Q: Have you or any caricature artists you know been sued by a celebrity for using their image in a caricature?

A: The area of law you are referring to is called the “right of publicity”, and I have written a number of blog posts about this subject over the years. The short answer to your question is no, I have never been sued nor to my knowledge has any specific caricature artist been sued for a caricature of a celebrity. The closest I ever got was when Arnold Schwarzenegger walked by my caricature booth at the Mall of America years ago and saw his caricature as one of my samples. He demanded we take it down. We refused, citing it was

1. Not for sale
2. Being used to demonstrate our abilities to capture a likeness, for which we needed to display someone who would be identifiable, thus fair use.

He left and we never heard back from him… he was probably too busy knocking up his household servants to bother.

While no caricaturist I know or have heard of has been sued,  a few I know have been threatened with legal action, and there have been many right of publicity cases that involved portraits or, in one case involving the afore mentioned Governator, a bobblehead. I see a lot of caricaturists selling prints of their work that not only probably violate specific celebrity’s right of publicity, but corporate copyright and trademark as well (doing a caricature of an athlete showing their team uniform, for example, violates the pro sport’s leagues trademark). These artists are leaving themselves wide open for being sued—and losing.

Here is a long-winded but comprehensive blog post I did years ago on the subject, complete with references to specific court cases:

Caricature and the Right of Publicity

A few years ago a colleague of mine who does party caricatures in southern California was contacted by comedian Jay Leno about an ad the artist had in the local Yellow Pages. The artist had used a caricature he had done of Leno as part of his ad, and Leno took exception to that. According to the artist, Leno was quite nice about it, but made it plain he did not want to see his image used for advertising this artist’s services. Leno did not sue, but he did ask for the artist to stop using his image, and if he did not a lawsuit likely would have followed. Did the artist have the right to use Leno’s caricature, or anyone’s caricature for that matter, to advertise his services? Can a caricaturist sell copies of his caricature of Jack Nicholson or any celebrity on T-shirts at some store or over the internet? How about all those caricature prints selling daily on eBay? Each case has it’s own individual facts and facets, but the underlying law that allows public figures (or private ones, for that matter) to protect the value of their own image is called the Right of Publicity. (more…)

Q: What was your very first paid professional freelance job?

A: That depends on your definition of “professional freelance job”. If by that you mean the first time money was ever given to me in exchange for my artwork, that would have been in 10th grade in La Crescent, MN, when a fellow classmate named Lori paid me to paint my concept of a Van Halen album cover… not a copy of one of their album covers, but my idea of a new cover. I did their classic VH logo looking like it was rising out of a glowing, smoking crater. I did it using enamel sign paints on the back of a 8 foot square old piece of kitchen linoleum flooring, and then somehow delivered it across town on my ten-speed bike. I think I got $50 for that. However, I don’t believe that counts as a “professional freelance job”. Nor do the thousands of live caricatures I did over the years while in college, nor a few other personal commissions and other odd private jobs I did around that time.

My very first real freelance job was for a design firm in Minneapolis, and it was such a nightmare I almost became a short order cook instead of an illustrator because of it.

During my third year of school at the then named “School of Associated Arts” in St. Paul, MN., I was approached by the head of the design department about doing a ‘little job’ for him. It was fairly well known throughout the small school (my graduating class: 40 students) that I did caricatures during the summer break, and he had a client that needed some caricature work done. Almost all the teachers at the school were professionals in their field first, and teachers second. This professor owned a design firm in the Twin Cities, and he had a radio station from Ohio (I think… this was 25 years ago) as a client. Their morning show personalities wanted a new logo designed that incorporated caricatures of themselves in it. I had to draw the three hosts of the show, which he was going to work into the logo design. I was thrilled! This would likely end up on billboards and advertising materials, T-Shirts and other merchandise. Published portfolio pieces were worth their weight in gold, plus I was getting PAID. I accepted and was eager to get to work on it. I got the photo reference a week or so later, studio head shots. Ugh. Glamour shots are the worst things to work from. Regardless, I worked hard on the pencils and gave them to him in short order. I thought I’d done a decent job on it… I was even kind of nice to them. He sent the drawings to the client for approval.

