Dave Taylor - Dave Chaos!



Bloody hell, you'd think Dave Taylor would tidy up a bit wouldn't you? This cover is going on the galaxy's greatest comic for crying out loud, you'd think he'd at least run the hoover around a bit and pick up some of those skulls. Messy git!

Tharg's most insanely intricate artdroid is back in Prog 1948 in the circuit frazzling story "Ghost Town." Fans of the artist will be thrilled, and not completely surprised, to learn that this excellent tale features some of his trademark cityscapes and his amazing robots - I'm in heaven!

Over to the man... I mean droid himself, to tell us more...

"Half way through drawing the strip I realised there was a damn good cover waiting to be done for this. "Hmm" I mused, "I'll get a 2000AD cover out of this, which is always a thrill, I'll get paid for doing it, which is always a thrill AND Pete Wells will feature it on his very excellent blog, which is always a thrill, I guess."

Yes, yes it is. You see gentle reader, every artist who's work appears on this blog gets a signed, tastefully nude picture of myself recreating their cover. That's why Dave went for the full frontal shot, the cheeky minx.

He continues "So I quickly doodled this sketch and sent it off. Tharg, in his majesty, said something like "Oh, OK." at which point I sprang into action!"

A really special(s) cover



"I spent about three hours roughing this out, channeling everything I love about science fiction from my memory banks. I wanted to make this as classic feeling as I could. I use a Faber-Castell Phthaloblau, Phthalo Blue 9201-110*** pencil, if you must know."

"But he looks so thin" I hear the cry from the balcony. "Yes" I shout back, "He's meant to. This is Dredd at his lowest, drained, used, had a f^*>ing nuf!"



"I'm going... home!"

"The inking probably took me the most amount of time on this one. It's the stage I thought was ether make or break."

Megashithole-One!

 

"My long study and admiration of the work of Jean Giraud (Moebius) is always considered at times like this."

I spy, with my little eye, something beginning with 'B'



"Now it's time for the "colouring in" bit (on computer). After the image is scanned in and cleaned up a little, I started throwing colour at it, just putting down vague "flat" tones. I have an idea to make it as gritty as I can, as dark and moody, but with no clear colour pallet in mind."

Some expert colouring in-ness by one of the industry's top colourer innerers



Dave continues "I start adding texture, for to make it more "texture."

To make it more "texture," Dave blindfolds himself and eats a blueberry muffin over the artwork whilst doing star jumps. Always the traditionalist.



"Now I'm thinking "lighting". When I was ill for a few years I used the time away from my desk as wisely as I could, studying the work of that old art guy Mr Leonardo da Vinci. He taught me that lighting should be considered before colouring. It's all about the lighting. What are the light sources? How strong are they? And who's shining that torch at this hour?"

Dredd feeling a bit light headed...

"Once I'm happy with the lighting I begin to tighten the image up with background detail, throwing the background as far back as it'll take, making an attempt at creating depth."

Is... is that a giant nob end in the sky?



"Here's where the magic really happens...a simple colour layer over everything, finding the overall colour mood of the image."

According to the Daily Mail, this is what the UK will look like 100 days after the election of Jeremy Corbyn.

 

"Finally a little bit of polishing... and we're done." DAVE! This is a family blog! Ooooh, you mean of the picture? Carry on sir... "Time for a glass of fine red wine and to sit back and think "Hmmm, it's OK. If I had more time and didn't have mouths to feed I'd probably start again, taking weeks to perfect the image in an attempt to get my work seen in fine art galleries around the world. But it'll do. I'm a little bit drunk now. This wine is very tasty."

More polish than Mr Sheen!



Dave continues "Here's where you drop in the published image and make rude yet amusing comments..." Oh! Right... erm... here is the published version featuring Dredd's glistening purple helmet. Ayethenkou!

The final resting place of U2's guitarist...



Huuuuuuge thanks to the lovely Dave for sending the images and brilliant commentary, an absolutely outstanding artist and a real 2000AD treasure!