'Nother Cat Drawing

OK, here's the deal. I'm concentrating on the Line of Action and how it defines a character's pose. This is a quickie I did wherein I drew the LOA and then sort of roughed-in an amorphous shape that would follow the line and roughly describe the character's action. Then I overlaid the character details on top of that mess.

It's off-model and wrong-looking, but I feel it's pointing me in the right direction. Previously, I was kind of doing it backwards and ended up all stiff and still off-model. Looks like I'll have a long Labor Day weekend to play with this theory.

Have a good one, folks! See you on Tuesday...

That Darn C.A.T.

Based on some helpful comments left by fellow-blogger Gabe, I'm trying a different approach to that "static" drawing of the cat. It's still a mess, but you can see it evolve, reading left-to-right. The cat in the upper right is off-model, but I'm starting (just) to get a feel for the pose as it relates to the indicated line of action. As always, there's still a ways to go, but I might now be getting a handle on some aspect of this LOA thing.

Thanks, Gabe!

Agony Unabated

And so it continues. I guess I'm just going to have to keep plugging away until I "get it." Well, if nothing else it'll help burn these principles into my cerebral cortex. Line of Action. Construction. Humiliation.

How's everybody else doing?

More Line Of Action Misery

Gosh, I dunno. Maybe I should hang it up. This Line Of Action (LOA) has me stymied.

As mentioned previously, I don't really "get it." For instance, there's a drawing of a cat just standing there, doing nothing and there's a LOA indicated. Concentrating on this #@%&# line has somehow completely neutralized my tenuous ability to draw. Arrgh.

Any hints, suggestions, etc. would be greatly appreciated...

Ouch!

Wow-eee! At first I was feeling pretty good about the drawing on the left. It felt like I had the construction pegged. Then stuff started to happen. Or, rather, not happen. It ended up looking stiff and flat. The facial features are blah, expressing I don't know what.

I scribbled out a "rough" of this pose next to it to try to loosen up. I feel better (slightly) now. That is to say, I'm making some course corrections and might not hit that big cartoon iceberg.

Sure hope I have some more time to draw this weekend. See youse on Monday!

Nothing New To Post

I spent absolutely no time working on anything Blair-related yesterday, so here are some more of those waiting room doodles. Ah, ball-point pen on legal pad paper. Sweet!

No big whoop, but I just feel better if I post as often as I can. You know what I'm talking about, right?

Running Mouse

Here's a quickie of the running mouse pose. One the on hand, it looks like I've captured the basic pose. On the other hand, it doesn't strike me as a very vital, dimensional drawing. I just may revisit this one to see if I can breathe some more life into Mr. Mousie.

Action and Inaction

Here are a couple more line-of-action "roughs" plus a more "finished" version of a previous pose. Wish I'da done more this weekend, but it just wasn't in the cards.

In the interest of flooding the internet with useless crap and eating up bandwidth, I am including some doodling I did while sitting around the airport waiting, waiting, waiting. There are a few botched line of action poses (the cat picking up an object) plus some attempts at drawing different facial expression and such. Meh.

What's My Line? Of Action, That Is.

I still don't "get" this line of action concept. I keep thinking that the line somehow defines the exact locus of the character. That it somehow is supposed to perfectly bisect the cat while at the same time perfectly show the action. This obviously isn't the case, so I'm just going to struggle with the exercises until I either understand it or loose interest.

Here is an example of one cat punching another cat. I don't mean to second-guess Mr. Blair, but the "punching cat" looks more like he's reaching for a door knob than inflicting pain on the "punchee cat." As you can see, I am making no attempt to draw finished characters; I'm just trying to get this action thing down.

Note: I have added "Gabe's Cartooning Blog" to the students' link section. Let's give it up for "Mcnuggetinator!"

The Line (Of Action) Starts Here

Well, well, well. Look who's slouching into the "Line Of Action" section!

This will be a challenge for me, as I am not yet very good at determining or defining lines of action. There are examples shown where the character is completely static and yet there's a line of action indicated!

I scratched out three quickies this morning. And, gosh, there's another "first thing to do" now. Used to be the first thing was to draw a sphere. Then the first thing was to draw that stick-figure skeleton. Now the first thing to do is draw the line of action!

