A look at some rarities of the last RWS artist, Clive Spong. Music can be downloaded here: sodorislandmodels.bandcamp.com/ Feel free to tip for the content I make here: ko-fi.com/sodorislandmodels
This was a really cool video. Being an american, Chris' books and by extension Spong's art is hard to come by so I really appreciate videos like this 👍🏻
I think Spong's one of the better artists in the RWS simply because he's pretty consistent, and overall I feel the proportions are pretty good. It's also amazing that you have a print copy of TIOS, congrats on finding that!
It's fun seeing artworks of the Railway Series illustrators I've never seen before. The Royal Mail one might be my favorite done by Spong. I would like to see an indepth look on the pop-up books.
In the picture where Wilbert Awdry is looking down from a bridge at Thomas Henry Gordon and James; as he’s looking older and the majority of the stories Clive Spong illustrated were during the 80s and 90s that picture could take place anywhere during those times but before 1997 obviously. Maybe it would be set after the events of Thomas and the Fat Controllers Engines when it was the RWS’s Golden Jubilee and Wilbert Awdry canonically decided to go to the celebration at Tidmouth where after he wanted to see some of the engines he featured himself.
@@sodorislandmodels6332I’ve also thought for the TV Series canon (where things are different from how they happened in the RWS and both are obviously two different universes) everything would be set at least before 1997 when Wilbert Awdry died due to him appearing all the way up to Season 24. And the fact Russia is shown as where Ivan’s from where the Soviet Union ended in 1991 with Russia coming back to be in 1992 means I’ve thought things from The Great Race-Season 24 would be set from 1992-1996. Though there’s the issue with Zhangye Danxia in China appearing in BWBA and Zhangye National Park in real life was said to be established in 2005 almost 10 years after Wilbert Awdry’s death in real life though since this is the TV Series universe we can just assume some railway in China just decided to build a railway line through these mountains before the idea of making a national park there was decided.
this is cool! there used to be a small shop in a town not too far from me that sold international toys and books called European Toys And Books that sadly closed down back in 2005 or 2006 and had tons of Thomas the tank engine items including the entire pop up book series i think. i remember going there before my family and i went on vacation that year and i got a couple of the items for the trip specifically to entertain me :) i dont think any of the items i had were spong illustrated but i do remember seeing them in 94 or something.
I think Christopher Awdry only started writing the Railway Series in 1983 due to the Thomas the Tank Engine & Friends TV series, which would have been in production then.
