Treehouse workparty

Today I took a much needed break from the massive task list on the computer and went back to the Tree house to join in with the Voluntary workparty. The Lochcarron Treehouse now has its own facebook page and soon will have a website. I'm part of the marketing team so i'll direct sensible tree house tales to its own pages now! There is an album of photos up on the FB page now. There is still an embargo on photos of the actual building until the TV programme is aired, I got some good ones today. As the trees have shed their leaves its easier to get a view of the Treehouse. Today I had some great views as I was on roof duty. The larch cladding had an uneven top so I helped Terry the local woodturner with his chainsaw and we shaped the roof top into nice curves, following the natural lines of the cladding and reflecting the wooded & river environment. I had time to wait about while Terry went for fuel.

It was nice up there, though the Larch trees the Tree house nestles into are huge, the rest of the surrounding woodland is roughly at the height I was.

And then there was a proper soup & sandwich lunch with local produce and home baking. Its great, and such an eclectic bunch of people all coming together in this, new folks joining in every time.

 and back to work.....

 end of day Photo!

Paths cleared. Roof shaped, doors varnished, timber tidied, storage shed base built, shed walls cut & prepared, a fun day volunteering outdoors had by all.

Next up, fireworks display and bonfire night tomorrow.

all the other million & one jobs will have to wait.... although there are a few small hours left still.

Firefighting art pre-christmas sale

In 2009- 2010 I did a series of paintings from my work as a firefighter. I had exhibitions at Inchmore Gallery, Inverness airport, and Tore Gallery with these. The art works and others are all available from my website as reproduction prints at £20.

I'm also offering up some of the original artwork at sale prices- these make unusual retirement gifts or great Christmas presents for someone special. I will consider payment by installments. Email me if interested in finding out more. E-Mail Here .

'Rainbow over training'. 64cm x 84 cm. framed canvas. Acrylic. was £400 , now £200.

' B-Post rip training' 31cm x 46cm. Acrylic on paper, unframed large window mount, cellophane wrapped. was £290 ( framed ) Now £90.

'Checking on a colleague' 33cm x 47cm. Acrylic on paper, unframed large window mount, cellophane wrapped. was £340 ( framed ) Now £120.

'Hoses ready'. 'Checking on a colleague' 33cm x 47cm. Acrylic on paper, unframed large window mount, cellophane wrapped. was £340 ( framed ) Now £120.

'BA Teams', 80cm x 60cm. Acrylic on canvas, Framed. was £450 ( framed ) Now £300.

'Toscaig Wildfire', 49cm x 34cm. Acrylic on paper, Framed and mounted. was £115 ( framed ) Now £60.

'Pump Training', 29cm x 38cm. Acrylic on paper, Framed and mounted. was £100 ( framed ) Now £55.

'United',  54cm x 48cm. Acrylic on paper, Framed and mounted. was £250 ( framed ) Now £200.

Dundee Comic day 2011

Dundee is a strange city to drive. The traffic system seemed determined to get rid of us, and once we eventually did find parking, the multi-story car park had no pedestrian exits- we escaped out of the traffic ramp in the end & found the Hoppo youth hostel which i thoroughly recommend, the private en suite room was as good as any hotel room, but half the price. We were early so popped into a local pub... another strange adventure, of course this was Halloween weekend so we were greeted by a cowboy blues band and  some drunken green masked pirates in jeans and thongs enjoying chasing each other around in a somewhat metro' way. This was all Before we met the rest of the comic contingent who had gathered for Dundee Comics day, things got weirder thereafter!

Dundee Comics day is organised by Dr Chris Murray ( and team, Phil, Gill & others ) who runs the Mlitt in comics at Dundee University. Its a fantastic event, great friendly atmosphere, great guests and interesting talks.

Paul Gravett gave a shortened version of a fascinating talk about the history of comics and '1001 Comic Books you must read before you die' a brand new gorgeous book that he has edited. There is an incredible variety of comics out there internationally much much more than people popularly think, some really inspiring and beautiful work. 

