She’s Alive!

This week marks the 89th anniversary of the classic Universal Monster movie, The Bride of Frankenstein. Michelle and I realized this late into the evening on Saturday and quickly ripped through a new ink wash illustration and process video to celebrate the occasion.

The actual bride of Frankenstein (played by Elsa Lanchester in a dual role that also saw her portray Mary Shelley) only appeared in that one eponymous movie. But despite not having as many times up at bat as Frankenstein’s Monster, Dracula, or The Wolfman, the character has left just as indelible an impression on pop culture as her monstrous counterparts.

And while I always look forward to rendering The Bride in watercolors and debunking the idea that she has green skin (preposterous!), I wanted to stick to the same black-and-sepia ink and wash technique I used on all those other Universal Monsters last October. Now she fits right in with the rest of them.

The sepia ink is a nice counterpoint to the black ink, but I wanted to use it for The Bride for a very specific reason. Elsa Lanchester had red hair. You can see it very clearly years later when she plays Katie Nanna in Mary Poppins opposite Julie Andrews. It follows, then, that The Bride of Frankenstein may also have had red hair. It’s not canon? Well…it’s my drawing, and I say she did. The warmer tones of the sepia ink do a passable job of conveying the idea that she has red hair, while not being as obvious as a watercolor wash.

If you want to see my process for this image, how it turned out, and listen to Michelle and I gab about movies and toys for seven minutes or so, the link to the video is below.

Studying the Way of the Samurai

Preparing to work on an upcoming Usagi Yojimbo commission, Michelle and I realized we knew little to nothing about the character. So, this past week we’ve been researching the Stan Sakai comic, doing some sketches, and, in this week’s video, a full ink, wash, and watercolor study of the samurai rabbit.

Wikipedia tells me Usagi Yojimbo is heavily influenced by Japanese cinema, Kurosawa, and other samurai pop culture icons. And it’s here that I realize there is a giant hole in my pop culture/cinema foundation. Aside from flipping through some issues of Lone Wolf and Cub back in college, I never really dove into stories involving samurai and ronins and swordplay. I read a few issues of Groo the Wanderer, which Sakai lettered, but it was mostly for the comedy and the classic Sergio Aragones cartooning. Look, I like comedy and monsters. Who knew there was such rich storytelling going on involving feudal japan and anthropomorphic rabbits? Everyone but me, apparently.

The watercolor study this week doesn’t do much to shore up my knowledge of that culture, but it does help me put a shape to the character. I think what little research we’ve done informed my decisions on how to pose the character, and to try to convey a quiet strength in his stance and expression.

And though the character and storyline of Usagi Yojimbo are set centuries ago in feudal Japan, this study prompted me to use modern technology to develop a new tool to help in the inking and coloring process.

Worried I’d lay down a wobbly or broken line when inking the katana and sheath, and having no flexible ruler to mold to my drawing’s sketch lines, I used a scan of my sketch, vector software, and a laser cutter to create a custom ruler out of wood.

Was it an over the top move for a simple study? Probably. Should I have just used the opportunity to strengthen my freehand inking skills? Definitely. But like the ronin’s of feudal Japan, I have no master. And I have cut ties with my family and clan. So if I want to buck the traditional methods of inking an anthropomorphic rabbit to turn out a half decent illustration, who’s to say I can’t? No one. You’re not the boss of me.

We recorded my process for creating this Usagi Yojimbo illustration. If you want to see how the illustration turned out, or watch me wield my deadly samurai custom ruler, the link to this week’s video is down

*blog originally posted at vincedorse.com

Unearthing the Bones of J. Giggles Flintstone

This week I had to work on a commission, and since it aligned nicely with the usual cartoony-spooky-vintage stuff we cover on our YouTube channel, we recorded my process. The medium is colored pencil, and the subject of the commission is the late J. Giggles Flintstone, a minor Season Five character who bequeaths Fred his entire fortune, on the condition that he stays one night in the old, haunted Flintstone estate. See? Told you it fit right in with our other videos.

The video isn’t just a rundown of my process, though. Michelle and I also discuss the episode in question, A Haunted House Is Not A Home, and recap it for anyone who might not instantly recall the 60-year old cartoon. It’s one of our favorite episodes, due in no small part to the malevolent staff who are also spending the night at the mansion, Creepers, Potrock, and Wormstone. If you think they look a little shady, keep in mind that should anything happen to Fred during the night, these stone-age weirdos get the fortune to themselves. Now, it’s a party!

The Flintstone commission is only the second time I’ve tried using solvent with colored pencil. It was a special request by the client, and I was happy to give it another try. And, as usual, in the spirit of passing on any knowledge we acquire by trying these things, I try to drop as many tips as I can think of while I work.

If you haven’t seen how solvent smooths out the texture of colored pencil, it’s really kind of magical. The colored pencil pigments are carried in the wax core of the pencils. When the mineral spirits of the solvent are brushed onto the wax, it melts, releasing the pigments. The result is a much smoother blend of colors.

