Christmas Doodles

Looks like this blog is once again long overdue for an update. Unfortunately, what with grading student assignments as the fall semester ends, as well as getting stuff done for Christmas, I just haven't had much time to do much new art to post. I'm afraid that these latest doodles are the best I can offer at this time, sketched yesterday while having lunch out and reading my newspaper. Hopefully I can do some more finished art in the couple weeks I have off before school starts up again.

In the meantime, I'm going to just relax now on this Christmas Eve by sitting back and watching Bell, Book and Candle, which, while technically is not a Christmas movie per se, does take place over the Christmas season nevertheless. It stars Jimmy Stewart and the yummy Kim Novak, who plays a sexy witch as I've caricatured her below.

Merry Christmas, folks!

Oodles More Doodles

Sorry I haven't been updating more regularly. You folks must be really sick of looking at those two kids in the hair nest by now, so here's something else to peruse. The top doodle is the result of me just trying out a new flexible brush marker I picked up today. One face just led to another until the paper was well covered. I love the thick and thin variation that you can get with those things!

Just some more random head doodles. I really enjoy playing with the underlying design of a face, varying the shape, size, and relative placement of the features, creating contrasting character types.

This one is actually a bunch of heads I sketched from real people while having breakfast at Denny's. This is something I strongly recommend in order to build up a variety of facial types in your sketchbook. I also strongly recommend breakfast at Denny's, but not so often that you clog up your arteries with that country gravy!

Just stream of consciousness at work, letting my pen do whatever the ad seems to inspire it to do.

Watch out, Miss Muffet! Just tuffet out, kiddo!

Here's something I rarely ever do - draw imaginary beasties off the cuff like this. I reckon I've always gravitated to cartooning and caricaturing that which really exists, maybe because I like the discipline of using reality as a springboard, rather than just creating life from scratch. Anyway, this is a rare unguarded moment of pure, polyunsaturated whimsy, so enjoy it while it lasts.

Some Cute (And Not So Cute) Doodles!

I make no bones about the fact that I love to draw cute characters. Cartoons that are cute and appealing are what I grew up with, and I still far prefer that over the ugly schlock of today, therefore that is what I gravitate towards in my own cartooning. Here are some more examples of recent doodles that explore that theme.


In the one above, I decided to scribble out several animated poses of the same little guy bouncing his basketball. Though I have never animated per se, I have always enjoyed bringing a character to life through continuity poses and expressions. Of course, this is the essence of what I have done for many years in illustrating children's books for Disney. Ideally I would love to start illustrating books with my own characters, but I'm not sure that children's book publishers even like cartoons anymore. Regrettably, they seem to have forgotten that the most famous kids' illustrator of all time, Dr. Seuss, was in fact a cartoonist.


These were a couple of quick impressions I scribbled of other diners at the restaurant I was at several weeks ago. The old guy reminded me a bit of Ed McMahon and the young girl had similar features to Drew Barrymore. The cat was not actually in the restaurant, but snuck into my doodling just the same.


Okay, I guess these ugly rascals can't be called "cute", but they were fun to draw. After finishing up a Suduko, I started aimlessly doodling a couple of ugly mugs, which then led to a whole series of unsavory mobster types appearing around the edge of the puzzle. I particularly like the psychotic looking fellow in the lower right corner and the wall-eyed rascal in the top middle. The whole exercise was really meant to explore facial features of varying shape, size and relative placement on various head shapes, which is something I stress constantly in my Sheridan College Character Design class.

More Doodles!

Here's a bunch more of my recent newspaper doodles drawn in blank areas of my daily Globe and Mail over a succession of leisurely lunches at my favourite local eateries. The oddly dyslexic Bell Canada ad pictured above seemed to offer up an interesting layout in which to fit a bevy of cute showgirls. It started out with just the one in the lower right, then led to one after another as my pen meandered clockwise around the page.


Uh oh, I think the guy in the above photo may be in trouble now that the gal's cartoon hubby has unexpectedly walked in the door! The family pets apparently never liked the rascal anyhow.

As for the following images, I believe that any product will sell better if the corporation hires cute cartoon gals to hawk its wares:




Aloha!

It's Doodle Time!

Usually I reserve this blog to just show my finished art, or maybe something in progress for a tutorial. Perhaps once in awhile though, I might post some of my doodles just for fun. Here are some recent doodles, mostly sketched while having lunch and reading my daily Globe and Mail at a favourite restaurant. After reading all the news I'm interested in, I'll start sketching aimlessly in whatever patches of bare space I can find among the pages of the newspaper.


