Tag: cartoon

Cartoon Love

andertoons1 Comment

You know, Valentine’s Day is just under a month away now, so I thought it might be time to examine a little cartoon love, Andertoons style:

This cartoon came while I was drawing a completely different cupid cartoon. The person having just been shot had all these little hearts around, and for whatever reason my head all of a sudden related them to the hearts on playing cards.

Now that I look at this I think I could’ve used a few spade symbols too. I’m pretty happy with the guy’s face though. He looks all confused and a little irritated. And if that’s not love I don’t know what is.

I will never understand the appeal of those icky dry little candy hearts with stuff printed on them. I know every year there’s a report of the newest phrase ("Tweet Me" etc…), but were I them I’d concentrate on making the things edible instead.

Still, they do make for a good cartoon.

I’m not what anyone would consider stylish.  I’m more of a jeans and flannel kinda guy. But I seem to remember not too long ago that the afro made a short-lived comeback? Is that right, or have I just been watching too many MST3K 70’s movies?

In any case, cartoon afros are really fun to draw!

Not only am I not stylish, I was never what you’d call good with girls.

I was the average looking but funny guy that girls liked to hang around with, but never wanted to, you know, really hang around with. Hint hint.

It all ended up OK, of course; I have a wonderful wife and two great kids, but I swear the platonic fairy followed me around for a good few years.

I gotta say, this kind of cartoon is awkward to write. I’m coming at it from the woman’s point of view, but, being a guy, I’m mostly guessing here.

You do hear this sort of thing fairly often, and for the most part I would assume it ends badly.  But probably not as badly as above.

Also, that salt shaker guy must be really spacey, or maybe hard of hearing.

This is one of those cartoons that as a cartoonist it’s better not to linger on, because when you do there’s a lot of problems:

  • What dating service has "Dating Service" on a sign on a worker’s desk?
  • Is the Cupid for shooting the woman, or for here to take with?
  • Where’s the customer’s right arm?

See what I mean? Let’s just move on…

This cartoon I really like, mostly because it’s a change of pace art-wise.

I tend to do cartoons in batches of similar themes. I might do a bunch of business cartoons one day, or maybe half a dozen kids/family cartoons. So when I was drawing Cupid after Cupid after Cupid for a Valentine’s Day batch, it struck me that you always see the same arrow in the chest idea used. Then I just twisted it a bit for the cartoon you see above.

Makes you wonder too. Did it still work

OK, last one…

This is definitely more of a guy take on the whole love arrow thing. If I were a Cupid flying around all day I’d be looking for a way to challenge myself just to keep things interesting.

OK, so there’s an Andertoons look at cartoon love. Hope you enjoyed it! And don’t forget that cartoons work great in presentations, newsletters, whatever!

Cartooning Q & A (To Mr. Sergi’s Class)

andertoons

classroom.jpg

Recently I received an email from 5th grade art teacher, Mr. Sergi. He said he does a unit on cartoons and his students are curious about tools of the trade, career info, publishing norms, etc…

I’ve actually meant to do a post like this for a while, so for kids out there interested in cartooning as a career, here’s the quick and dirty on my process and experience:

Materials

Every artist is different and I recommend that you play with as many pencils, pens, papers, or whatever as much as you can. It probably took me a good two years to find the tools I use now, but putting in that time is part of finding your style. I know cartoonists using pencil, crayon, ink & pen, and ball point on papers ranging from watercolor to copier quality.

But, since you asked, I use Faber-Castell Pitt brush pens and Prismacolor cool gray markers on Borden & Riley bleedproof marker paper. I still do all of the art the old fashioned way, but of course I use my computer for scanning, cleanup, and playing Hordes of Orcs.

Writing

You of course need to be a decent artist to be a cartoonist, but even more important is the writing. Good writing can carry bad art, but not the other way around. Study comedy and figure out how it works. And once you’ve done that, edit yourself well. Brevity is wit.

Dimensions

“How big should I draw my cartoons?” is a question every beginning cartoonist asks. If you’re looking to be a comic strip cartoonist, you’ll want to look at the dimensions of current strips and size that up as needed. For gag cartooning (what I do), or web cartooning, there’s really no preset dimensions to worry about. Just draw as much or as little as you need to get the joke across.

