Thought Bubble

At the minute I'm the bus stop at Leeds airport waiting for the bus to bring me to the Thought Bubble Festival. Graham Pearce, creator of the hilarious Sgt Mike Battle comic is sharing his table at the con with me over the weekend, so if you're about, call over to table 179 in Saville Hall and say hello.

I'll be selling copies of Jennifer Wilde #1, as well as Cancertown, Slaughterma's Creed, prints and custom sketches. This weekend will be one of the best times to buy comics off me as collaborators Cy Dethan, Nic Wilkinson, Vicky Stonedbridge and Maura McHugh will be about the con and can sign them for you, or I'm sure.wouldn't mind a chat about the books if you're not one for adding scribbles to your comics.

Treading Ground

New comic journalist website Cosmic Treadmill are presenting a spotlight week on Atomic Diner, and have a review of their latest comics including Jennifer Wilde, plus and a quick interview with myself, complete with an exclusive splash page art from Black Scorpion.

I've posted a breakdown of said splash page on my Tumblr this week as well. Click the preview above to bring you there.

Jennifer Wilde has been getting rave reviews everywhere, so check in with http://jenniferwildecomic.com/ if you want to hear the feedback. 

I'm working away on both Jennifer Wilde #2 & Black Scorpion, so expect more previews soon.

Jennifer Wilde #1 Where, When and Why

Jennifer has been cast into the Wilde. My copies of Jennifer Wilde #1 have arrived and they are very nice indeed, a really nice paper and print job.

If you want to get your hands on one, there's a blog post up on JenniferWildeComic.com letting you know all the places you can buy Jennifer Wilde #1, including direct from Atomic Diner and Forbidden Planet Belfast. It's also got nice review quotes from John Freeman and Hilary Lawyer as well as some process shots as I worked out how to draw a 1920s steam train.

I'll also be personally bringing a few copies over to Thought Bubble, leeds in Novomber to sell. If you want to  pre-order one from me, just let me know and I'll hold one for you. 

Back to the drawing board for more Jennifer Wilde layouts...

Black Scorpion

I little while back I mentioned I'd be working on a one-shot spin off of the extremely well reviewed 'League of Volunteers' (it's been called the 'Irish Hellboy'), written by Rob Curley. That comic is Black Scorpion and above is my cover (which 99% finished, with only a couple of tweaks to go).

The cover marks my first all digital, Cintiq drawn work for print, but I'll be back to real inks for the interiors. Rob and I discussed the process of creating comics and from that, Rob is writing the comic somewhere between full script and the old Marvel style, so it's going to really fun working out my panel to panel storytelling.

In other news, Jennifer Wilde #1 is at the printers, so  it shouldn't be long at all before it's available to buy. I'll also be at the MCM Expo in Manchester on Saturday 30th July, so if you're close by come and say hello.

A Jedi, a Superhero and a Judge walk into a bar: Commissions

Some recent commissions. These were custom drawn to be comic book interpretations of the clients.

I've started a Tumblr blog for rough and work-in-progress images, and you'll see the rough stages of these pieces over there at Downey Doodles.

2D Festival

Another fanastic year at the 2D Festival. Plenty of sketching, selling, drinking and even a little bit of dancing. I didn't brig my camera for fear of losing it, so all these photographs are lifted from the Facebook pages of Ciaran Flanaghan and Phil Friel.

 Sketching on the festival floor. Might be Hellboy for Ron.

 I think think was the busiest year of the 2D festival yet. 

 

More sketching. Looks like Venom.

 Tommie Kelley and I staring into Space.

 Being very professional and taking notes before the Sunnyside Comics presents: Piracy, Creator owned and digital comics.

 Slaughterman's Creed cover painter gets close and personal. No, we're not lovers and no it wasn't 'that big'.

Aimee and I enjoying drinks.

 Lily Daniels and Daniel Clifford flew over from England just for the dancing.

 And they took full advantage when they could.

Roll on 2D 2012.

