There’s to be a character in Nao that was a freelance signwriter/painter back in the sixties, just as my Dad was. This is a rough that I’m going to ask my Dad to paint up properly for me. It’s definitely going to be in the book… but the real reason I’m asking him to do it, is so that I get to own a beautiful piece of intricate sign work by my Dad, something I can show to my son & say this is what your Grandad did for a living. It’s such a shame that it’s a craft that’s all but dead now, plastic & vinyl lettering have completely succeeded in killing it off. I’m gonna ask him if he’ll do it for me as a Christmas present, so hopefully I’ll be posting a photo of the result in the New Year. And Dad, if you’re reading this… sorry I was just about to call you  

Been real busy doing… stuff… and writing and looking after Ro, so haven’t posted for a while. Anyway, here’s some boards that I’ve just finished… again they’re not in any proper order, they’re a hotchpotch of the best bits.

With regards Nao, I’m waiting to hear back from some publishers but in the meantime I’ve been writing more and I recently spent a great day researching in the kind of shop that Nao’s gonna be working in… more on that later.

I’ve had a busy week this week, did a day on a Jergens commercial, which included boarding the stills shoot. A few days with Laurence Dunmore on a Jameson’s ad and something called OTE which I think is some kind of Greek TV company… and still managed to fit in some parklife and a visit to Neverland. Finally finished up the animation too… stay tuned for more on that.

Just a few boards I did today for a Stacy Wall NFL commercial…

I finally got round to reading all six volumes of Katsuhiro Otomo’s ‘Akira’. I’d bought them all over the last year, they’re quite pricey so I had to do it over a long period, but I finally got round to reading them over this last week… a volume per day.

It’s amazing.

I knew it would be, I’d read chunks of it in the past, I had quite a few of the old 80s ‘Epic’ collections from when they first came out… And of course I’d seen the film and loved it… but really, it was great to read all six volumes in a row like that.

I was feeling a little bit overwhelmed at the task in hand with regards Nao… so it was the best possible tonic. My ambition of completing roughly 200 colour pages is completely dwarfed by the immense achievement of Otomo. Ten years in the making, a two thousand-plus-page epic of staggering beauty and detail. For anyone interested in comics, it really is an essential read. And now I’m full of confidence again… a year doesn’t seem like a long time at all.

Was digging through some old files today & found these stills, they’re from the only pop promo I ever directed – for Stina Nordenstam’s Lori Glory. I’m really pleased with them, Steve Blackman the DP was great & so was Dan Betteridge the art director.

This is the first rough character design for Tara Greene, Nao’s best friend and flatmate. She’s very much a strong, able, no-nonsense kind of woman. A nurse at St. Mary’s Hospital in Paddington and she’s a great believer in the medicinal qualities of a good cup of tea.