Rather like Neill (see his post) I find boats more interesting when they are taken out of their natural habitat. It must be an illustrator thing.
One of the very first films I saw was Pinnochio, and my favourite scene was Geppetto’s boat being consumed by a massive whale. The puppet maker seemed to live quite happily in the stomach of the beast, which resembled an enormous damp cathedral. Another film that impressed my youthful mind was Terry Gilliam’s Time Bandits, featuring a giant that wore a pirate ship as a hat. Gilliam confesses in the director’s commentary that he borrowed the idea from a Brian Froud illustration, which I have since discovered in the book Master Snickup’s Cloak.
Also in the early Eighties, I was very keen on the work of comic book artist Mike McMahon; at the time he was illustrating a story called Slaine, set in the world of Celtic mythology. One adventure featured the Cloud Curragh, an ancient ship that sailed through the sky, powered by Ogham stones and the occasional human sacrifice.
I find boats fun to draw, but I prefer it if they are sailing through space or recycled as a tree house, etc. I think it’s because I find them visually unbalanced when they are bobbing about in the water. The bottom half is hidden, which is a shame as there’s a very satisfying relationship between the curve of a sail and the rounded, sculptural quality of a nice hull.

David Wyatt has been an illustrator for a good while. Find out more at his ramshackle blog.

Recently, a news story concerning the unearthing of a witch’s cottage caught my eye.

According to reports, it was clearly a witch’s cottage because it had a mummified cat bricked up in the walls, and was found in Pendle, the scene of a notorious outbreak of maleficence in the early 17th century. Ten people were hanged as witches due to a tragic tangle of religious intolerance, familial rivalry and superstition.
Whether or not this particular dwelling played host to all manner of frightful witchery will be doubtless be pondered upon by historians and people (like me) with over-active imaginations. I’ve always loved old buildings – they act as a focal point for history and legends; they are like batteries generating stories, some down-to-earth and some fanciful. Read the rest of this entry »

I have had so many embarrassing incidents to deal with they have become unremarkable. As a part-time musician, every week seems to offer an interesting new way of making an idiot of oneself in public; the trick is to carry on regardless, pretend nothing horrendous has occurred and save the squirming and self-loathing for later.

Consequently, I am going ‘off-brief’ to talk about Trolls.

I recently had the pleasure of illustrating the cover of Conrad Mason’s The Demon’s Watch, which features a pair of identical Troll twins. To get me in the mood I did some research and looked through some of my favourite Troll artists (if this article becomes tedious, skip to the end and click on some of the links for some visual treats).

In Norse mythology, Trolls began life as the offspring of Ymir, the Frost Giant. They were said to be of huge size, varied in appearance and temperament; generally more like gods than the bridge-bothering creatures of folklore we recognise today.

Gradually they settled into the mythic landscape as a race of beings representative of the elements; sometimes benevolent, sometimes mischievous, sometimes downright vicious. They lived in societies of their own, in hollow hills, forests and wild mountainous regions. Read the rest of this entry »