Hello Everyone! I was doing hourly comic day yesterday, which is a a day where artists try and make a comic for each hour they’re awake. I’ve got to admit it was a bit of a struggle at parts but on the whole it was really fun and my 12 comics (yea I was only up for 12 hours) read a bit like a day-in-the-life-of.
Enjoy!
Whahey! Hope you liked them!
Until next time!
Neil
Well well well didn’t that fly in? Probably because we’ll all getting older and time moves faster for old people (it’s true an old person told me).
I think it’s pretty hard to not think back on the year on Hogmanay, my initial though was ‘okay, I worked pretty hard but could be better’ but the more I thought about it the more I was like ‘Yea, that was actually pretty awesome’ and one of the best yet for my art.
I’m just going to do a short round up of my work throughout the year, maybe you’ve seen it all, maybe you haven’t. I certainly forgot about a lot of it until I had a good think about it.
Okay! 2013 started out pretty quiet, Seven Days in Berlin had been out for a few months and I didn’t really know what to do next. Just before Christmas I’d met my now girlfriend Coralie, which you can read all about in my soppy comics short.
We’ve been dating for about a year now which is a new record for me. At the start of February I got a call from Kerrang magazine to do a strip for them about Oli Sykes and a dinosaur, I did my best and I reckon it turned out pretty well!
From February through to May I don’t really recall much, from the looks of my Tumblr and Twitter it seems I was just farting about drawing animals and stuff. Anyways, in May me and Coralie went to Bordeaux, I did start a travelogue about this but it’s yet to be finished. Here’s a page.
In truth, the whole time I was there I was writing out another comic in my head. One about space and Astronomy, so when I got home I locked myself up for a few weeks and produced this.
The Amateur Astronomer’s Journal. Of all the comics I’ve made myself I’d say I’m most proud of this one. I’m rarely happy with a finished piece but I feel I really hit what I was trying to get across with this.
The book went out to some really great reviews and before I knew it, it was July and I was doing Glasgow Comic Con. The book got nominated for 3 of the SICBA awards and a good time was had. Next was the Edinburgh book festival where I met a wealth of amazing creators. I even got to meet one of my heroes Chris Ware (sheepishly gave him a book) and took notes on his and Joe Sacco’s talk.
September rolled in and me and my long time pal Alan Campbell did an exhibition called ‘A Sinking Night’ at Little Ox gallery. My main piece was a comic about a girl falling asleep. You can see the whole thing here.
Throughout October me and Colin Bell (Jonbot vs Martha dream team) got hard at work on a new comics and in November launched this bad boy.
Dungeon Fun is one of the biggest things I’ve ever worked on, it’s full colour and 32 pages and took a lot of work and a few all nighters to get finished. But it was well worth it. It’s reception was fantastic, it got tons of fantastic reviews and recently got featured in Comic Book Resources top 100 comics of 2013!
We took Dungeon Fun to Thought Bubble in Leeds where it did super good but I reckon my highlight of TB was meeting so many like minded creators and individuals in the comic world which although at first was a bit daunting was overall inspiring and motivating.
Shortly after returning from Leeds me and Campbell Miller (How to be a Ghost dream team) Launched how to be Suave.
In the same vein as ‘How to be a Ghost’ it’s short and sweet with a few chuckles and a nice overall message to boot.
And that’s pretty much it! I’ve done loads of one-off pictures and mini strips which can be found on my Tumblr or Facebook but that’s all the main bodies of work covered.
looking back I think I did as well as I could have, 3 books in a year ain’t bad. And although I don’t really feel comfortable talking about money, it’s worth saying for the first time in a long time I feel comfortable (of course this could all change). I can remember some grim moments a few years ago of being a regular at Govan job centre and having to borrow money from my parents to pay for bus fares etc. Well now I’m doing okay, earlier in the year I cleared off my debts and I just bought my parents a lovely weekend away, amongst other things, for their christmas.
Next year I hope to make even more books although calm down a bit on the other kind of work I take in to spend more time with my friends and family and very understanding girlfriend.
Thanks for reading and I hope you all have a fantastic new year!
Neil
I must apologise for the very blunt title although my new book is out now and I’m super excited! Look!
It’s also been getting some great reviews, let’s hear some of them.
