Tim Hollis on the radio again

You may recall that our fellow SHC Tim Hollis was interviewed on WBHM's Tapestry a while back. Well now the public radio folks have brought him back, as a guest on a show about . . . stuff! And hey, who better to talk about managing your things than a guy who attached a two-story museum of memorabilia to the back of his house? Listen HERE.

RGB blues

Working on some biz cards for my dad's shop. Trying to use the Pantone colors he specified, but my primitive Photoshop doesn't have Pantone charts included, so.. go online to find RGB conversion numbers. But then.. the printer prefers CMYK files of course, so my RGB file will potentially have some drastic color shift.

Plus I had to recreate the logo from a composite scan where the hash marks ended up not aligning..

I also have to revamp the website, since it's been sitting around in a token, scary sort of way for eons. But he's providing me the materials for renovation, should just be some simple HTML plastic surgery.

looking for portfolio hosting sites?

I set up an online portfolio recently at something called mosaicglobe.com. So far it seems pretty good, their free option has ads but they're fairly unobtrusive.

I was just getting sick of trying to figure out how to set up a gallery myself, using Javascript, so I decided to use their generic but decent template.

Right now it's just got a brief intro and some "yo mama" jokes I once illustrated. I recently colored them for purposes of this gallery: http://timrocks.mosaicglobe.com

Here's one:


Actually not sure how to caption this one.. Best I could do is "Yo mama so short-- she gets air just paying her bus fare!" But that sounds really awkward to me.

I would sort of like to sell them as greeting/insult cards if I could figure out how. Maybe some sort of print-on-demand thing. Or maybe I could print up a small number and take them to your weirder stores and see if they'd carry them.

Or go door to door...

Econo-funnies

Salty 'Ham Slam 10

The tenth edition of the Salty 'Ham Slam has been scheduled! The exact date, time, and location are a secret, reserved for our official members and close associates only. If you haven't yet received the details by email, contact me and I will send them forthwith: cgarrison[at]bham.rr.com

More info HERE.

The Phantom - for rilz!

Hey! This guy has been dressing up as The Phantom, right down to the skull ring! He's also been dressing up other folks as other characters from the Phantom comics, and taking lots of pictures. And this is evidently going on somewhere in the greater Birmingham area.


It seems like maybe he's making entire stories out the photos. They even have a white horse. I don't know if he's going to add word balloons and do a whole fumetti thing, but that would be awesome.

Check out his website HERE.


Maybe Salty 'Ham Cartooneestas should have a sister site for real live costumed heros and such. Somebody start work on that right away.

[Update: I guess we don't have to bother with that, because, as it turns out, THIS exists.]

Inking in Manga Studio

You already know about my adventures in digital inking, if you've read these posts on my sketch blog: Inking in Flash, Inking in Illustrator (calligraphic brush), and Inking in Illustrator (art brushes).

Now I've been trying out Manga Studio. I have to say, I think it's pretty awesome! Here are some examples, with different settings on the brushes. With some more dabbling, I think I could figure out several more nice looking methods, too.


I definitely found it faster, easier, more fun, and more accurate to my intentions than inking in Flash or Illustrator.

I've been using the non-vector style, but it can also do vector inking, and I suspect it would be good for that, too. (But note: You only get the vector option if you pay for the expensive version of Manga Studio.)

I feel bad for not posting anything...

So, here's some Hero Happy Hour throwaway stuff; it's also my first attempt at completely 100% digital comic creation w/ the Cintiq (12", not the awesome 21" that Mr. Garrison has).

My Nightmare -- Again?!

Remember how I drew a guest strip for the web comic 1930 Nightmare Theatre? If not, go back and read all about it in this recent post, HERE.

And now look: I've done another guest strip for 1930 Nightmare Theatre, and it was posted this morning! Check it out HERE.

The Electric Heartbreaker on DVD

This isn't cartoon-related, but I'll post it here anyway. Years ago, I co-created a live-action short film called The Electric Heartbreaker. Recently, we finally made it available on DVD, with fun extras and everything. If anybody's curious, here are a couple of clips:

official site

facebook

buy it on amazon ($9.99)

Nolen Noel

A slightly belated, but lovely nonetheless, card from our fellow SHC Nolen Otts:

Happy December

From our fellow SHC Howard Cruse:

Happy December
packed as it is
with holidays worth celebrating
and childhood memories
that hopefully make you smile.

If you click the link below, you'll find the cartoon I've drawn
as my contribution to this year's festivities,
as well a bonus link to a video
that the cartooning fans among you may enjoy.

http://www.howardcruse.com/cruseblog/xmas10.html

My Nightmare

First, a bit of background: For anyone who doesn't know, DummComics.com is a great site for web comics, featuring new strips everyday, by a brilliant stable of artists. On Mondays, Wednesdays, and Fridays, they have one called 1930 Nightmare Theatre, by Ricky Garduno. It's an awesome comic.

