Happy Christmas

Happy Christmas everyone! Have a good one.

The Hardy Tree

This year after a long break I started making music again - though I'm not a musician by any stretch of the imagination. Sounds are gathered from various places, chopped up looped and rearranged on my computer, tunes picked out with one figure on a tiny keyboard.

I've started a little CD label called Clay Pipe Music, firstly to put out my CD and next year to put out music by other people. I see it being somewhere between a record label and an artist book publisher - everything hand made/printed and designed by me as best I can.

The CD is called The Fields Lie Sleeping Underneath by The Hardy Tree.

You can buy it here: www.claypipemusic.co.uk

Pop Ups

Just recently published by Walker in the UK, and Candlewick in the USA is 'Pop-Up -Everything you Need to Create Your Own Pop-Up Book', that I illustrated. It basically gives you all you need to make four pop-ups and learn the art of paper engineering as you do it. The book is large with lots of fold outs, so it was difficult to photograph. You can buy both the US and UK versions on Amazon

The Association of Illustrators awards 2010

Picking up my bronze award in the New Media catagory for the work I did on the BBC Primary History wesbite.

With Steve May another Arena artist who won the Gold.

My page in the Images 34 book.
Many thanks to Caroline at Arena for taking these pictures!

HMS Belfast

A poster I recently completed for HMS Belfast, have a look at Arena's Blog for a break down on the commissioning process including sketches and examples of work in progress. If anyone spots this on The Tube over the summer can you let me know!

Cycling in London Competition

This was my entry into 'The Cycling in London Competition' run by Transport for London and The Association of Illustrations, mine was one of the 50 chosen from over 1000 entries to be displayed at the London Transport Museum, pictures from the opening night are over at my agents Arenas blog.

More Monotone

Below are some more experiments with limited colour ways and type.

Finley

Images from an idea for a children's picture book that I will probably take in a different direction now, but I thought it would be worth posting them here.

Gobal Contexts

Sorry about the poor scans, my work has recently been featured in book called 'Global Contexts' by Mark Wigan, I've been following Marks work since the 80s when I remember his paintings on the walls of Kensington Market, and the Scala Cinema, so I was really happy to have my work in this book along with some other really great illustrators. It is published by AVA and should be in book shops now.

Happy Christmas! This is my Gocco hand printed Christmas card.

Observer Graphic Short Story Prize 2009

My entry to the Observer/Cape Graphic Short Story Prize 2009.

Barnsdale Gardens Children's Poster

This is a kids poster I illustrated earlier in the summer for Barnsdale Gardens.

BBC Primary History Website.

Last year I helped in the redesigned of the BBC Primary History website, yesterday after a long wait the website went live. Above are just a few of my illustrations that are used on the site.

You can see the website here: www.bbc.co.uk/schools/primaryhistory

Also if you look at the time line here you can see my illustrations in beautiful 3d effect, programed by Wolf at Luecker Interactive.

Blue Hare

Another experiment with a more limited pallet, this time yellow and blue. The green is where the two colours overlap. I think is some ways for this to really work the image needs to be simpler, perhaps this is what I will try next.

one colour experiment

This is an experiment in a restricted colour pallet, and Victorian typography. I've been looking at a lot of old music sheet covers on line and this was inspired by them. I'm hoping to find the time to do a few more pieces in a similar vein.

Health Service Journal

Recent editorial job for Health Service Journal.

Brand New Website Site

I've redesigned my portfollio website at www.smallmoonvalley.com I've added new work, and a nice new title page. Hopefully everything should display at a larger size now, as I think the images on the older site were a little small.

Ship In A Box

This was an idea I'd had for a while, I just needed an excuse to do it. (My mothers birthday present). I'd like to go on and make some more now, the most difficult part was cutting out the shapes which are printouts, glued on to mounting board, and then mat varnished. The mounting board is incredibly difficult to cut round even with a very sharp scalpel blade. I'm thinking I could use some sort of foam based product, that would be easier under the knife. Any suggestions greatly received.
The image was inspired by the folk song The Greenland Whale Fishery.

This is a self initiated piece, you probably need to click on it to view it larger as it doesn't really work too well scaled down.

Mackworth

Another snippet from my on going comic project, I was lucky enough to have some time before Christmas to work on it. This section is about my ancestors who lived in Mackworth a small village just outside Derby.