Falling Sky

The Finger Must Flow

Fingertips - Bill Doggett

Back from the WEMP after being congratulated for my tremendous peak flow which is back up to where it ought to be (550-610, apparently) so that's the lungs settling back to normality. A few more days winding down the steroids, then a swine flu jab next week and that should be the end of medical-related postings here for quite some time, knock-on-virtual-wood.

What does a boot drawn on MS Paint have to do with that? Well now, that there picture above wasn't drawn on MS Paint, or any other desktop app for that matter. Going through the recent feed for Urlesque I was pointed towards a post on Today In Art on artwork created on iPhones/iPod Touchs. And they're pretty bloody impressive, especially when you consider they were created on a 3.5" diagonal screen... with fingertips. Intrigued, I had a look at one of the applications listed in said post, Sketchbook Mobile from Autodesk, they of the mighty Maya. As well as the full version (priced at £1.79) there's a free version, Sketchbook MobileX, which I downloaded and installed on the touchy Spod just before heading out to the Doc this afternoon. Sitting in the waiting room, surrounded by the poorly-but-definitely-not-swine-fluey, I decide to give it a spin. The instructions and controls are simply and effectively demonstrated, allowing you to get started almost immediately.

Now, drawing with my finger is something I don't think I've done since I was a toddler making shapes in sand and it's a peculiar feeling, especially after being so used to using pencils, pens, brushes, some kind of interface between me and the surface. So a bit of a mental shift is required to get into drawing on this, and to be honest I'd feel happier with a stylus or something similar. Having said that, the lack of stylus means this really is utterly portable - have finger, will draw. I first had a go at drawing a bin but immediately arsed it up, very difficult to pull off the smooth oval curves, so I erased that brief monstrosity with the briefest of clicks and surreptitiously stared around for something else to draw, settling on a bloke's boot-clad foot. The result, which must have taken about 5-10 minutes, is above.

As a sketch, it's crude compared to what I'd expect doing the same with pencil & paper, but for a first start on a new drawing medium I'm pretty happy with it and curious to see just how far I can take this app, considering the work others have already produced. The use of colour was particularly enjoyable and I do rather like the effect I got of the folds on the blue jeans. Most of all, it was pleasantly surprising how easily I slipped into that sketching mindset when drawing, despite the odd medium - made me realise how much I missed it. Something like Sketchbook Mobile could never replace a proper sketchbook, but the sheer portability of it (I'm very rarely without my touchy Spod) will hopefully encourage me to have a sketch at any opportune time, safe in the knowledge that anything particularly shit can simply be deleted. An empty touchscreen isn't half as scary as an empty page.

(MP3 taken from Funky16Corners Radio v.59 - Hammond Madness!)

St Ives: Drink, Don't Drive

Westwards ho, from St Austell to St Ives - except we didn't go quite that far, getting off a stop early at Carbis Bay to check in at our next home-from-home, Boskerris Hotel.  As the name suggests, it's a full-blown hotel but not particularly huge, 15 rooms in all.  As befitting our honeymoony status, we stayed in the Celebration suite, a lovely big room looking out onto the bay with king size bed and a corner bath for two (in which we came close to boiling ourselves alive, but never mind that).  The bath robes and slippers from The White Company were a treat to swan about it, and the Bose iPod dock was a handy extra. The feeling of luxury was more subtle than our previous stopping point, more conventionally hotel-like but still special and thoroughly swish - the only complaint being that the walls could have been thicker, having been awoken at 2am the first night by the sound of the occupant of the neighbouring room being sick in their bathroom.  Bwurgh!  That aside, our stay was glorious, the whole hotel full of nice touches, a much more individual and genuine experience than staying in some behemoth Hilton, such as the giant map of Cornwall along one wall complete with notes on the best places to visit, eat, suppliers of their food, or the chalkboard with the days weather and any events happening that day locally.

