Roger Langridge's Blog, page 279

Team Cul de Sac

Here's an illustration I did of Richard Thompson's characters Alice and Petey, the stars of his Cul de Sac newspaper strip. The illustration was sold as a print at last year's HeroesCon to raise funds for Team Cul de Sac , the fantastic charity project put together by Chris Sparks which used Richard's characters to raise funds for Parkinson's research. The fundraising book at the centre of that project is still available, and worth your time and attention.


And if you're not familiar with the strip, you owe it to yourself to take a look. It's really, really great.

The Master

Here's a piece I did for a Kickstarter reward a few months back - it's The Master from Doctor Who as played by Anthony Ainley. (I'm telling you who it is because my caricaturing skills are a bit rusty these days.) Not really my era - I went right off the show when Peter Davison took over, because there didn't seem to be any jokes at all - but I've no doubt it'll warm someone's cockles.

My Daughter's Birthday

Here's a comic I did in November for my daughter's tenth birthday. We walk to school together every morning and it's a special time for me, and I think for her as well - there's no competition with her brother, the fresh air seems to sweep her usual truculent mood away and we have a lovely chat together about everything or nothing at all. It's probably the time I feel closest to her.

Happy New Year

First post of the year... and I've got a resolution or two. First one is, I'm going to attempt to post something every day this year, even if it's just a sketch - I've come to understand that, in times when  cartoonists can't expect to have their own comic book series, a website is the nearest thing most of us will ever get to our own one-man anthology. So the goal is to post 365 posts this year, with artistic content in each post. If I skip a day, I play catch-up next day. No slacking! Hopefully I'll find time to do an original strip or two along with the sketches and miscellaneous illustrations.

Resolution Two: to at least write and thumbnail, and ideally complete, a personal long-form project, outside of the direct-market comic-shop model I've been clinging to for the last couple of years. Hopefully I'll still be working there a bit - it pays the bills , after all - but doing something personal that isn't compromised by commercial considerations is important to me, and I need to jump back into that with some urgency. The universe has been reminding me of mortality over the last couple of years in a big way, with serious family illnesses and so forth. Time to stop mucking about!

So here's the first piece of the year - the cover to Popeye #12, the final issue. It guest-stars Billy DeBeck's great strip star of the 20s and 30s,  Barney Google, who's a bit of a personal obsession - I'm really thrilled to be working on a Barney story, the first one not to feature that irritating little tick Snuffy Smith for about three quarters of a century.

More tomorrow!

Non-Canonical Podcast

Hey, those "Best of the Year" articles are starting to pop up, and it looks like Snarked! and Popeye are getting the nod from a couple of them - thank you, folks!

While I have your attention, I would like, if I may, to point you towards the Non-Canonical Comic Podcast - specifically Episode 138, which contains an interview with my good self.

Finally, here's a panel from Popeye #12... just to tease ya!

The Rocketeer!

(Picture glommed from Comics Alliance - thanks, chaps)
Yup! This was announced while I was at Thought Bubble this weekend - a new IDW Rocketeer mini-series written by me and drawn by J Bone (with colours by Jordie Bellaire). Oh, I've been sitting on this one for months. Months, I tell you! Anyway, I believe the first issue will be out in February 2013. (And here's a doodle I did at Thought Bubble at someone's kind request.)


Speaking of sketches, here's a bunch from recent shows - those I remembered to take pictures of, at any rate. Thanks to everyone who stopped by at Thought Bubble, incidentally - Tamsin and I had a fine old time.

Thought Bubble and other stuff

Busy time here at the Hotel Fred - what the devil has he been up to, you ask? Well...

Apparently Popeye #7 came out last week? Is that right? Nobody tells me these things, but Comic Book Resources say it did, so let's assume they know what they're talking about. Anyway, it's an issue I both wrote and drew, so if that's something that interests you at all, I urge you to track it down. (And I'm just starting to draw another one at the moment, so there'll be more where that came from - the new one will be guest-starring... no, let's not spoil it. But a nice surprise for my fellow old-time strip nerds, I suspect.)

Signed off on a press release a few days ago which will be announcing something rather exciting. I'm trying not to pe-empt it, but oooh, it's ever so difficult. There's heroes and monsters and pretty girls and a fabulous artist and... and... I'll be quiet now. Ooh.

Submitted some roughs for a book illustration job. Out next Christmas if all goes well. (What the Dickens?!)



Oh, and hey! I'll be at Thought Bubble in Leeds this weekend with my lovely daughter Tamsin (say "Happy Birthday" if you see her!) and a bunch of comics (Royal Armouries Hall, Table 50, thanks for asking). I'm working on a new mini-comic at the moment which I hope will be ready in time. Plus I'll have stacks of Snarked, Popeye and that old perennial, Fred the Clown, for sale. I will be sketching, if you're wondering - quick head-shots for free, £10 for something a bit more elaborate and polished (perhaps occasionally stretching all the way up to £20 if you want more than a couple of characters in the same drawing - don't be afraid to ask!). And I'll be donating proceeds from any Marvel or DC-themed sketches I do to the CBLDF.

Which last item reminds me, Chris "Monkeybrain" Roberson and I did a short piece in this year's Liberty Annual - worth your support!

Hope to see many of you this weekend...