If you’d like to see more of this solvent effect, you can check out our original Velma and Black Knight video from 2022. And if you want to know if Fred makes it through the night alive, you can watch this week’s Flintstones video at the link below.

If You’ve Had A Dose of a Freaky Ghost

Who you gonna call? Not Michelle or I, that’s for sure. We don’t want anything to do with ghosts. Unless, of course, the ghosts are part of some cute and creepy art project like this week’s Ghostbusters Mini-Puft Sculpt-Off!

To hype ourselves up for the opening of Ghostbusters:Frozen Empire, we challenged each other to sculpt one of the tiny marshmallow mini-pufts from the movie. Michelle chose to work with felted wool, and I decided to sculpt my spook out of clay.

There are pros and cons to each medium. Michelle benefited from being able to alter, change, and repair her sculpt right up to and through our video/photo shoot. I couldn’t do that with my solid rock of clay.

On the other hand, my clay sculpt didn’t confuse the camera the way the fuzzy wool edges of Michelle’s sculpt did, and I was able to finish my sculpt well before she could. The needle felting process consumes time the way Slimer consumes hot dogs.

The bases we decided on are just simple black plinths with the classic Ghostbusters “NO” logo on top. That way they retain that black/white/red color theme of the original logo, and the mini-puft ghosts look like they’re popping out of the logo to come to life.

One final element we added to match the violent streak these malevolent marshmallows posses is weaponry. In the movie, these creatures are always putting each other through devastating physical distress: burning each other with fire, running each other through with skewers, liquifying each other in blenders. But our creatures aren’t marshmallows, they’re clay and wool. So their weapons reflect their art supply origins.

If you wanna see Michelle and I try to defeat each other in this Ghostbusters Sculpt-Off, the video is linked below.

You Know The Name of King Kong

Back in January, we inked Godzilla as a way to celebrate our love of Godzilla Minus One. This month, Godzilla X Kong:The New Empire hits theatres. And while we’re not sure whether we’ll love it or not, Michelle and I thought it was only fair to ink up a King Kong in anticipation of the release.

The difference between the two should be obvious. I inked Godzilla with pens, using hatching to achieve my grey tones. With Kong, I decided to use ink wash. It’s a softer look, but I think it works well for the composition and subject (a giant gorilla stomping through a misty forest on an uncharted island).

In addition to my own ape inks, we have once again conned Michelle into playing a game of “Ink It or Stink It” where she’ll take a run at inking my drawing of Kong’s apparent nemesis, Skar King.

We both learned a little about technique and materials while working on these, which is our constant goal. But if you want to see how they turned out, you can check out the video at the link below:

Making A Mini-Comic: The Sequel

If you’d have told me two years ago that I’d have to spend time making a sequel to our popular “How To Make A Mini-Comic From One Sheet Of Paper” video, I’d have whined and complained for hours. But as it turns out, Michelle said that very thing to me just a couple weeks ago and I had the exact same reaction.

It’s not that I don’t like making videos…or mini-comics. But I thought we’d already answered all the questions about how to do that. Then Michelle pointed out the literal arm-long list of questions in the comments section of that video, and I agreed that maybe a followup would be helpful.

Since some people like to work digitally, we did a deeper dive in the second video on the different drawing apps you could use to set up your mini-comic. I dusted off my iPad and dug into Procreate for the first time in way too many months. Actually had a lot of fun working in that app and I look forward to experimenting with it a little more.

We also covered using different-sized paper, adding pages, and before it was all over, I’d put together two different new mini-comics to use as examples. Granted, one was just a portfolio of horrendous caricatures of Michelle, but what do you want? I was under a time crunch!

We also brought back our friend, voice actor Owen McCuen, to do some voicework on a dramatic reading of my new mini-comic about public domain cartoon characters. So if you want to see that, and maybe learn a little about making mini-comics, the video link is below.

And for anyone who missed the first part (nearly 3 years ago) here’s a link to that video too:

Taking A Run At Scooby-Doo’s Ghost Clown

The comedy-themed project streak continues unabated this week as Michelle and I each take a turn at rendering the classic Scooby-Doo villain, Ghost Clown. And everyone knows there’s nothing funnier than a clown who could swallow you whole.

The clown first appeared in episode 10 of the first season, Bedlam In The Bigtop. I’m guessing the original clown design was done by Iwao Takamodo, since he handled most of the designs for those early Scooby-Doo episode. His design was tight and perfect for the show, and looked like this:

I love that clown. But I wanted to try to make him a little scarier. So, after a few sketches, I landed on a slug-like monster with two-rows of razor sharp teeth. I lightboxed my digital sketch, and inked it with Microns, Tombow Brush Pens, and some brushed inks.

