Okay, I’m closing in on it now, with a good mix of brushstrokes and penwork. More simplicity is still needed. I’m really grooving lately on the work of Scott Campbell, whose stuff is really amazing. His stuff is so high energy and awesome, which is kind of where I want to get, but I like to play around too much, and also I like making a gajillion little lines, too. C’est la vie!

In my continuing effort to figure out what I’m doing wrong with young Kid Medulla, I’m trying to deconstruct the little fella as far as I can so I can come up with a style that not only works for him, but is easily replicable across a dozen pages of story. These aren’t it, but I’m getting closer. More simple, Dharbin, more simple!

Next year my first ever published work will appear, courtesy Chris Pitzer’s Superior Showcase series. Appropriately, it will be the last issue of said series; on the other hand, it looks like I’ll be sharing space with the incredibly sweet Cliff Chiang, and the monstrously talented Laura Park, so I’ll be in good company. On the other hand, it might be better to have less talented book-mates, so I look better–but what can you do?

Anyway, the series is a spinoff of Pitzer’s super-critically-acclaimed Project: Superior collection, which featured a gajillion indie dudes doing superhero-themed stories. So I decided to do a little story about a kid with mind powers. I won’t give away the pulse-pounding conclusion, but let’s just say it involved farting. There, now it’s said.

So I went and did a whole page of finished art, which took me weeks, which I redrew and relettered multiple times, before I decided to scrap the whole thing and start over. The best part of this project is that it’s making me really REALLY examine the way I’m doing all this stuff, from character design to inking to lettering to storytelling. Really great opportunity. This image is the top of the first page, but it’ll be redone before too long. Assuming Chris doesn’t have a problem with it, maybe I’ll post it here. He’s kind of a tough mother though, so we’ll see.

I’ve been playing around with different ways to approach the “holding” line in a cartoon, and this was an unsuccessful attempt. Drawing with square nibs is okay here and there, but a C-4 is too big for the size I draw at, which is small. The dragon/goat/dog thing looks okay, though.

Nuff said.

These days, it’s refreshing to see a man who’ll cut through all the red tape and get right to the heart of a problem. None of this mealy-mouthed “side-effects may include…” gobbledy-gook. In true Eastern European fashion, Dr. Schmocter sees the heart of the problem, removes that heart, and then cooks and eats that heart. Thank you, Dr. Schmocter!

I mean, who doesn’t? Don’t you?

Doctor Schmocter! The metaphysical physician, noted quack, and all-around sensitive guy! Always earnest! Never efficacious! Dr. Schmocter!

Have you ever heard of Milton Glaser? Well, along with a ton of other stuff (the I-Heart-NY logo, the famous psychedelic Dylan poster, etc.) he co-founded The Push Pin Studios way back in the 50’s, with Seymour Chwast. The studio, which would become arguably one of the two or three most influential American design firms of the 20th century–they had a Louvre special exhibit in the 70’s–published on a semi-regular basis The Push Pin Graphic, which was on the surface, little more than a sophisticated calling card to send to art directors and other potential clients. The Graphic would feature hand illustration, dynamic typesetting and layout, and–increasingly over its lifespan–articles featuring bizarre or ironic esoterica. Of course, it was first and foremost a periodical design publication/experiment/brochure, but the studio’s infectious creativity made these little booklets enormously entertaining to anyone, regardless of their interest in design, illustration, or the other graphic arts.

One of the conceits of the Graphic was that the advertisements were done in-house, featuring the different companies that the studio employed to produce the publication; for instance, the images above come from a page of advertisements featuring the typesetter, printing company, retoucher, etc. Milton Glaser, from all I’ve read so far, seemed to be the more classically-bent member of the studio, with a background in painting and Italian art. Beyond the more obviously illustrator-y pieces of his in the publication (portraits of George Bernard Shaw, Mussolini marching on Rome) he would occasionally contribute fanciful cross-hatched illustrations like these. When I first saw these things, I was immediately blown away, not only by the style, and the elegant linework, but by how simply great they look. The problem with style is that it must always be in service to the material, except in cases where the style itself is the material. Many cartoonists will develop a very singular style, and even a very beautiful one, but it leaves the subject matter so overworked that the very idea of the cartoon is suborned to its manner of execution.

These drawings, on the other hand, seem at once stylish, abstract, and immediate–the idea is immediately clear, but there’s enough style there to keep someone looking. In my case, looking, and looking, and looking… so much so, that I found myself compelled to spend hours replicating them in my sketchbook, in quasi-fruitful attempt to learn the style. The problem, or at least one of them, is that Milton Glaser is so famous for other innovations, that searching for other examples of this kind of work is hard; mainly because most people, articles, and books focus more squarely on his admittedly far-larger design portfolio. I fired off an e-mail to his studio website, but of course have heard nothing. Who wants to hear, “I’m really interested in the work you were doing fifty years ago, and am irritated that the much-lauded work you’ve done since is getting in my way.” If you, gentle reader, ever come across more examples of this kind of pen-and-ink work, whether by Glaser or another, please e-mail me: dusty-at-dharbin-dot-com.

Oh, by the way, just to be clear: the above drawings are reproductions I did of several of Glaser’s drawings from the ad’s I was talking about. I had nothing to do with their conception, nor do I claim any copyright or anything. But don’t they look good? It’s terrible to be so proud of something that wasn’t my idea at all.

This is yet another idea for a kids’ book, but I’ve never gone back to it. I’m not even sure exactly what it was now, but it seemed to be in the classic Misfit-Children-With-Possibly-Demonic-But-Probably-Invisible-And-Definitely-Wearing-Flip-Flops mold that so many blockbuster properties have employed over the years. Sigh.