Art

Everyone’s style is going to be different, and I don’t think you necessarily need to go to art school to be a cartoonist, but you do need to draw well enough so your cartoon reads quickly and effectively. The best advice I can give is to draw constantly; it doesn’t get any simpler than that. The more you draw, the more happy accidents occur and your individual style emerges. Draw, draw, draw, eat a sandwich, then keep drawing.

Markets

Newspapers are having a rough time of it, and magazines aren’t doing a lot better. Where I used to make most of my living selling to traditional print, most of my income now comes from selling my cartoons online. Where will cartoonists earn their livings in the near future? It’s hard to say, but don’t believe anyone who tells you you can’t earn a living at it. Do good work, do a lot of it, and keep an open mind.

So that’s cartooning in a nutshell for me. I hope you and your teacher get something you can use out of this, and I wish you all kinds of luck cartooning. I can’t think of a job that’s better than drawing funny pictures all day.

Brandtellingâ„¢ Cartoon

andertoons3 Comments

Yesterday I finished up a custom cartoon for Arthur Germain and his Brandtelling strategy:

Brandtelling uses a series of brand stories to make your brand relevant to your target market or audience. These can be stories about the company, its products and innovations or its people. Brandtelling is built on the foundation of connecting people through a story that is relevant, real and repeatable.

After our conversations it makes all kinds of sense to me, and I spent about 20 pre-coffee minutes this morning trying to expand on the above, but Arthur’s gonna explain this a lot better at his blog.

Where I come into the picture is a cartoon I completed for him yesterday about Brandtelling:

Brandtelling Cartoon

Arthur will be using the cartoon in a number of ways, and I’m so glad he’s as pleased with the end result as I am.  (Read his take on it here.)

If you’re looking for a clever and entertaining way to get something across, try some Brandtelling in a custom cartoon!

(See how I summed it all up there?  Not bad before coffee, huh?)

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Creativity Q & A

andertoons3 Comments

creativity

I recently had a student email me some questions about creativity for a class. I get a fair amount of this, and normally I don’t respond, but for some reason this one got through.

Anyway, for what it’s worth, here’s the creativity Q & A:

1. How do you define creativity?

Working with what’s available to make something new and unique.

2. Do you believe that each person has the capacity to be creative? Why?

Certainly. Not everyone is a painter or singer, but I think everyone has the ability and the desire to create in their own way. I think deep down we all want to say ‘This is me. I made this.’

3. How did you find your creative niche?

It sort of found me. I love to draw, and I love being funny. I’m also a fairly adept musician, and I floundered at that for years, but in the end cartooning just sort of manifested itself.

4. Do you think creativity is innate or learned? Explain.

Both. It’s one thing to have that flash of wonderful inspiration, it’s quite another to shape that into something meaningful or useful, or to come up with something on a deadline.

5. Who or what experiences have inspired your work?

Cartoonists Peter Arno, Charles Schulz & Bill Watterson, comedians Bill Cosby, George Carlin and David Letterman, a few wonderful teachers along the way, and, of course, my family.

6. Have you always wanted to do what you are doing? If not, what made you decide to start?

Yes. I started tracing the Sunday comics pretty early on. I’m lucky that I had some innate abilities, and people along the way to point that out.

7. Does spirituality and culture play a role in your creativity? Explain.

Culture plays a huge role in what I do. To be a humorist is to be an observer. I subscribe to a ton of magazines, watch a fair amount of TV and surf the internet a lot. You need to be informed to be funny.

8. How important is education to your creative process?

A good sound liberal education is the base of what I do. To be a cartoonist you have to know a little about a lot.

9. How do you deal with creativity blocks?

Often you can push through them through sheer force of will. Other times you just have to wait it out. There’s no set procedure, but after a while you learn a lot of little tricks.

10. Do you believe that it is important to be accepted by others as being creative or is just doing what you love to do enough to justify your work? Explain.

I think we all want to be accepted and acknowledged for our creations, but I don’t believe it’s a necessary part of being creative. If you want to be a singer, sing. Want to be a cartoonist? Draw cartoons. Being a professional is another layer entirely.

I hope I come across well. I tried to be substantive and brief without getting too self-helpy.

Again, normally I just don’t respond to these because, honestly, there’s about a million more creative and successful people than me, but I thought these were fairly well thought out questions

So, there you go. Any thoughts?