Cardboard Robot Studios

How To Survive A Zombie Apocalypse

2011-10-07T13:28:00.000+01:00

The SFX Special Zombies - The Ultimate Guide came out last week here in the UK, featuring a four-page feature written by Dr. Dale Seslick of How To Survive a Zombie Apocalypse with illustrations provided by yours truly! Check it out. It's got some great articles in there.

Since the magazine's out on the shelves now, I figure it's safe to post up a couple of the drawings here:

Return of the Blog

2011-10-07T13:23:00.001+01:00

I'm currently in the process of building a slightly more professional and shiny-new website to replace this one, so I've let this wee blog fall a bit by the wayside, so what the hell, I'll dump a load of drawings that I've done recently:

HEY!! HEY! You! YEAH, YOU!

2011-08-13T20:36:00.000+01:00

...Have some drawings.

This one was done for Brandon Graham's jam, based on French comic juggernaut Moebius' Starwatcher drawing.

And finally, the Daring Dangerine! You'll be seeing a lot more of this Saffron Sentinel in the coming months.

That's all for now, see you next time!

Birthday Scrawlins

2011-06-26T16:32:00.000+01:00

Extreme poverty guided me towards drawing pictures for my brother and sister's birthday presents this year.

Fruit Punch: SHARK ATTACK

2011-06-16T14:57:00.001+01:00

I finally finished this comic the other day. I'd been slowly drawing it over the space of a year in order to warm-up for other projects. Initially it was all in pencil, but I wound up going back and taking the brush to it, which honestly was the best decision I ever made.

Anyway, without further ado:

2011-06-02T01:23:00.001+01:00

I personally have never much rated J.O. Barr's The Crow, but I had a lot of fun drawing the character. The "6,000 VIEWS" on the moon refers to this drawing being a reward for the 6000th view of my Deviantart.

Kirban Decay: MC Lightray

2011-05-22T14:58:00.001+01:00

Another entry in the Kirban Decay series!

MC Lightray holds a regular spot at the illustrious NuGenesis Nightclub. As the fastest rapper in the city, Lightray's light-speed lyrical loquaciousness never fail to pack the house. Over the course of his tenure at NuGenesis, Lightray has formed a close friendship with head bouncer Orion.

Kirban Decay: DJ Darkseid.

2011-05-16T14:53:00.002+01:00

The continuous listening of Adam WarRock's EXCELLENT album The War for Infinity, I was hit with the idea to do a series of drawings translating key players of Jack Kirby's Shakespearean-in-Magnitude Fourth World saga into a grimy inner-city setting. The series' name? Kirban Decay. Punlicious.

So without further ado, I give you the first of the series: DJ Darkseid.

Head DJ of Klub Apokolips, this Terrible Tyrant of the Turntables seeks to mix the fabled Anti-Life Compilation, thus remaking the underground music scene in his own malevolent image.

Audit pages.

2011-05-16T14:43:00.001+01:00

For those of you who haven't heard, Audit's been moved from its placeholder site on Tumblr to a domain of its very own, where it can be read in a much more convenient fashion. You can check it out HERE.

When I design a new character for Audit, I do a pretty bog-standard standing pose of the character for the sake of reference. (It's easier than constantly flipping back and forth through sketchbooks.)

Here are the major players from the first story.

Ornery cockney killing machine Bluedog Wintergreen:

Celebrated multiversal hero The Spectacle:

The Spectacle's powerful but unstable sidekick, Seeker.

The second story's already underway up on the website, but I've not gotten round to doing the characters for that one yet.

Mass Update-o!

2011-05-16T14:17:00.001+01:00

I've been so seduced by Tumblr's memes-and-porn charms lately that the stalwart and dependable blogspot has once again fallen by the wayside!

In the interests of keeping current, here's a pile of some of the stuff I've been doing in my spare time lately:

Sequential Hi-Jinx

2011-02-02T17:13:00.003Z

Quick reminder: I'm serializing my comics project Audit on a Tumblr at the moment while I work on building an honest-to-goodness website for it.

Also, since it's February (also known as the armpit of the year), I'm taking part in the Drawing-A-Day challenge meme that's doing the rounds. My attempt is a delightful comic kinda-sorta set in the same world as Audit, featuring the exploits of a young couple of urban professionals. If I had to give it a genre, it'd probably be "Action Romance". It's called Interesting TimeZ and you can read it here.