 

We'd got to the hotel by midday, an earlier check-in than usually allowed but the staff were extremely accommodating (as they were throughout our stay) so we were able to drop our luggage off in the room and head out for lunch.  Now, initially we'd planned to go to the Bean Inn, a completely vegetarian restaurant in Carbis Bay, until we found out it was only open in the evenings. Scuppered, we decided to walk over to St Ives instead along the coastal footpath, especially as it didn't look all that far on the map.  And indeed it wouldn't be, as the crow flies, but the map didn't show the startlingly steep climbs and dips the path takes. A bit of a shock for my leg at first, though I think the stretching actually did it some good, and the path was a very pleasant walk that we ended up taking quite a few times over our two days there as we bounced between Carbis Bay and its larger neighbour. The gloomy weather that had drizzled over Eden had given way to glorious sunshine and warmth, ideal summer holiday weather that didn't let up until the end of the honeymoon, bringing out gorgeous shades of turquoise and aquamarine from the sea and making suncream essential. As we entered St Ives at Porthminster Beach, we saw the sun had brought out lots of people (it was half term holiday in England that week) complete with a boggling number of men with great bellies perched on top of too-tight swimming trunks and a conspicuous amount of chunky jewellery, the beach a sea of pale skin turning scarlet. You could almost hear the sizzling.

Not the best of first impressions, but things quickly picked up nicely at the beachfront Porthminster Cafe. We saved eating in the restaurant there until our last day at Carbis Bay, opting for a lunchtime chippy from their take-away on the same premises. I went for the fish and chips, pictured right, and oh my golly. Since tasting an absolutely knockout fish supper in Stromness last year, fish & chips elsewhere has tasted bland and pointless, so I was delighted to have found another awesome fish supper on the opposite side of the UK. Look at that beauty! A battered coating that crunched like a good 'un yet didn't overpower the fish like they often do, the fish itself fresh and juicy, with good tasty chips and a wee portion of tartare sauce to go with it, all served up in a biodegradable box with little wooden cutlery. Seaside perfection.

Things then took a turn for the goddamn worse as we went for a post-lunch stroll through St Ives. By rights I should've loved it, street after winding street of lovely old buildings, the sound of the sea, sun beating down. But instead I loathed it for one very simple reason: cars. The amount of traffic moving through the town was staggering, far far more than it can realistically take, and if ever there was a case for shutting roads off to cars then St Ives on a sunny day is it. The tipping point came when, waiting to cross a road, a large car roared past just a few inches from my feet - I believe my exact words to my wife were "FUCK THIS SHIT." Never have I felt so unwelcome as a pedestrian or so at risk of getting clonked by huge SUVs stuffed to the ceiling with holiday bumf storming down tiny streets designed for a horse & carriage, and this pretty much soured St Ives for me for the rest of our time there - I was very grateful we were staying outwith the town itself, in the far more chilled-out Carbis Bay.

Still, there were a few quality moments to be had in St Ives. Firstly, the aforementioned Porthminster Cafe, where we had a delicious lunch before heading on to our next stop on the honeymoon. Secondly, Tate St Ives - sort of. See, I'm used to Tate galleries being free, so paying over £5 for entry didn't sound too good, especially when the examples I've seen of the work inside have been, well, not to my taste. So while the Missus paid her moneys and looked around, I hotfooted up to the cafe - quite busy inside, but the outdoor area was empty, folk being put off by the wind. Wimps! Choppiness aside, it was glorious sitting out there with the late-morning sun blazing down, so much so that I did my first drawing in sodding months whilst supping on an ice tea and enjoying a carrot cake, finding St Ives far more enjoyable at a distance. Thirdly, and the only way I could be led back into St Ives after that first disastrous experience, was the fortuitous happening of the annual CAMRA Kernow St Ives beer festival, where I made my merry way after Tate St Ives while my recently betrothed braved the throng-packed streets. As I was still taking painkillers for my leg, I restricted myself to 3 half-pints and deliberately chose some lighter local libations out of the 70-odd available - Keltek's 4K Mild (4.0%), Lizard's Kernow Gold (3.7%) and Skinner's Ginger Tosser (3.8%), thankfully not served by a redhead. This left me pleasantly merry for the rest of the day, and I still treasure my souvenir glass beer mug. Now, if I could just go there again sans painkillers...

On the whole though, Carbis Bay was where it was at for us. Ambling along the coastal paths was a pleasure, though rather exhausting in the sunshine, the beach certainly less packed than St Ives. The cream tea at Boskerris Hotel was a stunner, the scones that much lighter than any we'd had before, served warm and savoured while sat on the terrace looking out to the sea, a view inspiring enough to have me breaking out the watercolour pencils again, while my recently-betrothed looked lovely knitting in the sunshine. Despite the close proximity of St Ives and the multitude of restaurants there, we had dinner both nights at Boskerris Hotel - we didn't even know there was a restaurant there until we checked in (there's no mention on the website), but the menu sounded promising and the results were superb. On the first night I had the catch of the day (can't remember what it was, certainly not a fish I'd come across before, but damn tasty) pan-fried with caramelised fennel, a recipe I need to get the hang of, with cherry tomatoes and new potatoes, and an eminently nomable sticky toffee pudding for dessert. The next night I went for Cornish lamb cutlets with a splendid mash potato, sugar snap peas & roasted root veg, and for dessert (not shown above) a trio of Roskilly's excellent ice creams. Their dedication to locally-sourced nosh was all over the menu, the fish caught daily from St Ives, and the freshness was there in every bite - I couldn't have asked for better.

