Lunch time Meeeting Fun!!!

We had a big story artist/vis. dev lunch meeting today. For some reason, I couldn't stop drawing. Here are some of the sketches. The two with the little fish was inspired by something an exectutive said concerning movies and the audiences. The quote was something like " We would never do a movie about a fish who lives in a house and drives a car because it would skew too young and wouln't attract that older audience." This is my attempt to prove her wrong. It's a movie about a little fish taha likes blowjobs and lap dances. Coming soon to a theater near you. You'll laugh, you'll cry, you'll care.
-John

My Other Business

So I haven't posted in a long time, but I have a good reason. Well actually I don't, but I've been busy working at my other job, Wedding Art. It all started when I was unemployed and broke and I didn't have the funds to buy my friend anything on her registry. Instead I made a Warhol print of her and her husband to be. Suddenly it was a thing as my friends got married they all demanded art. So I've continued to duplicate pop art added a personal twist incorporating the couple. I just finished the Lichtenstein for the wedding I attended last Saturday.

It has been fun to study the works of great artists I admire and make a weak attempt to duplicate their style. Since I am only repeated what has already been mastered I am not earning a cent. My next task will be to create my own signature style. But actually I can't wait for the day I get to buy a toaster like everyone else.

Hilighter Love

Caricatures drawn with a eye-numbing pink hilighter pen.

FishPool and Happy Cinco De Mayo

Here's another meeting sketch. Don't know if these are Mudskippers or what but they're definitely up to no good. Playing pool and smoking lead to ________________________. (insert violent headline here)

For those of you in North America and Mexico, "Happy Cinco De Mayo!" For our other foreign friends...Have a good weekend!

Rabbits and Wolves

A few weeks ago, I was looking through some old stuff and found these drawings. The funny thing is that they pre-figure "Chippy and Loopus" by a year or two. Here I thought I came up with those characters out of thin air when in reality they were in the back of my head the whole time.
This first group of sketches is from a comic I was drawing called "Rabbit Zero". It's about a little rabbit who gets into mudane yet frustrating problems like being stuck in the line at a supermarket and then resorting to extreme violence to rectify the situation. Kind of a proto-Chippy. The big difference is he didn't talk and worked alone.



This is a page from my sketch book. The little girl bunny on the top left was the result of a dream my wife Sara had. She awoke one morning and said "get a pencil and a pad of paper". Then she preceded to describe this little rabbit character. I decided to to draw a little comic strip for her starring this little girl rabbit and her boyfriend (the rabbit on the right). I began to form a cast of characters to support them. For a number of reasons, I never drew the strip. Notice the wolf directly below the little boy rabbit. Look familiar?

Amos Moses

I'm working at home on this fine sunny Sunday, and listening to some favorite 70's jams. On came the classic "Amos Moses" by Jerry Reed. Oh yes, that's right, I said classic. Anyway, as Iistened, I started picturing old Amos. Here's what I saw. Enjoy!

Really Rough!

This might look familiar to the folks who read Chippy and Loopus. I was sitting in a meeting and my mind was wandering. I scribbled this out very quickly with a brush pen. I added the dialogue when I transfered the panels to a 2x8 strip. Until then, I had a general idea of what they were saying, but I didn't get specific until the drawings were done. The total time for this particular strip start to finish was 30 minutes. The finished strip is over at http://phloo.blogspot.com/.

Lost in Renderland

I was supposed to be boarding a scene but I got caught up in rendering this guy. When you pump out sequences too fast your brain turns to mush. That's were mine is. So I decided to slow down and just take the time to render something. Prismacolor.

Post screening sketch: Frumple

I like to draw during meetings. Here's an ugly dude for ya. I've been a big fan of Dave Cooper. He really pushes his designs in a grotesque manner but somehow (for me) they're still appealing. I also like his storytelling. Pick up 'Ripple' if you get a chance. So I guess what I'm saying is that I was inspired by him. BTW this was done with a Colors-In-Motion Twist up Crayon. Love those things! They have a waxy feel when you draw with them and they layer beautifully. The best for coloring your storyboards. Really. I got mine from Staples. Go buy some now (get the 25 pack).

Doodle E Doo

Sometimes when you follow a talented fellow like Walleye, occasionally you need to humble yourself and just post for posting sake. These sketches aren't the best but they are what they are, pieces of paper plucked from a recycling bin.

sketch one: Caricature study. Trying to simplify with shapes.

sketch two: When the director gets a craving for donuts, you get him his FutherMucking donuts!! This is the after drawing. I'll have to see if I can find the before drawing.

EDIT: Found it!!! Here's the before drawing. He reallly wasn't like this. Just an exaggeration.

