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I said that this month I wanted comic creators to interview other comic creators. I’ve given up on the Stephen Downey interview but letterer Nic Wilkinson (interviewed by Cy Dethan for CBO) turns the tables on Vicky Stonebridge -colourist on Slaughterman’s Creed.

Vicky, apart from being a retained fire-fighter in Scotland, is a superb colourist and painter (and has some nice skin art of her own -I think you were only allowed to work on Slaughterman’s Creed if you had skin art!).  Colourists add a great deal to comics but rarely get the chance of an interview.

So, thanks to both Nic and Vicky!

Nic:  Tell us a bit about yourself and what your role in Slaughterman’s
Creed

Vicky: I am primarily a freelance artist & illustrator. I live in the North of
Scotland where the harsh climate and economy requires one to do many
different jobs, I use this adaptive experience to inform my art
practice, crossing disciplines and genres. I was the colourist on SMC
from chapter 3 onwards, I also applied all of Mr Greens Tattoos using
Stephens design template.

Nic:  Tell us a little bit about how the colourist fits into the team
on a book and what a colourist can do in terms of the storytelling.

Vicky: I feel that the colours can bring a project to life, the pencils and
inks provide the meat on the bones- so to speak, but the colours can
bind everything, create a flow, atmosphere and mood. I was trained as a
ceramicist, when Clay is wet it is plastic and has movement and ‘life’
to it. When it dries out it becomes dull and un-engaging, the job of a
good Glaze is to bring ‘life’ back to the piece, I think of colouring
in the same way.

Nic: You have coloured the book from chapter 3 onwards. That’s quite
unusual so could you tell us a bit about why it was done that way?

Vicky:There is a natural break in the story where a few years have passed, It
seems a natural place to bring in a new colourist. This is also the
point where Mr Green comes in and the extra layers involved with
creating his tattoos would have been quite a workload on Stephen.

Nic:  There is a lot of information conveyed through colour in
Slaughterman’s Creed. Can you tell us about how you approached
defining and designing the various colour palettes for the different
sections?

Vicky: Stephen already had a clear sense of the different scenes and the colour
palette for each location, this ties in with the way I normally work.
Traditionally we are taught that sky is blue, grass is green – but if
there is an orange sunset, the grass will be orangey green the sky
orangey blue. Colour is all relative. So I limit my palettes and have a
clear idea of the main colour shift from the outset. Once you are free
from traditional ideas of colour you can use it as another storytelling
tool, playing with hot, cold, contrast and so on.

I kept the colours of the gangsters urban world dull and subtle, with  Lenny’s office very traditional. red blood, and meat colours used throughout. Mr Green was the point of contrast, his green skin & room at odds with the crime world he was embroiled in.

Above:Scott Grindison gets face-painted by Vicky and becomes Mr Green (we hope not!)

Nic:  Working as part of a team with on a comic must be very different from doing all the artwork yourself. What was your working process with with team, and with the penciller Stephen Downey in particular, on this book?

Vicky: I came in after the creative process had started, Stephen had already
worked with Cy & Nic and established a strong creative team. It was
a matter of me slotting in & finding my place within this. Each project
is always different, I found this one to be a great learning curve and
quickly found it easy to fit in with what Stephen envisaged. I had
copies of the pencils with handwritten notes and colouring hints which
was helpful. Once we had discussed the colouring schemes and palettes it
was straight forward and I could just knuckle down and get on with it.

Nic: You have a traditional art background that covers a wide range of media. Were you able to bring any techniques from that into your work and Slaughterman’s Creed?

Vicky: Yes, while working in a wide range of styles and techniques can drive
me mad at times and leave me spread rather thin, but the up side is that
each different job feeds across and informs the others. So digital
colouring has a subtle effect on the way I paint and vice versa. With
SMC I used the digital brush like a traditional one building up layers
of colours and textures.

Nic: Without spoilers if you can – which sections or characters were your favourite to work with and why?

Vicky: I loved working on Mr. Green, I am a bit of a nature child myself and
love tattoos, but aspects of Mr. Green’s personality are somewhat hard to
empathise with. He made me laugh, cringe and nearly throw up – so I guess
he was my favourite!