Time to talk “Amazing Tales” with the legend himself… DAVE DYE!!! In particular we’ll be chatting about Amazing Tales #6 presents the story of Beowulf. The Amazing Dave talking about Amazing Tales with the Amazing Sheydin….. My head may explode from all the amazing!
TRANSCRIPTION (there may be errors in the following text)
Sizzle (00:00:11):
Welcome show. How are you Shaden?
Sheydin Dew (00:00:15):
I’m very well, sis. How are you?
Sizzle (00:00:18):
I’m well, thank you. Thanks a lot. Today we are going to be talking with Dave Dye, but before that I’m just going to boost my screen up and almost press the remove button instead. Pressing the wrong button here. I’m doing a shout out to Shannon Browning for this awesome shirt that he designed and I was lucky enough to get it before it went off the market. Well done. Shannon Browning,
Sheydin Dew (00:00:43):
Absolutely amazing. I love the crossover. It’s Transformers and
Sizzle (00:00:47):
I’m not wearing uniform tonight. I’m wearing Shannon Browning shirt. <laugh>.
Sheydin Dew (00:00:52):
Is it a crossover between Transformers and Ghostbusters, did you say?
Sizzle (00:00:55):
Yes. Transformers and Ghostbusters. It’s awesome. I love it. Well done Shannon. And anyway, so back to the schedule. We are talking to Dave, so let’s get on with the show.
Sheydin Dew (00:01:28):
It is the man, the myth, the legend. Dave Die, thanks for being on the show.
Dave Dye (00:01:34):
Hey Dave. Good day. Good day everybody good? Shadeen, good day Sizzle.
Sheydin Dew (00:01:40):
How you been mate?
Dave Dye (00:01:41):
Very good, thank you. Although it’s bit sticky here today. Bit hot, Danny. Yeah, <laugh>. Hey Dana. Yeah, Goodday Dana. How are you? Yeah, it’s a bit sticky. We’ve had some hot weather. It’s been really hot down here in the Maui and like 42. We had a couple of days of 42 over 40 and that sort of thing. And now today it’s rained, so it’s humid and sticky. Bit like Queensland.
Sheydin Dew (00:02:14):
<laugh>. A bit weird weather, isn’t it? Yeah. I think we’ve had some very similar weather here in the Adelaide Hills as well. So to kick things off the drill let’s hear a little bit of your creative journey. Dave, give us a little taste into the world of Dave.
Dave Dye (00:02:31):
All right, well Dave, well, I start like most people who are doing this sort of thing. I started drawing when I was a very young child, or I enjoyed drawing and spy and had all my brothers and sisters. I got well, at the time I only had two sisters and a brother. So there’s four of us kids knocking around. I was the youngest at that stage and they were all better drawers than me. They could draw a really good gday chef and I used to try and keep up with them. So we’d sit around the kitchen table drawing from comics or books. The old dad had a heap, old books that we used to draw from. Always loved John. Oh, that’s what I could show you. I’ve my mum. I did a painting at kindergarten and when I brought it home my mum said, oh, that’s very good. And she framed it and I’ve still got it.
Sheydin Dew (00:03:32):
Really?
Dave Dye (00:03:33):
Yeah. Would you like to see it? If you got it a second, I’ll show it.
Sheydin Dew (00:03:36):
I think everybody will. Yeah, yeah, yeah, for sure. For sure. <laugh>, just for everyone to know, I was reading one of Dave’s, which we’ll get into later Beowulf, which is a part of his, I think it’s his adventure series. Am I correct? Amazing tales, sorry. Yeah, amazing
Dave Dye (00:03:55):
Tales.
Sheydin Dew (00:03:56):
Yeah. So we’ll get into that a little bit later. Anyway, Dave,
Dave Dye (00:04:00):
That’s boost up. Oh look, the oldest, this
Sheydin Dew (00:04:05):
Was during kindergarten.
Dave Dye (00:04:08):
Was it original art? That’s a tree. That’s a tree.
Sheydin Dew (00:04:13):
That’s so amazing.
Dave Dye (00:04:15):
Yeah, mum loved it and she framed it and she had that on the bedside table or on the Chester drawers for years, years and years and years. And I think the only, well probably four or five years before she passed away, I think the frame got broken somehow. Something the glass was broken, never got, so she took it down then. But that’s how long she looked after that for me. And I grabbed it when we went through her stuff after she passed away and that. So yeah, that’s the first time. Very,
Sheydin Dew (00:04:52):
How long did you have that, or how long did she have that?
Dave Dye (00:04:56):
Oh, well I would’ve painted that in 19 62, 63, something like that when I was in kindergarten. Wow,
Sheydin Dew (00:05:05):
That’s amazing that you can still have it. You still have it.
Dave Dye (00:05:10):
Yeah. Amazing. So that’s the oldest piece of art that I’ve got of mine. I always been drawing and always loved drawing. And I went through various stages of what I wanted to do. Goodday Ben thanks mate. And I wanted to be a fine art painter. I used to want to do painting portrait painting, figure painting and all that sort of thing. Goodday Dan. And so I went to painting for a long time. And so oil painting was my desire and that’s right. That was my main drive. Although I want to be an illustrator too. I discovered Norman Lindsay when I was in my teens. And of course he’s got a lot of naked women in his drawings and paintings. So that was quite inspiring to a teenager. But it wasn’t just the figures, it was his penmanship that I really fell in love with. This is the style of, this is not Norman, but this sort of thing that’s Frank Dunn and see that hatching that he does, that sort of stuff is what really turns me on. This sort of, that’s Stan Cross. These are Australian pen and artists cartoonists
Sheydin Dew (00:06:52):
Amazing.
Dave Dye (00:06:55):
These is the sort of thing that really got me going and that’s what I wanted to do. I want to be a book illustrator but things change. I went farming when I left school and I loved that life. I really enjoyed being a farm, hand farm labor. So I still did a little bit of drawing and painting on the side then, but not as much. And signed up for a couple of correspondence courses just in, you could do a draw, they’d send you a list of things you had to draw and I’d draw them and send them off and they’d mark ’em and they’d send it back. Cause all by post, didn’t have internet or anything like that. In those days. I was on the farm, so I’d get these and I’d just do it on a weekend. I’d do a drawing and send it off. So that was good. And then they helped me a lot with my perspective and things like that. Cause they were good little instruction. Cause we had to draw a wheelbarrow or a room or a vase or just a plain old stuff that you never want to do. But if you want to draw and you want to get better, you got to do it.
