Some 2015 Sketches

Above: a little girl discovers a back store room full of toys in a North Carolina thrift store.


I have been traveling a lot this year. Sometimes for family, sometimes for business. And when I have a moment, I will whip out the sketchbook and draw some people.

This is one of those small sketchbooks, 3.5 in. x 5 in., that fits in a pocket easily. None of these people ever noticed I was drawing them, which is a good thing. I like to be a fly on the wall.

These are, with the exception of the first one below, all from 2015.

Dude who sold me this sketchbook in Virginia really wanted to get me on some kind of list. I told him I was from far away. Dude still kept asking me.

A big man who said this several times to his kids. The mother, who was much smarter, was not to be seen.

When you have a fanny pack hanging off your gut, you really just do not care about how you look.

The above man was a beer brewer and he performed a five hour soliloquy on hops, yeast, water, and the beers of the world on the way from Portsmouth, NH to NYC. I was very happy to get off the bus.

Great t-shirt. I saw this guy a couple of times on the DC Metro.

Sitting and chilling in the Ronald Reagan airport.

A pilot with his sack lunch.

Cool beachy looking man at the Goodwill in Topsham, ME.

A couple of sketches of people working the night shift.

Thanks for looking. Let me know if any of these people is you!

Overheard at Market Basket

 Sometimes I overhear things and they stick with me. So I draw them up.

I overheard this older gentlemen ranting to a captive audience (a Market Basket grocery store employee, who was busy shelving).

I listened to as much as I could. I think it's about the BATMAN movie shooting. The "take him out back and have done with it" was damn chilling.

This isn't a cartoon; more like a slice of life kinda event. I hear this kind of raging hate, fueled with wrong statistics (Canada has more gun crime), routinely.

Micron Pigma and watercolor on 110 lb. recycled drawing paper.

And, below, the raw scan of my sketchbook page:

Sketchbook: Catskills Irish Arts Festival 2012

Above: a group of young musicians on the main stage. 


The Catskills Irish Arts Festival is a week-long celebration of Irish music in East Durham, NY. The entire town is invaded by hundreds of musicians and traditional Irish music fans from all over the world. There are classes during the week in fiddle, flute, and other Irish musical instruments. All of the hotels and pubs have impromptu sessions every night. 

Since my wife plays and I do not, I tend to people watch.

Here are a few of the sketches I did from CIAW 2012:

The above trio performed together. Below: the audience was young and old.

A lot of people walking around with instrument cases:

 Love this flutist's wild hair:

A rather dour look on the keyboard player's face:

 Watching the performers:

 Love this banjo player's hair-and-sunglasses look:

 This man danced with his baby, who wasn't too sure about all this Irish music:

 Two guys chatting at the end of the last concert on the last day:

  Here's a woman with her "Shut Up and Play" t-shirt:

Gotta buy a t-shirt:

 Performers were old and young. Here's a fellow in his 20s who had an amazing voice:

Loved this guy's 'fro:

Raw scans of these drawings from the sketchbook:

 

The Bus Critic

For those who missed it.

Cartoonists aren't the only ones who have critics. Here's a story I overheard my bus driver tell.

Travels with Ink and Nib and Brush

Next week it's NYCC time (New York Comicon). The convention is a great time, of course. The journey there maybe not as much. Here's some advice I posted from January 2010 about traveling with your precious old school drawing tools:




Traveling? I don't envy you. But if you have to travel, and you are a dedicated old school cartoonist who loves the old school drawing tools, then you already have a method for safely transporting your beloved art supplies through the rigors of the TSA, the baggage handlers, airplane pressure, etc.

Here's what I do:


Nibs! Those nibs (that you have delicately broken in) can be easily placed ...


... in a protective matchbox. When the TSA employee asks, Do you have anything that could be considered a weapon? -- Well, I have do not believe that nibs could be used as a weapon. At least, not a very effective one. Regardless, nibs get checked thru baggage. Along with the holder.
I like the ink in those squatty glass containers that are tough and ready for some travel tumbling and turbulence. (No Higgins Ink plastic containers if you please!) Wrapped in a couple layers of plastic wrap and then this baby is wrapped again in swaddling clothes (i.e., a black t-shirt),

A good brush is like your pal. Like a pen nib, it needs to be broken in and then it can last (with the proper care) for a long time. The problem is how do you protect your brush shape?

