Here I am traveling through time and space and thought.
Drawn with Photoshop on Cintiq.
Archive for the 'Comix' Category
Here’s one of my first sketches on the Cintiq 12WX! I took a couple tries at drawing myself on the Cintiq before this one. I drew myself all bright and cheery, but it just didn’t look right. I felt like I was making myself look too good, and who wants to see that? So I pushed this one a little more and gave myself that look of desperation. This was an unscripted pose, but it seemed as though I might be in a confounded state of pleading or grasping to understand something fearful, so I added the “But…”
I’ve been drawing upon various themes lately in my sketchbook, one of which is “pretty girls.” It’s not an unpopular subject among cartoonists and illustrators, in case you haven’t noticed, but it’s certainly a worthwhile one. That is, if you’re into that sort of thing. It’s fun to study different types of women or qualities that I find attractive and try to translate that to a (at least somewhat) pushed, cartoony sort of character that still comes off as pretty or sexy somehow. It’s a subjective process. What it is that makes a person attractive can be an elusive sort of thing. It’s not always in the details, and there is no single type that best exemplifies beauty. I’ve mostly been exploring petite types and models or young women. Typical, but hey, that’s what I’m drawn to at the moment and that’s what I’m exploring. Beauty is personified in all kinds of people.
Of course, all that egalitarian sort of talk aside, the most important pretty girl in the world is my fiancée, Jamie. Here’s a drawing of her.
Perhaps inspired by yesterday’s sketch of Jules Engel, I decided to take a shot at drawing myself as an older gentleman with his dentures out.
This is a sketch based on the crazy lady I recently met at my local diner. Maybe I’ll tell the story of our conversation in my comics at some point. I’m working on the first page/episode of my comics series now. It ain’t much, but it’s a start. Anyway, enjoy this sketch for the time being. Maybe my next post will be a comic! How about that?
After months of admiring the “LOL Cats” cartoons by Flickrpal Ape Lad (aka Adam Koford), I finally ordered one (for only $20 on Hobotopia.com)! The timing couldn’t have worked out more perfectly. My birthday was this past Saturday, September 15th, the very day that my LOL Cats cartoon was mailed. It arrived today on Monday!
I requested that he sandwich the cartoon in some cardboard, because my mailboxes are ridiculously tiny and my mail carrier, disgruntled. He was oh so generous and threw a little extra cartoon on the purple board.
“Mebbe a vineyard asploded?” LOL!!! Also pretty serendipitous, because Jamie and I spent this past weekend celebrating my birthday wine-tasting in the Santa Ynez Valley area of Santa Barbara County. Yes, folks. That’s “Sideways country” — and we did stay at the Buellton Days Inn, or “The Windmill.” This is our second time visiting the area for my birthday. The last time was in 2005. Our favorite wines continue to be made by Daniel Gehrs, who does not own any of his own vineyards, but purchases grapes from various places throughout the region and turns them into bottles of heaven at his winery in Buellton.
And I got more goodies today! A birthday present arrived from my brother. Wrapped in images of outer space, were two E.T. “Original Collectibles” from 1982. I was E.T. crazy when I was a little kid. These are showing some age, but still in their original packaging. Kinda like me.
These are some sketches from my ongoing quest to find the cartoon me. I am still warming up to doing some autobiographical or semi-autobiographical illustrated tales (a.k.a., “comix”) at some point. Note: The character in the bottom right is not me. I don’t know who that is.
I’m in the process now of compiling a list of story ideas and there are a lot more than I thought there were. I’m keeping them in a journal I’m calling “Short Stories” in homage to Roald Dahl. In a story by Dahl titled “Lucky Break — How I Became a Writer” (The Wonderful Story of Henry Sugar and Six More), he explains that he kept a journal bearing the name “Short Stories” and whenever he’d get the inkling of an idea for a story, he’d jot down a line or two. He kept it very simple and straight forward. Just, as Dahl described it, the “slender threads” of a plot. Almost every story he ever wrote started out as a thought written down in that journal.
