Doodle Gal

This week's Drawing Board topic is "Yourself as an Action Figure."
When I was a kid, I preferred stuffed animals over dolls. I did have a Bat Girl and a Barbie. Barbie was boring. As empty as her vinyl head. Bat Girl was flexible and could grip things, so she could have adventures.

Splash Screen

I have to be vague about what it's a splash screen for, except that it's something I did as a goof.
It's a Chinese Crested dog. They range in looks from cute to scary.
More on the scary dog here and here.

Note added 10/12/06
This page gets far more traffic than any of the others. My site counter says it's something to do with a Google image search, but I don't have the details.

L.A.: The Good, the Bad & the Smoggy

What I like and dislike about my hometown, Los Angeles:

Good:
More diverse than E-bay!
Cool sounding names like "Cuhanga" and "Topanga!"
Neon!
Funky goofy shops, cafes, galleries.
Googie!
Big Donuts!
Hollywood!
Disneyland! (ok, it's one county over)
Bungalows!


Could be Better:
Traffic. Words Fail.
Sprawl- Everything's spread out- it can take two hours or more to get from one end of town to the other.
Public Transportation (better in Santa Monica and Culver city).
Older architecture, even famous places, typically razed instead of preserved.
Earthquakes (though I'd rather shovel my apartment every 10 years than shovel snow all winter).
Trees and shrubs typically the color of Hefty Bags.
That concert hall* looks like wreckage.
No cardinals.**


*Normally I like goofy buildings, but this one has a cold, aloof vibe. Each time I see it I get flashbacks of getting cut on the jagged lid of a can. It looks somewhat better at night.
**They were introduced here but I've never seen one!

Dreamland

This week's Drawing Board topic: "Sleepwalking".
I figured a dreamlike offering was close enough. The result is kinda scrambled- more like some high end doodles that don't quite gel together. I'd play with it more but the deadline is today.
The two headed creature in the upper left corner came from a dream.

She Reminds Me of You

Cute Fleischer cartoon from the thirties. Not as wacky as Snow White or Minnie the Moocher, but still fun. I particularly like the final gag.

Quasi at the Quackadero

Whoohoo! I scored two sweet backgrounds from from this 1975 cult cartoon. It's one of my all time favorites. If you've never seen it, stop what you're doing and watch it. It's one of those cartoons where the animator (Sally Cruikshank) really takes advantage of the medium: Inanimate objects come to life and talk, backgrounds morph before your eyes, plus assorted crazy and funny details and gags. One background is visible at the six minute mark (the hallway with the rainbow molding), the other is the end title card.
I haven't been so excited about something I bought for a long time.

Evil Pet Tricks

Click cartoon for larger version .

That reminds me...

Years ago I worked at a pet store where a Severe Macaw watched me sweep around his perch with great interest. As soon as I put the broom down he'd swipe his beak across his food dish to send a new shower of food over the floor. He thought it was a game!

Legible Cow

"Legible Cow" was the Drawing Board topic this week...

1988- My First Published Cartoon

The strip on top is mine. It ran in my college paper (The Highlander, U.C. Riverside). Not sure why I called the thing "Lost In America". There was a movie with the same title. I never saw it.
The cat was named Flick and his nemesis was the rodent creature, who was always driving him crazy with stupid questions. I was proud of it at the time but now it looks very crude to me.
I included the stip under it because it was done by another student, Steve Breen, who became a Pulitzer Prize winning editorial cartoonist.
As for me, I dabbled in cartoons on and off (mostly off) until I cooked up this blog.

The Fantastic Deep Fat Fryer

Another Drawing Board offering. This week's subject was "Your Favorite Fat Superhero".
After toying with such ideas as "Suet Man", "The Avenging Elephant Seal" and "The Great Grease Clot," I went with the fryer.
Time was tight this week, thus the lack of shading and the blooper.

Table Manners

Click cartoon for larger image

Talk-o-doodle-doo

Working overtime this week and last week, which means less time for the blog for now. Ah well, it beats being unemployed.

Militant Slugs!

My latest drawing board offering.
Web research done for this cartoon proved interesting. According to Google, every demographic you can imagine is "tired of being stepped on."