As the hundreds of tiny dots grew more numerous, a face started to emerge from the napkin Glenn Fitzpatrick was drawing on.

The former Gulf War soldier was feeling down about his prospects as an artist when he took a break from eating a lunchtime sandwich at the No. 84 Tearoom in Parrock Road one day in August.

Overwhelmed by a sudden urge to draw but without any materials to hand, he took a gel pen to a paper napkin.

The 43-year-old told News Shopper: "I ripped the first one I tried to draw on so I ended up using dots.

"It started to look like an old friend of mine so I brought up a picture on my phone and finished it that way.

News Shopper:

Glenn's winning entry.

"People just kept looking over, thinking ‘what’s this chap doing drawing on a serviette?’

"Someone said ‘go on Glenn, hold it up’ so I did and the sunlight passed through the picture and I thought ‘wow, that’s really ghostly’.

"It was almost like you could touch the past with it."

After wowing fellow customers at the café, Glenn decided to mount his creation on a fireguard and enter it in prestigious art competition The Big Draw.

His piece was one of 12 out of 400 chosen for a commendation by the Society of Graphic Fine Art in the category of remembrance.

Glenn, who lives in Brown Road, Gravesend, picked up his award from BBC journalist Andrew Marr at a ceremony at the Menier Gallery in central London on October 6.

News Shopper:

Also known as Fitzy, Glenn first discovered his talent when serving in the first Gulf War as a trooper in the Irish Hussars.

He said: "I was so bored in the desert I started doodling.

"A sergeant looked over and said I could draw a motif on the side of a tank.

"The fashion was for Viz characters and I did one and soon all of the chaps wanted one so I exchanged my services for sweets and cigarettes and that was my first art initiative."

As well as carrying on with his dotty pictures, Glenn enjoys sculpture and other forms of art.

He said: "I like anything I can get my hands on and create and otherwise take advantage of.

"From war to art I have made a journey that has really liberated my soul."