Yes! Hello. I’m Back! I know, it’s been a while. I skipped a couple months. Hey, sometimes you’re just not in a blogging mood. And sometimes that feeling lasts for two months or maybe more. And anyway, I’ve been busy. My girlfriend and I went to New York on business (for her) and pleasure (for me) and then we both vacationed in Paris for a week, where we got engaged! It’s been exactly a month since we got back, and I’ve thought about posting to the ol’ blog, but… Blogging is a habit and like many habits, it can be fallen out of. Once that happens it can be difficult to pick it back up, but that’s what I’m going to try. It’s July 1st. A new month and the first day of the second half of 2007. Beginning of Act II. I’ve got doodles and photos and inspiration to share, so… we’ll see what happens!
Warmest Bloggy Regards,
Lee-Roy
“The Woodring Monitor.” Inky sketches and other machinations of Jim Woodring, creator of Frank, and a huge influence whom I don’t do justice. I will have to try harder.
UPDATE: The following image has been used with Jim Woodring’s kind permission. It is NOT my own, though I wish it were.
I’m still working on self-characterization. I think it’s getting better, but the process remains rather elusive. I think I have a design that works, I step away from it for a couple days, I come back, it looks like shit. The self character I posted previously now looks like some kind of strange bird, or something. Ah, well. Below are some sketches I did last night. Of course, they’re not hammered down designs. One sketch looks different from another. I’m working it out. Still, I think I’m seeing some progress in these. Tomorrow they will probably look all wrong to me.
As I mentioned in my previous post, I’ve got some story stuff I’m working on that will be auto- or semi-auto-biographical. The stories themselves are rough at the moment and just kind of fluttering around in my brain. I will tackle what I can as I can and we’ll see what comes of it. In the meantime, I thought I’d share another character design sketch. I’ve been developing my “cartoon self” off and on for a few weeks now or so and I’ve refrained from posting the sketches here, because, well, I guess they just weren’t quite ready to show. Later on, after the character is more established, maybe I’ll post the earlier drawings for the sake of curiosity. Suffice it to say, that caricaturing or making a functional character of one’s self is a unique challenge.
I’ve been doing a bit of sketching, developing characters for some auto-biographical story ideas. This is a quick sketch of my love, Jamie. Isn’t she cute? Happy Valentine’s Day, Jamie!
As I said in my last post, I’m a long-time fan of Harvey Pekar, and obviously that’s what brought me out to the event last night, but I was glad to learn a bit more about artist Robbie Conal ( 
), as well. I’d seen his posters pasted onto traffic-signal control boxes on street-corners of San Francisco, Seattle (I think) and Los Angeles (in that order). You’ve probably seen them, too. Those giant portraits of politicians, drawn in a fleshy, decaying, pock-marked, grotesque, and needless to say, unflattering light.
Here’s a snapshot I took just before things got going and Louise Steinman (center) asked everyone to stop taking pictures.
Harvey came out to the stage first and sat there alone for a while, silently observing the audience with a subtle facial expression I could not read (although he did look happy). When things got going, his voice was almost non-existant, but it improved over the course of things. Nerves, I guess. I’m going to try to avoid summing-up what was discussed, because letting myself go will result in far more than I’m sure any of you would care to read and would no doubt become a bit trivial. I will just say that it was pretty casual, though well moderated by Louise. We heard Harvey and Robbie give some background information on themselves, their childhoods, how they got started doing what they are now known for, et cetera. Some parallels were drawn between the two of them, including having communist parents and being dubbed “folk legends” among other things. Harvey said some pretty funny stuff. He has a real unique personality and is a tough nut to crack, even with all the autobiographical work he’s done.
Now, for some reason I thought they might be podcasting this conversation, but they only seem to podcast selected ALOUD events, and thus far nothing’s shown up for this one. You can subscribe to the ALOUD podcast here, though, and if anything changes, I’ll make an update to this post or elsewhere on the blog.
After the “conversation” portion of the event, a line was formed for book signing and such. Jamie got in line right away, and so I was only the second person in line. I tried to bend Harvey’s ear, but it wasn’t easy with the long line behind me, the slight din of voices and the barracade-like desk he was stationed behind. Still, I went ahead: “Hey, Harvey. I’ve been a fan of yours for a long time. When I was 13, etc. … So now I’m a storyboard artist and bla, bla, bla…” Harvey sat silently, looked at me a few times as I spoke, smiled slightly, perhaps, and tried to sign my books. I gave him my card. He put it in his pocket. It felt so rushed, but hey, it’s all a plus in my book.
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