Tom's Mad Blog
December 20th, 2006 | Posted in It's All Geek to Me!
A few weeks ago a wrote this post about the high definition DVD format war and how it’s shaping up. Briefly, two competing formats are trying to become the next DVD standard. In one corner you have Blu-Ray, backed by Sony and numerous other hardware companies and movie studios. In the other corner you have HD-DVD backed by Toshiba, Universal and a few others. Sony is the main backer of Blu-Ray. They pioneered the technology and are the driving force behind it’s marketing and roll out. In case you aren’t familiar with Sony, they have been down this road before. In the mid-seventies Sony introduced… READ MORE
December 19th, 2006 | Posted in General
Unless you have been living under a rock the last 18 hours, you have probably heard that Joe Barbera, of Hanna-Barbera animation fame, died yesterday at age 95 from natural causes. Tributes have been flooding animation and cartoon websites and blogs like Cartoon Brew, Drawn! and others. Clearly the man was a well respected legend in the animation business. Having little or no experience in the animation field other than a viewer’s enjoyment of the good stuff, I have next to no personal knowledge of Barbera’s history or contributions to animation as an art form. I think it’s a testament, however, to the longevity of… READ MORE
December 18th, 2006 | Posted in On the Drawing Board
I’ve got a TV show parody for MAD, but it’s is not due until late January, so like any good freelancer I am doing other jobs and only working on it in between. Here’s what I’ve got in the works for this week: Workplace Poster Job– Another one of these, this one for March publication. Here’s the pencil: Scholastic– Spot illustrations for an article about teenagers in ancient Rome and the differences between upper and lower class lives and expectations. Like National Geographic for Kids, Scholastic is a client that places a lot of emphasis on accuracy as far as historical clothes, hairstyles and other… READ MORE
December 17th, 2006 | Posted in Mailbag
Q: How do you choose which feature(s) to exaggerate in a caricature? A: That’s an easy one to answer: the face I’m drawing tells me. The explanation is not so easy. Caricature is all about your perception of the face in question. Perception is very different from measurable physical elements. If it was possible to have exactly the same nose on two different faces, that nose on one person may be perceived as big and on another person might seem small or at least not big. It’s all about the combination of features, how they relate to one another, and how an artist perceives them… READ MORE
December 16th, 2006 | Posted in General
Here are a few sites and cool things to be found out there in Cyberspace… – Nuckin’ Futs- A JibJab Year in Review http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=-4166195990973471960&q=Nuckin%27+Futs&hl=en I couldn’t figure out how to directly embed this gem from the JibJab site, but found it on Google video in somewhat disappointing resolution and embedded that instead. Follow the link above to see a razor sharp version of the video. It’s worth it… not only is it funny but it’s chock full of excellent caricatures of 2006 news makers and entertainment personalities. I made a cursory search to try and find out the names of the artists that worked on… READ MORE
December 15th, 2006 | Posted in Sketch O'The Week
Yesterday afternoon I was paging through magazines trying to find a face or figure that was interesting to draw in my sketchbook for the Sketch O’the Day when I realized something… I was spending quite a bit of time paging through magazines and trying to find things to draw for the Sketch O’the Day. Meanwhile I have three deadline jobs on the board. The Sketch O’the Day feature was a little too ambitious and time consuming. By the time I found a decent picture that I had an interest in drawing, drew it, scanned it, formatted it and uploaded it I as spending an hour… READ MORE
December 15th, 2006 | Posted in General
This final installment of “workout week” will detail what would be my current shoulders and arms workout I say what “would be” because currently I am unable to work my shoulders at all. About 20 years ago I was doing behind the neck presses with some roommates in a basement weight room when my right shoulder suddenly gave way and I dropped the barbell from nerveless fingers. Being a poor college student I did not go see a doctor about it, but my shoulder has bothered me on and off for the last two decades. Careful training avoided major problems the last 5 years or… READ MORE
December 14th, 2006 | Posted in Sketch O'The Week
Entourage star Debi Mazar: Of course Ms. Mazar will always be “Spice” from Batman Forever to me! Oh, wait, I hated that movie. Nevermind. READ MORE
