Today’s drawing is an exercise in vanity. I was thinking that it was time to try another cartoony self-portrait. I’d like to say that there was a noble reason for doing it such as it was needed for advertising an upcoming personal appearance at a children’s hospital, or perhaps it was to be used on “sorry you are in here” sympathy cards to send to the nursing home. No, nothing as honorable as that. Instead, it is just for my Facebook profile “photo”.
However, I did want to challenge myself creatively a little. I love the seemingly simple look of the old UPA cartoons – you know, like “Gerald McBoing-Boing” or even the old Mr. Magoo cartoons. The use of straight lines and round shapes intrigued me, so I set out to work up a version of myself inspired by that look.
For those of you who like to know the details, it was hand inked with a brush pen on a bumpy Strathmore watercolor paper pad. That’s why the line skips here and there giving it a loose quality. Then it was scanned into Photoshop where color was applied loosely, erased a little with a dry brush built into Pshop, and then a dot pattern was applied across all the color. Voilà!
It is always fun to try to work in a different style. It is easier to experiment on a subject matter that one is familiar with. There’s a reason my blog has a “Self Portrait” category over on the right side – so you can see many experiments in style using myself as the guinea pig. If you’d like to explore them now CLICK HERE! There are two pages of images to peruse.
Enjoy!