You start googling yourself and suddenly you find another newspaper photo you hadn't spotted. Here's me in the Weston Mercury back in June (which, if it appeared in the printed edition, went into the recycling before I'd even looked inside. You can lay the demise of local newspapers squarely at my door. Beside the recycling.)
CARTOONS came to life when a comic book artist paid a visit to a North Somerset school.
Youngsters at Locking Primary School saw their favourite superheroes and children’s characters recreated in front of their eyes. Beano
cartoonist Kev Sutherland visited the school in Meadow Drive as part of
literacy week, to show how pictures can illustrate a narrative. Kev has taught comic art master classes for more than a decade in schools, colleges and at festivals.
Kev F Sutherland, as well as writing and drawing Pansy Potter in The Beano, runs Comic Art Masterclasses in schools, libraries and art centres - email for details, and follow him on Facebook and Twitter. He's been writing and drawing comics for 25 years, he must know something.
A nice interview with Wales Online that I forgot I'd done, in advance of last month's classses in Porthcawl.
Comic capers as Beano illustrator brings summer masterclass to Wales
Kev F Sutherland will be teaching children the art of comic
illustration during two workshops in Porthcawl this month. Rhiann
Williams speaks to him
Kev F Sutherland who is holding comic art masterclasses at Grand Pavilion, Porthcawl
If you want some tips on drawing cartoon characters then who better
to learn from than a man who has illustrated classic kids comics like
Beano and Marvel.
Kev F Sutherland has spent his career drawing
iconic characters, including the Bash Street Kids, Dennis the Menace and
Doctor Who.
Now he will be passing on his tips during two
masterclasses aimed at children aged seven and above at the Grand
Pavilion in Porthcawl this month.
Kev has been an avid comic
reader since he was a child, and said that having grown up in a
generation that loved comics, it seemed natural to aspire to be a comic
artist.
“It was something many kids wanted to do,” he says. “I was lucky enough to turn my hobby into my job.”
He
has worked on a variety of projects during his career, including ‘Twas
the Night Before Christmas’ a full-length seasonal comic featuring
Dennis the Menace.
He believes that creating comics is something which any child with a pencil and some paper can achieve.
And as well as being fun he reveals its “a great educational tool” especially for those who struggle with reading.
And
he says that those who are disinterested in books, more often young
boys, can perfect their reading by picking up a comic instead.
“It’s
like telling a 10-year-old to stop watching television and just listen
to the radio; things are always more interesting and engaging when
there’s with pictures and words.”
He points out that comics filled with brightly coloured pictures
where most of the words are in speech bubbles from characters’ mouths
can make comics easier to follow than regular picture books.
“Pictures
with words makes it a lot easier to understand what’s going on, rather
than a wall of words on one side of the page and just one picture on the
other,” he says.
Kev also points out the fact that picture books
more often than not have to be read to children whereas it’s easier for
them to follow a story in a comic by themselves.
The artist has
drawn a variety of characters throughout his career and many of them
deliver their young readers an important message.
“Obviously some
of them just go off into the universe, fight some aliens and then come
home the hero, but some characters I like to make points with.”
Taking
much of his inspiration from the world, he says some of his storylines
and characters can be minor parodies of events and happenings in the
real world.
And in some instances, Kev’s work is also ‘pastiche’
whereby he takes situations or characters from older comic strips and
incorporates them into new ones. One of his best examples is Miracle
Banana who appears as part of a Bananaman script which Kev describes as
“lightly satirical”. Miracle Banana is a character based on Miracle Man,
formerly known as Marvel Man.
Kev started his masterclasses at
Bristol Comic Festival when he was asked to be part of an educational
outreach programme for seven to 12 year olds. They went so well that
people asked if he would do more and since then he has travelled around
schools, art centres and colleges sharing “the wonder of comics”.
Now
he is heading to Porthcawl for two classes which are designed so that
the children can make their own comic. To begin with, each child creates
their own comic character then Kev helps the children to put the
characters into a storyline.
Each child contributes a page to the
story, and by the end of the class, all of the pages are put together to
create a completely unique comic book.
And while the classes are typically aimed at children aged seven to 12 years, they are adult-friendly too...
Kev F Sutherland, as well as writing and drawing Pansy Potter in The Beano, runs Comic Art Masterclasses in schools, libraries and art centres - email for details, and follow him on Facebook and Twitter. He's been writing and drawing comics for 25 years, he must know something.
Last night's Doctor Who episode Listen was one of the best of recent years, and has been particularly well received by fans. Could this be because of all the previous stories it reminds them of? Here are some previous Doctor Who stories (and a sitcom) that moments in Listen may have brought to mind. (Obviously this is full of Spoilers for the episode Listen, and all the other stories mentioned).
ALIENS OF LONDON - The previous episode's "Next Week" trailer spoils a
significant bit of the story (in this case we knew the man in the
spacesuit was going to be Danny, or Dannyish). In AOL, the first two-parter of Christopher Eccleston's season, we leave the story of a cliffhanger wondering whether the Doctor will escape, only to show a second later that he obviously does.
ALL SEASON 1 - The Doctor wears a black sweater under his black coat, a la Eccleston
BLINK - Words appear written on the wall. Behind you.
