Friday, January 13, 2012

Coffee Spill on Sketchbook

This has happened to all of us!

I was having coffee with my friend and fellow cartoonist John Klossner on Tuesday and I bumped the table. The table was a bit wobbly. My coffee sympathetically wobbled, and capsized, spilling on my sketchbook.


On some pages,  I divide up some pages into little squares and sketch out rough gag cartoon ideas. Above was such a page.




The back of the page (yeah, I draw on both sides) had some sketches.

Not too much damage, fortunately!

The best insurance against spills is using pens with permanent ink that do not smear. These pages were drawn with Pigma Micron pens.

Sandy Kossin introduced me to these pens. They are permanent ink and do not fade (unlike Sharpies). 

"This is what you want," Sandy told me once, years ago. He moved his plate, revealing the paper placemat (we were at lunch), and, uncapping one of his own Micron pens, drew a line. Then he looked at me. "Show me a pen that can do this," he said dramatically, licking his finger. Then he placed his finger on the placemat, smearing it over the ink line. The line did not bleed.

Same with coffee spills!

Thanks, Sandy, for that great advice!

3 comments:

Dan Reynolds said...

Mike

Yes, coffee, both a cartoon hazard and the life blood of a cartoonist as well.

Since the characters did not jump off the page, I'm guessing this was decaf.

Btw, I take mine black with two Splenda.

Stacy Curtis said...

Embrace the coffee spill.

Amaral said...

Think of it as a water color wash.