MY LATEST, FOR MAGIC BULLET! DC's comics newspaper :) Do I see crop marks?
The Bird
Pointing That Out . . .
Somewhere near Basalt, Colorado . . .
MICAH six eight: 3x5 Challenge
You know that 3x5 Challenge going 'round? Where you post 3 pieces of art 5 days in a row? Here were two of mine yesterday. I love this Bible verse, and I think I've done about 5 art pieces of it so far (maybe more). these are art marker (Faber-Castell Artist Pens) and gouache and watercolor on Moleskine watercolor paper. Anyway, enjoy! I'm working on new ink pieces, and Magic Bullet 10 comes out soon! Be sure to follow DC Conspiracy on Twitter @MagicBulletDC; it's awesome comics by DC area cartoonists! Check it out! Meanwhile, I'm trying to live by Micah six eight. But I think it's hard to claim the humble part if you have a blog, and Twitter account, and . . . and a PLEASE Like ME PAGE . . . oh what a tangled web . . . I'm trying, anyhow. :) peace, trl
PAISLEY
I obsessively design, draw, and doodle paisleys, when I'm not cartooning, and I have for years. I have a fantasy about going to the PAISLEY MUSEUM in Scotland and just spending ridiculous amounts of time staring at paisleys (or IS IT ridiculous? I should make a plan!) This is a piece I'm working on currently - with a new Holbein gouache set I got at New York ComicCon (from Vermont Art Supply/HOLBEIN booth, on the main floor! It's always a great one.) The colors are SO deep and rich! AND the HOLBEIN gouache is smoooooooth. In a word: JUICY. I carry travel paints with me most of the time - a very minimal set, usually black and white plus one other color, usually red (this time blue). This travel set is an AVEDA eyeshadow compact I'm upcycling - it has a magnetic strip in the bottom, and these are beer bottle caps with gouache in them. I've added a tiny travel brush which fits in the case when it's closed. The silver pill bottle can carry a tiny amount of water, which is all I need when working with a limited palette (and it's easily changeable with a water bottle on hand, which I usually have anyway!)You could easily do this with any old compact, which has a metal bottom, by adding magnets to your beer, wine, or soda bottle caps.
In FURTHER other news, I've become obsessed (yes, I've overused that word today) with podcasts, particularly those from Nerdist Chris Hardwick (you might know him as the host of Talking Dead, the WALKING DEAD aftershow?) - they are frickin' hilarious, and great to listen to while I work. Yesterday, though, I had to lift my brush from my work because I was cackling too hard to keep it steady. So, it can be risky . . .
Have a great weekend, y'all. peace, trl
FOG OF WORRY: WOMEN'S MAGAZINES
NEW YORK COMICCON, here we come!
It's New York ComicCon week! Woohoo!
We are booth #1162 in the Small Press section:
Curls Studio/Carolyn Belefski, and Laughing Redhead Studio (me).
I will be selling my Minis - these are all one-of-a-kind originals ($10 each) of all sorts of spooky beings . . . skulls, vampires, zombies, creepy lil' kids . . . you get the picture. I have hundreds (thousands?) of these on hand, and I'm creating more all the time. I will be selling my Volumes 1 and 2 of Fog of Worry, as well as prints, greeting cards, and postcards, too. ALSO, I will be signing and selling art and product at the National Cartoonists Society booth on Thursday from 3-5, and on Sunday from 10-1. Carolyn Belefski will be doing signings as well, please follow us on Twitter for all updates and details! @CarolynBelefski and @LaughingRedhead (or just click on the button here on the site).
So much funness! Please stop by and say hey! And, if you ask very very nicely, we might even give you a FREE copy of the awesome comics paper created by DC CONSPIRACY, MAGIC BULLET (the WESTERN edition!)
Hope to see you there!
peace, trl, aka Laughing Redhead
FOG OF WORRY: MAGNIFYING MIRROR
SMART LITTLE HAT
DARK WORLD
FOG OF WORRY: KINGDOM OF JESUS
FOG OF WORRY: 10-40
FOG OF WORRY: THE BAD SELFIES
FOG OF WORRY: WRITING AND SICH
Freelancing FOR DECADES messes with your brain pan. For writers, actors, artists, musicians, singer/songwriters, comics, directors, filmmakers, cartoonists, poets, this is success: when you keep on keepin' on. Which is a sentence which may not convince you that I'm actually a professional writer. I actually get paid to write stuff. Mostly humor. I'm hoping to get paid to write some scary stuff, too someday. So, I'm writing it. The best money I usually make at my HUMOR writing is getting behind a microphone in front of a few hundred or thousands of people, and making them laugh for about an hour. But it still all comes back to the writing. And that's probably my favorite part, because it doesn't require SPANX or mascara or strip searches by the TSA. I want to encourage all y'all freelancers (yes, I talk that way) to hang in there. Don't give up. Keep on Keepin' On. Hang in There. (And other clichés! I'm picturing that stupid kitty poster from the 70s where the kitty is hanging onto a branch! Maybe this is why I like dogs better!!)
Mainly I say this encouragement crap because I'm saying it to myself. I know it's true, it's not really crap, but freelancing is such a roller coaster. Feast or famine. If you go by your paychecks, you mistakenly see yourself, alternating, from creative genius to pond scum (and not the pretty chartreuse kind.)
You may not be making untold kabillions, (which is certainly not to say that you won't) or get paid occasionally in coupons (which I have admittedly), but working in a field you love, or doing the things you love to do, on a daily basis, is a great thing. My son reminded me of this one day when I was bitching about a little bitty famine period. (It was a HUGE famine period, but I had you there for a minute, didn't I?) Really, creating for a living is a blessing, it's a blessing you have chosen, though sometimes it may feel like a curse. When you are discussing why it matters for you to get an advance against royalties for your writing, or why you should get paid for doing artwork for a greeting card company, or you're looking down the long list of outstanding submissions and emails which no one has answered, or replacing that printer cartridge once again, and thinking whuuuuuut the hell am I buying more ink for? This is RICH. THIS is optimism. This is wild, unfettered hope.
Is wild hope for creative types just eternally dangling a plastic carrot?
I don't think so. Maybe because I have friends all over the map, some of y'all have movies on the big screen as we speak, others have won Emmys and are now writing some of my OTHER favorite shows . . . others have several animation series under their belts, and new ones in production . . . or are in the storyboarding process of their next animated feature; others are negotiating with studios on sitcoms and movies and some are writing their 50th or 70th books - which are actually being published, and not just on their home printers. (Not that there's anything wrong with that.) And I'm soooooo excited when I hear my buds interviewed on NPR or when I can buy a ticket to a movie they wrote on the big screen. And I think of the thousands of my creative friends (hey, Facebook) who aren't there yet, who are still waiting and creating, or who have been there, but aren't now. And I want to encourage us all. Because you know what? Once you get a movie or a sitcom or a cartoon or your own TV series or book tour - it doesn't mean it's all smooth going (has watching 30 ROCK taught you nothing, compadre?!)
The oh-so-scientific study I conducted in my head while I was writing this tells me that all these people have one thing in common: they are still writing. They kept on writing. They are writing now, and they were writing then.
Let's keep writing and drawing and dreaming and submitting. I have a file full of rejection notices and plan to ModPodge them all on a wall someday in a gallery installation I'll call, "Try, Try Again." Or maybe "Try, Try, Again."
Editor, pleeeez . . .