As of writing (July 2024), this is probably my faavourite film that I’ve watched so far this year. Despite the title, there’s just something about it that feels overwhelmingly comforting, and I relate to Daisy Ridley’s Fran moreso than I have to any other fictional character (without the burden of sadness and the penchant for dreaming about death).


Often, on an evening, I like to colour my drawings from the comfort of a sofa and/or bed whilst I watch something on TV in the background. Usually a light film or something I’ve seen before. In July I’d somehow overworked my left wrist (despite it being non-dominant and useful for literally nothing), and so I had to pack in the colouring and give it a rest.

About 2 days in, I found myself getting restless, and decided that I would put my sketchbook in my lap and draw whilst I rewatched Sometimes I Think About Dying. It was a nice cure for wallowing and wanting to be cosy, and it was during my sketches that I decided I was going to build upon them to create a quick poster illustration for the film.

This was all done at about 11pm, and I think in my restlessness I was eager to get on and do it. My drawings usually take a long time, and so it’s not too often I find myself struck with the sudden urge to get something done immediately. But this was an exception, and I woke up bright and early the next morning to get a start on it.

Another rarity is that I got the whole thing drawn in a day. I did the piece fairly small by my own standards (roughly A4 on a sheet of A3) so that I wouldn’t be carried away by the details. I printed the logo and credits to trace, started pencilling at around 9am and was finished inking by 8pm- about 9.5 hours worth of work in total.


After some dinner I then spent another hour and a half cleaning up the scan and creating a rough colour palette. I knew how it was going to look; if you’ve seen the film it’ll be no surprise. I then spent a few hours here and there over the next week getting the piece coloured.


One big thing I like about this illustration is the way that I’ve drawn the sky. In some previous illustrations I’ve done (I won’t say which - have fun guessing) I’ve felt that there are a few sections that suffer from a lack of linework. It’s a tricky line for me to tread - too much and things start to get lost, or the composition becomes too much of the same, or too little and it sticks out as being bland. It was first with The Age of Wildness and Permission where I experimented with doing a light stipling approach for the sky. Previous clouds I’ve drawn have felt heavy and solid, and I felt the stipling worked wonders for making it feel lighter and more whimsical.



In this piece I was able to use the same approach to create a softer sky, something that fades and contorts and feels satisfying in a subtle sort of way. It also eliminates the need for me to use gradients - something which I find a bit tricky and a never ending slope to perfection. If I can manage to create the illustration using flat colours then I find it easier to cap the work and make it “final”. I also did the same technique for the road in the foreground.

It might be a phase, but this stipling/dot technique is definitely something that feels like a step forward and will almost certainly be cropping up in other pieces of my work.

Also, as an end to this ramble: Oscilloscope, if you happen to be reading this, please release the film on Blu-Ray. And if you need some cover art, I think this would work pretty spectacularly.