British Comic Sales Figures page moved, Creating Comics blog launched

As regular readers know the main downthetubes web site is currently down due to excessive data charges. I'm in the process of securing a new ISP and we've had a very kind offer from a UK publisher to host the site which will enable us to get back up and running at some point in the next couple of months.

In the mean time, I'm finding alternate homes for some of the features I know get a lot of visits from comics fans.

A very special thank you to those of you who responded to our hopefully temporary crisis by sending donations, which will help fund the current costs of the site - the forum and other services used to promote the site via social media. I was very touched.

My Current British Comic Sales Figures  is now on GoogleDrive. I hope you find this useful, although it is always depressing to read compared against these figures for 1960s and 1970s Comic Sales.
 
I often get asked questions about the state of the British comics industry, and I've moved my very general and opinionated piece to a page on this blog. If you're a journalist looking for more information on our energized but, it would seem to the outsider, embattled industry as it competes for the pounds in teenagers wallets, I hope this remains a useful resource.

My resources for colleges and course teaching comics in the UK is also a page on this blog: Learning the Comics Art

My guide to writing comics is slowly being moved to a standalone blog: Creating Comics: http://creating-comics.blogspot.co.uk. Be warned, I'm not expecting to update this very often - there are a lot of other great, although US-oriented comic creation bogs and websites out there which are much more active, including Tim van de Vall's impressive site.
 
If you're interested in the new comic strip, Crucible, which I'm co-creating with Smuzz for STRIP: The Adventure Comic Magazine, there's a behind the scenes blog here and some additional stories from the world of Crucible at http://crucible-comic.blogspot.co.uk

Discussion of British comics and creating comics continues on the downthetubes forum: new members welcome!

Artist Monty Nero offers online digital art class

Monty Nero's cover for CLiNT
Volume 2 Issue 3

Ace artist Jim Montynero, whose credits include Death Sentence for CLiNT Magazine, is teaching two weeks of live online digital painting classes from 6th August 2012.

These courses, organised by the Computer Training Academy, who have been running a variety of teaching since March, use video conference and desktop sharing software to link up your computer to a professional artist working in the industry today. In this way you can see the screen and talk live to the artist as they demonstrate techniques and take you through each step of their job. You spend every minute learning and being encouraged by a real pro. 

Getting set up takes minutes and is as simple as clicking on the link the Computer Training Academy send you.

All the tutors on these courses have over 10 year's experience as professional concept artists for computer games. Monty Nero tells us technical streaming quality is excellent, with the same one-to-one student attention and tutor interaction as a face-to-face class.

• Contact: info@computertrainingacademy.co.uk for more details.

• The Computer Training Academy homepage:
http://computertrainingacademy.co.uk/#/splash/

• A summary of the Concept Art class:
http://computertrainingacademy.co.uk/#/concepts/

• What you will need for remote courses through the CTA:
http://computertrainingacademy.co.uk/#/remote-courses/

• Pricing and class dates:
http://computertrainingacademy.co.uk/#/pricing/

Fourth Andrew Loomis facsimile art book in the works

Illustrator Andrew Loomis is revered amongst artists for his mastery of drawing technique and his clean, realist style and his hugely influential series of art instruction books have never been bettered.

Long out of print, early editions of his books have become highly collectible and sought out by art enthusiasts and practitioners but last year Titan Books began re-publishing facsimile hardback editions of the illustrator's guides.

A fourth – perhaps his best known work, Creative Illustration – is due for release in October.

Figure Drawing for All it's Worth provides a seminal course covering all the techniques needed to master drawing the figure. Hailed by the American Academy of Art as “one of the most brilliant contributions that figure drawing has ever received” Loomis’s book is packed with beautiful examples to help you master anatomy and capture the human form at any age, in movement and at rest.

Drawing the Head and Hands, also released last year, offer a masterclasses in tackling what comic artists often find the most difficult elements in figure drawing, but world-class illustrator Andrew Loomis’s classic primer offers plenty of solutions.

In May, Titan published Successful Drawing - a superb resource covering all the techniques needed to master three-dimensional drawing that has been many an artist's bible for 60 years. From the fundamentals of proportion, placement, perspective, planes and pattern, through a detailed examination of scale and the effects and capture of light, to the mastery of conception, construction, contour, character and consistency, Successful Drawing is filled with step-by-step instruction, professional tips and beautiful illustration.

In October, Titan will publish the fourth facsimile in the series – Creative Illustration, considered Loomis’s magnum opus, which is aimed primarily at the professional-level illustrator.

It’s divided into seven sections: Line, Tone, Colour, Telling the Story, Creating Ideas, Fields of Illustration, and Experimenting and Studies. The book is filled with instructions, tips, insider experiences, and incredible illustrations and definitely one for artists' wish lists, and a title I've often suggested as a resource elesewhere on downthetubes.

Born in 1892, after studying art, Loomis moved to Chicago where he eventually opened his own studio – working in editorial and advertising for most of the top clients of the time, including Kellogg’s, Coca Cola, Lucky Strike and many others. He also became renowned as an art teacher and his instructional books on illustration and art  - which also include Fun with a Pencil and The Eye of a Painter - are acclaimed classics in the field.

As well as Alex Ross, Dick Giordano, and Steve Lieber, among others, have cited the influence of Loomis on their style and studies. Steve Rude named one of the characters he drew in the Nexus comic book General Loomis.

• Andrew Loomis: Wikipedia Entry

Buzz Comic Launches Soon

Buzz Comic - a web site described by its creators as "a kind of YouTube for comics people", offering space to promote comics and advice on creating them, should be ready for a beta launch on Monday 19th July.

