Getting back to sketches that have nothing to do with the book, here’s a fresh one. Subject: the dreamy Ryan Reynolds. Bizarre sort of reference… looked like he had a mustache.

As promised, here are a few of the designs I did for one of the segments in last night’s episode of MAD on the Cartoon Network:

From “Capt. America’s Got Talent”:

Originally I did this character with a “shake weight” as part of a gag but it got changed to a spring-based chest exerciser… too much?

Summer draws to a close and the drawing board is heating up. Here’s what I have going right now:

• Cover Illustration for the UTNE Reader- Kind of like my last cover for them, only different!
• Spot Illustrations for Cleveland Magazine- Fun little job for the city publication
• Jeff Dunham work- More illustrations for Jeff. I’m told he will have a TV special soon that reveals some of the stuff I’ve been doing for him (even credits me for it!) and when that airs I will be able to finally show off some of the work I’ve been doing.
• CG Animated Character Designs- More work for RG Entertainment that I did stuff for on their films Super Capers and I Want Your Money. The animated segments from I Want Your Money caught the interest of a company that is producing a series of over 20 commercials using the same characters. So I am now doing more turnarounds including Ben Bernanke and Pat Boone. No idea when they will start airing, but I’ll let you know.
• MAD- Something supposedly coming this week for issue #512, unless they got blown away by Hurricane Irene.
• Personal commission- No kidding, this one has been overdue for six years. Embarrassing. However seeing as how I finally got my book done, which I had been trying to do for about 10 years, this one seems like I’m rushing it.

Here’s some work I did recently for the Marlin Co. Click either image for a closer look:

Final illustration

Pencil rough

Q: Have you ever been asked to do a job that you weren’t comfortable with for philosophical or ethical reasons? How did you handle it?

A: Yes, I have had a few occasions where I have been approached to do some job that I was not comfortable doing. I handled it by politely turning it down.

What kind of jobs? Well, I am a pretty open-minded sort of guy, so there isn’t a whole lot of things that would bother me to the point of refusing to do work associated with it. There are shades of definition in everything, but in simplest terms I won’t do work that conclude the following:

• Pornography
• Promoting drug/alcohol use to kids
• Blatant and/or malicious racism, sexism or any other type of hate or discrimination directed at a person or group of people

A lot of what I feel falls into those categories is open to debate over definitions. Nudity is not pornography in my book, as long as it is done tastefully and is important to the context of the illustration and whatever story it is illustrating. I do work for Penthouse, and the first thing I told them when they called me was I would not do any real pornography, to which they said they would only consider me for work I was comfortable doing. Some of it has involved nudity, but I was allowed to present it in the way I wanted, and have been very happy with the work I have done for them over the years. I have not crossed my idea of “the line”, and they have not asked me to. I have been asked several times to do work for porno publications and websites, to which I have said a polite, “No thanks”.

As far as drugs and alcohol, I’d be reluctant to do any job that truly glorified the use of drugs in general, but if it is aimed at kids then that is out of the question. That includes cigarettes. I have done plenty of jobs that depicted drinking alcohol, usually in humorous ways, and some that treated drugs in the same way, but again that is not quite what I mean by “promoting drugs or alcohol”. Mostly it would come down to if I thought the article in question was promoting the use to kids, or presenting the use of really bad drugs as being acceptable at any age… I’m talking heroin, crack or the like.

As far as the discrimination thing goes, there is a difference between un-PC level humor and real, intentional hate speech. Those jobs must past the “sniff test”—if they smell bad they are bad, and I pass. Some people may disagree that something I thought was just an off-color or somewhat insensitive joke to be a horribly hateful, racist thing, but there are plenty of people in the world who are way too sensitive about that kind of thing, and everyone has their own ideas about that. If I feel what I am doing is not meant to be hateful, I am content with that decision.

Thanks to Grant Jonen for the question. If you have a question you want answered for the mailbag about cartooning, illustration, MAD Magazine, caricature or similar, e-mail me and I’ll try and answer it here!

This week I have started getting a few PayPal transaction disputes from people who have ordered the book and are wondering why they haven’t gotten it yet.

Huh?

