"Fair to Midden"

My personal favorite and also one of the best made panels I’ve ever created. It’s probably not very funny, since my initial test marketing revealed about 90% of folks know neither what a midden is nor are familiar with the original turn of phrase, which as several of my classic started out as a mondegreen than morphs into the usual malapropism. Typically a more colloquial version is heard/pronounced as "middlin'" which eases the grammatical sleight of hand (or mouth in this instance) that is being spoofed, but regardless it’s perfectly done.

The drawing itself is an ideal composition, with exemplary linework, the palette too. Every element is no more, no less of what is needs to be. There’s just enough cutting in of cast-shadow shapes for contrasting value (example: the slightly darker inside of the tails, and on the tree trunk), and not too much airbrush gradations to add a hint of volume (see the footpads) so the overall aesthetic isn’t too “Photoshoppy.” It also helps that the colors are not high chroma, so not very vibrant, almost pastellish (just a dozen colors: three shades of brown, three greens, a blue, pink, yellow and gray + b&w). The only texture is a lot of stippling, a touch of spot-blacks using gestural stickwork on the drunken forest. *Technically those three back spruce, the same ubiquitous species that comprises much of the boreal forest and is also supposed to be what the squirrel on the right is leaning against, since those are the trees which typically have a midden – but hey, there are also talking rodents, so…?

Speaking of speaking the speech bubbles are positioned just so: the first one balanced in the upper right corner of sky and set a tad bit higher than the second, which overlaps the tree and thus overall reading left-to-right/top-to-bottom it leads the eye down the vertical pointer of the trunk to the midden itself, the darkest area w/highest contrast. The lettering is simple, legible, balanced and occupying a perfect amount of real estate within the bubbles leaving plenty of breathing room around the letters, words and unit of dialog. So this relatively simple panel is a perfect example of sequentially processing the parts, both text + image, and arriving at the idea. 

And that completes our over-assessment of the cartoon in question for this episode of flogging a dead horse, aka "pole-vaulting over a moose turd."

"Tattoo: What's Underneath"

As a college art professor I am always seeing every conceivable style of not just art but attire and appearance. Shaved heads and skin art notwithstanding (both of which I'd undergone a very long time ago), I am also reminded every time pen or pencil touches paper how much there will always be left to learn. From mistakes and from experience: that's what makes this such a uniquely human activity, one that will never be replicated any other way.

This is one of the few times I've been somewhat happier than most about how the watercolored wash looks as compared to the digitally colored print version. As in both are okay, especially the Photoshop one, which means I'm maybe getting somewhere with my palettes finally reaching the aesthetics I envision. Now back to the proverbial drawing board.

I always recommend to my students one of the practical advantages behind maintaining a sketchbook: not only does it document your though process at the conceptual stage (and serving as a reminder since I always forget ideas unless I jot them down)it's also the time and the place to make mistakes, so as to take advantage of any experiments before committing to the cartoon.

PS: Oh and this concludes our month-long series of grizzly bear themed posts... never fear there'll be plenty more ambling by eventually.

Xmas 2025

My Xmas panel (previously teased out here) that ran in last year's Sundays section (subscribers "get it" first). It's also doubling as this year's Xmas card, which gets handed out in person, and mailed out to inlaws + the handful of relatives still alive or not on the shit list. At least the ones who send me one first, so I don't have to do the requisite detective work finding out where they get snail mail. 

Actually that always just reminds me how most folks are grown-ups by now and thus have had a house for many, many years where they've since lived and raised a family, and haven't moved around like a migratory peasant. Ah yes, the twenty-fifth of December, where I get both of the year's most depressing events over with both in one day. 

But seriously, folks light up when you actually hand them a card, as in a tangible, physical object that manifests and encapsulates all those feelings into an actual thing that they can throw away later. One of the meta-reasons print media is still the main, original "platform" for my work is how I deeply appreciate the opportunity to directly give readers a sort of a "card" via the newspaper. Which they can still throw away.

Here's also a bonus watercolored version  I know, it's confusing, as I leave the freshest material unreleased on social media, usually staggered a year later or at least a few month after it appears in print (Instagram posts are mostly scheduled two years after publication). Membership, or in this case, subscription has it's privileges. Still on the scale of specialness, nothing beats the real thing, especially while doing a demo and making something appear for the first time.

 

... plus a bonus teaser of what'll appear in print this weekend. Stay safe folks, and thanks for reading: CHEERS

"Arctic Reptiles"

I suppose this panel works anywhere that it gets cold, but the farther north one goes, the pause for basking becomes more and more of a luxury. A brief bath of bliss, a recharging of our mental, physical and spiritual battery amidst another seasonal snap.

Indeed the difference is as obvious as the literal contrast between the two versions of the panel: before and after cutting in some shadows to push the range of values + some directional highlights. I want the viewer's eyes to also echo the "ahhh..." when they visually feel the warm glow.

Normally I am consciously choosing to de-saturate the digital feel and flavor of my colored panels, as has been mentioned many a time here before. But in this case I used the Photoshoppy effect to a singular advantage, as evidenced by a failed attempt to emulate the effect in watercolor, which didn't work and needed an extra boost with my last-minute makeover with markers. 

And here is proof positive of a frequent metaphor of mine: that of a sketchbook being more than a repository of ideas - it's a veritable compost heap of concepts, the mental mulch-pile where kernels of cartoons are incubated, fermented until ready to fertilize more funny ideas. Eventually it'll grow into another, even better variation of the initial seed that was planted back on page whatever. "Aaahhh..."         