The wash I use is just water and Dr.Ph Martin’s Black Star ink. I keep a few pre-mixed jars of it so I don’t have to work out the ink-to-water proportions every time I sit down to do a wash. Once all of that ink is dry — all of it waterproof — I put down some nice, bright, circus colors that echo the original Scooby-Doo design.

And in addition to my version of the clown, this week Michelle plays another round of Ink It or Stink It where she tries to ink one of my drawings for a panel of judges. I sketched out the original Takamodo design for her to try her hand at, and members of our Patreon voted whether the final outcome was an “ink” or a “stink.”

If you want to see the process video, and hear us talk about Bedlam In the Bigtop, the video link is below.

Grin And Bear It

I’m the first one to admit, Michelle did most of the heavy lifting on this week’s project, A Fozzie Bear mini-diorama that’s part of Gallery1988’s latest show, Off The Leash, a celebration of our favorite non-human characters from pop culture.

We called the piece “Wocka Wocka” and it’s something we’ve wanted to do for a while; A tribute to Fozzie the comedian. It’s a simple tableau of everyone’s favorite comedy bear, up on stage, with a microphone and some props, doing what he does best — telling jokes.

So while Michelle was busy needle felting our fuzzy friend, I set about figuring out how to make the rest of the piece. I started with the microphone (arguably, his main prop). To cut, drill, and grind the metal parts of the prop, I ended up utilizing the Dremel Workstation Michelle got me for Christmas. It’s a pretty invaluable accessory to my rotary tool and I couldn’t have finished my part of this project without it.

The grip of the mic is a piece of wood I sanded down into that slightly flared profile. Then I used my Dremel and a sphere-shaped burr to scoop out a concave bowl shape in the end. That way I could securely glue in the head, which I’d sculpted out of clay and textured with a stiff brush.

And while Michelle’s Fozzie sculpt is clearly the star of the show here, I gotta say I’m pretty proud of the stage he stands on and the props he uses. Also — little known fact — I was the one in charge of drawing the eight-hundred-or-so dots on Fozzie’s tie.

To see Fozzie and the rest of the pieces in Gallery1988’s Off The Leash exhibit, click here.

And if you’d like to see Michelle and I put together our tribute to this comedy legend, you can watch the video below.

Inking Godzilla Minus One

I don’t know what you guys did over holiday break, but Michelle and I just kept going back to the theatre to see Godzilla Minus One. We weren’t even necessarily huge Godzilla fans before this movie. I mean, of course he’s a ton of fun. He’s a monster. But this movie? It stomped us flat and left us breathless. Best movie we’ve seen in a long time.

When I was a kid, when I saw a monster movie that got under my skin, I’d spend days lying on the living room rug filling my sketch pad (and any other random piece of paper I could lay my hands on) with drawings of the monster. So it seemed natural for me to do the same thing with this new, powerful, terrifying Godzilla.

Big difference is that now I have better tools at my disposal. So I lightboxed my sketch onto heavy cotton watercolor paper, and went at it with Black Star inks and Micron fineliners.

My plan was to set up three distinct values — lights, mids, darks — and set up the composition so that they frame each other nicely, and lead the viewer’s eye where I want it to go. I wrestled over whether to render this in inkwash or hatching — each have their benefits — but chose to go with a very measured, hatched linework for the midtones to contrast with the chaos of the subject matter.

I had a lot of fun working on this and practicing my brushwork, hatching, and monster doodling. If you want to see me put the whole things together, Michelle and I recorded my process for this week’s video and talked about our Godzilla Minus One experience (no spoilers).

Our Holiday Tribute to Rankin/Bass

If you’re old enough to have watched all those great Rankin/Bass stop motion holiday specials when you were a kid — or young enough that your parents force you to watch them because “that’s what Christmas was like when I was your age!” — then you might enjoy our holiday card for this year. It’s an illustration of some of the worst creeps and goons Rankin/Bass ever animated.

Creeps like Professor Hinkle, for example. The failed magician who ended up stalking a small child through a frozen wasteland only to lock her in a greenhouse while her magical snowman friend melted into lukewarm water. Nice guy, right? And a wonderful thing for children to watch. It really helped prepare us for the real world. Never trust a magician.

And, of course, you have the Miser Brothers, Snow and Heat. These two petulant monsters argued constantly to get their way and threw tantrums when they didn’t. A great example of now NOT to solve conflicts. These Rankin/Bass specials really were valuable on so many levels.

And that’s why we decided to honor those fantastic holiday specials with a collage of their villains. We did it in watercolor — no colored pencils or inks for linework or details — and tried to capture that holiday magic that Rankin/Bass imbued all of their stop motion specials with. Well…maybe not Little Drummer Boy. That one always put me to sleep.

If you’d like to see us put this holiday illustration together, you can watch the video below. And since it’s just a couple weeks until the end of the year — Happy Holidays! We hope you have a wonderful holiday and best wishes for 2024!