Treviso!

Before I get to the main event, I'd like to point you towards a couple of recent interviews: first, there's one with Devin Nuhfer at Check Point here, and then there's a two-parter with Michael Dooley at Imprint, which you can find here and here. (Oh, and a big thank you to MTV Geek for picking Snarked #12 as one of their top ten for September!)

But the biggest thing lately has been my trip to the Treviso Comic Book Festival in Italy, where a bunch of New Zealand cartoonists (including a couple, like me and Rufus Dayglo, who used to live there but don't any more) were invited as guests. Besides me and Rufus, there were Dylan Horrocks, Ben Stenbeck, Colin Wilson, Greg Broadmore and Chris Slane. Some of these guys I hadn't seen in twenty years; others, like Greg, I'd never met at all. So it was great from that point of view alone. The fact that we were treated like kings was the icing on the cake. Huge, huge thanks to Alberto Corradi, who was responsible for the wonderful exhibition of our work and for showing us around and making us welcome, and to Creative New Zealand, who (with Dylan's help) were the ones that got us all together in the first place. Such a wonderful time.

One of the many exhibitions around Treviso
The bearded man on the right is Alberto Corradi
Rufus Dayglo, friend to children
Rufus decorated this toy with the child's help
Terrible blurry picture of Colin Wilson and Dylan Horrocks
Some impressive local architecture
The New Zealand exhibition
Work by NZ genius Barry Linton
Some pieces by Greg Broadmore
Work by Rufus
One of mine!
Work by Toby Morris
The comic fair itself

I don't know what these were, but I liked them



Venice!



Canals!


Original-style bridge with no railings
More Venice
Still more Venice

These shops were everywhere in Venice
Yes!


More Venice

Rufus and Alberto in Venice



This was supposed to keep ghosts from passing through the walls, apparently
The NZ contingent on Friday night
These window decorations were all over Treviso
My favourite!

Back From the Woods

So, #12 will be the final issue of Snarked! I'll be sorry to see the Walrus and Carpenter go off into the sunset, though I'm happy that the story I originally set out to tell will reach its natural conclusion. I've had an absolute blast working on the series (it's really been the first time in my life I've been able to make a living working on my own stuff for more than a few weeks at a time) and I'd love to revisit the characters one day soon. It looks as if sales on the book collections will be the deciding factor on whether or not I'll get the chance - so please vote with your wallets! And tell your friends!

That said, I've got a few things coming up - some of which I can talk about, others of which I'll have to refer to obliquely, I'm afraid. The main, regular thing I'm working on right now is Popeye for IDW, of course - writing each issue, and drawing the occasional story as time allows. My first interior artwork is currently scheduled for #7 (although the stories, being self-contained as they are, get shuffled around quite a bit, so it might end up somewhere else. But #7 it is for the moment.) I should also point out that the first book collection is available for pre-orders now.

I'm also writing something else for IDW. I hope I can talk about that soon. Right now, let's just say that it's something more in the action-adventure line.

I'm going to be illustrating a book. A proper book, with words and everything. That won't be out until Christmas 2013, but I'll be working on the drawings later this year.

I've got more stuff in the pipeline for IDW, as well - drawing this time. Just a single issue of something. (Shh.)

And I'm working on a new creator-owned idea right now - it's not quite there yet, but I feel I'm onto something. I'm going to do a three-page story to "take the idea for a walk", as it were, for David Lloyd's new online anthology, Aces Weekly - and I guess I'll take things from there if it works out. For now, I'll just say I hope you like hats.

To close out, here are some sketches I did at the Baltimore Comic Con last week, which was really wonderful (even though I didn't win any of the Harvey Awards I was nominated for - Kate Beaton deservedly winning a couple of them instead). Even so, I had a great time and I hope I can get back there again next year.

San Diego ComicCon 2012

Okay, I'm a bit behind with this, but I ought to report that Snarked! won the Eisner Award for Best Publication for Kids! Really, really thrilled, and grateful - and especially gratified to receive such an august recognition for something that wasn't a corporate property, but rather a story I crafted on my own (given a certain amount of inspiration by one Lewis Carroll, naturally). So yeah. I had a pretty good ComicCon after that, in spite of my usual overwhelming dread of the thing. Might even come back some time!

Rather than write up a report of my experiences of the show, I thought I'd just drop some more sketches on you. Commissioned sketchery wasn't really happening this year - because I was brought out to the show by Boom! Studios, who had a sketch team of their own doing Adventure Time commissions and wouldn't have appreciated the competition - but I did a fair bit of doodling in my notebook throughout the five days, basically just keeping my hands moving during the slow patches. (I thought that was probably not as confrontational as staring at passers-by with mad, pleading eyes.) Some of these are for projects I'm working on, some are just pure whimsy. If you can guess which is which you get to make yourself a nice cup of tea.

Last thing: on the column to your left, you'll notice there's a bunch of links to various comics I've done which are available in digital format. I'll keep adding to the list as things continue to expand in that area (as they inevitably will - we live in the future now, folks!). I may even throw up a little bit of exclusive content you'll never see on Comixology, like the odd minicomic or what-have-you. I'll yell about it here if and when that happens.

All right, enough wittering. Time to let my pencil do the talking.