A few days later he went over the feedback. The client didn’t think the likenesses were right on. No comments beyond that. No specifics like “you made his chin too big” or “he has more hair than that”. As a caricaturist, you draw a person they way you think they look. In other words, it looks like them to you when you are done. Did this guy think I just banged these drawing out without thinking I’d gotten a likeness, and now that he’d pointed it out to me I’d just go ahead and draw them so it actually looked like them? Working from pictures is tough as you have only a two dimensional image to use, and these people are three dimensional and seen every day in that way by the people who were reviewing this. If I’d been smart at this point I’d have asked for more reference, but I wasn’t smart… I was twenty. Okay, I did a new round and tried a more portrait-like approach. Off they went to the client for review again. I received essentially the same comments back. Another round, and off for review. They came back again… still no real direction, just ambiguous comments. Now I was getting frustrated. I then did a flat out portrait using an art-o-gragh to project the pictures and just traced the faces. According to the client it still didn’t look like them. Finally they sent a promo piece that they were previously using to give me an idea of what they wanted. In this example, the hosts of the show weren’t drawn as caricatures at all but as cartoons with big, white blocks for mouths and barely any resemblance to the actual people. Well, know I knew what they wanted so I did something similar. These looked nothing like the people whatsoever. Bingo! The client liked it and we proceeded to final. I redrew them on illustration board, inked and added values for the final art. Off they went, and I patted myself on the back for persevering. My first job complete!

A week or two later the design teacher took me aside and told me there was a problem with the caricatures. He explained that the original sketches I had sent in were shown to the hosts, who thought they looked fine. Some PR person at the radio station took it upon himself to “tweak” the artwork until HE was satisfied. The hosts didn’t see anything more until they were presented with the final logo, to which they objected asking “what happened to the first caricatures that LOOKED like us?” That’s right, I had to redo the artwork using the first sketches I submitted as the art.

Being young and stupid, I did not get compensated properly for the enormous amount of work that went into this. The design professor did not offer me any more money but did do a number of T-Shirts for me in trade (he had a silk screening business as well) because he felt bad about the headaches. I wish I had copies of the artwork, although in all fairness it was probably pretty rough and I doubt I did all that terrific a job on any of those sketches. I never did find out if they ever used the logo, and if so where it was used. I did learn some valuable lessons about communication and the important role it plays in any freelance job… and of course how to make sure you get paid for unreasonable numbers of revisions on a job.

So there you go… my first professional job. A total disaster. C’est la vie.

Thanks to Bob C. 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!

Q: How do I break into MAD?

A: If you want to break into MAD, the easiest way is with a grappling hook, 50 feet of rope, a glass cutter and suction cups. You can bribe your way in on Wednesdays with home baked cookies offered to Dick DeBartolo.

Seriously, getting into MAD is notoriously hard to do, but it isn’t quite the impenetrable fortress it was in the 70′s and 80′s. Back then MAD had their legendary freelancers in their prime, and there was frankly very little work they had in the magazine that one of their established and well known “Usual Gang of Idiots” was not available to do. It was ‘a closed shop’ as was quoted among hopeful freelancers. Today is a little bit different.

MAD‘s long time artists are slowing down, going into retirement, semi-retirement or just plain have less interest in tight deadlines and overwhelming amounts of work. Who can blame them? Their terrific work has defined the magazine for 60 years! Now that the magazine is in color, the dynamic has changed somewhat and artists who work in color have more of a shot at getting their chance than those who work in black and white only. The magazine is also striving to establish a more modern look and identity in the 21st century, and is more open to newer styles and different aesthetics than the traditional MAD look. These changes have opened the doors a little to new artist’s work. Given all that, MAD is still a tough nut to crack. In order to ‘break in’, you need three things firmly in place: have work that they like a lot, demonstrate professionalism and be in the right place at the right time.

Do work they like- This first point may be the hardest. MAD‘s idea of work they like isn’t necessarily the same as just “great work.” There are lots of artists that are terrific and that the editors and art staff are impressed by, but they feel their work just doesn’t fit the magazine. Many caricaturists fit this mold. I know of several who’s caricature work is exemplary, but who suffer from “caricaturist disease.” That’s a syndrome where a caricature artist thinks the world stops at the neck. They are so focused on the face they ignore the rest of the universe. MAD looks for artists who create their own world as seen through their own eyes, meaning the chairs, cars and toilets they draw have as much personality as their caricatures. MAD also looks for artists who can ‘sell a gag’ as I have mentioned before, meaning their artwork makes a written joke funnier and easier to understand. They also look for uniqueness. They don’t want Mort Drucker or Jack Davis clones. Finally, they are always looking for the “MAD feel”, which doesn’t seem to have a quantifiable definition.