“mixes pieces of astronomy and science with a slight but utterly lovely story” –Comics Beat
“a sweet, innocent and beautifully touching story” –Big Comic Page
“the most accomplished work yet from a cartoonist I’m enjoying more and more.” – John Lees
The book is now available from my etsy store for £3 ($5) and books bought this weekend also come signed with 2 free badges!
The book is also available on Kindle!
Also if anyone would like a digital pdf (ipad friendly) please email me!
Thanks for reading, until next time!
Neil
Hello! Hope you’re all doing well!
Firstly I am super sorry I haven’t updated the blog in a while I have been mega busy with some projects and there’s one I’d like to show off today.
This is the cover for my new book.
This has been in the making for roughly the last 2 months, although it’s been in planning for a lot longer. It’s a fictional comic in which I’ve done my best to marry together some of my favourite subjects: space and astronomy, science and soppyness. It’s told from the perspective of a female amateur astronomer detailing some of her finds and wonders and I’m really proud of it. Here’s one of the 28 pages.
You can pre-order it right now from my shop!
It’s going to be available as of next Friday (21st) although if you’re local to Glasgow you should come along to the launch night! Where my good friend Gill Hatcher is also launching her new book ‘Bunny Behind the Moon’. It’ll be a super night and we’ll be doing some drawing and colouring in and other fun activities.
So that’s my big news! I’ll keep you all updated with other book news, in the meantime take care.
And keep looking up!
Neil
Just a short wee update today.
Last week I got a phonecall asking if I wanted to do a comic strip for Kerrang! Magazine and I was like ‘Hell yea!’
For those outside of the ukelele (that’s what the U.K is short for) Kerrang! Is a widely distributed weekly rock/metal magazine.
Anyways my strip is about metal singer Oli Sykes and his pet dinosaur. Here’s a wee sneaky peek!
The magazine is in most U.K newsagents until Wednesday.
Take care!
Neil
Hey Everyone hope you’re all well!
I’ve got some excited news! I’ve made a new book! AW YEA.
It’s called ‘Seven Days in Berlin’. It’s a journal style travelogue comic that follows on (or can be read on its own) from ‘Nine Lines of Metro’ my travelogue of Barcelona.
Let’s see what it looks like.
It details all the stuff I got up to while at the same time telling a nice story about exploring, friends and Berlin. There also might be a little romance but shhhh.
Just for you I’m going to show you a few pages, here ya go.
If you’d like to see what happens in the other 37 pages stop by my Etsy shop and get yourself a copy! It’s only £4($6) or you can buy the travelogue set for just £6($9). All copies come signed by me with a little message!
I worked super hard on these and it’s little things like buying a comic or some cards that keep me going as an artist and enable me to keep doing what I do so please have a look.
Thank you!
Neil.
I’m sure you’ve all heard of the sad news about the passing of Neil Armstrong. As a small tribute I’ve made a short comic.
If you’ve read this blog before you’ll probably know I’m super into space and Neil helped spark that. See when I was growing I honestly didn’t know any other Neils and I grew to almost dislike my name until my mum told me about Neil Armstrong the astronaut. Then I suddenly thought Neils were awesome and learning about the other Neil sparked my interest in all things spacey which has stayed with me to this day.
Rest in peace other Neil.
Also, there’s some new wee bits and bobs in my shop if you have a minute for a look.
N
Hello Everyone hope you’re having a nice Saturday.
I saw this in the news the other day!
And I laughed HARD. The picture on the left is a 19th century fresco painting of Jesus Christ by Elias Garcia Martinez which is hung in Sanctuary of Mercy Church near Zaragoza and the picture on the right is the ‘restored’ painting by a local 80-year-old.
Now I’ve got to say it’s pretty obvious the restored painting is a bit of an epic fail but I’ve got it hand it to her, she tried her best and doesn’t deserve all the bad press.
In fact I actually tried to copy the fresco myself and it was very hard.
Take care.
Neil
I sometimes surprise myself when I can really geek out on something. This week I got a commission to do a painting of Simon Belmont, he’s a vampire killer from the game series Castlevania and he’s a total legend. Anyways here he is in a scene from Castlevania IV.
I tried to keep the style as close to the games art style as possible, after all I always say getting out your box is good (by ‘box’ I mean my usual painting style).
In other news I finally got my hands on a 3ds and got Ocarina of Time with it… so expect a lot more of this :P
Take care!
nx
Neil Slorance 