Martin Conaghan and Will Pickering talk about the re-release of their and acclaimed historically accurate Burke and Hare Graphic novel, explaining how they built up the information and story.

Monty Nero the fantastic artist and writer talks about his current work on a brilliant comic called 'Death Sentence'

John Wagner had spent the day touring Dundee with friend & journalist Mike Donachie, they'd found the house with the shed that it had all started in with Pat mills, where they used to sit and write! John talked about the need for wannabe writers to get themselves recognised in the massive pile of unsolicited submissions. How strong characters were the key to good storytelling. He also talked about the pros and cons of writing partnerships and took lots of questions about the Dredd film, why Button man hasn't been filmed yet and about the aging Dredd issue.

Robbie Morrison - Comics taught him how to tell stories. He'd read of how a spider bite gave super spider powers, nuclear exposure turns you big and green and soon realised that reality isn't like that. He wanted to tell stories that reflected more reality, the human and emotional content. Dante was conceived to create a different type of character for 2000ad, 11 books and 16 years later we are drawing to the stories conclusion that Robbie always knew would happen, he didn't want a character to go on and on past the point where the writer no longer remembered or cared about the story. He feels guilty about how much Dante has suffered, and warned of more suffering to come ( NOoooo! I love Dante ! )

Colin McNeil ( a regular Hi-Ex guest ) started his talk by explaining how uncomfortable as an artist he is at talking in public and how much better he'd be with a blackboard showing things visually. However his passion for subjects he cares for is always apparent. He talked about the influence of boys war comics on him as a child, this was the generation that didn't talk about the war, these stories showed him what had happened to the previous generation and members of his family. He dislikes the word 'hero' as it is generally a propoganda term. Colin feels he is not really a comic artist but an artist who just happens to draw comics ( one i relate to ! ). His main early comic art influences are Carlos Ezquerra, Cam Kennedy and Mike MacMahon. He also enthused about how as a small child he'd had the opportunity to see Rembrandt's Night Watch painting close up behind the ropes and how the colours and brush work had stayed with him. I love Colins work he is an artists comic artist!

The Commando editorial and writer team explained what makes a good solid story ( characters and the interaction between characters ) and discussed why commando is still going after 50 years. There has been some great artists work on it over the years. It was however pointed out that only 2% of the readership is female.

Cam Kennedy ( another Hi-Ex guest ) was a very entertaining speaker, regaling us with tales of his early years drawing in France and subsequent move to Orkney. He talked about the Scottishness and humour in the comics he's worked on. Cam also loved drawing machines, spaceships and tanks, coming from generations of engineers. While the Star Wars comics were a fan favorite, Cam was never a fan, he got sick of "drawing a big rug and a dust bin", though he pitched the Bobba Fett series which was witter by Wagner as he enjoyed that character. He also told the audience the famous Kenny Who story.

Frank Quitely ( another previous Hi-Ex guest )- gave a personal and inspiring talk about his work and the influences on him. He never made any distinction as a young person between comic art, album art, poster art and fine art, he was surrounded by books and art books and drew from all of them. He'd always doodled sequential breakdowns of motion like football or fight scenes without realising how it connected to comics. He explained that for him, when we hear a story it is in moving pictures in our heads, the artists job is to select the correct freeze frame to put the story on paper. His first published work was of course on Scottish 'scatological slapstick' comic Electric soup, where Frank satirised the much loved Broons with 'the Greens' . This is when he first adopted his pseudonym, which had "seemed really clever when 19 or 10", and had also been to hide what he was doing from parents etc. He'd worked for years in comics before an editor at DC questioned his storytelling layouts, what had previously been intuitive them became an obsession as the drawing took second place to the storytelling and he learnt everything he could from Scott McLeod and many others. While convalescing recently from back problems which stopped his working he has dreamed up some wonderful sounding personal projects. I look forward to seeing them happen!

