Tom's Mad Blog

Dreaded Deadline Demon

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

The Value of Retaining Clients

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

Sunday Mailbag

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

2010 Toon Award Exhibition

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

On the Drawing Board- 8/20/10

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

The Circus is in Town…

August 19th, 2010 | Posted in General

Illustration done for Minneapolis Star Tribune last fall Oh Boy! Brett Favre is back in town and going to play for the Minnesota Vikings! Yawwwn. I’m a Minnesota guy in most things, but as far as sports go, the only team I care about around here are the Minnesota Twins. I can’t stand the NBA and don’t know or want to know about hockey, so the Timberwolves and Wild hold zero interest for me. Baseball is my favorite pro sport and I love the Twins and all they represent. They play the game the right way, develop their own players and make smart moves that… READ MORE

Sketch o’the Week

August 18th, 2010 | Posted in Sketch O'The Week

This week’s sketch: pop star Katy Perry. A lot of people seem to dislike her, thinking she’s extremely vulgar and overtly sexual… but I think she’s doing all that over the top stuff with tongue firmly in cheek (insert “tongue firmly in somewhere joke here”). She’s intentionally being a parody of the Britney Spears/Christina Aguilera school of candy-like sex doll pop singers. READ MORE

MAD Cartoon Network Show Promo

August 18th, 2010 | Posted in MAD Magazine

This short promo just surfaced for the new MAD show on the Cartoon Network this fall: [youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HEEzuhFDcrE[/youtube] Here’s another shorter one: [youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7hlVYKw1sAg[/youtube] Neither feature any of my work. As you can see the style of animation runs the gamut from traditional cartoons to collage and highly stylized stuff. Many of the “skits” will be only a few seconds long with a single, quick gag. Segments like the TV show parodies I’ve worked on, the movie parodies and some ad parodies are a minute or two long and not part of these short promos. The show debuts on Mon. Sept 6th at 8:30 pm. READ MORE

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