FORTY TWO

Day 42: Fat pen style.

FORTY ONE

Day 41: Looks like a Muppet. I'm experimenting with the other brushes in Illustrator. This is a good one.

FOURTY

Day 40: I like that brush.

THIRTY NINE

Day 39: I recently heard an old lady tell Gene Simmons that she knew he was Jewish by the size of that "hook". (His nose.) That made me laugh. Here's a guy with a hook.

THIRTY EIGHT

Day 38: Here's my second attempt at a girl. I don't like drawing girls.

THIRTY SEVEN

Day 37: Frankenstein, or an "E"? You decide.

THIRTY SIX

Day 36: Coulrophobia: The Fear of Clowns. With films like "IT" and "Pee Wee's Big Adventure", it's hard growing up not being freaked out by clowns. I think people who dress as clowns are mentally handicapped. Can we just forget about clowns? Yes, I'm even willing to have Krusty killed off in a nation-wide effort to delete clowns from our memories.

I'm not that scared of them, I actually find it very demeaning to the clown, and the beholder.

THIRTY FIVE

Day 35: As some of you know, I'm way behind. Time to turn out some faces.

This looks like a Calvin and Hobbes face, I think Calvin had a gym teacher that resembled this guy.

THIRTY FOUR

Day 34: My Mom says I'm channeling picasso and matt groening.

THIRTY THREE

Day 33: The regular standard issued "Ethan Face" I draw on a regular basis.

THIRTY TWO

Day 32: Simple. Easy. Mildly lame, but it's what you get while I'm on vacation.

THIRTY ONE

Day 31: Alexander Calder made a face from wire. I saw it today in the National Art Museum in Washington DC. This is inspired souly on that project.

What's great about Calder's work is that when it's hung, shadows on the wall give you a different view/angle of his pieces. I'm going to get around to trying my hand at 3D wire faces eventually.

THIRTY

Day 30: Typical Ethan quick sketch.

TWENTY NINE

Day 29: I created a couple of characters in middle school named "Beany and Brat: The different twins". It was created for my underground comic "All Gore". My buddy HJ and I would draw the most bloody and disgusting images we could for these issues. The only colours were black, white and red.

Beany was a fat kid who wore a beany (duh) and is a nice "golden boy" nerd type. Brat was created to represent the bad kid (wore Korn tee shirts). Brat always tormented Beany, and it usually ended up in some type of bloody encounter. (I was thirteen and needed more violence than my alotment of television provided.)

If I were to draw Beany today, this is what he would look like.

TWENTY EIGHT

Day 28: I went to the national indian museum in Washington DC yesterday, so here's a picture inspired by the cover of a magazine. I can't find the cover itself, but it looked psychadelic.

I've fallen behind on the cartoons due to travel, and I'm away from my Adobe Illustrator capable computer. I've been demoted to drawing with a sharpie and scanning the drawings in. (I know, ancient technology.) I will make up for the loss today. I never said I would be perfect, but I will have 365 pictures for this blog next June.

TWENTY SEVEN

Day 27: I really appreciate the cubist movement. "Guenica" is probably my favourite of his work. I enjoy how cubism encompasses 3D into 2D. How you can see all sides at once. It makes for fun drawings and sketches. Modern art in general is far more bold and interesting than classic works. Don't get me wrong, I do appreciate classic paintings, but works from Emil Nolde, and Keith Haring.

I've always been a respecter of Bold.

TWENTY SIX

Day 26: Ambidextrous, I am not.

TWENTY FIVE

Day 25: I attribute this sketch to an animated short entitled "The Queens Monastery". It was part of a compilation dvd of wonderful animated shorts. Spike and Mike's classic festival of Animation.

Definately worth buying, as I've watched this dvd numerous amounts of times.

My wife wonders why I don't pen women very often. I'm not entirly sure, but it can probably be attributed to the fact that I don't want to emulate beauty with pen, because it's much more difficult than drawing the hideous and ugly. Men are usually uglier in my eyes than women. However, I do think this sketch entails the tall womanly figure artfully.

TWENTY FOUR

Day 24: I wish I could find the comic book that inspired this one, but I can't seem to locate the title. It was a compilation of different underground cartoonists, but it contained tales of Superman, Wonderwoman, etc. I loved it. The story lines were great, and the artwork even better. There was a drawing of a man that inspired this quick sketch.

TWENTY THREE

Day 23: My wife finally let me buy an iPhone. I'm busy with that today. Busy, and happy.

TWENTY TWO

Day 22: Bad day. Quick sketch. He's got a turtleneck.

