Tag: coversuncovered

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!

Except this isn’t a Covers Uncovered, not really. That came yesterday with Stewart K. Moore‘s in-depth and quite brilliant look at the cover to Surfer, the new John Wagner and Colin MacNeil collection – an absolute thriller of a Dreddworld tale.

No, today we have the second part of Stewart’s look into the creative process, something he described as ‘On Surfer and the artistic long game, pitch fails and successes and the pitching process for 2000AD.‘ Yesterday we did Surfer and some of the artistic long game. So today is more about the artistic long game, about pitch fails and successes, and about Stewart’s experiences with the pitching process for 2000 AD.

Despite dipping into comics in the ’90s, Moore only really got serious about it when he returned to the medium in 2012, beginning the slow work on Project MKUltra: Sex, Drugs & the CIA, which finally came out from Clover Press in 2021 and has a collection coming in October 2023. The Tragedie of Macbeth came next, self-published in limited numbers in 2016 and now coming out from Clover Press. After this, Moore worked with David Lloyd‘s digital comic anthology Aces Weekly to produce The Boötes Void and Thrawn Janet, an adaptation of R.L. Stevenson’s short story.

And finally, after a few attempts that you’ll hear all about, he came to 2000 AD‘s attention, working with Pat Mills on Defoe: The Divisor, which saw print in Progs 2150-2161 (2019), to give us a stunning rendition of this clockpunk alternate past where the undead are kept at bay by zombie hunters like Titus Defoe. And of course, since then, we’ve been seeing his art regularly on covers, pin-ups, special projects such as The 2000 AD Encyclopedia, and Judge Dredd strips.

So, here we go, a deeper dive into the artist’s head, featuring thoughts on creating, disappointment, failure, the Defoe pitches that eventually led to Stewart’s work with Pat Mills, and the genesis of his latest book, The Tragedie of Macbeth, originally self-published but now brought to a wider audience by Clover Press and based on his drawings of Prague Shakespeare Company’s adaptation of Shakespeare’s masterpiece.

But to start, let’s go back to a few things Stewart mentioned as part of his Covers Uncovered for Surfer, where he was telling us about the artist’s problem of seeing the thing they want to achieve and then invariably failing to get there…

STEWART K. MOORE: I failed to draw an 89-page graphic novel in one week, damn it….it took four weeks, but I’ll get to that in a minute.

[For the Surfer cover] I put in some incredible hours, but I didn’t get what I wanted. So it’s a bit of a heartbreaker this one. It’s not like anything else. I think that’s a success of sorts.

But ultimately it didn’t go where I sensed it could, it only got so far.

The trouble with art is we artists can see and feel it right away, but showing others takes many hours of work. Those who can’t imagine what we see can then see it in an instant and can imagine it in an instant, although they had no idea just a moment before. I can still see it and feel it and I’m sorry I can’t show you it, this is as close I could get in that blistering heat.

Maybe next time. 

The Surfer cover wasn’t a failure but sometimes you do fail and hard.

Don’t despair, keep those things around in a drawer, you never know. My first pitch for Defoe failed hard.

And here, thanks to Stewart, is that first pitch for Defoe…

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SKM: Pitching is a tricky thing to discuss, the editor makes a judgement call based on certain things that are unknowable. Even a halfway decent pitch can get rejected by unknowables, for example, maybe the editor already has a hunch a spectacular artist like Colin McNeil would be interested, it’s just not clear. I advise artists to be self-motivated and not wait for pitch acceptance and try not to take rejection personally. But it’s not easy.

When I thought of adapting Macbeth to comics [which came out as a self-published comic in 2016], the prospect of a detailed work, like my last pitch, made me feel sick.

I wanted to paint it in oils (and still want to do a fully oil-painted comic – call me!), but it was the primal work of Louis le Brocquy that sprang to mind when I considered Macbeth, as a book, and it was Pat Mills that told me about it.

I think Pat saw an exhibition of Le Brocquy’s prints based on the Irish myth of The Táin [or Táin Bó Cúailnge, sometimes known as The Cattle Raid of Cooley, an epic of Irish mythology].

When he read up on Irish mythology a terrifying warrior leapt into his imagination, a greater transformative mythic hulk than The Hulk and a greater warrior than Conan – this was Sláine MacRoth!

The primitivist style of the le Brocquoy art gave me the impetus to drop all the detailed inking I’d just laboured over for my failed Defoe pitch and try something new for The Tragedies of Macbeth.

I stripped the story back to its simplest shapes and gave myself a strict 5 minutes to assess, after each page was done. After that I was not allowed to touch it!

I was drawing 6 pages a day and aimed to have a graphic novel in 7 days. I failed, it took 28. That’s one moon cycle, which is apt for a story about witches. I self-published 120 copies and sold 9 to Gosh Comics (they’re great supporters of the small press!).

That was 2015 or so and this month it came out, from Clover Press, as a definitive new graphic novel.

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In 2017 I started adapting Thrawn Janet and went back to detail, this time aiming for a classic horror style reminiscent of Hammer films of the 1960’s.

This was published in Aces Weekly, the greatest digital anthology comic out there. Aces’ editor-in-chief is none other than David Lloyd of V for Vendetta fame.

I sent a few to Pat and he liked them enough to send them in as a possible creative direction, I was soon working on yet another pitch test for a new Defoe story – The Divisor. 

This pitch took two months, can you believe that? Based on old material from a previous Defoe story that I’ve yet to see. I was waiting for a tram when I got the text from Pat, the art had passed the test and the game was afoot! (a rotten Reeks foot and the hardest project of my career!).

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If you are lucky a great style will emerge from you. I envy that, it didn’t happen for me. So I follow my stylistic whims as they come to me. I’m still looking for my Dredd-world style, It’s close, I can feel it.

Stick in artist, trust yourself, plough on Macduff!

I have a signing for Macbeth coming up at Gosh Comics 1 Berwick Street, London on Saturday 30th September from 1 to 2 pm.

Bring your copy of Surfer or any of my 2000 AD work along and I’ll be delighted to sign them. I will be bringing many sketches and drawings from my work on Judge Dredd and cover art too.

I will be signing any and all 2000 AD comics and books that I have worked on and I will stay and sign until everybody has their book signed. I’ll draw a free sketch of the dead King Macbeth in all my copies.

Thank you once more to Stewart for yet another fascinating dive into the creative process – it’s something all prospective artists should bear in mind – keep trying, keep failing, it makes you better, it gets you ready to get the job you want, get the art you want.

Remember, you can find the first part of this extended look at the artistic process from Stewart with his Covers Uncovered for Surfer here. You can (and should) pick up Surfer from all great comic shops and the 2000 AD web shop right now.

As for more stuff from Stewart, there’s plenty we’ve already published for you – including Covers Uncovered pieces for The 2000 AD Encyclopaedia, Prog 2179, Prog 2239, Prog 2340, Megazine 440, 2020 Sci-Fi Special poster, plus an interview about his Judge Dredd: Ascension Day strip here and an interview about Defoe: The Divisor here.

For Stewart’s other work, find and follow him on Twitter and Instagram, read his bio here at Lambiek, and buy all his works including his amazing adaptation of The Tragedie Of Macbeth that you’ve been reading about and the stunning MK-Ultra: Sex, Drugs & The CIA, all about the shadowy world of government conspiracies and covert ops. The MK Ultra complete collection comes out in Sept 2023 from Clover Press.

And, like he says, he’ll be appearing at Gosh Comics in London on Saturday 30^th September between 1 and 2pm for a signing for The Tragedie Of Macbeth.

Yes, bring your 2000 AD stuff for signing and sketching but be sure to pick up a copy of Macbeth as well, it’s such a great book – based on his drawings of Prague Shakespeare Company’s adaptation of Shakespeare’s masterpiece. He documents the stage performance in Prague and illustrates it against the ‘starkest memories, places and myths of his own homeland.’ It’s a really stunning adaptation of the play, with Stewart’s use of the comics page and storytelling pacing making this a perfect adaptation of the play.

