Articles on creating comics, how tos, reference information and more
In Drawing The Beano, the latest Panel Borders podcast, Alex Fitch talks to writers / artists Laura Howell and Hunt Emerson who have contributed a number of strips to The Beano since 2002, including “Little Plum”, “Ratz”, “Minnie the Minx”… Read More ›
DC Thomson’s 1970’s Starblazer – “Science Fiction Adventure in Pictures” – is remembered by Enrique “Quique” Alcatena in a new Spanish-language documentary titled, simply, Alacatena, directed by Diego Arandojo. Enrique “Quique” Alcatena is regarded as one of Argentina’s most prestigious cartoonists who also drew several… Read More ›
A comics company lives or dies by its catalogue, and back in the 1980s and 1990s Marvel UK, like others, was always considering new ideas from editors. Some fell at outline stage, such as my proposed roleplaying game magazine (suggested following… Read More ›
My first article regarding the work of Ron Smith acted as a introduction, to remind us how great this veteran artist, now retired, has been over the course of his career. This next pair of articles will focus on one aspect of Ron’s… Read More ›
Hachette, the British publisher of titles such as Doctor Who: The Complete History and Judge Dredd: The Mega Collection is to launch How To Draw The Marvel Way on 6th January in all good newsagents. The part work – evocative… Read More ›
Leonard Matthews, General Managing Editor of Fleetway and the Eagle Group of Comics, was a “Creative Visionary”… but that, Roger Perry argues in his extensive biography of the man which continues here on downthetubes, is only due to him having utilised… Read More ›
With the festive season upon us and 2015 racing to a close, over on Comic Book Resources, staff writer and comics retailer Brian Hibbs, in an article titled “Tilting at Windmills: Trouble on the Horizon?“notes we’re in an extremely odd… Read More ›
A Marvel UK character that fell foul of the company’s implosion in the 1990s
Veteran US artist Don Perlin – perhaps best known for his work on Marvel’s Ghost Rider, The Defenders and Transformers – recently had surgery to stop bleeding in his head. Writer and editor Clifford Meth, who has previously led successful… Read More ›
Over on this always-entertaining blog about British comics, cartoonist Lew Stringer has posted a number of terrific Christmas strips drawn by the wonderful Ken Reid. You’ll have seen some of the pages before on Lew’s blog over the years but others… Read More ›
As Tony Esmond couldn’t make it this week (he’s busy helping Santa’s elves, apparently), it’s just Vince Hunt and Dan Butcher holding the fort on this week’s Amazing Comics Podcast, and they spend it cooking up a storm with lots of… Read More ›
The legendary late artist Al Williamson’s Star Wars: The Empire Strikes Back stories have been collected in the award-winning Artist’s Edition format by US publisher IDW, to be released in April 2016. Al Williamson is an artist much admired by comic creators worldwide and, back… Read More ›
The latest episode of Jeremy Bement’s Doctor Who Panel to Panel podcast features an interview with Road to Perdition and Doctor Who artist Richard Piers Rayner, along with its usual selection of news items and a review of Titan Comics 2015 Doctor Who Holiday Special, a… Read More ›
Available now on BBC iPlayer for about a month is the Radio 4 documentary Eagle: The Space Age Weekly, hosted by Sir Tim Rice and includes author Philip Pullman amongst the guests, as well as the voices of Marcus Morris… Read More ›
Leonard Matthews, General Managing Editor of Fleetway and the Eagle Group of Comics, was a “Creative Visionary”… but that, Roger Perry argues in his extensive biography of the man which continues here on downthetubes (Part One here), is only due to… Read More ›
As a comic fan of long standing, one of my real pleasures is identifying and applauding some of the artists that I feel never got the appreciation that they so richly deserved. But I have found that even with the… Read More ›
To put it quite simply, Ian Kennedy is the most experienced British comic strip artist working today. Beginning his career as a staff artist at DC Thomson in Dundee in 1949, he went self-employed in 1954 for the simple expediency… Read More ›
This week Vince Hunt, Dan Butcher and Tony Esmond are joined by the creator of the procedural cop drama comic Bajo Mano Tally Burtram to talk about the series and how it came to be. She also tells the ACP crew about… Read More ›
Last week saw the release of the first issue for Peter Milligan’s latest Vertigo project, The New Romancer. Fired from a cushy job in Silicon Valley, Lexy becomes a coder for New Romancer, an Internet-dating app that’s seen better… Read More ›
Some down time and the frantic run up to the brilliant Malta Comic Con mean I’ve gotten behind on some regular plugs, including those for the Awesome Comics Podcast from Vince Hunt, Dan Butcher and Tony Esmond – so let’s… Read More ›