Places.

I need to update my list of places you can find me! I keep forgetting to put it into my website… let me put it here, hopefully it’ll make me remember.

Twitter / @autojoy (very active!)
Tumblr / schmautojoy (active)
Flickr / autojoy (very inactive…)
This is My Jam / autojoy (active-ish)
ScentBase / autojoy (active-ish)
Google+ / Kate Brown (very inactive…)
Instagram (or Webstagram) / autojoy (active)

In other news, I’ve just completed a set of illustrations for a Phoenix Tale Feather short. I used a different style, and really enjoyed the chance to exercise my illustration skills. I’d like to do more, but illustration gigs don’t come up for me that frequently (probably because…. I’ve not really pursued them, haha). I’ll post the pictures once they’ve been published — to my knowledge, they are going out in the Hallowe’en issue. The story itself was right up my alley (as well Editor Ben knew!!)… very interesting fairy-tale material. I read it several times ^_^

Last week, I was in Dundee, visiting the Comics module they have going on there at the DJCAD. I was very impressed. I met and spoke with Phil and Chris who are running the Comics Module and the Comics MLitt courses, respectively. They both have a deep love of comics, current and past, and seem to have their heads screwed on in terms of what would be useful to the students. A good deal of their budget is set aside to invite professionals currently working in the field to visit and speak with the students, which I think is so vital… we only had the one guest (Paul Grist! :D) come to our course for the Swindon HND SA, and I felt it was exceptionally beneficial, and a serious shame we were unable to have more guests visit. (Also certain tutors may have spoken over the top of said guest a fair bit…………….) The Dundee courses also work towards compiling an anthology of the students’ comics so they have something definite to work towards, are able to learn about print etc., are able to see their work in real print, and are able to take the book along to events and sell it. So! Yeah, I was very impressed, and I wish them the best… I hope it expands into a full-blown BA! I think that’d be excellent! With what’s achieved in the space of 10 weeks for the Module students, imagine what could be done in three years…! Many thanks to Phil and Chris for taking care of me for my visit, I felt very welcome.

ALSO DUNDEE HAS A VOLCANO OMG!!!!!!!!

British Comic Awards – Young People’s Comic Awards

Well, wow!! I was super surprised and rather shocked that The Lost Boy is up on the nominee list for the YPCA this year! The other nominees are rather super, so I’m really quite flattered to be up there with them. I wish everyone the best of luck! It’s great that the BCAs/YPCAs are doing ace work getting these comics into the hands of school-age children… it must be pretty fun to be one of the young people judging the awards, eh :D

Whilst the YPCAs have been running sucessfully for a couple of years now, this is the first British Comic Awards ceremony we will see. I am very excited to see who will be nominated in the categories, and so happy to see such enthusiasm and great care taken over UK comics! Go Brit Comics! :D

Events & the tiniest preview!

Hi! Just as a quick update, I’ll be attending NICE along with mah bud Emma Vieceli! We will both have books for purchase and will most likely be sketching, too. It’s looking to be a really nice (sorry, sorry) event, so do come along and give a new show some support, and say hello to us!

Secondly, I got time to spend on something I’m really excited about! I’ve (literally) just finished a 4-pager for The Phoenix, which was written and devised by Neill Cameron. Neill is totally one of my favourite UK creators, and I was so pumped to get to work on something by him. I had *so* much fun making this comic, I can’t even begin to say! I really hope you guys will pick it up — you can get single issues of The Phoenix for just £2.99, delivered straight to your door (just to clear that up, because people always ask). I put up a little tiny snippet (like, really tiny — that section is about two inches high IRL) of it on my grainy Instagram the other day: http://web.stagram.com/n/autojoy I’m not sure which issue it will go out in yet, but I’ll let you know. I’ll be doing the cover, too!

Take care! ^_^/

Bye-bye Jim and Bob.

The (blank) cover I did for Issue 31 of The Phoenix, and a photo of the finished, printed issue! I liked how Laurence (the designer) made the title look as if it was gently uplit. Not long to go now, for The Lost Boy! It finishes very soon! O_O; I finished making it last friday. So… I’m off to work on more projects! I’ll update here when I have solid projecty-based news.

Webstore… open!

Go webstore…! It’s open now. There is… so much stuff O_O; Because there is so much, I’ll give a quick listing here of what’s available right now… but once it’s gone, it’s gone! Here’s that list:

>>> ALL interiors plus the front cover from Fish + Chocolate: The Piper Man/The Cherry Tree/Matryoshka, including the title images
>>> The Golden Fables illustration series
>>> All Nelson interiors
>>> Both posters and both covers from The Lost Boy
>>> My cover for The Thrill Electric
>>> Various prints at A3 and A4

Most original pieces come with a same-sized, high-quality print of the finished image.

Coming soon are the interiors for The Lost Boy. I’ll wait a while until after the strip itself has finished its run before I put them up. There’s other stuff I’ll put up at a later date, when I can find it. I’m a but shopped-out at the moment, heh. If there’s something you want and it’s not around on the webstore, please give me an email and I’ll let you know if it’s available to buy! Thank you! :D

Golden Fables