GRINNING LOON & DEADSTAR NEED YOU!!!!!

Attention all writers and artists! This is the call out to anyone interested in being involved in something cool. A project that I have been working on for some time now, building a world and a short narrative so that others may follow and expand upon. I've presented the idea to Deadstar Publishing, local indy publisher that I've worked with in the past and they are on board too, as are several collaborators who I was lucky enough to speak too over the weekend at Comic Con.

So, what is this master plan I hear you cry? I've built the ground work for a fantasy world and now I want writers and illustrators to fill it with stories, comics and art based on the original concepts. I've kept a lot of the world quite vague in places intentionally as I want other people to still have the freedom to expand on the brief and make awesome tales of heroism and villainy that are all set in the same world. Once everything is collected together my good buddy Kev over at Deadstar Publishing will get the whole anthology bound and printed and ready to hit the trade shows.

This will be a personal project that relies on submissions and I am not asking anyone to do something I'm not prepared to do myself. The artwork shown in my previous blog post are the first pages in an 8 page full colour story that will be part of the anthology. I will be submitting whatever concept and filler art we need to finish it off as well, but the dream is to have a professionally printed 80 page full colour collection of comics and written prose showcasing the talent of not only the indy crowd, but those creatives just stepping into the industry and looking to get their work out there and be part of something community driven. It is hard (and expensive) to self publish and get a full product ready to go, but a one off comic or short story where all the printing costs are covered and you will be able to carry it off to other shows yourself? That is something of a relief to a lot of people in my opinion. It certainly is to me. Which is why I'm putting this out there now.

Below is a link to the PDF of the final brief with all the relevant information for anyone wishing to be involved.

Age of Savagery Submission Call

All submissions need to be sent to ageofsavagery@deadstarpublishing.co.uk as well as any questions you may have. Kev and myself will answer these as soon as we are able.

 Thanks for listening to me ramble and I look forward to seeing everything that gets submitted.

The Next Big Thing!

Cardiff Comic Con is done for now and a great time was had by all. It was fun to see all my fellow trader buddies and con friends, both old and new. A big hanks to Kev over at Deadstar Publishing for sending people to my stall and I hope I repaid the favour, lord knows I tried.

As I promised, here are the final pieces that I've been working on the last week or so. It's always fun to work on a new project, but this one was particularly satisfying, especially to hear so much feedback from con attendees on the weekend plus various people involved in the creative industry of small press and indy publishing.

There is a very big reason why I was so pleased with the reseption of these pieces on the weekend as they heralded the next major project from myself and Deadstar Publishing. I have spent weeks drawing and scheming a barbarian fantasy world for next comic and now I've laid the ground work I want to open the world up to others. Between myself, Deadstar and various other contributors we will be creating an anthology of stories set in the savage world. I'm aiming for a September release date and will be taking submissions from writers, artist, poets, frankly anything that will go on the printed page. This will be a real collaborative effort of all involved as it will hopefully provide a few opportunities to people looking to get themselves into independent publishing as well building a career.

I will have all the important details, as well as the finalized brief for anyone interested in submitting work for the anthology later this week. For now, I'll just say thanks to everyone who stopped by the stand and can't wait to see you at my next attended event, Caerphilly Comic Con.

All Coming Together

Last week or so has been a mad scramble to get artwork finished for Cardiff Film & Comic Con this weekend. A long with dealing printers, restocks and last minute running around I've got the ashcans finished with time to spare.

For those unfortunate peoples unable to attend (sucks I know) I will be posting the Ashcan artwork here after the weekend so everyone gets a sneaky peak at what I have in the works.

I'm hoping to see a bunch of people this weekend and do my usual level best to sell them comics and art as well as chatting absolute nonsense all day long... going to be great

The Nerds Arise

This weekend is Cardiff Film and Comic Con and I've been a busy little monkey getting everything ready for the big day. Hence my lack of posts the past week. That said, some of you who are on the Twitter may have spotted a few sneak peaks at what I have in the works right now and I'll be saving the big reveal for the show this weekend.

So, if you like this;

...these;

...and some of this;

Then come along and say hello. I'll be handing out previews of my upcoming new comic as well as all my normal stuff. 

See you there.

Brave New World

Some time ago I started doing concept art for a an idea I had regarding a fantasy world. The sort of swords and sorcery equivalent of the the post apocalypse genre. I fancied the idea of a fantasy world where all the fantasy races, magic and most of the monsters just all died off. Their presence has left it's mark, but the the world is very much in the hands of humans. However, the Eldar races (to use Tolkien's classification) didn't give human's much of a lasting legacy and now everything has fallen to ruin and chaos. So I started building the world and the peoples that would dwell there and now I'm back to writing again for a few short stories set in this place. I've still got a lot to work out in regards to publishing it later this year, but I'm hoping to get some previews done for CFCC in March (so not a great deal of time.)

Any hoo, here are a few doodles from what I've been working on. Let me know what you think

To anyone thinking of going to CFCC in two weeks, swing by the table for a look at the previews and other comics on offer. For those who have been familiar with my previous title, New Wasteland Fairy Tales, don't panic! I will be returning to Beki and Nigel's adventures in the future, but this is something I need to get out of my system.

"AND MY AXE!"

Took a while. but the little beardy blighters are done. Fully armed and ready to take on what ever gribbly monster the fantasy realms have to throw at them. Below is a montage of the concept-to-completion for one of the little guys.

Between these and the goblins I sculpted last year, I'm really pleased with the out come. The goblins were an experiment to see what I could do sculpting at 28mm scale. The dwarves were an attempt at sculpting something more human. The goblins were all sharp, untidy armour and rags with equally slapdash features and weapons. The dwarves in comparison are the complete opposite; straight edges and neat corners on everything. to say nothing of the facial features. It was a long winded project, but it was fun all the same.

 As ever thoughts and comments are welcome. Any thoughts on what I should try next? for now though, I think I'll go back to some drawing. I've been putting off the comics for far too long.

These Are the Days of High Adventure

As hinted at in a previous post, I've begun working on a new comic idea. New Wasteland Fairy Tales will still be a prominent part of my work in the future, but I just fancied drawing something a bit different. After the masses of Sci-Fi and post-apocalypse themed stuff that I've been doing over the last few months I decided to have a bit of a detox and try some thing else.

The Dwarves have been a great distraction, but I think it's time I put myself back into drawing comics, especially with so many cons coming up this year it would be a shame not to have something new. So here are a few rough sketches of what I've been working on. The story is still pretty fluid a t this point, but I'm happy with the world and characters I've designed so far. Let me know what you think.

I, like most people of sound mind, am a massive fan of the original Conan movie with Arnold Schwarzenegger as the sword swinging, cult smashing, camel punching barbarian himself. So naturally I have always wanted to do something along those lines. The beauty of these stories is the world is pretty open ended which is why all those old comics and movies set in generic fantasy lands were so absurd. You didn't need much plot beyond "Evil Wizard/Warlord/King/Camel Enthusiast is causing problems. send suitable heroes to go sort it out." Add monsters and evil henchmen, maybe an ancient god for extra drama and you're away. As I have told people in the past, I am not a writter be craft so my stories in terms of plot are pretty basic, but I want to draw some kick-ass fight scenes with swords rather than robots.