Demonstrate Professionalism- This seems like an oxymoron as MAD is famous for self-deprecation and bucking the rules, but don’t let that facade fool you. These guys know their business and expect their freelancers to hit deadlines, do professional work and take art and editorial direction like a pro. The easiest way to demonstrate this is by having a body of work already established… in comics, magazine illustration, advertising, etc. It’s very, VERY hard to do work for MAD without having established credentials as a cartoonist or illustrator. MAD has been at the top of it’s genre for 50 plus years, and they don’t need to act as a proving ground for young, inexperienced talent. Unfortunately the MAD knock-offs that DID act as such a proving ground are basically all gone now. Having a portfolio with published work is basically a must.

Be in the right place at the right time- This means just get lucky. In order to get work from MAD they first must have a job available to give you. Here’s how the distribution of freelance work happens at MAD (as I understand it): First, the editorial and art staff meet with the features and articles that need art for upcoming issues. They start out with the “A” list of freelancers, or those who’s work is in almost every issue. They assign jobs to them as they see the individual artist’s style fits the piece, taking into account the artist’s availability, etc. Once all the “A’ listers are busy with something, they move on to the “B” list, or those who’s work is in the magazine consistently a few times a year. If there is any work left over at this point, they move on to the ‘best of the rest’, meaning those artists who have done some work in the past but aren’t really regulars. If anything is still left over, they will start considering new artists. As you might imagine, many months might go by without ever reaching that point. It’s even tougher now that there are only 6 issues a year.

There are two features in MAD that allow for new artists to get a ‘tryout’ without MAD having to commit a deadline or multiple pages to: “The Fundalini Pages” and “The Strip Club”. The “Fundalini Pages” is a three page collection of short gags, features and jokes that often need a spot illustration, and I’ve seen numerous new artists crop up there. The “Strip Club” is a multi-page feature containing comic strips that have edgy and quirky subjects and feels to them, and many new artists have appeared in that. Getting work in these sections is a little more likely and can lead to bigger assignments.

There is no secret address or password that will get your work in front of “the right person”. Not even home baked cookies will make any difference. Trust me when I say that anyone who sends work into MAD will get the proper attention paid to it, usually by Sam Viviano himself. Send artwork to “MAD Magazine, Sam Viviano- Art Director, 1700 Broadway, New York, NY 10019″. Writers can submit via e-mail at submissions@madmagazine.com. Do not e-mail any artwork, always mail it. Here is a link to their submission guidelines for more info. My advice is only send them strong, publishable type work, and leave the cool sketches you ripped out of your sketchbook at home. They aren’t interested in your ‘potential’, they just want to see work they could envision reproduced in the magazine.

Finally, be patient. Continue to send submissions in periodically. That way you have the best shot of having your work happen to be on Sam’s desk the day they are looking for someone to do a Fundalini spot. Never send the same thing twice, always make it new work they haven’t seen yet. Don’t get discouraged… after all, if I can get into MAD anybody can!

The above is reposted from a 2006 (with updates) mailbag question because… well… I get this one a lot. 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!

Q: Regarding using DVDs or other video sources for finding reference for your caricatures: Ever since upgrading to MAC OS X Lion I’ve had a devil of a time finding a screen capture solution that allows me to grab a movie still from an iTunes movie or a DVD. I read on your blog that you recommended “CaptureIt!”,  but I downloaded and ran the trial version and it doesn’t work either. The images it captures are just the white-and-grey grid. Have you been able to find anything that actually works in Lion?

A: This question came from fellow Minnesota illustrator Cedric Hohnstadt last week and wasn’t really for the mailbag, but coincidentally a better solution for this just was released, and it seemed like it might make a good mailbag question.

Some background: Apple makes some very good hardware and software products, but sometimes their thinking drives me crazy. They have always taken a “I know better than you so it’s my way or the highway” attitude when it comes to what they allow their customers to use their products for. One such example is their bizarre obsession to prevent Mac users from being able to do a screen capture (a simple still of a paused video) from any video source on the Mac. First they prevented their built in screen cap program “Grab” from being able to do it (taking a screen capture with Grab that includes a window with video in it results in that window appearing black). Then they eliminated any workaround using Terminal. The program “CaptureIt!” mentioned above worked in versions of OSX up through Snow Leopard, but Apple was up to it’s old tricks when they released Lion, and did something to eliminate that feature in CaptureIt!. As Cedric says, screen caps from that program now just show the checkerboard. This is an extremely frustrating policy, as there are many legitimate and legal reasons one can have to take screen captures of a video, including an artist looking for references to draw a parody of that video and the people in it. In fact, it was Apple’s lame-brained policy on this that kept me from using Macs in the first place, and I have seriously considered using Boot Camp or Parallels and a copy of Windows on my Mac just so I can have the pleasure of using the MANY great Windows-based video players that have excellent screen capture features.