Here’s a nice pic of him in front of his work in Gosh, just so you know who you’re looking for…

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 not a 2000 AD Prog or a Megazine cover we’re talking about but the cover to the new collection of John Wagner and Colin Macneil’s epic Surfer. The cover’s a wrapround stunner from Stewart K. Moore and, if you’ve been following these Covers Uncovered for a while, you know Stewart’s Covers Uncovered pieces are always epic!

Stewart’s entitled this particular Covers Uncovered…

On Surfer and the artistic long game, pitch fails and successes,
and the pitching process for 2000AD.

But in fact, because this particular Covers Uncovered is so epic, so huge, and so long, we’re going to split it in two. Today, you get the ‘Surfer and the artistic long game’ bit. Tomorrow, Stewart will take you through more of ‘the artistic long game,’ and we’ll get into the fascinating aspect of ‘pitch fails and successes and the pitching process for 2000 AD.’

So, today we’re all about Surfer, the John Wagner and Colin MacNeil collection of the two storylines that ran in the Judge Dredd Megazine. Surfer sees Wagner and MacNeill return to Dreddworld and also return (in a way) to Chopper and Supersurf 7.

It’s all about young surfer Zane Perks, whose troubles really begin when he lands himself the role of playing Chopper in a new film of Supersurf 7. What should have been a dream job swiftly turns into an absolute nightmare, with the (unbeknownst to Zane) illegal filming and surfing landing him in the iso-cubes. After that, on release, he’s then tied up with the mob, being forced to first escape MC-1 to pick up drugs from Canadia and then to do the even more dangerous thing of smuggling said drugs back into the city. It’s an absolute masterpiece and a start to finish zarjaz thriller that mixes the excitement of surfing – brought to life by stunning work from MacNeill – and a tense drama of crime and redemption.

Surfer is out right now, and should be there on the shelves on your local comic shop when you next go in. And of course, you can always pick up a copy from the 2000 AD web shop.

But now, let’s go deep into the creation of another stunning Stewart K. Moore cover.

As Stewart’s been doing for the last few Covers Uncovered, he sent along his rough and then a video of the process. It’s well worth watching the vids as they really do get so deep into the way that he works and allow you to see the minute detail that he puts into everything that he does – almost a ridiculous amount of detail, way, way more detail than a lot of us would notice.

This set of videos is a little different from what Stewart’s usually showing us though. He’s not showing you Zane, he’s not showing you characters in the foreground. No, he’s concentrating on the little group of characters in the background. The ones you maybe won’t even notice on the cover.

This lot, the one’s just in the entrance to Zuckerberg block…

So, here you go, the videos of Stewart’s process, enjoy!

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STEWART K. MOORE: I had two cover projects for Rebellion, back to back, in the summer of 2022. So the day I sent in the first I started the second. One of the problems of freelancing is bridging the project gaps, I’m always busy but somehow there are always gaps. Anyway, it was nice, that. Doubly nice because I was able to pull a stylistic 180-degree turn.

The first was Karl the Viking. The subject matter – a classic sword and sorcery story. It immediately suggested a painting in oils on canvas. So I did an oil painting – it felt right and I really enjoyed working on a Don Lawrence project, he was a master artist.

I enjoyed revisiting what felt like my artistic origins too. Dabbling with paint, listening to rock and punk and Ska while trying to understand the works of Frazetta and Vallejo and Bernie Wrightson and many more in the late ’80s.

Stewart added these notes to that Karl The Viking cover sketch…

SKM: ‘The fight on the drawbridge, Karl has dropped ‘from space’ into the centre of the fight. Light hits his hair, face, muscular arm and swinging sword, whilst the battle is shadowed by smoke from the fires.’

And, after a lot of work in oils (a LOT of work), we get this as the finished cover for the second and concluding reprint volume of Karl The Viking, a web shop exclusive hardcover that you can get here.

Written by Ted Cowan and Michael Moorcock, with art, incredible, beautiful, stunning art from Don Lawrence, along with Edmund Drury, Robert Forrest, and Ruggero Giovannini, Karl the Viking is the series which made Don Lawrence’s reputation, and it was on this basis that he was hired to revolutionise painted comic art with The Trigan Empire.

But as beautiful as Stewart’s work is on that Karl The Viking cover, we’re here to show you the cover to Surfer, so let’s get back to that…

SKM: But Surfer is Mega City One and so I did that in a digital style.

I wanted the oil to be classic and muted and natural in feel and the digital to push the envelope into something plastic, a little cartoonish, colourful, and utterly artificial.

I didn’t quite make it, but I closed in and it has been well received.

I feel we’ve got to strive toward the unusual and not readily accept the default image that comes to mind, lest that default be the fall-back. So I took some compositional risks here. I also wanted it to be a scene something like a game or animation cut-scene.

We all know how to make pictures and what ‘to do’, what makes a pretty picture; if we don’t there will be a book showing the way. Simples.

But with a comic like 2000 AD there have been millions of images by an array of maddeningly brilliant artists. How do you do something that fits with that merry band but also brings something new? That’s what keeps me awake at night.

Anyway, for Surfer I did a series of sketches. I can’t share them, I have plans for them. Oliver Pickles, my editor at Rebellion, chose a dynamic one. A fun visual grabber...

Part ways in and I realised it could be a wraparound, the jet trail leaves the page, there was fun to be had on that back page! I got the go-ahead for that extension.

Then the heatwave of 2022 came. It was so bad, so unbearable to work in, that I wrote to Oliver to apologise for the delay, let’s just say he’s not from Betelgeuse so I feared no Rigelion hotshots! The heat was enough of a punishment…awful, debilitating. Terrible. I have no air-con in the studio and usually, the heat doesn’t bother me. But this time it really did.

The picture was finished during this period, I put in some incredible hours, but I didn’t get what I wanted. So it’s a bit of a heartbreaker this one.

It’s not like anything else. I think that’s a success of sorts.

The design features a moment in the story where the lead character evades the judges by slipping into an underpass of some kind.

That would be these pages of gorgeous Colin MacNeil artwork…

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I studied the panels and tried to draw the same pedestrians I saw in the comic art panels, loosely based anyway.

I tried to draw Mr McNeil’s unique H Wagon / Manta too. I didn’t feel it would be right to draw a Manta the way I would (there are many designs, many artists have their unique take). His version is great, like a floating concrete tank, but I struggled to draw it. That’s the truth of it.

Of course, the H-Wagon that Stewart drew on the cover is obscured by the logo… but here’s what’s underneath…

And a close-up of the Judges inside the H-Wagon… this is what I mean by the amazing detail that Stewart will pack his art with…

And here’s a few panels showing you Colin MacNeil’s H-Wagons from Surfer for comparison – sorry Stewart, don’t feel too bad…

Okay, back to Stewart…

SKM: The physical stance of the Surfer has that unique, ungainly, monkey-like crouch quality we often see in 2000 AD characters. I got that right. If you look at the history of 2000 AD characters they don’t tend to be elegant like Marvel’s bounding pimped Nureyevs, no, they are oftentimes inelegant in 2000 AD. So I guess I managed that.

But ultimately it didn’t go where I sensed it could, it only got so far.

The trouble with art is we artists can see and feel it right away, but showing others takes many hours of work. Those who can’t imagine what we see can then see it in an instant and can imagine it in an instant, although they had no idea just a moment before. I can still see it and feel it and I’m sorry I can’t show you it, this is as close I could get in that blistering heat.

Maybe next time. 

Oh, Stewart, Stewart, Stewart, we know that readers of this and those fans picking up Surfer from the shelves will be thinking you absolutely nailed the cover. The insecurities of those art droids really are something!

Thank you once more to Stewart for another enthralling Covers Uncovered for Surfer. You can (and should) pick up Surfer from all great comic shops and the 2000 AD web shop right now.

