Lost in Space

Just found this mouldy oldy in my hard drive! He was done as a test for one of the now defunct card companies I worked for in the good old days when it seemed like freelancers could sell their wares! I haven't  worked for a card company in over a year now, they seem to be dropping like flies. Hopefully things will pick up again in the industry (and country) soon....although I'm not holding my breath! I feel like we need a character like 'V' to put the country to rights!

Gothtwinz Rises.......

Hello peeps!

Well I broke my promise to keep the blog updated....blame it on a heavy work load! What have I been up to since November, the usual, work,work, more work and a dash of work just to finish things off. We've had Chrimbo and Easter and now the summer hols are a looming like a ham covered gold brick. The older I get the more time seems to be going quicker. Hopefully I'll keep adding to the blog but we've all heard that before!

BWARG!

Hallo peeps!

Long time no see.....as usual been a busy bee at the studio producing god knows how many characters..think me heads gonna implode scanner style! Still doing any freelance work I can grasp onto in these hard times and of course doing my own personal work. Mrs Goth and the Gothettes are all doing well...mini Gothette is rapidly approaching one year of being on the planet...can't believe how quickly it's gone.

What else, well my latest BBC work was on Doctors but just last week, was easnt to post it up here but as per usual just didn't have the time. They showed my illos quite a bit but the story was bizarre to say the least (cool!)...best bit was the story was about a freelance comics illustrator who starts going mad and thinks the characters in his comics are real and coming after him (we've all been there at some point HA HA) but the best bit was the huge, posh house he lived in...as if, DON'T THEY KNOW WHAT FREELANCERS MAKE?!?!

Right, I've got to get back to work...hopefully I shall return soon!

Toodle Pipski One and All!

Burning Out.....

......this is exactly how I feel right now....burnt out! Work is unreal at the moment, we're producing CD after CD, some of our triple sets have around 2000 different elements on them! On my main ranges I tend to do between 6-8 full on characters and then countless other things like papers, covers and design sheets. I think we're staring to average  one of these sets every 2-3 weeks now....MENTAL! Nearly all my other jobs have had to go on hold now and I'm waiting for some sort of break just so I can catch up on myself, but I've been waiting for nearly two months solid now and I still can't se an end in sight. And to think that about nine months ago I was worried that I didn't have enough work on, now I want a gap from it all. If I don't get out there soon into the real world and see some trees and the odd lake or two I fear I mat go insane!

Where does the time go?

Well hello there.....if there is anyone left out there! I can't believe how long it's been since I updated the old blog. My lifes been kind of mental over the past months and I think I'd need at least forty two blogs just to fill you all in.
Where to start then, firstly I can proudly announce a new Gothtwin has arrived, baby Gothtwin Evie Eowyn was born on the 3rd of December. Shes a beautiful little thing with the energy of a superhero, massive bluey, grey eyes and a very cheeky grin. We still can't decide on her hair colour though, it seems to change every day.
Work, well I now am an illustrator for one of the countries biggest crafting companies! I'll try and post some of my stuff later (hopefully not another six months mind you). My freelance work has generally slowed down to a drip now. The industry still seems to be in a state of decline like the rest of the country, I don't see me going back to it soon!

The evil company which STILL owes me money has now utterly vanished into nothingness. They went under owing out thousands of pounds to printers, suppliers and of course artists but I doubt any of us will see a penny of it now. I was sent a creditors report recently where one of the key people involved was questioned by a panel. It was amazing how much 'he didn't know' about the runnings of his own company. It seems as long as you claim no knowledge of anything, then you can do what you want and get away with it.....I must try it one day. It does seem that only the people who play dirty make anything of there lifes....take note bankers and MP's.

New Illos!

Morning peeps. I thought I'd put up a couple of new images as I haven't uploaded anything brand new for a while now. I'm really pleased with the water on the canoe guy but I really have a soft spot for the club singer!

Thanks to everyone for all the comments from my last post......I always know that I can rely on my Army! Cheers guys!

The Return of the Gothtwin!

Yes, I know it's been a while since my last post....I'm still fighting the system, trying my hardest to keep afloat in this maddening society we have in Blighty. It seems that the more I try to work and 'get out there' the more I get shat on! You'll all know of my ongoing battle with a now defunct publisher (and I use the word 'publisher' with bitter, blood in my mouth) well the 'hilarious' news is I was commissioned by another publisher who's done the same thing! He didn't get any finished work but I put a lot of time into his project doing mock ups and the like. The funniest bit is he knew of my bad dealings with the aforementioned company and was actually sympathetic towards me wondering how 'any professional body could treat a freelancer like that?'...then he goes and does it himself! I wouldn't really mind, but he hasn't even had the guts to get in touch with me and explain himself! Another nail in the coffin for this countries publishing industry!

I've been working on other projects so I' haven't been sat around just crying into my black coffee, heres a job I did for the BBC last year on the Doctors programme which for some reason, I forgot to upload when it was actually on air! DOH!

Attack of the Dinosaurs!!

Hello one and all, sorry about the lack of recent posts. As a lot of you may know, I've been having major grief with a certain publishing company who owe me a small fortune so I've been tied up trying to sort this out. Needless to say, I'm still in the same postion with them but I hear that various things are happening to them so hopefully it'll be sorted out soon......(and pigs may fly)

Workwise lately, well, I've got to say that it is still dire out there in greetings card world. I've never known it be so quiet, so I'm trying to broaden my horizons a bit. I'll let you know if anything comes of my evil plans for world domination!

