2000 AD Covers Uncovered: ‘Dredd at his most badass’… John McCrea On Prog 2361
6th December 2023
Every week, 2000 AD brings you the galaxy’s greatest artwork and 2000 AD Covers Uncovered takes you behind-the-scenes with the headline artists responsible for our top cover art – join bloggers Richard Bruton and Pete Wells as they uncover the greatest covers from 2000 AD!
This week, it’s John McCrea back on the cover to the Galaxy’s Greatest, with a super snarling Dredd for 2000 AD Prog 2361.
John’s been a mainstay in comics since his 1989 debut here at 2000 AD with Prog 615’s Fast Forward, soon followed by his and Garth Ennis’ tale, Troubled Souls, their hard-hitting and controversial tale of the Troubles, which heralded the arrival of two brand-new talents on the comic scene.
Since then, we’ve had the pleasure of seeing John’s work pretty regularly in both 2000 AD and the Judge Dredd Megazine, but you’ve had the pleasure of seeing his distinctive artwork at Marvel, DC, Image, Dynamite, and more, including the highly recommended DC Comics Hitman series from 1996-2001 with Garth Ennis. Since then, he’s worked at Marvel, DC, Image, Dynamite, and many more.
Always a pleasure to see John back on the cover of the Prog though, especially with a Dredd that really pops off the cover like this one does! So, without further ado… Mr John McCrea and the making of a great Dredd…
JOHN MCCREA: All I want to do with 2000 AD covers is attempt to draw as iconic an image as my art heroes; Mick McMahon, Kev O’Neil and Carlos Ezquerra. Nobody drew better 2000 AD covers than these guys, imho. Obviously, I have failed to come close to matching them but that’s the goal, that’s what I’m aiming for.
So another Dredd cover. I wanted a cool standing pose that showed Dredd at his most badass. My first drawing was this…
It’s ok, but there’s something missing. Too straight on, not enough tension in the pose. I dunno. (Any actual wonkiness in the drawing would have been sorted out, but technical faults aren’t the problem here).
So I did this…
Basically, I rotated the ‘camera’ a bit, but I added more slouch to the pose, more angles to the figure. It seemed to work, so I drew the dead juve in behind him for a bit of visual depth and to give it more story.
Tharg was happy so it’s onto inks…
For some reason, I inked this drawing over the pencils, as you can see here. Normally I lightbox the pencils so that I can avoid the horrible erasing process. I can’t remember why this was different.
I love the inking, it’s so therapeutic, correcting any little mistakes in the drawing and just having fun scribbling away. Over the years, my inking has loosened up and relaxed a lot, some of this was due to necessity but mostly it’s due to the influence of my favourite artists, most of whom don’t seem to mind that each line is perfect, just that the whole picture is strong.
The finished inks, all cleaned up…
I think my favourite bit in this is the smoke wisping off the gun, the way it curls round itself.
Now I add a bit of digital tone…
Again, I try not to be too exact with this, as a bit of error makes for a more satisfying result. At least, that’s what I feel.
Before I sent this to Mike Spicer, I quickly added this background in Photoshop…
I wanted to give an indication of a Mega City skyline. And I like pink. I sent this to Mike and asked him if he could ignore the pink and just add blurred city lights to the shape, using a stock image found on the Internet as a starting point…
As you can see Mike did an amazing job.
He had made the sky pink but I felt that just distracted from the city below, so I asked for him to remove it.
I hope that the final result really jumps off the newsstand, website or wherever Squaxx dek Thargo find their prog!
That’s the job of a cover artist/colourist, to create an eye catching image that will draw readers to the comic.
Oh yes, that one absolutely launches itself off the shelf or screen John! It’s a great cover, a great Dredd, fabulously loose and full of energy.
Thanks so much to John for sending that one along to us – you can find that Dredd cover on the front of 2000 AD Prog 2361, out everywhere Tharg’s finest is sold from 6 December, including the 2000 AD web shop.
For more from John, be sure to take a look at previous Covers Uncovereds – riding out with Dredd on Prog 2224, ‘everyone’s favourite fascist’ on Prog 2328, and that very special meeting of Sam Slade and Judge Dredd for Prog 2351.
And be sure to go and have a look at John’s website, www.johnmccrea.co.uk, and his shop, The Mighty World of McCrea