Nick Davis's Blog, page 34

Introducing the Cuddly Ninja, Fluffy Heroes Taking Back The Night #Ninjas

Hello Teddy Bear Fans, I want to take a moment and introduce to you the Cuddly Ninja, these heroic Cuddly Toys are on a mission to take back the night. 

This is a concept image of a new Cuddly Toy Team that I hope to debut at some point this year. I may include a story about them in the Teddy Bear Project I am working on for the Fall, of which a lot will depend on the success of Out of the Attic to make it happen. So, keep your eyes peeled about these new Heroes. They are a coming…

The Cuddly Ninja illustration was colored in blended Derwent inktense pencils and outlined with Faber-Castell ink.

Light It Up Blue For World Autism Awareness Month #LIUB #AustismAwareness

 

April is Autism Awareness month, and you are encouraged to Light It Up Blue, by changing your online social media profile blue, wearing blue and donating to the Autism cause. So please light it up! Autism affects us all, including my own family and raising awareness, and learning about Autism and its effects is very important.

Light It Up Blue For World Autism Awareness Day #LIUB #WorldAustismAwarenessDay

Today is World Autism Awareness Day, and you are encouraged to Light It Up Blue, by changing your online social media profile blue, wearing blue and donating to the Autism cause. So please light it up! Autism affects us all, including my own family and raising awareness, and learning about it is very important.

Awesome 80’s Anime Style Star Wars Short – TIE Fighter a Fan Film

You may have seen that really cool 80’s Anime Style Star Wars short featuring Tie Fighters and X-Wings in combat, it lasted about two minutes and looked pretty cool. Well apparently that was only 2 minutes of a much longer film, which you can check out after the jump.

The animation was created by Paul Johnson, and is a meeting engagement in space from the point of view of the Empire, namely the TIE Pilots and the Imperial Navy.

Writing Without Fear – Spooky Abigail – Not Quite The Worst Witch Yet Synopsis

In my last Writing Without Fear I showed you all the treatment I wrote for Teenage Witch Comic – Spooky Abigail. That was largely a tribute post about the sad death of Sir Terry Pratchett, showing how I learned to embrace the absurdness of my humor and how I try to translate it into my writing. To continue on this theme of writing without fear, I want to share with you the the full Synopsis I wrote for the first issue of Spooky Abigail, and then sent to the books artist Veronica Smith.

The Synopsis For Issue #1 Of  Spooky Abigail
Notes To My Artist

Here we go, we get to explore, we get to set the tone and discover this new land, we are honored to be at the beginning at the best of times, the start of all things, we will set the pace for Spooky Abigail.

The world of Spooky Abigail is a magical and weird place, scenery bends to the dramatic expectations placed upon it, architecture in the most magical places rearranges itself to suit its occupants needs, it is a place of wonder and of great darkness peeking around the corners.

It is like Harry Porter, it is Sleepy Hollow, it is every village you’ve ever seen in a Hammer House of Horror or Tim Burton movie, it is Van Helsing, Sleepy Hollow, it is dark, Gothic and off-kilter. This is the world we are looking for, the feel of the environment everything is really, really old looking because… Simply put… the thematic magical atmosphere has changed it because isn’t that what we are all expect in a world full of Wizards and Magical creatures?

I have already written a treatment on my thoughts of the world of Spooky so I am not going to repeat it here. I do think it will be cool if you add fun little details into each panel, from spiders hanging from the comic book panels, eyes in jars following people around the room. But I will leave that to you to have fun with.

This book is a collaborative affair, if you have something you want to add to the story speak up and say so, or just add it and see if its gets noticed. We are inventing, we are world building, so take ownership of the world too. You are the visual storyteller who will bring my words to life, through you Spooky lives, I just supply the words.

Scared yet?

No?

Well I am… So here we go…

A Little Bit About Spooky Abigail

Much of her look has already been established, I just want to run through a couple of things I think are important to her teen character. First off, she isn’t fashionable, she is the kid who suffers from what her parents think are fashionable (aka sensible and hard wearing). Her clothes are constantly one size too big (to grow into) and always ten years behind the latest trend.

