Wednesday 12 June 2013

MAKING OF THE 2000AD PROG 1836 DEFOE COVER!!!!


GOD, I know it's been bloody ages since Defoe's been in 2000AD! Well there's no need to cry into your pillow every night now, as Pat Mills and I are back baby!!!!


Above you can see the cover that I did, that is now on the shelves of all good comic stores, newsagents, and digitally at the 2000AD store, and the Apple app store! Here's how I created it....

I'll admit now that I was thinking of an idea that wasn't too much work as I was, quite frankly, knackered after drawing the first episode (you'll see why soon). My first idea was the silhouette of a zombie hand, with the shadowy figures of Defoe and his Brethren inside.

Unfortunately, before I submitted it to Tharg, I came across a similar design elsewhere online, so scrapped it!


This was my next idea, and approved by my boss Tharg. Notice how from the beginning, I just coloured it red: knackered, remember...? But hey, it also looked cool and designy.... that's my excuse....

Pencils....


 Inks....
 I don't know if you remember from my previous Aquila covers HERE and HERE, that I've become quite partial to doing washes over my inks before I colour to give it a nice  texture. Here it is on a separate layer done over a lightbox.

The washed page added to the inks...

One shade of red added with some extra digital bits falling off, and it was done!

 I tried adding a background, but decided it didn't work...
 Once sent to 2000AD, the talented design bots came up with this cool advert in the back of last weeks prog, then finally put together the cover at the top of this post!

BOOM! ;)

(Next post will feature the making of the opening double page spread!)

Thursday 6 June 2013

ONE MORE THING.....

Ummm, anyone remember this from a few years ago.....?


Well.........


BOOM!  ;)

OI! READ MY WIFE'S BLOG!!!

Right, I'd like you to check out my wife's blog "A FAD-TASTIC YEAR: 52 THINGS IN 52 WEEKS"!

I'm very proud of Nik for starting this blog where once a week she attempts to do something she's never done before, the latest being a Civil War reenactment! She has a really lovely, entertaining writing style that makes her worthy of the name GALLAGHER, and I'm made up she finally has an outlet for her thoughts!

Check it out and make her feel welcome Blogoverse!!!

L

JUDGE DREDD SKETCH!


Here's a Dredd sketch I've donated to the charity raffle for the Herne Bay Sci-Fi By The Sea event on 16th June. The same lovely guys who brought you last year's Zombie Crawl! Please check it out if you're in the area. Sounds like fun!

DEFOE THE DAMNED INTERVIEW WITH PAT MILLS!


 Hey guys, long time no see!

There's a lot to show and tell in the near future, but I've had to keep my head down getting Defoe done in time for it's release in next wednesday's 2000AD, also available digitally from the 2000AD site!

Still a few more episodes to do, but in the meantime check out this interview with the writer Pat Mills here on CBR, where he also finally says the words I've always wanted to hear....sniff...... ;)

More soon, including a making of the colour image above that will be next week's cover!

L