The latest Daft preview

The 588th issue of Doctor Who Magazine is out this Thursday and amongst its packed contents there'll be another Daft Dimension comic strip from me. Here's a tiny section of one panel, cropped to avoid spoiling the joke. 

See the complete strip plus tons of other features in the official Doctor Who Magazine No.588 when it hits the shops on Thursday 2nd March! 

 ******************

Thank You!

 A big heartfelt thank you to everyone who placed bids on my artwork over the past week and congratulations to the winners. As we all know, these are hard times for all of us, and things were looking dicey with a huge gas bill to pay tomorrow but the funds will now cover it. Phew! 

Someone asked me the other day if I'd miss the artwork I'm selling. There are some pages I'd have liked to have kept but rather than storing them here for more years I'd rather they go to collectors who'll appreciate them. I don't have any family who'll inherit my artwork when I'm gone so I'm happy to let the pages go.

I'm just glad the publishers returned my art after use years ago so I can make them available to you folks now. Back in the 1980s/90s my editor on Buster was happy to parcel up my used pages and post them back to me every few months. This opportunity was open to all the Buster artists but I was surprised when the editor told me that only a few of us wanted our art back. If memory serves me right, Tom Paterson and perhaps Mark Bennington had theirs returned too. The older artists saw no sentimental or resale value in them and didn't want them. I don't think that older generation realised that there'd be interest from collectors years later. 

I understand that much of the art was destroyed by the publishers in "decluttering" exercises. Some pages did remain though, and were either bought by collectors or are still safely stored by the current owners of the IPC/Fleetway archives, Rebellion.

In contrast, D.C. Thomson have always held onto their original art and have decades of pages stored away in a secret vault.

Viz were happy to return artwork too. 

In the case of Marvel UK, I used to visit the offices in London now and then to collect my old pages.  

Since 1999 I've sent my art to publishers via email, so the original pages never leave the room, - well, until I post them to eBay winners of course. I'll be putting some more pages up for auction soon. Keep an eye on this blog for more details!

******************************

Latest auction ends on 26th Feb!

My current auction of my original artwork ends tomorrow night (Sunday 26th Feb). 

You can read about each item on my previous post at this link...

http://lewstringercomics.blogspot.com/2023/02/original-art-from-viz-oink-buster-and.html

...and the eBay page is here:

https://www.ebay.co.uk/sch/i.html?item=203554298786&rt=nc&_trksid=p2047675.l2562&_ssn=graphite47

Good luck with your bids!

*************************

The PETE AND HIS PIMPLE comic from 1987

 

Back in 1987 when I was a regular contributor to Oink! comic, editor Mark Rodgers asked me to produce an 8 page pull-out comic featuring my popular Pete and His Pimple character. Here you can see my initial cover rough and the finished printed version. Mark added the "with Pull-Out Plooky Poster" comment in his red editorial ink.

I had complete control over the 8 page comic from script, design and art and it was very enjoyable to do. Rather than hogging (piggy pun) the whole 8 pages myself I asked Ed McHenry and Mike Higgs to draw a couple of the back up features. The comic appeared as part of Oink! No.41 and you can read all about it over on Phil Boyce's Oink! Blog at this link...

https://oink.blog/2022/11/14/oink-41-pop-out-comic/

***************************************

Original art from VIZ, OINK!, BUSTER, and MARVEL UK and more up for sale!

 I've listed more items for sale on my eBay page. This time there are original pages of mine from Viz and other titles....

An original Suicidal Syd page from Viz that I drew back in 2004. (Adults only.)...

https://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/204249317826

 

One of my earliest professional strips, Snail-Man from Marvel UK's Spider-Man Comic (1985)...

https://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/204249336044 

 

 

Another very early strip of mine, and I think my first Christmas strip, a Robo-Capers from Marvel UK's Transformers (1985)... 

https://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/204249327417

 

A Tom Thug page from Buster comic (1990)...

https://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/204248774118

 

A Pete and his Pimple page from Oink! (1988)...

https://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/204249322928 

 

and a brand new full colour Brickman sketch plus the 2005 Brickman Begins book...

https://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/204249467504

The auctions for the above items run until next Sunday (25th February). 

************************

The other items I listed last week are still for sale too, with the following ending this coming Wednesday (22nd February)...

