So Robert Goodin asked me to do something for the Covered art show going on this month in Los Angeles, at Secret Headquarters. Before I get into all the boring art talk, I should say that you should go; I wish I could afford to go, but Los Angeles is a long drive for me. Hopefully less long for you. You can also see all the pieces in the show on their Flickr page, along with prices and info on how you can buy them, regardless of your location.

If you don’t know, Covered is a blog Rob started around a year or two ago, which is basically artists re-interpreting classic or favorite or just weird comics covers. It’s cool. Rob gets a lot of big names, and a lot of small names, and the takes run from faithful to weird and back again. I love it.

But I had a really hard time thinking of something to do, I came down to either “The Ark” (one of the Jack Chick “Crusaders” line of comics); or the Frazetta cover to Weird Science-Fantasy, the famous one with the spaceman fighting the cavemen; or the one I did. Honestly I was about to pull out of the show; I just didn’t have any time, and I’m trying not to do non-paying work, especially since I have undone commissions for some very patient clients.

But I’m glad I did now–drawing Richie Rich was so pleasant, I can’t even tell you. Weirdly, it made me feel really grown-up–I still have most of my comics from when I was a kid, and most of them are Richie Rich comics. So the cover above is something I’ve been seeing–something that’s a part of my inner visual lexicon–for the last 25-30 years. Richie Rich might be one of the single biggest influences on my own approach to cartooning, but this was the first time in my entire life including childhood, that I ever tried to actually draw him. In effect I was using adult skills to really look deeply at something from my childhood. It felt strange and great and sad.

The thing about Richie Rich–leaving the weirdness of the comics themselves out–is his design: it’s nuts. His head is nearly as big as the entire rest of his body, he’s got these kooky cankle legs that actually seem to get larger the closer you get to his feet, and he wears an insane black suit/blue shorts/white boots combo, that’s set off jauntily by his massive red bow tie. But what really makes his design is the shape of his head, specifically the way the line of his forehead-to-cheek swoops in and out expressively. You could always tell a crummy Richie Rich artist by this line–if that line doesn’t work, the whole face falls apart. Oops I’m digressing.

Okay so anyway I started drawing Richie Rich #141. I’m pretty anal, and didn’t have a lot of time, so I did a lot of measuring and mathematizing to make sure I could fit everything in–instead of, say, having to cram in the last couple of letters in the title or squoosh the bike wheel a little to keep them in frame. Or getting most of the way done and then having to start over. I draw small, so I made it 5.75″ x 8.5″, which is around 30% smaller than the original. Then I just took measurements and divided them by 1.325 to transfer them to the smaller paper.

I basically mapped out where the different title elements would go, as well as the top and sides of the figure, assuming the bottom dimension would just naturally work fine, since there was so much negative space in the composition and I was leaving out the “detectives” subtitle. I actually ended up with too much negative space at the bottom, but by the time I realized this, I had a set of pencils I was pretty happy with, so I just decided to say eff it and go ahead.

I have a weird approach to drawing, and not at all a healthy one–when I draw things I draw their component pieces one at a time, in relation to each other, rather than sketching out the whole thing and then firming up proportions as I go. So a lot of times when I draw from some reference, whether it’s life or another sketch or something like this where I’m straight-up copying, everything looks perfect but there’s an unsettling element somewhere, like the person’s legs are double long or short or the roof of the house is pitched nearly vertical.

In this case it fortunately manifested itself as drawing Richie bigger in ratio to his bike–both the bike and Richie are more or less correct, just not in relation to one another. But that’s not the sort of thing people notice, and for some reason I liked it anyway–it fits the way I’ve skewed the point of the original cover. So, a narrow miss!

I was happy enough with the pencils, in fact, that I was terrified to ink them; I was pretty certain I’d screw them up. Especially since I’ve been using nibs for the last few months, and am way out of practice with my trusty Kuretake brush pen.

The big lines for me are the tricky ones; I always draw them first, and they always looks terrible until you start filling in the other lines around them.

Like so. This is something I wish someone who knows about it would just sit down and teach me, this thick-to-thin ration that makes certain cartoons work. For instance, the cartooning math that decrees that Richie’s head should have a big chunky “holding” line–but that nearly every other line should be of a single weight, and pretty fine at that. I drew all the non-weighted lines with a .005 black Micron pen, which is the smallest one; even as small as I draw the idea of using the Micron for the actual basic lines in a cartoon is crazy.

