I'M IN LAAAHNDAAAAHN, YEW SLAAHG

Hey! Cheers for popping by and making last weekend at the Belfast Heroes & Legends show so pleasurable. (especially one tiny little Transformers knucklehead called Eoghan. That kid knows his stuff...) This weekend - 25th & 36th of February, I'm at the London Super Comic Convention, lurking by the IDW booth with Editor in Chief Chris Ryall. I'll be a-sketchin' and a-sellin' prints, and also shifting shome original artwork from sundry TF comics, so come and trade go-nowhere badinage and pithy small talk with me.

And check out the Raph I rustled up last weekend! Come and get one!

Heroes and Villians and Legends and Me

Well done all of you for buying that there More Than Meets The Eye#1. Apparently it was the best-selling shape-shifting robot-themed periodical on sale that week, so give yourselves a reacharound. #2 (Nick-free but Milne-stuffed) has slithered down the chute this week and keeps up the pace. I'm still drawing covers on the sod, so keep buying it for the sheer Roche-completism of it all.

NOW THEN.

I'm in Belfast this weekend at the W5 for the Heroes and Legends Convention. (http://www.heroesandlegendscon.com/) It's got proper guests like The Guy From Aliens and An Doctor Who, as well as blaggers like myself, Declan Shalvey and PJ Holden, all sketching and signing for your mirth and disinterest. And I'll be debuting THIS colour print at the show:


For sale to you, along with my older Wreckers prints, and a TF: Prime poster wot I made. Lines are by me, and colours are by my fourth favourite member of the soon-to-splode-up yer Transformers: Regeneration 1 team, John-Paul Bove. JPB has been picked to colour the Furman/Wildman/Baskervilleman continuation of the original TF series which hits this summer, so it's a genuine ear-nuzzler to have him colour up this little scene. Check out his blog at http://wordmongerer.blogspot.com/ which includes some RG1 tasters. He's a really perfect fit for the series as he was actually successfully tried for grave-robbing and attempted necromancy last year. Thanks John-Paul, you war-crime of a human.

So come say hi, pick up a print, and ask me what James Roberts REALLY did to that terrier. And if you can't make Belfast, I'm gonna be at the London Super Comic Con (http://www.londonsupercomicconvention.com) next weekend at the IDW booth. Same deal: come get a sketch or a print, and depending on which shipping list you believe, have me sign the Wreckers Hardcover.

Looking forward to fleshy contact with you. Come and get it.

MEET AND NO VEG

Look, I'm here now, and that's all that matters.

This week sees the release of the new Transformers Ongoing, MORE THAN MEETS THE EYE #1. Wroted by James Roberts and colourded by Josh Burcham, it's a comic I'm immensely proud of, and something that i think would catch they eye of the casual TF-browser, as well as comic fans in general. That's always how I approach anything I work on: make it a good comic first and foremost, and it's something to strive for when tackling Transformers. if you have any resistance to robo-comics or you've been burned before, I beg of you, for your own good, check out this (and its sister title, ROBOTS IN DISGUISE, out in two weeks) little peach and then make up your mind. Previews are on the web, but below is the un-coloured line-art for the first few pages. Love to hear what you think.









(Incidentally, Josh Burcham put in one of my favourite ever jobs from him on this issue. He's my go-to guy when I wanna look slick, and man, he nails it in this issue. Give it a Whirl...)

Sadly, this is my last interior work on TFs for the foreseeable, but I'm sure our paths will cross again. I love telling stories in that universe as it's easily as rich as any other franchise-fiction doing the rounds, and IDW have played a massive part in making it so. MTMTE & RID is good comics, folks. Don't be robotist: buy 'em.

I'd say you'd love to meet me, wouldn't you? I'd say you'd like nothing more than to scrutinise me from every conceivable angle and blow on my ear-hairs. Well tomorrow, 14th January 2012, you can flippin' well do that. I'm doing an in-store signing session from 2pm onwards in Dublin City Comics. All the factlets are here: http://www.facebook.com/DublinCityComics and I'd love to see you and your faces. I'll be flogging Wreckers prints too, so bring moolah! What larks, Pip.