SILENCE IN THE LIBRARY - Invisible things that are always there in the shadows everywhere
FAMILY OF BLOOD / ELEVENTH HOUR - Thing that's in the corner of your eye
CORNER OF THE EYE (story by Steven Moffat in the Dr Who 2007 Storybook)
COUPLING (sitcom by Steven Moffat) - Couple on a date, story is cut up and loops back on variations on how date could have gone
BOOM TOWN / ROSE - Out for a meal in Cardiff, it is interrupted
IMPOSSIBLE ASTRONAUT - Creeping round a childrens home at night
FEAR HER / LOVE & MONSTERS / NIGHT TERRORS - There is a grown man in a child's bedroom, and that's not strange.
GIRL IN THE FIREPLACE - Looking under child's bed
FATHER'S DAY - Rose meets her future boyfriend as a child, also sees herself
UTOPIA - The end of time
WATERS OF MARS - Future earth space traveller shown in headlines making well-reported journey
IMPOSSIBLE PLANET/WATERS OF MARS/HIDE - That orange space suit, which
every astronaut everywhere always wears. But only since 2006
BOOM TOWN - Tardis needs to recharge
WEDDING OF RIVER SONG - Reveal of who's actually in the spacesuit
HIDE - Astronaut turns out to be descendant of central couple
MIDNIGHT - Something invisible tries to get into spaceship in place where there's no life
THE BEAST BELOW - Doing a 'thing'
ROBOT - "Sontarans perverting the course of human history". Why the hell say that right now? *Self-referential cringe* (To be precise, Tom Baker's first line is "Typical Sontaran attitude… Stop, Linx… (mumble) course of human history…")
DAY OF THE DOCTOR - That barn. Yes we all recognised it. And, no, we
didn't need to learn that the Doctor's parents dress like Amish.
BIG BANG - Whispering to a sleeping child and hoping they'll remember this above everything else they'll ever hear.
I'm sure there were original things in the episode too.
The Scottish Falsetto Sock Puppet Theatre (who features as DVD easter egges in Doctor Who's The War Games, Horns Of Nimon and elsewhere) are on tour... NOW!
The first comics of the new school year by kids in my Comic Art Masterclasses, from Mendip Green in Worle to Phillipstown in Gwent to Sandy Lane in Bradford. Yes, this is the fruit of a fair bit of travelling, and what a delightful selection, wouldn't you say?
From the randomness of Clapapasp, a word which was the pure invention of its year 6 creator, to the accidental genius of Oluv in World War 2 - a mis-spelling of Olaf from Frozen, mixed up with the school's history project - these titles were chosen from 180 suggestions, all equally imaginative. Their choices for the celebrity who got to tread on a worm in my demonstration strip were slightly less varied: Simon Cowell (twice), Keith Lemon, Rihanna, Katy Perry and (suggested by a year 3 & 4 class) Mrs Brown the sweary-word drag act. Kids, eh?
An interesting range of class names this week too. In Mendip Green we have Class 14 and 15, both being the first ever year 4 classes in a school which is expanding upwards from being an Infant School, so next year those kids will become the school's first ever year 5s; in Phillipstown, in the valleys, we have Dosbarth Rira and Dosbarth Enfys, whose Welsh translation I'm sure you can work out so I won't insult your intelligence by explaining it here (I've forgotten. I've clearly forgotten.); and in Bradford we have classes named after famous local figures David Hockney and William Edward Forster (there was also a Titus Salt, a Richard Oastler and a JB Priestley, with the kids campaigning to have a class named after Zayn Malik out of One Direction)*.
*(I've just Googled famous people from Bradford and it must be the biggest wellspring of celebrity and influence of any town in the country! Check them out. What other town of a similar size could boast luminaries as varied as Mollie Sugden, Rodney Bewes, Harvey Smith, Dynamo, Harry Corbett, Tasmin Archer, Richard Whitelely, Mortimer Wheeler, Kimberley Walsh, Ricky Wilson, Tony Richardson, George Layton, Fred Hoyle, Gareth Gates, the author who wrote Lassie, a Doctor Who companion, dozens of famous cricketers & footballers, and heaps of inventors and industrialists. Well done Bradford.)
Kev F Sutherland, as well as writing and drawing Pansy Potter in The Beano, runs Comic Art Masterclasses in schools, libraries and art centres - email for details, and follow him on Facebook and Twitter. He's been writing and drawing comics for 25 years, he must know something.
There are two chances to vote for the Socks at the moment, one of which has given me the incentive to re-edit a classic video. Et voila the new version of Halloween, uploaded to Daily Motion* (above), as part of a competition to be part of the Montreux Comedy Festival (about which I know little at the moment, though I did see it on TV in Toulouse earlier this year, from which all I can tell you is that all the comedians were speaking French, so I'm not sure how high our chances are). This clip is also on Youtube. You will notice, if you've got an eye for these things, that it is edited together from two completely different shows. The soundtrack and close up angle comes from Edinburgh in 2010, while the wide shot come from The Rondo in Bath earlier this year. Seamless.
And here we have your opportunity to vote for the Socks' UKIP medley in the British Comedy Awards new comedy video section. We're a bit late to the contest, with literally hundreds of entrants ahead of us in the queue, so we won't get our hopes up. But next year, we'll try and get an entry of quality in early. Do vote, you know it can't hurt.
The Scottish Falsetto Sock Puppet Theatre are on tour... NOW!
At last the UKIP Medley / Farage Song (whose name we've never really settled on, obviously) is up on Youtube. Recorded live in Edinburgh, it was my favourite song of the show and the Socks hope you enjoy it.
There's also a studio version of it online, if you prefer:
Which means you can now get the feeling of a virtual version of being at the Socks new show, ...And So Am I, (part of it anyway) by watching it in these two or three minute chunks. Though frankly, you were much better off being there. Everything was in focus, for example.