Ay-yi-yi! Down we g-o-o-o-o-o!

Weekend In Box Springs

Well, after an abbreviated work-week of 12 hour shifts, I hopped in the family van and drove to Box Spring, Georgia to visit mon frere. I took along the Preston Blair book, but only managed to scratch out a couple figures, shown here. Didn't do much drawing, but I got to watch a whole bunch of movies: TOMBSTONE, AMERICAN SPLENDOR, WAR OF THE WORLDS, LOST IN TRANSLATION, BLAZING SADDLES, THE INCREDIBLES, NEW YORK DOLL and some other stuff I'm forgetting.

Also included is an attempt at a caricature of my brother. You see, he has a dachshund named "Junior" and he calls him "Junior-Poonyer." Gosh, but isn't this all so interesting. Well, thanks for a relaxing weekend, Scott!

Sorry about the elevated banality level, folks...

I'd Walk A Mile...

I revisited my friend, the camel, last night. I made some progress. Oh, it's all nice 'n' cartoony looking, but its doesn't yet conform to the book's model. Well, at least my ol' pal, the devilled egg, is amused! (The truth be told, he's not looking all that hot these days, either!)

I'll be leaving for Box Springs, Georgia tomorrow morning, so I may not be posting anything here until Monday. Long hours, but a short week. Go figger!

It Was Supposed To Be A Camel

Here's another attempt at one of the "orphaned" characters from the book. I doodled it at the breakfast table. As always, the feet are placed wrong and the overall silhouette suffered. It's a "fun" character, so I'll probably try it again, when I'm less groggy. With any luck I can draw more after Wednesday.

Yep, It Was An Elephant!

That's right - it was an elephant! Kudos to this week's winners bardhol and Louisa! It shore was a funny-lookin' stick skeleton.

There was a discussion about "twinning" in the comments section of John K's site. I kind of remembered seeing a really good example of it on an circa 1940 Popeye model sheet, but I couldn't find the sheet. This is sort of how I remembered it looking. These sort of symmetrical, "dead" poses should be avoided. Unless, of course, you want a symmetrical, "dead" looking character.

Originally, I wasn't going to post this drawing. It's just that bad. I tried redrawing this pose in a larger scale with the idea that I could better define the details. OUCH! In my defense, I was trying to take care of my 32-month old daughter and do this at the same time. Not a good idea. I could maybe do data entry or address Christmas cards or any other "rote" chore, but cartooning is not one of them.

But, Craig, what's with that dead bird in your previous post? Well, in anticipation of an avian flu pandemic hitting Fayetteville, NC, my employer is running a drill for the next two weeks wherein we will be working 12-hour shifts while wearing rubber gloves and surgical face masks! Yes, that's my life, folks.

More Fun With Skeletons

I did another cat pose last night. On my initial pass I had the cat's right foot placed too low, but I erased it and redid it. Then I did one where I roughly fleshed it out. Again, I wasn't going for a perfect, finished drawing. I think I'll have to work at a larger scale for that.

In the lower left-hand corner I sketched the skeleton for a mystery drawing. This is one of those drawings that I mentioned in my last post. It's not part of any "lesson" it's just crammed in the color center section of the book.

What could it be? Come back Monday and find out. You might be surprised...



What's with the cute li'l dead bird, I wonder..?

So Throw It, Already!

I took another pass at this pose with improved results. I initially started to place the hand holding the ball about 3/16" too far away from the body, but caught it in time and redrew it.

I didn't really work at perfectly capturing the face, but rather concentrated on the pose and the silhouette.

Something I've noticed is that the Blair book doesn't follow the lessons as outlined by John K. And the book seems to be padded out with some random pages of drawings (including a color center section). Not a criticism, just an observation.

I may take a stab at some of the random drawings if they seem to fit in with the section I'm working on.

Bowling Ball

Sorry to report that I did no cartooning yesterday. There were baby problems (severe diaper rash), car problems (flat tire), and other happy things that required attention.

If you want something to look at, here's a real neat-o ad from the good folks at Brunswick.

I shall return...