Her hair, is as saturated with magic as she is. Now I view magic a little like radiation, it seeps and prolonged exposure to it will affect you. Her hair is sensitive to Spooky’s moods, and while kept sensible strapped into two long braids (plaits?), it will swivel like a snake when she is anxious, stand up on its ends when she is startled, stick out to the sides if angry, it is as much of a character as Spooky is.

Her glasses, we get the honor of having Spooky with her glasses on. I see them as her shield against the outside world, the barrier to her confidence to becoming the Witchy legend she is will become. They should be slightly too big for her face, and she has to constantly push them back onto her face. Yes, we are going to use some Velma lost my glasses plot MacGuffins from time to time, because you cannot beat the classics.

What About Those Magic Books?

This is very important – it is very dangerous to write magic down and can only be done by that Witches hand if she wants to safely open a magical book. Magic is its own power, both natural and unnatural and lesson in the academy are learned on rote. Books containing magic are nasty, vicious little creatures to anyone but their former masters. Magic may have its wonder, but it also has its darkness.

Okay I Have Rambled Enough Here Is THE SYNOPSIS!

This issue has to do three things, set up the world, introduce Spooky and start the first story arc off. Now I am not going to worry too much about the latter over the former here, although the first arc story will kick off here this will be more of a self-contained story.

We will start is a birds eye view of Notorious Odyl, Not (NON), show the world off a little bit before zooming into our little bit of it which of course will be MacGiven’s Academy for Witches and Magical Folk. Establish epic and scale, before we limit Spooky’s world, if you can truly limit it to a tower that changes itself to accommodate your general needs.

We introduce Spooky who will be working on a lab bench full of bubbling instruments. Her Rat familiar will be perched upon a hat and she will be working on a potion, concentrating on getting it right. This potion will explode in her face, and it is only them we realize she is in a class of other Witches in Training (WIT’s) as the Teacher gives her another ‘Must Do Better’ Grade.

Class ends and she goes out into the hallway, it will be a traditional long (high school style) corridor full of lockers made of dark wood. She is putting stuff into her locker, when she see the most popular boy in the school waving to her, she gets all excited and flustered as he walks towards her. Then straight past her, to the most popular girl in the school and her coven (clique) standing just behind Spooky they all of course laugh at Spooky mocking her, as if he would think to look twice at her.

Spooky grabs her broomstick and marches off.

Cut to broomstick practice, the instructor a Female Witch in an era appropriate sporting outfit with witch hat on runs the girls through their broomstick training. It is basic flight 101, out to the marker, turn around and back again, and it is Spooky’s turn to fly. She takes off at an immense speed scattering her classmates and surprising the instructor with her confidence. Problem is she never has figured out how to turn around. Shoots past the marker and gets scared for being so high up, and has to be escorted down by the Flight Instructor. All the other WIT’s laugh at her, but this time are scolded by the Flight Instructor who has a soft spot for Spooky.

Later that day she is in Magical Lore a Co-Species class and she is sitting next to her best friend Bella the WereGirl. The Teacher is droning and all Spooky is paying attention to is the most popular boy in the school who sits two rows up from her, she is doodling in her pad. Gets caught out by the Teacher, even though Bella tries to warn spooky. Her doodle of her and the boy on unicorns in a heart is shown to the class.

After class she is approached by the most popular girl in school and her coven, and is taunted for her obsession with the popular boy ‘As if he would look at a Witch with Ugly Glasses’ upsetting Spooky. The girls are warned off by Bella, but not before Spooky runs off in tears.

Bella find Spooky in their dorm room, she has been crying and Bella comforts her. Spooky is convinced if she didn’t need these horrid glasses the popular kids would like her, and if she can do magic then there should be a spell that can correct her sight, right? Bella tries to convince her she doesn’t need to change to have friends, but reluctantly agrees to help her.

The girls spend the night pouring over magical lore books and don’t find an answer. Although there is a reference to transfiguring potions in a book in the Forbidden Library. A dangerous place that a WIT should not step in on pain of being expelled (if the Library lets the WIT back out).

