June 10th, 2008 | Posted in MAD Magazine
I believe I’ve mentioned, once or twice here on The MAD Blog, something called the “evergreen drawer” in the MAD offices. The evergreen drawer refers to articles that the staff at MAD keep laid aside for use in an undetermined future issue. For obvious reasons the articles that are put in the evergreen drawer need to be not of a timely nature i.e. their subject matter must be such that they can be run anytime and still remain basically relevant. Hence, “evergreen”. There are several reasons an article might end up in the evergreen drawer. The most common is that another article is fast tracked… READ MORE
June 9th, 2008 | Posted in MAD Magazine
In comic shops this week and on news stands June 17th: MAD # 491 (July 2008) Cover (Mark Fredrickson) The Fundalini Pages (Scott Bricher, Tom Bunk, John Caldwell, Matthew A. Cohen, Paul Coker, Dick DeBartolo, Darren Johnson, Jeff Kruse, Dan Long, Scott Nickel, Kevin Pope, Leonardo Rodriguez, Kiernan P. Schmitt, Bob Staake, Rick Tulka, P.C. Vey) G*d Damn America (Frank Jacobs, Jack Syracuse) A MAD Look at Going Green (Sergio Aragon?¬©s) Dr. Suess For The Digital Age (Darren Johnson, Gary Hallgren) The Pros And Cons Of Working At Home (Teresa Burns Parkhurst) Now That Anyone Can Become A Celebrity! (Jacob Lambert, Paul Coker) The Darker… READ MORE
June 8th, 2008 | Posted in Mailbag
Q: Who are the biggest influences on your artwork and what is it about their artwork that caused them to impact your work? A: I actually did a search for this very question on my blog and to my surprise it has not yet been asked and answered! Who knew?? It’s actually a tough question because my influences are a mix of both famous published artists and artists I know personally and have worked with doing live caricature work. Therefore some will be familiar to readers and some may not be. Also, many of the artists I cite as major influences on my work aren’t… READ MORE
June 7th, 2008 | Posted in Sketch O'The Week
Click for a closer look Several people seemed to feel I was too nice to Carrot Top in the most recent “Sketch o’the Week” so this time I went with “disturbing” as opposed to “cartoony”. READ MORE
June 6th, 2008 | Posted in General
For years I’ve been using an easy trick to create a layer in PhotoShop containing my scanned, inked line art that remains intact as I color “beneath it” sort of like an animation cell. It’s a simple thing to do: Scan line art as grayscale image Duplicate background layer containing inked art, rename “Inks” Set layer mode to “Multiply” On background layer, press “Command” + “A” to select and then “Delete” to delete line art on that layer Convert to RGB or CMYK Finished. Because “Multiply” mode means that whatever is on that layer in “multiplied” with what is below it, all the black lines… READ MORE
June 5th, 2008 | Posted in General
Yes. Sorry folks. I’m just too swamped to write a real post. The good news is that my next “Drawing Caricatures” tutorial article is in the works and will appear a little later this month. READ MORE
June 4th, 2008 | Posted in Sketch O'The Week
This week’s sketch is of the incredibly frightening prop-happy comedien Scott “Carrot Top” Thompson. This is an example of why you should not take steroids. Juice monkeys have a certain look to them… and this is it. As if the eye makeup and hair wasn’t scary enough… Here are the two pics I used as the reference for this drawing, just so you can see I am not exaggerating much. Look at the deformity in his shoulders and the thin skin. You can’t see it but his legs are stick thin… It’s guys like this that give bodybuilding a bad name. READ MORE
June 3rd, 2008 | Posted in General
Today is a sad anniversary. Sixteen years ago today MAD founder and longtime publisher William M. Gaines passed away at the age of 70. Working for MAD is great. The people and staff there really respect the tradition and history of the magazine. However I will always feel that I missed out on something special in that I never met or knew Bill Gaines. I started for MAD about 9 years after Bill’s passing. While MAD has of course continued since his death a chapter of its history closed on June 3rd, 1992. In his time as publisher I’ve heard that nearly every page of… READ MORE