But of course, that’s just the first part of this mammoth Covers Uncovered feature. We’ve done Surfer now, but there’s a load more to come, all about making art, pitching for work, and so much more. You can see that tomorrow. And believe me, you’re going to want to see it.

As for more from Stewart, be sure to go look at previous Covers Uncovered pieces – 2000 AD Encyclopaedia, Prog 2179, Prog 2239, Prog 2340, Megazine 440, the poster in the 2020 Sci-Fi Special here, and then there’s a look behind the scenes here for the 2022 Judge Dredd: Ascension Day strip and an interview about Defoe: The Divisor here.

You can follow him on Twitter and Instagram, read his bio here at Lambiek, and buy all his works including The Tragedie Of Macbeth and the quite magnificently wonderful and completely out there MK-Ultra: Sex, Drugs & The CIA, a deep look into the darker aspects of US intelligence and one of its most secretive and controversial experiments involving the CIA’s mind control program and its use of hallucinogenics. The collection comes out in October 2023 from Clover Press.

Stewart will also be appearing at Gosh Comics in London on Saturday 30^th September at 1-2pm for a signing for The Tragedie Of Macbeth. Bring your stuff for him to sign – and be sure to get yourself a copy of Macbeth as well – it’s another style completely from Stewart, he describes it as ‘very raw and hard and sheer.’ We’d describe it as gorgeous.

Stewart’s Macbeth is based on his drawings of Prague Shakespeare Company’s adaptation of Shakespeare’s masterpiece. Published by Clover press, Stewart documents the stage performance in Prague and illustrates it against the ‘starkest memories, places and myths of his own homeland.’ It’s a really stunning adaptation of the play, with Stewart’s use of the comics page and storytelling pacing making this a perfect adaptation of the play.

And now, to finish, plenty of screenshots from Stewart’s videos, showing you all that incredible detail in his artwork and the amount of work these art droids put into things…

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, Dan Cornwell’s back on the cover with a very impressive and mean-looking Dredd for Prog 2345, out on 16 August. And it all came about because of a pen test…

DAN CORNWELL: The proverb ‘Necessity is the mother of invention’ I believe sums up this cover.

I seem to spend a lot of time (more than I should) searching for the perfect tool, the perfect pen or paper – that will finally elevate my work to higher professional levels. But you soon realize it’s not the pen or paper (though they can help) that does that, it’s you. I’m still searching though.

Artists love finding new pens.

Anyway, this cover came about because of that hunt. The pen I use is a Pilot Pocket Brush Pen (Pilot Shunpitsu Pocket Brush Pen) which, unfortunately, is no longer available here in the UK. So, I went on a mission to find a suitable replacement. Tombow, Pental, etc. etc. but I could never find one that I liked as much as my Shunpitsu pen. They’re cheap disposable brush pens with a rubber brush tip and water based ink. Many artists don’t like them, but I do.

After months of searching I was looking at an empty one I had (I have about 40 empty, never threw them out, thankfully) and decided to take it apart to see if I could somehow refill it. After about 45 mins I managed to Frankenstein it. Now I have a lifetime’s supply of pens, and all I need is to buy the ink to fill them.

This image was done using the Frankenstein pen. I wanted it to be a cover quality image as it would be a proper test of the pen.

I decided to draw Dredd. I know! Crazy! What a curveball. Who could have guessed? 

First up was the composition – I wanted to do a slightly beaten-down Dredd, yet still enough in the tank to give you a good daysticking. I also wanted a slightly low angle so you’re pov is like you’ve just been beaten down by Joe.

Unfortunately, I never scanned the pencils as this wasn’t intended to be a published piece.

Next I inked it with the Frankenstein pen. Thankfully it worked better than I expected. I added some slight ink textures with dry brushes, sponges and other textures.

Next, I scanned it and cleaned up the image...

Then I added the flat base colours. I wanted a muted tone to this Dredd so I used a less saturated palette. I had always envisaged this image to have a white background, so Dredd himself would be front and centre and the sole focus of the picture.

Lastly, I added shadows and highlights along with some brush textures and dust and scratches. I moved my signature over as it would work better for cover blurb if Matt wanted it.

Job done.

I was very pleased with how it turned out and sent it to Matt and asked if it was of any use? He liked it and said he could use it as a cover for the prog. All very fortuitous. As is my comic career some might say. 

Dan’s comic career is in no way fortuitous – don’t ever let him tell you that. He’s worked his way up and his talent shone through. And that’s the reason why he’s become one of the great modern-day Dredd artists already – just as this cover shows!

Thanks to Dan for sending that one along – amazing what happens when you’re just testing out a pen, isn’t it? You can find 2000 AD Prog 2345 wherever you pick up your weekly dose of Ghafflebette comics, including the 2000 AD web shop from 16 August.

For more of Dan’s excellent covers, you should go look at the Covers Uncovered for Prog 2217, Prog 2241, Prog 2277, and Prog 2279.

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 have a debutant on the cover of 2000 AD Prog 2344 – Lee Milmore. It’s a nightmarish cover to announce the beginning of the Tharg’s 3Riller: Maxwell’s Demon, written by David Barnett and drawn by Milmore.

Lee Milmore first caught the eye of Tharg with his win at the 2000 AD & Thought Bubble talent contest in 2022 and since then he’s appeared in the Prog with the Future Shock: Relict, (Prog 2279) written by his fellow 2022 winner, Honor Vincent.

Maxwell’s Demon is the follow-up to Barnett & Milmore’s first collaboration, another 3Riller, The Crawly Man, in Progs 2297-2299. Barnett and Milmore took us into the pastoral folk horror of sleepy English villages, where horrors lie behind the quaint customs. We met young Caris, who was going to be sacrificed by her village until she was saved by the itinerant magician Herne and his dog Shuck. Caris turned out to be a powerful summoner and left the village after setting a demon on the village elders. Now, in Maxwell’s Demon, we return to catch up with them as Herne is attempting to exorcise an infomancy engine.

It’s more of the same from Barnett and Milmore and all introduced by a suitably nightmare-inducing cover from Milmore. For a first cover, that’s a beauty.

We’ll get into the making of the cover in a moment, but first I had to ask Lee what it meant to get his very first 2000 AD cover…

LEE MILMORE: Wow, it’s staggering. I’m on the cover of 2000AD. I always dreamed of being a 2000AD artist, not a comic book artist you understand, a 2000AD artist!

Most of my art heroes were/are in those hallowed pages and also, on the cover. And now I am. I don’t think deep down in my bones I ever thought this would happen.

So I feel very fortunate and just really fulfilled by this moment. Don’t get me wrong, it comes with a big dollop of cringe, I mean my cover followed Dave Taylor’s…and as Wayne and Garth were prone to say – I’m not worthy.

Wait, don’t tell Tharg I said that. I am worthy and please can I do another soon. Ahem.

We won’t mention it to TMO Lee. And we think this cover and the work you’re doing on the inside definitely shows us all you’re more than worthy!!

Okay, now it’s onto just how you made the cover…

LEE MILMORE: This cover came about while I drew part 1 of Maxwell’s Demon. David (Barnett) described a possessed meat machine with an HR Gieger vibe.

While I designed this Cronenburgian horror, the cover image just appeared in my mind – pretty much directly lifted from the strip itself.

Lee’s talking about this bit of horror in the first part of Maxwell’s Demon…

LEE MILMORE: I thought if we pulled in close it would be difficult to put your finger on what you were looking at, like most of what the great Kevin O’Neill did. I thought readers may even think it was an ABC warrior or something (although they may also end up being crushed it isn’t, which I didn’t think about until now).

So I made a quick mock-up, roughly painted over the top of the image from the strip. I took a deep breath and sent it over to Tharg to see if he’d deem it worthy. Tharg the decisive came straight back with a yes! I did a sort of embarrassing shimmy around my studio and after several hours was forced to clamp shut my massive gormless grin for fear of the wind changing.