My response to Cedric was that I use a program called “VLC player” to play DVDs, Quicktime videos, MP3s, and other flavors and can do screenshots from that with a combination keystroke. It’s not as convenient as CaptureIt! because as there is no single frame advance using VLC, nor does it have quite as elegant and easy an interface, but it worked. The lack of single frame advance was particularly annoying, as I often use that to get a clear and focused still as opposed to a blurry shot in mid-movement.

As it happens, VLC just released an updated version that is a total reworking from the ground up. It has many new features for those who do a lot of video work, but the nice thing for me is it added that missing single-frame advance. It’s still a little clunky to take and organize screen caps, as you need to set up a directory for them and either use a three-key shortcut or click into a menu for the action, but it works well and does the job.

So, for those of you who have a fair use, legitimate reason to take screen captures of video and use a Mac, I recommend VLC Player for that purpose and, best of all, it’s free. However, if you use VLC for professional purposes as I do, I hope you will donate some dough to support its development. I just did a new donation this morning after updating to VLC 2.0, even though I had donated previously. Without support from users, developers like those who created VLC wouldn’t be around and we’d be stuck with Apple’s $#@&*^ holier-than-thou BS policies… or Windows.

Thanks to Cedric Hohnstadt 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!

Q: Is your book The Mad Art of Caricature! ever going to be released as an eBook? If so, will it be available for the Kindle?

A: I’d like it to eventually be available as an eBook for the iPad, Kindle and Nook, but making that happen is problematic.

I have been researching ways to convert the book’s digital publication file to ePub (iPad) and PRC (Kindle/Nook) formats, and it’s not going to be an easy thing to do. There is no magic way to take the book’s Indesign master file and just convert it. That might work for a text-only book like a novel, or something that has only a few illustrations, but this is an illustration intensive book and the text directly relates to the illustrations in ways that preclude any simple conversion. There are currently three ways that this can be done:

1. Redesigned for ePub- This method would create a regular eBook format that has text that is resizeable with changeable fonts, can reflow with resizing, and is fully searchable. In order to do this, I’d have to completely redesign the book from scratch, placing illustrations inline with the text like a web page and understanding the relations of the illustrations and text would be changed depending on the sized text the reader chooses. Additionally, elements like the captions of the illustrations would be almost impossible to control. In other words, I’d be putting together an entirely different book devoid of much of what makes the printed version work well. Not an option for me.
2. Image-only format- This is the way that comic books and picture books are done, where each page is a static image. Text does not reflow nor can the type font be changed, resized or searched. While this retains the integrity of the original layout, it makes the book less easy to read (text is rendered as an image and subject to pixelization), nothing is searchable and the file size would be enormous (90 mb). Not ideal, but doable.
3. Fixed-layout format- This is a newer form of eBook format, which is perfect for graphics-heavy books like children’s books or instructional books like cookbooks or textbooks that require graphics in a specific positioning with text. These books have fully searchable and “zoomable” text but retain the layout of the original print. This is the ideal way to go for my book, but right now only Apple offers the ability to use this kind of format in a non-fiction book. While Amazon has this type of format available, they inexplicably only allow children’s books to use it.

By far the easiest way for me is option two. That could be done easily and (relatively) inexpensively, and be available for all three formats in short order. I just question if people would be willing to have such a huge-sized file on devices that have very limited capacity for storage, and put up with the slow response that may also be a result of the file size

I suppose I should ask you, the readers who might be interested in an eBook version, what your preference would be? Is there a general interest at all in an eBook version? Leave your opinion in the comments.

One other thing, should I get an eBook version going, I would likely take the opportunity to add back in some material I edited out in order to make the book size more manageable. I had a section on drawing children, a bit on exaggerating expressions, several more examples of live caricatures and a section on coloring live caricatures with the airbrush that got left on the cutting room floor. I’m not trying to entice any double-dipping, but I didn’t want to cut that stuff in the first place and adding it back in is a plus.

Thanks to Earl B. 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!

Q: What are some of your favorite drawing tools (e.g. type of pencils, drawing software, etc.) you use?

A: I get this question every so often so once I year (or so, actually it’s been since 2009) I do an updated answer. Here is 2012′s version:

In the Studio

For doing my publication work I use a lot of different tools and materials. While most of what I do these days is digital I do occasionally, when the job calls for it, pull out the old paints and such. Here are the tools I like to use in the studio:

Paper and boards-

Paper for roughs- I generally just use my live caricature paper for my rough sketches and layouts, which is a 67lb vellum bristol. The equivalent would be a Strathmore sketchbook heavyweight paper that comes in pads.

