Fred's Bed (2007)

Back in 2007 I hadn't had a lot published by D.C. Thomson, despite trying to get regular work.  An editor told me they considered me "a Fleetway artist", and it was true that most of my published work since the mid-1980s had been for IPC / Fleetway / Egmont but that's the nature of freelancing; you work for whoever pays you.

I'd drawn some strips for the "Fun Size" versions of Dandy and Beano for Thomsons around the year 2000 (see here), but could never crack the weeklies. Then in 2007, new editor Alan Digby gave me a chance to do a couple of fill-ins on The Beano. One was an Ivy the Terrible strip and the other was Fred's Bed. 

Fred's Bed was usually drawn by Tom Paterson, so I had to "ghost" his style to an extent. Not a problem, as Tom and I both had the same influences to our style (that of Leo Baxendale). 

The script was supplied to me by the editor, but I can't remember if Alan wrote it, or possibly it was by Iain McLaughlin. As this was a try-out for me on the Beano I had to submit pencilled pages first for approval. Alan Digby suggested a couple of changes; panel two needed to be redrawn and the camel needed to look more like a camel, and then I inked the strip. 

I thought you might like to see my pencilled pages compared to my inked pages.

The strip was accepted, and coloured and lettered by the in-house Beano colourists before publication. It was published in The Beano No.3411, which was the Christmas 2007 issue. (Even though my strip had no Christmas relevance I was still very happy to be in the festive edition.) 

It would be another few years before the Beano commissioned me to do regular work though, on Super School, and later on Pup Parade, Ivy the Terrible, and several other strips. Wheels turn slowly at publishers sometimes! 

I'm not currently drawing anything for the Beano. They have a lot of talented young artists these days, but hopefully I'll be back one day!