Next stop: Perranuthnoe...

Paperback Painter

Or, judge a book by its cover.

I've not drawn or painted a single bleedin' thing since the year started, something which vexes me greatly yet the solution - get paper, get pencil, draw - keeps being avoided by me. Bloody stupid really. Hopefully it's down to recently starting a new job plus all the wedding preparations and I'll be feeling that much more creative in four weeks time, especially as the honeymoon is going to be ideal for (among other things) some serious sketchbook filling.

Still, let's look back to the heady days of summer 2008 when I received a friend forwarded on an email sent out by a friend of his looking for artwork for a book cover. The book was going to be her debut publication and the artwork would have to be unpaid. Normally I wouldn't be wasting valuable cookie-making time on creating artwork for free for people, but any friend of a friend is a friend of mine (unless they're an enemy and on the list, of course) and besides I'd been to the Notting Hill Carnival with her back in summer 2000 so she wasn't a complete stranger. It was a tough brief to work, not least as I wasn't getting penny one from it yet it still required hours of work (I ended up taking a couple of days holiday from work to focus on it) and it was basically a piece of painted illustration, something which I've never really done much of, especially with oils on canvas. The brief was basically: snakeskin boots with blood on (but not lots of blood, which could be off-putting to potential readers). The result: voila!

The book is called The Imperium of Steves, written by D.C. Pae (forename initials, not police) and published by Quartet Books - lookee to the right and you can see the link to Amazon where you can purchase it for a reasonable price. Although the painting above was done back in August I was asked to hold off on wibbling about it online until publication, which was a few weeks back. Turned out okay I think - it's a painting I'm happy to put my name to, despite the rush it was produced in. Painted using actual boots as reference along with various photo-reference online, the process of the painting can be seen below, from initial colour sketch to the final shebang.

The book itself I only had the chance to read in the last couple of weeks. It's a startling debut, reminiscent in spirit of Iain Banks' The Wasp Factory or the work of Chuck Paluhniak, particularly Rant (of which I thought The Imperium of Steves was superior). All things considered, those boots on the cover ought to be drenched in blood, the central character - in whose voice the story is told - a delusional psychopath. The tone shifts from black comedy to downright darkness, and I preferred the more farcical midsection with the suggestion that the eponymous Mr Steves was ludicrously deluded about his abilities or those around him. Still, it's a taut, demented, vicious read and well worth a look if you like a walk on the wilder, muckier, viscera-strewn side. And with a pretty cover too!

What The Hell?

Falling Sky - too hot for Flickr, apparently.

Checking my email this morning I receive a long-winded form letter from 'Terrence' at Flickr Support telling me my entire photostream has now been Restricted. It doesn't state why, it doesn't state which photographs might require this - all I know is that I can't change it, people can't see my pictures... and this from a service I'm paying for. I've replied back asking for an explanation on what's the problem - one can only presume it's something to do with the life drawings, but given that they've been on the site for years and have already been reviewed once as perfectly kosher, I really don't know. Charmingly, the FAQ describes my current state as "unsafe" and that:

An "unsafe" account is something we think of as a loose cannon. It's not clear to us that you're moderating your own content at all, or if you are, you're not bearing in mind that there are other people using Flickr and that it's up to you to not be overtly offensive.

So, I'm an overtly offensive loose cannon. Crumbs. Why didn't anyone say?

Hopefully this will all get sorted out ASAfuckingP, but it's all rather reminiscent of the time Etsy got prudish. In the meantime, if you'd like to see the two pieces I drew at life drawing yesterday, they're visible on my Typepad photo album along with the rest. I'm off to the National Gallery to enjoy artwork as it's meant to be seen, displayed for all to see (even - gasp! - children) and free from filters, moderation and censorship.

Newdes!