Onto stage 2 and, OH DROKK! Now I actually have to do it – a week’s therapy ensued.

Finally, I was forced from my residency at the therapist with a firebrand, like Frankenstein’s monster. Apparently, ‘no they couldn’t do it for me, and I’d just have to put on my big droid pants and get on with it”

I went back to my drawing and copied it into its own cover document and examined it. I’d decided that, to make my life more difficult, I would paint it on paper with Acrylic Gouache and that I’d print out the lines as the base for the painting.

As I was going to do an analogue piece, I checked the drawing for rubbishness. What I found was it was a bit wonky. Don’t examine it too hard and you’ll retain a shred of respect for me.

So I threw some construction lines over the image and made it more symmetrical which was important for an image like this close in on the cover. Less so in the maelstrom of black ink from a greater remove.

I’d decided to show a little more of the Infomancy Engine and wanted those lamprey mouths reaching out at the viewer, so scratched them in. Then I dropped the black lines into a light sepia that would easily disappear under the paint.

On to stage 3. I printed it out onto watercolour paper (a heavy stock) and stretched it onto a board.

You can see my trademark sloppy workmanship here – when other artists post their stretched paper the tape is always immaculate, mine looks like the wrinkled old skin of the hands that type this essay. Also note the way the printer ink is water soluble, which shows up my tears…so scruffy (sob).

Stage 4 is painting. I just want to get as much paint onto the canvas as quickly as possible now.

If you dwell too long I find you start to doubt and lose energy for what you’re doing. So I spend a day just blocking in, picking up detail using a Prussian blue.

I also rough in the tumour veins that grow from the machine and the exposed fleshy brain. But no attempt at rendering at this stage. I know I want the engine to burn internally so I also lay in a little yellow which I also draw up into the skull/bone parts.

Stage 5 – Once the rough blocking in is complete I just get on with painting, rendering the forms establishing the sickly lighting and fighting with the notion that it needs to look polished but it also needs to look like a painting. One day I’ll get that balance right.

Stage 6. I scan the drawing using my trusty A3 scanner and, in Photoshop, finalise the image. You can see the difference that the scanner makes to the colour, the other pictures were just via my phone.

I add a dark halo around the circumference of the Infomancy Engine. I work into the fiery insides to bring a better glow and add just a little steam. I think I sharpened up a few lines too.

I think I’m happy.

I send it over to the Nerve Centre and Tharg doesn’t send back an order to visit Mek Quake. Phew…first cover in.

And then I wait for publication. I’m very busy but it’s in my head all the time. And now that time is all but here.

I wish I could be cool about it, but it’s 2000AD, the cover of 2000AD. Hope I’m allowed back.

And most of all I hope you like it.

Lee Milmore there – hoping you all like his first cover. We think you will. Heck, we’re sure you will, nothing like a huge, terrifying fear machine to leap off the shelves!

Our thanks to Lee for sharing with us this hugely important moment – and congratulations to him once more for a debut cover!

You can find 2000 AD Prog 2344 from anywhere The Galaxy’s Greatest is sold, including the 2000 AD web shop from 9 August.

For more from Lee Milmore, do go back and read his interview (with Honor Vincent) about that very first 2000 AD strip, Relict, here. And of course, go look at his website and follow him on Twitter.

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 the return of ex-Chief Judge Barbara Hershey to the cover of 2000 AD Prog 2343 as the climactic series of Hershey: The Cold In The Bones by Rob Williams and Simon Fraser continues inside.

But, despite what you might initially think, it’s not a Simon Fraser cover here. Instead, Tharg made a call to the Dave Taylor droid for this one…

It’s been a while since we saw Dave either on the cover or inside either the Prog or the Judge Dredd Megazine. Hopefully, we’ll be seeing his gorgeous artwork on the next series of the Ken Niemand-penned retro-infused alt-history of MC-1 epic Megatropolis series in the Judge Dredd Megazine soon. But right now, time to talk to him about this cover and how he’s hoping Simon Fraser doesn’t find out! (So no one tell him, okay?)

DAVE TAYLOR: I’m happy to talk about this cover as long as nobody tells Simon Fraser. I don’t want him finding out it was me that tried to blatantly ape his great style, and obviously failing dramatically!

UPDATE: Oh heck, seems Simon did find out… more on that in a while!

DAVE TAYLOR: Truth be told, this was a weird one to do. I’m a huge fan if Simon’s work, I love what he’s doing on Hershey, so it’s not comfortable to be asked to do a cover for his series, certainly not in a style that I might normally use.

I asked Tharg if it would be OK for me to do a kind of homage to Simon’s work, to basically do it in his style, and Tharg agreed this would be best.

So…OK then. I have to learn to draw like Simon, but not make it look like I’m copying him, so the readers don’t shout “Who’s this creep ripping off Mr Fraser?”

I got myself a copy of the first series and soaked it all up. I’d read it when it was first published but not in a collected form, so this helped refresh my memory of exactly how Simon goes about making pictures.

I found that, under the surface, our way of drawing wasn’t that different. There was a familiarity that I could latch onto about Simon’s line work and his approach to figure drawing.

So then I had a few attempts at coming up with the basic design for the cover, following Thargs suggestion of subject and referring to the few pages he’d sent me from this new series.

I did the sketch very small, 4×3 inches, in pencil, and scanned it into Photoshop to add the basic colour. Tharg gave me the green light so I went ahead and drew it up onto art board.

I tried to stay as faithful as I could without lightboxing the thing but now it’s done, I kind of wish I had lightboxed it. I think I lost a little of the drama, but who am I to argue?

All along, while drawing and then inking and colouring I kept thinking “how would Simon do that? Would he do it that way?” and so on.

When it was finished I found myself thinking “how is Simon going to react? I wonder if he’s particularly violent? He’s going to hate me!!” “

Fortunately for Dave, Simon Fraser is one of the nicest of art droids, so I think he, like us, will be impressed with what Dave’s done here, a stunning homage to his work on Hershey and a damn fine cover in its own right.

Am I right Simon? Simon? Simon? Put down the sharpened pencils Simon!!

UPDATE – Well, as we reported earlier, Simon DID hear about the cover and sent over this missive…

SIMON FRASER: I should give some context to this… I first saw Dave Taylor’s work back in the very early 90s when a mutual friend ( Ian Carney ) showed it to me. This is back when I was a highly motivated young hotshot ( in my own eyes ) trying to bust my way into the UK comics scene.

I was down living in London, knocking on the doors of Egmont Fleetway ( as it was then ) and drawing my first book ( Lux & Alby Sign-On & Save the Universe ). I thought I was hot shit back then. Then I saw some of the work coming out of Liverpool, Dave Taylors principally. Not only was it spectacularly good, but he was clearly drawing from the same European influences that I was, but better. I resented him immediately. Then I heard that Dave was now over in France actually working with Jean Giraud ( Moebius )himself. My resentment grew blistering!

I remained peripherally aware of Dave’s work and career over the decades, as one stays aware of a 400lb apex predator in one’s immediate vicinity. Now and again someone would compliment me on my intricate cityscapes and compare me to that other guy who does intricate, spectacular cityscapes in 2000 AD. I moved country a bunch of times,  never quite escaping the shadow.

I ended up in New York ( as one does ) and got involved with a bunch of New York comics-related stuff ( inevitably very cool ). While casually chatting to Chip Kidd one evening at the Society of Illustrators Bar, I wondered aloud if he had any interest in doing comics himself (  not in any way fishing for a gig ). Chip says that he is in fact already working on such a project and the artist is another Brit, you may know him ….Dave Taylor!

I turned my head away,  manfully containing my rage, sipped my beer through clenched teeth and stared at the immense Norman Rockwell painting over the bar.

Now …..THIS!

Oh heck. Time to leave before things get messy I think. Sometimes you can never tell how the art droids will react. Time for Tharg to take the extra caffeine out of their special wake-up oil mixture I think!

