Got Talent?

A while ago my colleague Barry Spiers suggested I submit a comics script for a Dragon’s Den style competition.

Much to my surprise I’ve been selected to pitch my idea at the Birmingham International Comics Show. The competition is in association with 2000 AD. The winning pitch will be published in that hallowed organ and drawn by a 'top artist'.

At this juncture I’ve no idea how many other entrants I will be up against. The first round will see the comic writing hopefuls whittled down to a group of 20 in a quick fire round. After this the judges will reduce this to 3 finalists.

All of this will occur in a 200 seating capacity theatre, no doubt filled with hardcore fanboys of every stripe. This rabble will be given the opportunity to question the writers on their pitches and will vote for which strip they want to see published.

The competition starts at 4:30pm on Saturday, and the final round is on Sunday. It’s going to be a nerve-wracking weekend.

At time of writing I’ve just finished the first draft of the five-page script called ‘The Day I Met The President’. It’s fair to say I am nigh on terrified, but I do have my elite cadre of minions/ cheerleaders/ guardians coming to Birmingham with me.

To find out more about the BICS got Talent competition go HERE

My Week in Comics

Following on from the Indiana Jones ‘Nazi Bastard’ scandal that has set the cat among the pigeons at Titan Towers I thought I’d post something in a more cheerful vein.

Here is another slice of Team Titan, written and drawn by my work colleague Andrew James. This time around we meet the lovely ladies of the Pre-school magazines (Noddy, Fifi and the Flower Tots and Lazy Town). The Pre-school girls (it just sounds wrong doesn’t it?) sit behind us and are well-dressed, sunbeam of frivolity. The girls temper the collective geekery of the room somewhat.

Here they are:

Be sure to look us up at the following URLs if you’re in to the whole Social Networking thing:http://www.blogger.com/img/gl.link.gif

www.bebo.com/TeamTitanUK

facebook.com/group.php?gid=22764146890

The Sacred and the Profane

Recently the American comics scene has been scandalised by the unholy power of harsh language. Frank Miller of 300 and The Dark Knight Returns fame, sprinkled recent All Star #11 with a liberal dose of the ‘C’ word. The offending word was covered up with a black bar, but unfortunately for DC Comics, the black-out ink was of a poorer quality than the actual ink used to print the word… resulting in still readable profanity.

This has been all over the interwebz for a while (namely here), but the whole affair had particular resonance for us at Titan Towers, when issue #6 of Indiana Jones comic went to print with the words ‘Nazi bastards’ in it.

The first complaint rolled in fairly quickly, with a mother of a five-year old complaining about the language. This was the first of many unfortunately, and the dust is yet to settle on this particularly thorny issue.

It’s important to note that the majority of UK comics that you see on the newsstand (as opposed to actual comic shops) are often reprints of comics sold in the States. For example, Simpsons Comics by Bongo, Indiana Jones by Dark Horse, and Transformers by IDW are all printed in the US of A before they are sold under licence to Titan.

‘No big deal there’ you may think, until you realise the American comic market is pitched at an age range of twelve years and up. In the UK, just about any five year old who recognises good branding can swipe a copy of a comic at their local Sainsbury’s, whilst Mum does the weekly shop.

I am in no way saying it’s acceptable to use the word bastard in front of a twelve year old, as opposed to a five year old, but it’s an important distinction. The truth of the matter is that Indiana Jones issue #6 should never have gone off to print with the word bastard in it… but sometimes these things slip through. Needless to say we are currently scanning every comic strip like hawks at the moment to avoid similar situations.

Just another 'terrible and glorious' week in comics as Frank Miller would say.

Sell Sword

Here is a figure I painted a while ago. It is a converted Ogrun Bokur, for use with Privateer Press’ Warmachine game.

During my initial games I was quite keen on using this big lug as a bodyguard of sorts for my Warcaster (think General that can cast spells). I’ve altered this guy so he has a Khador shoulder pad and given him a rather over-sized sword, taken from a Warjack (more on those later). I think he looks like some kind of demented hybrid of Final Fantasy meets steam punk.





Thanks to El K. for the photography.

From The Bloodstone Marches - III

Here’s another addition to the (painted) ranks of my Skorne army for the HORDES game, by Privateer Press.

This fearsome looking guy is, in fact, an animated obsidian statue who gathers the spirits of the dead. The Ancestral Guardian isn't exactly nimble on his feet, but more fool anyone finding them self within reach of his pole arm. I'm fairly pleased with the paint job and hope I can equal or surpass it on the second one of these models I recently picked up.

Over the weekend I took the Skorne to the field of battle (well, Stockwell) and played against my good friend Jared – and met some success.




Thanks to El K. for the photography!

Ten Things I Hate About London

Having preached the wonders of Old London Town in my previous post, I feel it only fair to now slag it off, under the guise of journalistic objectivity of course.

Idiots
Anytime you are on a bus you have to accept that some kid with an IQ equivalent to room temperature will be playing ‘Urban’ over his phone. If you ask them to turn it off you had better
a) Outnumber the offending music lover.
b) Have some very fast and sharp put downs ready and/ or
c) Be wearing a stab proof vest.
Note: No one ever plays good music on their phone, just the most offensive, over produced, tinny sounding sh!t.

Rain
The weather is terrible, even when it’s pretty good it’s still not great. Winter is five months of grey limbo. It’s not even particularly bad weather it’s just… apathetic. An umbrella is de rigeur after September.

