Favorite Scratching Areas of Local Cats by Mike Lynch

"Favorite Scratching Areas of Local Cats" is a cartoon by Mike Lynch. Ink and watercolor on 90 lb. Loew Cornell "Rough Surface" watercolor paper.

I was trying out this new watercolor paper. It took to the Micron Pigma pens just fine. But, as you can see, it likes to bleed a bit much -or my brush is too wet.


Above: the rough version, a page from a sketchbook.


Above: the original. I altered it to a vertical layout in Photoshop. I also did redraw of the "scruff tugs" cat, Bertie.

Obamacare Comics

Don't understand the heathcare overhaul? Maybe a graphic novel version will help. The Boston Herald's Christine McConville reports in today's cover story:

Jonathan Gruber, a nationally recognized health economist who devised the economic underpinnings of Obamacare (Gruber hates the term), said his three comic-loving kids encouraged him to use the hip format of the graphic novel — basically an expensive comic published in book form — to tell the story of the complicated plan to 300 million Americans.

The rest of the story is here.

Hefner's Cartoon Chronicles of Playboy

From the Playboy mansion scrapbook vault: A cartoon by Hefner about the origins of the Playboy bunny logo. Photo by Catherine Opie.


The New York Times Sunday Magazine profiles Hugh Hefner, who, at age 85, recently re-took his Playboy empire and is set to get married again.

He was, of course, a cartoonist when he was younger. Being a cartoonist was his goal before started Playboy, before he became, for lack of a better word, Hugh Hefner; the "Hef" we know today.

He is, according to writer Charles McGrath, an persistent self-chronicler in the tradition of Pepys.

In the attic of the mansion is an archive of continually updated scrapbooks now closing in on 2,400 volumes.

And in some of these scrapbooks: Hefner's cartoons.

Far more interesting are the earlier volumes, some of which are collections of stuff Hefner began keeping as a child. They include cartoons, a series of detective stories modeled on Conan Doyle and several issues of an illustrated horror magazine called Shudder. Hefner — a dreamy, solitary child, bright but socially immature — was already a publisher of sorts, churning out copy and writing editor’s notes to his readers. Most remarkable of all is a comic book, called “School Daze,” that Hefner, or an alter ego called Goo Heffer, worked on all through his years at Steinmetz High School in Chicago, depicting the larksome good times of an inseparable group of high-school pals.

The rest of the article, "How Hef Got His Groove Back" by Charles McGrath, is here.

Video: Lynn Johnston Interview

An interview with the creator of FOR BETTER OR WORSE, Lynn Johnston. The interview is sponsored by Schoolism. For more interviews, please visit Sketchoholic.

Bloggiversary

It's been five years! In Internet terms, that's a long time.

Thanks to everyone who stops by and makes my Mike Lynch Cartoons blog a part of their Internet routine. The blog has gotten more and more traffic since I first started it, at the urging of my inky pal Mark Anderson, way back in 2006.

I hope to continue to be a worthy Web surfing pitstop in the future.

NCS Division Awards - Call for Entries

NCS Division Awards - Call for Entries LAST CALL

Entries deadline: February 6, 2011. No emails submissions please.

From the National Cartoonists Society:

It’s time to prepare your entry for the National Cartoonists Society Division Awards.

Below, you will see the list of the juries which will judge the categories, the jury chair and the address to which you will send your entry.

Please remember only recent work can be considered. This means work published between the dates of December 1, 2009 and December 31, 2010.

Please submit published tear sheets when possible and document when and where the work was published. Members of the National Cartoonists Society and nonmembers may submit.

Each entry must be accompanied by a completed ENTRY FORM and a BIO SHEET.

PLEASE NOTE: ALL SUBMISSIONS TO BE PRINTED AND MAILED. NO EMAIL SUBMISSIONS PLEASE.

The winners will be announced at the 65th Annual Reuben Awards Dinner on May 28, 2011.

Cartoonists are invited to submit their work (or the work of anyone else) no later than February 6, 2011, for consideration for one or more of the following Division Awards:

TELEVISION ANIMATION
Submit one or more samples in VHS or DVD format of aired or exhibited
work that was released in the year 2010 to: Rob Smith, Jr., NCS
Florida Chapter, PO Box 540103, Orlando, FL 32854-0103
(ncs@robsmithjr.com)

FEATURE ANIMATION
Submit one or more samples in VHS or DVD format of aired or exhibited
work that was released in the year 2010 to: David Folkman, NCS Los
Angeles Chapter, 6171 W. Century Blvd. #160, Los Angeles, CA 90045
(folkmanart@aol.com)

NEWSPAPER ILLUSTRATION
Submit 6 samples of published work to: Adrian Sinnott, NCS Long Island
Chapter, 27 East 24th Street, Huntington Station, NY 11746-3701
(acsinnott@adriansinnott.com)

GAG CARTOONS
Submit 12 samples of published work to: Mike Edholm, NCS North Central
Chapter, 2108 Sandstone Road, Lincoln, NE 08512 (medholm1@mac.com)