Sheydin Dew (00:08:11):
Yeah, myself for sure. So you said that you used to draw from comics with your siblings is, am I correct, before, what kind of comics did were you and your siblings inspired by?
Dave Dye (00:08:26):
We were reading mostly Uncle Scrooge and Donald Dark. But we did go a bit crazy when Alex, Alex Major’s favorite movie came out. Jungle book number one in 1967 or 68 that came out. I think we loved it. We went to the drive in to watch that and I bought the comic book and I’ve still got that over there in one of my boxes. It’s not <laugh>, pull that one out. But my, mainly my Rose is my oldest older sister. I’ve got two older sisters. Kate is the eldest. Rose was two years older than me. Kate’s six years old, wouldn’t we? But Rose and I really loved the Jungle Book. And Rose made this what they call a mobile. Do you know what a mobile is?
Sheydin Dew (00:09:22):
Yeah. So is it kind of like a diorama kind of thing or a
Dave Dye (00:09:26):
It hangs
Sheydin Dew (00:09:27):
Or
Dave Dye (00:09:28):
A bit, yeah, hangs and the wind blows it and it turns around. And so she had sheer can bag Gli all them, she’d drawn them all, she had to draw ’em twice backwards. And she stuck ’em together, colored them all in. And she had that hanging it up in her room. And I was drawing Sheer Kne and Gli and Blu and oh, we were just right into that and we loved it. So that would’ve been the first comic book that I really got stuck in the drawing.
Sheydin Dew (00:09:55):
That is fantastic. That’s awesome. That’s so cool that you’ve got all that kind of inspiration from such a young age as well and people to have done it with and grow with. So that’s
Dave Dye (00:10:04):
Awesome. Oh, that’s right. Maybe if I didn’t have my sister there, me sister to and brother there to encourage me, who knows what else I wanted done, because we used to play a lot of sport in those days. I’d played footy and cricket and all that sort of stuff. Ran around a town like a mad kid. Everyone does. I could easily just gone off and if I didn’t have brothers and sisters, I might’ve gone and played with me mates and none of them did much drawing or anything. So I could have been a different story.
Sheydin Dew (00:10:35):
So it was a happy accident. That’s what it is.
Dave Dye (00:10:37):
<laugh>
Sheydin Dew (00:10:41):
An accident. We’re all very grateful for. I’m sure. So you’ve talked a little bit about your past and whatnot. Can you tell us a little bit of your projects both past, present, and maybe future that you might have going on at the moment?
Dave Dye (00:10:57):
Well, we won’t talk about past at the moment cause unless we want to talk about Bail Wolf,
Sheydin Dew (00:11:04):
I will be touching on Bail Wolf, if that’s all right.
Dave Dye (00:11:06):
That later. Okay, well I’ll talk about present. I’m working on something for Spy at the moment for the Moose. Number four, is it? And I’m working on that. I’ve just, previous to that, I did a short story for Peter Lane for Sky’s Cabin Library. Huh, nice. And previous to that, I did another short story for our, I’ll make quick Nick Cleary for his what’s it called? The Aerial one. Oh, fly Boys Fly Boys. Is it?
Sizzle (00:11:48):
Yes. Oh, now I’ve forgotten.
Dave Dye (00:11:51):
If you’re watching Quick, put it up up mate Quick,
Sheydin Dew (00:11:53):
Nick. Yeah, yeah, we need you.
Dave Dye (00:11:57):
So anyway, yeah, so I’ve done that one. So I’ve had three, a few previous. I’m working on the OUS one now and I’ve got a couple to do after that as well. So there’s a Rick McLoan script I have that needs to be started. So I’ll be getting into that as soon as I finish this. That’ll be for a full comic.
Sheydin Dew (00:12:23):
Oh my Paul, you like to keep yourself busy then, don’t you?
Dave Dye (00:12:27):
Yes, yes. Well that’s the good thing. I’m lucky because I can work on it full time. I, I’ve done my professional working. My working life is pretty much over. I was a farm hand to start with and I joined the Army and I did that for 28 years. Got out of that and retired at an right early age of 52 or something like that. I can’t remember. I was quite young and I retired. I had a good enough pension, I had my car. I just had to pay off a house and all that sort of stuff. So anyway, that’s why I didn’t do a lot of comic. I never had really a comic career or an art, a professional art career outside the Army until I was in my early fifties. You’ve got people like Gary cer and Tim McEwen and TA Perkowski and Dave Devers and all that. They started were putting out their comics when they were young. They were doing it on the side. Well, I wasn’t doing it. I was just concentrating. Well, I was just doing it other stuff. I wasn’t thinking about that. But now that I’ve retired, I can spend eight hours a day, 12 hours a day, 14 hours a day if I want working on my comics. I think
Sheydin Dew (00:13:55):
That’s, hello. I think that’s super inspiring though, that you didn’t start full-time into your comic career until a later age. I think we need more stories like that. So I think that’s super inspiring. Dave. Hey Nick. Mm-hmm.
Dave Dye (00:14:10):
Yeah, that’s right. Yeah. Goodday Nick. Yeah, that’s right. Well, it’s to my advantage, well, in a way to my advantage, but it’s also harder because I’ve got a Dicky old back. My hands are a bit of arthritic and not much good. My hip gets sore. I’ve got a old man’s aches and pains that I have to put up with, which you don’t have to put up with so much when you’re younger,
Sheydin Dew (00:14:41):
But you do have a wealth of knowledge that some of us youngins do not. So I think that’s definitely to your advantage. Can you tell a few of our viewers tonight a little bit of some of your own books that you’ve published, just so that they know Be Wolf and such?
Dave Dye (00:15:02):
Okay, well we’ll start with the first thing I did when I got out of the Army. This was the first one I did, yack Legend. It was in a landscape format to start with. I think it’s back on the other thing. So this is the sort of thing, this was my style. This comes from my desire to be those artists that I showed you before cross the, and Norman Lindsay the old, a lot of hatching and stuff in there. And that’s stuck with me. Why I draw a lot of that stuff the way that I do. I did that as soon as I got out of the army. This book here, I actually started this one when I was in the Army. And this was drawn this is Code of Honor, another military, another war story.
