General
March 1st, 2019 | Posted in General
I’m in Atlanta, GA doing a workshop this weekend! Class illustration above. For those who are on the fence about doing one of these workshops, The one coming up in Minnesota in May could be a rare opportunity for some serious one-on-one time. Right now I have only three students signed up but as my expenses are so much less doing one here in my hometown, I’m going to do the workshop regardless of the number of students. So, there may be as few as three for the entire workshop class. Even if that number doubles there will still be only half the students I… READ MORE
March 1st, 2019 | Posted in General
Founding MAD publisher William M. (Bill) Gaines was born on this day in 1922. He would have been 97 today. I never got to meet Bill. He passed away June of 1992, 8 years before my first piece appeared in MAD. The list of current MAD contributors who worked with MAD during the Gaines era is getting small. Al Jaffee, Dick DeBartolo, Sergio and Des Devlin are still regulars. Rick Tulka, Paul Coker, and Sam Viviano have occasionally appeared in the last few years. There may be a few others I’m missing, but many like myself never even met him. READ MORE
February 28th, 2019 | Posted in General
Back in 2015 I did black and white, pencil caricatures of all 44 (then) presidents of the United States as centerpieces for the Washington DC Reuben Awards banquet tables. I made a poster out of them (no longer available I’m afraid). Since then I’ve sold the rights to use these images a few times for various clients, including a kids book that needed me to color them. I don’t recall ever posting the color versions, so here’s a gallery with them all, including Trump who was not part of the poster (Click on one to start the gallery feature): READ MORE
February 25th, 2019 | Posted in General
I shared a peek at the “Merry Poopins goes to the White House” splash page from MAD #6 last week, but that feature I did with writer Ian Boothby was six page long. So for the next few weeks I’m going to post a favorite panel from each page. This was my fav from page 3, mostly because of the background gag. I drew in a “David” statue with Trump‘s head, with a cell phone of course, and with even more enormous hands that the real David has. I think that is a gag but I wouldn’t be surprised if Trump hadn’t commissioned something like… READ MORE
February 24th, 2019 | Posted in General
If you are into that sort of thing… I stopped watching when they gave “Best Picture” to “Annie Hall” instead of “Star Wars” in 1978. Granted, I was 11 years old and couldn’t figure out how some movie with a nervous weirdo and a lady who dressed in men’s clothes could be better than one with light sabers and Darth Vader. In fact I still can’t. READ MORE
February 24th, 2019 | Posted in General
Q: I noticed that in beauty or glamour magazines that eyes are tilted up to highlight lashes while the eyes you draw are often tilted down. Is this to emphasize a sort of “sad sack/loveable loser” nature to get readers to sympathize or identify with faces that have distorted features? A: No, and I don’t think you are correct when you say the eyes I draw are “often tilted down”. I draw the eyes of any subject tilted as the eyes of the subject are tilted. Some are up, some are down, some are even. It’s all about the specific subject. The angle the eyes… READ MORE
February 23rd, 2019 | Posted in General
In case no one noticed, there has been no copies of The Mad Art of Caricature to be had anywhere for about the last month. My distributor has been out since the end of the year, Amazon ran out the middle of January, and I have had no copies in stock here since Feb 13th. That’s because the ninth printing of the book (yes… NINTH PRINTING) was delayed somewhat by the fact that I switched to a different printer and the rough winter weather the last month. The original delivery date here in Minneapolis was Feb 4, which got pushed back to Feb 14th due… READ MORE
February 17th, 2019 | Posted in General
Q: I usually hate having to ink anything because it never looks as good as my pencils. How did you learn to ink, and why did you choose the tools you use? A: I’d like to preface this answer by saying I do not consider myself a very good inker. I’d categorize myself as “competent”. I don’t ink enough (i.e. daily) to gain the kind of natural ease with inks you need to be an exceptional inker. My inking is often still an exercise in controlled frustration. I had not done much inking prior to my starting with MAD. With the exception of a couple… READ MORE