The idea of BuzzComic is to enable comic creators to upload your comic pages, which can be just teasers of your published work or stuff you are experimenting with. When the site goes live, the stories can be favourited and commented on (anyone can favourite, even non members but comments are limited to those with paid accounts so that there is more quality and integrity to the site).

One of the main ideas of the site is that it will act as a natural market research tool as the popularity of any story or genre will become clear as the top favourited stuff gets pushed to the top.

The site will also include a library of tutorials teaching graphic novel and comic making which the site's editor hope to build on over time. Currently Bryan Talbot, Kev F Sutherland and Warren Pleece feature.

BuzzComic.com will now be open to all comic/graphic novel genres, so it is no longer aimed at children only as was originally planned.

• Sign up at www.buzzcomic.com

How to create comics the Steve Whitaker way

The late, great Steve Whitaker drew this guide to creating comics back in the 1990s and it's available online via Flickr if people want to use it for teaching purposes, published under a Creative Commons license.

Printed in the Society of Strip Illustrators newsletter for September 1992, it's a terrific instructional page about how comics works that was presumably intended for use in the London Cartoon Centre classes which Steve ran.

Strangely, this is the second time Steve has cropped up in online happenings for me this week: this time it's the result of an appeal by Bryan Talbot, who plans to use the art as part of a presentation on comic storytelling next week to a secondary school whose, pupils are doing a graphic novel on their local history inspired by his graphic novel, Alice in Sunderland.

The first time it was a social networking site suggesting I become his friend, which was really spooky given that he's not been with us since 2008...

Free Comics Workshops at ThoughtBubble

Leeds comics event Thought Bubble, which takes place this coming weekend, has just announced several free workshops for children and adults run by industry professionals. If you or anyone you know wants to come along for some comic art and writing fun just sign up!
To book a place email thoughtbubblefestival@googlemail.com

Digital Colouring Masterclass with Peter Doherty. 14:00-15:00, Carrigeworks, FREE, 16+

Famous for his work on The Wachowski Brothers' Shaolin Cowboy, and Judge Death, Peter will take participants through the stages of how to digitally colour line art in photoshop. A basic understanding of photoshop is required. Places are limited, book soon to avoid disappointment.

Sequential Art and Literacy Workshop. 14:00-15:30, Leeds Art Gallery, 12-18 year olds, FREE

Award-winning artist, curator, and academic Sarah Lightman, who trained at 'Slade School of Art', will go through the stages of creating your very own publication. She will explain how young people can use the comic format to reflect their own feelings and experiences. Places are limited, book soon to avoid disappointment.

Yishan Studio Shojo Manga Workshop with Yishan Li. 14:30-15:30, Leeds Central Library, 7-12 year olds, FREE.

Yishan Li, a leading manga artist, and creator of the Yishan Studio 'How To Draw Manga' books, will run this fun workshop for younger children. Yishan will take them through the steps of how to create characters and figures.

Creation of Computer Game Concept Design. 14:50-16:50, Leeds Central Library, 16+, FREE

Steve Beaumont, character design and storyboard artist, will look at how the two are produced within the video games industry. There will be an opportunity to work from a typical client brief to create a gaming character. Steve will also touch on what the gaming industry looks for to give you a heads up in this ever growing field.

Manga Character Art Workshop with Emma Vieceli. 14:50-15:50, Leeds Central Library, 12-18 year olds, FREE.

Sweatdrop Studios' Emma, is well known for her presenting on Anime Network, and her fantastic art on the Manga Shakespeare series. In this session, Emma will demonstrate techniques used in manga styled pages and show participants the foundations needed to create their own characters. This workshop will be fun and informal.

Frank Quitely Art Masterclass. 15:15-16:45, Carriageworks, 16+, £5 Entry.

Thought Bubble is delighted to welcome Frank Quitely, one of the world's most respected comic book artists, for a special insider look at his art. Frank is best known for his work on Grant Morrison's New X-Men, Batman and Robin and We3. Talking to Peter Dohert of 2000AD fame, Frank will reveal the creative process he employs in this fascinating masterclass. For tickets go to www.thoughtbubblefestival.com

Young People's Comics Writing Masterclass with Adam Lowe. 16:00-17:00, Leeds Central Library, 12-18 year olds, FREE.

Local author Adam Lowe's first novel, Troglodyte Rose, mixes sequential art and prose. In this workshop for young people, he gives tips on writing scripts for comics, including dialogue, pace, and visual cues in this fun and informal masterclass.

• For more information go to www.thoughtbubblefestival.com

• We'll have a fab behind-the-scenes feature by Matthew Badham on the Thought Bubble event here on downthetubes on Wednesday, with info on how it's put together and more!

Making the Most of your Self Published New Comic at BICS

Comics Worth Reading, a great US indie comics advocate, has featured a recap on some recent posts following last weekend’s Small Press Expo in the US, and offers some useful advice on using possibly duff copies of your new book, that I thought might be useful for indie press publishers going to the British International Comic Show at the weekend.

"When you’re unpacking your books, comics, or minicomics for a show, you’ll notice some copies don’t look as good as the others," notes site runner Johanna Draper Carlson. "Maybe they’re print errors... or packing damages.

"Set those copies aside, and give those out as review copies or press freebies," she suggests. "Save the good ones to sell. Most press members won’t mind; if you explain, they’ll even understand.

She also suggests taking some some kind of small stickers (red dots) or flags to the con, and mark your damages as you see them so you’ll be easily able to find them when you need them. If you have more damages than you’d like or want to give away, sell them at a discount to bargain hunters. One respondee to the post also suggests they would also make good donations to a school or local library.

CWR is a great site: it's posted lots of info, often on Manga information on to selling you Manga in Japan and PR: What Not to Do: Review Copies and Guilt Trips

• Comics Worth Reading Site