Brickman and Captain America artwork from Jack Kirby Quarterly (1997)...

https://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/204245177839

 

Combat Colin from Transformers (1989)...

https://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/204245170657 

 

A Daft Dimension strip from Doctor Who Magazine (2017)...

https://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/204245166848 

 

Another early work of mine, Captain Wally from Marvel UK's Spider-Man comic (1985)...

https://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/204245161376 

 

Good luck with your bids!

https://www.ebay.co.uk/sch/i.html?item=203554298786&rt=nc&_trksid=p2047675.l2562&_ssn=graphite47

*****************

Shouty is back next month!

Yesterday I sent in my pages to The77 for the next Sgt.Shouty episode and you can see the result next month when The77 No.9 goes on sale. 

To reveal more would provide too many spoilers so I'm only showing one panel here with the dialogue removed. 

I really enjoy contributing to The77, and with a character that's my own creation too.  It's a fresh and exciting comic and features loads of other all new strips too of course, from a variety of creators including Steve Bull, Ade Hughes, Dave Leeley, Andrw Sawyers, and more.

You can pre-order The77 No.9 and the back issues from their webstore at this link:

https://the77comic.bigcartel.com/ 

COVER BY STEVE KANE.

 ••••••••••••••••••••••••••••

Original art for sale. CAPTAIN WALLY! COMBAT COLIN! DOCTOR WHO! BRICKMAN and... CAPTAIN AMERICA!

I'm selling more of my original artwork on eBay this week so I hope that those of you who missed out last time will find someting to interest you here. 

There's one of my earliest characters here as a page of Captain Wally is up for sale. This strip appeared in Marvel UK's Spider-Man Comic No.649 way back in 1985! Not only does it feature Captain Wally but it's also the very first appearance of my Macho Man character when he was a villain, before I rebooted him as a hero for his own strip in Secret Wars comic.

https://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/204245161376?hash=item2f8df5d5a0:g:7v0AAOSwTcZj7UNG

 

Next, there's a Daft Dimension strip from 2017. The original art for the episode that appeared in the official Doctor Who Magazine No.508, featuring three Doctors! As a bonus I'm also including my initial roughed out idea for the strip plus a full colour print of the final version.

https://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/204245166848?hash=item2f8df5eb00:g:OCYAAOSwlM9j7UVm

 

Thirdly, original art for a Combat Colin strip from Marvel UK's Transformers No.218 (1989) in which Colin meets Jim Bowen!

https://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/204245170657?hash=item2f8df5f9e1:g:gt0AAOSwaNZj7UcJ

 

Last but not least a very unique item from me. Back in 1997 I was asked to draw a page for the Jack Kirby Quarterly magazine and was sent a photocopy of a Jack Kirby pencil sketch to ink via my lightbox. The result is me doing Kirby-style art of Captain America and Brickman!  

https://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/204245177839?hash=item2f8df615ef:g:bW8AAOSwmO5j7Uhf 

 

These four auctions run for a week, ending on Wednesday 22nd February. See the links above for more photos of each item. Good luck with your bids! 

*****************************

Testing Times!

These truly are Testing Times but the reason for using it as a blog post is that's the title of a page I drew for next week's Beano. It was drawn back in December and has seen print in Beano No.4173, which will be in the shops on Wednesday 15th February.

It was a pleasure to draw all the Bash Street Kids, including the new ones. Although not in the script I thought I'd add a few of their dogs too, as I miss doing the Pup Parade strips. I know readers miss them too so I hope they'll enjoy seeing them included here.

This week is the 69th anniversary of The Bash Street Kids, who first appeared in the Beano in 1954.

I've no idea when I'll be in the Beano again but I had fun drawing this full pager. Here's how it looked when I started pencilling it. I then inked it and scanned the page into Photoshop where I applied the colours.

 

Animal Planet cancelled in Thomson cutbacks

No doubt you've heard the news that D.C. Thomson announced massive cutbacks yesterday with 300 redundancies and several magazines being cancelled. 

https://www.theguardian.com/media/2023/feb/09/beano-stylist-dc-thomson-cut-staff

One of the titles ending is the superb Animal Planet magazine, which just goes to prove that quality is no guarantee of success. Animal Planet (recently retitled Animal Planet Kids) was a fun magazine about animals and the environment that was presented with more depth than most kids' mags. Its free gifts were also of a higher quality, created especially for the magazine and made of card or paper, not plastic, to reflect the magazine's respect for the environment. On the occasions where it was "bagged", even the bag was paper, not plastic.