A moment for Anger

Been a while since I've posted any of these. Lost some momentum with tight deadlines and too much real work with a dangling paycheck. Stupid work.
Anyhow, I wanted to bring Anger back. Sorry for the language to anyone easily offended. I firmly believe in the heart of every "Nice" human being, is a raging, ball of fury just waiting to break loose. This one is a bit of a rant...I hope blogger blows it up enough to actually read it. If not, I'm sure you'll get the drift.
To the Count, I apologize in advance for the body fluid in this strip. That's where my head went when I thought up the idea. Funny thing, the idea of the head blowing up came from watching this crazy religious show where these muscle guys lift and break shit for Jesus. This one meaty neckless born again steroid sucker, took this run of the mill pink water bottle and using his veiny lungs, blew the thing up until it was the size of a tire and then kept going until it exploded. Between each breath he would thank Jesus for giving him the strength to pop that little piece of rubber that was probably manufactured in China for less than a nickel. The passions that drive people fascinate and terrify me. So that got me thinking about my tendency to rant and how my deep seeded nut of fury is probably the same passion that the muscle dude used to pop the unsuspecting waterbottle. What better way to pay homage to that than to blow up Anger's head. What can I say, I'm not that original. If the brow be low, then let it drag.
I love peanut butter....let's keep it clean, folks.
Happy sailing.

Kagematch Is Moving!

Hey Folks, the Count here, hijacking the site again to announce your favorite political rantfest, Kartoon Kagematch is moving, and has a new name. So come join me at my new home for political and social commentary at:

COUNTFUNKULA'S POLITICAL CARTOON CARNIVAL !

It's the same nutty political points of view and drawings, with a new website. Also, more videos and articles. Kind of whatever is on my mind on any given day, usually with my healthy dose of liberalism. But please know. all political points of view are welcome! I just got tired of server problems here on blogger. So once again come on over. The CARNIVAL'S in town! Wheeeeeee!

Fat Supes

He's Superman and he's fat.

fat barbarians

I wasn't really into superheros when I was a wee smear of shit, but I always dreamed of someday becoming a barbarian. Running across steppes, pushing giant wooden wheels, hacking apart fat guys in pits, and ravenging women with my massive pecks...hey, sounds like the life of a story artist! These drawings were made with Pelican watercolours and Faber Castell pastals on 140 lb Arches Watercolour papier.


Actually they were scribbled with photoshop on a stolen Mac while I tried to pull a weather vein from my arse. It was fun going IN....
Fat bottomed girls, you make the rockin world go round!

Fat Spidey

So, in the spirit of skribbl's fat Batman, here's fat Spiderman, aka Peter Porker. Yuk yuk...

Rejected Designs

Here are a few designs I did for a movie I was working on. I used the shape tool because the "directors" wanted a "Cartoon Network" type look for this 3d movie. I had fun learning the shape tool at least.

FatBat

So I'm double posting here. POST HOG! POST HOG! I guess I'm making up for not posting in oh...three weeks? I wanted to post a Superman drawing during Robo's awesome thread but work has been B-U-S-Y!! So here's my version of Batman. A first! I've always been a Marvel person myself. Anybody else wanna try?

Hey, I just noticed that all of the people I've drawn on this site have been portly. Hmmm. Wonder what that means...

DO NOT try this at home!

These are a few drawings I did a while back while waiting for a meeting to start. At the time my son was crawling and I just was doodling and this is what came out. Now I'm not advocating child abuse here. I just started drawing crawling babies and added "stuff" to make the drawing more interesting.

Yes I am a demented individual. Like you had to ask.

Chippy and Loopus's new home!

Hey everybody!
I wanted to drop in and let everyone know that I've moved Chippy and Loopus to a shiny new home! Here's the link:

Chippy and Loopus!!!

I will maintain Phloo as an archive, leaving all the old strips, posts and comments exactly as they are. The new place is all ready, and a new episode will be posted there, as always, every night sometime before midnight, unless otherwise noted.
I invite you to come along!!!
Thank you for your patience, and thanks for reading!!!
See you on the other side!
-John

A GREAT Article

Hey Folks, I have THIS up over at Kagematch, but I think it bears viewing here too. It's a great article about animated film making as of late.



Check THIS out. Tip of the hat to Cartoon Brew for the heads up on this.

UPDATE: Great big hat tip to our visitor Salma for the above image. It's from a message board mentioned by Salma. See it HERE. Great example of less is more.

RE-Introducing....Mr. Underbite!!!

So it is with happy heart that I re-introduce Mr. Underbite's site!!

You see, Mr. Underbite has had the misfortunte and bad luck of running into a blog that hasn't really worked from day one due to technical difficulties. REAL pain-in-the-ass Blogger technical difficulties. So, in a nutshell, he's moved his site away from the difficult Blogger do his own .com REAL site. You can now really go here:

Mr.Underbite

And you can tell by the way he put's down his line that he means business!!! Go Donnie, Go!

Ahoy Matey!!

Some of our fellow scallywags over in Visual Development have started a new pirate themed blog! And they're starting a stream-of-consciousness blogstrip of their own to boot!! You can visit them here:

El-Pacifico

You can also see their caricature sniping blog here:

Sketchclub

Count I think you've started a trend...