Basically all these folks are brilliant, and many of them will be coming along to Hi-Ex 2012. Many thanks to the Dundee comic day team for organising this great event and having us along. I always love hearing how other artists especially my comic heroes ( sorry Colin ! )  relate to their art.

Smithy development. Wossy & others

This is my artistic impression of what the proposed Smithy site development just outside of lochcarron could look like, this artwork was used for a recent funding proposal. There is a high demand for craft workshop/retail spaces, My old pottery studio space is being taken over by a local weaver who'll be selling tartan and tweed quality products, the interior is looking great, you'd never know the walls had previously had clay splattered up them! The  Tree house should soon be ready to use by community groups. a web site is getting built, more news is in the local magazine 'An Carranach' this month, basically we're waiting to get electricity put in, a building warrant, then community groups will all get a free session before the hire rate kicks in.

meanwhile in other news;

Jonothan Ross has written a complimentary introduction to the book 'Tales of the Fallen' which I did some colour work on. This is a brilliant PR coup by Barry Nugent the editor ( middle of picture ) . The book will be launched at Leeds Thought Bubble Festival in a couple of weeks, we will also have a discussion panel to launch the book & signings etc. More info here

The Highland-Russian Connections charity is selling the Christmas cards i designed for them last year to raise funds. contact the charity directly or contact me to buy some.

News to follow about the Dundee Comic Day we attended this weekend.

Victorian Kitsch

'The Happy Couple'. paint drying now. the second of the 'vintage' themed paintings. Here is a tidied up photo of the previous one. These are heading to The Beauly Gallery for their Christmas show.

Family portrait 1

I've been struggling to find much painting time, one job after another keeps piling on!  one of the galleries Christmas shows theme is 'Vintage' so after watching tonnes of Sherlock Holmes ( the 1980's Jeremy Brett version ) & looking at loads of old photographs, this is the way I'm playing it. Does it work? is it kitsch enough ? lots of gold & copper & thick shiny varnish too. Another one in the pipeline. What a foxy fox.

Christmas Fair poster

www.artsandeatstrail.com
Heres a poster I've done for next months local Exhibition.

Octocon part 2

Octocon was 21 years old this year so there was balloons, sweets, cakes with candles, singing, speeches and all traditional birthday goodness. Above is this years Octocon committee chair and organising all-overseeing-person Gareth who kept things running slickly with his charming Octocon minions.

John Higgins, Sally Hurst & Leonia Carroll get creative on the party table.

Leonia & Patricia light the birthday cake candles while Micheal supervises.

The irrepressible John Vaughan demonstrates a kick boxing anecdote on reluctant victim James Brophy.

SUNDAY.

" Pitches that failed " with Ruth F Long, Richmond, Derek Gunn, John Higgins. Some stories about pitches that shouldn't have failed, those that should never have been pitched, and the joy of rejecting the rejectors.

12noon, " the exquisite corpse" after the horror of last year, yes they wanted us back again, Myself, Richmond, Alan Nolan, James Brophy, with musical accompaniment from Danielle Lavigne . Its basically a comic jam, where you can't see what was drawn or written before, in front of an audience. difficult!

brilliant artist Alan Nolan and his very polite rude gesture.

Richmond 'I've never drawn a cartoon in my life' Clements supplies the cruel plot twist.

and this is the sort of bleak tragedy that unfolded. The art work is all up here.

 Excuse the blurry picture, this is the panel introducing the new Irish full colour comic anthology 'Lightning strike'  Rich is writing a story about Brian Boru for it, I'll be colouring it. lots of other rising comic stars are will be involved. on the panel, Ciaran Marcantonio, Eoin McAuley, Richmond and Daryl Cox. The enthusiasm of these guys is very impressive, its going to be a cracking publication!

" Comic book creation for beginners " Eoin McAuley, Barry Keegan, Richmond ( were there any panels he wasn't on ?? ) and Ciaran Marcantonio discuss the basics of how to get into comics and how comics get made.

