WHEN Tim Hall decided to have a go at creating his own comic, he had no idea just what a huge task he was taking on.
A professional artist and fan of comic books and metal music, he came up with the idea of creating a couple of test pages of a Vikingthemed story.
Three years and more than three thousand hours later, volume one of Skragbeard and the Vikings – Escape from Helheim is on the shelves.
And Tim, who runs his own media design and publishing company, Void Studios, is already working on volume two.
Tim has always spent his time sketching. After university he worked in advertising and thinks this has honed his interest in creating art for a reason rather than for its own sake.
“I’ve always enjoyed researching subjects rather than doing things at random and I’ve always enjoyed telling stories,” says the 33-year-old from Fareham.
“Maybe because of my advertising background, I’ve always felt before you put pen to paper you need to have a message and a concept. Without that it’s just eye candy and I’ve never found that interesting at all.”
Tim had already had the idea of producing a comic based on Viking mythology when he went to Norway on holiday and found it so awe-inspiring that he started developing the comic immediately.
Skragbeard and the Vikings: Escape from Helheim tells the story of a small group of friends who are shipwrecked on their way back from a stag weekend in a strange land which turns out to be hell.
The hero, Skragbeard, discovers that his fiancée is also there as he tries to piece together what has happened and how to get back home.
Each frame in the comic is drawn, inked and coloured by hand on A3 paper, which takes four to five days per image, before it is scanned into a computer. Volume one has more than 125 images in it.
Most comics are produced by a team – not only is there normally a separate writer but often different people have individual artistic roles, such as sketching and colouring.
It wasn’t until Tim had embarked on creating Skragbeard that he realised what a mammoth task it was doing this all himself along with work.
“I did have a lot of dark times along the way,” admits Tim, who finally completed the comic over Christmas.
“I think that’s quite normal in the creative process. There’s a sense of futility sometimes, especially when no one is telling you to do something.
“You’re doing it because you have the freedom but you need to keep that focus. But then the negative energy builds up and becomes inspiration.”
Tim has self published his comic and is sending it out to big publishers in the hope of getting it mass distributed. But he is also having a go at selling it himself and it can be purchased from Guitar Central in Southampton.
He has already embarked on volume two but is hanging fire on diving into it while he sees what the response is to the first edition.
“It would be beyond my wildest dreams if this could become a full time job. I’d love to have a comic book studio. I’m an idealist but also a realist. I understand the steps you have to take to get from point A to point B.
“There’s that saying that everyone has a great idea in the shower but it’s the people who actually do something with it who can achieve something.
I’m not saying that I’ve achieved anything but I’ve proved I can do something for myself.
“That’s satisfying and it’s also really good to express a vision that’s in your head and get it down on paper.”
- For more information, visit voidstudios.co.uk or find Void Studios on Facebook.
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