After a nine month hiatus during which I'd planned on sketching at Edinburgh Zoo and ended up doing precisely sod all, I've resumed Saturday life drawing at the perpetually peculiar Leith School of Art. Well, I actually started a couple of weeks back with some mostly mediocre small pieces, was off sick last weekend and it was only at yesterday's session that I regained my drawing mojo and really got back into it. The problem with my earlier session, and those last year, was the small formats I was working on, A4 size or less - all the better to sell and send, you see. However, it's also terribly restrictive working so wee, and since nobody's buying my pictures anyway there was no obvious reason to keep doing so. As a result, I brought along two A2 sketchbooks to the session yesterday and had a great time letting rip with thick dark sticks of charcoal. It felt far more physically involving - standing up with an easel, you can't relax back the way you can seated - but the real key benefit is being able to take a step or two back from the drawing and look at it as a whole. On top of all that, working at such a size meant I could pretty much forget about trying to sell them, so I stopped worrying about seeing each picture as a commodity and enjoyed the very process of drawing, the words of John Howe still echoing in my noggin, just the way it should be.

The results were hardly personal bests, far from it - despite standing back, I can see anatomical errors in all the drawings that I just didn't notice at the time - but unlike last fortnight's session and the latter sessions of last year I felt positive, excited to be working like this, feeling energised at the drawing board for the first time in yonks. It's a pleasing reminder of how I used to feel during life drawing sessions while studying animation, or the Glasgow sessions from a few years back. The only problem, if that's the right word, was yesterdays model's hair - she has it dread-locked. Never seen the appeal meself, but that's by the by - however, it's an absolute bugger to try and capture dreads in a drawing. Unlike 'normal' hair it doesn't flow, wrap around form or even completely obey the laws of gravity. Still, I think I just about got it right with the colour pastel piece, and it's good to be challenged by your subject now and then.

Howe To Draw

Here's a belated write-up on the third illustration-related book festival event I was at - I would've written this sooner, but my noggin chose last Monday morning to lose itself in dizziness and fuzzy vision. Not so much like this, more like Van Gogh's Starry Night seen through over-exposed glowing static, if that makes the slightest bit of sense. Cue a near-faint at the office water-cooler and being escorted home in case I fell over and cracked my temple clean open. None of the exceptional pain of last year's migraine, but the dizziness left my brain feeling bruised and tender for the rest of the week. Annoyingly, I'm still not back up to full speed so I've had to let a day pass to this weekend's Connect festival that I'd won in a competition go to waste. Immensely frustrating, especially as I'd love to have gone and the prize was non-transferable so I couldn't pass it on to any local chums, but with our annual Skye sojourn just a few days away it'd be foolish to go through two 3.5 hr coach journeys in one day when my head's still not quite back on my shoulders. Anyway, no point brooding on what isn't - let's have a look back on what was.

'Smaug Destroys Lake Town', John Howe

Last Saturday evening was spent in the company of John Howe. Howe, for the uninitiated, is best known for producing stunning fantasy artwork, most notably for Tolkein's books and recently Beowulf, and for working alongside Alan Lee as lead concept artists for Peter Jackson's Lord of the Rings trilogy. I've been semi-aware of his work thanks to those films, but seeing his original artwork projected onto a good-sized screen was damn near breathtaking. As with Mick Inkpen and Dave McKean, he turned out to be a fascinating speaker, intelligent and genuinely interesting - for a written example of this, check out his write-up of his time in Edinburgh, halfway down this page.

Admiring the wide range of styles, subjects and atmospheres his paintings presented, I was struck by the variety of skills and imagination required to produce such artwork. Architecture, anatomy (human, animal, fantastical), landscapes, portraits, clothing, weaponry, lighting, composition, a clear sense of visual storytelling - that's a lot to get right, but the results are spectacular and if they'd only had his Fantasy Art Workshop book at the bookshop afterwards I'd have snappped it up. Howe also made an excellent point that managed to put into words something I've vaguely felt for years, which I scribbled down summarised as:

Drawing anything is one of the closest things to meditation... It's a form of communion, giving yourself up... The result is much less important than the act of drawing.

While you may think this sounds somewhat pretentious, I reckon it's right on the money - when you're drawing and you get right into it, the rest of the world does seem to melt away, time goes wonky and it can be immensely relaxing. Of course, the flipside is that when you're not getting into it, you're trying harder and harder and it's all going horribly wrong, it's teeth-grindingly infuriating, as my grouchy face at innumerable life-drawing sessions would attest. The comparison to meditation clicked for me, and made me realise that my lack of drawing over the last few months is almost certainly linked to my increasing fecked-offness at work and general tiredness. It's ridiculous, because drawing doesn't require hours of time or specialist equipment - I could work on a pencil sketch over just 20 mins one lunchtime - but I seem to have been deliberately avoiding it, developing a daft dread of a blank page. The only real creative burst of the last few months took place when I had to knock out a book cover illustration over the course of a weekend (unpaid, mind - you'll hear all about that once it's published, hopefully before the end of the year) and the result of that was excellent, one of the freshest pieces I've done, all the more so for the urgency behind it. So much the better I'll be starting life drawing sessions again in a fortnight, four hours of unavoidable drawing and painting every week, which I suspect will do me a world of good.

