Tuesday 4 June 2013

Four Cartoons

Click to make larger

I’m supposed to be drawing but instead I found myself poking around in my cartoons directory. That’s where I found these four cartoons. They are just a few of the far too many I never thought were worth posting or even finishing. It seems a shame to let them lie there rotting. The ideas behind them weren't all that bad and some I might even try to redraw.

Some days, I find cartoon ideas impossible to come by. Late at night, I can never think of a single one and I sometimes fall asleep at my desk trying to think of a good joke. Other days, I can sit here and rattle them off, one after another. I don’t understand why but sleep is clearly important. When I’m in an ideas mood, I’ll do nothing but sit and write gags until I’m exhausted. That way, I can keep a typed list of cartoon ideas for when I want to draw but I’m too tired to think of the material. There are probably hundreds on the sheet, some good but many bad. I then print out six boxes onto blank white card which I use as the frames for the cartoons. It saves me the time of drawing the frame but also the expense of using one sheet per cartoon.

Why am I telling you all this? I don’t know. Perhaps somebody out there finds this stuff interesting. It’s also too hot and I don’t function once the temperate goes over twenty five degrees. No, that's not it. I think I'm feeling deflated. Despite writing what I thought was a blisteringly good article on the dystopia we’re about to enter with Google Glass, I’ve still not heard back from The Guardian. I figure if I don't hear within an hour, I won't hear at all. I also have six blank boxes to fill but I don’t know if I have the enthusiasm to even begin...

9 comments:

  1. I have a cartoon idea that I think would be hilariously funny - but I don't have your artistic talent... In fact, I can't draw to save my life... In fact, with hindsight it probably isn't that funny if you don't have my perverse sense of humour...

    It doesn't need any words...

    Load of people sitting in an aeroplane.
    Emergency de-pressurisation and all the Oxygen masks pop down.
    Remembering the emergency briefing, they all grab a mask and tug it to initiate the flow.
    Masks all come off the pipes in their hands and they are left, shocked holding the useless things...

    Would love to see it produced properly....

    ReplyDelete
  2. No, I love that idea. I'm all for dark comedy. The difficulty would be drawing all the people holding the masks but if you perhaps did a side view, from the aisle, you could focus on two people looking confused as they hold the masks. Perhaps what would be even funnier is if everybody else had their masks on...

    Hmmm... Since you asked so nicely, leave it with me. I'll see what I can do. I might have something for you for the end of the day. ;)

    ReplyDelete
  3. Oh, I can assure you it will definitely not be awesome or even, probably, close to how you imagined it. Sitting down to draw a cartoon always means you have to think about the viewpoint, where to place the bodies and hands... All I can say is that it will be my take on your idea. I've finished it in pencil and will now begin to ink it in so you'll soon be able to say 'No, that's nothing like I imagined it at all!' and begin to tell me how I've got the interior of the aircraft all wrong. That's usually what happens. ;)

    ReplyDelete
  4. I don't think I could complain if it is a different aircraft to that I'd imagined!

    ReplyDelete
  5. Well, I did suddenly think that you might have been talking about the interior of the Boing 757 when I've drawn the Airbus A340...

    ReplyDelete
  6. [...] very quick cartoon based on the idea offered here by Barman and, in fairness, probably nothing like he suggested, especially since he did say that it [...]

    ReplyDelete
  7. LOL. No but nor is it anything like the cartoon you wanted either... Sorry about that. Things always just go their own course. Anyway, it's done and I shared the credit with you. ;)

    ReplyDelete