Comics

2000 AD Covers Uncovered – Tiernen Trevallion gets Fiendish again!

2nd October 2020

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, we chat to Tiernen Trevallion about his latest cover – 2000 AD Prog 2201, featuring the return of that Fiend of the Eastern Front!

The artist first appeared in 2000 AD with the Terror Tale, ‘Man Bites God‘, written by Al Ewing in Prog 1533 and in Judge Dredd Megazine with a Tales From The Black Museum written by Arthur Wyatt in issue 289. But it’s his work on the grumpiest Guv’nor, Harry Absalom that he’s best known for around these parts. The supernatural spin-off from Caballistics, Inc. began in Prog 1732 and ran for several stories before ending in a fabulously fitting finale in Prog 2143, all written by Gordon Rennie.

He’s also been working with Ian Edginton on the Fiends of the Eastern Front series, with the series Fiends of the Western Front running from Progs 2111 to 2115 in 2019. That six-parter was all blood and bats, with the Black Max guest-starring.

And now we’re back with another Edginton/Trevallion Fiends, returning once more to Romania in a new Fiends Of The Eastern Front – Constanta.

We chatted to an incredibly busy Tiernan about his process and putting together that eye-catching first cover for the new series!

Apologies, this is going to be pretty brief, partly because I’m busy but also the process is fairly straight forward.

I sketch it… ink it… colour it…

The sketch I’ve included is an alternative version. The right side shows the coils of a serpent as opposed to the Wilson/bat thing.

I ink digitally, here using four layers, one for each of the foreground elements of the panels, and the fourth for the background. This layer is knocked back to give some distance, and make the foreground pop.

Colour: I’ve gone for a muted, contrasting tone. Pretty simple.

There’s a final layer over the top for the rain.

Thank you to the good Mr Trevallion for giving us the skinny on that great looking cover. You can find it on the shelves of your local comic shop or newsagent on September 30 – and, of course, you can get it from the 2000 AD web shop!

If you’re looking for more from Tiernen Trevallion – try these brilliant Covers Uncovered features written by Pete Wells – Prog 1748, Prog 1767, Prog 1809, Prog 2042, and Absalom: Ghosts of London. But first, the stunning cover to Prog 2112 – with the last Edginton & Trevallion Fiends of the Western Front strip!