Slaughterman's Creed FP Belfast Signing

To celebrate the launch of Slaughterman's Creed I'll be signing copies at Forbidden Planet Belfast on the 11th of June. Slaughterman's Creed inker Andy Brown and cover painter Ryan Brown will be there also.

If you come along there's a free sketch with every copy bought on the day and Andy Luke will be signing and giving out FREE print copies of our Absence comic.

Hopefully see a few of you there and spread the word if you can.

Slaughterman's Creed: Video Nasties

I got my hands on a few copies of Slaughterman's Creed on the Sunday of last weekend's Bristol Comic Expo, and it's so good to see another year of work held in my hand.

I was suprised that the pages, and Vicky's colours especially, look even better in print than they do on screen. Mr. Green's tattoo's stand out fantasticly well on the glossy paper.

A real life Green: Scott Grandison, who was crazy enough to get his face painted as Mr. Green to host our panel: The Task of Blood: Creating Slaugherman's Creed.

A photo from the panel itself, which went down really well with a healthy audience listening in. You can download the audio, posted under Scott's podcast 'Comicbook Outsiders', here, and if you want to see the presentation slides you can download a PDF here.

I spoke a little about uising reference and models, which included a short 'reference to final pencils' video which you can watch below.

The whole Bristol weekend was a fantastic launch for the book, with lots of people coming by to pick up a long list of pre-orders. Together with sales on the day we shifted over 100 copies which is by far Markosia's highest ever selling convention book.

Next up is the 2D festival in Derry where I'll be on the Creator owned/Piracy panel on Friday 3rd June at 8:30pm, then selling Slaughterman's Creed and sketching at the Comic's open day on the Saturday.

Hopefully see a few of you there.



Ps. Thanks for the photos Vicky

Absence - A comic about Epilepsy

Absence is a comic written by fellow Belfast creator Andy Luke about his experiences with epilepsy throughout his life and drawn by me at the start of this year. Absence is a touching, informational, funny and maybe most important of all, FREE comic funded by Unltd. Its drawn in quite a different style for me to suit the A5 print and was really fun to draw.

We're having a launch party this Thursday, the 21st April, at Catalyst Arts, 5 College Court, Belfast. Free comics, free entry and maybe even some free nibbles and refreshments. All welcome so come along for the craic.

If you prefer to read your comics digitally, absencecomic.com has just launch and hosts the entire comic, with details to get free copies delivered right to your door. The site will be updated with details of our Apple Store launch via Oxicomics in a few weeks.

I'll also have some copies on our table at the Bristol Comic con in a few weeks time, so pop along for a free comic.

Kapow! Sketches

I had a great time at the Kapow! comic con in London last weekend. The room was buzzing the whole weekend and my table was constantly busy. I only had a few copies of Cancertown (as much as my hand luggage could hold) but sold out by noon on Saturday and just about all my prints were gone by closing time.

I was constantly commissioned for sketches, with a small queue forming at a few points, and I've seen a few pop up online that I've posted below.

Daredevil for Stew

The Shadow for Alan

Iron Fist for Luke

Venom for Ben

I'll be at the FanSciCon in Dublin this Friday selling Cancertowns, prints and hopefully doing some sketches. I've added a little 'upcoming events box' to the left sidebar so you can keep up with my con season schedule. FanSciCon Sounds like a fun day, so I'll hopefully see a few of you there. 

 

Jennifer Wilde Cover Art

Jennifer Wilde is my latest project, created and co-plotted by Rob Curley with a fantastic script from Maura McHugh. The book will be published through Atomic Diner and draws from Irish history, with ties to the great Irish writer Oscar Wilde, to tell a supernatural pulp noir tale that starts in 1920s Paris. 

#1 Cover art:

"At the start of the Jazz Age in Paris in 1921, young French artist Jennifer Chevalier becomes embroiled in death, espionage and revolution which takes her across the three nations of  France, England and Ireland - ably assisted by the ghost of Oscar Wilde." - Jennifer Wilde Synopsis

I'm half way through drawing the first issue of the 3 part miniseries and I think you can tell by the description above there is so much fun stuff to draw and play with.