My favourite subject matter is cartooning the human face, as I love to explore the myriad shapes, sizes, and relative placement of facial features on various head shapes. Admittedly, most of my doodles end up being of cute cartoon girls, as that is a subject I can never tire of drawing! The great thing about doodling on newspaper is that it is so completely inviting and tempting. Unlike doodling on clean white fresh pages in a sketchbook, which can be rather intimidating due to the commitment of the act, sketching on newspaper is just like getting more use out of something that was destined for the recycling bin anyway. Also, there is nothing quite so pleasing as the feel of a ballpoint pen on soft, padded newsprint.


I especially like to doodle because I feel I can draw completely in my own natural style, as loose, spontaneous and free of the constraints I might place on myself when drawing for a paid commission, particularly when the client is expecting something to look a certain way. When one doodles, there is the distinct pleasure of knowing that you are doing it just for yourself, not subject to anybody else's approval nor what they would be willing to pay for it. No, you yourself are the only one to satisfy and, heck, even if you don't like it, you haven't invested much time or effort in creating it. If it's good, maybe you'll file it away for future reference, and if not, it joins the rest of the newspaper in the aforementioned recycling bin.


More cute girls. (Hey, how did that one funny looking guy get in there?)


Often, these cute cartoon girls make an appearance right after I've solved my Sudoku puzzle. Could somebody please check to make sure I put all the numbers in the right place? Thanks...

Mouse Doodles

Sometimes it seems I'm happiest when drawing "throwaway art" - that is, cartoons for non-commercial, usually trivial reasons. These sketches of a mouse were done on the spur of the moment as a way to brighten up and add a bit of humour to an otherwise rather dry looking assignment sheet for the Character Design class I teach at Sheridan. There was some spare room on the sheet and I decided to fill it creatively. My only regret is not filling the available area more ideally, having left a lot of open air space around each pose. Maybe I'll juggle the elements a bit for more visual appeal before assigning this one next year.

This particular assignment has to do with "Performance", and involves the students choosing any two of the characters they've designed for me previously this year and having them act out two little scenarios I provide in a total of six poses apiece. The three pose example of the mouse is my way of showing them what I expect of their efforts in regards to drawings that communicate a story visually, showing distinct expressions and body language to indicate what the character is thinking and feeling at each stage of the scenario. I know my students have been overwhelmed with the cumulative amount of work involved in the assignments from all of their various animation classes. Despite this daunting workload, my hope is always that they have some fun in my character assignments, as that sense of fun usually can be seen in the final work, resulting in real entertainment value for the viewer.

Some Old Stuff...

I've been a bit busy lately since I've just started up again with teaching at the college. So nothing too interesting to post today. I was going through some files on my old computer, transfering stuff over, and came across this series of character drawings. This was done originally for the newsletter that used to be published by the Toronto Animated Image Society (TAIS), and had accompanied an article I'd written on the subject of posing and body language. I thought my Sheridan students might get something out of these, as we've been talking about character posing. That's all I've got for today!

Jungle Gal!

As I look over these blog postings thus far, it occurs to me this place is in need of a bit more colour. Most of my personal art is, I'm afraid, in black and white ink line, so the colour pieces are going to be the exception to the rule. Anyway, here is one that started out as a pencil doodle that I then tacked up on my corkboard above my drawing table for inspiration. Some time later, my friend Adam was around asking if I could give him a quick painting demo to help introduce him to using gouache, my paint medium of choice.

I decided to grab this jungle girl doodle as a fun subject to use and proceeded to trace her down onto some illustration board using graphite paper. Prior to using graphite paper, however, I usually like to rub away most of the excess graphite, as it tends to be a bit greasy at full strength, making it more difficult to cover with the paint. Once on the board, I started to cover the main areas with mostly flat tones of colour, sometimes working in a bit of wet-on-wet, like in her hair, but mostly leaving the rendering to a layering of dry brush applications. I really like the dry brush approach with gouache, as blending it can be a pain in the butt and there is something so nicely illustrative about a clean, crisp dry brush technique.

Due to this just being a quick painting demo, I was working pretty fast and the result is certainly on the loose side. However, I really kind of like the spontaneity of it, rough spots and all. Just for fun, I later scanned it in and Photoshopped it onto an appropriate jungle photo background.

Like a lot of longtime cartoonist and illustrator friends and colleagues of mine, I really love the gouache paintings that used to be the norm in magazine and children's book illustration. I'll probably post some links soon to illustrators from the 50's and 60's whose work I really love in this medium.