If you're the sort of person who likes to avoid me, then go there anyhow, only not when I'm there. Ridiculous range of collectible toys and amazing service with your American comics. I recommend 'em, and that should be enough for you.

I think this ol' blog will get more of an airing in the next few weeks, mainly as I drum up interest in upcoming appearances; I'm at the Heroes and Legends Con in Belfast in February, so please pop along and say hi to me there. Sketch sessions and prints ahoy.

Oh, and also, there's a recent Q&A with me on the IDW Message boards. Head here for a mirthsome read. Any other Qs you'd like me to A, send 'em to this blog! It might keep me regular!

I tolerate most of you.

Nick

BUY ME

Hey you! Do you remember me? I used to sit next to you at school...

Yes, yes, jokes (and serious points) a-plenty to be made about my lack of online presence. Seriously, if I was here more often, you'd tire of me. As it is, I'm like a beloved drunken uncle, pinwheeling his way through your house for a couple of hours on Christmas Eve, bringing joy to all I encounter, without lingering long enough that you realise what a sad and hollow figure I truly cut...

It's obvious that I want something, isn't it? well, sometimes, what I want and what you - Timothy Smythe-Public - want are the same thing. So let's deal.

This Friday, I attend Auto-Assembly 2011, Europe's biggest Transformers convention. (Check it out here, hit's quite the larf: www.autoassembly.org.uk/) Apart from interviewing my childhood idols, Simon Furman and Geoff Senior, in a 25th anniversary retrospective on seminal robo-epic, Target:2006, and facing off against David Kaye (Beast Wars Megatron) and Gregg Berger (G1 Grimlock) in a voice-acting battle of halfwits, I'll also be signing and sketching all weekend. And flogging two brand-honking-new 'Last Stand of the Wreckers' themed art prints. Check 'em out below:





Tasty, huh? Coloured by the multi-hued and semi-skilled Josh Burcham. It's a true Wrecker Wreunion, and you can pick these bad boys up (A3, 160 gsm) for ten British pounds per print. I've been asked quite a bit if I'll make these available to buy online afterwards. The answer is: Highly Unlikely. I'm just not very good for staying on top of practical matters like that, so if anyone wants one, ask a friendly AA-Attendee to grab one for ya. My earlier prints (The Revelations Covers, and the Starscream And The City one) are also available at a reduced rate this year too.

What else? Well, I recently wrote and illustrated a How to Draw Transformers: Prime book for IDW/Scholastic. this book - weirdly - is NOT available in the shops! You can only get it through eductaional publisher Scholastic for your school. But I'll have limited copies available for sale this weekend too. Here's a sampler of the art:

Yep, all your favourite Prime characters drawn in my easily-imitable style. Hopefully the book helps in breaking down the pretty complex CG character models into something a little more drawable. Buy one and find out! Seriously, these books are rare.

Rarer still is original TF comic artwork by Nick Roche for sale. Not this weekend! For the serious collectors (and for the silly ones with too much coinage) pages from Transformers Ongoing #13, and Transformers: Infestation #1 & #2 will be up for sale. They're pricey, around the £100-£150 mark, with some pages a little under, and others a bit over. Covers are around the £200+region. They're big buys, and I don't like letting them go very often, but I know some people like a bit of warning that these things are available. So they can skip lunch and buy one I suppose.

That's about it! Come along and say hi! Can't wait to sketch, sign and sob my weekend away! Till All Are Brum!

You've Been Nicked

DnA FTW

I've been a fan of the separate and combined talents of Dan Abnett and Andy Lanning for about twenty-three years now. So it was another lifetime highpoint to get to work with them on the upcoming TRANSFORMERS: INFESTATION, due out next week (January 26/27) from all discerning stockists. The book's as fun as you'd hope, and more in-continuity than fans may have imagined.