 There's a Facebook page here, where you can follow the creative process. 

Big Blog: Slaughterman's Creed Bristol Panel, Order Cancertown, Jennifer Wilde, Kapow! etc.

Lots and lots happening recently so it's time for a big blog roundup!

Slaughterman's Creed panel at Bristol: I'm really excited that I'll be part of The Task of Blood: Creating Slaughterman's Creed panel at the Bristol Small Press Expo. It will be held at 12pm on Sunday 15th May at the Mercure Hotel and will be hosted by Scott Grandison of Comic Book Outsiders. It'll bascially be Cy, Vicky, Nic and myself chatting about making the book, showing some work in progress and I hear there may also be some Mr. Green facepainting and sweet. If you're a Facebook-er you can keep up to date on the events page.

Kapow! Con: I'll be attending the Kapow! Comic con this coming weekend 9th - 10th of April. I'll be at table 87 ("in the island beneath the Tardis and Darlek."). I'll be drawing custom £10 sketches and selling the prints that  you can see in the Shop section. I'll also have previews of Slaughterman's Creed, Jennifer Wilde and other stuff on display so if you're attending drop by for a chat. 


FanSciCon: Just a week later on the 15th April I'll be a guest at the free, one day FanSciCon in Dublin. It will be held at UCD Students Centre in Dunlin from 9am and promises to be good fun. It's in association with Rob Curley's Sub City so I'm sure we'll be showing off some Jennifer Wilde Stuff. Speaking off...


Jennifer Wilde: The Facebook group for my latest project Jennifer Wilde from Atomic Diner has just started up its Facebook page. If I haven't mention before it's written by Rob Curley and Maura McHugh with art by me. There's little a Preview of the #1 cover over there, which I'll post in a bigger format here once I get the logo added.  


Order Cancertown and Slaughterman's Creed: We had a little trouble with Amazon, but you can now pre-order both Slaughterman's Creed and the Cancertown re-release through both Amazon.com and Amazon.co.uk. If you prefer to shop in a comic store, Cancertown is on Pg 218 of the latest Previews catalogue for shipping in June and available to order in-store now. Slaughterman's Creed was in last month's catalogue, but Forbidden Planet Belfast have ordered a few copies and are taking reservations for them at the minute. 


Digital Revolution: If you prefer to read your comics digitally on your iPad, laptop or even phone you can download all of Cancertown via Graphic.ly for under $6 here. I wish I had a tablet to see how it looked. 


Phew! All this stuff going on and I still have to get the actual art done.

Slaughterman's Creed advance reviews!

We've been hearing word back from advance copies of Slaughterman's Creed we've sent out and one of the most exciting came from Punisher artist Laurence Campbell who has written the foreword to the book. You can read the whole foreword on Cy's Blog but here's a brief excerpt:

"It’s Stephen Downey, the artist, who I feel so sorry for. This may be because, being an artist myself, I know what he’s going through. You see, people are going to readSlaughterman’s Creed and will be going to the artist saying, “How do you come up with this dark stuff? What goes on in that scary mind of yours?”

And Stephen Downey will say, “It’s not my fault - it’s the writer, Cy Dethan. He put it in the script." 

Advance reviews have been popping up on the internet and here are a few snippets and links to what people have said:

Geek Syndicate:


"The story is a violent one and art matches it but I never found the violence to be over the top. It felt real, visceral and horrible, as true depictions of violence should be. The second thing is this book is for adults in both the aforementioned violence but also in the plot, the themes and the characterisation. "

Hi-Ex blog:

So, all in all, I’d say this book is a bit of a triumph for all involved. With a strong narrative, well realised and rounded characters, strong visuals and a wonderful seam of oh so black humour this deserves to be a hit for all involved. And not turning it into a movie would be nothing short of a travesty.


Everything Comes Back to 2000AD blog: 


I was a big fan of Stephen’s Cancertown art but the improvement between this and that is marked and has me excited to see how his next project looks. Cy’s writing is very tight and the book has a real British cinema feel to it.


There are great reviews on the Small Press Big Mouth and the Sci-Fi pulse podcasts. 


