For cartooning, I think doodling is a valuable exercise. Kool Aid Gets Fired came from a doodle of Kool Aid having a moment of existential crisis. Many of my background characters come from doodles in sketchbooks. I doodle something that I feels really captures the visual essence of what you might think such a person looks like. When I drew the little guy down in the right hand corner, I thought he looked like an everyday background office worker, someone who pretty much comes in, does their job, and goes home.

His final incarnation in Kool Aid he had glasses. But the basic idea for what many of my office workers would look like came from this doodle. To me (and everyone is going to see different), it says, he’s been at his job not just years, but a few decades. Not fully beaten down, but definitely a corporate cog that knows his place.

As contrasted by this doodle, who I always thinking of as Ken Newman, bright, shiny, energetic, looking for ways to make a change and improve things. Often I will take a doodle and expand on it, working out how the character might look expressing different emotions.

Sometimes a character from a doodle ends up in a full illustration. I’m not sure if I specifically used the person on the left in the drawing on the right. The one on the left was a women who got onto the train with her chello and bags and insisted on squeezing into the space. I was trying out some new brushes in Painter for this. Clearly the way I drew the head stuck in my head for the crowd scene I drew.

When I worked in offices, often my meeting handouts would end up covered in doodles. Often they were of co-workers.

I think that moving forward, I’m going to devote some time to just doodling each week. No specifics, no goal, just a journey.

But then I thought, wait, I do have all those black and white illustrations I have been working on for the kickstarter project to illustrate computational thinking of abstract ideas! So, there was a page of samples right there!

It shows consistency of style, which is important in textbooks if they need multiple images using the same characters. It shows a visual expression of a concept. So, I put three of my favorites onto a page. Now I just needed 9 more pages. I personally think 10 pages is a good number of pages to show what you can do. You can focus on a particular style, but also include a few different ones, to show your range.

While certainly not a textbook illustration, I decided to include this illustration which is a mash up of two shows, Project Runway and The A-list. I used to work with the designer at the company, she knows my sense of humor, she’s also got a wicked sense of humor, so I knew this one wouldn’t cause a problem.

I have an InDesign file set up ready to make a PDF. I can swap out images and pages as I need. While doing this I realized something. I have a lot of new images to show. And while some of them may have been done for Next Magazine, they certainly could show my ability as an illustrator, without the content being questioned.

I was really happy I was able to switch out what I had started to see as the Same Old Samples I’ve been showing for years. I had new samples, which I felt were much better then my old stuff. I had pieces from clients I’m rather proud of. Like the images I did for MIT.

And finally, I included some of my own stuff, which I did to explore new directions in my style and to learn a few things, and on these pieces I felt I was very successful with that.

Putting these samples together, and looking back over the last year, I felt really proud of the hard work and time and focus and energy I put into pushing myself as an illustrator. To me, these new samples represented a visual history of my growth as a commercial artist. For many years, I wouldn’t call myself an artists or an illustrator, simply because most of the time, I wasn’t even drawing. I wasn’t doing anything. I also feared being told that I was a fraud, or a hack or not talented.

All these illustrations have been done in about the last year. In the last 6 months I’ve done close to 85 illustrations. Honestly, that’s more then I had ever done before that over the years, combined. When I compare that first illustration I did for Next Magazine back in may, to the one I just did in October, I can clearly see improvement.

Not only that, I remember that first illustration (Pirates of the Caribbean mashed with a street festival featuring dance) taking for ever, and me stressing out over every aspect. The Antonio Banderas in the sauna took about 3.5-4 hours to complete. In the Pirates one, yeah, that looks a little like Johnny Deep as Captain Jack Sparrow and that girl pirate in the movie…oh yeah, Penelope Cruz. Back in May, I was ever so freaked out about having to draw famous people and have them look like the person. I thought for sure, people are going to tell me that I was simply copying photographs! (I wasn’t).

Sometimes, stress and tight deadlines have lead to coming up with some great solutions. Not every illustration has been a gem. I’m thinking of a few that I haven’t ever posted to my facebook or google+ page. Not everything you do is going to end up being amazing, even if you give it your best. The illustrations below didn’t come out as good as I wanted, and if I had time, I would love to go a second round with them. I sometimes think I will, but in the end, you never seem to have time to do that.

