Andertoons Oatmeal

No, this entry isn’t about another Andertoons food product, it’s the first Andertoons greeting card for Oatmeal Studios:

Oat1

Oat2

Not bad huh?

The kinda weird part is that a lot of this card wasn’t done by me.

The color? Oatmeal. The inside cartoons? Oatmeal. The smudge under the word ‘but?’ Oh. I think that’s Andertoons chocolate. Ahem…

Just for reference, here’s the original:

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Notice any other changes? (Hint – check the patient’s gender…)

Don’t get me wrong, I’m not complaining, it’s just weird seeing my work redone by someone else.

Oatmeal is lovely to work with, the pay is fine, and they certainly saved me a ton of time and effort making changes. It’s just a weird feeling looking at stuff that’s mine, but that’s not really ‘mine.’

Here’s some close-ups of the card’s interior characters:

Oat3

Oat4

Oat5

Some obvious Photoshopping from the original, but they definitely had to invent some stuff on their own. The woman’s hair, for example, is probably more realistic than the women’s hair I normally do.

And I think the coloring is nicely done – subtler and more professional than my version for Good Housekeeping:

3907Gh-1

Like I said, it’s fine, just an odd feeling. I wonder if guys like Schulz felt/feel weird about this too.

I suppose after a certain point you’re fine with it, and anyone of that caliber certainly has other things to think about, but it’s a first for me.

Anyway, let me know if you run across this in the wild at Target or something!

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Cartoon Twofer in November Reader’s Digest!

Rdnov06

Hey, I’ve got two cartoons in the current Reader’s Digest!

Here’s one, and here’s the other.

As an added bonus, here’s an email I got on the second one:

Can you explain the cartoon with all the turkeys at a party all with nametags that say “Hi I’m Tom”?

Is it the whole male turkeys called Toms thing, and if so, is that funny?

Yes, that’s funny.

(BTW, the person who emailed me? You guessed it: Tom.)

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School Cartoon in Commonweal

Hey, just a heads up that I was in the October 20th issue of Commonweal!

Here’s the cartoon:

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This is a really really early cartoon of mine. In fact, in my inventory numbering system, it’s number four. Yeesh!

Just for fun, here’s a similar, more recent, cartoon in both caption and art to compare:

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In the first you can see that I used a ruler for the chalkboard. Anymore I don’t really worry about straight. I like the character of my slightly askew and wiggly lines much better. Plus it’s a heck of a lot faster!

Also, in the first you can see the chalkboard was blackened entirely by hand. Not in the more recent – that’s all Photoshop CS2!

The writing on the first board? White pencil. The second? Reversed in Photoshop.

I’m not sure when I gave up on the Charlie Chaplin splayed feet, as seen in #1. But I think you’ll agree that #2 looks a lot more natural.

There’s more to critique, I’m sure, but I think I can sum it with this – I’ve come a long way, baby!

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