With so many words in this post, I thought I should share another panel from the book:

Red Ghost

I was asked by Stephen Coffey to provide a variant cover to his upcoming Red Ghost comic that he's working on with Rob Carey and Patrick Burton. Working off Rob's designs, and incredible looking preview pages I created the following cover:

Rob also worked on 'The Indifference Engine' with my Slaughterman's Creed collaborators Cy Dethan and Nic Wilkinson, as well as being coloured by Cancertown's Mel Cook. The indifference Engine is out now as a digital comic on the Playstation network and Graphic.ly now and I believe will be out in print late Summer.

Keep an eye out for both Red Ghost and Indifference Engine. I'll definitely be picking them up myself.

Slaughterman's Creed is Open for Orders!

Slaughterman's Creed is now available for pre-order, to be either delivered by post or picked up at the launch in May at the Bristol Comic Expo! This was a huge project for me, with 110 pages that I either pencilled or fully inked and coloured. It's a great, complete story by Cy Dethan who's blog I'm going to quote ordering details from because I'm too lazy to reword:

"Things are ramping up towards the launch by Markosia comics of the hardcopy edition of Slaughterman's Creed at Bristol Comics Convention in Mid May.

There is going to be a convention special edition, signed by all the creators, on sale over the launch weekend at the special price of £10.

Everyone who buys it on the day, or pre-orders it before the 14th May to be sent out after the show will be entered into a competition to win an original piece of art pencilled by Stephen Downey and coloured by Vicky Stonebridge.

We know that not everyone will be physically going to the con, and some people will only be there for one or other of the days, so if you would like to reserve a copy to be held behind the stand, or posted out to you, please then you need to get in touch with us now and we will add your name to the list, and email you to let you know the options for how to pay.

If you are not coming to the show there will be postage added to the £10 which is £2 in the UK and £4 for overseas delivery."

So there you go. You can always get in touch with me about pre-ordering a copy instead if it's easier for you.


Here's a gory little panel, with colours by Vicky Stonebridge and inks by Andy Brown to whet your appetites:

Slaughterman's Coming, Cancertown's Back!

It's been a great few days for my creator-owned projects.

From yesterday all 6 chapters of Cancertown: An Inconvenient Tooth are back on the Playstation network as a digital comic, published through Markosia and complete with audio commentary from Cy Dethan and I. Well, Cy does most of the talking, clocking in a couple of hours of facinating insights spread over the chapters, while I chip in with a few art process snippets. The first chapter is free, so if you have a PSP why not check it out. Markosia have also announced that Cancertown will be coming back into print sometime later in 2011.

Look at that beautiful cover! Harry Markos at Markosia has also let us announce that Slaughterman's Creed will launch at Bristol International Comic Expo! Above is the all-but-finished graphic novel cover (pencils by myself with digital paints from Ryan Brown). Cancertown went down a storm 2 years ago at it's Bristol launch so we're hoping things will go as well for Slaughterman's Creed. It'll also be in stores some time after that. Must book some flights now...

It's in the (body) bag!

The final interior inks, colours and letters (by the talented Vicky Stonebridge, Andy Brown and Nic Wilkinson respectively) have been added to the last page of Slaughterman's Creed and the book is done!

Cy Dethan has added a 12 page lettered preview to his website (and to our Facebook group which you may care to join) so you can finally add a little bit of context to those random panels and works-in-progress I'd been posting early last year. 

It's a little odd seeing artwork that I drew over a year and a half ago only surfacing now, (I finished the interiors of the book about 6 months ago, but it's 110 pages long and the panels below were drawn sometime just before the launch of Cancertown at Bristol '09) but I'm proud of the book and you're in for a gory treat with Cy's cracker story.

Here's the first two pages of the graphic novel (I handled full art duties for the first two chapters, so this one's all me with Nic's lettering and of course Cy's words), but head on over to Cy's site for the rest of the preview:

The story will be released on the PSP as a digital comic through Markosia later in 2011 and other formats will follow. I'll update the blog with all the info as I get it.