Messages

1

Creative Common / Re: Does My Figure look big in this?

« on: Today at 06:34:44 PM »

when I do my figures I only pick up what I can see on the source material and what Mr White has done is Superb. My hats off to the man 👍🏻

And after all my showing off, I see that the book cover has the correct PH gas helmet (although it’s the incorrect SBR mask in the story) and that the model is not date-specific, and therefore not incorrect. Also the model’s rifle is right and the book cover’s is wrong.

I’m just too clever for my own good, me.

I also take my hat off to Mr White and Mr Colquhoun both.

2

Off Topic / Re: Threadjacking!

« on: Today at 05:20:26 PM »

Doc, I think all you can do is periodically drop round their place with the cheeriest most neighbourly smile on your face, hand over their mail, and ask them if they happen to have any of yours.
That makes it a meeting of neighbours: not a confrontation.
It’s harder for them to casually rip someone off if they see that you’re a real person and if they know that you’re likely drop around anytime your mail goes missing.
If they turn out to be ignorant pigs then try the cheery neighbourly community spirit thing on the postie. Become a face rather than an address. That might help.

I should add that I have no experience at all in this matter. I’ve been living in a small inner-city terrace for the past 19 years and we all happily sign for each other’s parcels.
It only took five or six years to convince the neighbours that, even though I was born all of two miles away, I was actually pretty harmless (for an outsider, that is). We’re parochial, so we are, and proud of it.

3

Creative Common / Re: Does My Figure look big in this?

« on: Today at 04:58:21 PM »

Harping on.
Can’t for the life of me find a signature on Book 2, which I’m looking at right now. No info on the copyright page either.


But Book 1 is definitely either Colquhoun or a very clever Colquhoun pastiche. On that I will lay a fiver, sir. Maybe even as much as £5.50.

4

Creative Common / Re: Does My Figure look big in this?

« on: Today at 04:35:25 PM »

In my head the original Titan covers were done by Ian Gibson and the cover to book 1 defo looks like his work. Book 2 is less clear but I'd say that spiky tree in the background looks very Ian Gibson BUT Barney has them listed as the series artist Joe Colquhoun - but I'm not convinced.

Can anyone confirm either way as I'm dead curious now (and would have had a fiver bet they were Gibson)

I’ve had that book since 1988 and I’d have sworn up and down it’s Colquhoun, only now you’ve gone and sown the seeds of doubt. I realise that I don’t have any examples of Colquhoun’s painted style to compare it to. I do maintain though that the military detail (incorrect puttees notwithstanding) is very Colquhoun, and that’s a real Colquhoun horse. Spiky trees were also well within the man’s compass.
I’m willing to concede that it might not actually be Colquhoun, but it’s not Gibson. I can’t see a trace of Gibson there. I look at Gibson’s Titan covers from that time and there’s no similarity.
Am I confident enough to lay a fiver on the matter? A whole fiver? Well now...

5

Creative Common / Re: Does My Figure look big in this?

« on: Today at 03:19:17 PM »

That’s Joe Colquhoun, not Ian Gibson, but you probably knew that.
And for my nitpicking lap of honour, may I add:
A rare slip by Colquhoun, but the story illustrated is set in the summer of 1916, and that gas mask didn’t come into service until late autumn. Lastly (as any schoolboy could no doubt tell you), the puttees are wrapped the wrong way. Infantry wore them as shown, fastened at the knee, but cavalry and artillery wound their puttees from the knee downwards, tying them at the ankle.

If you want to be a know-all, it’s not enough to know it all. You have to tell people.

(Nitpicking aside, it’s a beautifully done model. I had a butcher’s at Marcus White’s YouTube, and I am impressed. The how-to of the last stand of the IXth Legion is a standout.)

6

Creative Common / Re: Does My Figure look big in this?

« on: Today at 01:11:35 PM »

The chevrons on his sleeve are too thick. Do I win the nitpicker’s prize for today?

7

Off Topic / Re: This is the News!