And what he said about the result being far less important than the actual act of drawing - well, if I could've just realised that in November last year when I was fretting about the financial worth of my artwork, I might not have stopped the life drawings in the first place. I have to hammer into my head the fact that it doesn't matter if I don't produce a single sellable painting or drawing at the upcoming sessions, that the hours spent producing those artworks will be all the reward I need. And considering I've not sold a single scribble all year, that will have to be the truth. Thanks to the revelatory effect of Howe's seemingly obvious statement on my little arty brain, I reckon it'll be just fine.

God, that all got a bit self-obsessed didn't it? Ah well, this is a blog. Point being, the man's smart, an artistic inspiration regardless of whether you want to work in fantasy or not, knows just what he's talking about when it comes to this illustration lark (I suspect Myth and Magic, his published portfolio/autobiography, would make a cracking read and will try to locate it in the next few weeks) and has a website that's well worth delving around. Oh, and he swears by drawing standing up (to keep the artwork loose and alive) and uses 3B & 4B pencils, with watercolours and coloured inks for colour work. Which makes it sound so easy, but I look at his paintings and damn near boggle at how they could've been made. All the more reason to pick up his next book, helpfully titled Forging Dragons: Inspirations, Approaches and Techniques for Drawing and Painting Dragons. Lovely!

One more write-up to come, regarding Varmints and writing for illustration. If only an embeddable trailer for the film would become available, it'd be a whole lot easier...

Neato McKeano Swellorino!

The Edinburgh Book Festival has continued to churn away over on Charlotte Square all this week and Tuesday night saw me battling my way there against thick sheets of rain to see long-time art idol Dave McKean, who I last saw at the Edinburgh Film Festival three years ago introducing Mirrormask. There's an absolutely splendid write-up about McKean's presentation up on the Forbidden Planet blog, so if you're remotely interested then that's well worth a read. Here, I'll just add any bits that they didn't cover:

He's bogglingly prolific and seems to have a bundle of stuff on at any given time. For example, currently on the go is a feature film, Luna (live-action, set in Devon and based around two couples, the filming of which led to a desperate origami SOS in November last year), a new children's book based on a poem written by Neil Gaiman called Crazy Hair (artwork sample here), a book of paintings based on silent films called Nitrate (artwork sample here) and, most intriguingly of all, artwork and design for The Big Fat Duck Cookbook. What's that all about? Well, it's a whopping new recipe book/biography by Heston Blumenthal, he of The Fat Duck, with a suitably whopping price tag and, going by the examples McKean presented, some supremely gorgeous artwork. There's a wee sample of it on the Forbidden Planet blog, and you can see tiny glimpses on the Amazon page. McKean enthused about a "magic" tea at said Duck, where through scientific shenanigans a glass of tea is served with half of the tea cold, the other half hot, the result apparently sensational. I fear I shall never know, but it sounds cracking.

At one point, McKean spoke of how he'd lost touch with drawing when producing all those lavish, deeply textured mixed-media paintings. He got his pencil mojo back thanks to family holidays spent in galleries, filling sketchbooks, leading to Postcard from Vienna and Postcard from Barcelona.

He discussed Cages, and how he threw in a deliberately inexplicable sequence into chapter 4 after receiving some particularly smug letters crowing their understanding of the entire story when less than a third had been published. Worked out for everyone - the sequence in question is a beauty!

He's produced illustrations for Neil Gaiman's next book, The Graveyard Book, and McKean reckons it's the best thing Gaiman's written. Which, considering the awesomeness of Sandman, is very very high praise.

There was a woman interpreting McKean's speech into British Sign Language on the spot - it was good to see such accessibility at a live event, and there was one particular moment when McKean had just stopped describing a character in Mirrormask who has an orchestra living in a small red box in his hat. There was a pause after he stopped talking as the interpreter found a way to sign what he was saying, and when she did - miming a box rising out of her head and opening up - there was a great chuckle from all the audience.