Nine weeks ago, I started doing illustrations for Next Magazine, 3 each week for the What’s Next Section. All the illustrations were things I don’t normally do, such as famous people. At first, I was a little intimidated with the idea of having to draw people to look like who they should.

Here is the first illustration I did for Next Magazine.

Not bad. You get that’ it’s Johnny Depp in the 4th Pirates Movie. So that must be Penelope Cruz. At the time, I was pretty pleased with how this came out. Looking back, I think it’s Meh.

Nine weeks later, here is the latest illustration I did for them:

Much better work on the faces. They are bolder, better details, more stylized then rendered. It also took a lot less time to doe this one, compared to the first one. I’m making choices faster, and I certainly know I’ve learned a few things about the face and structure of it.

Also, my composition is getting better, but there are still times when I think I could have done way better. This illustration, I actually ended up liking the composition more over time. It was one of those pieces that while you are working on it, you think it’s not working, and then near the end it starts to come together and you think, it’s better then I thought.

And then there’s this one, where I think all the single elements are good, and done very well, but the composition brings the whole pieces down. It’s the boat really, it just makes it so lopsided and wrong. I should have just done it coming straight towards the viewer. Live and learn.

Over all, I also think I’ve been doing well with color. They like bright colors, so it’s kind of easy. I’m also letting myself be a bit more free and with my process and how I create. Much more free and painterly approach to things.

My goal, is to do illustrations for them for at least one year. That will be over 150 illustrations I drew in a year for them alone. That’s a whole lot of drawing. That’s a whole lot of getting better!

Doing something that is successful, is great. It really makes you feel like it was worth it. Take Kool Aid Gets Fired, my comic. I did that 4 years ago, and it’ still doing well. A local comic store has probably sold close to 70 copies. For a mini comic, that’s actually pretty amazing. Add to other stores that sell it and when I do conventions, I’ve sold quite a lot of copies. All the reviews of it have been very favorable, save for one.

It even got written up in Pop Candy, an online column that’s part of USA Today. This translated into about 480 visits to my site, and 7 sales. But that’s fine. I haven’t gotten any jobs because of Kool Aid. But that’s fine as well.

I’m working on a Kickstarter Project. Our goal was first $1500. We got that in 3 days, so expanded the scope of the project, and in the end, we needed $2,250, and ended up raising over $4,300. Not bad.

Each time I have a success, it makes me feel great. But I don’t have any expectations that it’s the one thing that will suddenly open the flood gates to never having to fight for work, or better clients.

I do hear some illustrator friends talk about how frustrating it is that something they did, which still gets lots of attention, hasn’t brought in any additional work by catching someone’s eye. Yeah, that happens. With the Kickstarter, a few friends would suggest that maybe they could do something like that, only what they wanted was to basically get paid to draw. Kickstarter doesn’t work that way. You need a clear focused goal. Not just, I want money to do my webcomic/blog/take pictures and post them.

The fact is, you should be doing all that stuff because you want to. That you can’t go a day without drawing/writing/taking photos. Sometimes you have too, but the desire should be there.

In some ways, you shouldn’t have any expectations of what you will get from doing something, other then what you are doing. If you are writing a novel, you do want it published. But your expectations should be just to end up with a novel when you are finished. When i do an illustration, that’s all I’m going for. Same with a comic. Yes, sometimes I have flights of fancy. But I don’t ever think, Man this is the Graphic Novel that is going to change the format for ever. Why I might even get a Pulitzer Prize!

Heck I don’t even think, people are really going to love this! I just think, Wow! I wrote and drew a whole Graphic Novel! That’s amazing in and of it’s self, considering how often people fail to do anything.

They say it takes about 12 years, as a freelancer, to get to the point where you can call the shots on what kind of projects you want to work on, or pitch your idea’s for your own projects. Along the way, they estimate 80% of people taking this road in life, give up at some point, because it’s just to frustrating.

I keep that in mind when after finishing some huge project, suddenly find myself with nothing to do. At that point, my expectations are to simply keep drawing and pushing my talent and skills to the next level.

These are part of a series done for Reeling, the Chicago GLBT film festival. They got a lot of attention and people really liked them. So much that someone ripped off the style for several brochures, and people thought I had done the illustrations. To bad I didn’t, because more then likely, the person who ripped me off got paid. I did this for free for the exposure. I didn’t get any work from this.

I was very proud of these at the time. They were the best work I had done at the time. I can still see elements of these in my current work.