Our thanks go, as always to Dave for taking the time to talk about the cover and send in his artwork. And thanks to to Simon for sending in his thoughts on the cover. Tharg has sat them both down in a small room and isn’t letting either droid out until they kiss and make up. Or at least stop throwing pointy pencils at each other.

You can find 2000 AD Prog 2343 wherever you pick up your weekly dose of Ghafflebette comics, including the 2000 AD web shop from 2 August.

For more Covers Uncovered pieces from Dave, do check out the covers to Megazine 431 and Megazine 438. We also interviewed Dave about Megatropoiis here and he talks about it on the 2000 AD Thrill Cast here. There’s also an interview with Dave and Ian Edginton about their work on Fiends of the Eastern Front here.

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 another stunning cover by Dylan Teague for Judge Dredd Megazine issue 459, that looks very much like this…

Yes, it’s Dredd out on the streets on Mega-City One, locked and loaded and in a mean mood. Although, thinking about it, when isn’t the city’s finest lawman not in a mean mood?

So, without further ado, here’s how another brilliant Teague cover comes together, all starting with an idea to pitch to Tharg The Mighty. Dylan had this to say…

DYLAN TEAGUE: ‘I know that Tharg can sometimes need a sort of generic Dredd cover, as he features in both mags all the time. I was trying to come up with something quite graphic and after a few failed sketches came up with this as a concept.…

After that initial sketch – which Tharg of course said an emphatic yes to – it was time to get down to the business of getting the cover sorted out.

Back to Dylan again…

DYLAN TEAGUE: From this it was just a case of getting Dredd right and then the background. Dredd always takes me ages to work out, every part of his costume takes a while to get right and then render, eventually got it done and then moved on to the background.

This was a bit more straightforward, though I didn’t manage to keep it quite as graphic as I’d initially envisaged.

Art droids, always finding problems where readers only see brilliance!

All that’s left to show you is how it all came together. First, what Dylan described as ‘getting Dredd right and then the background.’ So it’s a case of building the layers on Dredd bit by bit, just like this…

After that, all that’s left to do is add a few colours and that’s it, another magnificently moody piece of Dredd cover art from the Teague droid.

Okay, okay, adding the colours takes hours and hours to get right – something the Teague droid always does so well…

Thank you so much to Dylan for sending over the artwork – it’s another great cover that you can find on Megazine 459, out on 16 August wherever you get your Thrill Power, including the 2000 AD web shop.

For more from Dylan, and another great study of Dredd, take a look at his Covers Uncovered piece for Prog 2236.

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 sees the return of Ken Niemand and Tom Foster for Judge Dredd: A Fallen Man, the third part of their trilogy following former Judge Kyle Asher, freshly returned from his 20 years on Titan for beating a citizen to death and now working as an auxiliary. It follows A Penitent Man (Progs 2225-2230) and An Honest Man (Progs 2281-2286) and something tells us it’s just not going to end too well for poor Kyle. Not if Dredd’s got anything to do with it.

To mark the start of the third and final part of the trilogy, we get to welcome back Tom Foster to the cover of Prog 2341 with a fabulous Dredd image – although, as you’ll discover, he’s got issues with it…

TOM FOSTER: Alright, I’ll level with you. At the time of writing, I’m just over halfway through the third-to-last chapter of this story. By the time you read this I should be (if all goes according to plan) a few days into drawing the penultimate part – and part one will already be on newsagents’ shelves and in the hands of whichever subscribers are fortunate enough to live in a district with a prompt postal service.

So, if this ‘Covers Uncovered’ has an air of desperation about it, it’s because this droid is currently gears-deep in the process of trying to get it all finished in time for the solemn and immutable deadline, the spectre that haunts a comic book artist’s dreams like a sleep paralysis demon.

Those familiar with my working methods, or even just my general essence, may have good cause to suspect that this frenzied dash to the finish is the result of poor time-management and fecklessness. For once though, I’m happy to say this is not the case. But, whatever the root cause, the implications are the same: I am racing face-to-face with my own doom and we are about to smash into each other in a cataclysm of blood and zygomatic arches.

But sure, let’s use up a chunk of my remaining time to go over the process for the cover of Prog 2341.

First of all, let’s be clear on one point – this cover has problems. Some of those problems are the result of logical sacrifices in service of the concept and some are the result of my own surfeit of limitations and ignorance, but problems they remain – and the biggest, by some measure, is wideness.

Judge Dredd is too wide. His face is too wide. His helmet is too wide. His whole vibe is too wide.

To understand this overabundance of width it is necessary to journey back to the beginning, when I was just a fledgling Prog 2341 cover artist, starting out on my journey to make the cover for Prog 2341, with nothing but hope in my heart and a bagful of dreams.

As is the custom, I started with a layout sketch. Here, I was presented with my first problem. This is a Dredd story – Dredd being on the cover is generally a plus here – but Tharg also likes covers to reflect the actual chapter of the story that they are to accompany. So, what does Dredd do in this chapter? He stands and looks at a screen.

‘Hang on though’, I thought to myself ‘if I show the action on-screen reflected in Dredd’s visor, it’ll create the suggestion of Dredd’s involvement and foreshadow any confrontation to come later in the story’. It seemed like an excellent idea.

Then I realised just how narrow those bits of Dredd’s visor that he looks out of are. ‘No problem,’ I thought ‘I’ll just fudge the proportions a bit.’

Little did I suspect that that fudging would come back to fudge me in turn. Fudge me something rotten.

I rushed through the layout, a hanging offence, with the rationale that I’d drawn Dredd’s head a million times, so there was really no need to over-prepare. Idiot.

I based the whole composition around using Dredd’s helmet as a design element that didn’t really have to correspond to functional reality. But then, of course, I still wanted it to look convincing and to have Dredd’s whole chin in shot, so a certain amount of proportional shenanigans was necessary to have the visor take up the requisite amount of active space to have a nice clear shot of our stealth gunman reflected therein.

With the penciling stage, I started to notice some irregularities. The neck seemed wrong, springing up out of his body like one of He-Man’s buddies. The whole head seemed alien-like and unconvincing. ‘No problem’, I continued to think, ‘I’ll fix it in Photoshop before I ink it.’

A whopping great fudging was now lumbering inexorably in my direction.

I did my best to mitigate the damage and then printed out the pencils for inking. This stage went not too bad. I used a smaller brush for the figure in the visor and a bigger one for Dredd, just to give some sense of scale (a Winsor & Newton 7 Series size 0 for the figure and size 2 for Dredd, for all you brush-heads out there).

Then, again, I tried to compensate for the flatness in the image engendered by poor proportion, by really highlighting the middle of Dredd’s face and darkening out the outer edges of it.

While this worked in part, there’s only so much dimension you can add this way. I only really fully realised my folly the day after I’d finished the colours.

Seeing a thumbnail-sized preview of the image on my desktop, I was suddenly struck by how wrong it looked, how much like a mid-late 90’s abomination of horrible superhero anatomy and colour gradients.

You can simulate this process now yourself by standing up the cover on a shelf in front of you and slowly stepping backwards away from it. You’ll see all the nuance disappear – all the seemingly-aligned elements of facial anatomy giving way to a snarling, two-dimensional monstrosity that even Rob Liefeld would have humanely euthanised on the spot.

Like all intelligent people, I keep a skull around the house – for contemplative and instructional purposes. As any good skull should, it provided a chilling portent of the error of my ways. I noticed that, when viewed from the front, the jaw is really only about two ‘mouths’ wide. One in the middle (obviously) and roughly one half on either side. No doubt this was covered in one of my many anatomy books, but my youthful abandon conditioned me to ignore it.

Even with someone like Dredd, whose mandible often suggests a state of medical emergency, there’s only so much you can stretch these proportions before things start to look prohibitively unrealistic, particularly if you show his full array of pearly whites (as I had), betraying the underlying anatomy to the viewer.

So it was that I realised that, not only had I made this mistake here, but in a hundred other drawings, some contained within this very issue.

