For an explanation of all this – see here.

More of the “non-winners” of the Cape/Observer Graphic Short Story Prize. ……

(David Enker – The Sleeper.)

(John Riordan – Olympus School)

(Nigel Gilbert – Starcross’d)

(Paul Francis – Tower Hamlets.)

(Sally Romagueras – My White Dad)

And The Winner Isn’t: Introduction to the idea.

And that is it for this year. Hopefully you’ve seen something in all of these exmples that has made you investigate further. It’s good to see so much good work out there.

Updates on the entries are also on the Comica site and the Cape/Observer 2009 Graphic Short Story Prize Flickr stream.

For an explanation of all this – see here.

Last weekend we extensively covered a lot of the “non-winners” of the Cape/Observer Graphic Short Story Prize. The plan was that we’d just do those few posts and move on. Except all this past week I’ve been seeing more and more of the entries crop up online. So, if it’s okay with all of you out there, I thought I might put a few more up here for your viewing delight:

(Francesca Cassavetti – Age Of Innoncence)

(James Milroy – Waiting For Banksy)

(Paul Shinn – Digital Love)

(Aidan Potts – Ropomo)

(Moel Fox – Cow.)

And The Winner Isn’t: Introduction to the idea.

For an explanation of all this – see here.

To end our little look at the great works entered for the Graphic Short Story Prize we have two familiar names to the regular readers of this blog. First up Jim Medway, who comes up with the beautiful and frankly hilarious Paul Crystal, Graphic Designer. But, like Jim says: “For the benefit of those who are not Observer readers (the foreign and the non-middle class), the story pokes fun at the pretensions of many of their features, whilst berating the Saturday Guardian (same publisher) for so savagely dropping the Comic section. Which might be why I didn’t win”. I was very tempted to run all four pages here – we do get “proper” comics from page 2!

And after Jim Medway we have Andi Watson to close out our look at all of the entries that didn’t win this year. Andi, as you should know is the very talented creator of Glister, Breakfast Afternoon, Slow News Day and Little Star amongst others. His work is always a delight and could very well be exactly what you’re looking for this Christmas to give as presents to all your family. He takes the interesting route of using his 4 pages to do his own little “choose your own adventure tale” of Derek’s Dreadful Dungeon Diversion. Typically wonderful.

(Jim Medway – Paul Crystal, Graphic Designer)

(Andi Watson – Derek’s Dreadful Dungeon Diversion)

And that’s it. Hope you enjoyed our little wander through some of the entries for this years Observer / Cape Graphic Short Story Prize. I think the quality of what we’ve seen is pretty damn good, don’t you?

And The Winner Isn’t: Introduction to the idea.

For an explanation of all this – see here.

Fire Sermon by Sion Smith and Charlotte Rose (available as an free ebook here) – a very different style from a lot of the entries it seems, and Sion says on the Tales From The Zodiac Lung blog that “they were obviously looking for something very different from what we could have ever delivered. I’m seriously not bitter at all because the deadline made me finish something faster than I would have normally“. And following that we have Richard by Hannah Forward, which certainly packs the most panels into it’s four pages – and apologies for the resolution of the piece. I’d recommend clicking through to Hannah’s blog for the bigger, more readable version. And bringing this post to a close we have Fwendly Fruit’s Zany Adventure by Mickey Lam

(Sion Smith and Charlotte Rose – Fire Sermon)

(Richard by Hannah Forward.)

(Fwendly Fruit’s Zany Adventure by Mickey Lam)

And The Winner Isn’t: Introduction to the idea.

For an explanation of all this – see here. Three very different styles on show with these entries, first up is Laurie J Proud’s entry Aubrey, which brilliantly features the line “We moved away in 1948 after Dad went mad and burned the shed down”. And then there’s Maddy Vian‘s IDEAS – Maddy is very probably the baby of the bunch – just 17 and producing some very nice work already. And we have Dan Archer’s The Right To Return and finally Khaled Abou Alfa presents Coffee Beans. Khaled is also trying to get together some sort of anthology publication of the Graphic Short Story Prize entries – details here.

(Laurie J Proud – Aubrey)

(Maddy Vian – IDEAS)

(Dan Archer – The Right To Return)

(Khaled Abou Alfa – Coffee Beans)

And The Winner Isn’t: Introduction to the idea

For an explanation of all this – see here. Hugh Raine up first, whose very funny comics we featured here, with his entry Maryl. Following that is Matilda Tristram’s entry Sloth and Spiders and finally for this post, from the ever growing Flickr group here’s the entry by “Thorsten Sideb0ard“. I’ve looked but I can’t find the artists real name anywhere – can anyone help?

