2000AD Original Art Thread

[Frank]

I really like the look of Colin's most recent art - it'd probably take an artist to explain precisely how he's tweaked his style (thicker lines? Chunkier-looking, more stylised figures?) but it comes off as extremely assured, bold and confident.

Plus one on that; MacNeil's art looks even more incredible in its original form.

Remember that superb Henry Flint Day of Chaos page someone posted in monochrome a while back? After a generation of artists who thought being able to paint meant they didn't need to learn how to draw, we've got a strong enough roster of artists to think about the comic going black and white again. Economics mean that's never going to happen, but I'd love it if someone offered limited edition collections of stories in b/w for curmudgeons who think everything was better before we went decimal.

[Graff Vynda K]

Moving away from colour, Colin has become such an assured and dynamic sequential artist; images/panel/sound effects all driving the narrative forward with no one panel or page dominating or demanding attention. Total Comics.

I'd love to pick up some of his work, but it would have to be a full episode, I think.

[Simon Beigh]

Well... Seeing as everyone is being so nice about Mr MacNeil, what can I do but follow up with another.

This ones got robots and Lawmasters and a big old VAWOOM!!! (it's like being 8 years old all over again - brilliant!)

[hippynumber1]

Superb pages Simeon! Lovely stuff indeed. And can I be the first to propose a one-off, all black and white, 2000AD Christmas prog!?

[Dr Feeley Good]

Both great pages...well in !

[Link Prime]

Very nice Simeon- MacNeil is as impressive as always.

By the way, I had a look at your stuff over on CAF Graff, you own one of my favourite pieces of art of all time- O'Neills contents page from the '85 annual. Amazing.

[Bubba Zebill]

My god, those are beautiful pages. I thought they were wonderful on the printed page...now I think I prefer them in B&W. So economical and deceptively simple and exciting to follow. 

Usually, with colour, heavy black inks are the first to go...

[Bubba Zebill]

It looks like the artist did the lettering too... exquisite work.

[Simon Beigh]

It looks like the artist did the lettering too... exquisite work.

He did - and I was amazed. I felt sure it would be done on the computer. But nope - Colin did it all himself and it is beautifully done. Even right close up it is all so uniform. Very talented man that Mr MacNeil...

[Bubba Zebill]

That's unusual from what I can tell, I wonder what the letterers thought of that...To me these are simply classic pages. I could go on and on...and on...about how special they are, they're perfect, they do the job of telling the story perfectly well. Instantly understandable and clear in direction - so the eye doesn't slow down at all, so the pace seems fast. Just awe inspiring....in fact I'm wondering off up the street in something of a fugue state...in the direction of a pub....muttering the while.

[Bubba Zebill]

I just realised that the group of figures in the page above are seen as if in the eye of a judge's visor. I've not seen the painted version in a while, perhaps that's obvious in colour, in B&W it's almost abstract. Did MacNeil colour the pages for print? It looks like the ink is applied mainly with marker pen, maybe not.

There's been a lot of good stuff on this thread but IMO this is about the best I've seen here. Got any more pages like this? (I don't collect, just out of interest)

[dark-spartan]

Those Colin McNeil pages look fantastic, I don't have any of his black and white art

I have few of his painted pieces, including a Song of the Surfer page that I got from him at a Bristol Comic Con years ago - great art from in my opinion from the best 2000ad story ever told

anyway thought I would show you this one - its a much better scan than the one on my CAF page

[Jim_Campbell]

That's unusual from what I can tell, I wonder what the letterers thought of that...

Artist-drawn sound effects are always a bit a vexed question for letterers: there's not a one of us who doesn't like to see beautifully executed FX work like Colin's on these pages. Most of the time, though, our reaction tends to be: "Oh, why did you have to go and do that?"

Cheers!

Jim

[Bubba Zebill]

That's unusual from what I can tell, I wonder what the letterers thought of that...

Artist-drawn sound effects are always a bit a vexed question for letterers: there's not a one of us who doesn't like to see beautifully executed FX work like Colin's on these pages. Most of the time, though, our reaction tends to be: "Oh, why did you have to go and do that?"

Cheers!

Jim

I thought that might be the case and would think letterers would need as much freedom as possible. The lettering is superb here of course but I can imagine there might be artists who may think they are stronger in that area than they are. Jim, in such a case are you authorised to remove those elements or would that be a no-no?

[Bubba Zebill]

anyway thought I would show you this one - its a much better scan than the one on my CAF page

Great work and a great story too. Thanks for posting.