Fortunately, this process was an instructional one that has now informed the way I think about all faces and my work has improved as a result, but it came at a cost.

The thumbnail of this cover still haunts me and I can offer no better advice to budding artists than to consult this verse I’ve composed on the subject:

“If plagued by troubled doubt you be,
when drawing head anatomy,
consult the skull upon your shelf,
’tis wiser counsel than yourself.”

And we will leave poor art droid Foster there – the art droids really do beat themselves up over things when they think something’s wrong. Thanks to Tom for opening up to us – it’s almost a form of therapy sometimes!

You can find 2000 AD Prog 2341 wherever you pick up the Galaxy’s Greatest Comic, including the 2000 AD web shop from 19 July.

For more from Tom here at 2000AD.com, check out his Covers Uncovered features for 2000 AD Progs 1986, 2225, 2281, and 2310, his great Storm Warning cover for Megazine issue 450 and his just as great Surfer cover for Megazine issue 454. We’ve also interviewed him a couple of times – he talks about his 2013 Thought Bubble talent search win here and the Judge Dredd: A Penitent Man strip here. Finally, if you want to see and hear him, there’s his 2000 AD Thrill-Cast Lockdown Tapes appearance here and his far too funny From The Drawing Board video can be found here.

And as a special bonus for you, here’s the first three pages of Tom’s great artwork on the first episode of A Fallen Man… starting in Prog 2341…

Oh, and if you’re wondering why Tom’s labeled the cover ‘After Romita Sr’, well that would be because he’s homaging the classic John Romita Sr cover to Amazing Spider-Man #55 (Marvel Comics, 1967)… although, as he said to me when I enquired, ‘I know the composition’s a little different (it could just as easily be seen as an homage to Bolland’s cover for prog 161), but that Doc Ock over was definitely the more prominent in my mind while I was working on this one, so it just seemed appropriate to acknowledge it.’

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!

The latest Judge Dredd Megazine, issue 458, comes out 19 July – you can’t miss it, it’s got another stunning Nick Percival cover to mark the finale of the Dark Judges saga (for now at least) as Death Metal Planet comes to an end.

Nick’s art has graced the pages of the Megazine for nearly 400 pages of Dark Judges action. But all good things, as they say, must come to an end, even Judge Death.

But although Nick’s bidding farewell to Judge Death, we’ll be seeing him very soon with another Judge – but we’ll let him fill you in on that as he talks Megazine 458…

NICK PERCIVAL: “Here we go! – The final part of Death Metal Planet. It’s the end of the gig with no encore for Judges Death, Fear, Mortis and Fire.

It’s probably no surprise that things don’t end well for Death and the gang (do they ever?) and the cover image certainly shows that everything’s NOT coming up Milhouse for him.

It was actually Tharg’s cool idea to go with an image that would show Death vaporised from the intense power of Rosco in her Judge Light mode.

I wanted a full on, ‘there’s no coming back from this’ feel to the pic with a nice cosmic look.

I tweaked the image a little from the original sketch, just to make it clear it was Judge Death that was being destroyed and decided to go with a simple high-contrast colour palette to keep all the emphasis on the core image.

It’s been a fun and to be honest, quite a strange series to conclude my time (for now) on the Dark Judges after nearly 400 painted pages working on the characters with top writers, John Wagner and David Hine where I got to illustrate all manner of dark, weird and sometimes wacky stuff.

I’m back on Judge Dredd now with a little peek at something cool coming in the September Megazine and then a top secret, very dark Dredd epic for 2000AD that makes ‘Se7en’ look like Play School  –  say no more.

And as for the Dark Judges – Surely they can’t come back from this? (Although, I do have a couple of ideassss….)”

And thanks to Nick, we have a sneak peek of his next Dredd… just hope the Percival droid’s cleared this one with Tharg or we’re both in big trouble!

But remember, although this might be the end of Death Metal Planet – it’s not going to be the end for the Dark Judges and Judge Death. After all, ‘you cannot kill what does not live!’

Thanks so much to Nick for sending his cover process and that sneak peek of his work on Judge Dredd. As always, it’s grotesquely beautiful work from an art droid that never fails to impress.

You can get hold of Judge Dredd Megazine 458 wherever the Galaxy’s Greatest are sold, including the 2000 AD web shop from 19 July.

If you’re in the mood for more of Nick’s Covers Uncovered work, be sure to have a look at these – Prog 2247, Megazine 427, Megazine 430, Megazine 443, Megazine 448, and Megazine 453.

But before we go, just one last look at Nick’s version of Judge Death and Roscoe…

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 time to dive into the latest new 2000 AD Special – and what a special Special it is… it’s fresh, it’s new, it’s a vision of a future that you’ve not seen before, it’s Mega-City Max! And we’re taking a look behind the scenes with cover artist Priscilla Bampoh.

Mega-City Max is brand-new, fresh as you can get comics, max-ed out 2000 AD thrills for a new generation. It features cutting-edge comic talent and their versions of classic 2000 AD characters, including DeMarco, Devlin Waugh, Harlem Heroes, and Walter the Wobot, Dredd’s one-time house robot. With all-new stories for an all-new teen readership, Mega-City Max features some of the hottest breaking talent in comics, including Lucie Ebrey, VV Glass, Hannah Templer, Ramzee, Oliver Gerlach, Korinna Mei Veropoulou, and Roger Langridge.

And of course, right there on the cover to Mega-City Max we have Priscilla Bampoh, who’s about to tell us all about putting this one together…

PRISCILLA BAMPOH: I think the biggest challenge making this piece was the background, designing the city itself.

SK Moose’s spread art for 2000 AD Prog 2179 was one of the inspirations for the building designs and figuring out how to design a wraparound comic book cover as it was new territory for me.

Pris is talking about this one from Stewart… and you can find the Covers Uncovered piece for that here.

PB: A lot of the focus was designing an interesting setting, making sure there was little to no similar designs and that something was going on.

With the background sorted, I got to move on to my favourite part! The characters given were meant to be styled like they were going out together, roaming about in the big city.

The brief requested Gem, Devlin, and De Marco to be the main characters they wanted to fit onto the front cover, and that was a huge plus; they look like the type of characters I would want to work with for other projects. I managed to fit Walter in the front cover to avoid any empty space.

The moment I got the references for the characters, I had an immediate idea of what type of look I’d imagined they wear. Gem, for example, I imagined a retro bomber jacket, while someone like Devlin, who at first glance look insufferably pompous, would probably keep the more ‘smart’ look.

Now, the three stages of putting the cover together – from Pris’ initial rough through to the finished art ready to throw the colours onto…

PB: The goal was to make a “fun, vibrant” setting, and you see that most with the colours.

Here’s the initial colour palette; I like working with a lot of reds and would use that as the sunset.

The final piece matches the colours used for the cover, plus I had to remove the badge from De Marco’s coat.

I think an improvement I would make would be to make the characters feel less static; make them look like they were actually roaming around the city that surrounds them as opposed to just standing.

Thank you so much to Priscilla Bampoh for sending that one along – especially as she was snowed under with University stuff! Yes, all that absolute brilliant art and she’s still incredibly young! What an incredible talent!

You can find her stunning artwork on the cover of Mega-City Max – out on 19 July from comic shops and 2000 AD’s web shop..

Pris is a brilliant young artist and comic artist with an incredible future. You can see more of her work at her website, you should follow on Twitter, and all the other relevant links are at her Linktr.ee.

Right, time for bigger versions of the art you’ve seen, just because we can and it’s so great to see… the front and the back versions of rough, ‘pencils’, ‘inks’, and both colours. And after that, more of Pris’ great artwork to make you drool!

And now, just to give you some idea of what her work is all about, as if the fabulous Mega-City Max cover didn’t give you enough, here’s just a sampling of just how good Priscilla Bampoh is…

First of all, the only time we’ve chatted to Pris, albeit only briefly, was with the interview series for the 45 Years of 2000 AD Art Book, where she gave us this wonderful interpretation of Venus Bluegenes, saying this…

‘The character I got to draw was Venus Blugenes. In the art, I had the character all bloodied looking tired and in pain. I was basically just thinking what’s the best way to make her look as intimidating as possible.