Anyway, I know there is some cartooning science to this, but I can’t quite put my finger on it. But I want to. I want to put my finger on that science! Because Warren Kremer, who was either the original or one of the original Richie Rich artists, and very likely the artist I’m ripping off paying homage to here, has definitely got it. In spades.

It’s like the fat lines are bringing forms out of the more mundane shapes in the background almost. But that’s not quite it either. Heck I don’t know. But it was awfully fun to ink, maybe one of the most fun things I’ve ever inked. If someone gets the license to Richie Rich and wants to pay me to ink them, I will take that money. You’ll have to get a good artist to draw them though.

Figure’s all done, next up: lettering! Surprisingly, most of my mistakes on this are in the lettering, which I got a little overconfident on. I like lettering and enjoy making it, and just sort of assumed that lettering the small stuff wouldn’t be nearly as hard as getting the big line around Richie’s head right.

Still, much as you reduce art for print to smooth out visible errors, by drawing pretty small it makes errors hard to see sometimes, because they are after all tiny.

I spent  a long time trying to puzzle out how best to approximate the original colors, but ended up ditching the blue background. I couldn’t get a Copic marker to match, and all my blending attempts were either too dull or too bright; the closest one would have meant I hatched the whole background with a blue Micron over a gray marker underlayer. I ended up just doing the underlayer and leaving it at that. Why screw it up just for the dropped background?

And there you go! I cannot overstate how much I enjoyed making this, it was the best. Seriously, someone get that Richie Rich license and pay me to do something with it. I don’t think I could compose new Richie’s in this smooth style, but I would love to be involved with something nevertheless with someone who could.

One $12 Target frame later, and it’s ready to be packed up and shipped off to Sunny California! The show starts this Friday, March 6, and will last throughout the month. Rob is putting up a new piece from the show each day on the Covered blog, so you can see them there, or if you’d like a sneak peek (and/or to purchase one OR EVEN MINE AHEM AHEM, you can check out the Secret Headquarters Flickr set devoted to the show! Okay time for bed it’s late!

Okay! This Saturday, March 6, I’ll be beginning a new 8-week class at Charlotte’s Central Piedmont Community College, and I want you or someone you know to take it. The class is titled “Constructing Visual Narratives;” if you know me you know I did not come up with that class title. I think if I were to call it something, it would be “MAKE COMICS.”

Which is what we will be doing. The Advertising and Graphic Design department, who oversee this particular Continuing Education series of courses, has generously granted me carte blanche to do whatever I like, so I’m excited about this particular class. Basically what I’m planning is to make comics every week, both in class and as homework. We’ll use the comics we make to discuss some of the basic precepts of comics theory and application; but more importantly we’ll just make a ton of comics. There is no better way to learn comics than to make them. Practice practice practice as they say.

So! There is a link to the class listing here–it will take place in Room 255 in the Central Campus’s Overcash building. The cost is $225, and I will do my best to make sure that you get your money’s worth. All you need to bring to the class is some regular ole paper and some sort of mark-making device, a pencil or pen or whatever. THAT’S IT.

Alright! I, with the kind assistance of random.org, have selected a winner to my little self-promotion contest. Hats off to Mr “@EthanEde“, who was the 13th to retweet and/or post a link to my original contest posting. For his troubles, Mr @ede will receive the original concept drawing for my Under-Achiever strip–not technically the art for the strip itself, which was pieced together from a lot of drawings, but a nice pinup nonetheless, and far larger than what I ended up doing anyway.

Additional kudos to Mr Henry Eudy, who also travels the Twitterways as @OhTheHumanatee, and who was the very first person to enter; as well as someone who bought a page of art from me last week, and who has patiently endured my continued forgetfulness in actually transmitting said art to him. Henry is a cartoonist of no small talent himself, so it’s a double pleasure to get his money. Which is not to say I don’t want your money, just to be clear. Because I do. I want it. I need it.

Okay, so thanks to everyone very much, not only to those who participated, but also to those who endured it. I’m a little embarassed about doing something like this, as it’s precisely the sort of thing I hate myself. But what can you do, we’re all our best employees in this hardscrabble world, you’ve got to get out there and beat those streets!

