In between all the other stuff (work, life, family, sleeping) I am, very slowly, learning Japanese. Not very seriously, it's a hobby, but I'm enjoying it.

My interest in things Japanese goes back to the 1980s when I got into martial arts, and through that developed an interest in Samurai, and through that an interest in Japanese film, and that led also, eventually, to an interest in some Japanese manga and anime.

As a karate teacher (I'm testing for my 5th dan next weekend, gulp!) I have some Japanese already, so it's nice to work out from there into more of the language. Also, as an artist, it's nice to be able to write it, the kana forms are very satisfying. At the moment just hiragana, but I'm currently working on katakana, and then I'll dive into some kanji.

a page from my workbook - Japanese names and karate kata written as hiragana

Years ago I came up wih the name for our karate club, Kanzenki, which consists of three characters for kanzen (perfect, complete, whole) and ki (spirit, life essence), reflecting the idea that through karate you can improve all aspects of your life.

This past summer one of our club members went to Okinawa to train with Hokama Sensei, whose bojutsu (staff) sytem we practice. Whilst there Hokama Sensei brushed calligraphy for our club - at the same time confirming my Japanese was correct (phew!). We now have banners featuring the kanji (Kanzenki dojo).

Kanzenki dojo banners and Hokama Tetsuhiro Sensei brushing the calligraphy

I have finally uploaded all the War Films Podcast episodes to my YouTube channel. This means all twenty of the Adventure Films Podcasts and the War Films Podcasts that Murray and I recorded between 2011 and 2021 are now available there.

There is a playlist for each (War and Adventure) and there is a playlist for all of them together. Of course the old blog still exists and they're also up on Apple Podcasts, but it seems that YouTube is the most accessible.

I don't know how the algorithm works on YouTube, but somehow the Golden Voyage of Sinbad episode has eleven-thousand views, with most of the others having a more-expected few hundred each.

I really enjoyed discussing these films with my brother, Murray, and I think they turned out to be pretty decent podcasts in the end. Give them a listen if you have a moment!

A quick note to say that I have ended my active participation on the platform that used to be known as Twitter. As I posted there yesterday, overall I have had a positive experience on the site, but I cannot actively engage with a platform whose current owner is a conspiracy theorist, promotor of misinformation, and a supporter of fascism and hate (and I don't use those words lightly).

I have not deleted my account, but it is locked, perhaps in the hope that one day the current owner will realise what a mess he's made of things there and it will pass into more enlightened hands. But I have removed links to my Twitter page and will no longer visit or update there.

I am not a strong user of social media - I'm just not very good at it! I certainly see the positives, and, as I said, that has mostly been my experience. And I have no criticism of anyone who continues to use Twitter - we all have out own priorities, whether business or personal, and I respect that. I am not losing much by opting out.

This blog remains my main home on the internet. I do have a Bluesky account which I am keeping engaged with, and the same goes for Instagram - so please consider giving me a follow at either or both of those, if you wish (see the community section on this page for more). Thank you!

Continuing my determination to have at least one blog entry a month this year and it's the final day, the final hours, of September, with nothing to show for it.

We had a very late-booked summer holiday - my first time in Spain, and my first time ever on the Mediterranean, at Sitges near Barcelona. It was very nice, if just about at the limit of my heat tolerence.

The Brambletye Box is still chugging along with this theatre scene, which (as already mentioned) was the genesis of the story ... a stage magician's assistant turning up to ask Julius Chancer for help. I'm really enjoying drawing it - despite the numerous audience-filled backgrounds!

I did end the month with a very nice and long overdue get-together, having dinner with Colin Mathieson (Zulu Water Cart Rescue) and his lovely wife, who were down for the Battles Through History event at the nearby Ardingly Show Ground. We worked out, rather shockingly, it's been seven years since we last met up, at Copenhagen Comics in Denmark. It's actually been that long too (the Munich show, three months after) since I've had any (real-life) interaction with comics folk at all! I need to get out more ...

The highly respected karate master, Soke Takayuki Kubota, has died at the age of 89. I record it here because he had a huge influence on my own karate as I trained at his Glendale dojo from 1985 to 1986, four to six times a week, gaining 3rd kyu under his tutelage.

Kubota's father was a jukendo expert (bayonet fighting) and during the war his home village took in two Okinawan refugees who taught the very young Kubota some karate. As a teenager he moved to Tokyo and hung around various dojos, training whenever and wherever he could, or just watching and learning. Kanken Toyama and Yasuhiro Konishi were two such sensei from this period.

Shotokan must have had quite an influence on him too - besides his numerous own kata his school teaches the Shotokan forms - though it is rarely cited in his biographies. But a Black Belt magazine interview from 1964 mentions Shotokan was his favourite "method" and that he was a member of the JKA at the time. Soon he was helping to train the Tokyo police and accompanying them into various dangerous situations, helping to forge his own 'hard and fast' style of karate further. More connections came as he taught at a variety of US military bases in Japan.