I am sure I have been very clear about this- all orders right now for the book are PREORDERS. The printing process is going on right now, as we speak (figuratively), in Korea through Asia Korea Printing, and the bound copies will shortly be shipping to me here in Minnesota. Printing was delayed somewhat by come color/value issues with the proofs, but that has been resolved and I had taken possible technical delays into account when estimating shipping dates. We are still on track for shipping copies in September, it’s just going to be late instead of early in the month. It takes a long time for thousands of copies of a book to ship from Korea to the U.S., as it comes by ship and train.

If I was not clear about the fact that an ordered copy of the book will not ship immediately, and that anyone who places the order is looking at late September (and actually we have so many pre-orders that new orders are looking at early October before we get caught up with fulfilling all orders) as when the books will ship, then I apologize. If this is making you nervous, please email me with your PayPal order number and I will issue you a complete refund and remove you from the shipping queue, which will be fulfilled in the order in which it was received. Please DO NOT open a “PayPal Dispute” to do this… those are for disputing transactions where the seller is not living up to their guarantees… and that is not the case. Note that you will lose your place in the shipping queue if you do this, but I don’t want to keep anyone’s money who is not comfortable with the wait.

I will be sending out a book printing update email on Monday or Tuesday to everyone who has placed a pre-order via PayPal.

Click for a closer look…

This Friday’s sneak peek of my upcoming book The Mad Art of Caricature! is the beginning of Chapter 4: Drawing and Caricaturing the Features. This chapter details how to draw and caricatures the main facial features: the eyes, the nose, and the mouth. While it incorporates much of the information found in my online tutorials, this chapter goes into much more detail and includes dozens of additional illustrations . The chapter contains 33 pages and over 90 illustrations! You can preview other chapters here.

The book is currently under production in Korea, and will shortly be shipping to my doorstep—immediately after which all pre-orders will be filled and shipped. If you want to get a jump on the getting the book, you can pre-order it today!

Season two of MAD on the Cartoon Network will debut this Monday, Aug 29th. at 8:30/7:30 Central Time. According to the show’s website, the first episode will feature two segments I worked on: “Konan the Kardashian” and “Capt. America’s Got Talent”… I’ll leave it to your imaginations to figure out what those will be about.

I will post some of the art I did for the segments on Tuesday.

This week’s sketch is another from my studies for the Secret Agent Man print (limited edition prints still available!)- this one is the final pencil sketch of Sean Connery.

As promised, a look at the art for “Parks and Regurgitation” in MAD #511.

Click for a closer look…

Pencil Roughs- Click for a closer look…

I have to say that Nick Offerman, who plays Ron Swanson in the show, might be my favorite person to caricature ever for MAD… and that is saying a lot.

On news stands tomorrow and in comic book shops today:

MAD # 511 (October 2011)

• Cover (Charles Akins)
• The Fundalini Pages (Matt Lassem, Hermann Mejia, John Caldwell, Kenny Keil, Kit Lively, Marc Hempel, Glen LeLievre, Pater Bagge, Ward Sutton, Scott Nickel, Sam Viviano, Garth Gerhart)
• Parks and Regurgitation (Arnie Kogen, Tom Richmond)
• Dictators Next to be Overthrown (Jeff Kruse, Tom Bunk)
• 12 Good Things about Y0ur Smoking Addiction (Teresa Burns Parkhurst)
• Spy vs. Spy 50th Anniversary Poster (Various)
• Overheard at the Kardashian Wedding (Jacob Lambert and Jeff Kruse, Rick Tulka, Colors: Tom Luth)
• Planet TAD!!!!! (Tim Carvell, Brian Durniak)
• A MAD Look At Lady Gaga (Sergio Aragonés, Colors: Tom Luth)
• Satellite TV Listings (Writer: Jeff Kruse)
• MAD Presents… Still More Facts that Sound for a Second Like They Might Be True… But Aren’t (Justin Heimberg, Kevin Pope)
• The Strip Club (Vic Black, Box Brown, Christopher Baldwin, Jason Coates, Jason Yungbluth, Jacob Lambert, Douglas Paszkiewicz)
• Spy vs Spy (Peter Kuper)
• Disturbing Facts about the Incoming Freshman Class of 2015 (Writer: Scott Maiko)
• MAD Fold-In (Al Jaffee)
• Drawn Out Dramas (Sergio Aragonés)

My work in this issue was the art for a six page parody of the TV show Parks and Recreation, written by Arnie Kogen. I will post a sneak peek of that tomorrow.

What are you waiting for, clod?!? Go out and buy a fershlugginer copy already!