"Dreads"

From today's News-Miner, originally a pen & ink in-class demo done earlier this semester on creating different textures. Print version above, the sketchbook doodle, and the wash demo below, both done after scanning in the line art. Half a dozen implements were used: couple traditional dip-pens, couple Microns, a brush, and a ball-point, after penciling in the rough on Bristol board, based on the sketch book doodle. It's important to let students see firsthand the process from initial concept all the way through to what appears in the newspaper, along with all the accompanying meta - such as display of the original in a gallery setting, a web-presence, and bonus digital prints handed out. 
This particular panel in turn inspired a whole rash of Rasta-themed cartoons which are all ridiculously out of place in the Arctic environment, reminiscent of the Jamaican musher that competed in last year's Iditarod and Yukon Quest. 

And as a side-note I lost the flies seen in the original doodle as posted above 'cause some good friends of mine have dreads, and they all smell wonderful. Not so much musk ox, at least the ones that I've been close to (that's another story). Interesting how a minor edit can subtly shift the interpretation away from a disparaging take to a more holistic, cosmic interlude, dude. There is an additionally minor differences between the two versions , including a relatively small Photoshop fix in an attempt to cover up the botched ox-ankles. And to think that's what I once specifically did a series of field-sketches on: the particular anatomy of musk ox feet... let's just say laying on your belly next to one of these critters gives you an entirely new perspective unavailable to the average tourista's experience. Oh, and thanks to a last-minute comment from an observant student, crucial detail with bonus, added arm-hair to match the hobbit-feet.
Soundtrack: Dread Zeppelin's awe-inspiring cover version of "Immigrant Song."

“We come from the land of the ice and snow,
from the midnight sun where the hot springs blow”  

- Jimmy Page/Robert Plant