Chrome Roses

Survey coming this month!
5 months ago – Mon, Jul 01, 2024 at 04:32:52 AM

This post is for backers only. Please visit Kickstarter.com and log in to read.

Progress!
6 months ago – Fri, May 24, 2024 at 07:41:46 AM

Hope you’re doing well.

Just a quick update on progress. This month I’ve been airbrushing new pages, I’ve also lettered ten more pages, and I’ve written another little story that ties in with the main story.

I’ve also just sent the artbook reward to the printer, after adding a commentary to it and including all the work leading up to Chrome Roses and some initial designs. It’s turned out to be an amusing read. It’s called Little Deaths 2 and you’ll find it in the survey next month if you haven’t ordered it already.

So things are motoring along nicely.

More soon, as things happen. 

All the best

Monty 
 

Production rolls on
7 months ago – Tue, Apr 30, 2024 at 05:45:46 AM

Hey there

Just checking in with a monthly update on production, which is going well.

It’s the best part of the process, simply making the comics. 

The great thing about cyberpunk is you can invent everything from your imagination, you’re not limited by reality. I absolutely love drawing these pages, and as I get deeper into it I keep coming up with new ideas for characters, props and locations within the plot I’ve mapped out. 

Here’s some examples. In my script this all happened in a corridor. Well, the corridor got upgraded 😂

The paint was still wet when I took these. Hand drawing it is a lot more fun than using the computer.

I still letter on a computer (though a lot of the sound effects are hand drawn) and I’ve been cracking on with that too after scanning the art in.

I’ve also been putting together the final pages for the art book which will be the first thing to be printed next month. 

At the moment I’m a couple of weeks behind schedule, largely through putting extra detail into the art. 

I’ll update again at the end of next month, with news on the survey. 

Hope you’re all doing well too.

Oh, I’m guesting at The Lakes, and Thought Bubble this year too, if anyone wants to come there’s some great guests and events this year. 

All the best 

Monty 

Funds have arrived - let's crack on!
8 months ago – Thu, Mar 21, 2024 at 01:40:05 PM

Hey there 

Hope you're well.

The funds are in, and even though that happens like clockwork 19/20 days after closing (in the UK at least) it's still a very exciting day.

I'm always happy to take an order from a dropped pledge (anyone's card can get refused for all kinds of crazy reasons) so just message me here if that's happened to you. Though this time around there were very few dropped pledges which keeps things nice and simple.

I'm still thrilled by how popular Chrome Roses proved to be, partly because I spent so long dreaming it up, then writing the script, and then making all the art - but also because of all the cool things I can now add.  I'm figuring out all the details with my excellent printer, Stuart Gould, and both of our new stretch goal artists. It's very satisfying to have raised enough to do the book exactly as I'd hoped all those years ago. Thank you so much for making the Chrome Roses dream a reality. 

I'll keep you posted as things happen, and please feel free to message me here whenever you want. I will reply but I've switched back to 'creative production' mode now so it won't be as quick as during the campaign. There's lots of art and lettering still to do and I've been rattling through the remaining pages, very inspired. It's all on target for later this summer, and I'm enjoying the hell out of ticking it all off on my schedule.

The key to great comics is conjuring an imagined world, and the lives of fictional characters, with vivid intensity. I can't make special stuff with my head online. I have to be fully focused on the page of art and the script before me. I even tell my family to leave me alone, because I'm lost in the world of Chrome Roses and the unique atmosphere I'm creating. If my mind's not stuck in that fictional reality I can't transmit magical stuff from my brain onto the page for you all to enjoy. 

Of course, I still answer emails, check KS, take Wee Nero to football training, make dinner and so on. I'm no hermit, but I've learnt over the years I get better results from a laser-like focus. When I'm campaigning I'm campaigning, when I'm shipping I'm shipping, and when I'm writing and drawing that's the best bit. Everything else rests on my creativity, and I wouldn't have it any other way.

I'll reply to KS messages, of course, but don't think anything's amiss if I'm a bit slower or quieter over the next few months. I'm simply delivering what you backed, and figuring out cool ways to make your books even better.

Talking of cool imagined worlds I'm super excited for Fully Loaded  over on Zoop. Jimmy Broxton has drawn some awesome stuff for this story, and I can't wait to read it myself. If you're a cyberpunk fan like me you won't want to miss what he's devised - all published with the expertise of Shane at Scratch Comics  - with just 37 hours left to go!! Go get it here!

Also, I did a talk for Will Eisner week recently and met a cool new creator making his first book. He seemed a good guy, with his head screwed on right, and I liked the concept and the art too. It's called Oreium Saga, about a precious rare metal found in someone's blood, and you can check out all the excitement that rises from that predicament right here

Finally, I wanted to thank Jellop for their help promoting Death Sentence cyberpunk - not least via their First Backer newsletter. 