My friend was working at Chicago Magazine, handling the entire online website. This was back before the internet started killing magazines and newspapers. Chicago Magazine didn’t support the online site then. It was just her, and she had no budget, no direction to take the site. It barely served as a, whats happening. So she asked me to do these tiny illustrations for the site. For free. I thought, at least I can say I have worked for Chicago Magazine, and maybe I might get to network to get some work in the actual magazine. But that didn’t happen.

For a while I worked at a company that did corporate communications, mainly newsletters, brochures and more. Sometimes, they wanted illustrations. My boss never wanted to spend money of art and graphics, which was good for me, since it fell to me to come up with illustrations.

I really don’t know what I was trying to do with the shape of the heads. These were for a brochure about hospital credentialing. Back then, computers had these giant, thick monitors, that took up your whole desk!

Oh hey! One of the first illustrations I got paid for. For Lakeland Boating (I still do illustrations for them). It was about how the head (bathroom) on boats often can be left…messy. I wrote a dirty limerick on the wall, and thought I had smudge it enough. I didn’t, but thankfully they caught it before it went to print. I don’t do that anymore. (Here I sit, broken hearted, came to shit and only farted, in case you were wondering.)

Back then, I did  lot of work with actual materials, and would have to send them in to be scanned. The good thing about that, is you can work in different ways. Like this for an article about Morse Code.

I did it on scratch board. I really liked it. So did the editor. So much he kept the original art and never sent it back. Nor did he offer me any money for the original art. Yeah, people actually do that. A contract prevents that.

However, this did lead to me doing a series of these of skeletons. A friend of a friend opened a small knick knack shop, and wanted artists to put their work up for commission. So I did a bunch, and they sold. The first few that sold she gave me my share. The rest, she kept all of it, because her shop wasn’t doing well, and needed the money.

Come to think of it, she was friends of the editor that kept the image above. Another good reason for going digital, or at least only delivering digital. And contracts

These are some images that I did that were not for clients, but just myself.

It’s always interesting to look back. I also found a disk with all these illustrations I did for this interactive CD a bank put out to help people prepare to take a test to get their real estate license. There were 3 of us doing the illustrations, and a 4th guy doing all the photo researching. I think there was over 500 illustrations that were needed. I was working for a company that was doing the CD for the bank. I never dealt with the person at the bank, but we always got to hear her feedback. Like, I don’t like the color green. So what about the illustrations about lawn care and such? She also didn’t like red. Or bright blues. In fact, she doesn’t like primary colors.

So the color palette eventually became grays, beiges, purples, light baby blue, and where appropriate, some greens.  She also so everything as sexual and violence towards women.

I honestly can’t say what I think about my old work. I can say my skill has improved a lot.

But I also think successful artists also have a way of approaching making art as a professional that sets them apart from those that end up not being successful.

I’m also not much on the, Do What you Love, and the Money Will Follow kind of people. While their might be some truth to that, I know lots of people that did what they loved, and the money didn’t follow and they eventually had to give up. And not all of these people lacked a drive to make it.

But, I do think some of the ones that gave up, had unrealistic expectation of what success would be. I’ve heard many artists talk about the one thing that would do it for them. But, it’s never really about one thing. Everything is built on something else. I had good success with Kool Aid Gets Fired, but I don’t want to try and make a whole career off that one comic. I’ve had good success as an illustrator, but I’m only as good as my last piece. I’m not looking for that one image that will make everyone flock to my door.

I’ve known artists that get very negative when something they did, is well received, but doesn’t lead to other things. Kool Aid was well received, but i don’t think I’ve gotten any other work from it. It does help to show my level of ability and that I can write and draw a whole book. And that’s enough for me, honestly.

So, if people Do What They Love, and the money does follow, I think it’s because they don’t spend to much time worrying about if what they are doing is going to make them money. Yes, in this day and age, you have to worry about money. No one really likes living in a shack, with dirty cloths and eating garbage food because that’s all you can afford. But again, it’s not about that either.

For example, right now, I’ve agreed to be the weekly illustrator for a local magazine in NY. 3 drawings a week, for the Whats Coming up section. The pay isn’t on level with normal illo jobs, the magazine, while having a good profile, isn’t making money hand over fist it’s self. But, I’m getting to do 3 drawings a week, that require me to stretch my abilities, focus on getting the work done fast without hacking. I’m also trying to expand my style a bit, as I change my thought process in how I approach things.

