Character 1: Elventhorpe Trunkbrisket

When I began designing these characters, I decided that I would 'pulp' together various items of period clothing & equipment, to give a sense that the characters were mercenary types - surviving on the scraps that they could gather from their various regiments, but at the same time drawing on pictorial sources, to give a sense of realism too.

As these characters would be zipping all over the North African deserts in jeeps, I started to think about practical equipment. Obviously, they'd need something to keep the sand out of their eyes, and the sun off their heads. One alternative would be to wear flying caps...

This flying cap is based on an RAF pilot's cap from the 1940s.

For this character, I decided to give him a British paratrooper's smock, just because they look very cool. I also figured that if I was a daredevil gold-hunter with a military past, this is probably what I would have chosen - it's a very practical piece of equipment too, as it would keep the cold out on chilly desert nights, as well as being the coolest piece of British army uniform of the war.

Here's one of the pictures that I used as a source - it shows a group of paras returning from the harsh fighting at Arnhem.
I looked at a number of different sources to get a proper feel of how I'd like the characters to look, and one of the key sources that I found were pictures of the LRDG - a group of British special forces soldiers, who zipped around North Africa in Chevrolets (not unlike my characters), causing havoc and confusion at German depots. Many of the photos of the LRDG were of bearded soldiers. Beards are good in the desert, as they keep sand and sun from getting at your face. So, this character has a beard. In this initial picture, he looks a bit too Osama-ish though, and that wasn't the look I wanted.For your average fighting man, it's very important to have something to carry your ammo around in. Most of my characters still carry British army webbing, but I thought this fella should have something a little more unusual. And then I remembered Terry Gilliam's Time Bandits. One of the characters in the film - Randall, played by the brilliant David Rappaport, sports a flying cap, and crossed bandoliers, which I've always thought was a great combination. The bandoliers look like the type used by the Australian Light Horse in the First World War.
So these 'Australian Light Horse' style cross-belts were added to the character.
I felt that his face was a little harsh, and too angular, so I tried a new look for him. I'm still not entirely happy with the character, but as yet, I've only been looking into the equipment, not the geezer who's wearing it all!So, here's me trying a more stylised way of drawing. I've recently been rather inspired by a few artists out there in internet world, so I'm trying a style a little closer to theirs, and actually sketching in pencil beneath the colours. Here's our hero pre-beard, and without the flying helmet. He's in his para's smock, so possibly he's returning from the aftermath of Arnhem, fed up with the war. He's going to run off to North Africa, meet up with his old comrades, and ransack the desert until he finds the Nazi gold that he's found out about!Here he is with the addition of cap, goggles and beard. I wasn't so happy with the way this one turned out, but I drew it rather fast whilst waiting for a friend, in the Red Lion pub on Kingly Street, which has terrible lighting (just as well, the locals look quite freakish!)This is my first attempt at drawing the full character in his new style. He looks a bit too thin & non-hero like, so more work, I think...This is much more like it!There's a little more detail here too - especially in the British tanker's style holster there, see? It'll be holding a Webley Mk.4, or a Browning HP-35. Haven't decided yet...Here's an attempt at colouring it on the computer. I don't have any drawing programmes other than MS Paint, so I think I did rather well! The camoflage is cut-&-pasted from web-pictures of actual Denison smocks.And here's another try at colouring, this time with tonal shades. (Again, only using MS Paint - perhaps some cartoon-loving millionaire who sees this blog could send me a whole load of free art packages?)

I'm happy with the look of this character now, and just have to practice drawing him, until my fingers remember all the details. He'll probably evolve a little along the way too.

I'm a little annoyed with Blogger that you can't click on these images to see closer up, but Hey Ho.

This character won't be called 'Elventhorpe Trunkbrisket' for long - it's just a provisional name that I thought up when trying to get a feel for the character. As a basic outline, he's the leader of the team. No longer a Captain as I'd originally decided, but I've boosted him to Colonel, so that he can be out-right leader of the group (which I've decided will just be made up of officers now, which allows a little more plummy BBC-speak and Tally-Ho'ing). The character is experienced, and a little grizzled. He's fought in every theatre of the war, volunteering all the way from Dunkirk to Norway to North Africa, to Burma, Italy, Normandy, and Holland, serving with the Rifle Corps, the LRDG, the Paras and the SAS. But now he's fled back to North Africa to get rich as a retirement plan! He's intelligent, cunning, and a bit of an 'Aragorn' type figure. A little bit of a quiet loner in his personal moments, but will do and die for the team. Quietly awe-inspiring.