PORTRAITS

There is an old cliché about writers being painters in words, yes, I know hoary and hackneyed, but I want to use this metaphor to introduce the work of Joel , whom you have encountered as the talented editor of the long running Tripwire (http://www.tripwire-magazine.com/). You may know that Joel Meadows deals in words, he is a respected journalist and has two exciting projects bubbling away as I write, one is an intriguing policer and the other is none other than Dee For Detective, which Corvus will be publishing in the near future.

However, what I am trumpeting today is his work as a photographer (just how talented can one man be). Joel has not one, but two new collections of his photographs out, both show how skilled he is at composition, the use of black and white as a photographic medium and are well worth a look.

I suspect like me you will get lost amongst the faces that stare back at you from every page of Portraits Joel’s pictures of famous authors. I shall let Mike Carey sum up the appeal of this book: “Time and again Joel Meadows uses his portraits not just to present his subjects but to explore and interrogate them. A beautiful and thought provoking book.” I especially found the photos of Alan Moore, taken over a number of years to be very powerful. He uses this time lapse photography to great effect with his studies of Michael Moorcock and Christopher Fowler as well. I cannot recommend this book strongly enough.

Joel has also produced Spooked, A London Gothic. This volume really highlights Joel’s skill at capturing the spirit of a place. As you look into the photographs you will realise that Old London has never gone away and that the city you know is built on something far older and more beautiful. That’s all I’m going to say, as I want to go and loose myself in that gothic London which is never very far away.

You can order both of these book and more from Joel’s blog (http://joelm1-joelmead.blogspot.co.uk/2010/07/joel-meadows-photography-at-last-my.html ). Don’t delay, they are that good.

BRISTOL EXPO PHOTOS

A big thanks to all those people who went to the Bristol Expo and took such trouble with their costumes. It was good to see you all.

VICTORIANA LAUNCHED!

It was smiles all around last Saturday as our latest title, the steam punk sensation that is Victoriana was launched at the Bristol Comic Expo. The author Tim Hart introduced his two short films and gave an informative speech about the world of Victoriana,

It was good to see some familiar faces and to make some new acquaintances as well. I was particularly taken with Luke Foster’s on line cartoon Moon Freight 3 (http://moonfreight3.com/). I shall review a couple of books that caught the attention of us here at Corvus next week. 

STEAMPUNK SATURDAY!

Yes, the Bristol Comic Expo (http://www.bristolexpo.co.uk/) is this weekend and we at Corvus are ready to celebrate the launch of our new steampunk title Victoriana which will be unveiled at the show. As well as premiering two short steampunk films about Victoriana, and the chance to meet not only the author Tim Hart, our in-house steampunk wunderkind and the artist, the wonderful Georgina Greaves, there will also be a raffle for an original piece of artwork! How much more excitement can a body stand?

There is much of interest at the Expo this year including the first UK visit by the sensational IDW Publishing, the people who are responsible for the Star Trek/ Dr Who cross over series. This is truly a landmark in publishing, the meeting of two unique, long running, fully realised universes. Miss this at your peril.

When the excitement has got too much, and you feel the need to touch base with reality once more, why not wander over to our stall? We will be there all weekend and we would really like to talk to you. Not only about our peerless stable of titles but about anything and everything. And if you are coming in costume then we really would like to see you so we can post your photo on this very website next week.

So don’t be as green as a treen, come and see us this weekend in Bristol.

VICTORIANA APPROACHES!

We are launching the preview of our new steampunk series in ten days time! Yes, the Bristol Comic Expo (http://www.bristolexpo.co.uk/) is nearly upon us! I must stop writing with exclamation marks!

Victoriana is special in a number of ways, firstly because it is a unique vision of an alternate world, a world that is both familiar and very different. Secondly it is the first Corvus launch that is tied in with not one, but two short film premieres (I want to use exclamation marks here but I’ve used the week’s supply already). Thirdly it is the first work of Tim Hart, our young steampunk wunderkind, to be unveiled-but not the last.   

This story has legs, so many legs it could win a marathon. Tim has taken the conventions of steampunk, invented a memorable world that is peopled with believable characters involved in cliffhanging adventures and woven this into the jewel that is Victoriana. Miss the launch at your peril.

MEMORIES OF THE FUTURE

I am taking a week off interviewing the good people at Corvus and I want to look at the future of publishing, and like the three witches in Macbeth I’m going to make a prediction. OK, I’m not Nostradamus, and Al Stewart will not be writing a ten minute epic ballad about me, but then the music industry isn’t what it was when Al released Past, Present and Future back in 1974.

In terms of the new technologies, there is a slight Dejavu it feels like we have all been here before, in the late 1990’s when people began to share music files. There are many parallels between publishing and the music industry and many lessons that publishing in general could learn from the failure of the music industry to come to terms with the possibilities of new technology. Now that one in four adults in the UK has a Kindle or other electronic reading device the world of downloading has arrived big time.

People of a certain age and an obsession with music, will remember with fondness the days of the local record shop, sadly those days are gone. The demise of all those local, independent and chain record shops is down to the change in the manner we access music. No longer is it difficult to find obscure bands or rare tracks,plus it is cheaper to buy online, and if like me, you use a storage device such as an i-pod, then you can bi-pass compact discs altogether. The next casualty of the technology will be the local book shop.

