START YOUR ENGINES
Mortal Engines was an ambitious futuristic movie that took up 18 months of Ian McQue’s lifeGoing freelance has led to Ian McQue
shifting from games concept art to
cinematic productions, and one of his
favourite projects has been Mortal Engines,
a Peter Jackson film based on the books by
Philip Reeve. Ian was initially contacted in
2015 and ended up working on concept art
for the movie for about 18 months,
spending six of them in New Zealand.
“I lived my time there, made some great
friends and hung out with some of my Weta
heroes,” he says. “It was my first real
experience of how movies are made so
I was a bit wet behind the ears going in, but
learned a heck of a lot.”A post-apocalyptic revenge thriller with
ravenous mobile predator cities, attack
robots and cyberpunk airships, the movie
was the ideal playground for Ian, given his
love of designing enormous futuristic
vehicles. More than that, his concept work
on the film led to Ian being commissioned
by Scholastic for a new set of covers for the
series of books. “I ended up doing the
covers for those and the prequel trilogy
along with 40 illustrations for a new book of
three short stories, Night Flights, also set in
that world,” he says.
“Night Flights is possibly the thing I’m
most proud of since going freelance. It wasa real honour to work with Philip Reeve and
a stunning-looking book. Book illustration
was what I’d wanted to do on leaving art
college all those years ago, so it’s felt like
coming full circle.”
As well as on his Instagram, Ian’s
improbable futuristic vehicles, settings and
characters appear in four books of sketches
he’s published, which include Robots,
Mechs, Chroma, and Ruins & Robots. In
addition, four of his creations have been
produced as model kits by Industria
Mechanika, enabling you to build Remora,
Waldo, Wasps and Sky Mark vehicles. More
details at http://www.industriamechanika.com.JENNY HANIVER
The Jenny Haniver is the main
airship used by the protagonists
in Mortal Engines.LUX INTERIOR
Ian also created imagery to
capture the atmosphere in
the Jenny Haniver’s cabin.GASBAG
Ian’s penchant for unlikely
looking airships made him an
obvious choice to create
concept art for the film.All Mortal Engines images © Universal Pictures 2018Interview