I say experienced because once that film started it’s beauty pulled me into what can be only desribed as a waking dream.

The entire thing was hand drawn on paper ( Hand Drawn, people ) before being run through the digital processes to add all the affects. And believe me, that human touch added a very fluid, living aspect to the whole film.

The director, Tomm Moore, commented in an interview that Genndy Tartakovsky’s Samurai Jack was an influending factor in designing the look of the picture and I can certainly see why. Imagine a long episode of one of Genndy Tartakovsky’s cartoons ( Samurai Jack, Star Wars: Clone Wars cartoons, Dexter’s Lab ) but supported with a nice solid budget of $8 million.

I could talk on here about how beautifully designed and mesmerising this film is but I think you should just watch this trailer instead.

Go, go now. Shoo!

What are you waiting for? Go watch it!

The Secret of Kells

…and if you like the look of it, guess what? The blu-ray is barely more than £4 on amazon.co.uk. No excuses. Enjoy!

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“Where’s my Shoggoth?” has now oozed itself online. Respected internet sellers Amazon and Forbidden Planet are now offering hardback copies for pre-order at the gentle price of £6 a pop. So if you know you want a copy might be worth taking advantage of the pre-order discount!

On non-Shoggoth related news we recently completed a piece for the Walsall Synchronised Swimming Club. 500 square feet is currently dangling poolside ready for the club’s 40th anniversary show this coming week ( picture below ).

One of my prior tutees is taking part and I know for a fact that she is now at the level where she is competing in national championships so it should be quite a show.

If you’re in the area and fancy seeing some up and coming athletic talent then click on the following link. The tickets are very reasonable and I know I am certainly looking forward to it.

http://www.walsallssc.webeden.co.uk/

They don’t touch the bottom during any of the routines. That’s a damn sight fitter than I’ve been for years.

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Disappointingly my 2000ad submission was rejected the other week. However I must say I’m grateful for the time they took to actually look through my work and offer some criticisms and suggestions for improvement. Submissions for 2000ad need to be based on previously printed scripts and in this case Tony Lee was good enough to allow me access to one of his printed Tales From The Black Museum ( Judge Dredd Megazine #285, June ’09 ).

Ironically, some of my favourite parts were their least favourite and some of the panels that I thought were “sore thumbs” ( small anatomical errors etc. ) were some of their favourites. It just goes to show how subjective it can be some times.

Nonetheless, criticism and analysis is always helpful and gives me a fresh perspective on my style, process and general areas of needed improvement.

If it was easy I’d get bored and wouldn’t do it. I’m a masochist.

Even so, I think the work is decent enough to throw on here. Otherwise, it’s only going to languish in my studio.

Click on the square images immediately below and you can scan your way through the pages in order. Hope you enjoy!

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After bouncing back and forth between Archaia and both Ian and myself “Where’s My Shoggoth?” is on it’s way to the printers.

A number of changes were made, most notably to the cover. However we also took the time to add in some extra pages and even a game as well!

It’s due out June/July 2012 and as we ooze closer to the date and deatails start to congeal I shall reproduce them here.

Meanwhile here some more piccies to whet your appetites for cephalopods!

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In short, it’s a horror book for both kids and adults

Last night I finally signed with Archaia (Artesia, Mouse Guard, Okko, Fraggle Rock) witnessed by a public notary with her crazy stamped seals to make it all legal and everything.

And yesterday the cover was also submitted so they can include it in their Spring 2012 catalogue.

So I’m sat here wiping the sleep out of my eyes and the eyes of my account ( and nursing a belly that probably ate too many chillies in his celebratory curry last night ). But I’m writing this blog to whet your appetite with a few piccies of the cover and a couple of the incomplete pages. Over the coming months I’ll be uploading some of the pages I have been working and will be working on.

But what is a shoggoth? I’m sure that a good number of people reading this will at least have heard of H.P.Lovecraft, but for everyone else’s benefit he was a horror writer around during the early 1900s. What makes him stand out amongst other horror writers was the unique way he took note of the prevalent scientific discoveries of the time.

During that period the world had seen the actual full beginnings of astronomy and how the universe works, the acceptance of Darwinist evolution as a model for all life on earth, the most catastrophic Great War ( World War 1 ) the world had ever seen, the publication of Einstein’s Theory of General Relativity explaining that the world we see is not the world that exists and the inconstant nature of time… and those are just some of the many fundamentally world changing discoveries that mankind was witness to.

Around 1900 the world changed substantially in a very short amount of time, and H. P. Lovecraft captured all of that fresh uncertainty of man’s ‘place in the universe’ in his horror.

So now you have the context, what is a shoggoth? O.K., O.K. I’ll get on with it.

In Lovecraft’s Cthulhu mythos, millions of years ago our world was colonised by incredibly powerful beings, so powerful and advanced they appear as gods. Just to witness their existence is to lose your mind. Most of them have left though some of them are still here, only sleeping and biding their time to reclaim this planet from it’s fresh inheritors, us. And a shoggoth is one of the creatures they brought with them.

The entirety of ‘Where’s my Shoggoth?’ is fairly simple in nature but through the eyes of it’s young hero(?), Ian and I take the reader on a quick, whistle-stop tour of a number of the monsters of Lovecraft’s absorbing, high concept worlds.

You know that thing that goes bump in the night? Well, it’s in the book and it’s going to apologise for waking you but says it is necessary to rob you of your sanity.

Thanks very much.

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Whilst potential work is still in potentia the last few months have seen me working my behind off on my current college contracts. Running from one campus to another and then off to the studio leaves your head in a state of gentle spinning, I must admit.