Sheydin Dew (00:16:04):
Amazing.
Dave Dye (00:16:06):
This is a hundred page graphic novel that went through many rewrites and reiteration. Get on your chair. Well, I finally got to the stage where I was happy with it. I think it went through about four different rewrites. So I finally got that one together and I had to print it colorize it very quickly and get it printed because I was going to a comic convention. I’d been working on other stuff through the year. And when you go to a convention like the beginning of the year, I like to have something new to show to sell it. And I go and I didn’t have anything because I’d been doing other projects for other people and for that year pretty well. And as a result I thought, oh, what I got to do. So I found that, dug it up, went through it quickly and re-scanned, rewrote it and changed a lot of the text, added a few panels and got rid of one or two other ones and colorized it.
(00:17:15):
I did think at one stage I did about 10 pages in one day of color. I was just pumping it through and you can probably tell when you look at it, but <laugh> worry about that. So yeah, that was it though. The reason it was so I was so busy. One of the reasons was I was working on this book now that was, I was approached by Hugh Darwin. He saw the Anzac legend. He says, Dave, can you do a story for me in the same style? So there that’s 60 something pages of the Story of the Battle or Thes Eureka or the Eureka stockade incident at Ballarat during the Gold Rush. So that was what held me up, I think that year. But that was fun to draw and informative and it’s good. Well, it’s always fun to draw whatever you draw’s fun.
Sheydin Dew (00:18:24):
I agree. That’s amazing. So you’ve got quite a plethora of work that you’ve done yourself and I think I really wanted to touch on Be Wolf, especially as I read Be Wolf and Greendale, as well as be Wolf and the Dragon, which I absolutely loved. And I completely understand where you come from the hatching and the penmanship in your work, which got I think, what was the artist that you mentioned before with the hatching?
Dave Dye (00:18:59):
Norma Lindsay was the initial inspiration.
Sheydin Dew (00:19:03):
Yeah, yeah. He shows up in your work a lot and I definitely saw that with Be Wolf. And I was very, very impressed by your <laugh>. It was really, really amazing.
Dave Dye (00:19:18):
Thank you very much.
Sheydin Dew (00:19:19):
Always, always amazing whenever you’re on drink and draw I think a lot of people are in the same boat as me. They’re absolutely mesmerized by your work.
Dave Dye (00:19:27):
So yeah, <laugh> done other work with Roger STTs and I did the time fold and that’s a similar sort of, it’s black and white, but I’ve did a lot more brush work with this one. So to change it so it’s a little bit different, but you still got these details. The house is amazing. Pen and ink stuff there. And do people have said, when I’ve got my comics reviewed, they’ve said, your black and white stuff seems a lot better than your color stuff. Which suits me fine because I hate color and the bloody things
Sheydin Dew (00:20:10):
<laugh>.
Dave Dye (00:20:11):
I’m quite much happier doing the line work. But this is the next Anzac legend, a smaller edition of it. So it’s called All the similar sort of style for that sort of stuff, I think. But yeah, Wolf still doing it. Yeah,
Sheydin Dew (00:20:35):
Absolutely. Amazing. Breathtaking Dave. Absolutely breathtaking.
Dave Dye (00:20:41):
Yeah,
Sheydin Dew (00:20:42):
<laugh>,
Dave Dye (00:20:45):
Lot of really good black and white artists that are around now. You got Jardine who just poked his head in a second ago before Lee Chalkers. His black and white stuff is great. Ryan Veer fantastic. A lot of great people still pumping out good black and white art for the comics now. And a black and white comic just cause hasn’t got color, doesn’t mean second class. It can still be a good comic.
Sheydin Dew (00:21:15):
Yes, absolutely.
Dave Dye (00:21:18):
Of course Duncan Previ with his bin Kitty. And
Sheydin Dew (00:21:22):
Shout out to Duncan also. I just wanted to touch a little bit briefly on the legend of Anza, or I think it was, oh, Anzac Legend. Sorry. Now I heard that you won an award for that. Am I right?
Dave Dye (00:21:38):
Yes.
Sheydin Dew (00:21:38):
Can you tell us more about
Dave Dye (00:21:40):
That? I got the Oz Comic AZ comic. Yeah, I have to read it. Winner of the 2014 Comic Oz, best Australian Original comic book award. So that was in 2014.
Sheydin Dew (00:21:57):
Absolutely amazing. And so when was that published?
Dave Dye (00:22:00):
2014
Sheydin Dew (00:22:02):
2000. It’s the same year. Amazing.
Dave Dye (00:22:04):
I had to get it out by I wanted to get it out by Anza Day 2014. So I was really rushing to get it ground, even though they didn’t land till the year, a year later. But anyway, that was just what, you know, got to set yourself a bit of a deadline. I was working something like I’d work probably 20 days straight on this every day. I was working all day and then I had just had to have a rest. I’d stopped, you know, work like that. You wear yourself out, so you have to have a rest for a week or something after that. Absolutely, yeah. And then you get back into, it
Sheydin Dew (00:22:41):
Was
Dave Dye (00:22:42):
The job that when I started, I wasn’t going to put it aside and let it rest. I had to get it finished. I was determined to finish it because I didn’t want it to be something sitting in the shed three years later, half finished and thinking, oh, I’ll have to do that. Get finished that one day. No. So they just stuck with it. Yeah.
Sheydin Dew (00:23:04):
Yeah. Nice. So would you say that that’s the fastest you’ve ever completed a comic? Would that be fair to say?
Dave Dye (00:23:11):
No. No. Probably that Eureka book was the one that really, one was hammering up because the other one took me four years to do the other one, the Anza legend. It was 200 and something pages. This is 60 odd pages. But because we had a professional editor and all that working on it, get a plus,
(00:23:39):
It had to go back and forth, back and forth to them and suddenly the deadline changed or something like that. Or they were late at getting back to me. I was keeping up with my deadlines, but I sent it to them and they must have put it on the intro and forgot about it for a week or two. And I’m waiting for the feedback to come back to get on with what’s got to be done. So at the end I was inking three pages a day. I had it drawn and I had to sit up in the morning, I’d in a page before lunch and start another page and finish inking it by tea time. And then after tea I’d do another page before I went to bed. Then get up the next day and do it again. So that was for probably the last half of that book.
