(All these comics, and more, are available to read in the ARCHIVE section)

Space Raoul was created sometime in 2001, initially as a sketch of a lumpy thing with bulgy eyes. Drawing a circle around his head instantly made him a space captain, obviously.

Note also the extensive thought process that went into deciding upon his name.

Raoul's first adventures (above) bore all the characteristics that would later come to define Space Raoul. Stupid alien criminals, weird spacey things, and a mention of pies.

A handful of stories were collected, intended as a series of comics. Even the covers were painted up and ready to go. But after one publisher said no, I gave up.

A couple of years later, Raoul found his way into the hands of The Funday Times (the comic supplement for UK newspaper The Sunday Times). He was given a handful of centre page spreads for his adventures. These were large pages originally hand-painted in goauche paint, each double-page spread taking a week to create. This was before I was aware Photoshop existed, and when I was stupid.

Fate, and some war, intervened in Raoul's story, and he disappeared from public life. Only to return, a year or two later, in a short series of one page strips. Photoshop made life easier for me, and the strips come to life.

Since then Raoul has been biding his time until he moved to The Dandy comic, where he sits merrily astride a 12-week run of double page stories, starting in 2007.

As for the future, who knows where he may find himself. His adventures so far will be collected together and released as a comic book or two some day in the near future. From there, there's alot of space left to explore, alot of aliens left to cosh, and alot of pies to consume...