Boards for finals- Strathmore 400 or 500 series bristol, usually vellum finish but lately I’ve been using the smoother stuff sometimes… mainly when I know I’ll be doing my “colored line” style of digital finals. I like a smoother line for that. If it’s a real painting I’ll use a piece of illustration board with a kid (rough) surface as it won’t buckle when I apply a lot of washes. BTW, Strathmore has had it’s problems in the last few years with quality, but it seems they have figured out the problem, so it remains my board of choice.

Pencils-

I like the mechanical leadholder type pencils like the Staedtler Mars Technico Lead Holders with F or HB leads. They are comfortable to hold and the lead pointers make keeping a sharp point easy, but it also has a thickness that the ultra thin mechanical pencils don’t have. Otherwise I have been known to just grab a handy No. 2 school pencil. Lately I have been playing around with mechanical pencils that use a 0.5 mm lead, requiring no sharpening. I kind of like these, because the quality of line is so… uh… mechanical that you don’t get caught up in the aesthetics of the line and can concentrate on the forms you are drawing. It seems to work well when you intend to ink the results.

Pen Nibs-

I use mainly the Gillott 303 but occasionally the classic Hunt 102 crow quill. The Gillotts are tough to find in the US. You have to order them from overseas, and that’s expensive. But, if you have to have them, try:

Scribblers (UK)
John Neal Booksellers

There are others but these are the cheapest I’ve found online. If you look elsewhere, usually the good nibs are found listed under “Copperplate” among calligraphy supplies. These suppliers have lots of cool nibs like Brause and such, so if you are looking for something that “feels right” buy some singles and try out a few. You can get pen holders here as well.

You could try my method of getting Gillott nibs: beg a friend and colleague who lives in Great Britain to order 1,000 nibs at his local art store and bring them with him to the NCN convention in the states, where you pay him for them and then buy him some beers in gratitude. I am still a few Guinness shy of total compensation. Thanks, Steve!

Pen Holders-

There are lots of different kinds, but I found one I really love called the Universal Pen Holder. It’s just a clear plastic rod with a soft plastic sleeve around the end to hold the nib. The soft sleeve also acts as a cushioned finger grip. Simple but great. You can get them at John Neal on this page.

Brushes-

I use a red sable #1 and #2, and a #6 for big areas. Winsor & Newton Series 7′s set the standard but they are expensive. If you take care of them they will last a reasonable length of time, but ink destroys them much faster than watercolors do. You can find these brushes at virtually any art store.

I have recently gotten a Kuratake No. 40 Sable Brush Pen, and using their Carbon ink cartridge (waterproof) am enjoying the results. It’s great for certain stages of a piece when you need a brush’s touch but are moving about a lot and dipping/rolling the brush is a pain.

Inks-

For the dip pen I use Pelikan Drawing Ink A. It used to be hard to find this ink but now they are more readily available.  If you want to get a BIG bottle, try:

MisterArt

For the brush I like Dr. Ph.Martin’s Black Star HICARB or Tech 14W Black, which are both much more dense that the Pelikan and make for better brush work.

Digital Color: Software-

I use PhotoShop for all my digital color work. I know a lot of people swear by Painter, but as I can accomplish everything I want to in PhotoShop I do not see a compelling reason to switch. Currently I am using CS5, and I suppose eventually I will upgrade but again I feel no need to rush to do so.

Digital Color: Hardware-

My current computer is a 27″ iMac. I used to have a more expensive Mac Pro but honestly the memory and processor speed of more “standard” computers are so strong now that they can easily handle imaging tasks… even big images. I recently did a 29″ x 40″ movie poster illustration, 300 dpi and CMYK and with multiple layers that weighed in at a whopping 360 MB, and my iMac didn’t even break a sweat. These days unless you are doing 3D modeling or video rendering work, you can use computers right off the rack at Best Buy or the Apple Store for most any illustration.

I use the Wacom Cintiq 21UX as my graphics tablet. Its’ a workhorse and has served me well for many years. It’s the original 21UX model from 2005. The new 24HD widescreen Cintiq looks awesome, but as long as mine keeps on trucking I can’t justify that kind of expense to upgrade. Maybe after I win the lottery.

Real Paints!-

When I do get out the real paints I basically work in a combination of acrylics and watercolors with both a brush and some airbrush touches. I have no preference as to the manufacturers of such materials, and have a hodge-podge of tubes of various types. The last time I did a real painting was last winter for a personal commission, which I didn’t bother to scan. Here’s a spot from a few years ago I used real paint to do:

Live Caricatures

Pencil-

I learned to work in pencil so I stick with that. My pencil of choice is a Caran D’ache FixPencil 3 using the 6B leads. I also use a Create-a-Color 5.6mm leadholder with a 4B lead.

