Mailbag
October 29th, 2006 | Posted in Mailbag
Q: I’ve been looking everywhere for the materials you mentioned in your inking tutorial. Where can I get Gillott nibs and that stuff? A: Few if any art stores carry anything but a few token inking supplies, mostly in the form of “Cartooning Kits”. Ecccch. Thank goodness for the internet. Here are some sources for inking supplies: Gillot Pen nibs: Tough to find these in the US. You have to order them from overseas, and that’s expensive. But, if you have to have them, try: Scribblers (UK) John Neal Booksellers There are others but these are under $1.00 US each. If you look elsewhere, usually… READ MORE
October 22nd, 2006 | Posted in Mailbag
Q: What is your favorite movie parody? What is the favorite movie parody you have drawn? A. The mailbag questions have begun to flow again! I will assume the first part of your question is my favorite movie parody ever, whether I worked on it or not. I have not read every one MAD has ever published, but I have read a lot of them, and I think my favorite is “The Oddfather”, art by Mort Drucker and written by Larry Siegel. I know that sounds like an obvious answer, but I can’t help it. First, “The Godfather” is one of the greatest movies ever… READ MORE
October 15th, 2006 | Posted in Mailbag
Q: What do you do if you have no questions to answer for the Sunday Mailbag? A: Exactly what I am doing right now. Nothing! For the first time since I started the blog back in June, I have run out of e-mailed questions. So… no mailbag! If anybody has any questions about freelance illustration, cartooning, caricature, MAD or how to make a kick ass chocolate martini, e-mail them to me and I will endeavor to answer them. READ MORE
October 8th, 2006 | Posted in Mailbag
Q: I was wondering if you’d ever post a step by step of your live caricature technique. What you look for to get a likeness, and what your thinking is to make it look cartoony as opposed to realistic. A: While I plan on doing another tutorial or two on the blog in the near future, I am afraid I won’t be doing one on the live caricature technique, or certainly not one that in depth. The reason being that I have a book in the works on that particular subject. While it is still at least a year away from publication I don’t want… READ MORE
October 1st, 2006 | Posted in Mailbag
Q: How long does it take to do a MAD movie/TV parody? A: As long as they give me. The process of doing a parody involves a lot of people, and it all depends on how fast the editors want it in the magazine as to how much time I end up getting for the art. I don’t know whether the editors assign a movie to a certain writer, or if writers suggest doing a movie and submit a rough draft or outline of the parody (I suspect it’s mostly the former these days), but either way first the script needs to be written. Then… READ MORE
September 24th, 2006 | Posted in Mailbag
Q: What materials do you use to do your live caricatures? A: I don’t do a lot of live caricature anymore, but when I do I’m still using the same basic materials I have for the last 20 plus years. Paper: I buy large quantities of paper for the theme park operations, so I use a special paper that is difficult to get in an art store. It’s an bristol vellum, bright white, 12 x 16 inches and 67 lb weight. That’s a good, heavyweight paper without being a cardstock. It is smoother on one side than the other, so I can use the rough… READ MORE
September 17th, 2006 | Posted in Mailbag
Q: Where do you get your references for doing caricatures? A: Several sources. I have an old fashioned “morgue file” at home. A morgue file is a file cabinet full of reference pictures filed and cross-referenced. I keep alphabetical files by last name with clipped photos of celebrities from entertainment magazines, cross-referenced (sort of) by movie or TV show. I’m not too good at clipping and filing, though, so that is not a very good source for me. Another reason my morgue file doesn’t get added too very often is that my oldest daughter, Elizabeth, is autistic. One of the obsessive/compulsive things she does is… READ MORE
September 10th, 2006 | Posted in Freelancing
Q: How much should I charge for an illustration? A: I get individual e-mails occasionally asking for advice on what to charge on this project or that kind of job, and the problem is that the question in basically unanswerable. It is always “that depends”. By the letter of the law the discussion of how much to charge for the same kind of service or product between two competing sources of said service or product is called “price fixing”, and is quite illegal in the United States. Realistically there needs to be someplace to begin for illustrators just getting into the business. For those people… READ MORE