So Spooky comes up with a plan, they will need a key to get in, a map or a way to find the location as the Library constantly moves around the school, and they need to be invisible to not been seen by the Gargoyles that guard the library against intruders. Of course they don’t have a clue how to get started, but as Spooky has potion class first thing she will search the text books for an answer to the invisible problem.

She finds a potion that turns snails invisible, perhaps if they double the ingredients it will make them invisible. Somehow it spills on the popular girl turning her head invisible much to the amusement of the class as she was boosting about dating the popular boy for the first time after classes. Instead the popular girl is taken to the infirmary. Here Spooky gets a little accidental revenge and figures out she needs to quadruple to turn them invisible. Although she isn’t too sure if it will last or be a permanent change.

Next up they need to find the location of the library, that night in the dorm using a Crystal ball Spooky sneaked out of Prediction class they search for the Library, and the last panel ends with the girls looking into it with amazed looks on their faces. ‘Oh Fiddlesticks!’

— And that was my synopsis for the first issue of the Spooky Abigail Comic Book, you can learn more about this book here.

Writing Without Fear – The Treatment For The Spooky Abigail Comic Book

Spooky Abigail – A Teenage Witch In Training (T)WIT)

Yesterday we learned that Sir Terry Pratchett had died, a unique and much favored author of fantasy, sci-fi and I guess with Dodger historical fiction. Within my eulogy I had vowed to start, or more correctly keep writing without fear and I want to share with you my first leap of faith. I had been contacted last year by PRM Comics to write a treatment for their newest creation Spooky Abigail, a teenage witch with a rat without a cat, she lived in a peculiar fantasy world and the book needed some direction. So I stepped up, writing a treatment about the world and the script for the first Spooky Abigail book. You can read it below after the Jump.

Spooky Abigail – Treatment – Teenage Witch Comic Book
Overview

This is a teen book aimed at all ages, but most importantly is this story has to be accessible for all-ages. Spooky is a teen Witch, having teen kid problems while attending witching school. She must be identifiable to girls of her age and have the same problems – like fitting in, crushes, picked on, not to bright in class. We have to establish her world, and her character through her actions and eyes. In a sense we are exploring this world with her and her friends.

Pitch – Her World

Welcome to the realm of Notorious Odyl, Not (NON), a land of magic, wonder, mystery and leeks. A county of crystal lakes, soaring mountains and if the wind is in the wrong direction a hazy onion smell.

Meet Spooky Abigail, a spirited and kind-hearted girl of red hair, green eyes, very pale skin, with freckled face and thick black framed and lensed glasses that always seem to be two-sizes too big, which she is constantly pushing back onto her face and she is blind as a bat without them. Which would be just fine if Spooky was an ordinary little girl, but she isn’t… You see she is a Witch, or more correctly put a Witch in Training (WIT), a first year student at MacGiven’s Academy for Witches and Magical Folk. You can see it over there – it’s the craggy scary looking leaning black tower nestled quite nicely next to a large forbidding lake, looming mountain, dark forest and customary homely village full of gentle, (but not very bright) folk.

As Witches go, even first year ones she isn’t really that good; a constant grade of ‘must do better’ follows her from class to class and it seems she only excels at Broomstick riding, which she rides with a skill that can only be described as a stubborn refusal of recognizing any maneuver apart from a straight line.

Since Spooky is a Witch she has the usual witchy gear, a pointy black hat (slightly crooked at the top as she accidentally sat on it), a black dress that is touch too long because she has to grow into it, and is sensibly practical, but ten years behind current witchy fashion, and of course her familiar.

Her Familiar – The Rat

Now every Witch must have a creature to deposit magical energy in, sort of like a portable battery or lightning rod to earth the magic running through them. Most Girl Witches have a Cat or Bat – normally black because that is traditional, while the Boy Witches usually have a Lizard or Owl. Spooky sadly is allergic to cat fur, feathers bring her out in hives and has a phobia about Lizards after being chased by Uncle Montgomery’s during High Solstice. She was perfectly safe, the Lizard only wanted the candy rock she was carrying.