Shun Goku SANTA

2010-12-23T01:41:00.001Z

I've had the urge to do some Street Fighter fanart for days, but then I thought "I should probably do something christmassy as well".

So I Potara'd that shit.

Some might call it lazy, I call it efficient.

Happy holidays!

Dear Blog...

2010-12-10T02:23:00.001Z

Hey baby. I know I been neglectin' you these past couple months, but look! I brought treats!

That will be ALL, Pennyworth.

2010-11-06T22:43:00.001Z

Grant Morrison is the best thing that's ever happened to Batman.

WOMO

2010-09-15T19:03:00.000+01:00

Here's a commission I did for the creator of WOMO, one of the coolest vinyl toys to hit the scene recently. His website's going up at the end of the month, so you should get in on the ground floor, so you can be one of those guys who were into WOMO when it was still Indie.

You've no chance of getting a preorder one, though. I snagged the last one. HA!

Anyway, here's the pic:

Click for full-size, ya confoundits.

Audit has begun!

2010-08-16T01:39:00.000+01:00

Take a look over to the right. See that link there? That's a link to my new ongoing comics project Audit.

Start reading now, cause there's a lot more to come!

Wolfman Investigations Comic

2010-07-19T23:35:00.001+01:00

The past month or so, I've been illustrating an 8-page comic for Wolfman Investigations,

It's been massively educational and my largest professional undertaking yet. The client has been kind enough to let me put up a sneak preview so I can prove I've not been sat on my arse doing nothing the past few weeks.

So without further ado:

It's well worth checking out the show, since it's by the very talented people behind How To Survive A Zombie Apocalypse.

Script by Ben Muir
Art by yours truly with lettering courtesy of Nate Piekos

Robot Fall Down...

2010-07-16T21:02:00.000+01:00

Go K-DOOOOOM!

Here's a sketch from the Audit production sketchbook I started recently. I'm following Skottie Young's recent advice and keeping schtum on details for now. I want a lot of people to be hit completely out of left-field by this premise.

Barbarian Chef

2010-05-17T00:31:00.000+01:00

Have a drawing.

This is a warrior chef dedicated to tracking down the rarest and most dangerous-to-obtain ingredients in his search for the perfect flavour.

You'll be seeing more of this fella in the future. Who knows, he might even have a name by then.

Shark Attack Sneak Peek!

2010-05-11T21:29:00.001+01:00

It's no secret that my primary passion is comic books, and my fondest wish is to have my own stories published and out there, even if only a dozen people end up reading it.

But you can't get anywhere in this vicious comic book dojo without bloodying your knuckles (metaphorically. Unless you're David Choe.)

Here's a sneak preview of a short comic I've been working on between official projects.

Story and drawings by me, colours by my secret weapon.

Audit's Bluedog Wintergreen

2010-05-06T21:20:00.000+01:00

Here's a pin-up from a personal comics project I'm working on, called Audit (working title).

This is the main character, Bluedog Wintergreen, one of a cadre of assassins working on curtailing the increasing tide of chaos brought on by an exponentially increasing number of superheroes, renegade ninja clans and giant monsters.

Fashion is Dead

2010-05-05T22:35:00.001+01:00

Here's a T-shirt design I made for indie darling zombie movie Colin.

The shirt's coming out via Zombie Aid's upcoming clothing label, the film itself is available from the website.

2010-04-30T20:50:00.000+01:00

Thought I'd upload some of the character turnarounds I've been doing for Zombelina. There's more than just these, but who wants to have a good story spoiled for them, eh?

2010-04-29T22:01:00.000+01:00

Bit of Jack Kirby fanboy joy to wrap up the day's work.

G'night, folks.

Zombelina

2010-04-06T16:29:00.000+01:00

I've been taken on to handle the design and storyboard side of Zombelina, a short stop-motion animation based on the story by Leighroy Marsh, author of the delightful Maya And The Hairy Plug Monster.

You can find out more about it here.

There's also a group on facebook you can join here to keep up on how things are going.

Freak Road

2010-03-24T23:15:00.000Z

So, I've had a concept for a webcomic germinating in my brain for a while by the name of Freak Road; a meditation on urban legend and lifestyle, within the milieu of a character-driven "cartoon crime drama".

