News

First day of the holidays and up until 2.30am??? That must mean there's a Christmas Tale of the 44th Century to read: VOID: The Christmas Asteroid

Had a few productive weeks - four pages pencilled, two then inked; example here: p18 Pencils

Been busy; fun new job been taking my energies for last six months or so, plus lots and lots and lots of writing; comic stuff coming back on stream soon. In the meantime, I loosened up the art skills with a pencil sketch of my Angela Landau character with her hair doing its Barbarella/Medusa thing... : http://www.tot44c.com/angela-pencils

Been a bit of a comic pages desert for a while, but the next instalment is on its way, honest!

Had a busy year with other projects, however, I now have enough pages for another issue; just need to colour up and letter. Latest completed artwork is p17 - view it here: http://www.tot44c.com/issue4-p17-inks

Happy 2017 all! Having changed job, and got a shorter commute into the bargain, there's a chance of more artwork this year!

This years little yarn for the festive season is published and complete! Please find on the Text Stories tab or follow this link: Text Story #8 - VOID: Arctic Training

Story nearly ready to go up...

The story is nearly complete, the principal artwork is done - just need my epilogue, a scanner and a splash of colour. In the meantime - here's a brief taste:

VOID - ARCTIC TRAINING
Prologue
The meteorite flashed through the air, illuminating the low cloud around it; in less than a second it exited the cloud layer and lit up the snow-bound landscape a bright yellow-white before smashing into the ground.

The creature approached cautiously, the steaming crater intrigued it. It extended its neck and head over the jumbled ice and snow surrounding a small crater and probed the warm ground it exposed with its long snout. Something metallic sprang from the crater and struck it.

Deep in its cavern, the vault computer detected the electromagnetic emission, recognised it and entered defensive mode.

Chapter One
Isabeau LaFey scrambled to her feet, spitting out snow and ice crystals as the creature lunged at her again; its heavy, clawed paw missed her head by inches as she staggered backwards out of the deep snow and onto rock. It was on its hind legs now, rearing up at the same time as she lost her footing once more. It didn't matter though: Isabeau had reached her rucsack.
Her fingers fought through numbing cold to un-buckle the flap, rip the drawcord and its spring-loaded clasp back to open the main compartment and reach in and find something by touch. All the while she was scrambling back up to the crest of exposed rock and she then toppled over the other side. Fortunately for her, the fall was down a slight incline and into another deep pocket of snow; it bought her vital seconds as she finally freed her weapon from the rucsack, took aim and fired.
The creature bellowed in pain and shock as the particle beam hit its chest; other than that the stun blast did little to halt its rush for the kill...

to be continued...

Happy Christmas!

Christmas comes around again & text stories set in snowy places flow from the pen (or rather keyboard). Responding to a challenge to carry out an advent marathon by a few sporty types at work, I decided rather than run a mile or so per day of advent I would instead... write 250 words a day. Plan is to cobble these together into a Christmas Tale of the 44th Century - so watch out for an upload Christmas Eve! There will be some illustrations...

PS just finished p17 of the seemingly ever-lasting ESPF comic story 'Farborn'; hoping to get time over the Christmas break to post a new issue:

Been a while since I put pen to paper, got five more pages ready to colour up and letter (and remember the script of...)

The second instalment of the journey into the physical and political darkness of the Moon is available to read now: Farborn-Part2, available in the Tales of the 44th Century Comics tab!

Apologies for too little comic strip content of late, but frankly the sun has been shining and the air warm for three or four weeks and it's a rare thing in Scotland! Deckchairs have been deployed and the ESPF left in freeze-frame with missiles approaching! Work has started again and the snapshot is below:

I'd just like to pass on my condolences on the sudden death of the very talented artist, Darwyn Cooke. Below is a lovely sketch he did for me sitting in the Shakespeare in Kendal at the Comic Art Festival in Kendal, in October 2015. He was a generous gentleman and is a loss to the profession, my thoughts go out to his family.



Catwoman sketch Copyright 2015 Darwyn Cooke

Please visit the text stories page: http://www.tot44c.com/text-stories to read "VOID - The Pyramid" - Austin Amundsen's new home in Wyndham Forest is close the strange feature referred to as The Black Pyramid; a new illustrated text story gives us the perspective of a young boy called Peter on this enigmatic structure.
This story rather shamelessly sees me re-use a couple of illustrations from a comic drawn in my younger days (1992!).
Please also note that the text stories page has been updated to make it a bit more obvious where to download the .pdfs - the underlined story titles in contrast colour are now the hyperlink to the document.

ESPF Issue # 4 is now published; "Farborn" begins here: http://www.tot44c.com/issue-4

Please visit the Text Stories tab to read the Epilogue to this year's Christmas Tale of the 44th Century: http://www.tot44c.com/text-stories

Happy Christmas!
Here's a Christmas Tale of the 44th Century, introducing Isabeau Morganna LaFey, currently residing in the vast, subterranean Northlands Refuge on Earth…
http://www.tot44c.com/void1-red-elf-blue-raven

Pencil work all complete on the Christmas Tales of the 44th Century story 'Red Elf, Blue Raven', some previews in the 'Works in Progress' portfolio on the TOT44C Comics page.

The format is a bit of laziness - bought a 10"x 10" pad in Hobbycraft and just started drawing and decided (because of time pressure) that would do...

Production on the next comic strip - Farborn - being unavoidably delayed until the New Year, I will turn away from the Moon and the ESPF and instead be posting a little Christmas ramble upon and beneath the Earth of the 44th Century and some of its curious traditions for the Year-End Festival (which of course bears a striking resemblance to our own mid-winter festival!) Keep watching for 'Red Elf, Blue Raven'!