If “the medium is the message,” what’s that say about Barbara Dale‘s latest canvas? What did you do during the pandemic? One local cartoonist has quite the answer. Barbara Dale used the materials she had at hand to chronicle a year none of us will ever forget — and the materials at hand just happened […]
Editorial cartoonist Clay Jones has written an in-depth review and comparison (“it’s long. I wrote it over three days”) of Microsoft’s Surface Pro and Apple’s iPad. To be specific, my review is of a Surface Pro 6 (16 GB) and an iPad Pro 12.9 (1 TB) as for how they apply for drawing political cartoons […]
Cartoon critics Phil Witte and Rex Hesner look behind gags to debate what makes a cartoon tick. This week our intrepid critics examine the drawing behind some favorite cartoons. Line, crayon, more line, wash, much more line, tone. Frank Cotham, Robert Weber, Richard Taylor, Mick Stevens, Jack Ziegler, James Thurber, George Price, Alex Gregory, […]
Ottawa Citizen editorial cartoonist Cam Cardow has posted a video showing how he creates the Duoshade effect in Photoshop. Doushade was a paper that when a special chemical was applied, a diagonal shading line appeared under the pen and ink drawings creating a shading effect. The paper was discontinued in 2009. Here’s Cam’s video:
This came across my Facebook feed and I thought I’d share. JetPens is selling a five pen bundle of Brush pens for only $26. Some are felt tip, others synthetic hair. My trusty Pentel Pocket Brush Pen is in the mix – usually a $20 pen by itself. Once I found the Pentel Pocket Brush […]
Last August Wacom created a bit of buzz announcing a new ballpoint pen called “The Inkling” that records what you write or sketch which can then be imported into your favorite program like Adobe Illustrator, Photoshop or Autodesk Sketchbook Pro. Rosa Golijan, over at MSNBC’s Gadget Blog reviews the device: The Inkling’s ability to spit […]
David Paccia has posted a video on how wooden pencils are manufactured over on his David Wasting Paper blog. Almost from the beginning I’ve used mechanical pencils because they keep a sharper line (or consistently tighter line), but when you read through David’s blog, there is still a great many artists that use the good […]
The other post about the declining quality of the Strathmore bristol board has prompted quite a bit of response. Mike Cope has posted a video of him drawing a Valentines Day cartoon that appears in this months Readers Digest. He posts the following regarding his technique: Each gag cartoon begin as a very light rough […]
I’ve heard this complaint from other sources too. Lately I’ve gotten a number of bad batches of Strathmore bristol. The problem with them was they bled. Inking on them with a dip pen resulted in your line getting fuzzy and hairy-looking. Totally unusable. At first MAD sent me some boards that did that, and I […]
We’re closing in on the end of the year. 2010 was a good year, but mostly a blur. That said there were a lot of great books, services and products that came out this year. I’ve compiled a list of things I thought are above and beyond. If you’re still looking for a gift to […]
Those who are fans of the Moleskine notebook might be interested in the new limited edition Peanuts notebooks. The notebook comes in two sizes and in both ruled and plain styled paper. Charlie Brown and Snoopy are given top billing on the silkscreen printed covers, whilst the anniversary logo is debossed on every notebook. The […]
There are a few cartoonists who are real masters of the watercolor medium – Richard Thompson, creator of Cul de Sac and Richard’s Poor Almanac is one of them. He recently posted a piece on his blog detailing his watercoloring process. The only thing better would be for him to get a webcam and do […]
I admit, I never tire of talking tools. Not the stuff found at the Home Depot, but the local art supply store. I don’t believe that any particular pen, paper or pencil will make any cartoonist funnier or produce more clever cartoons, but I’m fascinated by the tools cartoonists keep in their quiver. Last year, […]
Graphix is discontinuing it’s Duoshade and Unishade products. The specialty paper allows a developer solution to be brushed over an inked drawing creating horizontal lines for shading. You can see the product effectively in Investor’s Business Daily editorial cartoonist Michael Ramirez’s work (see example). According to Hayley Prendergast, President of Grafix, Consumer Products, the production […]
I got a kick out of Richard Thompson’s latest blog post about his favorite nib, including its history. In n earlier post, I’d driveled on at length about my favorite pen nib, the Hunt ##101 Imperial, shown above. I use a dip pen nib every day of my life and am therefor a leetle obsessive […]