the next couple of days or so I'm preparing my pitch for Zuda, something I've been talking about doing for ages (and not exactly been putting off either) where I'll hopefully be able to put some of those lessons to good use.

MUSIC NIGHT ON STRANGE PLANET

Sigur Rós – Inní mér syngur vitleysingur

Sigur Rós – Gobbledigook

DON'T MAKE ME ANGRY ...

I cannot wait to see the new Incredible Hulk film out later this month. I missed Iron Man when it screened, but I'm setting a date with the big green guy. I LOVE the Hulk and I cannot recommend enough Peter David's run on the The Incredible Hulk from Marvel comics back in the nineties. Truly amazing series. I was more than a little disappointed by Ang Lee's effort, so I'm hoping this new version doesn't Mister MgGee me. Speaking of Mister MgGee, I love the inclusion of the theme tune from the glorious Bixby tv series at the end of the trailer. Awesome.

OH MY GOLLY GOSH!