Sheydin Dew (00:24:30):
So
Dave Dye (00:24:30):
What
Sheydin Dew (00:24:30):
A four
Dave Dye (00:24:31):
Month schedule really. And that’s what happens when you work professionally for a real company. You’ve got to deliver. You can’t muck around. So you put yourself, I’m happy to work for yourself. I can get up now, no watch a bit more telly or I’ll go out for a walk and then come back and do it. That’s much more better <laugh>, much more.
Sheydin Dew (00:24:58):
That’s amazing. No, good on you. Good on. So you’ve definitely been very busy over the years and whatnot. Many different projects happen. No good on you. So we talked a little bit of about your biggest inspirations. Can you delve more into some of the artistic inspirations that have you come across maybe recently or any ones that you hadn’t listed previously?
Dave Dye (00:25:24):
Well I’ve Inspira, I get inspiration from anyone really. I was looking at your book today I was looking at this today and I was thinking, wow, you’ve got some really good drawings in there and the angles you’ve, the different angles that you’ve drawn your figures at that this is inspiring. So real, anyone can, I can get inspiration from everyone. Yeah, nice. Definitely. This should inspire people. This is a great book. So
(00:26:06):
I get inspiration by lots of artists and yes, I watched Lee Chalker show with Hayden Sparrow last night. And I dunno if I am inspired by writers so much. I do write that’s what these are books are written by me, but a lot of them. But I dunno if I’m inspired, I think it’s just the way I tell a story is how, I don’t think there’s any particular writer that I look at and go, I want to write Alan Moore or Chris Claremont or someone like that. Well actually Chris Claremont, I think he’s one that writes a lot of, I think I’ve seen, he’s got a lot of word balloons, so I definitely don’t want to write like that. And what’s his name? Bing. Not Bing Lee. There is the bloke who ran Marvel, big top boss, cocky. He died a year or two ago. Oh, Stan Lee. Stanley Stanley. Stanley Lee. Yeah. I don’t want to write like him cause I read some of his comics and they just save verbose too much. I’d like to keep it minimum if I can
Sheydin Dew (00:27:20):
That I think that’s fair to say. Yeah, for sure. I think even reading Beowulf, it was so easy to read and it was just, you went straight into the story and it was sharp, straight to the point. And I think it was just really easy to digest and I really, really appreciated that. Yeah. Oh, thank you for blessing us. Amazing stories. Steve, I think I could listen to your stories all day,
Dave Dye (00:27:54):
But
Sheydin Dew (00:27:55):
I do remember you saying so you did serve in the Army and you were a farm hand as well. Were these types of roles that maybe inspired you to create comics? I do understand that you did an Army related comic, is that correct?
Dave Dye (00:28:11):
Yeah. Well, I don’t know if I ins inspired me to do comics, but it’s something I draw on when I do my comics. My comics are pretty much based on the things that I like to do. And I like Australian history, Australian country life and the army and art. So they’re probably the three things that I like over my lifetime. When I was a little kid, I wanted to go drive tractors and I like working with sheep and cattle and all that sort of digging holes. I like being outside work working outside. So I wanted to be a farmer. I’ve always wanted liked drawing, I’ve always liked painting and that sort of thing. Artistic, I’ve always been in that sort of minds space. And I’ve always had an interest in military things. And it turns out later didn’t really, we used to get told your great-grandfather was in the Crimee war and he was a hassar in the Chmi Crimee war. And oh,
Sheydin Dew (00:29:31):
There you
Dave Dye (00:29:32):
Go. One of his son, my grandfather’s uncle died in the B War and my grandfather was in World War and my grandmother’s, well, my mother’s uncles were in World War I and my uncle was in World War ii. So we’ve had a long association with military stuff. So whether it’s in the blood, I don’t know but I ended up, I was always sort of going to be a soldier, I think.
Sheydin Dew (00:30:08):
Yeah, and I think it’s good that you’ve got that history to draw upon in your own stories. So I think that’s definitely a huge thing to also draw or draw attention to, I should say with your amazing tale. Was it? I think you did.
Dave Dye (00:30:22):
Yeah. Amazing tales. A lot of the stories in there. In Amazing Tales. So when I first started doing Amazing Tales, the first one I put out, this was just after I finished this book I had to have a break because that was a hard slog. There was a lot of research involved with that and it was hard. It was a lot of work. So I wanted to do something more relaxing. So I just did all these fiction stories. There’s four fiction stories in there two set in the Australian Outback one set in outer space in the drop ship, 15 crew and another’s set in the Vietnam during the Vietnam War. So that’s the four stories in there. So they’re touching on all the things that I’m interested in. I don’t mind space, I like Aliens and all that movie when it came out and science fiction the genre I like. So yeah,
Sheydin Dew (00:31:30):
Amazing.
Dave Dye (00:31:31):
Never had an interest in being an astronaut or anything like that though. But that was one thing I didn’t have. But Roger Sitz and was pointed out to me that my science fiction stories or my space stories, they’re not really much to do with space. They’re just war stories or soldier stories in space. And I’ve said a number of times that I’m not smart enough to do science fiction, so I just do what I know and I know Army so I put that in there.
Sheydin Dew (00:32:07):
No, I think that’s great. I guess I really wanted to touch on, while we’re on the subject what kind of ins inspired you specifically with Be Wolf? I know that you do write a little section beforehand of was it written in 1912? Is that correct?
Dave Dye (00:32:25):
Yeah, I think so. Yes. This book here?
Sheydin Dew (00:32:29):
Yes.
Dave Dye (00:32:30):
Okay. The Legends,
(00:32:33):
Tectonic Myths and Legends. I bought that book was probably three or $4 or $5. And I read that and I just got right into it, really got into my head. I didn’t know anything much about four and Oden and all that, but it also goes later to Trian and Isdi, which is lighter in more probably dark ages type of Europe. So it just isn’t the ancient things. It goes a lot more covered in here. And they’re all very interesting stories. So when I read that, I was actually, I was doing a TAFE course and a lot of the stories I was reading in this was coming out in my sketchbooks and I was doing paintings that this painting here?