(Hugh “Shug” Raine – Maryl)

(Matilda Tristram – Sloth & Spiders)

(Thorsten Sideb0ard)

And The Winner Isn’t: Introduction to the idea

For an explanation of all this – see here. Three very different styles on show with these entries, first up is David Litchfield’s entry Bill and Joyce, which I found from the developing Graphic Short Story Prize Flickr group. And then there’s Flu Fighters by Key NG. And finally we have Martin Simpsons Tinned Peaches – we reviewed Martin’s Unmasked here on the blog in 2008.

(David Litchfield – Bill and Joyce)

(Key NG – Flu Fighters)

(Martin Simpson – Tinned Peaches)

And The Winner Isn’t: Introduction to the idea

For an explanation of all this – see here. Next up we have the entry from the writer and artist team of Jason Cobley and Paul Harrison Davies – a reworking of their Hugo The Zombie strip from the Accent UK Zombies special. Following that we have the entry by illustrator Frances Castle as she presents a tale of genealogy and strange regurgitations – Sherwin Cottage and we close with a funny strip on that difficult question every woman faces over the D.O.B. Question by Natalie d’Arbeloff.

(Jason Cobley & Simon Harrison Davies – Hugo The Zombie)

(Frances Castle – Sherwin’s Cottage)

(Natalie d’Arbeloff – The D.O.B. Question)

And The Winner Isn’t: Introduction to the idea

For an explanation of all this – see here. To kick things off, the first “non-winner” that I saw online a couple of weeks ago: Rob Davis. Rob put his excellent entry “How I Built My Father” up on his blog here, complete with a little explanatory commentary here. And then David O’Connell brings us Blip, featuring a very pretty and fun story of the four elements. Finally for now, Luke Pearson’s Some People.

(Rob Davis – How I Built My Father.)

(David O’Connell – Blip)

(Luke Pearson – Some People)

And The Winner Isn’t: Introduction to the idea.

Last weekend, the Observer/Cape Graphic Short Story prize was announced. Our post on it is here, together with rather a lot of comments. Even before the winner’s announcement I had been thinking it would be nice to put up a few of the “non-winners” as the quality of the work looked really high. But since the competition ended, more and more strips have been posted and there’s quite a heated conversation going on about the rights and wrongs of the winning entry.

So before we start looking at the “non-winners” I’d just like to clarify a couple of things:

1. The Cape/Observer competition was just that – a competition. The judges picked the winner based on their opinions. You might have picked differently. I might have picked differently. It doesn’t matter. The judges decision, as they say, is final.
2. This series of posts is not intended as a slight on the winner and runner-up, more a celebration of the quality around the competition this year.
3. And that title above is obviously tongue in cheek! Because, like it says on the Random House Graphic Short Story Prize page:

“We ended up receiving an absolutely record breaking number of entries this year. Quantity was without a doubt matched by quality and the judges … had an extremely hard task on their hands picking just two winners. The increase from two to four pages of the Observer Magazine allowed for the development of some fantastic narratives and ambitious artwork.”

So over the weekend we’ll be running a few of these “non-winners” for you and you can see for yourself exactly how high the quality was. We’ll just put the first pages – it’s then up to you to go and investigate further…..

One very nice idea that came from the comments on our original post, was Frances’ idea to set up a Cape/Observer Flickr photostream to showcase the entires. And here it is – and it’s filling up very quickly. Like most Flickr groups it requires registration, but that doesn’t take too long.

Also, Khaled Abou Alfa writes to let us know that he’s thinking of putting something together around the entries – details here.

Okay, these are the entries we’ve seen so far……

The Winner for 2009: Vivien McDermid – Paint (available to read here: page 1, page 2, page 3, page 4, or online here.)
Runner Up 2009: Joff Winterhart – Days of Bagnold Summer (available to read here: page 1, page 2, page 3, page 4.)

Khaled Abou Alfa – Coffee Beans
Dan Archer – The Right To Return
Francesca Cassavetti – Age Of Innoncence
Frances Castle – Sherwin’s Cottage
Jason Cobley & Simon Harrison Davies – Hugo The Zombie
Natalie d’Arbeloff – The D.O.B. Question
Rob Davis – How I Built My Father.
David Enker – The Sleeper.Paul Francis – Tower Hamlets
Moel Fox – Cow
Nigel Gilbert – Starcross’d
Hannah Forward – Richard
Key NG – Flu Fighters
Mickey Lam – Fwendly Fruit’s Zany Adventure
David Litchfield – Bill and Joyce
Jim Medway – Paul Crystal, Graphic Designer
James Milroy – Waiting For Banksy
David O’Connell – Blip
Luke Pearson – Some People
Aidan Potts – Ropomo
Laurie J Proud – Aubrey
Hugh “Shug” Raine – Maryl
John Riordan – Olympus School
Sally Romagueras – My White Dad.
Paul Shinn – Digital Love
Thorsten Sideb0ard
Martin Simpson – Tinned Peaches
Sion Smith and Charlotte Rose – Fire Sermon
Matilda Tristram – Sloth & Spiders
Maddy Vian – IDEAS
Andi Watson – Derek’s Dreadful Dungeon Diversion