In 1964, invited by Ed Parker, 'Tak' Kubota brought his now named style, Gosoku Ryu, to the United States. He was present at the 1967 All-Star Tournament, giving demonstrations alongside the likes of Bruce Lee, Chuck Norris and his longtime friend, Fumio Demura. Some of these relationships hinted at his future 'side-hustle' in Hollywood, with roles in films alongside Charles Bronson and James Caan to name just a couple of his numerous appearances. Kubota's reputation continued to grow as he helped train the Los Angeles Police and invented the kubotan key-chain as a self-defense weapon.

I have a number of fond memories of my time at the Glendale dojo, including attending the 11th Annual IKA Tournament where So-Shihan (as he was called when I trained there) was presented with a 400-year old Tokugawa meditation bell. Kubota struck it three times and everyone present meditated to the nearly endless ring that the Shogun himself had once meditated to.

In a 1965 Black Belt magazine interview, Kubota summed up his 'Tokyo Way' of karate: "Practice the first form five years, one and a half hours every day. Begin kumite at the age of eleven. Now practice three hours every day; more kata! More waza! That's karate the Tokyo Way."

A quick post to let you know that, after a bit of a hiatus, The Brambletye Box comic returns online today.

You can read the latest strip here, which resumes after a four-page scene cut from the online preview, but available to Patreon supporters - and, of course, in the book when it comes.

As before, there is no update schedule, but there should be a few strips uploaded in the coming weeks (work and life stuff permitting!).

Late last night I started to see a trickle of Facebook posts claiming the great bande dessinée artist André Juillard had passed away. I couldn't find a source, but some of the announcements were from well-connected European BD figures, so it seemed to be correct, and, indeed, this morning it is, sadly, being more widely reported.

My first introduction to Juillard was with his self-written After the Rain (Apres la Pluie, 1998), translated into English by NBM in 1999, and then via his masterfully illustrated Blake and Mortimer albums, seven in all, written by Yves Sente, from 2000's La Machination Voronov (The Voronov Plot), to 2016's Le Testament de William S (The Testament of William S). On one of my visits to Germany, in Colne in 2014, my German publisher very kindly gifted me two volumes of Juillard art books (Péle-Méle) - I often flick through them when inspiration is running a little low!

Juillard's beginnings included drawing classes from the likes of Druillet (Lone Sloane), Mézières (Valérian) and Jijé with his first published work in 1974 for Formule 1 (previously Cœurs Vaillants, the first home of Hergé's Tintin and Jo, Zette and Jocko in France). He soon established himself as a devotee of the historical comic, adapting Romeo and Juliet and debuting his 13th-century set story, Bohémond de Saint-Gilles.

Widespread success was slow to come, but did soon arrive with Les Sept Vies de l'Épervier (The Seven Lives of Sparrowhawk, seven volumes from 1983 to 1991), written by Patrick Cothias and set in France at the beginning of the 17th century. This lead onto the series Masquerouge (Red Mask, ten albums from 1984 to 2004, written by Cothias and then Marco Venanzi). Juillard also teamed up with Jacques Martin (creator of Alix and Lefranc) for a Napoleonic series, Arno (three volumes, 1983-1987).

Juillard's reputation was now without question, and more work, both in comics and illustration followed, with portfolios and art books released to continued acclaim. He won the Grand Prix at Angoulême in 1996. His last few albums included Léna (with Pierre Christin, three volumes, 2006-2020), Double 7 (with Yann, 2018) and a return to Les Sept Vies de l'Épervier (with Cothias, 2014 and 2021). Before his death he had been working on a new Blake and Mortimer album, the series' 30th, Signé Olrik (Signed Olrik), set in Cornwall, and scheduled for an October 2024 release.

There is no doubt the world of comics has lost one of its master creators, but André Juillard leaves behind a legacy of incredible work, a treasure-trove of bande dessinée art of the highest quality.

I don't have a lot to show or tell from over the past few weeks. But I've been determined to make sure every month this year has at least one blog post, so here's some bits and bobs ...

Recent work on The Brambletye Box has mostly been writing, and I can't really show much about that. An article I wrote back in 2010 on the actual Brambletye House ruin was recently reprinted in a local community magazine - you can read it online here, and have a look at various images I've collected over the years.

In other Julius Chancer news, I have a new stock of Secret of the Samurai books - head on over to the shop to order a copy if you've been meaning to get one!

The other writing I've been doing, when I can, has been my first Tunnels and Trolls adventure in about, crikey, twenty-five years, I think. It's to play with my children over the summer holidays and is called 'The Well of Sarduk' - it's been great fun getting back into saving rolls, Monster Ratings, dungeon-building and so on. We'll see how it goes!

