Here's a preview of a couple more panels I drew for Team Toxic in Dimension X that appears in Toxic No.261, out this week.
Toxic has been in published since 2002 and I'm proud to say my work has appeared in every issue. Quite a few imitations of Toxic have come and gone over the years but it still remains the top selling boys magazine. I suppose the moral of that story is: Don't imitate, innovate!
Toxic No.261, on sale 30th September from newsagents and supermarkets.
Here's an advance preview of next week's Team Toxic story in which the Team journey into Dimension X! Basically I gave myself the opportunity to draw various weird aliens like this one. I love creating weird and (hopefully) funny creatures like this.
You can see what happens next in Toxic No.261, on sale in newsagents and supermarkets from Wednesday 30th September.
Copies of the controversial Grindhouse No.8 are banned in Canada but they're now getting into UK comic shops. I've no idea how well it's distributed though, but my nearest Forbidden Planet had one yesterday. It's published in a sealed plastic bag because of its sexually graphic story by Alex De Campi and John Lucas, but my back page strip (which isn't sexually graphic but does feature Satan) can be seen through the polybag. Milo Manara art on the front cover, comic strip by me on the back cover. What a team-up. :-)
Grindhouse: Drive In, Bleed Out No.8. Published by Dark Horse. $3.99 (about £3.15 in UK comic shops). A digital edition is also available from the Dark Horse Comics app and Comixology.
The next show I'll be attending will be Comic Con Leicester on Sunday 11th October at Athena, Queen Street, Leicester LE1 1QD.
As Leicester was my grandad's birthplace I've always had a soft spot for the place so I'm looking forward to revisiting the city. Other guests include talented comics artist/writer Rachael Smith, Dark Pond Creations, and SFX makeup artist Stuart Conran amongst others.
The Comic Con Leicester webpage is here:
http://www.comicconleicester.co.uk/
You can find out more info at the convention Facebook page here:
https://www.facebook.com/events/846357075452460/
Here's an illustration of Octobriana that I did recently for a new book about the character which has been published by Kult Creations. Who is Octobriana? An underground character that has been around for years and, unusually, is in the public domain. Truly a woman of the people.
John A. Short has researched the background of this fascinating character and has revealed all in his excellent book Octobriana: The Underground History, which I'll be reviewing on my other blog, Blimey!, as soon as I've had time to read it all.
For the moment though I thought I'd show you my contribution to the book, in its original black and white form. For the published version, John has added colour and some amusing text. Buy the book to see it!
You can find out more about Octobriana: The Underground History, and other publications by Kult Creations, by visiting their website here:
http://kultcreations.blogspot.co.uk/
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| Cover by Simon Breeze |
Doctor Who returns in a new 12 part series to BBC 1 this Saturday (19th September) and the Daleks are back for the first two episodes as well! To celebrate this I've done a special Dalek-centric episode of my strip The Daft Dimension for the next issue of the official Doctor Who Magazine.
That issue will be in the shops this Thursday (Sept. 17th) and is a bumper 100 page issue with previews of the new series, plus the regular 12 page Doctor Who comic strip and lots more. It'll be bagged with a massive free poster. Here's the bag design to look out for. Don't miss it!
I thought that some of you might be interested in seeing the rough mock up of the Brickman Returns! cover compared to the finished version.
On the left are my rough pencils which I scanned into Photoshop in two halves. This left a shadow across the join but that didn't matter as it was just for a quick mock up for my own use so that I could determine where to place the cover text.
As you can see, I made a few alterations to both the drawing and the cover copy before the end result.
After I'd done this rough I then finalised the pencils, inked it, and scanned it into Photoshop again so I could colour it. You'll notice that I didn't complete the characters on the left. They'd be partially obscured by captions so there was no point in drawing them in full. Anyway, at this point it was time to add colour. Firstly the flats...
...then the finished, graduated colours. It took me a while to decide on the background colour. I didn't want to leave it white, and a plain colour didn't feel right either. At one point I was thinking of going with the version seen on the left (below) but I felt that the characters would stand out better with some yellow behind them, so the one on the right was my final choice.
I added a few more stars and gnats, rejigged the logo and cover text, and the cover was done. Then it was time to send the files of the entire issue off to the printer.
The finished result looks spectacular. Full marks to UK Comics Creative for doing such a fantastic printing job!
If you'd like to buy a copy it's available now from my online shop:
http://www.lewstringer.com/page7.htm
The first review is in, and it's over on The Oink! Blog here:
http://the-oink-blog.blogspot.co.uk/2015/09/brickman-returns-as-does-lew-stringer.html
