This semester in drawing has been a wonderful chance for me to explore several styles, genres, and mediums. I got to revisit charcoal, something I hadn't drawing with in quite some time. I also continued exploring digital media and painting in Photoshop. I ultimately ended up getting back into editorial cartoons.



The first project was the charcoal compilation drawing. The reference photos I gathered were some from the Devils Punchbowl, and a few from around my apartment. I wanted to set up a mildly humorous juxtaposition between a seemingly monotonous domestic image, and a beautiful natural phenomenon such as the Punchbowl.



During the 6 hour pose we got to work on, I brought my Wacom to class and decided to work on painting digitally. I still have a long way to go before I'll be close to satisfied with my photoshop results. It's been a struggle to find local colors, and depict them convincingly. On the flip side however, it does go pretty quick, and its very easy to fix mistakes. I never did finish this painting to a point that I'm happy with, I did notice some of the colors turning out better. Also I was pretty happy with the likeness I got on the model.



The next project was a lot of fun. Our assignment was to use the 3 words we were given somehow in our drawing. My three words were contest, surreal, and powdered charcoal. My main focus was to use "surreal" in a way that was completely disconnected from the artistically surreal images of Salvador Dali and others. The drawing was inked with a brush, then I added the value with watered down powdered charcoal, almost like watercolors. It was a fun process that I would like to explore more. Overall, I enjoyed how the drawing turned out. The drawing also lead me back into a more editorial field of illustration.



This was another painting of Rush Limbaugh done in photoshop. Mainly I was concerned about getting a good likeness and caricature of the man that has thus far eluded me. I reached a point in the painting where I thought I needed to put the stylus and let it be.

For the last couple projects, I gave myself a challenge of getting 5 editorial cartoons done a week. For one, I wanted to be a lot more prolific for the remainder of the semester, and also I wanted to explore some more controversial topics and put my spin on them. I have been drawing editorial cartoons off and on for the last couple years, and feel that I've made some big strides in these last bunch of drawings, especially in the jokes and imagery. As far as drawing goes, I tried to use a brush a lot more on these drawings. For one, it translates better when the drawing would be reduced to print size, and it also makes for more dynamic linework.

Bipartisan Breather

I find it funny how Congressional productivity is directly related to the timeliness of hot issues and elections.

Chewless Campus!!??

Well, there have been a few things during my tenure at UW-Stout that have gotten me a little steamed, but most recently it has been the campus wide ban on all tobacco use. Last year there was a referendum for a smoking ban (socially enforced as it was unlawful to ban tobacco use on government property), but now the Stout Student Association and the student body have expanded upon the referendum to include all types of tobacco. I still am wondering in what way a person chewing, snuffing, snusing, etc. has anything to do with other students on campus. Other than the appearance being unpleasant for onlookers, there is no harm to anyone, save the users. In the case it is for the sake of tobacco users that the administration and SSA banned tobacco use on campus, there are many other health conscious issues that should be addressed before the minimal percentage of chewers and smokers on campus. How about the nutritionally unsatisfying food they serve at our dining halls that many of the students indulge in. Freshman 15 anyone? Wisconsin has a 63.5% overweight/obese population. Hows that for unsightly/unhealthy?

Oh, and there are two other cartoons down there. One about Oklahoma and abortion, the other about Arizona and them crazy illegals... or legals, whichever the case may be.