Sir Basil Hudson-Landry
Toontown Cops Wanted to Know WHO ROPED THE RAVISHING REDHEAD
Let me add to Toontown's crime wave by committing first degree plagiarism and saying, "She's not bad, she's just drawn that way!"
Which is to say that even though I've enjoyed it, I've also been somewhat frustrated drawing my little cartoon girls, trying to imitate my heroes Ward and Wenzel and DeCarlo with MS Paint and not even coming close to a distant approximation. Over the years I'd given thought to and even played around some with icon stick figures and emoticon faces, the idea of getting back to simpler, more cartoon-like figures with simple bodies, hairstyles and backgrounds, with either full frontal or side views only of both people and objects, rather than trying for 3/4 views and more than an illusion of perspective, and 3-to-4-head high figures along the lines of Andy Capp and Peanuts characters (Reg Smythe and Charles Schulz being a couple of my other heroes--in fact, even greater and more influential ones, since I was seeing their work from a much younger age and on a far more regular--i.e., daily--basis). Along with that, I realized that part of the problem is that if MS Paint has severe limitations as an artistic tool, I have my own severe limitations as an artistic talent.
So, I finally decided to recognize my own creative inability AND to quit fighting MS Paint, to quit trying to overcome its weaknesses in drawing complex shapes and using its strengths--straight lines and circles--to draw the simple ones we're both better suited for. This CADD--computer assisted deranged drafting--is the result. Not sure I'm altogether happy with it, but I do know I'm happy with the fact that while it took me six weeks or so of playing around to work out the basic proportions and come up with some figure bases and faces I liked, once I started on this cartoon itself it took me one day to do it (actually a half day or less, counting all the coffee/smoke breaks and the nap I took). Which is somewhat more fun than spending hours and hours over a period of days using the maddening Curve Tool and making pixel-by-pixel changes with the Pencil Tool trying to get the curve of one of my little bimbos's calves to look like the smooth and sweeping curve of the real thing. And never being satisfied I'd got it.
I'll leave it to you True Detectives out there to solve "The Mystery of the Secret Joke" by following "The Clue in the Number on the Door". 10-4.
Toontown Cops Wanted to Know WHO ROPED THE RAVISHING REDHEAD
Let me add to Toontown's crime wave by committing first degree plagiarism and saying, "She's not bad, she's just drawn that way!"
Which is to say that even though I've enjoyed it, I've also been somewhat frustrated drawing my little cartoon girls, trying to imitate my heroes Ward and Wenzel and DeCarlo with MS Paint and not even coming close to a distant approximation. Over the years I'd given thought to and even played around some with icon stick figures and emoticon faces, the idea of getting back to simpler, more cartoon-like figures with simple bodies, hairstyles and backgrounds, with either full frontal or side views only of both people and objects, rather than trying for 3/4 views and more than an illusion of perspective, and 3-to-4-head high figures along the lines of Andy Capp and Peanuts characters (Reg Smythe and Charles Schulz being a couple of my other heroes--in fact, even greater and more influential ones, since I was seeing their work from a much younger age and on a far more regular--i.e., daily--basis). Along with that, I realized that part of the problem is that if MS Paint has severe limitations as an artistic tool, I have my own severe limitations as an artistic talent.
So, I finally decided to recognize my own creative inability AND to quit fighting MS Paint, to quit trying to overcome its weaknesses in drawing complex shapes and using its strengths--straight lines and circles--to draw the simple ones we're both better suited for. This CADD--computer assisted deranged drafting--is the result. Not sure I'm altogether happy with it, but I do know I'm happy with the fact that while it took me six weeks or so of playing around to work out the basic proportions and come up with some figure bases and faces I liked, once I started on this cartoon itself it took me one day to do it (actually a half day or less, counting all the coffee/smoke breaks and the nap I took). Which is somewhat more fun than spending hours and hours over a period of days using the maddening Curve Tool and making pixel-by-pixel changes with the Pencil Tool trying to get the curve of one of my little bimbos's calves to look like the smooth and sweeping curve of the real thing. And never being satisfied I'd got it.
I'll leave it to you True Detectives out there to solve "The Mystery of the Secret Joke" by following "The Clue in the Number on the Door". 10-4.