The other main thing in my life is the karate club I run, which is going pretty well with almost 40 members now. One new aspect for me, started last year, has been adding bojutsu to my repertoire (the bo is a 6' bamboo or oak staff, like a quarterstaff). A recent trip to Okinawa by some members of our head organisation has brought back lots of information and training material for us to work on. But I'm also going to have to step up my own karate training as I'll be testing for 5th Dan in November.

A short while ago I managed to make some new family history discoveries, resulting in finally being able to write something of the story of one of my more interesting antecedents, Thomas Levell Hammond. The article is here if you're interested in, or connected to, the Perthshire/Fife Ewings (or if you just like a bit of eighteenth and nineteenth century social and military history).

I've not been watching or reading much lately. I did start to watch the new Shogun on Disney+, but gave up half-way through (I may come back to it). Despite it being flash up-to-date with modern effects and direction I think it pales in comparison to the 1980s version with Richard Chamberlain and Toshiro Mifune - which had a much tighter script and even seems more authentic, despite its vintage.

In books my reading has dropped off with too many late nights, but I've been greatly enjoying the comic work of Olivier Schwartz, his Spirou stuff (especially the La Femme Leopard volumes) and his Atom Agency stuff. I'd seen an exhibition of his originals in Munich a few years ago - a fantastic artist.

Work on The Brambletye Box, which had been enjoying a pretty good flow of progress over the past couple of months, has come to a bit of a halt at the moment. It's just one of those things - work, life, family and stuff has all combined to slow things down. But it's by no means permanent, and I'll be back to it as soon as possible.

When things get going again - at the beginning of July I expect - I will once again be posting strips here on the website for the next scene after the previous one being available only on Patreon.

There have been a few changes in plans for The Brambletye Box as well, with the eventual book now being planned as two volumes instead of a single, big album. While this has meant a bit of re-jigging of the plot and script, it also means a book is likely to be appearing sooner rather than later (next year?), even if it is just a part one, but, after thinking about it quite a bit, it makes the most sense.

The next scene to draw is one that has been in my head since I first came up with the story several years ago and I'm really looking forward to getting into it. As ever, I greatly appreciate your patience and support - thank you!

AI art is pollution, infiltrating, poisoning the creative environment, spilling out and infecting search engines, timelines and archives. AI art is a lie, another step in the flood of disinformation and dilution of truth and facts.

AI art is not created, it is not made. It is churned out in a mechanised production line largely by those who do not have the ability or the patience for craft - organ grinders expecting applause for the complex sonata that emanates from the lever they push while not understanding a scale, chord or key.

AI users have to reign themselves in, for producing so much would reveal too readily what it really is - machine-produced mass content. It's the plastic tat of the gift shop, shiny but valueless, tawdry, throw-away.

AI art is for that friend who wanted to be your agent, your manager; you'd be the talent, do the work, and they'd rake in the cash. Now they've got AI there's no pesky artist in the way wanting creative control, just an acquiescent machine with which to overpopulate Amazon, Etsy and Ebay with colouring books, calendars, notebooks and art prints.

Some fall victim to the machine completely, believing they are the artists themselves. They will claim the 'text prompt' is a hard-won skill only a handful have mastered. Then some will claim there is no AI in their art at all. Out of nowhere they are producing full paintings, two or three a week, one a day if they're not careful, merely adding the flourish of a signature to make it theirs. Perhaps a previously amateur artist, now bursting with a brand-new style, but we never see the roughs, we never see the sketches, there is no video of their process.

Here they come ... festival brochures, event leaflets, book covers, comic strips, movie posters. The incredible wood sculpture made by a six-year old, the amazing historical photo no one has seen before, the viral video narrated by someone who may or may not be Morgan Freeman. The compromising picture of a loved celebrity, the off-mic comment made by a political opponent ... the video proof to justify a war.

AI art is trash and in that there is some hope, because those that use AI to promote their book festival, or their children's fun event, or their new novel, are broadcasting a certain set of values that most would reject if they knew: low-quality, cheap, insincere. The danger lies in an audience whose senses have been bludgeoned by a constant scrolling stream of thirty-second videos, forty-word posts, deepity-memes, and an internet media already full of charlatans, grifters, and conspiracy-pushers (it's no coincidence they are some of the biggest users of AI images).

Art is beautiful because it has been made by a fellow human being. Life is infused into human art. It is the mind laid bare for all to see. When you see art you like, you immediately think of the person who made it, you wonder about them - it is connection. Machine art is devoid of everything we relate to in human life. AI content is a climate disaster for the internet, an invasive species, a complete corruption of humanistic values. Reject it.