Sheydin Dew (00:33:32):
Yes, that features in one of the interests to
Dave Dye (00:33:37):
There. Oh yeah. Yep. That’s on the inside cover. So that’s the painting I did back in 2001 or something. And that was when I was interested in, first started reading this sort of stuff and I was doing the course and other, I’ve got sketchbook somewhere, I bought ’em out somewhere, I’ll put ’em somewhere, I can’t, oh, here, they’re up in the portal.
Sheydin Dew (00:34:07):
I love why you putting things out of the so-called portal for all our viewers portal. He just brings everything and anything from behind the screen.
Dave Dye (00:34:17):
So you can see a sketch there of that painting. It’s a gush of approaching her in the middle of the night. So that was done in oh, I haven’t got a date on that page, but anyway, yes, but that was 2001, I think. And there’s more sketches. I was my old sketchbook. This was probably done for a painting I was thinking of doing for my TAFE course.
Sheydin Dew (00:34:48):
Amazing.
Dave Dye (00:34:51):
So yeah. Wow. Out of my, there’s random all through scattered throughout the sketchbooks I’ve got is those things, those sketches and drawings I’ve sort of on my mind. So
Sheydin Dew (00:35:07):
I absolutely love how you render your faces, Dave. I think you’ve done such an amazing job with your expressions and whatnot. Yeah.
Dave Dye (00:35:15):
All right. Yeah. Well that’s something I do strive for. And I do have one of these here. A mirror. Yes,
Sheydin Dew (00:35:25):
I must
Dave Dye (00:35:28):
<laugh>. And that’s something I’ve found that you sometimes you’ve got to act out when you’ve stuck and you can’t draw something, you’ve got to get a mirror and look at your, and think about, okay, put yourself in that mind frame and pull that face might be lost for thought and then quickly sketch that down with the mirror. Or sometimes you might have to act out swinging a sword or something like that. So you’ve got to actually get up off your chair and go through the action and visualize yourself in that position and get it down. That’s how you sort of nail some of those pages. Pete,
Sheydin Dew (00:36:14):
Look at
Dave Dye (00:36:15):
That. <laugh>. Good
Sheydin Dew (00:36:17):
Inspiration,
Dave Dye (00:36:18):
Dave. That’s awesome. Good mate. Yeah, never. Well, I noticed on I think it was on Pete Wilson’s show the other night, he asks what makes a creative person? And my answer to that is I, everyone’s creative. I think everyone is creative, but it’s in different ways now. Some people are creative. My wife’s very creative in the kitchen cooking. She’s a brilliant cook and she creates beautiful dishes. Some fellas and ladies like to pick up a spanner and work on their car. And they’re very good at mechanical stuff and doing stuff. Other people make things out of wood, crochet knit. So everyone’s got a hobby. And I think everyone’s creative. And so I think it’s just developing whatever you are interested in will make you better and you’ll stick out. If you enjoy doing it, you’ll keep doing it.
Sheydin Dew (00:37:26):
Absolutely. You said that. Well Dave, you said that very well. Yes. I also just really wanted to ask when you were talking about the origin of Wolff, what really grabbed you in that novel that you are reading? What really made you want to write specifically about Be Wolff?
Dave Dye (00:37:47):
I think he’s a pretty all round sort of yeah, he’s a big, strong, tough Conan type character. He’s a brag, which is something which I don’t like brags. I hope I don’t come across as a brag, but I don’t like brags. And he’s a brag and that’s part of the character of that made someone, back in the old days, we’re talking ancient days. That’s what you had to be if you were going to be king of a race or run the tribe, you had to, but you had to back it up too, of course. And he could back it up. So he said
Sheydin Dew (00:38:32):
He did, that’s for sure.
Dave Dye (00:38:33):
Yeah. And he, he is strong, he’s, they’re in the good stories in the Thor stories. The Thor ones are quite good because there’s a bit of humor in there. There’s one episode where, I can’t remember the Giants sleeping and Thor sneaks up the hit him on the head while he is asleep and killing, knock him out, not take him out of the game. And he keeps cracking this with his hammer. As hard as he can mean this Giant’s just asleep there not worrying about it. And Thors is going crazy, but little does he know, he’s been hexed a little bit by someone. I can’t remember who. It’s a long time since I read it. And he’s hitting a big rock. He’s hitting a, he’s missing the head and he’s hitting a rock. So there’s bits of humor through these as well. And that’s what I try and put in my stories. These stories. I always try and put a bit of drama, a bit of action and humor. I think humor is a key attribute to a good story.
Sheydin Dew (00:39:40):
Absolutely. And I’m not going to spoil anything, but when I was reading Be Wolf, I was a little saddened and I think that was really good that you conveyed that emotion because I wasn’t expecting it. I was expecting to read a big Burly Man and his adventure and he’s got a sword and he slays and he is ra. And then at the end I was like, oh, that’s a really actually a real heartwarming story, especially at the end of Be Wolff and the Dragon I recommend to read
Dave Dye (00:40:05):
Tour <laugh>. Well it’s nice to have that, hear that bit of feedback from you about that I
Sheydin Dew (00:40:11):
Was really connected with Be Wolff and then, oh yeah,
Dave Dye (00:40:14):
Yeah, that’s good. Because when I think a lot of us, when we create these things, you dunno what people are going to say and I will, you know, think, oh, what are they going to say tonight? Oh, I know you wouldn’t be rude or anything like that to me, but what are you really thinking? You know, going to say something nice about this horrible comic we just read. Oh good, what are you going to say? <laugh>
Sheydin Dew (00:40:41):
Nothing but the best for you, Dave. Honestly, no one’s got anything bad to say about you. Only praise, so you are fine,
Dave Dye (00:40:50):
Thank you. But it’s just natural. I think we all go through that as creators when we create something that we’ve feel, is it good enough? Will people like it? I absolutely, I’m a bit unsure about this bit that I did and maybe people will hate that and they’ll hate the whole thing. And so it’s nice just to get a bit of positive feedback. So thanks very much.
