TOM WILLIAMS

Old Forum Fella · Post by **Old Forum Fella** » 26 Feb 2006, 17:03

My father was a cartoonist with both Fleetway & DC Thomson from about 1970 up until his death in 2002. He drew many, many characters but hardly ever signed his strips so his work is relatively unknown. His more popular strips included Tiny Tycoon & Creature Teacher. I know he drew many others but my memory is bad & I live in Canada now! We used to have in his studio an absolute tonne of comics from that era, us kids used to take it for granted that comics would be coming through the post on a daily basis. Take care & thanks for your appreciation of all the work done by these cartoonists in the heyday of British comics! I just posted a little tribute to him over on Wilkpedia - hope you enjoy it. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Thomas_Wil ... toonist%29

Originally posted by Anonymous on the old forum on 2/1/2006

Old Forum Fella · Post by **Old Forum Fella** » 26 Feb 2006, 17:10

I remember seeing your father's lively artwork in many comics, so it's good to have a name to put to the style. He was always able to convey the story clearly, which isn't always as easy as some might think. Best regards to you and thanks for sharing your memories.

Originally posted by Lew Stringer on the old forum on 2/1/2006

Old Forum Fella · Post by **Old Forum Fella** » 26 Feb 2006, 17:11

I wrote scripts for your father, for several years during my time as a sub editor with DC Thomson?s in the late 70?s/early 80?s, in the early years of Nutty comic. I thoroughly enjoyed the Steevie Star stories we teamed up on. Each one was a spoof of a TV programme or film, with the eponymous hero taking on the key role. We covered everything from James Bond, through Star Trek and King Kong, to Fawlty Towers (one of my particular favourites), and I can only hope Tom had as much fun drawing them as I did writing them ? the best compliment I can pay him is it always looked like he did. His interpretation of the scripts was always spot on, and he would often put in his own very funny ?extras? to add to the fun. Sadly, I never actually met him, and our only regular communication back then was notes scribbled on the scripts. I was very sad to hear of his death in 2002. I echo Lew?s thanks for these memories of Tom ? he played a big part in that chapter of my life back then, and was one of a number of artists that inspired me to follow into the profession.

Originally posted by Steve Bright on the old forum on 2/1/2006

Old Forum Fella · Post by **Old Forum Fella** » 26 Feb 2006, 17:12

Hi Steve The thing I remember about the Steevie Star strip was the fact it required a lot of research to find images of the celebrities you were asking him to draw - in these days you would just go on the internet but in 1981 it meant us being asked to go through stacks of TV Times, Radio Times etc to find good pictures of the stars in question. Thanks for your kind words Steve -he was a one off & it was strange that as kids growing up in a house full of comics with a father drawing all sorts of characters we took it entirely for granted! I was the post boy often taking his art work down the road to the post office on it's way up to Dundee to be printed - times have changed i guess!

Originally posted by Anonymous on the old forum on 2/1/2006

Old Forum Fella · Post by **Old Forum Fella** » 26 Feb 2006, 17:12

Indeed so. Some of us now scan our pages into our Apple Macs and e-mail the artwork to the editor. So the pages don't even leave the studio/back bedroom.

Which means we can finish the art on the day of deadline instead of the day before.

Originally posted by Lew Stringer on the old forum on 2/1/2006

Old Forum Fella · Post by **Old Forum Fella** » 26 Feb 2006, 17:13

Not half - all my work is sent by email these days, and picture refs are in plentiful supply via Google and other search engines. You had me feeling a little guilty there, if it were not for the fact that I have done my stint of searching newspapers and mags, often driving miles to the local library in (the usually vain) search for one decent picture of whoever/whatever I was after.

