Ganging together on this post a few recent examples from the "Nuggets Sketchbook" series that occasionally punctuates the regular panels. For some unknown reason there was an unusual number of them this year: these three which were published in the paper this past July, September and October, plus previously ones in March and August (both of which were uploaded here earlier in another set of sketchbook samples). "Currant Mood" is sorta special to me as it's about something that most newspaper readers probably aren't familiar with, so they'll never get it, and those that would probably get it never read the newspaper, so they'll never see it. But fortunately it went on to occupy a third dimension...
Update: This particular panel was the only one out of four submissions of mine to get accepted for the 2024 "64th Parallel" annual juried exhibition of the Fairbanks Arts Association (the others were "The Lodge," "Rush Hour" and "No Lives Matter"). This was the first show my work's been selected since 2017, o fourteen years - maybe half of which work was entered... the meta-lesson here being just never give up, don't ever stop chumming the water. Incidentally the fifth of six (possibly seven) shows this year alone, and that's why for 2025 I'm gonna swing to the opposite extreme and not do any, take a few years off from the endless marketing.
Regular readers know that these "Sketchbooks" are little offshoots are a special insight into creating the cartoons where I feel it provides a nice little break from the more commercial (some think contrived) vibe or visual feel of the regular feature. Put another way the aesthetics are a bit more spontaneously or raw, as opposed to the comparatively more controlled and polished look of the formal pencil > ink > digitally colored process for the "normal" panels.
The origins actually arose from when I was essentially homeless, couchsurfing at a girlfriend's cabin, and without access to my accustomed computed + scanner setup. So I temporarily resorted to just submitting images shot directly from the pages of my sketchbook. One meta-lesson that gave me insight into my work was how essentially incidental the whole professional standards of production were: nobody particularly gave/gives a shit that I use specialized equipment and rarefied, arcane tools (ex: and insistence on archival materials etc.), aside from other geeks. The only factor that really matters is the content ie how funny it is. This is reflected in the industry mantra "a good joke will sell a bad drawing, which goes a long way towards explaining the style of many a successful cartoon. Nevertheless I have always continued in my quest towards self-improvement - 2019's reboot of "Spring Breakup" illustrates this perfectly, as some measure of pride in craftsmanship is inherent in any artistic pursuit.
Of all of these latest ones in the series, this particular panel to me is a touch more special than the rest, in that not only was the printed version a reworking of the original doodle (from the initial one done on a scrap of paper > then translated into the sketchbook variation), but the charming simplicity of the piece really stands out. The only aspect of it altered was the digital spot-coloring of the heart, all else is marker + water-soluble wash. Incidentally the pen is a Micron (08), which I after many, many years of using ballpoint pens for the sketchbook doodles, I have adopted full-time this year, mostly because erasing the underlying pencil without waiting for it to dry so as to avoid smearing the ink is a pain in the ass - this is much quicker and also more opaque. It's still a "dead" line, meaning no line weight variation which is the hallmark of dip-pens.
Bonus: this is also one of the relatively rare non-verbal panels, which is another factor in its primitive clarity... reflective of my current relationship situation. It's quietly exceptional enough that I selected it as one of the three pieces showcased in the annual faculty exhibition in the UAF art department - subverting expectations with a thumb in the eye of artsy-fartsy elite.
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