Long Range Desert Group

Illustrations by Joe Colquhoun from the Lion Book of War Adventures 1962.

Safari Danger

Mike Western illustrates this text piece from the Hurricane annual 1972.

Death Game 1999

John Stokes provides illustrations for this text story from the Action annual 1977.

Blake's Blenheim

Ian Kennedy draws this strip from The Wizard, dated November 2nd 1974.

Terror in the Tall Tower

Here's a cover created by Denis McLoughlin from 1974. Love this: it's such a classic pulp image... See here for Ian Kennedy's version from the reprint collection in the eighties.

The Death Planet

Some more work by Brian Lewis.

Dan Dare

Brian Lewis provides the pin-up for the back page of 2000Ad dated 9th September 1978.

The Hotspur annual 1976

Ron Smith provides a cover depicting Nick Jolly, an 18th century highwayman, who's transported into the 20th century by an 'amazing Time Ray, which had also transformed his trusty mare, Bess, into a jet-propelled horse of steel'. Apparently....

No, this isn't the original art. For some reason I thought it'd be interesting to see it sans text, so I did a little PShop jiggery-pokery. Yep, I don't get out much.....

The Phantom Patrol

A bit of a departure from the norm: some contemporary British Comic Art by Chris Weston. CW has created the cover for a reprint of this series which originally appeared in Swift comic in the early sixties. See here for more info.



Here's a page drawn by the original artist for the series, Gerry Embleton.

Fraser of Africa

By Frank Bellamy for the Eagle dated 15th October 1960. In this series Bellamy took the unusual step of doing away with full colour and utilising a limited palette to evoke the heat and dust of the African plains.

Valiant Annual 1973

A painted annual cover by Mike Western.

Dan Dare

Frank Bellamy creates page one with Don Harley on page two. I love the texture that Bellamy applies on the 'Nagrab' in the first frame.

Terror in the Tall Tower

A giant octopus living in an old abandoned skyscraper in New York-yay!!
This is Ian Kennedy's cover for a reprint edition from 1980. See here for a peek at an original cover from the first run of this series

Kampfgruppe Falken

Luis Collado Coch draws this weeks episode of Kampfgruppe Falken that appeared in Warlord, dated 26th July 1980. Like Mike Dorey, Coch uses texture to good effect in creating a gritty realism.

Well-Fancy That!

Who said that comics aren't educational? Pat Nicolle provides some lovely pen-work for this informative piece from the Valiant annual 1973.

The Youngest VC

Joe Colquhoun's inks and washes accompany a text piece about Arthur Fitzgibbon who, at the age of 15, became the youngest person to win the Victoria Cross. From Battle 17th may 1875.

London Invaded and Counter Attack

A couple of curious items. Frank Hampson created two centre-spreads for Marvel UK in the mid 70s. Not too sure about his rendition of Spidey methinks, but the rest of the pen-work is pretty cool; especially the second one starring Superdare! Or is that Super Dare? Or Supe Rd Are? Any hoo... Cool work.

Morgan's Mob

Ian Kennedy does some lovely pen-work in this strip from The Crunch, May 12th 1979. I think Kennedy really went to town on this one. It's interesting to see how he's drawn the backgrounds. See how he uses a thin line to push things into the distance like the soldiers watching from the river bank in frame 3 on page one? Observe the minimal way of rendering of the jungle as a series of squiggles. I've included some close-ups at the end for you to look at. I like the cross hatching technique that IK uses on the soldiers. Another nice example is on the Dakota as it takes off.

Trail to Nowhere

From Valiant 15th june 1974. Mike Western draws this, um, Western adventure.... I like the lettering on this. I wonder if MW lettered this one himself? The balloons seem to be integrated into the artwork rather than just pasted onto it as is the usual case. Anyway, I'm pretty sure the sound effects are by Western. You'll also notice a couple of blown-up frames underneath the episode. I love the way he creates light and shadow.

2000AD

Brian Lewis draws Judge Dredd. Not the best rendition of Joe Dredd.

"Why the long face Joe?"
"Heavy dentures-creep!"

But only one of a handful of jobs BL contributed to 2000AD and Starlord before he died. I'm unsure how BL would have been received by the editors of 2000AD at the time: whether they thought him too old school to fit into the new comic that was trying to break from tradition.

Wulf the Briton

Every now and again I head over to the Compalcomics site to moon over the stuff they have up for auction. Here's an early Ron Embleton (Express Weekly number 155, 1957) piece that went to some lucky, albeit monied, blighter. Sigh....

Spaceburst

Brian Lewis provides this self-scripted short that's both silly and typically British in content.
I like the way he draws the space ship in frame one using a chunky line. I think the 'star bubbles' in the background are pretty cool too... I know, kinda sad, but I have to find entertainment wherever I can-I don't get out much....

Scoop Donovan-War Cameraman

Ron Turner provides Scoop Donovan art for this issue of Film Fun dated, 24th June 1961. In my opinion Turner wasn't a war artist. He had a great style, but his mind wasn't really set to the subject matter. By that I mean that he hasn't really researched the strip all that well. The weapons/uniforms/equipment are an approximation rather than being realistic. What he was really suited to (and excelled in) was sci-fi. He was a master of the hi-tech future.
I like how he renders Scoop's right arm and body as he's swimming under water in the last frame of page one-how it loses definitition and becomes a series of lines. See how he renders things as they recede into the distance like the German artillary and landing craft in frames 10 and 11 on page 2.

The Private War of Private Moore

Ilustrations by Ian Kennedy from the Lion annual 1968.

White Rhino

Frank Bellamy provides some nicely textured pen-work for this story from Boys World annual 1971.

Johnny Boyland and the Quail Hunters

Illustrations by Frank Bellamy from the Boys World annual 1971.

Dan Dare

Way back in 1979 Dragon's Dream released the first of three Dan Dare reprint books. For the first book: The Man From Nowhere, Frank Hampson and Don Harley redrew the first frame of each episode. According to the book, The Man Who Drew Tomorrow FH pencilled the illustrations and DH coloured and inked the rest. Although, I would say this first frame is ALL Hampson compared to the second illustration which has Harley doing finishes.

You can buy Titan Book's release of The Man From Nowhere here.