I just get a card (an index card, or piece of cardboard) and tape the brush down. And then I take another card and tape it on top, creating, for all intents and purposes, a snug brush sandwich.

Confession: I usually use those Pigma permanent ink pens. Below is a drawing from last year depicting "the pens on my desk:"

Related: Some sketchbook drawings and a few more of my sketches.

Also related: Do you have too many sketchbooks?

Our Prince Edward Island Vacation

 

My wife and I spent a few days in Prince Edward Island. I told you about the international editorial cartoon exhibition, Freedom in Broad Strokes. Now, below, are some scenes from our trip.

These are color sketches, blown up from my sketchbook. I was doodling and scribbling with no pencil foundation so, you know, it's doodly and messy and all that

TOOL NERD INFO:

• Pen: Micron Pigma 5mm
• Color: a kids' watercolor set from a dimestore

First up: Canadian Maritime Swimwear. It's a bit chilly, but the locals are used to it!

Below: Camping in PEI! Active fun for some, passive smoking for others!

Night time was dark and you could only hear voices and see everyone's campfire. One young girl was thrashing on an old guitar, singing what sounded like folk songs, but, when listening closely, they all turned out to be old Alanis Morissette hits. The middle aged fellow in a Winnebago was visibly smitten, He really did stand at the edge of his site and go "Wooo!"

Some good things and bad things about the trip:

EDIT: "NO BARS" should be on the right and "IRISH BARS" should be on the left. Thanks to Caryn Alma for pointing out my transpositional boo-boo.

"No bars" was probably for the best. My wife played great Irish music with the session players at The Old Triangle. She was in top form!

And here are the actual uncut pages:

Yes, that's the bookmark hanging there on the page. I am a lazy scanner, huh?

Oh, the toe's all better now!

Sketches from CARTOONING FOR EVERYBODY by Lawrence Lariar

Here are some sketches from CARTOONING FOR EVERYBODY by Lawrence Lariar, copyright 1941 by Crown Publishing.

Above: Lawrence Lariar self portrait.

Lawrence Lariar was a cartoonist, a cartoon editor for PARADE and LIBERTY, a novelist and one of the most prolific authors of "How to Cartoon" books. He edited the long-running BEST CARTOONS OF series of books from 1942 to 1971. He died in 1981.

If you are building a shelf of books about cartooning, it's inevitable you'll run into a Lariar book. Thanks to him, we have many gag cartoonists' work between hardcovers that may have otherwise turned into dust after being published in the throwaway magazine medium..

Here are some sketches by Lariar and a couple of colleagues. Unlike his other, later books, Lariar emphasizes the value of sketching and doodling for a number of pages. The nice thing about these sketches is that they look as vibrant and full of life as ever. He's right: sketching from life helps you cartoon.

 

Above: a page from illustrator and cartoonist Greg D'Allessio's sketchbook. (He was married to cartoonist Hilda Terry for 55 years.)

Above: spots by John Groth (1902-88). I love how loose he works. Loose and confident.

 John Groth made a career as a painter and illustrator by focusing on sports and war. He captured the action-packed scenes by witnessing the events first-hand and sketching his experiences. Groth used a style technique called “speed line,” in which he sketched his subjects using rough, unperfected lines and filled the lines in with watercolors. Upon describing his technique, Ernest Hemingway, whom Groth spent time with during World War II, wrote, “None of us understood the sort of shorthand he sketched in. the men would look at the sketches and see just a lot of lines. It was a great pleasure to find what fine drawings they were when we got to see them.”

He also was a artist-correspondent during the Korean and Vietnam wars. Groth was also the art Director for Esquire magazine.

From his rogallery.com biography.

 

 Above two pages again by John Groth "with no preliminary pencil understructure."

Above: cartoonist Jack Kabat with some freehand fanciful doodles.

Above: a sketch from Lariar's sketchbook that he sold to the New Yorker as a spot drawing.

Above and below: some more finished sketches of middle-aged women and kids. "Study these doodles and originate a few."

My thanks to my friend, the one and only Don Orehek, for passing along this great book. Thanks, Don!