Tube Surfing: Thursday 21 May

• ComicBitsOnline is wondering why Britain's biggest comic publisher has not been nominated for an Eagle Award -- and it's not DC Thomson, Panini or Titan but Cinebooks Ltd., which now publishes some 40 top quality comic albums a year and exports them globally.

Why is it not getting attention? Because its titles are English editions of European titles such as Lucky Luke, Blake and Mortimer, Orbital and The Scorpion - superb comics that have had little exposure because they were originally created in a language other than English.

"Cinebook - The 9th Art is like a fresh breath of air in a stale market," argues CBO author Terry Hooper, "and it’s about time that a “Comic Industry” award realised that they must - must - begin to recognise the company for its publications as well as its commercial value.

"If it doesn’t then it just proves what people have been saying for years; awards are given to mates, mates of mates or given through influence because no one wants to upset Marvel or DC."

• The Forbidden Planet International blog reports Ilya and Emma Vieceli will be at the London Cartoon Museum (35 Little Russell Street) on 30th May to celebrate their work in Self Made Heroes’ well received Manga Shakespeare graphic novels, with exhibits, talks and a slideshow presentation. The event starts at 1.30 and runs until 4.00pm.

• If you are in London and looking for something to divert the kids over the half term or the summer holidays there are a number of activities on the London Cartoon Museum’s events list, from Never Mind the Beano on Wednesday 27th May (learn to draw your own Beano characters) to summer classes in comics drawing and even in clay animation.

• Artist Nelson Evergreen reports he recently created a comic to promote Doublesix Games' comedic PS3 slaughterfest Burn Zombie Burn has been included in an exhibition of videogame inspired art running this weekend at the Brighton Fishing Museum, as part of the Brighton Festival. Opening on Saturday (23rd May), the annex of the Museum will be taken over by a multimedia exhibition of art from, and inspired by, videogames. Award-winning videogames artists will exhibit alongside artists who’s creations are inspired in someway by the world’s largest entertainment industry: videogames.

• Writer Lee Robson has posted a fascinating article titled Writer's Block, admitting that is a little misleading but is a great piece on how easy it is to get, well, distracted by day to day happenings when you're a creator. As for writer's block he opines " I don't believe in the concept... I think it was Warren Ellis who said (and I'm probably misquoting here) that if you want to write for a living, you have to get up every day and actually f****** write, and that's a philosophy that I wholeheartedly subscribe to. Or at least, I'd like to."

• At the last minute DFC top talent James Turner (creator of the wonderful Beaver and Steve) have got a table at the MCM Expo in London this weekend, so if you are going along keep an eye out for him! He'll be printing some more mini comics (with four pages of all-new B&S material!) and have some new badges to sell too.

• Ace cartoonist Roger Langridge has published a teaser image from an upcoming Mugwhump story for something called the Act-i-Vate Primer, which is pretty much what the title says it is - a print introduction to the work of various Act-i-Vate cartoonists. "One for the Mugwhump fans who might be getting itchy during the hiatus," he says. "My story consists of six densely-packed (12-panel) pages showing events before the current strip began. Roger is busy drawing The Muppet Show comic for Boom! Studios and also reports issues - not licensed for sale in the UK - are selling for ridiculous amounts on the InterWeb. "Wait for the book collection, folks!" he notes. "The whole collectors' market is a cesspool of poisonous idiocy..."
Let's hope Titan Books or another UK publisher picks up the rights to that so we can finally read the book in the UK, eh?

• The first issue of Stuart Kolakovic 's Nobrow is out! Printed in two spot colours on heavy paper in an oversized format, Issue 1 from this highly talented creator is available in a numbered edition of only 3000 and available from all sorts of arty outlets, as well as from Nobrow.net.

• And finally... congratulations to ace blog Thrillpowered Thursday, best described as an issue-by-issue review site for 2000AD, which recently celebrated its hundredth post.