Category: Cartoon art

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Illustration Friday: Soar – Flying with Whales

Flying with Whales

Ink and watercolor in 5.5″ square dream sketchbook (Larger)

I love my flying dreams. In this one I was flying over the ocean and saw some whales frolicking below. I flew down and was playing with them when one bit my arm hard. I knew he meant no harm though, so once he let my arm go, I stayed and played with them some more.

The next dream wasn’t as much fun. I went into San Francisco to visit my boss (unbeknownst to her), planning to phone when I got there. But my cell phone had no reception and then I dropped it and it fell apart right over a sewer grate. I finally retrieved all the pieces and then a block away, drop it again over another sewer grate.

Then I realize I’ve forgotten my shoes and am barefoot and it’s dark and cold and I’m in a bad neighborhood. But I remember I love to run barefoot in the dark (huh?!!!) . So I run up and down the hills of San Francisco, trying to find my way to downtown Hollywood where I can catch a bus home. It goes on and on, but the rest of the story is likely to amuse only me so I’ll stop there.

I woke up with the idea that I needed to replace my cellphone and then wasted the morning researching the latest phones until I remembered that my phone hadn’t really fallen and broken and does still get reception and that I had no excuse for considering buying an iPhone, no matter how cute they are.

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Cartoon art Drawing Dreams Painting People Sketchbook Pages Watercolor

Blogging about Dreams; Dreaming about Blogs

All are drawn in ink and then watercolored in 5.5″ square sketchbook
(Larger)

(Above) Dreamt my hairdresser shot someone and was going to jail.
The really bad part was that I was going to have to find another hairdresser.

– – –

Hillary forgot to shave her legs
(Larger)
(Above) Dreamt that Hillary Clinton was visiting her OB/GYN. The doctor left the door unlocked so a bunch of reporters and photographers opened the door and took pictures.
Hillary was horrified because she’d forgotten to shave her legs!
Then Kate wrote the story up and Laura published it in the S.F. Chronicle.

– – –

Gay line dancing church

(Larger)

(Above) Dreamt that a cute guy at a dinner party invited me to visit his church called “J.O.H.N.”.
It was for gay men who loved women, and lesbians who loved men, and where they did line dancing dressed as sailors from the 1940’s. The women had those big poufed-up, pinned-up 40s hairstyles and were wearing military uniforms.

– – –

L's Paris Car Repair Shop

(Larger)

(Above) I dreamt that my ex-husband was starting a blog about a car repair shop he was opening in Paris (huh?!) and he asked me to paint something representing Paris to use on the blog. First I thought of the Eiffel Tower, but knew that was trite and would be hard to draw so I decided to paint a fountain. I was working on it in my dream, trying to paint Paris fountains like Laura, and the painting wasn’t going very well.

I just realized that not only am I blogging about dreaming, now I’m dreaming about blogging! I’m so glad I’m on vacation now — I need it!

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Cartoon art Drawing Dreams Life in general Other Art Blogs I Read Painting People Sketchbook Pages Watercolor

Dream Journal: Film Crew Dinner & Sleepless Sleep Over with Laundry

Film crew dinner with Amazon Indians

Ink and watercolor in sketchbook (Larger)

I did these dream drawings right after I woke up, sitting in bed with a special SAD light (see previous post) propped up on my lap, shining on my face. My friend loaned me her spare light to see if it helped. I’m not sure if it was the lights, the sunny day, the hour at the gym and walk in the sun afterwards, but I’ve definitely been in a much better mood today than I’ve been in weeks.

Last night’s dreams were quite strange. The one illustrated above was about a dinner party with a film crew, including the director (at the head of the table) and two Amazonian Indian women who had just participated in a ritual that the crew filmed for a documentary.

One woman was displaying the scratches/lashes on her back she proudly received during the ritual. The other was mostly just displaying her boobs.

Maybe I’ve been watching too much of the TV show Bones on DVD about a forensic anthropologist? Or maybe it’s from listening to the National Public Radio series about the Ganges River (that I converted into the Amazon) and combined it with the interview on NPR’s Fresh Air with film director Jason Reitman and scriptwriter Diablo Cody.

Sleepless sleepover with pile of laundry

Ink and watercolor in sketchbook (Larger)

In this dream I invited Martha over for a little slumber party (huh?) and then remembered that I needed to vacuum because there was cat hair everywhere. I was still cleaning when she arrived so she hung out downstairs helping my mom plan some wonderful menus involving roasted pork. (I have no upstairs, my mom doesn’t live here, and she doesn’t cook, especially not pork.)

I still hadn’t finished vacuuming but realized there was laundry everywhere and so started piling it up on the spare bed to get it out of the way. Finally we said goodnight and Martha went right to sleep. I didn’t.