As a little nod to the D and the A, I lashed together a shot of some of their individual and joint successes; Nova and Rocket Raccoon from their cosmic Marvel stint, and Death's Head II, the Abnett-helmed character I drew more as a teenager than any other. It was almost as fun as working on Infestation.

You've Been Nicked

LAST ISSUE OF THE LAST STAND OF THE WRECKERS

Ready to get Wrecked one last time?

TRANSFORMERS: LAST STAND OF THE WRECKERS #5 punches your comic shop in the bollocks tomorrow, the 19th of May ( it donkey-punches the rest of the world on Thursday 20th) and it marks the end of a truly phenomenal chunk of my professional life. THANK YOU to all those who picked up each issue, supported it, blogged and posted about it, created fan banners and generally made the world Wreckers Aware. The feedback James, Josh (and the wrest of the Wrecking Crew) have received over the last few months has just been tackle-ticklingly terrific. We realise that not everyone that wanted to managed to get on the Wreckers bus, so for those of you who know that something special happened but just didn't manage to get Wrecked-up, the TPB collection of LSOTW hits in August, and all being well (and the planets at IDW Editorial aligning) we'll give you a jam-packed, exclusive-thronged package filled with the 5 issues, plus a ton of supplementary fun. Servos crossed...

So, to accompany the release of #5, let me link you to an interview I did with Sohaib Awan on his EXCELLENT "Fictional Frontiers" pop culture-based radio show/podcast. It was from a while back, so I think I'm still talking up the coming issues, but there might be some stuff you've not heard. Plus, check out some of the other Fictional Frontiers shows on tap there. There's something for every geek. For me talking Wreckers, click here

Also, by now, The first four issues of Wreckers are available on iTunes with the IDW app. And what's more, I'm told that you can get in on the action with yer PSP too.


Go here and press the magic buttons that put the comic I made onto your pocket game box, yeah?

So that's it. On behalf of Andy, Denton, Carlos, Chris, Joana, Waki, Andrew, Guido, Josh, James and myself, thanks for taking this series to your fuel pumps. I don't know if anything I work on will be this well-received again, so I'll enjoy the buzz while it lasts. If you want more, drop a line to the Eds at IDW, or send a note to letters@idwpublishing.com, and hopefully James and I will return very soon.

Wreck and Rule.


Last Stand of the Wankers. Photo by Whittle

You've Been Nicked

LAST STAND OF THE WRECKERS #3 OUT THIS WEEK

HUGE thanks to the super-talented, and uber-hunky Chris Mowry for putting this poster together for us.

Last Stand of The Wreckers #3 is released March 24th in North America and on the 25th everywhere else. And if you missed the first two issues...

LES WRECKERS DIGITALES

Graham Thomson of The Hub (http://www.the-hub.co.uk/) puts it better than I ever could:

"The first two issues of the critically-acclaimed IDW mini-series "Transformers: The Last Stand of the Wreckers" by James Roberts and Nick Roche are now available to download to your iPhone/iPod/iPad* for just £1.19 per issue!

You can download the IDW Transformers Comics app for free via iTunes http://itunes.apple.com/gb/app/transformers-comics/id335638555?mt=8 and from there buy/download individual issues directly to your device.

Each comic can be viewed either as one-panel-per screen (by holding your device sideways) or one-page-per-screen (by holding your device upright).

And you can even take screen captures of any page/panel for use as wallpaper on your device. Just imagine looking at a screen of beautiful Nick Roche artwork every time someone sends you a message, Facebook update or Tweet!

£1.19 really is exceptional value for a RochertsTM product. Other Transformers comics are available via the App for the same price, but clearly aren't as good value.

So, if you have an iPhone/iPod/iPad* or are a pirate with an iPatch, then do your bit today to support James and Nick and cement a long and utopian future of RochertsTM Transformers comics for our children, their children, and their licensed bio-engineered offspring!

*iPad coming 3 April 2010."