But I enjoy it. I like the variety and I like the challenge.

Meanwhile, there are a few cheap events that have been hapenning in Brum that are worth paying attention to:

One of them is Afternoon Play. For anyone looking for a cheap lazy Sunday out of the house (and also looking to avoid the rabid Christmas masses) then Afternoon Play is worth a look. To any game players out there, basically everyone brings an unusual game to play and the Sunday afternoon is spent relaxing in a cafe drinking, eating and playing the games people fancy. Last month some of the games on offer were Bang! (a Western style card game), Roborally (where players have to guide their robots through deathtraps) and Anti-monopoly (where entrepreneurs send monopolists bankrupt).

Another regular event worth checking out is Skeptics in the Pub. In short its a contribution based event (so drop a few quid in the jar at the end of the night) and, in their own words:

“Skeptics in the Pub (SitP) exists to provide an opportunity for people who are interested in science, skepticism, rationalism, critical thinking to socialise and discuss matters of interest. Each month we invite someone to come and speak to us, and if there’s someone you’d like to hear, let us know!”

The speakers range from the stand-up comedy Mathematics of Matt Parker to widely read authors like Simon Singh.

After a Christmas break the next event is on Jan 12th and the guest speaker is a man at partially responsible for Intelligent Design being taught in science classes. Quite a controversial topic and it will be interesting to hear what he has to say to us here in the UK, one of the most atheistic countries in the world.

Check them out and if you’re at loose end and in the area then come along

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God Squad and Brass House: Both of these are with writer Anthony Jones and have been self published with minds to be distributed by a creator owned publisher. Brass House was well received and Anthony is currently following this interest up. Will post more on that as it becomes appropriate.

Where’s My Shoggoth?: with writer Ian Thomas. An all-ages “kids” book with a cthulhu twist. At NYCC we had interest shown in this so at the moment this is being beefed up ready for a formal pitch next week.

Empyre: with writer Stephen Aryan. Imagine Spooks meets Brian Lumley, so politics, action and tension but with a good vampiric twist in there too. Insomnia Publications originally introduced Stephen and I over this project with the intent to release the full 90 pages of it as a graphic novel. Since they no longer exist, Stephen and I are revisiting it with a mind to pitch it as another creator owned project.

On top of these I’m still looking at other work going on around me, trying to stop myself from being pigeon holed into one project until it has some sort of official greenlight. As soon as one of them does it will be full steam ahead whilst busily lining up the next one!

Busy busy busy. Theres always a lot of frustration getting some of these up and running, and if I had limitless cash and time then all would get an equal treatment and see print asap. But, as everything seems to be, strategising my time seems the best idea for now until they all see print.

Will report in when the next development occurs.

Over and out.

+m

The walk back to my car was less than pleasant however. Getting set upon by a 10 strong group of drunks can really ruin a night.

Anyone who decides that randomly punching and throwing someone around in the street is acceptable should have their index and forefinger removed. My reasons being that this would stop them from being able to punch, slap and grab people. But it would still be humane as, provided they can use their thumbs, they’d be able to pick up items just slightly more effectively than a cat.

Conversely, passersby who shout out “don’t bother with the police, they won’t do anything” should probably grow their relevant sexual organs. Watching a couple of people get smacked around and then shouting that out is basically cowardice. Certainly being outnumbered is not a very winnable situation, but to not even step up and then to tell the victims they should know their place is so bovine they should probably consider a career change into a burger or a milk-maker.

And finally, the police and bouncers did do something. The bouncers kicked the group out of the next pub they walked into and the police arrived shortly after and tried to catch up to them. No, the group were probably not going to be caught and locked up. And no the police were not going to sever the group’s fingers ( mores the pity ). But the police did know who they were, the group did know they had to keep a low profile and so I did know that no one else was going to get a worse beating by the end of the night.

You can’t stop a societies problems with violence but you should at least try and do what is right. Let the right people know and the system can deal with the rest.

But walking around thinking it’s ok to be a victim? That actually makes you worse than a thug.

If that’s all you can do then you’re a bigger problem than they are and you can get in the same line as all the newly fingerless freaks, awaiting their turn to be made into meat pies for someone more deserving.

Spines are free you know. They come as part of the “vertebrate package”.

Use them.

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Lots of interest from all the right people so now it’s just following it up. Some of the work I’ve been doing  got more interest than the others but I have some ideas on how to get them up to scratch. More to come.

However, one of the best things about New York was knowing some of the locals. Big thanks to Lurch Triple Stack and co. for telling us where we needed to go to see the underbelly of New York City. We got away from the mostly-shiny convenience of Manhattan and saw some of the grit and talent that so many who live and visit there seem quick to forget.

Back to unpacking I go but here are some photos of the above mentioned we were lucky to have seen. And a photo of the sun setting on Coney Island pier. You can’t go to New York without going to Coney Island! My week long search for a Twinkie was satisfied there too.

Hey, after Zombieland I had to know what the fuss was about!

+m

Fantastic mix ( or hybrid in fact ) of rock, dance and sometimes even orchestral, their music is all but unknown in the popular market. But then a lot of good music is.

Often sounding like the soundtracks to a fast paced sci-fi film they’re really good to listen to when conjuring up something futuristic and fantastical. Or even just when playing a sci-fi game.

In fact one of Hybrid’s albums is even called Morning Sci-Fi.

Recently I discovered Fluke’s overlooked side projects, 2 Bit Pie and Syntax, and I’ve got to say it really is criminal how overlooked they are.

Check them out:

Hybrid track – Empire

Fluke track – Absurd