There was loads more, stuffing the hour nicely with image after image of gorgeousness, displaying a surprisingly wide range (well, surprising to anyone who's only seen his graphic novel work). McKean came across as a friendly, apparently down-to-earth despite the visual flights of fantasy he produces, the kind of chap you could happily chat with over a pint of foaming nut brown ale. Afterwards, as is the custom, he gave a signing. I noticed quite a lot of people had brought numerous books along for him to sign, which I felt was a tad selfish considering the great queue waiting behind them, so I only brought my lovely lovely hardback edition of Cages. As the opening pages are all on black paper, I knew the usual signing tool of a black pen would be useless, so I remembered one of my Conté white pencils, usually used for life drawing. He was perfectly cool about signing with that - and seemed particularly taken with how good it looked on the black paper.

While he scribbled away with hypnotic ease I asked if there'd been any progress with an animated feature of Varjak Paw, as he'd mentioned back in 2005. Sadly not - acquiring funding had been very difficult, but apparently there was hope of getting backing from France. I do hope so, I can imagine French studios being more open to the very nature of Varjak Paw, a million miles away from something like the Aristocats. I also desperately hope there would be some way I could animate on it, and told him so in a terribly awkward gushing manner, so it'll just be a case of keeping my ears open for any further developments. I know I've all but renounced animation after too many disappointments, but I'd happily pick up a blue pencil again for that.

And the signing he did for me? Well, here it is. If the book it was in wasn't so damn beautiful itself, I'd cut it out and frame it. Just look at what he can do with a few simple lines! Truly inspiring.

Cheers Dave. Later today - John Howe, fantasy artist extraordinaire.

Mick Inkpen, Diamond Geezer

Last Sunday evening I tentatively dipped myself into the frothy waters of the Edinburgh Book Festival. I work just round the corner from it, but haven't been before, put off by the high prices, an overwhelming variety of events and the sniffy masses of people seemingly straight out of 44 Scotland Street. The variety has been no exception this year, with so many different authors appearing who I'd like to see that actually doing so would've cost well over £100. However, by focusing on just one particular subject - illustration - I could bring my ticket wishlist down to four events, far more realistic and financially viable (as long as I ignore the rest of the festivals - surprisingly easy).

Why illustration? Well, it's a subject that's particularly interesting me these days, not least with ongoing plans to produce a picture book for children with His Royal Bobness, but also as I very recently found myself painting a potential cover for a new book (can't say any more about that until it's published, whenever that'll be, but it looks rather nice and isn't the kind of thing I'd normally paint). I spent years studying hand-drawn animation, and illustration seems like a possible way to put some of those skills to use without chucking myself into the whole studio ghastliness. Painting an illustration alongside a full-time civil service job is do-able and doesn't require sacrificing too much time otherwise spent relaxing with the Lass - if I wanted to make an animation alongside full-time work, she'd barely ever see me. Sod that!

But goodness knows there's already approximately ten bazillion illustrators out there, so if I'm to even consider getting into such shenanigans then I need as much inspiration and advice as I can get my mucky paws on. Huzzah, then, for the mighty Mick Inkpen, who on Sunday gave a masterclass on his work in children's books for twenty lucky sods, me included. Mr Inkpen - and, yes, that is his real name - is the man behind Kipper, the astonishingly appealing Wibbly Pig, The Blue Balloon and a bunch of other deceptively simple, smart and wonderfully illustrated books. After working in design, producing hundreds of greetings cards (an excellent primer for children's books, apparently) he hit the ground running in the late 80's/early 90's with the aforementioned Blue Balloon and Threadbear, churning out brilliance ever since.

So, everyone's sat around a long extended table covered with copies of Inkpen books and - oh, what a treat - original artwork from some of those books. The colour work in his books is so smooth and pretty much perfect that I'd half wondered if they were graduation fills on Photoshop, but nope, it's all there on the page, drawn and painted on thick textured watercolour paper. Absolutely gorgeous, with masterful use of white space, I'd quite happily buy an original or two one day. The man himself was there with some of his family, and once introduced gave a talk for about 40 mins or so, followed by a Q&A. An unassuming presence at first - he told of a recent book signing where a mother expressed disappointed surprise he wasn't a big rotund fellow as she'd always imagined - he has a wry and intelligent look complemented with a sharp silvery beard. Thoroughly down-to-earth and quite self deprecating, he read from a script he'd already prepared, and it was particularly fascinating when he'd read excerpts from some of his stories, his delivery and expression switching to storyteller with the ease of a master.