Hey guys! I will be a guest at this Saturday’s Charlotte Minicon, which will occur literally almost within sight of my house. I have been stressing lately about the various travel costs I’ll have to wrestle with to do the other cons I’m planning (TCAF, SPX, maybe Stumptown, APE), so having one I can wheel a little dolly to is pretty convenient. I mean, real luxury at a con is being able to walk home to use the bathroom if you need to.

ANYWAY. The show happens this Saturday from 11 to 5 pm, at The Palmer Building at Fireman’s Hall. I know that sounds confusing, but for you Charlotte residents it’s what used to be the fireman training facility at the corner of 7th Street and 5th Street, practically across the street from Lupie’s. The address is 2601 E. 7th St, Charlotte NC, 28204, so Google that shizz if you dare!

While I am gainfully employed by Heroes Aren’t Hard To Find (we put on the Minicon), this is the first time I’ve ever set up at a Heroes event as a cartoonist, so I’m kinda excited. I would be even more excited to see you guys come out and say hello. I’ll be selling stuff, comics, t-shirts, originals, all that. Even most excited to take your money, I assure you.

Also excited to see you will be my pards J. Chris Campbell and Rich Barrett, who I’ll be sitting somewhere near. Plus there are a bunch of other local superhero dudes, plus South American Francesco Francavilla, who is exactly as entertaining as his name sounds. Tons of info right here!

ALSO, for those of you wondering why my strip is late this week, I am working on it! I am coloring my 8-page strip from J. Chris’s Ancient Age book last year, and it is taking way longer than I thought (why is that always a surprise?). But: soon. For now, you can read it for free!

Truly there is no more treasured person in all of Education Assembled than the teacher of Continuing Education courses in Comics. Ranking higher even than the American Sign Language (ASL) teacher, higher than Ukrainian As A Second Language (USL), even pulling even with the Creative Scrapbooking (CPb) teacher! Now, combine this celebrated position in civic culture with a person like myself; a person known far and wide for his sagacity, his perspicacity, yea even his sesquipedality. What you get is a position as revered as the most hallowed in the community: as revered as the “Security-Guard-In-Training”; as treasured as the “Cable Television Installer”; as feared and respected even as the mighty “Assistant Principal” himself.

But lo! I am informed by my prospective employer, Central Piedmont Community College, that if enrollment in the first class in this series doesn’t grow, then the class will be cancelled. SO! Get thee to admissions, my loyal and future students! That is, if you live within driving distance of CPCC, located here in the heart of educational Charlotte, North Carolina. You can see a rundown of the various classes in the series here on the CPCC site, and this handy link will begin the odyssey of signing up, or maybe paying money, or even both.

The first class is 8 weeks long, will meet on some day of the week, presumably Saturday, and will be involved mainly with Scott McCloud’s book “Understanding Comics” as a foundational text. Over that I will include my own patented brand of stuttering, clumsy, but ultimately and sublimely efficacious comments and humorous anecdotes. La Profesora is ready to educate you!

Oh, the things we go through in the name of true, pure, senses-shattering beauty.

So if you guys have not been following my Twitter feed, you may not know that last Thursday I, at long last, after great GREAT trepidation, went under the knife and had my two front teeth cut out. They’re the same teeth I knocked out originally when I was thirteen, and which then the dentist crammed back into my head. After the root canals, they told me they’d turn black and fall out (OMG!) in around 7 years, but today I’m 35 years old, and more than 22 years have gone by. Apparently the teeth had become fused to the bone over the years, so instead of dramatically turning black and falling out, they just turned a sort of muddy brown over the years, and little pieces would break off now and then.

Either way, it turned out that, while they were indeed fused to the bone, they were being “resorbed” by my body, meaning my body was eating them slowly away, and soon they’d just break off and fall out. I really can’t think of anything more terrifying to me–after all this time, including the entirety of my teenage years and adulthood, of being afraid of my teeth falling out, it’s a pretty powerful fear for me. So I agreed that we should cut these badboys out and start putting something in their place, rather than wait for the worst weekend ever to occur, or one to break off while I was kissing a girl or eating peanut brittle or something.

