Richmond Illustration Inc.

Tom's Mad Blog

Not Again!

August 29th, 2008 | Posted in General

Here’s another of those oddball advertising jobs that come along, you do them and get paid for them, but they never get produced or used in the way intended. This project was done a few years ago for an ad agency. They wanted a “superhero” team designed in a style somewhat reminiscent of the Bruce Timm animated look for some ad campaign pitch to Canon, the photocopy/consumer electronics company. I got the job via referral from a fellow illustrator. I needed to design 5 heroes, two of which were a hero/sidekick combo. I honestly don’t remember the exact details but the leader of the group… READ MORE

Sketch o’the Week

August 27th, 2008 | Posted in Sketch O'The Week

I thought I’d do something different for “Sketch o’the Week” this week. I’m a member of an international organization of caricature artists called the National Caricaturists Network, which I occasionally blog about here. Part of membership is access to a private forum where ideas, opinions and artwork are shared concerning caricatures and the business of caricatures. One of the forum sections is called “The Firing Squad”, where members post pictures of themselves and other members draw their caricature. A lot of the caricatures in my “Me Gallery” come from there. This week I thought I’d take a person from “The Firing Squad” and do a… READ MORE

Holy Lemon Law, Batman!

August 26th, 2008 | Posted in General

As long as we are on the subject of Batman movies… If you happen to have an extra $110,000 laying about, head over to eBayландшафт and bid on this ’89 Batmobile. The seller describes it as one of the 5 original cars built for the Tim Burton 1989 film starring Michael Keaton and Jack Nicholson. From the interior it sure looks authentic… there are a few batmobiles of this type about that were built for Six Flag’s stuntshows but the interior of those were minimal with a space for a hidden driver to make the car appear like it was remote controlled. I’ve always loved… READ MORE

Getting Downey on “The Dark Knight”

August 26th, 2008 | Posted in News

Regular blog reader Chip O’Brien sent me a link yesterday to this article about how “Iron Man” star Robert Downey Jr. disses “The Dark Knight” in this article on Moviehole.net. “My whole thing is that I saw ‘The Dark Knight’. I feel like I’m dumb because I feel like I don’t get how many things that are so smart. It’s like a Ferrari engine of storytelling and script writing and I’m like, ‘That’s not my idea of what I want to see in a movie.’ I loved ‘The Prestige’ but didn’t understand ‘The Dark Knight’. Didn’t get it, still can’t tell you what happened in… READ MORE

On the Drawing Board- 8/25/08

August 25th, 2008 | Posted in On the Drawing Board

After finally putting to bed several ongoing projects last week and this weekend, the only thing currently on the board is a pretty big MAD job, which is more than enough for the next two weeks. Just for something to look at, here is my latest “workplace poster” job- pencils, inks and final color: Click for a closer look… In the initial pencils there was a lot going on. The client wanted four servers in tuxedos, race/gender specific serving Thanksgiving dinner to a family of turkey farmers. The catch is, of course, they are serving anything but turkey. I needed to show it was: A.)… READ MORE

Sunday Mailbag

August 24th, 2008 | Posted in Mailbag

Q: Upon viewing the Phelps drawing it prompts the question, how much of your style is based on comic book drawing?¬¨‚Ä† I kind of get the impression that what sets your work apart from others is that you draw caricatures the way a Marvel or DC artist would. A: In my opinion not much of my style of drawing or caricature is based on comic book work, and none of it is intentionally. My main style of caricature was developed from doing live caricature work at theme parks, and my experience with comic book style illustration is rather limited. It’s hard to pin down where… READ MORE

The Pen is Afoot, My Dear Watson!

August 23rd, 2008 | Posted in News

A couple of weeks ago I wrote about the availablility for purchase of the sculpted Sherlock Holmes pen that was based on my illustrations of Holmes for the audible collection of the complete Sir Arthur Conan Doyle collection One Voice Chronological: The Complete Holmes Canon. That announcement was a bit premature, as the web page meant to enable buyers to purchase the pen was having some trouble. Well, that is all corrected and the new ordering page is up, running and seems to work great on either a PC or a Mac, at least on my Mac using FireFox. While you are at it, visit… READ MORE