Blending Stump-

Standard No. 8 stump for shading. I soak the new stomp in tap water for about 10 minutes, then put it on a paper towel and place it in a sunny window for about 3 days until it’s fully dried out. This has the effect of loosening the glue that binds the stump and making it much softer. Then I sand off one of the ends to a much rounder shape, so I have a fine end and a wide end. I know… that’s a lot of work for a $1.65 tool, but it’s much more useable after that process.

Airbrush-

I use the Iwata HP-SB Plus for live caricature work with a 13 bottle palette. I also use this same brush in the studio. I have metal bottle hardware custom made, as the plastic horrors available for general purchase are garbage. In fact I make the entire bottle assembly myself (Please don’t write me asking to buy a set… I don’t sell them except to artists who work with us in our caricature concessions).

Airbrush Paint-

Mostly Com-Art Opaque and Transparent paints by Medea.

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!

Q: I remember about a year ago you wrote a post about the decline in quality of Strathmore bristol boards, a brand you used with your work. Whatever happened with that? Did you find a suitable replacement? Have the Strathmore boards improved?

A: Here is the post to which you refer: Strathless Bristol Bored.

I contacted Strathmore about my concerns and found their customer service department very receptive to working with me. They were concerned and, while they didn’t come right out and say it, I got the feeling mine was not the first complaint they had received. They asked me to send them some samples of boards with this problem. I sent them sample boards where the same lines were inked by the same pen nib and the same ink, and yet one board showed the ink clearly bleeding among the fibers while the other looked good. Both were the same 500 series 3 ply kid finish boards, but bought in different batches. I also sent them some 400 boards that were doing the same thing. I demoed several different inks and pen nibs between the two boards. This little demonstration clearly proved it was the board and not the inks causing the issues.

I received an explanation that basically said there was no concrete explanation—yet. There are many chemicals bought from vendor companies that are used through the process of creating the illustration board, and they believed one or more of them had changed their formulas or chemical structure or something that was in turn affecting the results of their process, which had not changed. This made sense, since why would one batch be fine and another bleed when they were both made with the same process? They were trying to figure out which of their vendor’s chemicals might be the culprit, but as yet they did not know.

What they did do was send me a nice supply of good boards, which I am still using today. I spoke with some pretty high ranking executives in the company, and they were both concerned and helpful. I have not had the occasion to buy any boards from an art supply place in a while, so I do not know if they solved their issues or not. I hope so because there isn’t anything that compares to a good Strathmore board out there as a replacement.

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!

Q: I’m enthusiastically working through your book. Aside from enjoying the art and fantastic tips, I’m really interested what you said about it taking 500 faces to really get the nuances of caricature / portraiture.

So to fully understand…. maybe naively so, I have set out to draw 500 faces. I really want to at least begin to recognize all the subtleties you mentioned… and to overcome some of the challenges I’ve faced while drawing portraits. A friend of mine said that it takes 1,000 attempts at a particular activity to beome an expert. My goals isn’t really to become an expert (a half expert is fine with me) so much as to further my own art and to help me grow as a hobbyist.

What else would you recommend artists do to grow and become better at achieving a likeness?

A: I think you are mistaking the difference between caricature and likeness. Here is the quote from the book to which this question refers:

The Mad Art of Caricature, Page 12:

In caricature, the old adage of “practice makes perfect” has never been truer. The ability to see doesn’t spring up overnight, and I often tell eager young caricaturists they have about 500 or so bad caricatures in them before they start noticing the subtle things that hide inside the ordinary face.

By the term “see” I am talking about not necessarily the ability to DRAW or to capture a likeness, which can be done without any exaggeration. I am talking about the ability to observe and notice the things about a face that makes it unique—the things that a caricaturist is going to want to exaggerate to create a caricature as opposed to a portrait. The “500 or so bad caricatures” I say a new caricaturist has in them is not about improving drawing skills or capturing a better likeness, it’s about developing your eye to notice those unique things through the simple medium of observing and then drawing what you observe. Of course the act of drawing over 500 caricatures will also improve an artist’s drawing skills as well as their observational skills as it pertains to simply seeing the facial features that a likeness requires be accurately drawn immensely, but it’s the development of the ‘eye’ to which I refer in that quote.

Additionally, those 500 drawings are not a threshold wherein drawing number 501 is like some switch was suddenly switched on and an artist’s drawings suddenly become successful. I actually use that number with my new theme park artists as saying that is about when they stop fighting with the tools and medium, start getting comfortable in the chair and faces start to look different to them as things jump out that previously went unnoticed. It is still an ongoing process, and at the end of the next 500 drawings, number 1,001 will look very different than 501 did as long as they continue to apply themselves.