With Spooky limited in her range of familiars through allergy, reaction and phobia she ended up with the choice of a Rat or a Frog – and sensibly choose the Rat. While not very good for magical storage and would go splat if used as a lightning rod, Spooky’s Rat even for NON standards is super-smart – a side effect from being around all the magical energy.

MacGiven’s Academy for Witches and Magical Folk

Now a word must be given about MacGiven’s Academy for Witches and Magical Folk – it is a traditional boarding school for Witches, Werewolves, Vampires and other Magical Folk and is very progressive for NON. With mixed classes in all the subjects except Magic, which Witches are expected to learn and Werewolves and Vampires are not. A school stuck between stuffy tradition and the modern times.

The Academy is a large, slightly leaning black tower full of terraces, stairwells and overlooks a large dank lake that it is said inhabits a large ‘Nessy’ Monsters that was rumored to once be the pet of MacGiven. The woods are dark and always seem to be constantly wet, the Mountain well that just looms because that is what is expected of Mountains that are near large Black Towers. You see the entire land around the tower is saturated with magic off-spill and conforms to dramatic expectations. It is only dark, looming and scary because that is what is expected of it.

It is in MacGiven’s we will be introduced to Spooky, the school is a traditional mix of 50’s common-rooms, dorms, secret passageways and amazing vistas. Pretty much everything you expect from a boarding school, that is a Witches Tower, and a looming piece of Gothic architecture. This huge tower packs in Terraces for flying practice, Gymnasiums for spell practice and the hated dodge-the-ball sport, great labs for potion practice, assembly rooms for feast days and stadiums for kick-the-ball-with-your-foot. The tower is so saturated with magic it will bend to expectations placed upon it, and is almost sentient in its nature.

About Magic

We must have a quick work about magic, it is dangerous stuff almost radioactive with its invasive touch. It seeps into the environment around it and can have positive and negative effects to the fauna and flora around it. Magic is so powerful that is dangerous to write it down, and books that contain magic are vicious and mean. Long ago Witches banned the use of printed press when producing magic books and everything has to be hand taught, and written down by the Witches hand for their eyes only. The books in the forbidden library are kept under constant guard by Gargoyles and are caged on their shelves. Indeed the Forbidden Library is deemed to be so dangerous that it is never in the same place twice in MacGiven’s Academy, it wanders around sometimes while it is still occupied, and can only be found if it wants to be.

The Village

The Village next to the tower is a right out of the pages of a fairy tale book, wooden timbered, thatched roofs, Tudor style buildings, and exists to service MacGiven’s needs. With stores of every type, a High Market every other Sunday, a street of craftsman, a fat docile Mayor and a workforce if need be. Although it will not be mentioned only hinted upon in the book, the non-magical inhabitants of NON are very much second class beings.

Opening Story – Synopsis

The first book will open with an introduction to NON and the Tower, before we introduce Spooky who will be working on a lab bench full of bubbling instruments. Her Rat familiar will be perched upon a hat and she will be working on a potion, concentrating on getting it right. This potion will explode in her face, and it is only them we realize she is in a class as the Teacher gives her another Must do better grade. It will be through her eyes that her part of the Tower world will be introduced and we find out she has a huge crush on the most popular boy in the school – a subplot will be her trying, and failing (every time) to get his attention.

She will run foul of the most popular girl in her school and her mean little gang. We will find out her best friend in the school is her dorm partner a Girl-Werewolf called Bella; it is important to establish the tone and character of Spooky in the opening pages. She is a kind-hearted, spirited girl desperate to fit in, while a little clumsy and bumbling – just like everyone in their first year in school. She is the every Witch for our Reader to root for.

The first story will be her adventure aided by Bella to get into the Forbidden Library to locate a rumored book of powerful potions that could restore her eyesight. Of course she will need to turn herself invisible to get past the ever vigilant Library Gargoyles, and must first master that potion before taking her steps into the Library, and of course she will need a map to the books location, and the Library’s because it keeps moving around the tower – leading to her needing to use a Crystal ball to predict where it will turn up next; that will uncover a nefarious plot by Outsiders to steal a magical artifact from the Towers Vaults.