This is what they looked like a few weeks before the surgery:

(that photo’s by my man Dylan Chorneau, he’s kind of amazing)

So it happened. The night before me, Dylan, Piemaker and Anida met for a last toast to my poor old little brown beans, splashing a little Jameson’s over them one more time. The next morning my friend Kate very kindly took me to the oral surgeon’s office, whose receptionist you can tell a direct lie to and she’ll choose to believe you because she can tell you would argue her forever otherwise (the lie was whether or not I’d had a cup of coffee that morning: I had). A few minutes later I was waking up high as all get-out, blood all over my mouth, and with something massive inside of my mouth. It was the appliance that my actual dentist The Roz (Dr. Gordon Roznik, D.M.D.) had made for me, essentially a retainer with two big ole teeth on the front.

You have to remember that I’ve had these undersized weak teeth–I don’t know if I’ve ever bit confidently into an apple in my adult life–forever, so the idea of something being normal-sized in that space was pretty weird. So at first I guess I thought it was normal for my mouth to not be closing all the way–strangely, before I busted them out I had some big ole buck teeth, so I just assumed it was back to that. Remember I was high as heck on Thursday.

But by Friday my face was hurting like crazy, and I could tell the appliance wasn’t fitting right. I also was getting more and more concerned throughout the weekend about this pain in my face–I can definitely be pretty whiny, but I’m not bad with handling pain, especially when taking these massive 800mg Motrin’s every 6 hours. But the pain didn’t seem to be lessening at all. I really hadn’t had any instruction from the surgeon as to what to expect, so I felt kind of lost–I would take my appliance out and peer at the horrifying wounds and just sort of wonder if that was how they were supposed to look.

That’s why I love The Roz so much–on Monday morning I trooped down to his office, ostensibly to follow up on the fit of my appliance. But while I was in the chair I asked The Roz to check out my wounds–sure enough, I had the dry socket! TIMES TWO! Without hesitation The Roz was cleaning those badboys out, before I even had a chance to grab something to keep from screaming, then packing some sort of numbing medicine stuff in there to promote healing, then handing me a bottle of special rinse and patiently answering all the questions I was wincing out at him. Time elapsed–maybe 4 minutes. Charge = $0. The other guy cut my teeth out for $900 and all I got was a handout telling me to rinse with salt water and apply ice!

Not only that, but The Roz hooked up my appliance too, although he had to shave some of my crooked teeth down to get everything to fit, and now my fake teeth are so sharp I could bite your finger off. But when I left his office I was feeling 1000% better than when I walked in. It’s not just The Roz either, it’s his whole staff, everyone is just super friendly and relaxed and trying to figure out how to help you, from the hygienists to the receptionists. I feel like a star when I walk in there, it’s amazing. We’re talking about THE DENTIST here, you know? But I love The Roz, he’s the best, and that’s saying something for a guy with more than his share of dental fright (me). Check out what I look like now, I’m giddy:

Okay that’s all I have to say–isn’t it plenty? I’m working on a short comic about all this to post next month, so you’ll get the update then. In the meantime, if you live anywhere near Charlotte and are looking for the baddest-assed dentist possible, please accept my highest possible recommendation for Dr. Gordon Roznik. Don’t worry, he doesn’t go by “The Roz,” that’s just what me and the Piemaker (another patient) call him. The staff crack up every time too–”the Roz told me to check and see if I have enough insurance left for a deep cleaning.” Anyway, love The Roz. I had to take down the video I had up here–I couldn’t figure out how to keep it from playing by itself all the time, it was driving me nuts.

Hey, do you guys know about my Etsy shop? Well sure you do! Now available at said Etsy shop, is this delicious American Apparel shirt, hand-screened by the enormously competent folks at Contagious Graphics, and featuring my face, my poor distressed face. I originally printed these for this year’s SPX, but still have some left. Think of it like a time capsule–why, just LOOK how much longer my hair and wild my beard are! Truly, I need you to love him, now more than ever!

Also at said Etsy shop are my 26 Cartoonists print, plus DHARBIN! 1-2, Nutted!, and other stuff. Later in the week I’m going to try and get up some originals, but we’ll see how that works out. Busy week this week, in the good way not the bad way. Okay go send me your money!

