SICBA: Inspirations

Who would you say your inspirations were?

Gillian Hatcher

I've mainly been inspired by American alternative comics like Peter Bagge's Hate, Julie Doucet's Dirty Plotte and Mark Beyer's Amy and Jordan. All these creators bend and break the rules to make something that has a high visual impact. I've never been interested in becoming a highly skilled technical artist- I just look for ways to communicate my stories effectively.

Charles Schultz and Herge have also been huge influences since childhood.





David Lumsden
2000AD, Robo-hunter & Rogue Trooper were my favourites. My older sister would let me read her Tank Girl comics when we were growing up too.

But James O’Barr’s The Crow really stuck with me, it was so dark and grim. Watchmen had a huge influence on me too. I was a big fan of Crimson by Brian Augustyn, the artwork of Humberto Ramos, the Wolverine series, the list would be endless so I better just stop there.



Letty Wilson

There are so many. From a very young age I was really into zoological and botanical art. I still have books like Thorburn's Birds and Keble-Martin's Concise British Flora, which I return to when in doubt. I love the exactness and detail of this kind of art, and the way some artists lay it all out on a page to describe a lot more than just what this animal or plant looks like. 

As far as comics artists go, I fell in love with Kirby's bold, structural linework from the outset - I still have an old Eternals issue, I think it's older than I am, and the art is just so instantly recognisable, it's iconic.

Tove Jansson is another favourite - I love the Moomins both for their storytelling, and often quite dark humour, and the art itself which is beautiful. Also loads of webcomic artists, or at least artists who started out in webcomics, are huge influences because that was what I was reading when I was first getting in to comics - they were free, easily accessible, and there's some fantastic creators out there, like Noelle Stevenson, Kate Beaton, Evan Dahm and Jon Allison. 

More recently I've been really influenced by Dan McDaid and Jake Wyatt's inking. Good inking is a huge part of good drawing, at least for my style and I'm trying to look more consciously at it. Dan McDaid has this kind of scruffy, sketchy elegance that I love, while Wyatt is great at combining realism with stylisation to get a very crisp, solid, but still otherworldly effect.

John Grieve
I’m a huge fan of everything Bill Watterson has ever done. Terry Pratchett, Dr Seuss, Lewis Carrol (The Hunting of the Snark) and Tim Burton (The Melancholy Death of Oyster Boy) among many others

What are you reading right now?

David Lumsden

Right now I'm reading a mix of things: The Walking Dead is the one I have been following for a while now and I've just started Mark Millar's Chrononaughts. I liked 100 Bullets, Y the Last Man and Preacher and I read a local publication called Treehouse which is a collection of stories from different Scottish writers and artists that is really enjoyable.


John Grieve

I kind of dip in and out of reading graphic novels nowadays to be honest. For instance I only got round to reading Maus last year! 
That said, The Walking Dead is a pretty regular read for me.
There are no pictures, but I’m also reading Terry Pratchett’s A Slip of the Keyboard at the moment.

Letty Wilson

I just finished Return of the Living Deadpool by Cullen Bunn and Nick Virella. I love Deadpool and this is the best Deadpool story I've read in ages - particularly the ending, which seems finally to have a good take on a female Deadpool! 

Funniest thing I've read this year, excepting Sosmonaut the Cosmonaut, by Nathan Langridge with art by Isaac Hoar (though I should admit a little bias as Nathan's my flatmate and I helped letter it. Still, it's a great book about a cosmonaut trying to spread communism through space, mostly by beating up aliens). I'm also reading Help Us! Great Warrior by Madeline Flores, coloured gorgeously by Trillian Gunn. Tiny adorable demon-fighting heroes is exactly my kind of thing. 

Also Rumble, by John Arcudi, James Harren and Dave Stewart, which has fantastic art and is a lot of fun, plus more demons! I seem to be on a demon kick lately. Just finished its first arc, I can't wait to see more. 

I recently started reading Southern Cross , by Becky Cloonan, Andy Belanger and Lee Loughridge. I always love Becky Cloonan's work, and this is really cool, especially love the atmospheric art style and the cool in-world posters and ads at the end of every issue. 

I'm totally stealing that idea for the comic I'm currently working on. 

And for webcomics, Judecca by Jonathan Meecham and Noora Heikkilä is amazing - muted, atmospheric art and a really intriguing story. Also I've mentioned him before but Evan Dahm's work is criminally underrated and his current project, Vattu, has been going strong for ages and is spectacular, everyone should read it, particularly if you're interested in amazing world building and how to tell stories with very little actual script.



Gillian Hatcher
I recently finished Sugar Skull, the final installment in the latest graphic novel by Charles Burns. I don't really like straight horror, but I absolutely love the unsettling creepiness of his work.

I've spent the past few weeks putting together the eleventh issue of Team Girl Comic (TGC), so I've had the pleasure of reading everyone's stories and compiling them into an anthology. This issue is one of our best yet, and covers themes ranging from politics and gender to monster cafes and rock bands in outer space.