Freak Road is essentially me trying to congeal all my personal influences and secret socio-philosophical theories into a complete concept, with the result hopefully being something that's uniquely me. I don't wanna give away too much detail, but I'm really excited about where it's going.

Anyway, here's some character doodles.

I've been toying with a new colouring style, and I'm enjoying it so much it's almost obscene. Easy to learn, difficult to master, and ridiculously versatile.

There'll be a lot more of this, wait and see.

2010-03-15T20:07:00.000Z

Here's a quick warm-up I did today. From start to finish, it took a hair under 3 hours.

Wouldn't it be awesome if someone made a new TMNT comic series in the vein of the original old-school comix from the eighties? I'd love to see the turtles act like real Inner-city teenagers with ninja skills, dispensing foul-mouthed vigilante justice in between trying to obtain booze without ID or going to see obscure hardcore bands in dive bars.

Evil Pixie Commission

2010-03-10T15:27:00.000Z

Here's a logo I did for start-up photography studio Evil Pixie. Completely coincidentally, the pixie apparently is the spit of the guy who runs the company, so it worked out pretty well!

2010-03-09T12:06:00.000Z

I've been working without ink recently in order to give the lineart a rougher energy that I think works quite well. I'm still refining the technique but I love the effect to bits and I can't wait to put it to work on a big project.

Commisherations!

2010-02-18T18:10:00.000Z

Here's a commission done for Drum-fiend and all-around Welsh person, Sion Hopes.

How To Survive A Zombie Apocalypse!

2010-02-12T16:27:00.000Z

Here's a recently completed pin-up for improv troupe How To Survive A Zombie Apocalypse.

Click for a bigger view!

Mm... Photogenic...

2010-02-10T15:22:00.000Z

I've been doing a fair few of these recently, taking snapshots from various parties and drawing onto them to make some fun little gags.

I've been forcing myself to do these only in Sketchbook Pro, and the interface makes it seem so much more fun than the weird robot art-factory of photoshop. Although I do love Photoshop.

T-Shirts!

2010-01-07T18:14:00.001Z

UPDATE! Shirts are now up for sale on the link below, running at €9.99 per, with all kinds of cheap shipping options. Snap one up, why not?

I tend to knock out t-shirt designs when I'm bored, but don't have the energy to do more demanding work.

You'll find some of these on Dzine Clothing, and they should be available to purchase by February.

More to follow.

Singularity character design.

2009-12-15T15:06:00.000Z

Local music-man Ste Kirby commissioned me to come up with a character for his story-driven musical project "The Singularity".

Here's what I came up with.

Character Designs

2009-12-15T15:00:00.002Z

Here's some sample designs I did a while back for a children's book project about a little girl that loses her umbrella. I tried to envision different kinds of brolly, and the kind of person that would use them, then fuse that together to create a character.

Barbarian Revenge!

2009-12-15T14:53:00.001Z

I tend to do these to warm up in the morning, but I like some of them so much that they make it into samples of pro work.

Thaw Rimescar treads the frozen wastes of the Shattered Steppes, his warhammer BrainFreeze gripped in gloved fist.

The crunch of snow beneath his heels is his only herald.

Blood on the ice, his only calling card.

For if the north wind chill is the breath of the Reaper, then Thaw is its War-Cry, promising swift and terrible retribution to the unworthy.

Ursula Ogrebane is THE harshest bounty hunter in the Longreach Peninsula. She lost her eye to a fugitive minotaur, and now wears his hide for clothing and keeps smokes in his horns.

Some say that the minotaur is actually still alive and captive in one of Ursula's safehouses, just in case she needs anything else off him. Harsh.

Skate Decks!

2009-12-15T14:37:00.000Z

Here's some deck designs from my portfolio. I have more of a blast designing decks than pretty much any other kind of pro work. I either do the image on the old macbook, or I'll sit with the deck on my knee and just blast out some randomness with pens and paint!

You can expect a few more of these as the dribble out of my brain.

First post!

2009-12-15T14:29:00.001Z

Alright, folks?

This here blog'll serve as the main website for business-type professional work, with samples of the kind of quality of work that I can do for you. No doodles here, no sir. If you want doodles, check my Deviantart.

Over time, this blog will become swollen and unwieldy with all kinds of art. You know how Apocalypse Now Redux was like, three days longer than the original release? That's this blog. It's my portfolio, plus anything else that was good, but didn't fit into the old faux-leather folder.

Alright, let's get this party started.