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Does My Figure look big in this?

Started by Trooper McFad, 09 April, 2021, 09:48:10 PM

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pauljholden



This is almost certainly the basis for the cover.



I'm not sure if this gives you more ammo or me :)

JohnW

Ah, but I remember that cover!
Now if you can produce a Baikie picture from that era that shows a WW1 burial scene, we might have some basis for argument.
You've possibly goaded me into overconfidence, but because you're safely at the other end of the country, I will square off defiantly, spit on the floor, and shout, 'Colquhoun!'
Come at me.
Why can't everybody just, y'know, be friends and everything? ... and uh ... And love each other!

Dark Jimbo

Yup - I can totally see it (in the graveyard cover especially). It's more Baikie than it is Colquhoun.

In particular, it's everything about Charley himself - the hair, the face, the hand. Not to mention it's got all Baikie's colour sensibilities.
@jamesfeistdraws

Colin YNWA

Arh now I could defo see this being Jim Baikie now its been suggested.

Jim_Campbell

Quote from: Dark Jimbo on 30 January, 2023, 09:51:19 AM
Yup - I can totally see it (in the graveyard cover especially). It's more Baikie than it is Colquhoun.

In particular, it's everything about Charley himself - the hair, the face, the hand. Not to mention it's got all Baikie's colour sensibilities.

I'm definitely in the Baikie camp on the graveyard cover — PJ's absolutely right about the inks on the lower half of the horse, which is what convinced me one he'd pointed it out.
Stupidly Busy Letterer: Samples. | Blog
Less-Awesome-Artist: Scribbles.

pauljholden

I'd suggest Baikie AFTER Colquhoun, either commissioned to do the covers based on Joe's images or working in tandem. BUT - I'll take Kenneth Stewart Moore's word for it, if he's about...

lincnash

Fantastic cover and dampening of your thrill receptors are required for 32 PAGES OF TOUGH WAR THRILLS!

"I love the smell of musty old Battle covers, smells like ... victory!"

To my 'tone deaf' eyes, I also think Joe did the cover art on Titan Book 1 and just to muddy the waters a bit further, the oracle of all 2000AD knowledge BARNEY, quotes it as Joe's work also ;-)
https://www.2000ad.org/?zone=reprint&page=gnprofiles&choice=charley1
Noteworthy is the publication date on the First Print of MAR 1983, so Joe Colquhoun was around for art duties on the cover at the time, if Titan did actually approach him.
Here's hoping some or any of the creator droids in this thread could 'ask around the office' for something concrete and learn if it's Joe's cover definitively.

On the Titan Book 2 cover inspiration, it has to be the JUN '79 issues of Battle.
Last page and close up of final panel 16 JUN 1979 issue.



Then next weeks issue, 23 JUN '79 featured a great Cam Kennedy cover for Charley's War.

First page and close up on first panel, oooh horsies!



Lookee JWare, Cavalryman in the Somme Summer Offensive is wearing GASP a private purchase/Winter issue sleeveless sheepskin jerkin, the horror, the horror.
;-p [spoiler]Just jokes, I really appreciate your passion for accuracy when referencing WW1.[/spoiler]

... and only loosely on topic but just for nostalgia's sake...
2 JUN 1979 Battle cover, the bumps on the helmet make me think an early iteration of DREDD

That cover artist has a very distinctive style and their future may be looking up from JUN 1979, could go on to great things. ;)





JohnW

Quote from: lincnashOZ on 30 January, 2023, 10:17:50 PM

Lookee JWare, Cavalryman in the Somme Summer Offensive is wearing GASP a private purchase/Winter issue sleeveless sheepskin jerkin, the horror, the horror.
I'll forgive Colquhoun anything for giving us images like that.
Three pages a week, every week, for years on end, and never a dip in quality. His heart attack in '82 knocked him out for a few months but didn't diminish the standard of his work on whit.

And look at the gravestone (faithfully recreated on the model that started this kerfuffle):
Jacques Hurlant—'James Screaming'?
Why can't everybody just, y'know, be friends and everything? ... and uh ... And love each other!

lincnash

Quote from: JWare on 30 January, 2023, 10:36:24 PM
His heart attack in '82 knocked him out for a few months but didn't diminish the standard of his work
I remember being so distraught he was on the way out, with Charley missing from the weekly Battle.
IPC/Fleetway started reprinting from episode 1 and then joy of joys, Joe recovered to go on and continue with his fantastic art.
You bloody beauty!
He also did most of the early episodes on Johnny Red in Battle, many high detail pics of WW2 Hurricane's and Russian Yak's. mmmm

All the pics I hosted/posted are in large format, if Squaxx want to 'click the pic' you can expand out to review the detail in Joe's works.

JohnW

Quote from: lincnashOZ on 30 January, 2023, 10:17:50 PM


First page and close up on first panel, oooh horsies!

GASP That's not a 1908 pattern sabre in the hand of the man on the right!
All my faith in Cam Kennedy's militaria is out the window in an instant. :o
Why can't everybody just, y'know, be friends and everything? ... and uh ... And love each other!

lincnash

It's down to IPC's poor form of using the incorrect shade of khaki uniform, for Calvary at the Somme in 1916.
BAAHHH GAAAAAHHH Gnashing of teeth, chewing of bottom lip.
;)


Definitely Not Mister Pops

Yeah, that's so dumb, everyone knows the uniforms at the Somme were all coloured red....
You may quote me on that.

Jim_Campbell

Quote from: lincnashOZ on 30 January, 2023, 10:17:50 PM
Then next weeks issue, 23 JUN '79 featured a great Cam Kennedy cover for Charley's War.

I'm going to choose to believe that someone in editorial had that terrible skull bodged into Cam's otherwise typically exquisite artwork. Zooming in, I actually have no problem believing that.

Back in the mists of time, when Moose Harris' archive of scans from 70s boys' comics was online, I discovered that Cam drew several short Charley's War stories in a lovely line-and-grey-wash for the Battle Annuals — I don't think Pat wrote those, either, making them decidedly non-canon... which is probably why (to the best of my limited knowledge) they've never been reprinted.
Stupidly Busy Letterer: Samples. | Blog
Less-Awesome-Artist: Scribbles.

JohnW

The skull is indeed horrible, but if it's bodged in it's bodged in well. Look how the swordsman's shadow curves across the cranium.
The Kennedy illustrated strips from the annuals and specials look very nice, but I remember seeing one of them and saying to myself, 'This is that guy off Fighting Mann. What happened to the proper fella with the Q in his name?' Small boys tend towards rigid conservatism.
Colquhoun did strips for the 1982 and '83 annuals.
I can't find a writer credited on any of them, but they don't read like Mills stories. Nothing wrong with them at all: solid annual fare.

(And I realise that my gasp above should have been rendered {GASP}. Have you taught us nothing, Jim?)
Why can't everybody just, y'know, be friends and everything? ... and uh ... And love each other!

M.I.K.

It's entirely possible that there was a far scarier skull there originally and someone at IPC decided it needed toned down a bit.