Tom's Mad Blog
May 21st, 2012 | Posted in News
Many months ago the Center for Cartoon Studies in Vermont contacted the National Cartoonists Society to enlist members to participate in an interesting publication project they were putting together called The Cartoon Crier. They described the project as follows: “The Cartoon Crier” is a one-shot tabloid newspaper that will explore the relationship between humor and sorrow in comics.¬¨‚Ć The content will consist of comic strips, gags, articles, and illustrations created by NCS members as well as the students, alumni, and faculty of CCS.¬¨‚Ć The release date is March 2012 and the paper will be distributed for free at comics conventions and colleges.¬¨‚Ć The editors hope… READ MORE
May 20th, 2012 | Posted in Mailbag
Q: Do you normally ask permission from the people you know (friends, officemates, relatives) before you draw/caricature them? Were there such a case when they didn’t take it so well, or found it offensive? A: Have I ever offended anyone? Sure, and that’s funny considering my style of caricature is not very derogatory or offensive. When doing live caricature you occasionally get people who don’t like the results. Sometimes it’s because the drawing is legitimately “off” (you can’t win them all), but often it’s their problem. To paraphrase Jack Nicholson from “A Few Good Men”…some people just can’t handle the truth. So far no one… READ MORE
May 18th, 2012 | Posted in News
It’s down to the wire for the Kenosha Festival of Cartooning’s Kickstarter campaign to help fund the event. It’s woefully short right now with only 4 days to go. This is very disappointing. Outside of comic book conventions, which few outside the working industry actually attend, there are not many events where the general public can meet and listen to prominent cartoonists speak about what they do and how they do it. For free. The lineup is pretty stellar: Stephan Pastis of Pearls Before Swine Greg Cravens of The Buckets Michael Jantze from The Norm and Jantze Animation Studios Norm Feuti of Retail and Gil… READ MORE
May 17th, 2012 | Posted in MAD Magazine
If you are ever in Washington DC and go to the International Spy Museum on F Street NW, you might see the above illustration on a T-shirt available for purchase . . . if you have the stomach to wear such a thing. I did this for Warner Brothers Consumer Products specifically for the Spy Museum store, and as far as I know it is not for sale anywhere else including their online store. Just for fun here are a few of the other pencil roughs I did that they considered before settling on the trash can one: I’m working on some other WB/MAD related… READ MORE
May 16th, 2012 | Posted in Sketch O'The Week
Clicky to embiggen . . . A year or so ago I attempted to take my pal Stephen Silver‘s online animated character design class. Steve is an awesome artist and a great teacher, but I don’t know what I was thinking when I enrolled because in typical fashion I got swamped with work and had to give up on the class. Anyway I was clearing out some old sketches from the flat files today and ran across these from one of the lessons. We were supposed to do a (more or less) realistic character sketch of this model, then do three different takes on his… READ MORE
May 15th, 2012 | Posted in MAD Magazine
CBR reports that “Dynamic Forces has announced a partnership with Warner Bros. Consumer Products to create a line of toasters designed to burn iconic images into bread. Much like the popular “Battlestar Galactica” toaster that makes Cylon-ized toast, Dynamic Forces’ line of toasters will brand bread with a special image from various Warner Bros. properties such as “The Wizard of Oz,” “A Nightmare on Elm Street” and “Watchmen.”” . . . and also MAD Magazine. Yes, YOU TOO can toast your bread to display the nauseating visage of Alfred E. Neuman (actually I have no idea what MAD image will be burned onto your breakfast,… READ MORE
May 15th, 2012 | Posted in News
Funny and fantastic cartoonist, former NCS president and friend Rick Stromoski is one of many who have joined the growing number of cartoonists entering the wonderful world of eBooks in recent years. He just released a new one: Bad Cats, a feline-centric collection of some of his terrific cartooning. Rick does the syndicated strip Soup to Nutz thorugh Universal Uclick, and is known for his great greeting card and gag cartoon work, as well as book illustration, advertising . . . you name it. I really enjoy his work…he’s a pro’s pro. If you have any cat-lovers with eBook readers in your life, this book… READ MORE
May 14th, 2012 | Posted in General
I almost didn’t have time to post this non-post. Ecccch. READ MORE