A Younger First President...

I don't remember when I drew this sketch. It was an experiment with charcoal.

B.

Stupidest post ever

I just posted a drawing about a Hummer (I'm procrastinating....Sorry Skribbl), and I drew a palm tree in that cartoon. For some reason I started thinking about palm trees and a conversation I had with another board artist a while back (Mr. Underbite) and how Palms are really incompetent trees. They are a well suited metaphor for LA...Tall, attractive, skinny, but they're no good for shade, shelter, forts, food or anything useful. Just like celebrities! What if trees were conscious of their issues?

Hummer anyone?

So I was driving to work this morning, and on one leg of my journey I drive through this nice residential neighborhood with these speed bumps to slow down traffic. I come to a stop sign, feeling more or less content with the brown sky and palm trees when a big ol' Hummer pulls out in front of me off the four way. I almost swallowed my own tongue when this rig of a car proceeded to make every effort to go AROUND the blippity boppity booby sized speed bumps! ITS A HUMMER! This is a automobile DESIGNED to go over, through, and ontop of all sorts of terrain....IT SHOULD BE ABLE TO HANDLE A @#$%**!!!!ING SPEED BUMP! This guy was taking out garbage bins and small trees in an effort to save his shocks from a little "budda bum". For some reason, this filled me with rage and humour all at the same time. Its funny, but says so much about the sorry state of western culture all at the same time, that I thought I'd put the discussion out there on the blog. When you have to take your Hummer up on the sidewalk to avoid a speedbump, I feel like theres a confusion of priorities. Its like putting your baby in a box with a lion to keep her safe from the sun.

I hope we run out of gas soon. I won't be afraid to ride my bike to work then.
Cheers.

Mug Shots

Haven't chipped in on storyboredom for a while, I've been so wrapped up with the kagematch. Robo, I don't know how you've been doing it, contributing to both phloo! and this blog lately. This drawing was inspired by the Sopranos return and my new post on kagematch. Drew a couple of mobsters, and got inspired to draw a few faces. Hope you folks like.

Another Superman

Louie did another superman drawing, inpiring me to do this "quickie" on the Cintiq. In Photoshop.
Superman rules.
Here's Louie again:

http://randomanomalies.blogspot.com

It's Nerd time again!!!

I was checking out Louie Del Carmen's blog the other day and saw a drawing where he had done his take on Superman. I thought that was pretty cool, so I did one of my own. I'm a huge Superman fan, I can't help it. I sketched it put quickly in Photoshop, and then grabbed the colors from one of the many Superman Returns pictures on the internet.
To see Louie's version, which is much cooler, go here:

http://randomanomalies.blogspot.com

I highly recommend Louie's book "Random Anomalies". Great story, terrific artwork. One of my favorite recent comic store purchases.

Introducing...Mr. Underbite!!!

Hey peeps! our good friendand co-worker Mr. Underbite has created a blog!! Woo hooooo!

And you might have also noticed that he gave a hint of his genius by guest sketching on RoboTaeKwon-Z's blog Phloo!:


His first installment of the self titled blog is now up! Go see the magic!

Mr.Underbite

Coffee Karma

So yesterday I went to lunch with the guys. As we crossed the street there was a couple in front of us walking slower than usual. We got closer and noticed that the couple consisted of a large guy and a small woman. The woman wasn't a dwarf but just small enough for you to notice (I'm not tall so even I noticed). Working in animation you see that contrast and your mind immediately pushes the visual further. So we walked around them and went to lunch as the couple went the opposite direction. We ate lunch and decided to go to Starbucks for some coffee. WalderMonk and I were in line and we start commenting on how small that woman was. Now side note here:When you go to lunch with a group of storyartists, they tend tell stupid jokes, go off in tangents and do silly voices. We just can't stop working I guess. Anyway, I start joking around about how small the woman was and WalderMonk starts making motions like he is leapfrogging over her and we giggle like little kids. So it's our turn to order and BAM! The woman asking for the order is the small woman. We suddenly decide that we're not thirsty and stand off to the side embarrassed as hell. So embarrassed that we have to leave Starbucks so we don't die of embarrassment. Now I have to say that I'm not a mean spirited person and WalderMonk is one of the nicest guys I've ever met and wouldn't hurt a fly so we aren't normally mean people. We just got caught being stupid kids. Needless to say we learned our lesson...

Don't make fun of somebody until AFTER you get to work!!!

It's Alive!

Hey Storyboreders, the Count here. I'm hijacking the site for a quick plug for my other blog, Kartoon Kagematch. I have a good reason though! Right now on the Kagematch I'm hosting one of the funniest damn things I've ever seen. It's a brilliant but all too short lived web series called "House Of Cosbys". I explain the whole story over there. Hurry and get 'em quick! It may not last long!

**Skribbl** You're gonna love the music video and blooper reel!

UPDATE: Kagematch is back up. Theooooo!

a couple new ideas

Nothing earth shattering here. Just some more silly doodles.