Sheydin Dew (00:41:14):
Isn’t not a problem at all. Absolutely. That’s really awesome to know exactly where Beel Wolf kind of originated from. But I really want to kind of delve into a little bit more of your techniques and your process of how you actually go about your comics. I know some of our viewers and some of the people in the comics community kind of work digitally, myself included. So I was wondering if you shed a little bit of light on how you created specifically Be Wolff, which is a theme of tonight, and shed a little bit of light of how you’ve worked over the last coup comic career I should say. Because I think the traditional world is definitely interesting and something that I would really like to learn more about is your creative process. So
Dave Dye (00:41:58):
<laugh>, right? Well if you this with <inaudible>, cause I had to write it first. So I will go back to that stage if you like. Now I had to read it, I haven’t read this story for 20 odd years. So I had to reread it all. And when I did that, I reread, I read it again and then I took notes because this was going to be, oh my god, this is going to be based on the legend and it wasn’t just going to be Bay Wolf’s name and the story that I made up, this is going to be the legend. So basically what you’re reading in this is a ized version of this. Okay, yeah. But shorten down now, that’s what did. So after I’ve written that down and the notes of what happens, it goes for, I dunno, a few pages. Where is it? I had it here. I was going to show you
Sheydin Dew (00:43:04):
This. Is Peter your portal?
Dave Dye (00:43:08):
No, the portal isn’t there? This one? No. Where is it? It’s underneath all the books and that I’ve got down here. Get on your Jillian. Yeah, thanks. So once I’ve done that, I break it down into, oh, you can’t really see that. I write it out again. And this is for another story. I can’t find the <inaudible>, but it’s the same process. I’ll write it out and then I’ll break it down. All these points I derive from those notes that I made and they, they’ll be the what will I need to put in. And some of those points will be take up a complete panel and in some of those points there might be two or three of those points make up another panel. So I just read through it and work out the pacing of the story. And in doing that, I work out you can see here on this particular story, there’s a line which delineates what? This is all going to be one page. Then oh yeah, these points down to the next line. That’s the next page. So once I’ve done that, I’ve worked out the content for that page. Then you probably can’t see, this is the actual Bayer Wolf and grand outline. I’ve done it very small, but these are the pages.
Sizzle (00:44:48):
Yep.
Dave Dye (00:44:49):
So that’s them. And that’s for the whole, that’s got the 24 pages of the story there done in thumbnails on other stories. This is the bushfire story in amazing tales. And number five, they’re bigger thumbnails, they’re bigger, more like a draft. But I did it bit different for the bail off and grand story. But that’s the layout. Then I’ll get my Bristol board Bristol paper and put it on the, I’ve started drawing over on the drawing table now, so haven’t got my drawing table, but you’ve seen it on drink and draw my drawing table, my slab, whatever it is, drawing board, rule up my panels and just start penciling my pencil with a blue line mostly these days and put the text in. All my stuff’s over there now, but you’ve seen most of it before. I’ve got a Ames R ruling guide, a hand letter or my lettering. I like the hand letter because people like I don’t understand it people like computerized lettering because it is neater. It is very neat. But I can look at some of my lettering in these books and go, well that’s pretty good. I’m pretty happy with that. That’s not bad. That one’s a bit rough, but, but you know, get your good and your bad. But it’s something I enjoy doing. I really enjoy lettering
Sheydin Dew (00:46:33):
And I think it brings a lot more character into the text in the book because it’s not stock standard. It’s done. And you can see a lot of the character that comes through. That was one of my questions was whether or not you hand you lettering by hand or not. So I just have to let my cat out or else he’s going to be me out the entirety of the research.
Sizzle (00:47:02):
Yeah, Davis was a great read.
Dave Dye (00:47:04):
Oh, enjoyed it. Did you mate? Yeah,
Sizzle (00:47:06):
Enjoyed it very much.
Dave Dye (00:47:07):
Oh did you? Fantastic. I keep
Sizzle (00:47:09):
Wanting to talk about bits of the story, which I probably shouldn’t do because it was spoil it, but yeah,
Dave Dye (00:47:16):
No, well look, I know a lot of people don’t like to talk about, but I’m happy if you want to talk about any section where Beov has to dive into the lake or the swamp and go down and hunt down the grand’s mother who would’ve, and he is fighting her. And look, he’s got to all her sea demons have come to help her fight Beowulf. And what are her sea damages? There’s a seal, there’s a turtle. That’s what they are. Well that’s my imagination of ’em. But yeah, that’s what I thought. Oh, what would they be? They might be lizards or whatever, something not dragons. I didn’t do that. That’s in the next story
Sheydin Dew (00:48:04):
And I’m so glad you pulled up onto that scene because that was one of the scenes that I was most impressed by. I guess it was because it was so contrasting to the rest of the story. Everything’s more white than black and then all of a sudden he dives down and everything’s changed. I thought it was really, really fantastic. And you shared a lot of contrast to that
Dave Dye (00:48:23):
With that particular drawing. I had to do a bit of digital work there because if you have a look at that, you see Grendel’s mother is here at the bottom. Where is it here? That’s her there under my finger. That’s her. And there’s Owol up here where my other finger is. Can you see it up there? Yes.
Sheydin Dew (00:48:48):
Yeah, we see
Dave Dye (00:48:49):
Him. Yep. Yep. In that panel he’s coming down. But initially I drew her too small and what I did, actually, I did it in photo in clip studio paint. I cut her out and made her bigger and stretched her bigger. So I cheated in studio paint, so there you go. Ah, nice. So I’m not perfect on the things. I could have wired it out and redrawn it, but I got lazy and I thought it’d be quicker to do it that way.
Sheydin Dew (00:49:17):
Well we were none wiser. So you fool as well. Also, I did notice that you had a little bit of half tone in some of your illustrations. Is that also digitally added in?
