Friday 27 May 2011

More Greybeard images

Practice waves for the Greybeard poem I'm illustrating, most of the action takes place at sea so I thought I'd better get better at drawing waves. I started writing and illustrating this poem back in 2009 and have recently been seized by a desire to finish it.




"Land Ahoy!!” Shouted Greybeard then looking around
With the sudden intensity of a bloodhound,
For Master Moth his last ships mate
Just the thought made him salivate.
He's not on deck, maybe in the Galley
Thought Greybeard as he rubbed his belly,
But he wasn't there, nor on the lower decks
Or anywhere else that Greybeard checked
Meanwhile the Moth arrived at the figurehead,
Where he grabbed Mr. Flea and away they fled 
Towards the isle of their salvation
The wee flea quivered in anticipation,
But the island was far, Mr. Moth grew tired,
His arms grew clammy with the sweat he perspired
They became so slippery that Mr. Flea fell
And splashed into the tumultuous swell
Narrowly avoiding a hungry mackerel.






                     
Mr. Flea surfaced with a gasp of relief
To his good fortune he was close to a leaf,
With sides curled up like a canoe.
He climbed aboard and searched for a clue
As to the whereabouts of his ally
Though he saw no trace in the sea or sky,
And so he called out to him, concerned,
But sadly his calls went unreturned
Mr. Flea never did see the moth again,
His friend had succumbed to the food chain.
Meanwhile onboard the Regal the crew still evaded
The sights of the Captain so he worked unaided
Working the ropes he pulled and adjusted
To make the most of the wind when it gusted.
The tropical ocean did its best to convey
The Spider and Flea each in their own way,
Towards the very same sandy bay.

Thursday 19 May 2011

The Right to Talk to Strangers

These are for Simon Comber's EP release tour of the U.S. 
I started doing it in my normal way, doing a drawing then adding colour with tracing paper and pencil scanned into photoshop, but then almost at the due date I decided to just paint it with gouache and ink instead. The tour dates didn't fit into the text box I left so I did three separate posters for the central west coast, the northwest and the east. For more info on Simon Comber and his tour check out his myspace and/or website



The colours were inspired by this picture from a 60's interior design book, its very inspiring.

From the sketchbook

These are for my long slumbering Greybeard project, it's an epic poem about a spider who is the captain of a ship and his gullible crew of moths, fleas and flies.

From the garden.

This is my cat Shorty, she was a stray who turned up last October. Her talent is sleeping in ridiculously cute positions, showing off her fluffy tum. These were pencil sketches which I filled in with ink and touches of gouache. When she closes her eyes she is almost entirely monochrome, just little touches of pink on her nose and paws, it lends itself to ink very nicely.

Radio As Paper launch!

Get yourself to Berlin on the 28th of May! The comics anthology Radio As Paper (edited my the talented Jerome Bihan) is being released to the world. I did the cover:

More info on the RAP blog

Cheese box

I've been pretty bad a putting things up this year, slacker! Here's a project I completed some months ago. My friends wanted a mailbox which looked like a wedge of cheese, so they built it and I painted it. Got a bit carried away and was compelled to put a mouse wearing a bow tie and shades telling a cheesy joke.