High Speed Histories

Early in 2009 my agent mentioned that the lovely people at Scholastic were working on a project that they were keen for me to be involved in- an off-shoot of the uber successful Horrible Histories books, but with a more comic book feel.

The work load has been quite a bit more than we envisaged, and they are mammoth things to work on but very enjoyable and have stretched me quite a bit.
And they have my name on the front!!!

which is nice

Currently in print are Egypt and Tudors, with Knights in the bag and for sale in March, and Rome my current project- scheduled for shops in summer 2011

Damn it!

Knew I'd forget about this

busy too (which one shouldn't complain about)

SO!
Onwards then

where were we....?
Yes, ok- after a few successful escapades into the world of full colour Horrible books I got a job doing a couple of books tying in with the BBC series Merlin
More comic based they were fun to work on, but seemed to take me too long.... wish i knew how to use, and had, Manga Studio.
My agency stable mate Rob Davis did the next two books and blew me out the water....

Alongside these babies I also started recovering a few ranges of books from similar fields, overseen by designer Nikalas Catlow, namely Horribly Famous (previously.... "Dead Famous) Ten Best's (previously....erm, Top Tens- I think) and "Totally...." (previously "The Knowledge")

The above pics are the Ten Best range- and these started me on the road to my own style, which seems to fit nicely with that of Tony De Saulles (Horrible Science) and Martin Brown (Horrible Histories) without treading on their toes.

Something really clicked with these and I'm really pleased with them. Loads more have followed and they flexed my illustration muscles enough to bring in other work too....

but more of that another time- I have a glass of vintage cider that won't wait any longer.

I'm sure I forgot something...

I have had a small amount of breathing space in what has been my busiest period of work in, like, forever!

Never one to complain *cough* I thought I'd dust off the blog and actually stick something on it....

.... so here goes

Scholastic have (Bless them) been giving me a bunch of work over the last couple of years, and it's been the making of me really- I've found a style that not only works, but I enjoy, and they really like what I've been doing.

I started working with them after a stint banging out artwork for the long running Horrible Science Collection partworks. They sped me up, and I really enjoyed the discipline of working in someone else's style- it was liberating, especially after years of banging my head against the drawing board getting nowhere fast.

It gave me a steady income (which was nice) and got me used to a more comic/cartoon style.

Off the back of the magazine work I started working on a set of new book titles under the Horrible Science banner- the Handbooks, of which I have done 5 or 6 now I think, with another due for artworking this summer.