I am really not sure discussion forums are a good thing for me to be involved in. I haven't really frequented many over the years, and of those I have stuck with only the Doctor Who forum formerly known as Outpost Gallifrey has been outside the world of comics.

However, I've decided to knock that on the head following a rather irritating exchange regarding Rob Shearman. Now he's a writer I quite like, but it's manifestly obvious that he hasn't been asked back to Doctor Who since his season one episode, Dalek. Sadly, Mr Shearman in common with several people involved with the new run of the show frequents this forum and my comment it seems is something of a painful home truth for him. Hence he posted a response which, whilst not contradicting the assertion, clearly showed he was rather irritated by it. Probably justifiably.

Still, much as I hate the idea of annoying people I respect and who's work I admire, I think there's absolutely no point in discussion forums that aren't allowed to discuss anything that might annoy the subject of the discussion. I've seen this in the comics world too, at places like 2000AD Review although in fairness there's a lot less toadying from other posters to "the talent" there.

Now my problem is that in my capacity as a fan I can be quite critical of even my absolute heroes. Indeed, I am more likely to be, as it's their work that interests me the most and I have nothing really to say about people who's creative output I can't stick. But I have no particular wish to share these feelings with the people concerned. I don't really think Alan Moore needs to know my views on his dealings with Hollywood and similarly I didn't really want to tell Rob Shearman I suspect he was ditched because Dalek was rubbish (even if that probably wasn't even his fault).

Furthermore as someone that could conceivably end up on the other side of the fence if my comic writing ever becomes the subject of an Internet discussion I need to seriously consider how I would feel if I were in Shearman's place and some other "fan" in mine. Probably a tad annoyed.

So I am going to back away from these forums for a bit. I just don't have it in me to be a sycophantic twat, and I also really don't want to annoy people who basically I think are great.

The best thing about the small press is the lack of any intense deadline. It’s partly a product of no one really having enough free time to complete a comic on a short deadline and partly from every one giving there time for free. That’s the practical side, the fun side is the chance to really go crazy and experiment with impractical techniques that you could never get away with commercially. That’s the set up, that’s the kind of opportunity that it would be rude to refuse.

For about the last 10 years I have been mucking about with 3D software, using it mostly for layouts and background perspective. Integrating 3D into a comic page is a bit like using a photograph for a background, it rarely works. I think the Glimmer rats By Mark Harrison is the closest any artist has ever got to getting away with it and he spent years on Durham Red with varying degrees of success. Kevin walker gave 3D what could be considered A brave but massively flawed Stab on his Demonifuge strip, so you can understand why I have been hesitant to try my hand at something that even good artist at the height of there powers have largely failed.

Up until now my largest single project in 3D has been an animation I did at university that had limited construction but lots of animation. This Project for Future Quake is the most complicated modelling task I have ever set myself. I’m going to keep the Blog up to date on my progress so I’m not going to say too much about the Strip now because it would leave me with nothing to write next time, but it’s a story set in space and the section I’m building is a giant automated factory. The big difference this time is that I’m not just blocking in objects for perspective, something to draw over, not for an animation or a computer game or an architectural Pr-visualisation, I’m trying to build a model for publishing, for a comic.

For practicality I’m trying to keep it reasonably low resolution, it’s going to be in black and white so I’m not really worrying to much about texturing except to add detail and I’m not trying to smooth out all the hard edges. It will be interesting to see from hear on in how much of a success or mess I make of what has to be the worst way to approach a comic strip.

Alas, I can only report failure in our brave bid to take an Eagle:

The voter's favourite black and white comicbook - British was How to Date a Girl in 10 Days, a very different kettle of fish to our own modest effort.

I was convinced that Eleventh Hour would take the trophy, as it was the only professionally published comic in contention and I wanted Futurequake to do it because those guys are great and so is FQ. Still, I am delighted that a work like "How To..." can get recognized by what are effectively the BAFTAs of comicdom, my heartiest congratulations to Mr Spleen for his victory.

The ceremony itself was really good fun. I enjoyed the meal immensely and we were sat with a some great people so the conversation flowed. A rather strange intro to the awards themselves from our host Frazer Ayres (so you're a Hindu? Good for you) soon led into the real meat of the event and although our name steadfastly refused to be called, it was rather exciting in any case when the moment came to see who had won our category.

Some random memories of the evening:

- Mike Conroy declaring that Tony Lee did not cheat. I had no idea what that was all about until I googled today and found this.
- Dave Gibbons winning Best Letterer. Eh, what?
- Cassandra Conroy's dress.
- Spectacular Spiderman winning Favourite colour comicbook - British. EH, WHAT?
- D'Israeli's acceptance speech.

All in all a cracking night.

Oh and even our hotel was excellent. £45 for a twin room, although £16.60 each way for the taxi into town...

Ah, it's that time again and next weekend Steve and I will be trekking over to Bristol Temple Mead for another of these Comic Expo thingies:

We'll be attending the Eagle Awards dinner, but we won't be exhibiting as the organisers don't actually explain how you go about doing that and I'll be damned if I could find out in time.

Maybe next year...