Dave Dye (00:49:29):
Yes. Yep. Yep. It’s something I discovered that when I did the Rick McCleon, I’d never done that. Always wanted to know how to put it in and I’d seen people put it in there stuff, how do you do that? So I got on the Google and found out how to do it and I just reckon that’s great. That shade or what’d you call it? The, what did you call it? Half? Half? Yeah, print. Yeah, screen. Screen,
Sheydin Dew (00:49:57):
Yeah, yeah, yeah. Because I recently actually bought adhesive screen tone, half tone. I got it from a little dollar store day. So if anybody’s familiar where you actually have to cut it out to the shape that you want it. So you do your artwork by hand and then you section off an area that you want shaded. But I’m a super fan of half tone. Anything in an illustration with half tone, I’m in <laugh>. So it was really pleasant surprise to see it in your work. So yeah, I think that was awesome. It’s good to know that you work, you are very versatile in how you work, so I think that’s a plus for you. So
Dave Dye (00:50:35):
Yeah, necessity. I think I do like to use a pen and brush. I often use a brush when I ink. I don’t just ink with a nibble at time. That’s the nib. But I often use a brush as well. So Indian, I like good waterproof Indian ink is what the ink use. So yeah,
Sheydin Dew (00:51:02):
I think we could all learn so much from you, especially traditionally was, so it’s been really nice to delve into your process, your creative process. But yeah, I also really want to delve in another question for you is maybe what is one of your most proudest moments that you’ve had in your creative career? Do you have or do you have many?
Dave Dye (00:51:27):
Well, oh gee, I don’t know. I’ve, I’ve been lucky a few times. Well I got that award from Nat Carmichael at Comic Odds. He’s a great supporter of Australian comics. Great fella. No, I did get asked to exhibit my comic work at the Polish, was it Poland Comic and gaming exhibition a couple of years ago in lads. That’s the biggest I can’t remember the name of the bloke who set me up for that, but he’s a nice fellow and he’s done it since with other people. So there’s a few people got invited to be in that. And I’m a bit embarrassed that I can’t name the convention or the exhibition properly, but that was it’s always nice when people think that you’re good enough to contribute to something like that. And of course, always thrilled when people buy my stuff is it thrills me always. And especially when you get a returning customer who’s bought something and they come back the next year and say, I bought that one, I want to buy the next one. What do you got? And I think that’s why a lot of us do it. If you got that a few people that come back and keep buying your stuff, that’s as good as earning a hundred bucks a copy.
Sheydin Dew (00:53:05):
Absolutely. I agree. I agree.
Dave Dye (00:53:09):
I know. But yeah, it’s good. And also another thing is when people, I’ve had people like the Hugh Dolan, he asked me to work on this book because he’d seen my Anzac book. So that’s affirmation of what I did with the Anzac book. And I’ve had a lot of good feedback about the Anzac book. I know great feedback on that as well as I get good feedback on my comics as well. So I’m pretty lucky very fortunate to have nice fans, well nice people that greet them.
Sheydin Dew (00:53:48):
I think the comics community especially is just such a wonderful community to be a part of. I know myself, I’m very honored to be a part of it. So kudos to Shane in the corner there. Amazing. He’s done a good job. Connect us all. Another question that I had was to kind of feed off that one was like, I know you’ve done many, you’ve got many different works in your portfolio. What was your favorite comic to work on out of the ones we’ve just discussed?
Dave Dye (00:54:21):
Well, I don’t know if I’ve got a favorite.
Sheydin Dew (00:54:25):
Are they all your favorite?
Dave Dye (00:54:26):
Yeah, I dunno. I, I don’t think I’ve got a favorite. I enjoyed, I think that’s my good luck is that I, I’ve always been able to do what I like to do and because I like to draw, I draw what I like to do and I’ve had people have given me scripts and that I’ve read and they’ve been great to illustrate and do. And people actually paid me good money to do a story for them. And I’ve been very fortunate to receive good money for my services and I’m happy to do that all the time. But today I’ve just struggled a bit. I dunno if it’s the weather or what, but I’ve done much work today because I just felt a bit icky. I might be the humid humidity or something, I don’t know. But it’s a bit frustrating when you can’t work and you’ve got a story there you want and you, it’s all penciled and I’ve done most of the outlying ink and I’ve got to go back and drop in the blacks, the spot, the blacks and all that sort of stuff. And I just couldn’t get it in my head into it. And I did a little bit and smeared the pin ink across the page with the thing and go, oh, buy me <laugh>. Not today, today. I wish I had just stayed. Not worried about it at all. But anyway.
Sheydin Dew (00:55:59):
Well, considering your comic career and how busy you’ve been and how productive you’ve been over x, y, Z amount of years, I think you are welcome to have a day off here and there. I think you’re good.
Dave Dye (00:56:21):
I should have been smarter and recognized that when I smudged that ink, I should have just said, okay, that’s it. I’m not, stop it, I’m not doing anymore. Just stop it. You’re going to make a mess of things and sat down. And I did pretty much, I did, didn’t do much after that. I worked till about lunchtime and then the afternoon I just did other things. I got other little things, projects I got to do that aren’t related to drawing. And so I got on with those. So that’s probably the best thing to do, I think. But I think everyone, you sort of have your days when you just, things don’t just seem to, you can’t draw a stick figure, rub it out.
Sizzle (00:56:57):
That’s me every day Dave
Dave Dye (00:56:59):
<laugh> get it right. You know, trying to put a nose on a face or you, you’re just going to get the expression you want or something like that. I think I’ve heard a lot of other artists say something like that. So yeah, you just have those days. You just got to fights wrong.
Sheydin Dew (00:57:19):
Yeah, completely understand. Well we’ve talked about be Anza Legend and many more of your art, of your work that you’ve done over the years. Can you tell some of the viewers where to find you and your art and your comics?
Dave Dye (00:57:36):
Yeah, well the comics shop is stocks. All my stuff. You’ve got cut down and Time Fault.
Sizzle (00:57:45):
Yes I do.
Dave Dye (00:57:48):
And Blue Sage. So there are three books that I did with Roger STTs and he wrote those and Roger and I have got a little deal going on that if for only Indy for example, he’s, I’m on own indie and so is Roger. So I just advertise the books that I did alone. And he has his own section where he has cut down Time Fault and Blue Sage, so I don’t go in competition with him there. He, that’s all his stuff so he can have that. But I sell those on the comic shop and at conventions. Yeah, I think that’s the only two places own Indian comic shop. I did submit things to that pop-up shop in Melbourne, but I haven’t heard anything about what’s happened there. And there’s a thing in Ballarat, the Ballarat comic Shop. Yes. About that is I’ve sent an email to that person.