However, I fully recognise that the Steevie Star story must have been a particular nightmare where that was concerned, and it's all credit to your father that the finished jobs were obviously drawn with a great deal of familiarity of the subject matter. I only wish he'd have asked at the time - we had a pre-Internet search enging at DC Thomson called Photo-files, which was a kilobyte-free machine run on people power, employed to search out pictures that had been used in the various DCT newspapers and journals. To my shame, I never thought to use it when I sent off the scripts back then. I offer my belated apologies, but I'm glad you remember your involvement the whole process with such...erm, frantic affection.

Times have indeed changed, but the essence of drawing comic pages remains very much as it was, and your Dad was an unique and shining example of that.

Originally posted by Steve Bright on the old forum on 2/1/2006

Old Forum Fella · Post by **Old Forum Fella** » 26 Feb 2006, 17:14

Woops - looks like Lew and I posted around the same time. I was of course responding to the post before Mr Stringer's...but then you knew that....I'll shut up now.

Originally posted by Steve Bright on the old forum on 2/1/2006

Old Forum Fella · Post by **Old Forum Fella** » 26 Feb 2006, 17:14

No probs Mr.Bright!

It's interesting how times have changed re artwork. A few decades ago publishers insisted on having the original art and never returned it to their artists (as I'm sure you know). I think it was 2000 AD that started returning art (thanks to Kevin O'Neill if I remember correctly) and the other IPC comics followed suit IF the artists requested it.

I might be wrong on the origins of art-return, as it was 20 plus years ago when the procedure changed, but in any case it's good to keep the originals.

Originally posted by Anonymous on the old forum on 2/1/2006

Old Forum Fella · Post by **Old Forum Fella** » 26 Feb 2006, 17:16

No problems Steve - it was never a chore looking for these images & my dad was a luddite of the first order when it came to technology! All the drawings were pen & ink & he was always fussing about his pen nibs, ink & paper (Oram & Robinson seems to ring a bell paper wise). I don't think he ever retained much original artwork - my sister has some back in the UK & piles & piles of dusty old comics. I just remember the drawings were packaged up & posted to Dundee almost every day.

Originally posted by Graeme on the old forum on 2/1/2006

Old Forum Fella · Post by **Old Forum Fella** » 26 Feb 2006, 17:16

I was that Luddite too, Graeme (thanks for the name) ? it was my younger brother who turned up on my doorstep several years back with a computer he?d built out of spares who changed all of that. He?d driven 250 miles, so I felt slightly obliged not to tell him to take it away. Up till then, I own up to an old green screen Amstrad for word processing, and a fax machine to enable me to work from home as an editorial cartoonist for a newspaper with same-day deadlines, but I had fiercely resisted heading down the technology path, and was equally proud that the instruments I used to draw cartoons were very similar to those who did the job 100 years before me. It still took a lot of trial and error before I got into using the computer for work (and I?m still learning on the job), but as Lew and I have already hinted, there are significant benefits to the technology for cartoonists, not least being the bonus that you keep all your original artwork, and only send electronic digital images (the ONLY reason I have any of my DCT work at all, Lew ? they still hang on to the originals of those artists who haven?t gone ?cyber?, as far as I know).

I haven?t sold out altogether though ? there is an increasing number of cartoonists I know who are now actually drawing using their computers, and extremely effectively too. The best of these are so skilled, you wouldn?t know they are using a Wacom tablet and mousepen, though I do find it amusing that they go to such great lengths to achieve a ?natural? look to their drawings with technology. I still love using a pencil, and a nibbed dip pen to ink with. The work only sees a computer once the pages are inked in, then they are scanned and coloured before being emailed to Dundee. Perhaps I?ll give the Wacom method a serious try some day, but for now I?m happy to have the original, physical pages at the end of the process, especially having been denied that for so many years.

From a personal viewpoint, Graeme, I?m glad your father refused to give in to technology, if it means there are literally thousands of pages of his artwork in existence (and it must be thousands). The real shame is that you have so little of it to remember him by, although you obviously have many cherished memories for that. Thanks again for sharing some of them.

Originally posted by Steve Bright on the old forum on 3/1/2006