I always intended to blog at least once a month...

...so I am posting another page from my Crimson Iris strip, this one leading on directly from the last.

What I've been up to...

I've really enjoyed doing this drawing, mainly that of the Crimson Iris herself, and the colouring has been a real self-teaching thing - I've been doing it more professionally with the help of The DC Comics Guide to Coloring and Lettering Comics, which is absolutely excellent and I think will be crucial to my work in future! You'll notice that there isn't any dialog yet... this is for two reasons - because the Lettering section of the book requires far more precision and care, and because the dialog is to be in Italian, which I do not speak! Anyway, I hope you like it, its still a work in progress so please tell me what you think!

Batgirl sketches.

More Viper!

Another image of The Viper, this time in the role of the femme fatale!

Enter The Viper!

The Viper is another of my characters, something of a villain, a mercenary and assassin who is in possession of a piece of alien technology called the Viper Vest. It links into the nervous system and allows total physical metamorphosis, which means that the Viper could be anybody. Literally anybody, man, woman, child, priest, senator, police sergeant, Barbra Streisand. Anybody. That's what makes the Viper exciting to me - you could have a whole comic series and never actually know who the main character really is. And being a mercenary really opens up story possibilities too. Visually the viper vest presents quite a challenge, having the colours and visual texture of oil. I know I could pick something easier, but that's what it looks like in my head - that or beetle shell colours, but that was even harder to pull off! As usual, I don't expect to get around to developing this idea further, as much as I'd like to... so many ideas, so little time!

Mist Maiden!

This was an experiment, trying to do some kind of hair texture, which I actually think worked pretty well. I have no use for it beyond that, but every day is a school day! x

Atomic Woman in... A Friend in Need

Part 2 of an occasional series! Previously, Ubero sought answers to the mysterious diminishing of his super powers...

A little bit of sunday sketching!

I didn't really sleep last night, and I've been restless all day. I don't know why, it's just been a weird day. I thought I would do some sketching to give my mind some exercise, and this is the result. It, or something rather like it, would make a fun nightclub flier, if any club promoters are reading! Ha ha, that seems oh-so-likely! x

More from The Crimson Iris!

I did this sort-of Lautrec inspired poster image this evening... I really like it, and I think I'd like it as a poster in my house! I hope you like it too! x

The Crimson Iris

This is somebody I thought up whilst driving back from Newquay t'other day. She's called the Crimson Iris and she is dedicated to ending organized crime, whatever the cost.
When I was growing up we had a swing set that faced a flower bed of these tall, deep red Irises, and for some reason they made me uneasy. They struck me as very fleshy flowers, and their colour was almost bloody. It may be that, or anything else, that gave me the creeps.
I thought for this character - which I have absolutely no use for - I would recycle that vague fear from childhood, so that she might seem more real to me. Whoever she is, I have decided that she too grew up afraid of Irises. x

Ubero in... Power Outage! Or something that sounds cooler...

I'm going to try to continue this every now and again... I have been deeply inspired by the total brilliance that is DC's Wednesday Comics, which you should definitely read if you like comics. Anyway, back to the Ubero piece above, I was trying to do something sort of organic and very colourful! Let me know what you think of it, as always I'm very grateful for suggestions! By-the-by, Ubero is a software company or something, but I'm not changing his name now that I know that, because this blog has about five readers and I'm sure y'all won't care! x

Just something I did ages ago!

I seem to have been very social of late and haven't really done much to put on here... I've been continuing with the Chalice project, and I've done a couple of nice pages of that, but I'm not gonna blog 'em until it's all done! I did the picture above ages ago, and never got round to finishing it, so I thought I'd put it on the blog just to get it out there rather than leaving it languishing on the hard drive! I really enjoyed doing this one actually - I was trying to stretch myself in terms of the buildings and the car - things which I usually hate drawing - and I was really pleased with the result.

Another design for Chalice...

Cookie Cutter, investigative journalist!

What I've been up to today...

These are images I've been messing around with today... I created the Chalice character on the back of receipts back when I worked at Zara in Bluewater about five years ago, and my best mate Matt and I came up with a good backstory for him. We got all creative again last night and decided to drag the story out of mothballs, so I've been updating designs today... there are others too, but are we really interested in seeing his dowdy housekeeper? We worked out a much better structured story, and are going to hammer out a proper script any day now, so maybe possibly perhaps I might be able to put up some proper sequential art some time in the not-too-distant! I hope you like these images - the bottom one was just me messing about with elements of the top one, but Ilike it! x

Any better?

I've taken on board some suggestions and some more ideas I had... any better? Or is it worse? You tell me! xXx

What do you think?

I've been doing this tonight - What do you think? How can I improve it? I'd really value your suggestions! Either comment here, or message me on facebook (the link's at the side --->)! Thanks, my artistic brain-trust! x

Long time no blog...

I have been doing messy, oil-painty art at the moment, and as I have no camera I have had nothing to put on this here blog! But I am determined not to just forget about it, so I've done this cute picture of one of my comics characters, named Madame Juno (you may have worked that out). She's a psychic investigator (you might've got that too). I like this drawing, it's quite fresh and sort of 50s looking, and I really like the flat colouring. I definitely prefer it to the Victory Girl drawing from a few weeks ago - it was more fun to draw, and i think that comes through when you look at it. I hope you like it too! x

Victory Girl!

This is the second generation of a character I invented recently called Victory Girl. She was active in the sixties and seventies, embodying the spirit of victory during the cold war! I was practicing with a new shading technique on photoshop. I'm not over-keen on the finished effect, but it's a learning curve!

Zomboy!

This is Zomboy, a character my bezzie mate and I came up with a few years back... I was in need of drawing last night so I knocked it up on the tablet! It's a bit gothic - more halloween than easter - but it suits the undead hero! I think this is influenced by Damion Scott's artwork. Zomboy is a member of a group of young heroes who were inspired by a bunch of people we saw sunbathing one day... One of them was completely still, as though dead... and lo, Zomboy was born! I hope you like it! x

By the way....

I've been painting Munnies lately, and might put some pictures on here soon if you're interested? Quite honestly I don't even know if anyone's reading this - If you are please comment so I know if it's worth bothering, because frankly I find cameras really boring! Doctor Who is on TV on saturday - how exciting! I'm rambling now, so I'm gonna go and do some kind of doodling... Take care now! <3

Happy Easter!

I drew this a while back - it's that thing where you draw a random shape and see what you can turn it into.And it looked a bit like a bunny, so I made it into an easter thing and saved it for a later date - and here it is! I like the colour of it - its kind of 50s, I think? Anyway, Happy Easter!

Wonder Woman!

I doodled this last night with the Bamboo, and I quite like it! I think I had the influence of Mike Sekowsky in mind.

More La Jetee!

I drew this one last night, an image of the Utopian future visited by the protagonist. I wanted the future to look both seductive and innocent, having overcome the problems faced by our hero's own time. I'm not keen on the man on the left, but the two ladies are nice. Are the nipple areas too much? I quite like them, but maybe I'm too close to it!

La Jetee

I've been interested for ages now in doing a comic book based on La Jetee, the film by Chris Marker. One day -probably when i've retired - I might get around to really doing it! I drew this with my Wacom Bamboo, I really like the crisp effect it gives.

First Post!

This is my first post on this blog - I probably won't post much, but I thought it would be a good way to show the art I've been doing and the things I've been looking at. If you like anything you see on here and want to know more, feel free to comment and I'll try to get back to you! I hope you like it! x