Chains
Unlike say, Italy and France with it’s cosy café culture, the British can’t get by with out branding – expect McDonalds, Eat, Starbucks, Burger King and other chains to appear within five minutes of each other, all the ƒu©Ki~g time!

Free Papers
Apart from Short List, a free men’s lifestyle paper that comes out on Thursdays, all the other free papers are sensationalist pieces of sh!t containing less actual journalism than the Sun. They are basically little more that shoddy, daily versions of Heat with the odd discourse on whichever Muslim has annoyed the editor that day.
How much of this paper gets recycled?

Filth
Maybe it is just because London has a sheen of greyness about it, or perhaps it is genuinely filthy. I’ve been to cleaner cities. You'd think with the amount of rain we get the place would look a bit more washed. I realise this directly contradicts the first list – but I’m a very conflicted person.

Nothing Is Free (Seemingly)
Living in London is not cheap: it usually lurks around the top five most expensive cities. Travel, eating out and even fairly basic pursuits (like drinking and cinema!) soon set you back a pretty penny.

Tourists
Yes, they are good for the economy and yes, they keep the theatres open, but for love of god!
- Have your travel card in your hand BEFORE you reach the barriers when traveling on the underground.
- If you are from America – do NOT use the word quaint. EVER.
- Do NOT take photos of landmarks during rush hours.
- Try and keep up, average walking speed is five miles per hour in London, not three, and never one and a half! Life moves fast in the city.

The Constant State Of Panic
According to some sections of the British media, living in London will mean being stabbed bi-annually, having your children stolen by paedos, being taxed into the stone age, and the expectation that you should be grateful for these unique privileges. There are far worse places to live. Off the top of my head – Tibet, Zimbabwe, Saudi Arabia, Iraq…

Interesting to note that Glasgow is just as, if not more so violent than London, but rarely seems to make the news.

Antipodeans
I like Australians: individually they are plucky, funny and uninhibited. En mass, and assembled with their Kiwi allies they are interesting. In fact there seems to be a long standing cultural trend of spending two to three years in England, hoovering up as many drugs as possible, and pissing in the street on any given night out. I’m all for altered states and having a good time, but you’d think Keith Richards was their national hero.

Immigration
Prickly one this – do I come off as a closet right wing nut job? Let’s see: we have a long tradition of immigration in this country. How about we get some time off for good behaviour? We definitely need a degree of slow down, just so people can get their heads around ‘Multiculturalism’. The white working classes are feeling so under represented the current government is just playing into the BNP’s hands – and the Daily Mail’s headlines. And it's not just the white English working classes – reports of antisemitism were on the rise during the influx of workers from the north-eastern Europe. It seems this melting pot might do better at a lower temperature.

Ten Things I Love About London

A quick run down of why I love to live in the over-crowded, knife-fighting, terrorist-infested Capital (warning: sarcasm!) of our fair land

Cinema
You absolutely cannot fail to find a cinema in London, frequently within walking distance. On Wednesday’s you can even go for half price providing you are on the right phone network and have a date.

Music
If you are remotely interested in seeing live music it pays to live in London, or know someone that does. Hammersmith Apollo and Brixton Academy are two notable cases in point.

Transport
Despite the fact that the media and most Londoners whine terribly about public transport, you can get around with a bit of planning. Just not on Sundays when you can lose hours of your life over short distances for no discernable reason.

Anonymity
Growing up in a small town has its advantages but as soon as you do anything noteworthy you can kiss goodbye to any privacy. Short of streaking at the Oval, painting yourself blue or actually being famous you’ll rarely run into anyone you know in the sprawling Metropolis.

Nightlife
Nightclubs and dance music – specifically The End, Fabric, Cargo and the recently defunct Turnmills. With a constantly evolving scene and any number of cool bars to check out Londoners really are spoilt for choice when it comes to electronic music.

Alternative Living
Obviously with a population density of a major city, certain tastes can be accommodated – Camden is the nexus of the alternative life style, and whether you are gay, straight, bisexual, transvestite or a communist space ninja from Alpha Centarii you should be able to find your niche and get your itch scratched.

Architecture
London’s architecture maybe a badly thought out mish-mash of new-meets-old but there are plenty of iconic buildings. It’s worth taking the top deck of a bus just to see all the architecture above street (and shop) level.

Famous People
If you really want to, you can stalk famous people. My angle is book signings because I’m a geek. As a teenager I was searched for drugs by the police whilst waiting to meet Jesus Jones out the back of the Astoria. Ah, happy days. However, for the more celebrity obsessed among you maybe you should try China Whites, Stringfellows or Boujis – if you can afford it.

A Real City
London is dirty. It feels lived in, and I love it for that reason. Whenever I go to America I feel slightly anxious, as everything is so clean and sparse (the exception to this rule was New York). You can tell a place has some history when it has dirt underneath its fingernails.

From The Bloodstone Marches - II

Here are some more figures from my growing Skorne army – Praetorian Swordsmen

They are for use with the Hordes game by Privateer Press. I took these guys out for their first game last Sunday (led by the Warlock Makeda) and got a severe kicking in both games – practice makes perfect I hope!







Pics courtesy of El K.

From The Bloodstone Marches

For while now I've had some of Privateer Press' awesome figures, however procrastination is a terrible thing and I've never gotten around to finishing them.
Now, finally I've been disciplined enough to really set to the task at hand. Here is my Warlock for the Hordes game. He is a variant of the Hexeris model available in the shops.





Photography courtesy of El K. (Thanks!)