Tom's Mad Blog
August 30th, 2010 | Posted in General
MAD writer extraordinaire Desmond Devlin sent me this link to a highly interesting article about a lively exchange between comic book writer Mark Waid and Sergio Aragon?¬©s at last night’s Harvey Awards. Mark gave a keynote speech about copyrights, public domain and the dawning new era of electronic publishing where he took the viewpoint that, with regard to rampant piracy on the internet, the “genie is out of the bottle” and that energy expended in efforts to protect ownership would be better served being used to figure out how to profit from one’s intellectual property. Sergio strongly disagreed and a heated discussion ensued. I wonder… READ MORE
August 29th, 2010 | Posted in Mailbag
Q: So I really want to pursue my passion for caricature and cartooning. I want to give it a go but Sunday is my only day off so live gigs are hard to come by. I look on E Lance and Solo Gig but seems like a lot of professionals are on there. So my questions are, should I capture what is going on in local news and submit my work to the A.D. Of the local papers, without contacting them first? Undercut everyone on E Lance? And last, I need to create a portfolio and needed to know what to include. Should it be… READ MORE
August 26th, 2010 | Posted in News
I think John Read needs to get a hobby. You’d think he’d have enough to do writing, editing and producing the excellent cartooning industry magazine Stay Tooned!, but apparently he has a lot of time on his hands. Instead of doing puzzles or collecting rozzers or veeblefetzers he’s put together a traveling exhibit of original cartoon strip artwork called “One Fine Sunday in the Funny Pages” which features 140 comic strip and panel originals… all published in American newspapers on the same Sunday, April the 11th. Here is the show where it is currently hanging in a former jewelry store space in Northpark Mall, the… READ MORE
August 25th, 2010 | Posted in General
Currently have four projects going at once and all of them demanding roughs, final pencils or finishes in short order. No time for blogging or sketching. READ MORE
August 23rd, 2010 | Posted in Freelancing
For the freelance illustrator there are two tasks that are absolutely essential for being successful: Finding new clients Keeping the clients once you’ve found them The first one is all about marketing yourself, doing appealing work and targeting the right clients with your promotional efforts, and is universally considered the hardest part of being a freelancer: Finding the work. The second one is at least as important as the first, however. Once you find a client, doing ongoing work for them is one of the cornerstones of building a successful (and stable) freelance business. One cannot rely on a constant influx of new clients providing… READ MORE
August 22nd, 2010 | Posted in Mailbag
Q: You seem to straddle the divide between traditional and digital illustration, with one foot firmly entrenched in the age old techniques of drawing and inking and the other in the modern techniques of digital color and painting. One thing I’m concerned about is the eventual disappearance of any form of original art once the digital world takes complete control. What’s your take on that? A: It’s funny how things come full circle. Way back in the day before I was a working illustrator, artists didn’t even think about stuff like the resale value of their original art, especially for magazine or advertising illustration. They… READ MORE
August 21st, 2010 | Posted in News
Last year I participated along with several other cartoonists in judging a show of college student cartoon work organized by Toon Ed. Toon-Ed is dedicated to educating the student of cartooning and provides a chance to showcase students cartoon art that are enrolled in post-secondary schools, colleges, art schools, and universities. It’s a great organization headed up by cartoonist and educator Ken Alvine. This year’s Toon Award Exhibition is officially announced and will be judged by memmebrs of my chapter of the National cartoonists Society at our fall meeting in Ohama, NE on Oct. 1-2. Heres’ the official press release: You can visit the Toon… READ MORE
August 20th, 2010 | Posted in On the Drawing Board
Plenty going on right now: MAD– Really digging in to a 5 page TV show parody for #506. Due on news stands in October Character Design– very cool project for a well known comedian… someday I’ll be able to share the details MAD Animated- Actually awaiting the next segment assignment Workplace Poster- My usual monthly assignment Speaking of workplace posters, I promised to post the final art on the last one that I posted the pencil sketch for a few weeks ago. Here’s the pencil sketch again: Click for a closer look… And here’s the final. There were some changes on the sketch. They wanted… READ MORE
