Posts Tagged Andrew Wildman

Bristol Comic Expo 2009… the one without a job

This weekend was another Bristol Comic Expo – my fourth, not my fifth, as I got confused about before.

I’ve gone every year since 2005, except 2006 (when it clashed with a trip to LA for E3), but every year I attended to officially represent NCsoft. What started in 2005 as a couple of us stuck in a corner trying to flog City of Heroes (without actually selling it) culminated last year in a big ol’ stand with practically an artistic production-line to handle the pencilling, inking, scanning, colouring and printing of player sketches. Without a doubt, in terms of our professional ambitions, Bristol 2008 was our high point. As a fun weekend away for me personally though, this year is the hands-down winner.

Despite that, we definitely fulfilled our primary purpose: to help out Andrew Wildman once more with Draw the World Together. Mat and I couldn’t be happier to help, but as always, there were a lot of people who made things happen.

First and foremost was Mike Allwood, Expo organiser, who gave us the space and time we needed to sketch in. It was no easy feat, as with this year’s Expo being squeezed into the Ramada Hotel (with overspill at the nearby Mercure) it was hard to swing a cat, let alone get half-a-dozen artists to sketch in one room. Mike also ensured that our most generous supporters could get into the Expo, even after tickets were officially sold out. As always whenever I saw Mike over the weekend he was a picture of relaxed calm amongst the chaos, and went above and beyond to help things run smoothly.

DTWT doesn’t really work without Andrew Wildman at the centre of things though – even though he’d say he’s not the most important part! As always Andrew pulled strings, stroked egos and generally hustled to get a great group of artists to sit and sketch. He’s a diamond geezer, as anyone will attest to, and of course he sketched more than a few things on the day too.

Mat and I? We just turned up, really. So let’s kick back with the traditional, chronological, rambling retelling….
Read the rest of this entry »

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UK Games Expo 2008… in one post

Yes, so this is three months late. It’s been written in fits and starts. When (if) you get to the end, you might understand a little about the delay. Enjoy.

Let’s start with a quick recap of…

Friday 30th May

Just two weeks after our last VanQuest we were off again, feeling a distinct sense of déja vu as we assembled at the car hire place, packed the van and ended up at Oxford Services for lunch. I find it slightly worrying that I’ve considered – twice – getting a ‘Frequent Customer’ card at the coffee place there.

A series of unexplained slowdowns on the M25 delayed us a bit, but apart from that we made good time, pulling into the Clarendon Suites’ car park before 5pm. Then it was a quick and easy unload, followed by a stress-free setup, the only slight kink being that we had to ‘haXX0r’ the wifi password for the venue.

The fact that we could hack it sort of speaks volumes… Read the rest of this entry »

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Win an Andrew Wildman PC!

Well, sort of.

In yesterday’s Daily Mirror – which as I understand is a ‘national newspaper’ here in the UK, with a ‘very high’ circulation – there was a competition to be found on page two, wherein readers could win a ‘one of a kind’ PC with a lovely drawing by Andrew Wildman on the side of none other than Back Alley Brawler. Which looks like this:

Daily Mirror PC competition pic

Yes, it’s an NCsoft-City of Heroes-Draw the World Together competition in a national paper. How’d you like them apples.

(Interesting timing, too, no? With a certain big-name, big-muscled superhero film releasing this weekend? Choice of Paragon City’s resident big-muscled brawler wasn’t a coincidence either.)

But how can you win this PC I hear you ask? Go foraging in bins for yesterday’s copy of the paper? Invent a time machine and go back a day just to buy the issue, and while you’re there, bet on whatever match happened last night in Euro 2008? You could do those things.

Or alternatively, you could just click here.

As well as winning a unique piece of Wildman art, you’ll also bag a new PC, crafted by our very own PC-crafting bods, who reliably assure me it’ll run ‘anything you can throw at it’ including all of our games.

Competition closes at noon on June 25th, and you only have to answer one question to win. Good luck!

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Saturday evening with my feet up

Ye Gods, you have no idea how good it feels to be in a prone position with my feet up. Aaannd… relax.

Busy – and then quiet – first day at the show. As a result, looked like a blockbuster of a day first of all, then settled down so that it ended up in the ‘decent’ category. Still, if the same happens tomorrow I’ll be happy with the weekend as a whole.

Draw the World Together went really well it seemed; Karl Kopinski took to the process like a duck to water. Neil and Andrew both of course did great stuff too. Karl did a knockout sketch of Callista that I’ll share soon enough. Suffice to say it contains three figures… but simply looks amazing. We were all green with envy.

Right, now it’s time to get off to the curry house with artists and a few players in tow. (I can tell all the ‘regulars’ are here because my hits today are so low!!) I’ll leave you with me and a box of money.

DTWT cash

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Wildman + Cardy = Optimus Prime

We kept this hidden off the Flickr feed as it was a birthday present for Mat’s friend. I am informed he was ‘speechless’ when he got it, and hey – what self-respecting Transformers fan wouldn’t be:

Optimus Prime - pencils Andrew Wildman, colours Jason Cardy

£30 well-donated, I’d say.

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