Current work in progress, for Next Magazine

After a few months, I expect that I will see significant improvements in my art, and the speed at which I work. I will feel more confident in my choices. I didn’t mind the low pay, because the challenge of doing this is worth it to me. So, I’m getting paid in a way that doesn’t pay the rent, buy food or clean my clothes in any serious way. That’s ok. I’m investing in myself. I’m willing to take the ten years to see if it pays off.

I’ve been working at being an illustrator, for about 2 years now, and I really focus more on doing the work, finding the work and making the next piece better then the piece before it. When I don’t have any work to do, I draw and try and push my work into new directions. When the checks come, they come. It doesn’t matter that this drawing paid me $600, took the same or less time then this drawing that paid me $100. I gave them both my best work.

I know many artists who insist that you should always try for the $600 jobs. I do. But I take the $100 jobs too. I take the jobs, because what it really means to me, right now, is a chance to draw, with a focus and a goal and end to work towards. It means I have to trust the choices I make, and it means I get a chance to put my brain to work and see if I can come up with a great idea. It means I’m doing what I love, regardless of the money, because I’m actually trying to get something out of it that is more important then money.

Another thing I hear people say is that they tried for a few years, and things didn’t happen. I wish I had the link, but studies show, people who try and make it in the creative service industries, get successful in 12 years on average. By successful, they mean to the point where they can pick and choose the projects they want to work on, or pitch the projects they want bigger companies to invest in. And that on average, it takes about 3-5 years to get to the point where you are getting the kind of work you want. I’m lucky, I’m getting some of that now. But I still take what is called Meat and Potatos work.

I worked many years as a production artist for publishing companies. Now I work part time, from time to time, for companies that staff up when they have a lot of work and down when they don’t. It works out great for me, as it gives me more then enough money to get by, money to set aside for the lean times, and more then two days a week for my own work, or any illustration work. I work towards having to do less and less of that kind of work.

Also, I don’t take not getting work as a set back either. An actor I knew, gave up acting, after not getting a part. The way he tells the story, it was down to him and one other person. The other person got it, because they were friends of the marketing person for the theater company. I have no idea how he knew that, and I even asked, and the best answer he could give is, I just know it. The way he tells the story, is that he did A, B, C, like you are supposed to, and so he should have gotten the part.

But the thing is, that’s how the entertainment industry works. It’s partially how the commercial art industry works. It’s how a lot of industries work. It’s not the only way it works, but it’s foolish to think other wise. It’s also foolish to give up on what you want to because of one show you didn’t get the part to. And in the actors case, he was only in his early 30’s when it happened. It wasn’t like he hadn’t gotten shows or worked as a professional actor/singer before that. In fact he had. What bothered him, this was a big show. Would it have been a career maker? Who knows. It’s what I was saying earlier about not expecting the world from one piece.

To me, it just means I’m moving closer to success. I at least made it that far. What do I need to do next time to make it farther? Or in my case, what do I need to add it my art to make it better then last time.

That’s what I’m focused on. Not how big a check I’m getting.

However, The top one is closer to style of this illustration:

I wanted to stay closer to this flatter style of illustration. I did find myself getting more and more detailed as I worked on the goblins. Take the sleepy goblin in the back on the right hand side, he’s leaning against his spear. I had to go back and flatten his face some, because the level of lighting and details I had on it were more realistic in style then say the goblin sitting on the rock.

And I certainly feel that the grass moves much farther away from the style below.

Not that I think the after version is a failure. I love it. I’m glad I took those extra steps and pushed it even more. The far right goblin, picking his nose, I think his feet and legs are awesome. They have a real sense of space, direction and shape. I love the sitting goblin, his face, the legs. I feel I managed to really make each goblin have character.

What is lacking is any sense of story, as they are just standing around by some trees. So, now I have an idea to do a second drawing of these goblins around a camp fire, as if bedding down for the night. It will also let me do some lighting from a strong source, as I’m working to expand my skills and learn something about light and coloring.

The background was far harder to get right then each Goblin was. In fact, the Goblins were easy compared to the background. I had an idea of what I wanted in my head, but getting there took a lot of experimenting. I redid just about every aspect at least once, the tree trunks took about 4 tries to get to the stage I wanted them. First they where too tall and thin. I finally got the shape, size and texture right.

