Hello dear reader!
I’m a self-taught Illustrator and Comic Book Creator based in Leeds, West Yorkshire. I was born in Darlington, raised in Middlesbrough, and in 2013, wandered about an hour or so south to Leeds, where I’ve lived ever since.
Creative Background
I create manga-inspired comics, and digital and traditional illustrations, primarily using ink and watercolour (and programs replicating these mediums). How screentone gets used in manga and manhwa has inspired some of my collage-inspired pieces with clothing patterns. I like to utilise the speckled effects of certain screentone to bring unusual texture to my digital work.
My influences over the years have included creators such as Terry Pratchett, Neil Gaiman, CLAMP, Jean Haines, David Mack, Bryan Lee O’Malley, Noizo Ito, Akira Toriyama, Naoko Tamaguchi, Arina Tanemura, Hazel Soan, Serena Valentino, Takao Aoki, and Mika Pikaso. I’m almost certain I am missing many more.
Graphic arts have always been a part of my life. I’ve made marks on nearly any surface I could find (including phone books and windowsills – sorry Mam!) since I could pick up a pen. I started making one-page comics after being introduced to video games and Sonic the Comic. I always carried notebooks and pencils in my school blazer pockets to doodle on during classes (well, most of them).
Even while studying Physics at university, I always kept a sketchbook in my bag. The doodles and sketching kept me going during difficult lectures. I drew course-related things like Schroedinger cats and Einstein to identify communal milk bottles while living in dormitories and houseshares.
Since then, I’ve spent most of the last decade working full-time as a Data Analyst (I now work part-time). Despite this, the need to create artwork has remained a constant in my life. I’ve devoted thousands of spare hours to making comics, digital art, and watercolour paintings. I may have also stolen a few hundred working hours doodling on work notes in meetings or when trying to solve an especially tricky problem.
Despite suffering from chronic mental illness (which turned out to be undiagnosed ADHD), I believe life is beautiful, even in chaos. I strive to include this in my creations, which range from tidy but quirky emotes to drippy atmospheric watercolours that reflect how I feel about my changing moods and states. I find it challenging to stick with one particular rendering ‘style’, but I enjoy the variety of what I experiment with and create.
Since 2017, I’ve been exhibiting at comic conventions and festivals and occasionally run comic workshops around Yorkshire.
I founded the Association of Comic Creators in July 2020 alongside Jennie Gyllblad and Sarah Millman. The AoCC is a global Discord community for mainstream and independent comic creators. It allows them a space to support each other and share knowledge to prevent exploitation within the industry, a direct response to the 2020 allegations of misconduct within the Western comics industry and the reveal that these were ‘open secrets’.
I’m currently the technical administrator of the Discord group. Still, I’m often posting about valuable tools and services for other self-employed creators to manage the business side of creating comics through automation or low-cost quality outsourcing.