Death Sentence Cyberpunk was featured heavily on the First Backer Newsletter, so I'd like to invite you to join its growing community of Kickstarter backers. You'll receive news on the freshest Kickstarter projects, amazing early bird offers, and awesome freebies right in your inbox. Click right here to subscribe. 

More from me soon

All the best

Monty

Wow! A staggering total!
9 months ago – Fri, Mar 01, 2024 at 04:39:30 PM

What an ending! Huge thanks to you all for backing Chrome Roses. AmazingI!

When a comic creator commits to something like this it's a hell of risk. I turned down work-for-hire all last year and spent my life savings writing and drawing Chrome Roses, because I wanted to make something truly special. So, for you to believe in it, and back it with your own hard-earned cash, really means a hell of a lot to me. 

I've been working on more pages as the campaign's progressed, and I'll be working faster and harder on these books right up to the delivery date this summer. We hit a higher total than I was anticipating, so I can add a couple more cool things to the Chrome Roses universe. I'm also talking to some world-famous comic artists about getting an extra story added to Book 2. It's very exciting.

Thanks to you, we can make this series just as I dreamed all those years ago when I wrote down the very first synopsis. What an absolute honour.

Now, for the last two weeks I've found the comic community a very supportive place. So, I'll hope you'll join me in supporting all the other brilliant creators who are realising their dream projects via KS.

ENHANCED

Enhanced is a groundbreaking cyberpunk sci-fi graphic novel from Europe based on a role-playing game campaign. It set the bar high by raising nearly 55K in its first day of launch (and now is close to 85K in the late-pledge store). If you're a fan of Edgerunners and Ghost in the Shell, this 90+ page treasure trove of thrilling action scenes, epic narratives, and breathtaking artwork is tailor-made for you! Holographic Cards, Mirka Andolfo’s Variant Cover, Enamel Pins and many more cool add-ons available! Join 1400+ Backers HERE 

Don’t miss your chance, the pre-order ends soon!

THE FEW AND CURSED: Hidden Away

This is a wildly successful series from Brazil by Felipe Cagno!

Imagine a supernatural post-apocalyptic Western if the apocalypse had happened back in 1840 and opened up the doors to all sorts of monsters, curses and demons. One day the world just dried up and whatever little water that was left, being now the most precious resource on the planet, started to be used as currency. 

The Few and Cursed is a fast-developing comic book universe that started almost ten years ago with a Curse Chaser known only as the Redhead and then went on to publish over a dozen books so far. 

This Kickstarter campaign aims to raise funds to produce, print and distribute the latest title of the franchise: Hidden Away - a one-shot standalone graphic novel set in the same universe without any need to read anything prior. For new readers unfamiliar with anything from the TFAC universe this is the perfect entry point :D

Think Goonies meets the Old West with a touch of supernatural - check out the incredible world Felipe has created here!

RONIN OF OKANE volume 1-3: Cyberpunk X Japanese Folklore

RONIN OF OKANE is an explicit Graphic Novel for fans of Cyberpunk and Japanese Folklore.

This book was born from a love of the neon-soaked cyberpunk aesthetic and the beauty of Japanese folklore.

Follow Noguchi and Nyx as they explore the underbelly of a bad city gone worse. Nyx, the cyberpunk girl with a thousand pasts, sets out on a dangerous journey through the Hidoi desert, chased by bounty hunters. Seeking an undefeated warrior who lives in a desert temple.

Noguchi Michio. Ronin turned bounty hunter, searching for “The Futsunomiyama”. The kantana that glides through metal, when held by the right master.

In a city where everyone has a secret, Noguchi can trust no one. Yet someone knows who he truly is…

Get Ronin of OKane HERE

LONG DARK WINTER

LONG DARK WINTER 1 is a properly violent horror story, with some truly atmospheric storytelling from the script/art team of Matt Ringel and Henry Ponciano.

’On the first day of the winter solstice, a small town in Vermont is blanketed in perpetual darkness. Sheriff Ted Fallon is faced with a spike in criminal activity that is getting progressively more gruesome but the truth behind the crimes is more horrific than he could ever imagine.’

The creative team that brought you the FALLEN series (Red 5 Comics) is back again and this time turning up the terror! Get it HERE

CLOCKWORK WEREWOLVES #1

Who doesn't love steampunk werewolves?! Exactly!! So check out Clockwork Werewolves #1 NOW!

A seemingly ordinary field trip to the town of Direholm,  known for some of the oldest recorded werewolf legends in Europe, becomes a race to survive as occult expert Gabriel Cushing realises local myths owe more to fact than fiction. Direholm's Observatory is the home to Werewolves... and not just any lycans, but cyborg beasts from the Victorian Age! Soon Gabriel, his apprentice Melanie Lancley, and a group of terrified students, find themselves trapped on a school coach, under siege, surrounded by evil, and low on gas!

"Curse of the Clockwork Werewolves" is a bloody, gothic horror, inspired by classic British Hammer Horror films, and given a brass-edged steampunk-twist!  Get it here.

Phew. It's getting late. More news on Chrome Roses soon.

Thanks again

Monty