Stuff I Did

These are some sketches I did of unsuspecting coffee drinkers at Abbot's Habit. Meh.

Ok, been a good long time since my last post, but due to living situation changes I'm gonna be riding the red line a lot again, so that bodes well for my train sketchbook. Anyway, words later, for now here's a new train sketch

Interesting factoid, the black lady on the right started out as an old white guy.

One Does Not Simply Post Into Blogger

Just a doodle of Gandalf, nothing special, this is an old one too....

The Best One Yet/I Hate Saying That

Yeah, this is a good one though. I've gotta figure out a way to spend more time on buses and trains, which is a fucking sad thing to say. Anyway, this girl was beautiful, but I may have beautied her up a bit as well..

An End Of The Month Drawing As The Month Draws To An End..

Alright, a few thoughts on the state of contemporary train doodleadge and possible ramifications of the move to the big city--pertaining to sketching. Mostly this: I am now not on the train for 45 insufferable minutes at a time. The trip from Evanston to downtown can be nice, especially on an express, and it's great for people watching, but it's just too much, and I would not have it back for anything. Still, even if it does take a longer time, I have gotten some transit people down, as evidenced by this one, which I actually like.



She noticed me drawing this, by the way. It was weird.

Two Good Transit Doodles In A Row, Excellent

Not much to say here... This was a pretty straight shot too, like one or two train/bus rides and finished (I think).

This Is A Good One

Yep, nothing much to say about it, fended off crazy dude "You draw that man? You a drawer?" attack while doing it...

Today's Effort Is Meh, But There's A Good One In There..

The one on the top right I like, nothing more to say. Didn't do the whole thing in one shot, it should be mentioned...

Guy really did look a lot like Buster though.

Computer Arrives! Moving To City Begins! The Renaissance Continues!

As I type this on my new awesome keyboard, attached to my new awesome laptop, I can't help but wonder what wonders the world has in store for all of us, and how life is like a shifting gossamer curtain, alternatively revealing and hiding its magic from us! Oh, that our impish joy at this spritely game should continue!

Jesus, I can't believe a piece of hardware has had such a pronounced dandifying effect on me, what the hell is wrong with me? As always, sketches follow.


Disregard the fatalistic pomposity of above, I want to skip through a field of wild poppies!

Been A While

New sketchbook (now with actual paper designed for doing art on!), new laptop coming my way (more on that later), moving into the big city, things are looking good. Sketches follow.

More Cowboys

Messing around with some digital stuff, not many brushes out there for GIMP. Oh well...

MODOK Mondays! ...Fuck. Fucking Illiteration.

In lieu of a comic page tonight we're gonna do a sketch/experiment in GIMP. It's MODOK (Marvel comics rights blah blah), which stands for -get this- Mental Organism Designed Only for Killing.


Silver Age man, a simpler time, a better time.

Halloween Episodes Are Best Episodes

Who remembers back when The Simpsons Halloween episode was like, the coolest thing? Back when all shows obeyed a narrative structure, and characters had to actually stay in character? I have a pet theory that classically TV shows had Christmas episodes and Halloween episodes and those were the two opportunities for the writers to go nuts: introduce mystical stuff, kill characters, have Santa Claus, Christmas miracles, It's a Wonderful Life parody episodes, etc. And then it would all go back to normal the next week.

And that's true from The Honeymooners to The Flintstones, Facts of Life, Saved by the Bell, Friends, etc.

And then come Family Guy (which I hate) and South Park (which I love), and the whole game changes. These shows both abandon the artifice of maintaining steady character traits, because it's more fun to see their points of view and intelligence switch episode to episode, and embrace cartoony logic as the rule for their shows' universes, because it expands the parameters of what the shows can tackle. But now every episode turns into a free-for-all. It's telling that The Simpsons get to kill or disfigure a character once a year, and South Park gets to once an episode.

And of course this so popular that it echoes back to other shows, on The Simpsons Homer gets to be a savant when it's comedically convenient, 30 Rock gets to treat humans like cartoons (again, love the show), and Community umm...exists.

Not that this is all bad, in fact it's kind of awesome. We've mastered straight narrative and now demand self-aware programing. But still, makes me remember how cool and new it was to see Bart play a raven to James Earl Jone's narration.


Oh, and the drawing isn't strictly for Halloween. I'm actually attending a Werewolf Bar-Mitzvah tomorrow.

May Mads Be With You

So my buddy Andrew Hegele is over at JoBlo.com, keeping it real and getting tricked into giving positive blurbs to Resident Evil movies. And Thursday he's interviewing director Nicolas Winding Refn (Valhalla Rising, Bronson, the Pusher movies) and the cast of the movie Drive (slated for release in 2011). Which is a pretty big deal because the guy really is a tremendous director and this is his first American film, he's moving up fast and seems to be retaining integrity too.
Also, Christina Hendricks might be in the room, and she's, like... the perfect human.

So I've sketched a (not great) Mads Mikkelsen to wish him good luck.

May Mads protect you my friend.


UPDATE: Again, need to enlarge it to really see it. Damn, need to start working smaller.

Keith Richards Sketch

Wow, really terrible interview on NPR: Terry Gross and Keith Richards.

I'd watch that buddy cop movie.

As long as Terry Gross is the one who's a loose cannon and out on the edge.

UPDATE: Hmmm... it seems that my Keith sketch is too detailed for thumbnail mode. It's all fuzzy. Oh well..
I suggest you click through and enlarge it, gives a much better picture.

Still feel like this

There we go, not exactly a finished thing, but it's enough for a doodle.

I've been thinking a lot about what level of finish I should be posting on this. I think my site works (or will work whenever I get the damn thing done) as a repository of actually finished work, and this can just be process and lots of crap. I'll filter everything afterwards.

I need to do some writing. It would be really nice to have a portable laptop, as opposed to my current one; which at five years old is positively geriatric.

I'm begining to draw myself as an ethnic zombie

Right now I'm working on recoding my website. It is unpleasant.
It is made more unpleasant by knowing that I should just be using a gallery template. It is stupid to code a website. I do not like coding.

Also, after you spend enough time staring at a screen typing out nonsensical computer speak giberish you start thinking like a robot.

A robot designed for loneliness.





I sort of thought I'd squeeze out a boredom sketch tonight, but this is gonna have to get finished tomorrow.

Damn, I should put up some kind of drawing...

Honestly, I do not like this drawing. It's like I'm aping every overly precious fakey whimsical bullshit illustration I saw when I was at school.

Which wouldn't be a problem if I were a little better at it.

Damn.