This dream happened right after Kate and I talked about meeting in person the next time she comes out to San Francisco (Kate turned into Martha in my dream). Having guests always seems to bring up those darn insecurities about not having a fancy home and other general unworthiness (that I can usually overcome with a little pep talk to myself).

In reality, my house is usually tidy, organized and there are no piles of laundry. There is the cat fur problem though, which I tend to ignore longer than I should…but I just warn people not to wear black to my house since it’s a cat-fur magnet.

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Cartoon art Digital art Illustration Friday

Illustration Friday: Geeky (Computer Geek/Circus Freak)

Geek

Sketched on paper, traced manually in Painter and then automatically in Illustrator, colored in Painter, converted to Photoshop and “saved for web”.
Click here to see larger.

This weeks Illustration Friday challenge is “Geeky.” The original definition of a geek is someone from a circus or carnival freak show who ate live animals such as mice, including biting the heads off live chickens. How the word Geek came to mean someone who is into computers and nerdy, I don’t know. I guess it’s the social outsider thing. So I just took it a step further and made it a freak show guy who eats computer mice and other computer parts. I made myself stop playing with this illustration so that I’d still have time to do some real painting today, so it’s not as clean as I’d like it to be.

I’m a bit of a computer geek myself, and have recently been studying color management theory and practice between devices and software programs. It’s really complicated. This time I was able to embed my monitor and color profile in Painter so that when I converted it to Photoshop they had fairly similar color.

Refrigerator Update
For someone who prides herself on being a techno-geek, I definitely don’t have it when comes to large appliances. It turns out that whole disaster with my fridge was caused by the dial in the freezer (which I didn’t even realized existed) being turned to OFF. I don’t know how it got turned off, but that’s all that was wrong. The skinny, weasel-faced jerk of a repairman tried to charge me $98 instead of the $65 I was quoted over the phone for a diagnosis, claiming he had to charge for his (5 minutes of “labor” too).

I told him the guy on the phone said there’d be an estimate before any labor was charged and he said, oh yeah, they always tell you that. But I have to charge for my time starting with when I walk in the door.” I called Sears back and the guy on the phone confirmed I was right so I asked him to talk to the repairman. They chatted for a bit, the repairman said “OK” and handed me the phone, which I hung up. He said, “No, you were supposed to talk to him–he was going to tell you to pay the $98 and take it up with Customer Service later.”

I thought for a moment and said, “I’ll tell you what, I’ll give you the $65 I was quoted and YOU take it up with Customer Service” and crossed my arms and stared him down. He realized there was no point arguing any further and gave me a “discount” back to the original quoted price and left. Sheesh! What a scam!

Here’s the original sketch on a decorative notepad.
Original sketch for Geek

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Cartoon art Digital art Dreams Life in general People Sketchbook Pages

Still Dreaming…

Dream-Movies

Dreamt I was at the movies with my blind husband (don’t have one) and another blind man and they were showing off by walking from side to side on the stage being tricky and funny.

Dream-ShoulderFix

Dreamt I created a company called “Subsidiary” that makes devices to make shoulders more comfortable while sleeping.

Dream-Cereal

Dreamt Cody was a kid again and a funny old grandpa was in the kitchen showing him how to eat cereal from those little fold-open cereal boxes.

Dream-Mom

Dreamt my mom wanted to come live with me but I remembered I had a husband I had to ask first. Then I remembered I wasn’t married anymore but had a roommate (a former friend I don’t see anymore). I asked if she minded and she said she’d inherited a fortune and was going to be buying houses for 13 friends and I wasn’t one of them. Mom was sorting through papers in an envelope marked “Dec 06” that she’d found in her piles of junk stacked around her on her bed.

These are all drawn in ink in my sketchbook, then scanned and colored in Painter.

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Cartoon art Drawing Dreams Sketchbook Pages

Dreams Illustrated

Dream-GirlBand

Dreamt I started a Japanese all-girl band as a way to promote a baseball team.

Dream-Lawnchair

Dreamt I invented a combination yoga mat/lawn chair. In the same dream something was tickling me and it was big banner that said “Big Banner” tucked behind my pillow.

Dream-Cabbage-lady

Dreamt there was an old lady who kept coming to my door every month trying to sell me food made from cabbage like coleslaw and kimchee. She always carried one worn out old brochure for the American Cancer Society, and the money she made from cabbage was supposedly donated to them. I was skeptical so I visited the ACS and was given a tour. (see next)

Dream-ACSparty

(immediately above) They had a room where they helped people quit smoking by letting them smoke one last cigarette. The woman showing me around sat on a weight bench while smoking a cigarette and suddenly fell asleep and fell on the floor. Later (above previous) all the employees were having a party and were all happily smoking marijuana.