Sizzle (00:58:52):
Yeah, I’m trying to get more information so I don’t talk out of term so I’m not saying stuff that’s not right.
Dave Dye (00:58:58):
Okay. So I’ll shut up.
Sizzle (00:59:01):
No, no. If you know more than me go for your life.
Dave Dye (00:59:04):
No, I won’t say any more than that, but apparently the comic shop there is considering dropping all their American or foreign comics and just going Australian Indie.
Sizzle (00:59:19):
Yeah, sounds awesome.
Dave Dye (00:59:21):
Yeah, so hopefully that goes ahead and just keep your eye out for that everybody, if that goes ahead, there’s another outlet for you. Yeah, that’s it. That’s where you get my stuff. Yeah, that’s it. That’s where you get my stuff.
Sheydin Dew (00:59:35):
Yeah. Amazing. All right, awesome. Well now viewers know where to find you. I did want to wrap up this amazing talk with you, Dave with a few of the questions that I ask everyone on the show. And it’s basically, what is your favorite thing about the Australian indie comic community?
Dave Dye (00:59:57):
The community. Oh, well everyone’s majority of people. Very friendly and easygoing and very approachable. Oh well yeah, that’s it. It’s friendly and everyone has their moments I suppose, but generally everyone’s very good and supportive, which
Sheydin Dew (01:00:15):
Is great. And has there been a really, one of your favorite things to come out of it? It just been the community or the shows in general that Shane has put on
Dave Dye (01:00:26):
<laugh>? Yeah.
Sheydin Dew (01:00:28):
One is my favorite thing that’s come out of it.
Dave Dye (01:00:31):
Well I do and look forward to all the shows that we’ve got through the week as a, I was mentioning before the show there’s I think about four shows now, isn’t there?
Sizzle (01:00:42):
There’s four now. Yep. And there’s this show, Oz Comics, the Friday Drink and Draw and Sunday Spotlight.
Dave Dye (01:00:51):
Yeah. And it’s great. I tune in to every one of ’em and I look forward to every one of ’em. They’re fantastic. And I just want to at the end, Lee or Pete are going, oh, we’ll have to start winding up. I’m going, don’t wind up. Don’t wind up, keep going, keep going. I don’t want you to stop. I’m happy to. I’ll get another, I’ll top my glass up and sit in for another hour. Oh I really enjoy it.
Sheydin Dew (01:01:18):
I think it’s really nice, these shows you can definitely put them on in the background and us creatives are always working on something and I think it’s definitely, I dunno if any of the viewers can agree with this but it’s nice to have something in the background while you’re working. What better thing than Indie Australian comic creators.
Dave Dye (01:01:36):
That’s right. I do exactly the same thing. I’m drawing away. I watched Lee and Hayden last night and again while I was working today, I put him on again and listened to the show again. I’ve probably listened to who was it Peter Wilson and Spy the other night. Two or three times. Yep. I know. Just put it on in the background. I’m writing, you know, read this one, Dave. This one? Yeah. Oh well <laugh> probably have to watch this one to see what the made of myself.
Sheydin Dew (01:02:20):
You’re fine, you’re fine. Yeah. Well what’s one thing that you would like to see more of in the future, I guess in this community in general? I
Dave Dye (01:02:29):
Guess what more of I’d like to see more people getting involved with the comics the community. There’s so many thousands of creators out there and where there’s only a small fraction of them. As members of the comics community I’d like to see more people and more people come onto the show come back for the show watch the show, be involved. And I’d like to see more people interacting with each other. There were times if years ago when I was trying to interact with people and I found it very hard, people were actually having YouTube movies and I’d watch them and comment and whatever and I’d get no reaction and there’d be no follow up. And I really, because I live out on my own, I’m out in the bush up here in the Mai. I don’t have any other artists. We had a Mildura Zine Fair last year, and I thank goodness for the people in Melbourne who came up Ben Hutchins and that crowd down there from Squish face, they came up and filled the room. We had about 20 people selling their zines. I was the only local. So that’s how I am. I’m the only one here. I’m bit like Lee Chalker in Townsville, I’m on me, pat Malone. So this gives me the opportunity to meet more people, interact with the, and I’d really love this and I’d like to more people be involved with it so I can meet more people. Cause everyone I’ve met through the comic show have been really pleasant, nice people and I’d like them to get to know more. Yeah, great.
Sheydin Dew (01:04:30):
Absolutely. I think you being up in the Mai, I think you’re a trendsetter, Dave. I think you’re into your own up there. I love it. And same joker as well. Good on you both. But yeah, so if there’s any viewers tonight, I mean jump on board and if you are a creator too, then maybe you two can be on the show. But for all our viewers, if you don’t already know, like Shane did say beforehand, we do have four shows. One on Tuesday, which is the chinwag tonight on Wednesdays I’m only a fortnightly host. So our other host is Morgan Quaid. So you definitely have to tune in next week. Friday’s a drink and draw, which is our all time favorite, especially for me. So you have to tune in for that one as well. That one’s a crowd favorite as well as Sunday spotlights as well. So you have to tune in for those ones as well. But otherwise, Dave, it has been an absolute pleasure. Have you got anything to add Shane?
Sizzle (01:05:31):
Yes, I do. I’ll do the normal thing and I got to go on the right page here. Don’t forget to the video and subscribe to the channel. It’s very important. That helps us get to more people. It gets you notified when the next video is on so you don’t miss it. So yeah, don’t forget to do those things. That would be awesome. Yeah. So is that the show?
Sheydin Dew (01:06:02):
I think so, unless you’ve got anything to add, Dave. Otherwise, it’s been an absolute pleasure. But yeah, just to reiterate everyone, you can find Dave’s stuff on the X Shop, so head on over there if you are interested. It’s definitely worth a read. But otherwise, thanks for tuning in guys. I’m looking forward to seeing more shows this week, the Drink and Draw and the Sunday Spotlight. Otherwise, I’ll see you guys in Fortnite. Thanks for tuning in guys.
Sizzle (01:06:37):
Thank you very much. Have a great night everyone. Thank
Dave Dye (01:06:40):
You for having me. Bye.
Sizzle (01:06:42):
Pleasure, Dave.
Voice Over (01:06:43):
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