Now, as to your actual question about what else (besides practice) an artist can do to improve their ability to capture a likeness…

Nothing. There is nothing else besides unyielding dedication and sheer, unrelenting observing/drawing that will help an artist become better at getting a likeness. Studying and incorporating different techniques are important, and can help an artist along the way, but there are no shortcuts. No amount of studying, reading, watching videos, listening to lectures or other sources of information on drawing can replace the act of drawing and what that does to your ability to make your eyes, hand and brain work together. It’s like swimming. You can read about how to swim, you can look at diagrams of the action, you can watch videos and have classroom instruction in swimming. Until you actually get in the water and start moving around, you will never be able to swim.

That is advice nobody really wants to hear, but it is the absolute truth. Talent is only part of the recipe. The most talented artist in the world would not be more than a mediocre artist if they never bothered to work at developing their skills. Modest talent with enormous work ethic and determination will beat out enormously talented but lazy artists every time.

Thanks to Steven White 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!

Q: I am just starting my career as a freelance artist/illustrator. I just completed a project with a credit union for a character design that they used in their advertisements. When the obvious discussion of pricing came up, I wasn’t sure where to begin. We settled, quite quickly, without any problems. I was just curious if there is any method to the madness?

A: This is a question I get pretty frequently, so every once and a while I re-post this answer from a few years ago.. simply because it’s still as good an answer as I can come up with:

I get individual e-mails occasionally asking for advice on what to charge on this project or that kind of job, and the problem is that the question in basically unanswerable. It is always “that depends”.

By the letter of the law the discussion of how much to charge for the same kind of service or product between two competing sources of said service or product is called “price fixing”, and is quite illegal in the United States. Realistically there needs to be someplace to begin for illustrators just getting into the business. For those people I always recommend the Graphic Artists Guild’s “Pricing and Ethical Guidelines Handbook”. This book has a plethora of information from typical trade practices to copyright considerations to actual comparative fee ranges for different kinds of graphics services including “Magazine Editorial Illustration”, which is broken down into B&W/1 color and color categories for national, medium or small circulations. It also contains very useful generic contract agreements for almost any kind of graphics job, including magazine illustration. The book is a must have for any professional illustrator that wants to know what they are getting into for the contacts alone.

Unfortunately, the very next thing I tell people after recommending the book is to basically forget about the comparative fees they list. My copy of the PaEGH is the 10th edition circa 2001, and most of the fees I’m able to get are just now in the low end of the range they quote. Maybe some magazines actually pay more in the midrange, or the mythical high end range, but I’ve never worked for any. Granted, I don’t have Time, Newsweek, People or Sports Illustrated in my resume, but I’d be surprised if even they paid the kind of rates the PaGEH quote for national circulation. My advice to those who get the book is not to expect to get those kinds of rates unless you have a long resume and are a known name in illustration (like a Payne, Brodner, Cowles or similar). Most of us are not. The lowest end of the rate ranges seem to be the most realistic rates to expect to get in most cases.

Sounds like pricing your illustrations is a guessing game, doesn’t it? The good news is that it rarely is. In fact, it’s my experience that most art directors that call looking for a job to be done have a budget already for the art, and they come clean with you on that budget right away. You either do it for that amount, or turn it down and they move to the next illustrator. This happens with 90% of the jobs I get these days. Art directors don’t want to dicker, or bother trying to hope you will lowball the rate if they ask you to give them a quote. They want the job done, they have X amount of money… interested or not? I will ask an art director what their budget is first, and if they ask me for a quote instead I give them a high one, perhaps the midrange of the PaEGH recommendation. However I find that if I get asked for a quote first one of two things will happen. Either they will say it’s out of their range or they will say it’s higher than they can pay and will I “take X amount instead?”. It’s also been my experience that clients that ask for a quote end up not being very good clients even if the job does come through. Publications that buy art frequently know what they can afford to pay and know what they are doing, and don’t mess around tying to play used car salesman games with freelancers.