"Tag"

I'm pretty dense at times, taking things too seriously when somebody's just messing around with me (stupid trustful instinct). So even when something is literally staring me in the face I'll still miss it. Except in the instance of waking up and wondering why a simple pillow could be so mean, as in reading that ubiquitous, omnipresent tag attached to everything which warns of dire consequences should it be removed. At least I remembered to write down the inspiration this time. As of late been chasing a dream where I remember what I forgot and then forget to note it in the sketchbook, so the next day all I remember is that I forgot another really funny idea, whatever it was.

On a side-note, finally installed a new Topic (see sidebar) to tag any "Wash" posts, which'll slowly get integrated into the blogflow. This is one of the relatively rare panels I personally prefer the watercolor as opposed to the digitally colored one (although I'm still somewhat satisfied with the new, simplified palette), and woulda used that version had I not already sold it when it was still damp while doing demos at a recent show.

"Denali Zebra"

In all seriousness this came from the same place as my idea to someday stalk the tundra in Denali National Park wearing a panda suit, which would go over particularly well with one sizable demographic of Alaskan visitors.

In all seriousness though, that plan has a fatal flaw in that plan, since the most potentially dangerous and unpredictable instances of violent behavior are a hair-trigger away when it comes to Homo sapiens. In other words, I would make for a pretty sad specimen on a trophy wall.

After recently giving a series of lectures on the history of cartooning I am once again reminded of how grateful I am to have the opportunity to be in print at such a large scale when compared to the fate of most contemporary features with "syndication shrink."

"AK Body Positivity" + Bonus Demos

This cartoon panel was done as an inking demo for the cartooning class, while we were working on out second critique pieces: four gags + two editorial panels. I think I penciled & inked it in under twenty minutes, which must be a new land-speed record, though coloring (both digital + watercolor versions) took another hour. I admit that I pushed myself to knock out the print version within a day of doing the demo. After all, when leading by example one has gotta continually prove that you can walk the talk when it comes to meeting deadlines. "It's called artWORK!"

And yep, this is yet another example of the reoccurring walrus motif that will take some time to get out of my system after Demo Day 2024. I was also advised I might want to give the portly pinniped a distinctive goatee.
In other words, I am the walrus.

Bonus Meta: While sketching this demo (posted below) during a drawing class field trip up at the the UAF Museum of the North, some tourists were up in the "Thinking Made Visible" exhibition where a looped video of me drawing the same bear froze, and when they went to complain at the desk, they just pointed them down the hall to where I was doing it live. Same bear. Same hat. Just to mess with the guy I froze in the middle of my demo.

But seriously, right after that amusing incident, the nicest thing to happen to me all year occurred after meeting one last time with the students at the end of the day's session for a quick sketchbook review. I was still sitting at my table in the lobby working up these sketches, an elderly woman from New Orleans came over and told me that she couldn't help but notice how kind and attentive I am to my students. Since I routinely worry about how I could have done so much better when first starting out teaching, which in turn lingers into the occasional imposter syndrome, that was so incredibly validating and humbling to hear from a total stranger. It made my day. Whole semester in fact.

Another sweet spot about this particular panel is how it appeared in the middle of a series of other pieces, making for a memorable day of making art. It started out in the morning Beginning class with 20-minute  demo drawing a "subtractive selfie" in-class exercise with charcoal from an enlarged portrait (current variation of this assignment). Since I was rather sick of drawing myself, I instead used an absent student's image as an example. Then in-between classes I did the Nuggets panel (20-minutes pencil > ink + another hour for coloring). Then for the afternoon field-trip with a class of Intermediate + Advanced folks, I cranked out a few demo sketches (approx. 10-minuutes each + another hour of texturing/color) for their pen & ink assignment. What a day, and I'm gratefully aware of how lucky and rare it is to get such an opportunity.

"Self-Arrest"

This was actually a demo piece done for an interview for an upcoming episode of a docuseries "The Story of Art in America." It figures that for the filmed demo piece I'd pick a panel that absolutely nobody will get, as nobody outside of the mountaineering community will even know what the hell a self-arrest is.  

Meta: Brought to you by Demo Day 2024 - one of the side-effects of drawing walrus (walruses? walri?) all damn day. Bonus soundtrack here.

"Existential"

A simple and straightforward concept paired with a complimentary, uh, scaled-back rendering, especially the application of color. As explained in the preceding post, Gallagher's "Heathcliff" as of late has been reminding me the crucial lesson in not taking anything, including my own work, so seriously. Like don't forget to play. Maybe even have a little bit of fun sometime. 

Okay so yeah, there's also the whole metaphor thing going on about societal-wide stress, and maybe reflection of personal struggles with depression and temperament. But cheer up.

"Streaming"

I don't stream. Still. Still never installed Zoom on any computer. (update: finally succumbed last semester to signing up at the office computer. Still buy DVDs. The closest is sometimes having YouTube (less and less these days on account of incessant advertisements that are mostly scams) open in the background while working on the computer. Supposedly, according to a valued friend's opinion on the industry, comics is (or was) largely populated by adolescent boys of any age who work long isolated hours and are consequently self-exposed to right-wing media which in turn reinforces a toxic, misogynistic and myopic perspective. And I have nightmares about how horrible the unmoderated complete shit that YouTube pumps out must corrode people lacking social media literacy skills who are vulnerable to manipulation. Anyways, there's no accompanying doodle or sketch to this, so it's another one of those that just came out the other end of the pen while in the midst of a workflow session. I gave the watercolored original to someone and it was left behind so I reclaimed it, which is good since I had forgotten to document it. And so here it is. More of a commentary on how idyllic and blissful it can be floating along completely ignorant of what's going on below. And now the beaver's definitely gonna be a new sticker, maybe even the moose too...