The foliage also took a lot to figure out. At one point the foliage and trunks were blending into each other. So I thought, lets darken the top of the trunks as if being shaded by the leaves, which lead to the thought of dappled light. That took a bit to get right. Eventually it all feel together.

I really learned a lot working on this, the background in particular. I had thought to try and do something different, like putting them inside a cave, as that would be easier, but I stuck with my idea, until I worked out a solution I was happy with.

The fact is, we all have to make our own choices on the road to the final piece. I’m working on some illustrations for myself, as a form of practice and skill building. Recently I sent this to a few friends to get some feedback on it.

From those three friends I got 3 different kind of feedback. All valid too. It’s my choice on how much of that feedback I use and incorporate into the piece.

I then posted the image on a site that has a monthly crit of work either finished or in progress. And I got some more feedback, some of it similar and some of it different. All good and valid. So this work will have some tweaks done and some parts reworked in more major ways. But hey, since it’s for me, that’s fine!

Right now, though I had another idea I wanted to get down on paper. A goblin raiding party.

So, here are the first rough pencils:

I just wanted to get the different characters in place and a general composition set up. After I went and did tight pencils of each of the different goblins. First I did the axe wielding goblin in the back.

I knew he needed a much more action ready pose then what I gave him. Then I moved onto the goblin mage to his right. This one, man is that boring, it looks like he’s just doing parlor tricks and is about to ask “is that your card?” rather then blast you eldritch energy. But he took a while to get something I liked. First I thought I would make him more sinister, but also frail. Wasn’t to happy with that, so I made him less frail. Then I decided, it’s partly the direction he’s facing. I imagined he was the kind of mage that delights in his craft, and cultivates an air of mystery by being devious. So he might hide what he’s going to do. So I turned him away from what the group is looking at. It added some variety to the com as well, so that not everyone looks like they are holding the same pose.

I like this set up much better.

So, on I went, with each character. What were they wearing, what features in their face made them different from another goblin? In particular the Rat Master was fun, since I decided that he’s kind of filthy and particularly smelly compared to your average goblin, he does after all, sleep with the rats he trains. After I had all the characters penciled in, I tweaked their positions, as I had a few spots where I had bad tangents, where several elements meet that become distracting. For example the Squatting goblin, the archer and the one rat all meet up and made it a confusing mess, it wasn’t clear what was what.

So here is the tight pencils as they stand now. I will not start on the final version till later, so I can go back in a day and look and see if there is anything I want to change.

For example, I think the lower leg on the squatting goblin is too short compared to his upper leg. So I will go back and fix that. I’m also not sure about his hair. Maybe he just needs to be bald and an eye patch. His dagger will certainly have a poisonous  The goblin mage needs bigger hands. Maybe a few animal skulls and feathers and such. These aren’t quite savage enough right now. Perhaps the archer needs to have his cowl down over his face more. The warrior and rat master I think are at good where they are. The rats are certainly what I want.

After heating some good feedback on the first illustration, I took those thoughts into developing this drawing. And before I start on the final work, I’ll get some feedback on that as well.

If you don’t know any artists personally or professionally, I suggest finding a site that offers a forum for posting work and getting feedback.

Below are some drawings I did over the last few days.

The final art however, were these illustrations:

The drawing displays my talent. I have a natural talent for drawing. (which can be seen in some of the other figure drawing I’ve posted in the past).

The illustration (And there is a difference between drawing and illustration), shows the skills I’ve developed over the years. With drawing, it’s more of letting myself free to work and to see what happens. Many times when I’m drawing, I will be really loose, and see what lines or shapes come out, and then go back and hi-lite those lines and shapes that I find help create the image. Some of my favorite characters have come about this way.

But when I go to take it to an illustration, There is much more thought up front. I find that if I spend time thinking about the final illustration before starting it, I get much better results. Often I will do a tight pencil drawing in between sketching and illustrating. This gives me time to think about the different aspects, how to approach them, what’s the best way to achieve the results I want, and more details just start filtering in.

The tight pencils are a blend of using my talent and skills. I let myself the freedom to explore with the pencil, but I also keep in mind the composition, what colors I might want to use, and more.

By the time I moved into doing the final illustration, I would say I’m mostly in the skills side of things. It’s skill that lets me get the shading how I want it, the texture of surfaces, and more. Is there some talent there? Yes sure, but I would say it’s in the passenger seat instead of driving.