It is to misquote Van Dyke Parks it is The Clang of The Digital Reaper, (I think I am in a mid-1970’s mindset today). It takes no great insight to make the claim that the bookshop is going to be as rare a sighting as a record shop in five years time. As tragic as this is the interesting thing is what will happen to the big publishing houses? Are they ready for the Hard Rain of digital downloading? I don’t know, I suspect the larger the company the longer it takes to respond to any change. The big winner of course will be Amazon, by creating the Kindle you could say Amazon had won before we knew there was even a competition.

I think the opportunities are there for the small press publishers, and the independent authors out there. Look at Timothy Mo and how he has circumvented the traditional publishing methods, he is an example to us all. We at Corvus are in the process of setting up a digital download page, where you can load our stories direct onto your reading device, or at least you will be able to order on line.

I think I am still coming to terms with the projected loss of book shops. Here in Taunton, our one independent bookshop, Brendon Books (http://brendonbooksonline.tbpcontrol.co.uk/tbp.direct/customeraccesscontrol/home.aspx?d=brendonbooksonline&s=C&r=10000088&ui=0&bc=0) has been selling a mixture of new and second hand books for some time. I find myself spending longer browsing these days as there are always unexpected titles, so the picture is not all bad news. What do you think? Why not let me know your thoughts on the digital revolution. Anybody know which band sang the song I used for the title? If you do then you are an anorak!

SIX QUESTIONS: TIM HART

Tim is the newest edition to the ranks of Corvus and I caught up with him earlier this week to ask him the six questions I’m asking everybody around here. Tim is the author of an exciting new steam punk series Victoriana, which caused quite a stir at Cardiff in February when the rough sketches were shown the enthusiastic steam punk aficionados of Wales. Tim has a unique vision as you will discover.

How did you get started in this business?

Victoriana started as a combination of things that I like: cat girls and steam punk. It arose out of my years of reading Manga and a Goggle obsession I fully expect Matt Smith to be praising on Dr Who in the near future! The thing that kick started Victoriana was the music of Abney Park (http://www.abneypark.com/). My friend Robin introduced me to the music and he is immortalised within the pages of Victoriana as an Agency member. Steam punk is a genre that is still new to the majority of the world and I wanted to create something that was unique. The early issues of Victoriana will be more Victorian than steam punk but the steam punk style and influence will increase throughout the series, especially in the Alice centred plots. I was conscious that I could not throw my readers into the deep end too early, so to speak, I was worried that they would be confused or overloaded with information. I was always the geeky guy at school and proud of it, I have always wanted to write a comic (as have the majority of readers I suspect).

Who are your influences?

That’s a good question, having been raised from an early age with Silver and Bronze Age comics around me, I tend to have a four colour mentally when it comes to deciding what is good and what is bad. As I got older I moved into British stuff like Judge Dredd, and anything published by 2000AD as a graphic novel. In the past decade I’ve read a lot more indie comics, there are many worlds out there to explore. Gilbert Sheldon’s Freak Brothers opened a darker world of underground comics, I have a strange relationship with them.

Masamune Shirow (Dominion Tank Police) and Phil Foglio (Girl Genius and thousands of Magic the Gathering cards) influenced the creation of the Bast sisters (they are the central characters of Victoriana). I have a slight thing for cat girls you see...I wanted almost Moreauian (that’s H.G. Wells’ The Island of Dr Moreau) creatures with a severe level of humanity but a distinctly alien look. The kind of faces that if you saw them on the street, would cause you to do a double take. Saskia (the first artist) nailed them spot on.

What are you working on at the moment?

 Well, finding the right artist has not been an easy task. Thankfully God (never doubt the Almighty) was smiling on me and He sent me George (the series artist) via a friend of mine Em, who was herself looking for an artist for her comic-thanks Em. George has that serious style with a slight cartoony element that I was looking for. Also she took the original artwork and ran with it making it her own. So miracles are possible, but like a Noir detective it is all about being in the right place at the right time and that takes a lot of footwork.

What’s coming up?

I have a new idea in the pipeline, but I need to get that written down. I’m helping my typographer with her comic as well at the moment, and of course there is Arc 2 of Victoriana, I’m writing that at the moment. Everyone loves vampires, don’t they-save for the sparkly ones of course...

Character or plot, which comes first?

With Victoriana it was the characters that came first, I spent a lot of time fleshing them out in my head before I put pen to paper. That’s how I tend to work, leave the ideas to percolate in the back of the brain while the frontal lobes get on with the task in hand. I wasn’t until I started writing the origins of the Bast Sisters that I realised how complex the story had become, that’s why I need six issues to tell it in. George asked me why the sisters have different coloured hair, the answer was simple, so people could tell them apart! I tend to have ideas like this slide in when I start to write. I had to do some research on Ninja Clans as they appear later in the story. There was a point when Mags Bast only spoke in Biblical quotations-now that would have been fun!

In the film of your life who would play you?

Is Ross Kemp available! (Laughter)

As you can see Tim is fizzing with ideas and Victoriana is becoming more baroque with each day. At the Bristol Comic Expo (12/13 May) Tim will be previewing two short films that relate to Victoriana. I for one am looking forward to that!