Or course Spooky will first tell her Teacher who will dismiss her, leaving her determined to stop the Outsiders herself. Plucky, courageous, full of heart and slightly clumsy will be her character throughout the first set of books.

My Thoughts on the Books/Art

One of the most important things about this teen book is it has to have its own character and look at the world Spooky inhabits. We are seeing it through a Spooky’s eyes, so the darker elements, the coming war (shown in the adult books) and oppression should only be hinted at.

I think the first story will carry over into four issues of 17 – 18 page books or six issues if it is run as a B-Story in the other books. It is important to keep the mood light, as we ramp up the danger – which should be dealt with a feeling of Home Alone slapstick before descending into unnerving menace.

Spooky herself is defined more by her glasses, they are her shield and viewpoint of the outside world. When we first meet her she should be all kinds of awkwardness, new school, badly fitting dresses with very little expectations placed on her by her peers.

Summary

To be frank I’ve largely ignored the Issue Zero script, it doesn’t contain any fun elements that are missing from this world and should be included. NON is magical therefore we should channel a whimsy and absurdity into the story.

I have taken elements from the overview and incorporated them into my pitch – the land should be High-Fantasy with some very dark places. I will need to know because the adult book will be taking the lead on character, what I can, cannot put into the story as that will be dealing with the hero themes more than this teen book. Can I have Werewolves and Vampires in the same school as the Witches? Do I get to choose her best friends? I will hint at other elements of Spooky’s past through the first story, about her Nanny and growing up fairly normally (for a Witch).

That is all… Thank you for this opportunity and let me know your thoughts about my thoughts, and if we are going in the same direction I will start the script for the first book based off my synopsis.

— And that was my treatment for the Spooky Abigail Comic Book, you can learn more about this book here.

RIP Sir Terry Pratchett Died Aged 66 At Home Today

I sit here trying to find words… So I will start from the beginning because that is how all things should, not the middle, maybe sometimes the end so we can work our way back, but always how things came to be. I caught this sad news about two minutes before it exploded across the internets that Sir Terry Pratchett had died, I held my breath for a moment thinking it a joke, for it was not the first time Terry had died on the internet. Then the BBC announced it was official, my favorite author had died aged 66 at home.

I don’t pretend to know Sir Pratchett, what I do know of him is reflected in his books, his words and humor within them. I traveled to Discworld through his eyes, embraced the characters, booed the villains and loved the askew way he looked at the world, how he could make us laugh in one paragraph and have us crying in the next. He is a rare talent and I encourage you, if you’ve not read his work to start reading it.

I had always hoped to meet him, to shake his hand and thank him for his words, the joy he shared and for setting my own words free. I may not have written as fearlessly as him, but he got me writing, and helped finally in my last few works to get over the fear of embracing the absurd, of not being afraid to share my humor, my joy.

From this point forwards I will write without fear, to carry on the torch.

Thank you Sir Terry, I know one day we may meet, Death is after all impartial and inevitable… It just wont be this day, or many more yet to come

First Look At The Full Cover Art For The Tristan & Cuddly Defenders Comic

Hello Teddy Bear Fans, I am proud to present to you the full art of the cover of the upcoming Tristan & the Cuddly Defenders All-Ages Adventure Comic. This cover was created by Josh Lyman, you can view more of his work at the Art of Josh C Lyman. You can view the art after the jump.You can Pre-Order the Tristan & the Cuddly Defender Comic Book here.

A Dragon Argument between Smaug the Magnificent and Toothless the Nightfury

This amazing cartoon was created by Ria Rosa, you can check out all her Dragon works on her side-blog.

First Look – Page One of Forrest & Scout from Tristan and the Cuddly Defenders Comic

Forrest and Scout are new characters to the Teddy Bear Tales and will be introduced in Issue#1 of Tristan and the Cuddly Defenders. After the jump you can take an exclusive first look at page one of their premier story.