Hopefully, I'll be updating more often!

Merry Chrimbo!

Wishing you all a very Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year! Gothtwinz shall return with a vengeance next year!

More moldy oldies....

These were done to try and get a monthly if not weekly cartoon strip up and running. Needless to say, it failed and now looking past with hazey eyes and can see why! Years ago, myself and Niel Bushnell used to do a couple of daily strips, Flasher Mac for the Daily Sport and The Funny Farm for the Hartlepool Mail and Yorkshire Post. Again, like my previous post, things seemed so much more easier then. Of course, The Farm is still close to our hearts and we're still trying to get it animated but breaking into T.V. is a really long and difficult path!

A Blast from the Past....

Work is so slow at the moment (as in there isn't any) that I've had an opportunity to go through some of my old files of work. I came across these....all hand painted from eons ago. They were for a now sadly defunct magazine called 'Stories for Children'. This magazine was brilliant, it normally had about 5 to 6 original kids stories illustrated by some of our best artists (including Norman Beardsly...who used to do most of the illustrations on the 'Rainbow' kids show)

I miss those days when everything seemed a hell of a lot easier than they are today!

Scooby-Dooby-Doo!

Spooky greetings to you all mortals! Tis a tad late I know for Halloween but I hope you all had a good one! I've got to say that it was a really quiet one round our patch, I think the state of the country has even effected this our holyiest of holy days!.....If it wasn't for those pesky kids!

He's behind you.....AGAIN!

Well dear reader, another year, another panto poster. I don't know where the time goes!

I love working for this client as they're always so easy to get on with and generally give me free rein to do whatever I want to (within limits anyway...I always tend to go for a more moody, dark image and have to be gently reminded these posters are for a family market so brighten the buggers up!) best part is, unlike another company I know, they pay up within a week! They also give me plenty of time but I somehow always run out of it...mind you this year I had a good excuse...the accursed company who owe me are slowly destroying my will to live at the moment.

Anyway, at the end of the day, I must admit that I like this illo...and I got away with doing it with a nightime background as well! VICTORY IS MINE!

A fish called Gothtwinz

Well the summer hols are done and dusted and as you can tell from my lack of posts last month, twas a hectic time! Two Gothette kids off school for six weeks and one Gothtwin trying to work from home is not an easy thing. Work is slow, the card industry (like the rest of the country) seems to be falling to bits. I'm working on a commission as we speak but after that I'm dry although I've got a new client lined up for some book work which sounds pretty exciting!

Here's some fish I've been messing around with in Illustrator just to keep my finger in so to speak.

I like RED ROBOTS!

How do all! Heres another old sketch I've just painted up. Haven't got a clue who he's meant to be....I was going to do him in white armour but as always seems to be the case with any robotty things I do...he's ended up in red!

Many,many moons ago I did a couple of comic strips featuring an army of red suited soldiers flying around the universe in their red spaceships. I think it all stems from one of my childhood heroes, Baron Von Richthofen AKA The Red Baron. I adored his Fokker Triplane and loved the fact that he (and his fellow pilots) were so confident that they flew around in brightly coloured bi-planes (unlike thier Allied counterparts who flew in dull coloured planes)

I dream of genie...

Here's the concepts for the hero and genie for my poster job. There was a green version of the genie done as well as my clients didn't know which version they were going to use. My problem was that in my eyes, the red genie reminds me of Hellboy (one of my gods) yet the green version reminded me of the Hulk (one of the dullest comic characters ever!)

They've plumbed for the red (which I wanted as it links into the overall colour scheme) so I'm a happy bunny!

Bad news is that my bad guy (see below) and the Emperor have been dropped from the poster...gutted at that as I really liked the bad guy!

Angels to some...demons to others.....

After working on the poster commission, I thought I'd redo an ancient sketch I found from many moons ago. Spent a few hours on it and here she is!

New for old...

Here's a little something I've just finished working on. The top image is my old avatar, pencils then coloured up in Photoshop. The next image is the new version which was done completely in Illustrator. I've removed the spoon (as the original image was for a cereal box design) and messed around a bit with the geezers proportions. I'll master Illustrator if it kills me.....and it is slowly!!

Is there a Doctor in the house?...

Heres the work I did a few months ago for the good old BBC. It's for the 'Doctors' programme which I've worked for before, this is now the third time they've used me so I can officially make this a trilogy!

The blurb for the episode says 'Karen helps a 14-year-old boy to win a battle against his school bully and his online avatar.'.... all I can say is that the characters I designed are for a mock computer game Warwolf. They're meant to be half animal/half robot fighting machines of death. I also had to do a mock title screen for the game (featuring the main hero fella) and a mocked up game screen which if I remember correctly is made up from various pieces of Cornwall and parts of the chemical works in my home town of Middlesbrough, they make great futuristic buildings.

The two front view faces are, I believe, going to be superimposed onto the actors faces in the show....sounds like it's going to be good!

It's on BBC1 on Friday the 17th of July at 13.45 so make sure you watch it soap fans!!....oh, and the episode is called 'The Art of War' which is pretty damn cool!

All artwork is copyright BBC PRODUCTIONS. 2009

Good guys and bad guys...

More concepts from the job I'm working on! (Thanks for all the comments! I'm really enjoying this new style....although I know I'll have to tighten it up for the finished poster!)