schweizercomics:

lucybellwood:

SPEED COLOR!

So, a little background here: the commissioner of this piece requested a vessel from the early 1600s that could conceivably have been commandeered by John Ward (the pirate popularly known as the historical predecessor to PoTC’s Jack Sparrow). 

I decided to go with a full-rigged pinnace, and one of the best examples of the rig on the water today is the Kalmar Nyckel of Delaware. I didn’t have direct confirmation that Ward had commandeered a Dutch vessel at any point in his career—though there’s plenty of reference to members of his crew being Dutch, so it’s entirely possible—so I opted to give her a different paint job and run red flags, rather than Kalmar’s very fetching Dutch ones. 

I was interested to see that the cornucopia of “classic” pirate flags we associate with the trade today hadn’t come into use in the early 1600s. Rather, pirates would simply run red or black flags to alert and terrify their victims.

Anyway, there’s some detail for you all! Apologies to all the fabulous Kalmar crew who were looking forward to a proper portrait of their ship. I’ll do one in the future, I promise!

Dang, lookit this beautiful Lucy Pirate Ship commission!