It's been running for a long while now. If you haven't been following it, and you want to sorta catch up on the evolution of the strip, start by reading the first few installments, starting HERE (then use the arrows underneath, to navigate forward). Read a few pieces from the middle of the run, starting HERE. And read some of Ricky's most recent editions, starting HERE.

Now here's my news: Ricky Garduno invited me to do a guest strip for 1930 Nightmare Theatre! So I did, and it was posted on the site today. Check it out HERE. Like most of the guest artists, I tried to honor the spirit of 1930 Nightmare Theatre, while at the same time putting my own spin on it.

Inking in Illustrator

I'm still practicing my digital inking. I tried inking in Flash, then I tried inking in Illustrator with a Calligraphic Brush. Here are my latest experiments -- still inking in Illustrator, but this time using a set of Art Brushes that I made myself.



I get more accuracy this way. I mean, I can really get the ink line to sit RIGHT ON the pencil line, if I want. But I think it has a little less life than the previous two methods I tried. It lacks a certain spontaneity and humanity. Next I'll try inking in Manga Studio.

Burns, Baby, Burns

You may remember Area 47 Entertainment as the guys who made that Dag Nab Ants video I posted here recently. Jeremy Burns animates videos for the songs created by his brother Chris Burns and him. And now, they have their own SHC page, HERE. Take a look!

The Green Seed - "Crack Kills"

Hello people,
We recently completed a music video for the Birmingham hip hop group The Green Seed. They are excellent musicians in their own right and really enjoyed the video we made.
It contains pop culture references galore, so feel free to watch and repost!


Thanks for watching and support local music.

Cheers,
Brian Ratigan + Sugartooth

KoronisFest PSA/Poster Competition

Here's an announcement from the UAB School of Public Health: They're having a PSA/Poster Competition. Want to do some public health-oriented animation or poster work (or a live-action spot)? Your work could be screened at KoronisFest (at the UAB School of Public Health), and you could win an award and a cash prize. Submissions must be received by March 3rd, 2011. More info HERE.



If you have any questions that aren't answered there, email:

Joan Ohrn - johrn[at]ms.soph.uab.edu

Alabama Jungle

Our fellow SHC Christopher Davis created these beautifully simple images for use on Alabama and Auburn T-shirts.


Take your pick, and go to his cafepress page to pick one up. And for those rare birds who refuse to pick a side (like myself), he even has T-shirts for fence-sitters!

Sequential Olbermann

I just posted a short comic about Keith Olbermann's brief suspension, I hope you'll check it out.
Thanks,
Tim

Dag Nab Ants

Jeremy Burns animated this video for a song by him and his brother Chris "C.B." Burns. I'm hoping Jeremy will join the Salty 'Ham Cartooneestas, because this is pretty fun stuff.

Marvelham - by Rosko

Tongue and Pencil

In response to Chris Fason's post about Super Art Fight (below), I'll bring up another inspiring event, which also involves putting cartoonists in the limelight.

My buddy Chris Prynoski runs an animation studio in L.A. (and also in NYC now), called Titmouse, Inc. They've started putting on a show called the Titmouse Tongue & Pencil. So called because, while a stand-up performs, a cartoonist draws funny drawings in response to what he says, and the cartoons are projected behind the comedian in real time. Sometimes, the two forces clash, and sometimes they collude. Potential hilarity, either way.

Tongue & Pencil web site.

Tongue & Pencil facebook page, with good photos.

A Tongue & Pencil video - slow starting, but gets pretty good.

In the past, cartoonists performed live by way of vaudeville chalk talks. Maybe now they're wanting to take the stage again. Maybe we should think about bringing something like Super Art Fight to B'ham, or something like the Tongue & Pencil show, or some similar new invention of our own. Thoughts, anyone?

Super Art Fight

I've dabbled in Live Art a couple times back when Cave9 was still rocking and I have a cartoonist friend (Brandon J. Carr) in Virginia who's started "competing" with http://superartfight.com. Today, he posted this on his Facebook. And it's got me to thinking that that would be really really fun to bring to the 'Ham. Do you guys think we could pull something like this off? Maybe not immediately, but I'm sure that we have enough members with enough connections that setting something like this up would be plausible. Check the links and share what you think.

Nabbed Another'n

Introducing yet another new Salty 'Ham Cartooneesta: David Wheeler

Ghost Pokers!

Here's a bit of quasi-animated silliness that I made a while back but just uploaded to my youtubes account.