« on: Today at 10:22:17 AM »

I'll never move to America.

400 million privately held firearms and 74 million people who thought a second term of Trump was a good idea. Not attractive numbers, by any means.

8

General / Re: Which do you prefer?

« on: Today at 09:18:12 AM »

I'm probably being unfair to that run of Flesh, but I couldn't be bothered being fair to anything from that era, narrow-minded old git that I've become.

9

Prog / Re: Prog 2316 - Taking Liberties

« on: Today at 08:59:57 AM »

Presumably it was Malkovich’s accent in Rounders that Mills had in mind.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BJFxtii24uA

That's going to my Deadlock from now on.

10

General / Re: Which do you prefer?

« on: 26 January, 2023, 04:45:59 PM »

Thrud for me too, but later Thrud and Lobster Random-era.
Critchlow’s painted work in Flesh was excellent, but the story stank out loud, so he’s tarnished by association (similar to what AlexF was saying about Walker on Hellbringer).
I wasn’t dazzled by Lobster Random, but it had wit, and much of that was down to the art. Given he’s the creator of Thrud, maybe Critchlow has a natural feel for comedy that manifests in all his work.

11

Creative Common / Re: Sales Spike!

« on: 25 January, 2023, 07:36:40 PM »

Historical fiction. (Is that the same as fictional history?) Anyway, you can read all the blurb stuff on Amazon if you care to.

Dirty Shirt was the book I always wanted to write. Seeing as it got published, I put the rest of my material into a sequel, which is going to be three sequels by the time I’m finished.
Book 3 is with the publisher right now and will be out this summer maybe. Book 4 has got underway but for the moment it largely consists of me staring into the middle distance and periodically hitting ‘delete’.
I’m not worried. With sales like this I can do a Lee Child and get someone else to finish the book for me (maybe even Lee Child himself, seeing as he’s free).

12

General / Re: Which do you prefer?

« on: 25 January, 2023, 02:36:24 PM »

I might possible take his inking on Dillon's stuff on Cinnabar over both of these.  It was just what was needed for the filth, smut and blood that made up Cinnabar's streets and Nu Earth's swampier, uglier zones.  I know he did the same for Harlem's Heroes but I mean, Harlem Heroes, for Jesus' sake.

I’m not usually a fan of separate penciller and inker, but Walker's inking really added to Dillon’s work, and made Harlem Heroes look very promising indeed. Shame they didn't deliver another Cinnabar to us.

13

General / Re: Which do you prefer?

« on: 25 January, 2023, 02:28:52 PM »

was going to switch to another artist but couldn't decide which one. 

The late-80s change in paper stock and the transition to full colour would provide plenty of material for this thread. A lot of before-and-after comparisons to be made.

14

Creative Common / Sales Spike!

« on: 25 January, 2023, 02:13:28 PM »

And that, my friends, is what a sales spike looks like.
Not just one book, but one of each book.
That makes two books.
(I’m not absolutely sure about the sums, but soon I’ll have people who will handle the big numbers for me.)

I realise that you are all eaten up with envy right now, but don’t be. You’ll be able to say that you knew me when I was just some rando posting on some comics forum, and then maybe people will buy you drinks and ask you to tell them all about it.

15

General / Re: Which do you prefer?

« on: 25 January, 2023, 12:36:44 PM »

Which do you prefer?
If I may elbow in here, JayzusB, and tread on your toes, and generally act like I own the joint: how about Kev Walker’s fully painted Khronicles of Khaos versus his pen and inks on something like Mandroid?
Walker’s early contributions to the prog were nothing special at all, and then he’s given The ABC Warriors and – oh wow. I used to smoke weed and go over those early episodes with a magnifying glass. Astonishing stuff.
Cut to the new century and it's minimalist as hell, shadowy as Mignola, utterly different, and still brilliant.
Which do I prefer? I’d have to say the newer style, because it’s more confident and because sometimes less really is more.
(Maybe I’d think differently if I started smoking weed again, but I’m just too damned old.)