Why hello there! It’s me again, Dusty–how are you? Don’t be intimidated by my friend up there; he may come off all standoffish and strong-silent-type, but really he’s just an elephant. He can’t speak English. Also, he could squash you, like no problem. So– yeah.

Anyway, me and my elephant wanted to let you know that one of us–me–will be “deejaying” at Snug Harbor this Monday evening. By “deejaying,” I really mean I will be bringing my computer and playing songs from my iTunes. My Pie Factory brother Elroy is bartending, and he’s been having some of us regular civilian cats deejaying on Mondays just to break things up a little bit. I don’t know the first thing about “deejaying”, but I bet I’ll be not that bad at it. If you have the time to come out and say hey, I’ll be “deejaying” between 10 and 2 that night, and my watchword will be “conversation.” Meaning that unless everyone is dying to get up and shake their groove elephants, I’ll be playing nice music at a volume that will still allow you to flirt with whomever is sitting next to you.

On the other hand, if a bunch of hot ladies are in the room, I’ll play some rumpshaking hits and me and Elroy will be passing out strings of beads Girls-Gone-Wild style. Either way.

Besides his regular duties hanging out on the Serengeti and squooshing lions, my buddy the elephant is also a freelance illustration for a new marketing concern “starting up” around the Charlotte area. The name of the company is Dream Elephant, and it looks like at least some of their branding materials will feature different versions of my guy on them. Kudos for them for their incredible good taste, and for you when you display the same. My buddy the elephant is not the only one of us available for hire.

Hey guys I tricked some people into having me as a guest on their podcast! Oh these dummies will long rue the day; but for now, and until they wise up and take this thing off the internet, you may listen to it here:

http://theinkpanthers.mikedawsoncomics.com/episode-25-featuring-dustin-harbin/

TOPICS INCLUDE:
McDonald’s
Jams
Pink Floyd
Dune
Funny Accents
VCR’s
Mike Gets Embarassed And His Face Flushes
Not Funny Accents
More Accents Of Indeterminate Humorous Qualities
More Dune
Possibly Too Much Dune
My Dog Barks A Lot
Alex Is Not Actually A Clown
Oh I Forgot Did I Mention Sex?
Dune Reprise: The Movies
Mike’s Circle Of Friends = One Person
AND MANY MORE!

The Ink Panthers podcast is hosted by Box Office Poison creator Alex Robinson and Freddy & Me creator Mike Dawson. They are super funny guys and tough cartoonists, BUT EVEN BETTER, the podcast has very little to do with comics actually. Which let’s face it, are not nearly as interesting when you’re talking about them, as opposed to reading them. As this blog is ample evidence of. I got a little nervous and talked WAY too much, but fortunately Mike and Alex are super funny despite this. They’re champs! Anyway, go check it out!

At last! Beginning this Monday, October 19, I’ll convene the DUNE BOOK CLUB, right here on your friendly neighborhood Dharblog.

SUPER SIMPLE RUNDOWN:

1) We’ll read a certain prescribed amount of the book during the week, then on Mondays I’ll get the discussionizing started with a little post, and we can all join in by commenting on the post in the appropriately-named COMMENTS section.

2) The rules are a) Don’t Be A Jerk, and b) Don’t Be A Pottymouth. My mom looks at my blog sometimes, I don’t want her reading all your tee-tee/ca-ca language. Also, c) Don’t Spoil The Plot. Some of us might be reading it for the first time, so let’s try to respect that if so. If YOU’RE reading it for the first time, just speak up so no one ruins anything.

3) We’ll be confining the discussion to just the first book in the series, which is self-contained. It’s by far the best one anyway, and it’ll keep things simple, rather than looking at the larger (bizarrer!) story of the whole 6-book unfinished series.

4) We won’t be talking much about the movie, which I’m not a big fan of. You guys can if you like, but I’ll be keeping my posts on the book itself.

All are welcome! This is probably my favorite novel ever, and definitely the book I’ve learned the MOST from over the years. Whether or not you like science fiction, this book is CHOCK FULL of nuggets of wisdom, it’s pretty amazing.

FOR MONDAY’S MEETING, let’s read the first 40-something pages, depending on the edition you have access to. Read to the end of the chapter that begins “Paul watched his father enter the training room..” and ends with “..his new awareness denied it.”