Dream-Horsecart

Dreamt there was a horse pulling a cart with a horse in it and another horse behind that and they all turned out to be fraternity guys wearing horse suits.

***

The best part of remembering my dreams is discovering the goofy stuff my mind cooks up when I’m not looking.

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Cartoon art Digital art Illustration Friday Sketchbook Pages

Illustration Friday: Sign (on the dotted line)

Illustration Friday

Drawn on paper and digitally colored in Corel Painter

I planned to try to finish two acrylic paintings this weekend but yesterday I spent the day at the San Francisco Sketchcrawl (I’ll post that story and those pics tomorrow) and today I got distracted by this week’s Illustration Friday challenge and this image that word brought to my mind. After tending my roses, getting in some exercise, having lunch and taking a nap in the sun in my backyard, I followed my muse and did this drawing that wanted to come out and play.

Now it’s time for dinner but my lovely neighbors just brought me a beautiful plate of fresh grilled salmon and salad so I don’t have to cook. I can eat and then get to work on those paintings.

Yay! A much needed day of rest and fun!

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Cartoon art Drawing Illustration Friday People Sketchbook Pages

Illustration Friday (redux): Citrus (Juggler)

Citrus-juggler2

Ink in sketchbook then digitally painted in Painter

My Illustration Friday post yesterday was lame. I didn’t have a single interesting idea of what to do with citrus other than a literal drawing of a lemon. But today I had another idea and quickly sketched it and then spent an hour or so coloring it in Painter. Now I feel better.

Actually, I feel better about my IF post and my back is feeling 50% better today. The work my physical therapist did on me yesterday and the exercises she gave me that I did today seem to be helping. I do miss being able to lay in bed with my laptop looking at blogs but she warned me that it’s about the worst thing I can do for my back. I’ve had lower back problems forever and know how to care for it but never had upper back pain until I started reclining with my laptop.

Yippee! Getting better…makes me want to jump for joy and dance and juggle citrus!

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Cartoon art Life in general People Sketchbook Pages

More Dream Sketches

These are all sketched in ink in my morning dream journal in ink and then colored in Photoshop. They can be seen larger by clicking image and selecting “All Sizes.”

Dreams-May-4

Dreamt I was hanging out with Michael and a lovey-dovey hippie woman who was handing out crocheted flowers and I realized I was wearing ugly sweats.

Dreams-May-3

Dreamt I was in the hospital and all I wanted was someone to bring my my toothbrush.

Dreams-May-2

Dreamt I was painting and someone told me I should take out insurance on my paintings in case of fire.

Dreams-May-1
1. Dreamt my mom was visiting and Marcy planned a hike but invited her friends and the hike was too hard for my old mom.

2. Really bad icky dream about people stealing from homeless bums.
Dream-May11

Dreamt my mom called to tell me she heard on TV that if you go to a “Big 3” (?) college you make more money the rest of your life. She often reports random information (usually about celebrities) that she hears on the TVs that are contantly on in every room of her house.

Dream-May1

1. Dreamt I was visiting my bubby (Jewish grandma) only she was Mexican and named Rosita and illiterate so I was reading a letter to her from a friend in Mexico. I was trying to translate it into Spanish but she told me to just read it in English.

2. Marcy and I were going to LA to visit our mother and I was packing and telling myself to pack light for once but I realized none of my pants fit and we had to hurry and leave and Marcy was still sleeping.
——–
Hmmm, seems like my dreams are reminding me that it’s been too long since I’ve visited my mother and that I need to buy a plane ticket and go see her soon.

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Cartoon art Illustration Friday

Illustration Friday: Polar (Bipolar)

Polar (Bipolar)

Digital illustration in Corel Painter started from scanned sketchy ideas drawn on the back of a receipt sitting on the kitchen table.

This week’s Illustration Friday challenge is “Polar.” I first thought of polar bears of course, but I did a polar bear illustration before for Illo Friday when the word was DANCE. Next stop on the train of though was “bipolar.” I hope that this image won’t be considered insensitive. I’ve done some reading about bipolar disorder in relation to artists, since many famous artists and writers have had this disorder. Kay Redfield Jamison, a professor of psychiatry who is also bipolar wrote Touched By Fire: Manic-Depressive Illness and the Artistic Temperament and An Unquiet Mind: A Memoir of Moods and Madness (bipolar disorder used to be known as manic depressive illness).

I was inspired to do Illustration Friday today because I received an email this morning from the editor of an-inflight magazine for a middle-eastern airline asking for permission to use my previous illustration for phobia in an article they’re publishing on phobias. The internet is sure amazing the way it connects people all over the world!