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
June 2nd, 2008 | Posted in General
Well, not literally…. although with the spring we’ve had in Minnesota I wouldn’t bet against snow in June. I mean snowed under with jobs right now. I finished my MAD job but have two other major projects that are coming due right now so this week and next are going to be a continuation of the same old story. I wanted to post my thoughts on the season finale of LOST, which I finally got to watch last night… but I really cannot justify that time right now. I just couldn’t bring myself to post the Dreaded Deadline Demon again today, so instead here is… READ MORE
June 1st, 2008 | Posted in Mailbag
Q: Whenever work gets slow, I always think about trying to get an artist’s rep to circulate my work around. Have you ever used one, and if so, what do you think of them? A: Reps are great if you can get a good one. I’ve heard horror stories about bad ones, so you need to be careful. I’ve never had a real rep, although I am a part of Cagle Cartoons’ small stable of custom illustrators, and have gotten a few jobs from them over the years. For those who may not know what a “rep” is, the term is short for “representative” and… READ MORE