If an illustrator gets told what they are going to get paid, then how can they work up to a higher rate and make more money? There are two ways to do this. The best is to become a famous illustrator who’s work is instantly recognizable and who can both dictate their fees and who are called by the biggest publications in the world on a regular basis… good luck with that and when you figure it out write me with your secret. For the rest of us grunts, the only way to raise our rates is to try and move up the food chain as far as the type of client we work for. Since an illustrator is just one person, there is a limit to the volume of work that artist can realistically do. Of course step one is to get to the point that you have more work than you can handle at most times (that doesn’t happen all the time, but to be busy MOST of the time is the goal). It follows then that the only way to get a “raise” is to get more money for the amount of work you can realistically produce, and that means working for larger magazines and publishers. How do you accomplish that? The only way is by working up the food chain, starting by taking jobs from smaller clients. By doing a great job, working hard and being professional, you will gain a reputation as a solid illustrator. Then by marketing yourself to bigger clients, you hopefully will start getting better paying jobs. When that happens you’ll have to start turning down the smaller clients so you have time to do the work for the bigger ones, and so forth.

That sounds easy but it is often the slow work of years to accomplish, unless you are one of the very lucky and skilled illustrators who break in with a bang. The artwork itself is a big factor, of course. You have to be realistic about the professionalism and quality of your work and it’s stylistic appeal to art directors. For example, my work is very cartoon orientated, and as such I probably will never get work from magazines like Time or People, which tend to like either a very painterly, realistic style, a graphic, design orientated style or an artsy, underground style at least in terms of caricature. Unless I alter my style I am probably never going to see my work in those types of magazines. Some illustrators “engineer” a style so what they do is appealing to the current tastes and trends, but they either have to continually reinvent themselves or see their jobs dry up when that flavor of art style becomes passe. The longtime successful illustrators develop a personal style they stick with, and it becomes timeless and remains appealing despite current trends and tastes. That’s the goal, but it’s a lofty one.

While there seems to be a long list of factors and extenuating circumstances, illustration pricing isn’t as complex as it might appear. Most of the time pricing is just a matter of what the client you are working for can afford to pay and what you can afford to do the work for.

Thanks to Chris Grant 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!

Q: Do you do personal commissions? I’d really like to get a caricature done of my wife for a Christmas present. If you do, what does it entail and how much does it cost?

A: Many years ago I stopped doing personal commissions for a number of reasons. First, I didn’t have the time. I am usually swamped with publication work and it’s hard to squeeze in personal commission jobs around the edges. If I were to take them on, it would be at the expense of publication jobs.

The second reason is that I’d have to charge an outrageous fee to do personal commissions. This is because of the previously mentioned reason of having to sacrifice professional jobs in order to get the personal commissions in. I’d have to charge the same sort of rates I’d charge for the publication stuff, and to be honest I’m embarrassed to do that. My average rate for a full-page magazine illustration is about $1200, and a personal commission is comparable to that in time spent. Asking $1200 for a personal commission is, to me, ridiculous. I could name several dozen professional caricaturists who could do just as good a job as I could (or better) for far less than that.

Thirdly, personal commissions are often a real pain in the posterior. Invariably, it’s always a battle with the client over the caricature itself. Usually I am being commissioned to do caricatures of people the client is very close to, often a relative, friend or co-worker. These are people they are in constant contact with and with whom they have the kind of close dynamic I would never be able to duplicate working from a few photos. As a result, there is a often great deal of “this doesn’t quite capture them” or “don’t make them so heavy” that becomes frustrating. I am far from a “mean guy” caricaturist, but I am working cold drawing a person I have never met from a series of sometime lousy photos, trying to capture a person the client knows intimately. The bottom line is I am trying to capture from a bunch or two-dimensional pictures not the way the subject looks but the way the client thinks the subject looks, and that leads to difficulties.

The last real personal commission I had was the one that broke the camel’s back for me. It was probably ten years ago, and I was contacted by a wealthy family from the Hamptons who owned some fancy restaurant in that area, and wanted a family group caricature done for their eatery. After several revisions it became obvious to me these people thought they looked like Bo Derek when they looked a lot more like Bo Diddley. I was even being overly kind to them, and they still demanded some ideal they did not match. I killed the job and have not done another since, with the exception of the occasional one for special occasions, like this one:

I did this as a present for outgoing NCS president Jeff Keane

That said, I am seriously considering changing my policy on this. I might do something like Mort Drucker did when my wife commissioned him to do a caricature of me (something he also rarely, if ever, does). Mort agreed to do a simple pencil rough of me first, and then send it to Anna for approval. If she liked it, he’d do the commission piece as agreed. If she did not, then it would simply end there and he suggested she could look at some MAD originals instead. In other words, no revisions or art direction. That might work for me to do a similar with for an advance on the commission price. If the client likes it, the advance goes toward the final cost and we proceed. If they do not, I keep the advance for my time and they are not obligated further. Might work… I’d be more inclined to consider commission work if I could eliminated the frustration of reason number three above. Something to think about.

Thanks to Bill Johnson 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!