Naked Bush

I'll write something about this cartoon later. It's 5am and I work tomorrow.

*Edit - 07/30/08 12:26pm*

I'm at work now, and I'm pissed, but I don't want to talk about it. I want to talk about this cartoon. This is my favorite version of Bush to date. Thank god I got a good one in, because there's precious little time to do him anymore. Mike Luckovich draws my favorite Bush. He small and clueless (I just spent ten minutes trying to write a sentence explaining why I like Luckovich's Bush, but my brain's not working today. There's more to it, I'm just having trouble expressing it).

The lettering is a custom font I created using the wonderful free tools available at fontstruct.com It was a pain to make and still needs work, but its worth it to avoid handwriting everything.

I cheated on the oval office, and my wacom made it possible. I pulled a photo into photshop and traced the outlines on a separate layer, removed the photo and completed the shading freehand. Now you know my dirty secret.

RSS is super

I've finally understand Really Simple Syndication and have started subscribing to my favorite bloggers' feeds through Google Reader. Realizing how much I enjoy aggregating all my favorite internet material prompted me to make the luxury available to anyone who reads my blog. The folks at www.feedburner.com made creating an RSS feed easy and even provided a sweet little link icon. Look at it, over there, on the left side of the page.
Anyhow, if you enjoy the pleasures of aggregation, now you can subscribe to El Blogo de Mike O.

wacom-generated editorial cartoon 3

I'm getting better with the wacom, faster at least. Today's cartoon comes from an idea I picked up reading August J. Pollak's blog. He's smarter than me and did a better cartoon on the subject. I got to draw a dude barfing though, and that's probably the best side-view of an apartment building I've ever done.

Okay, I'm blogging from...

Okay, I'm blogging from the couch right now. So, we're gonna take this out a little bit on the Internet once we get up frim the couch and look on the Internet. And, go look at my blog, do a demonstration on it. How great it is to blog just like talking to your phone. All right, see you there. listen

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wacom-generated editorial cartoon 2

Here's my second digitally-drawn cartoon. I wanted to do something on Budweiser because I've lately grown fond of the beer and finding out that the company is selling to InBev unexpectedly made me feel as loss of pride. Its a shame we're losing competitive edge in the world economy, but I suppose its years of American arrogance and worldly ignorance coming back to bite us in ole' tuckus. Whatever the case, here's my cartoon.

wacom-generated editorial cartoon

This here is my first go at a cartoon created completely on my computer. I am very happy with the art, because it achieves the sketchy "luckovichian" style I've been striving towards for a while now. It also pisses me off a little that I haven't been able do do this with traditional pen and ink. It means i'm a pussy in the physical world. I wouldn't take risks with pen and ink for fear of the tedious touch-ups and re-dos I'd have to do if I made mistakes. None of that with the wacom tablet--I screw up as much as I want and just erase over whatever's wrong. It's wonderful, but again, an unwanted reminder of my pussyness.

What with that, I'm not sure this cartoon is a good one for the message it sends. I think you have to be too much inside my head to get at the bigger idea I want to portray. Seeing as most viewers aren't telepathic, this cartoon will likely bomb.

Whatever.


Wait...one more thought. Handwriting is a bitch on the wacom.

Janitor sketch

It was something like 3am. I couldn't sleep and went out for a walk around the office building near my house in Fredericksburg. Noticed some lights were on inside. When I walked past the front door I saw a janitor fella squeezing a mop out and getting to work. It was 3am. Thought it was poetic. Sketched a bit before going to bed, and here's what it was.

Boy MonsterI

I have not posted much lately, but that's ok because no one reads my blog anyway. Ha ha. But I just received a Wacom Intuos3 drawing tablet from the mailman today and got to draw something directly on my computer. No pencil ink eraser, just me and photoshop. Made me figure that not posting art I made and like on the computer is very lazy. No scanning to do. Just save the file for web and upload it. So here it is. A creepy baby sketch for my comic book thats coming, Boy Monster.

-O.