Guest of Honour John B Higgins, rounds up the closing ceremony with a heartfelt speech about what a brilliant convention Octocon is.

If you want to be part of the action fr next years Octocon buy your membership early to get the best deal !

 But never fear we will be poaching some of these good people for Hi-Ex 2012 ! 

Octocon part 1.

Octocon is the Irish National Sci-Fi convention. Myself & Rich were honoured to be invited back this year as guests. The convention is brilliantly organised, friendly and a whole load of fun. Guest of Honour this year was John B Higgins ( Watchmen, Dredd, Razorjack etc ). As ever the weekend was a whirlwind of talks, meeting new people, catching up with friends, meals and laughter. I'd love to have more time for in depth reviews of occassions like this as some of the discussion panels can be very mentally stimulating and are worthy of more than a passing comment. However time is not my friend, so here is a round-up in two parts with photos!

First panel on the Saturday 11pm was "Answering Tharg the Mighty's call ". Richmond with his 2000ad fanzines editorial hat on, Mike Carroll, Sally Hurst and John Higgins who have a strip in the current Judge Dredd megazine as well as many previous strips. The panel talked about how to pitch to Tharg and the massive influence of 2000ad on the comics industry now and historically.

At 12pm I ran a workshop on 'How to draw demons and Monsters'- of course the joke being that i never draw demons & monsters & have always chosen to stay in the 'light' with my art!  I enjoyed doing the research for this workshop however & who knows what nasties I may unleash!  First I did some quick ideas storming with the participants;

Then we cut straight into drawing with piles of wacky photos for references, the great thing about scary beasties is that there is no need to get hung up about technical things like symmetry, perspective or anatomy, i prefer to get pencils on paper as soon as possible. Everyone came up with crazy and wild creatures!

Here's my doodle, i might run him through photoshop sometime for extra grossness.

Next up; no stranger to drawing monsters and everything else, John B Higgins gave an illustrated talk about his work, assisted by the lovely Micheal Carroll.

Then at 3pm. a rather lively panel, which i have no photographs of being on it myself. This was " 'Women in sci-fi/ comics/ fantasy panels'- Do they ghettoise women?". The discussion was moderated by Maura McHugh, we also had on it Ruth F Long, Sarah Rees Brennan, and in the name of equality James Bacon.  At conventions there tends to be loads of discussion panels on a range of subjects, mostly being discussed by an all male or at least majority male guests, then a token panel for women will be stuck in the middle ' women in comics etc ' . We looked at whether this is a true representation of the industry's gender balance, lazy convention organising, why this happens, what to do about it, how to move forward. It was interesting as we had two convention organisers on the panel. It appears upon discussion that women guests are more reluctant to put themselves forward to talk, that when women do speak out they are often silenced. It was very disturbing to note how still in this day and age that women creatives who speak out, express opinions and blog about things are subjected to death and rape threats as a matter of course. Little wonder we don't pipe up so often as our male counterparts! How can we build up other women's confidence to express themselves in public? Ideally all discussion groups should have a completely random gender mix, but it soon became clear that we are a log way off from that with a whole raft of gender based cliched assumptions about what we like to read and write still out there. There is much work to be done ! ( team Hi-Ex have duly taken a note of this ! )

4pm both myself and Rich were on the " Maintaining and Online community " panel along with Micheal Carroll and Sarah Rees Brennan. This was an interesting overview of the heady, rapidly evolving and weird world of putting yourself and your work out there on the internet, how to juggle personas, time management, boundaries, pseudonyms, trolls and stalkers. Answers on a postcard please !

6pm, " Humorous Writing" with Ian Sharman, Richmond, and Alan Nolan, dealing bravely with the problem that dissecting humour is seldom humorous- but they still were, extra brownie points for all those books they managed to plug.

We were feint from hunger by this point so missed John Vaughan's famous vault of Horror. Now dear reader I suggest you take a break and put the kettle on while I blog up part 2 of Octocon.