His presentation made for fascinating listening and deserves a wider audience - there was much in there that would be of use to art students or anyone else thinking of getting into picture books. Fingers crossed he finds a way to get the text out there, whether it be online or in print somehow (there's little online presence for him thus far, sadly) but for now I'll try and pass on some of what he said through the scrawled notes I made at the time. Let's see...

He writes his books for children at "an age when imagination and reality coexist", an age that seems to get squeezed shorter and shorter over the years.

For Inkpen, illustrations are a means to an end, the end being "the staging of a little drama." He noted that children love visual detail in illustrations, yet at the same time open, simple expressions on characters are good as it allows the reader to project themselves onto the character. He particularly enjoys using a single eyebrow on his characters for a slightly intrigued look.

Important to consider the use of page turns in how the story is told. Also bear in mind that books with flaps and/or pop-ups are much more expensive for publishers to produce.

Stay playful in your storytelling, subvert conventions, have fun with them - for example, the way his characters sometimes interact with the publisher info at the start of a book, or comment on the format of the book itself. For goodness sake, Bear breaks the fourth wall!

'Empower' the child reader by giving them a role, a controlling influence in the story (eg, saying "shhhhh!" in Lullabyhullaballoo).

When it comes to creativity, "work from the inside" rather than relying on external influences, avoiding interference or market influence - "follow your instinct".

"Don't be an arse!" Can't argue with that.

Can a story with rhyming text be translated for foreign-language markets? If not, it'll be harder for the publisher to sell the story overseas.

"Meet your deadlines!" I can learn...

"Don't patronise your audience" - keep playful, engage, entertain. Write/draw for yourself, don't talk down.

When it comes to submitting your work to publishers, be aware of the industry, particularly bookfair schedules. Don't be submitting to publishers just before the big bookfairs, they'll be busy enough.

Black & white work means cheaper production costs for publishers.

Make sure you first submission to a publisher is as good as it can possible be - hit the ground running.

Keep the pages clear - don't have anything to distract from what you want to focus on with each page.

There was plenty more, both within his presentation and in the Q&A after, but that's all I scribbled down. Cracking stuff, the 90 minutes really did fly by all too soon, I could've happily spent another half an hour just gawping at all that lovely artwork. An extra bonus was that he was doing a signing afterwards, which I hadn't expected, so I went and bought the original Kipper and queued up. Got to meet the man, as friendly as he appeared, and I was especially happy to tell him about how the Emster damn near leapt with glee at her first sight of Wibbly Pig last year - he looked genuinely touched and it felt good to be able to thank him for that.

Was it of help? I think so - it helped clarify and sharpen quite a few thoughts that had been drifting in my head, and helped focus where I'm going with the storywriting, pulling back on the educational aspect and letting the fun flow back in. Personally I was reassured to realise he didn't start on children's books until well into his 30's - plenty of time yet - and it was genuinely delightful to see how he brings these books together, the 'subversive' touches, the fresh brightness of the artwork. The next day, I finished work early and spent 90 minutes working on my own little story, in the most productive setting I can find. Whether any of this will ever come to anything, goodness only knows, but it makes me happy.

Next up, next week: longtime hero Dave McKean. Hopefully with moggies.

Bits and Bulbs

Like a bit of garlic in your kitchen? The above watercolour's up for sale at the Emporium for a measly €80 (dollars are so last century).

In case you've not already heard, I've got my wedding suit. It's very nice indeed, and as long as I maintain a 36" waist for the next nine months we'll be fine. The missus-to-be, for her part, has also been successful at the shops, so that's pretty much the wedding sorted out. Ah well, there's still the soundtrack to compile.

Reading an awful lot at the moment. Aren't libraries brilliant? Full write-up on all those books any day now - I keep meaning to, but as soon as I finish one cracker I end up starting another. Right now I'm tearing through Stephen King's On Writing which is both entertaining and genuinely useful, while my next Aubrey/Maturin book, Desolation Island, is calling seductively to me from the bookshelf. And then there's the Moomins, but they deserve a post all of their very own.

Saw The Dark Knight at the end of last week. Should eventually get a full review (possibly after a second viewing, especially if I can catch it IMAXed) but in summary - really, really good stuff. Surprisingly bleak and intense, very much of these times, and definitely not for children under the age of 10. For god's sake parents, do a bit of research before taking your primary school child to a 12A, will you? Here endeth the lecture.

What's better than freshly baked bread? Freshly baked bread with mixed berries jam from the Strawberry Shop's stall at the Farmers Market. Mate, it's better than chocolate.