TWENTY ONE

Day 21: This guy looks like Butthead from Mike Judge's "Bevis and Butthead". Mike Judge is another cartoon hero of mine. King of the Hill has been running for 12 seasons, right behind "The Simpsons" who start their 20th season this fall (longest running American sitcom).

Judge also directed the cult film "Office Space" and more recently "Idiocracy". He also does a lot of voice work. Here's a hilarious Judge animated short he created in his early days. A guy talks about film.

TWENTY

Day 20: It's funny how I think I come up with a totally original face, only to stand back later and realize I completely ripped it off.

This is probably where I got it from. Hoggish Greedly from Captain Planet. (What a crappy name for a crappy villian for an even more crappy show.)

NINETEEN

Day 19: This is a Bill Watterson inspired portrait of myself, with a "Family Guy" mouth. I like the simplicity of this one. The original was gonna have green hair and light blue skin, but I didn't feel like making him look "rebootish".

EIGHTEEN

Day 18: What's really interesting about Adobe Illustrator CS2 is that when I draw a really long black line, the program will cut the line off for me. I can't draw one continuous line, I have to reconnect with the pen. It's rather annoying and I hope CS3 or the upcoming CS4 addresses that problem.

That aside, I rushed this line figure, inspired by Tiki art and sheer boredom.

SEVENTEEN

Day 17: Running theme in my faces work.

This was actually a doodle I did when I was in 8th grade. There's a rather unknown song by the Smashing Pumpkins called "Ugly". CLICK HERE for a video using the original pumpkins song. Song aside, I like how OrangeCaesar managed to make an interesting continuous shot watchable.

That's all for today, folks!

SIXTEEN

Day 16: I really didn't feel like sitting in front of the computer and drawing for more than a minute today. This face shows what I can do in less than a minute of work. Just a quick sketch of a balding man. George from Seinfeld perhaps?

The cartoonist from "Zits" does a lot of sketching out of cartoons before inking the bolder lines. I usually don't bother with this style, but have tried it a few times before. It gives an interesting look, but I still prefer just jumping into the final design first. Probably accounted for by my attention deficit disorder.

FIFTEEN

Day 15: Happy Fourth, America.

From Wikipedia:

Uncle Sam is a national personification of the United States (US), with the first usage of the term dating from the War of 1812 and the first illustration dating from 1852. He is often depicted as a serious elderly white man with white hair and a goatee, with an obvious resemblance to Presidents Andrew Jackson and Abraham Lincoln, and dressed in clothing that recalls the design elements of the flag of the United States—for example, typically a top hat with red and white stripes and white stars on a blue band, and red and white striped trousers.

I guess I forgot the Stars. Meh.

FOURTEEN

Day 14: UUGGGGHHH! I couldn't stand working on this one, let alone look at it, but sure enough, I posted it!

Another trace from Photobooth. That is a great program. I think I want to make a clay bust in a really freaky looking manner. Something to make people stop and appreciate their normal, non-hideous face. Maybe if I create face busts of people so hideous, people will love, praise and appreciate more, because I'll create a false sense of security. "At least I'm not THAT ugly."

But then again, beauty is in the eyes of the beholder...

THIRTEEN

Day 13: Pillboy. I wanted to do more colouring and shading, but I screwed up when I was grouping different parts of the drawing and it became increasingly difficult to shift things around once I drew. I'm sure there is a simple way to do what I'm doing, but I'll just have to figure that out in the one year span that I have drawing faces everyday.

I remember reading an old cartoon from the 30's where a King needed three Pillboys to go out and find stuff or something...that is what inspired this guy's long blue face. There were three pillboys. Red, Green and Blue if I can recall correctly. I used to stay up at night and read this large volume collection of cartoons. I want to say it was associated with the Smithsonian, but I don't recall for sure. I'll know later this month when I fly back to Virginia.

TWELVE

Day 12: I've seen this guy before. Probably from the Looney Tunes. Actually, it is. It's the episode where Bugs Bunny stumbles upon that mansion and finds a huge hairy monster within. I'm pretty sure that was a Chuck Jones episode. He's my favourite cartoon director of all time. Such a unique and wonderful style. I've read that he didn't use model sheets like other animators, but I'm not certain. He had a great style.

That being said, I rushed today's drawing a tad because I'm a little busy today. I'm guest appearing on a Podcast called "Geocentric" where I'll talk about the new 3G iPhone. (Link to the right.) Plus, I'm thinking about going to the local art store and buying some modeling clay to make a cartoonist bust, like Robert Arneson. Yeah, I feel inspired.