I had her coming out of what looks like a huge wreckage in a jungle, kind of a way to show her strength and resilience. I look at images of Venus, and I’m like-WOW she’s fierce and deadly, she’s sort of the type of woman I try to replicate with my original characters nowadays.

The last 2000 AD character I made an illustration of was Durham Red, who was a joy to draw, but I feel like I play to my strengths as an artist more with Venus, especially with the colours. I’m not going to lie, I was unfamiliar with the character since I’m still very new to the 2000AD series, so I don’t have a huge attachment, but I wouldn’t hesitate to draw Venus again given the chance.

And then there’s this absolutely wonderful selection of Pris’ art from her website…

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, more wraparound madness from Stewart Kenneth Moore. It’s always a wonderful experience to get into the mind of this particularly great artist. And Stewart certainly didn’t let us down here on the cover of 2000 AD Prog 2340, out Wednesday 12 July.

Stewart’s cover is all part of the launch of the brand-new seven-part strip Portals & Black Goo, a great new comedy-horror from the wonderfully twisted minds of John Tomlinson and Eoin Coveney.

Portals & Black Goo is all about a London where monsters live amongst us and asks the question: what happens when the monsters get hungry and fancy a bite? Well here’s where Devouroo comes in – ‘We Deliver… You Devour’. Whether it’s bags of fresh plasma for vampires, bloody bones for djinn, or steaming viscera for werewolves, the put upon scooter riders of Devouroo will bring it to you. A satirical look at the world in the finest traditions of 2000 AD, Portals & Black Goo takes swipes at modern working conditions, the nightmarish world of zero-hour contracts, and the prejudices faced by all marginalised groups in society.

It’s another brilliant new strip for you in 2000 AD, all wrapped in a spectacularly good cover from SK Moore. As before, Stewart’s sent along videos of his process to fascinate and amaze you all and we’ve grabbed screenshots from the videos to illustrate what he’s talking about.  

And for fans of SK Moore’s art – yep, that’s all of you – be sure to check out the latest Judge Dredd Megazine, issue 458, out on 19 July, where he illustrates another great Ian Edginton written Judge Dredd: Ratings War. There’s a sneak peek of that at the end of this particular deep dive into this latest SK Moore cover.

So, shall we begin this look at the complete wrapround to Stewart’s Portals & Black Goo cover – oooh, get a load of this.

And now, over to Stewart for this latest, rather fabulous, Covers Uncovered…

SK MOORE: There are shedloads of art tutorials for artists online. Some of what I share here verges on technique but mostly it’s like a diary entry about the mental process, getting on with it, sticking with it and where ‘it’ comes from. If you are a budding comic artist I’ve listed some books below that I think are very helpful.

I relished this assignment, I’d just finished duties on Project MKUltra: The Complete Edition (out from Clover Press in Sept 2023) and found myself propelled forward into the work void with pen in hand and absolutely nothing on my desk.

An open road is exhilarating and terrifying. What’s next? A skill no one teaches in art books – How do you keep the work coming in while not being so busy that you can’t take on more work? That’s an art skill!

This cover offered real licence to generate numerous freaks and weirdoes – and freaks and weirdoes are my bread and butter. People are strange and learning there was to be a new story coming to 2000AD, set in an area populated by monstrous freaks, wasn’t in the least bit surprising, Jim Morrison was right – people are strange.

And just to prove that – Stewart sent along a few pieces from his sketchbook – some beautiful things that we’ll show you later, but this pair, ‘Sex Tourist’ and ‘Bucolic Alcoholic’ definitely fit under Stewart’s point of people are strange…

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SKM: The new story is Portals and Black Goo by John Tomlinson and Eoin Coveney. Tharg commissioned the cover early and Eoin was kind enough to share some character sketches. These included the ‘DEVOUROO’ logo, delivery rider, and a fearsome werewolf (who looked not too pleased with his delivery!).

There was also a vampire that reminded me of Joan Jett. I liked her right away, she was gonna be great to draw.

Tharg gave me my lead too and I think it went something like this:

‘The DEVOUROO delivery rider has just warped through a portal to arrive in the street. He is immediately hitting the brakes to avoid colliding with the monstrous pedestrians’ (we’ve all met them!).

I’m pretty sure that was basically Tharg’s lead, at least I think that was what he said. 

Tharg liked the sketch I sent over and now I just had to work-up the various weirdos milling in the street. Freaks and weirdoes are much easier to draw than flowers in vases and not only because they are entertaining – but because flowers are perfect and beautiful and perfect and beautiful things are hard to draw.  

Any mistake in drawing a flower or vase and it will be obvious to all that you have screwed up. Make a mistake with a freak, on the other hand, and it’s your keycard to freak-town. Errors only deepen the weirdness.

I realised recently that I’ve worked almost exclusively on wraparound covers and double-page spreads for 2000AD since 2019. I have a single-page cover coming up, but the one after that will be a wraparound. I love the challenge of a wraparound because the composition has to appeal in two formats, portrait on the front and landscape in whole.

My colouring instinct was a limited palette of red, black and white with some pinks (tints of red). This was a typical graphic style for budget horror in old film and theatre posters back when each additional colour cost money. The less colour you used the cheaper the print run would be.

I think Shaun of the Dead used the same colours in their poster and for the very same reason, they were pointing to classic horror, just as I do here.

I recently did it in a cruder way, on the cover of The Tragedie of Macbeth, my Shakespeare comic adaptation of ‘The Scottish Play’ – red, black and white, a powerful graphic combination for horror. 

I got the model of the motorbike from Eoin and found some good photo references. The colours of the Devouroo logo hadn’t been decided yet (it was early in the game!). So my colour scheme worked here too because the picture is essentially a red-tinted black-and-white world, so the livery can be black and white or any colour in the story that Eoin or his colourist might settle on.

[The colourist is Jim Boswell and he’s done a stunning job!]

I thought about the old Hovis TV advert directed by Ridley Scott in which a delivery boy pushes his bike up a steep hill of terraced houses. I looked online to find terraced houses in East London. I screenshot some and drew the background.

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I always try and include a brain in a jar If I have the opportunity. They are a classic sci-fi trope that somehow always amuses me.

One of the worst films ever made is pretty much a brain in a jar film, it’s called ‘They Saved Hitler’s Brain’ and it’s absolutely atrocious, and oddly dull for such a startling title. But the bits featuring Hitler are amusing. Anyway, if you don’t know it, let me save you the tedium, here are the highlights...

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AND NOW…DIGITAL INKING

If you are curious about digital inking, here’s the thing, there’s no button that does it for you. AI is a different matter, AI images are generated by machines and it shows because they are horribly soulless things. For now, at least.

I draw and ink in Manga Studio (Now called CLIP STUDIO PAINT) and I paint in Photoshop. But I use the same skills I learned on paper, there’s no shortcut. The Draw Curve tool, for example, replaces the French Curve. The various ink tools replace sable brushes and Rotring pens. It is faster and cheaper and you can’t beat that. The computer also combines several tools, it’s a lightbox and an encyclopaedia, all my brushes are where they should be and I never need to clean them.

Nevertheless, I’m moving back to a traditional media. There’s a bunch of things I don’t like about digital and it’s bugging me. Primarily I want there to be an artefact behind the printed page. I’m an artist and I want to make things. I want to leave images behind me that can’t be simply ‘switched off’.

Makes you lazy too, or it has me. It takes a more disciplined artist to maintain traditional tools, it is also much more expensive, this is why digital art wins the day. Sadly, that means the world of comic art (and you!) lose because there’s not as much tradable art on the market. Under the circumstances, ‘going that extra mile’, is simply unaffordable to many comic book artists. 