Where will you be on September 14th? If you're in Scotland and like your music powerful, melodic and heavy as fuck, you'll be here. Two awesome Hydrahead bands for the price of 1/7th of Tom Waits cheap seats. Fingers crossed there'll be a big stack of vinyl goodness ripe for the plucking.

More proper blogging soon, with paragraphs and everything, especially as August lurches into place with Nina Nastasia and assorted Book Festival goodies to yelp about. And then there's the kids book I'm writing, but I'll be keeping details of that pretty close to my chest for the time being. Mind, it'll just end up like this...

Mid-Year Report

Here we are, toppling obliviously into the second half of 2008 - dear god, Christmas is just around the corner! - but it's barely noticed in the week-to-week routine of work and not-work. Ah well, just a few decades 'til retirement. Anyway, when I'm not grafting away thanklessly for the good of the Scottish nation, what have I been up to lately? Summery summary time!

If you've not swanned by my online shop lately, do have a gander - there's now 31 pieces up, the above being the two most recent. I've decided to go back to life drawing sessions at the weekend again having given up last year - while I may still have to deal with mercenary voices in my head the moment I start a sketch like the above, at least I'll be producing fresh new artwork again on a weekly basis. As things currently stand, without the discipline of being out of the house and in a studio with dedicated time devoted solely to artwork, I just can't seem to focus on regularly working on drawings or paintings in the evenings or weekend. So, come September, it's back to Leith and expect to see a lot more artwork cropping on my Flickr stream again, rather than monthly occurrences of seascapes and garlic.

Also, over at the wedding site, I've written a great big post wibbling on about what I might wear at the wedding, being the groom an' all. Worth a read if you a) have built up an immunity to the paragraphs of prattle that plague these pages and b) have the slightest interest in what I might be wearing come the 23rd of May (hint: not a kilt).

Not entirely unconnected to the above, may I sing the praises of Doctor Who? Of course I bally well may! The latest series has just come to an end and personally I think it's the strongest one yet, pretty much the best piece of fictional British television being broadcast, practically bursting with enthusiasm, imagination and an ambition that all too often would be sneered down. The last few months have seen some absolutely remarkable stories and sights, an oasis of creativity in the ever-growing desert of tedium that makes up primetime television. The stories have been varied and compulsive - I didn't think the one-two punch of last series' Human Nature/Family of Blood and Blink could ever be matched, never mind topped, but with Silence in the Library/Forest of the Dead and Midnight it bloody well happened! The acting has been even stronger than before, with David Tennant so completely suited to the role now that the possibility of him leaving at the end of the penultimate episode was genuinely startling, while Catherine Tate trumped all us nay-sayers who only knew her from that overplayed "am I bovvered?" Her character was initially annoying in Runaway Bride (in hindsight, deliberately so) but over the course of this series she'd blossomed into a fascinating, rich and thankfully-not-lovelorn companion thanks to some superb acting. Julian Bleach's Davros rocked my world over the last two episode with his Hitleresque monologues of rage. And big up the Bernard Cribbins - his scene with the Doctor at the end of the final episode was sombre and genuinely moving. Wonderful, wonderful stuff. I'm looking forward to the Christmas special immensely (the fact that it'll star Dervla Kirwan certainly doesn't hurt...) but next year's BBC1 schedule is going to seem awfully barren. Wildlife aside, will there be anything to watch?

What else? The baking continued apace at the weekend with apple scones (now sussed out the best way to add the cinnamon, very nice too), another loaf (after this, there's really no chance of ever going back to supermarket shelf bread) and trying something new with handmade puff-pastry. The latter took hours to prepare, most of that time spent in the fridge or being 'turned' - tasted good, a sweeter, fresher taste than the shop-bought stuff, but the sheer time it required means I won't make a habit of that. Still, good to keep trying new recipes as I edge closer and closer to the fabled Nagl bagel...

Meanwhile, there's a big old post brewing regarding kids books, both the ones that the missus-to-be got me for our anniversary and certain... plans that may yet come to something, but that's definitely for another time. It's requiring a fair bit of research into something I know next to zero about, so that'll be my excuse for light posting over the next few weeks, but you never know. We're a couple of months into using the Wii Fit and having a grand time with it, so that'll get a write-up of it's own eventually, but in the meantime I've been rather smitten with the WiiWare game LostWinds - there's a suitably comprehensive review from Ryan, but here's a lovely video trailer for it, complete with the gorgeous music and lush visuals that make it a pleasure to play and to watch. Certainly looks a lot more summery than Edinburgh in July.