Hansel and Gretel

A recent illustration for an upcoming production of the Hansel and Gretel opera - A brief respite from writing a doubtless ground-breaking research paper. I'm now in the final stages and then it's open seas for my current comic project.

A Stuck Herring

Potential cover image for my upcoming comic 'The Silver Darlings'. The image is of a herring run through with a white handled gutting knife.

After Donald McGill

A poster created for the Royal Scottish Academy of Music & Drama's upcoming production of Albert Herring http://boxoffice.rsamd.ac.uk/peo/show.asp. Given the parochial tone of this comedy about a period of social change in an East Suffolk village, Donald McGill's saucy sea-side postcards seemed the perfect inspiration. A fleeting departure from ink and watercolour, this was created largely in Photoshop as I wanted it to have a more 1950s/60s travel poster style about it to reflect the setting.

Kaleidoscope @ Orbital Comics

Excited to be exhibiting at the Kaleidoscope exhibition this March, kindly put on by Orbital Comics. It features a range of fantastically diverse, new British Cartoonists from the indie comics scene. Details are on the flyer I put together above and the Facebook event details are right here. No doubt I'll be found loitering covertly in the corner hoping to glean some useful feedback. Thanks especially to Camila at Orbital for making this event happen.

The Silver Darlings - Preview

Open publication - Free publishing - More comic

Three preview pages from a new graphic story due to be published under Blankslate's Chalkmarks imprint later this year. The story concerns a few of the fishermen that I've featured in a couple of previous drawings, it's always great when you find something you really want to draw!

The Lass of Lochroyan

A private commission, this turned out to be how I'd envision a Jean Paul Gaultier ad set in a 1970s fisherman's pub. The song they're singing is an old Scottish ballad from a wonderfully musty tome I have, illustrated by the incomparable Arthur Rackham.

Colour vs Monochrome

An experiment in the impact of grey-scale vs glorious technicolour.

Uncharted Seas

Or was it? This short sequence is a preparatory drawing for a new graphic story I'm working on about a Scottish herring fishing family (the cast of characters can be found here). The story itself will be in black and white, but I wanted to experiment a little in colour...on the evidence of the first wash I was ready to cast the drawing into the ocean, however its proof to me at at least, that it's worth seeing things through to their conclusion.

Tea Service

Illustrations produced for a local business. Twee, yes, but I thought the blog could use a splash of colour.

The Bearded Detective - 3 Page Preview

Open publication - Free publishing - More noir

A three page preview of The Bearded Detective - a slice of silver-screen Noir, set in present day Kentish Town, written by Chris Bye with artwork by myself. The first part is planned for mid 2011 (once I've completed a couple of other projects) and stars Stanley Nicholas. He's a very fine detective, but despite his best efforts is more Prince Philip than Philip Marlowe when it comes to wise talking.