GREETING CARDS
Submit 6 samples of published work to: Ron Evry, NCS DC Chapter, 2880
Cedar Crest Court, Woodbridge, VA 22192-3119 (revry@panix.com)

NEWSPAPER COMIC STRIPS
Submit 12 samples of published work to: Polly Keener, NCS Great Lakes
Chapter, 400 W. Fairlawn Blvd., Akron, OH 44313-4510
(pollytoon@aol.com)

NEWSPAPER PANEL CARTOONS
Submit 12 samples of published work to: Doug Bratton, NCS Metro
Chapter, 17 Crestmont Drive, Dover, NJ 07801 (bratcartoonist1@aol.com)

MAGAZINE FEATURE/MAGAZINE ILLUSTRATION
Submit 6 samples of published work to: Patricia Storms, NCS Canadian
Chapter, 65 Bernice Crescent, Toronto, Ontario CANADA M6N 1W7
(gpstorms@rogers.com)

BOOK ILLUSTRATION
Send up to 6 samples of published work to: Jack Pittman, NCS Southeast
Chapter, 1740 Brooks Avenue, Raleigh, NC 27607-6618
(jack@jackpittman.net)

EDITORIAL CARTOONS
Submit 12-20 samples of published work to: Brian Walker, NCS
Connecticut Chapter, 34 Old Forge Rd., Wilton, CT 06897-3707
(hiandlois1@aol.com)

ADVERTISING ILLUSTRATION
Submit 4 samples of published and marketed work to: Graham Nolan, NCS
Upstate NY Chapter, 162 Godfrey Terrace, East Aurora, NY 14052
(gnolan@sunshinestatecomics.com)

COMIC BOOKS
Submit 3 samples of published work to: David Coulson, NCS Pennsylvania
Chapter, 6425 Wilkins Avenue, Pittsburgh, PA 15217
(ndavid.coulson@gmail.com)

GRAPHIC NOVELS
Submit book published in 2010 to: Mike Lynch, NCS National
Representative, 61 Nutes Road, Milton, NH 03851-4800
(mike@mikelynchcartoons.com)

Once again: Each entry must be accompanied by a completed ENTRY FORM and a BIO SHEET. ALL SUBMISSIONS TO BE PRINTED AND MAILED. NO EMAIL SUBMISSIONS PLEASE.

The submission deadline is February 6, 2011.

Illustrations by Sergio Aragones for the NCS.

"The Cardtooner" by Milt Hammer

"The New Way Cardtooner," copyright 1940 by Professional Publishers Inc., is a deck of oversized (4 1/2" x 5") playing cards by cartoonist Milt Hammer. Sure, you can make your money playing poker with these, or follow the instructions on each card about how to draw and make ZILLIONS by being a cartoonist!

Each card has a unique drawing lesson on it. Yes, every card has a

"... new and easy way to draw funny pictures ... you take a pencil and some paper, add lines step by step, and you create cartoons ... it's as simple as A, B, C."

I can understand the smiling fellow on the cover, but why is there a very upset one-toothed infant (just look at those tears, zipping away into the stratosphere) on the back cover of the package? Not so appealing!


Milt Hammer drew for comic books published by Dick Cole and Target. He looks like a product of one of those mail correspndence courses in cartooning like the Cartoonists Exchange. His Lambiek page has very little information -- not even a birthdate. Craig Yoe highlights a comic of Hammer's from a November 1948 issue of Target Comics here. And that's all the Web has to offer for now.

Like NBC TV used to say, if you missed the original airing, then the rerun is "new to you." The deck, which is missing a few cards after 71 years, is reprinted below in sequence, for the first time this century.

I've never seen or even heard of a "how to cartoon" instructions printed on playing cards. I wonder how many exist.


"Endeavor to express a certain emotion when drawing any of these features." Well, of course you should.




A good thing about the "Body" lesson on the two of clubs card is that Milt keeps all hands in view. Even with his "comic woman" he draws her right hand coming out a bit from the far side of her body. He's not hiding hands. A lot of beginners will stick hands behind backs and in pockets so they don't have to struggle with drawing them. A very bad habit!









One of the odder things about Milt Hammer's style is his habit of drawing eyes like inverted commas, like the swimmer figure in the left middle of the four of clubs above.



And the fellow in the upper left is Maurice Chevalier.






Those inverted comma-style eyes makes everyone look a bit cheesed off.


Note his use of shadows. For instance, with the car bumping along, unattached to its crosshatched shadow, such that the jalopy appears to be up in the air










These guys are scary looking.




Drawing animals can be hard. I really think Milt's remiss in not showing how to draw animal bodies.


Spats are what Chevalier would wear.




Is the fellow in the upper right above dead or stinky or both?










Lettering is becoming a lost art nowadays, which is a shame.

Above is one of my favorite cards. Milt was not afraid to draw expressive hands, a necessity when cartooning.







A big hat tip to my friend John Klossner for lending me this set. Thanks, John!