The other day, I saw a couple people pushing shopping carts full of recyclables (beer and wine bottles removed from other's recyling bins) down the street at 6 am or so. What a racket! I remembered an idea I had for a wagon of sorts, which I combined the usefulness of a shopping cart and the speed of a sled and voila, the Binner's Cart 2.0!
It's meant to be driven as mushers ride their sleds that are pulled by dog teams; stand on the back platform and kick the cart forward with your trailing leg. There is a locking foot brake on that platform and you steer by turning the steering bar. All models are constructed with high-strength, lightweight space age aluminum and yes, the LX model comes with hand warmers, ShurDry AC power outlets to charge cell phones and run radios to make that early morning work more pleasant! The wheels come with standard non-marking rubber tires and high pressure inner tubes to soften the ride and make the cart quieter. Spares and accessories (lights, reflectors, air horns) are available.
Just what every Binner needs, all for the low, low price of $999.98 CND, tax import fees, and shipping not included. That's a lot of bottles!
European model shown.
Ever watch the news and groan to yourself and lament the state of the world?
Groan no more, take up a pen (pencil, brush, spray can, double edged butterfly knife - your choice) and express your frustration like I tried to do with this one.
During the dog walk I thought about the composition, and tried to nail down the dialogue. You can see the final didn't change much from the original sketch, but little things did. I made the 2nd speaker a woman and changed her hand gesture because women don't point with their thumbs, don'tcha know?! Actually I didn't think such a gesture was very feminine. I spent some time on the two other roughs (with two characters each) because I'm working on a new style (best achieved with the cameraman) and also since I'm not 100% confident drawing on a Cintiq, I figured that good, well thought out roughs would help the inking.
30 - 45 minutes of roughs, and about 3 hours of inking and there you go. Now I need to figure out who to send this to!
I started this one a couple weeks ago, so don't hold our breath for the second page, but I'll get to it soon and don't worry... it'll make sense... well... as much sense as my work generally does! Trust me... it'll work!
Regarding the process, I did a pretty simple drawing on a piece of lined paper (the lines are quite helpful for designing the page and panel layout), then scanned it and inked it.
My concerns were to get the stork looking good. I looked at some photos online and could picture the poses and angles in my head, so he came together pretty easily. Also, I was worried I wouldn't be able to make the city look reasonable or interesting. Too much detail would kill me, so I decided to suggest the buildings with shadow and few simple details. I enjoyed imagining the city, the transit lines, the downtown, the industrial areas etc. Two radio-filled hours later and you can see the result. Take that, Mr. City Planner!
It was then that Christine looked at it and said the baby didn't look like a baby. Or rather, she said "What's that?!" Never a good sign - the drawing should speak for itself.
So, like I said, page 2 will be coming (sometime!) and when it is done, I hope you won't look at it and say "What the?!"
When I was in high school, we played a game called Strategem in which each player acted as a minister in government. One player would demand money to develop the military, another would request funds for agriculture, another would need money to develop resources, another would request funds to keep the country's environment clean and all players would have to agree on how to distribute the money. The goal was to work together to operate the country and make it "successful" - I can't remember what or how success was defined or scored.
Despite the name, it was a simulation that showed how each department had to work together to make the country "work". Most interestingly (to me) was how industry minister and environment minister were often at odds. If industry got too little and the environment got lots, your country would limp along, if most of the money went to industry, the environment would take a hit and in a few rounds your country would crash. Maybe the game needed a tourism minister who could show that a beautiful environment would bring tourist dollars?! Anyway...
When Stephen Harper said what he said (shown in the cartoon above), I was amazed and pleased that he was (I think) honest, but also very disappointed.
I can't do much, but I can voice my frustration and talk about my hopes and dreams. I can speak about what I think is wrong and what I think is important and how I want the world to be. But this isn't just about me. On this voting day in Ontario and everywhere else and every day hereafter, lets start talking about what we want, what's right, what's wrong and how we want OUR world to be.
When I was a kid (and sort of looked nothing like the one on the right in the drawing above), I used to do one drawing on a sketchbook page. Not only was it a waste of paper, but I think it created a bad mentality.
It's was all fine and good if I did a great drawing on a page. The page was done, don't touch it, leave it, keep it perfect. Same thing if I did a bad drawing, but I started a new page out of shame - don't touch it, move on, I never drew that. Worse yet if I did a bunch of skunky drawings in a series. That could wreck a sketchbook. Bad book, bad book!
Recently I've been doing something different. If I do a bad drawing and assuming I've not inked it or can somehow alter it, I do. Often weeks or months later, I erase as much as I can, try to re-imagine the original inspiration and draw on top of the old stuff.
I still tend to do a single drawing on a page and leave it. Take the one above. I did the guy in the center with the child standing on the chair few months ago. I liked it well enough when I did it, but the more I looked at it, the less I liked it. Somehow it's too cartoony and the adult's feet look too heavy or out of proportion. Maybe I didn't like the style. Maybe I thought I was being too profound or like I was trying to say something.
Anyway, last night I returned to this page and did the unthinkable. I drew some new figures on either side of the original ones! They have a similar style an weirdness and I can imagine some more elements - some other people caught in picture frames perhaps. But do you want to know the best part? I've dodged the shame of a lone bad drawing on a page and the page has been rescued! As for the quality and fate of the sketchbook? Well... that's not entirely decided yet!