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A BRAIN IN A JAR WITH CRABS LEGS AND MALE & FEMALE HANDS

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I greyed out the rough and began a new layer over it and began refining that layer. It was mostly rubbish at this stage. But the fly-headed ‘flasher’ guy with the raincoat looked ok and so did the guy with the ‘cushion face’. Although ‘Fly Head, The Flasher’ had a detailed face with proboscis I accidentally filled in his head with the paint bucket tool. I saw right away it was better in shadow. I learned a long time ago that embracing happy accidents is a good idea, so I didn’t ‘undo’ it and kept it that way, no more proboscis!

After loads of re-attempts I finally had a better rough that I felt I could really ink the hell out of! I flatted it all on one layer and made it blue for inking. 

If you are working on paper you should consider blue pencil – if you intend to ink, anyway. If you draw comics in pencil, that’s cool, for pencil or paint, that’s fine. But why do that if you are planning on inking? I never understand the trouble artists go to only to rub out the pencil after inking. Don’t do it. It’s bad, a waste of time, and you threaten to damage all that fine inking! What are you, crazy? Get the blue pencil, no rubbing out. Camera can’t see it….and blue pencil looks great. It just does.

This video begins with me inking the brain. Uplighting is another classic horror trope, I’m uplighting the brain here. At some point you’ll see I begin inking hands without any pencil sketch. This usually happens after I’ve built up a head of steam, after I’ve warmed up so to speak, I go a bit freestyle.

I’m using symmetry rulers here and there, perfect for machines. With organics I think you should always re-work the symmetry, asymmetrically, after dropping the ruler. A lot of artists don’t bother and it always shows. Once you see it you can’t un-see it. So I always adjust symmetries in organics, I undo a bit of the facial symmetry for example. But machines can be totally symmetrical.

You’ll see I draw two hands, both tough-looking male hands to begin with, but then I delete one. Learning to be able to draw hands from any angle is vital and a great learning aid for any comic artist. Best thing to practice IMO. I suddenly realised how much more interesting it would be if the other hand was refined, feminine, bejewelled, like this crab-legged Brain in a Jar was assembled from spare parts.

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CRAB LEGS

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Here I’m using a mix of free-hand inking with the G brush and line with the ‘draw curve’ tool. On paper that would be a sable brush and mapping pen, Rotring pen on Bristol board. The ‘greying’ out of under layers is just like using a lightbox. Same thing.

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THE ‘WAITER’ AND TENTACLES

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The sketch for the figure in this case is very rudimentary. If I were drawing a principle character I’d likely have a strong sketch to work over. But this guy, I’ll call him ‘The Waiter’, is a one-off, so I can wing it and make him up as I go. Again, he is largely uplit, so I’m flaring the line on the upside, placing the shadow on top of his nose. I like the flare of the brush line, a mechanical line is more popular today.

With digital, as you can see, I can add characters to background fairly easily and later delete the overlap to push them back. Again, I’m working back and forth with a mix of free hand brushing and Curve Tool. 

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FUR, EYEBALLS, BLOBS, SUSPICIOUS LUMPS

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Using the same free-hand line you’ll see here I create a velvet-like texture for the blob surface and hair on the beast-man, same brush and same size, just a different motion of the hand. Incidentally, the beast man is based on a friend of mine (he’s not so beastly). I always like to draw one real person into my comics. Not sure why, perhaps because it anchors me to at least one image from the real world. Not so much here, once I made him up, Kevin all but disappeared under my ‘make-up’.

You’ll also see a kind of spider-teddy boy character here. I thought of that because when I was a kid, and punk was the thing back then, you’d still see some Ted’s knocking about, in their heavy coats and blue suits, DA’s, felt collars, the works. They seem to have died out now. Global warming maybe.

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PH’NGLUI MGLW’NAFH CTHULHU R’LYEH WGAH’NAGL FHTAGN AND THAT

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I start with the energy line of the portal. I know this will be painted as though it’s a hot gas or crackling lightning, so a thin line is best here. In the layers menu (I always have way too many layers! You don’t need that many) you’ll see blue squares. These are my blue pencil sketch layers.

The yellow and black coloured boxes are my photo references, in this case limited to terraced houses, the motorbike, and my actor friend’s beastly gurnings (the gurnings are, admittedly, rather beastly). Kevin sent me snaps following from a character doodle I sent him, his photos were great and I may do some other drawings from them, they were really very dramatic. But he’s an actor, so whad’ya expect?

In drawing the eyes of the Cthulhu-esque creature I used the circle tool and a symmetry ruler that mirrors your line in 6 or so places. Instant iris!  See, told you digital was faster! But the rulers are seductive, so my advice is to be sparing with them. They’ll show you up if you don’t watch out. The rest of the beastie is drawn freehand, so I’m just inking and winging it mostly. But being technical with an eyeball can really sell that eyeball…and the eyes are the route to viewer engagement in many cases.

Shading the eyeball, I switch between black and white to cross hatch. In traditional media I’d use white ink here, or if it were on scraperboard I’d use a black pen over the white ‘scrape’ lines.

Colouring-wise, again, I look to old printing techniques where flat colour was cheaper than ‘continuous tone’. It points to comics of old and, again, classic poster design. So I try and use just flat colours…mostly.

After inking is complete I export the ink layer to Photoshop with a high-resolution of 300 dpi or 720 dpi, these are print resolution. Computer screen res would be 72 dpi and that would look terrible if printed, a higher res is needed for paper. In Photoshop I make the ink my top layer and apply colour to a layer beneath it.

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EXPLORING FINAL COVER DETAILS

Next time I’ll go into more detail about colouring. Actually, next time I’m doing an oil painting, a scene featuring Judge Dredd and painted on canvas in OG traditional methods. I can’t show anything yet, but keep an eye on Covers Uncovered if you’d like to see how that painting happens. And if you are an AI ‘bot’ artist, go suck a duck. 

Recommended reading – Dynamic Anatomy and Dynamic Hands by Burne Hogarth. I learned to draw hands and feet here. Comics and Sequential Art by Will Eisner, and How to Draw Comics the Marvel Way.

And that, I think you’ll agree, is a rather brilliant Covers Uncovered from Stewart! Make sure you go through all those videos, the detailing is incredible, really opening up the mystery of just how it’s all done.

Now, both parts of the cover in all their glory for you to drool over…

You can find Stewart’s wonderful cover to 2000 AD Prog 2340 wherever you pick up your weekly dose of Ghafflebette comics, including the 2000 AD web shop from 12 July.

If you want to see more and read more from Stewart, you can go salivate at his Covers Uncovered pieces for the 2000 AD Encyclopaedia, Prog 2179, Prog 2239, and Megazine 440, and the sort-of Covers Uncovered for his very special poster in the 2020 Sci-Fi Special here. Then there’s with Stewart here for the 2022 Judge Dredd: Ascension Day strip.

You can (and should) follow him on Twitter and Instagram, see what he does here at Lambiek, and buy all his works including The Tragedie Of Macbeth and the quite magnificently wonderful and completely out there MK-Ultra: Sex, Drugs & The CIA – the collection comes out in Sept 2023 from Clover Press but they still have copies of Volume 1 and Volume 2. It’s a blistering look at one of the most secretive and controversial government experiments in history, the tale of the CIA’s mind control program and its use of hallucinogenics, and is a stunning work of comics gazing deep into the dark side of US intelligence.

And now, as promised, more from Stewart and more from Portals & Black Goo… first of all, some of those amazing wrapround covers…

And then the rest of the sketches he sent along…

Next up, remember I told you about the new Judge Dredd story by Ian Edginton that Stewart’s drawing. It’s called Ratings War and it’s coming in the new Judge Dredd Megazine, issue 458, out on 19 July. And here’s that preview we promised you…

And finally, seeing as this cover is all about John Tomlinson and Eoin Coveney’s new strip Portals & Black Goo… here’s the first three pages of what looks like another one of Tharg’s best…