The decline of Ken Reid

[Mr McScotty]

Yeah I can't disagree with you Raven, Ken did use the profile shot a lot more than most. mostly I think as he could really draw faces very well indeed and he managed to capture in full gory detail the full opened mouth expression of horror in cartoon art - but he also mixed it up with the 3/4 profile etc (if that makes sense) plus some great full body shots - however in his last few years his profiles were (to me at any rate) a bit flat and were basically mostly very similar "talking head" shots (well drawn all the same) just in profile shots (few 3/4 faces etc) he also cut down on his backgrounds which you dont notice until they are not there - not in anyway to disparage Kens latter work it was always top notch just for me not a s good as the 60 - 70s work which for me was a comic zenith . I can imagine as a kid seeing Kens work against Robert Nixons (another fantastic artist) more animated style for the first time that Kens work would look "old fashioned" (or perhaps "Gothic" is a better word) as Ken drew his kids with blazers and caps, his old men looked like old men with canes, flat cap, bowlers, frayed jackets etc and no teeth/hair etc whilst Roberts take was more modern (ell for the 70s/80s) in design as well as style portraying people in more modern garb - but I agree even looking back on his 50s work Ken Reid's strip look very different from everyone else's ( yeah I know what you mean re " stiff" without being stiff lol)

[Raven]

Y I can imagine as a kid seeing Kens work against Robert Nixons (another fantastic artist) more animated style for the first time that Kens work would look "old fashioned" (or perhaps "Gothic" is a better word)

Or Dickensian, maybe!

[DavidKW]

I read Ken Reid died whilst drawing a "Faceache" strip. That's quite a dedicated way to go.

[Kid Robson]

I read Ken Reid died whilst drawing a "Faceache" strip. That's quite a dedicated way to go.

Well, he died with a Faceache page, unfinished, on his drawing board. I'm not sure whether he died whilst actually drawing it. I read the letter from his family to Buster, explaining that they'd like to keep it. It was pinned up on a board next to editor Allen Cummings' desk.

[Adam Eterno]

For any Ken Reid fans out there, I've just seen this on Ebay. Sorry for the short notice as there's only 7 hours to go as I type this!

http://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/Complete-coll ... 2807af19b9

[ISPYSHHHGUY]

As stated by others on here, my main criticism of Kens' work is his over-use of two characters taliking in mid-shot profile: he done many thousands of such frames, just all too similar....he must have wanted to draw like this though.


I still maintain he was the best British comics-artist ever though----possibly the best the planet ever bore [I haven't seen the work of every comics artist ever worldwide so I can't state further than: 'possibly the best'.]

[suebutcher]

It's hard to compare because there's so many different types of comic art, but Reid is the best comedy-horror artist I've ever seen. Baxendale was good at this too, but he didn't reach Reid's level of hilarious repulsiveness.

[ISPYSHHHGUY]

For a long time, I thought that Ken couldn't draw women ---he seemed to purposefully avoid drawing them, or maybe they just weren't in the scripts he got-------but he actually could draw good-looking women, I have seen at least one example he done on this subject.


Attractive women are amongst the hardest of all subjects to draw, even in cartooning, and even many otherwise excellent cartoonists draw women that look more like women wrestlers, when they are intended to look 'purty.' Many women in comics just look like 'men in wigs' which is a lot easier to draw because it is just a variation of the same drawing principles......many excellent artists went this route, and still do.

Drawing effective women requires a very different approach, there are fewer lines to work with so the artist has to get all of these lines spot-on, which takes a lot more skill than just burying everything in detail, which can be done with most other tricky subjects...2000 AD's Ian Gibson is one of the best UK artists at drawing effective cartoon women, I reckon.


Here are some CARTOON artists who I think are good at drawing nice-looking women [there ain't too many!]--add some of your own if you can think of any.


Dudley Watkins


Charlie Grigg


Ken Harrison

Barrie Appleby

[philcom55]

I think Ken himself said that he was never very comfortable drawing women (though he made an exception for Jonah's sister Jinx!)

[suebutcher]

You're right about fewer lines to work with, unless you want to draw an older woman. There are many artists who can draw conventionally pretty women, it was a commericially useful skill, but far fewer who can put real character into the drawings. But I like Edward Gorey, who had no trouble drawing either gender because his figures were practically sexless!

[philcom55]

I think there are certain conventions about the way both men and women are drawn that govern what we see. For example it's difficult to draw lips on a man without making him look too feminine, while lines on a woman's face nearly always make her look too old or masculine. Yet in a photograph such features rarely have the same effect.

[alanultron5]

I think his work on Dandy's "Big Head and Thick Headed" gets sometimes overlooked a bit! Some of those strips were amongst my very favourite comic strips ever in the 1960s. Check out the Dandy Annual released Sept 64 (Korky & Pantomime Horse cover) B& T strips easily the best in there-in my view.