I was an occasional contributor to Animal Planet, with the Bad Pets strip which was written by Nigel Auchterlounie. It'd rotate with other strips so it didn't appear every month but it was always a pleasure to contribute. There are still two unpublished strips; one featuring a moose (panel shown at the top of this post) and another featuring an octopus. I've no idea where or even if they'll ever be used but thank you to DCT editor Claire Bartlett for commissioning me for the gig. (Claire also works on the Beano.)

A far bigger blow of course is for the 300 staff who are about to lose their jobs. These are terrible times for publishing, or in most industries really, and my thoughts are with them.

With rising bills and less work it's hard to see any positive future in publishing. I wish I could end this post on a more upbeat note but I hope you'll enjoy these two examples of the Bad Pets strip that were so enjoyable to draw...

 

 

Returning to MACC-POW! this July!

I'm very pleased to say that I'll be back in Macclesfield on 1st July for Macc-Pow! 2023, a convention devoted to comics that I always enjoy attending. See you there!

Other guests announced so far are:

ALISON SAMPSON
NICK BROKENSHIRE
MOLLIE RAY
EMMELINE PIDGEN
GENIE ESPINOSA
CHRIS CHATTERTON
NIGEL PARKINSON
NIKA
DAVID LEACH
TOR FREEMAN
SONIA LEONG

For more info see:

https://www.facebook.com/maccpow 

********************************

Combat Colin!

Just a reminder that my Combat Colin comics are still available to buy from my eBay listings. Issues 1 and 4 have sold out but I still have stock of Nos.2 and 3. Each issue features self contained stories. 

The comics collect my Combat Colin strips that I did for Marvel UK over 30 years ago. 

Combat Colin No.2 reprints the Combat Colin stories from Transformers Nos.153 to 225, February 1988 to July 1989.

Combat Colin No.3 reprints the Combat Colin stories from Transformers Nos.226 to 256, July 1989 to February 1990, plus bonus back up items. 

Available exclusively from me at this link, posted first class in a card-backed envelope:

https://www.ebay.co.uk/sch/i.html?item=203554298786&rt=nc&_trksid=p2047675.l2562&_ssn=graphite47 

•••••••••••••••••••••••••••••• 

 

Kirknewton Story comic in art exhibition

Artwork from The Kirknewton Story comic that I contributed to last year is currently in an exhibition at the Howden Park Centre in Livingston. It runs from 3rd February to 9th April.

I understand that most of the pages on display are prints, as the original art resides with each artist. I was pleasantly surprised to hear that a print from my story, Close Encounters, scripted by Colin Maxwell, is part of the exhibition (see above) along with many other images by other artists.

My thanks to Jeremy Briggs for sending me these photos from his visit.

You can read more about the exhibition, and it's forthoming comic con, at this link:

https://comicscene.org/howden-park-comic-art-festival-and-comic-con-2023/

Also info on the Down The Tubes blog at this link:

https://downthetubes.net/the-kirknewton-story-comic-art-exhibition-announced-supported-by-heritage-lottery-scotland

**************************************

Tom Thug and Doctor Who art in auction

Only a few days to go on this week's auction of my original artwork.

You can bid on a Tom Thug page from the 1988 Oink! Summer Special at this link:

https://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/204228106615?hash=item2f8cf19977:g:GbcAAOSw7R1j1uCY

...a very early Daft Dimension (actually the second one I did) from Doctor Who Magazine at this link:

https://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/204228114197?hash=item2f8cf1b715:g:9HwAAOSwMXpj1uMO

...and another Daft Dimension, this time featuring the Zarbi, at this link:

https://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/204228109497?hash=item2f8cf1a4b9:g:CigAAOSwbQ5j1uH8

You can see more photos of each item in close up at those links.

Good luck with your bids! Auctions end on Sunday evening, 5th February.

•••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••

One Year Ago...

This time last year I was drawing the Oink the Seal page for the Stingray Comic Special! The comic was one of the items that was part of the Stingray Deluxe Limited Edition Box Set produced by Network. 

It made a nice change to draw something different like this, especially as Stingray was one of my favourite TV shows as a child. 

The box set is still available and can be bought from The Official Gerry Anderson Store at this link:

https://shop.gerryanderson.com/products/stingray-the-complete-series-deluxe-limited-edition-blu-ray-region-b 

Cover art by Steve Kyte.