Can you be an ex-student? I don’t think you can.

I studied Media Production and Film and Television Production at college and university. One of the first things my head of media at college said was ‘Learning how this works is probably going to ruin films for you’.

It didn’t. It gave me a huge appreciation for what happens behind the scenes, camera work, sound, lighting. The machine of production.

As a media student, my introduction to Dune was via Lynch’s 1984 masterpiece. And it was a masterpiece. Over-ambitious, abstract, clearly unfinished and bonkers. I’d watched this movie tens of times before I read the books, so I went in to reading Herbert’s Dune with an image already formed in my mind.

I set myself a task of reading the books before Villeneuve’s 2021 movie Dune: Part One was released. That didn’t quite go to plan as I’d only made it towards the end of Children of Dune when the first movie came out.

I drew these images watching parts 1 and 2 at home with a pad and a stick of charcoal. They’re a mix of Villeneuve’s interpretation of Stilgar, Jessica and Baron Harkonnen, and the faces I saw as I read the books.