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Here are the first two strips of the freelance project I mentioned in my last post. The strip is tentatively being called "School St.". My co-conspirator, i.e. the guy responsible for all the words and stories, is named Martin Fernandez.
Martin is a teacher, and these things all really happened to him. Hopefully he'll have a web site up soon so I can point you to it.
I'm really having a lot of fun with this process, and I can't wait to do more. Keep an eye on this blog for more installments!
I have my first freelance job. I'm pretty psyched! The project involves illustrating a series of vignettes authored by a friend of mine who is a teacher. These are short, funny interactions with young students. It's basically Kids Say the Darndest Things only with cartoons instead of Bill Cosby.
So I've been working up some ideas and character sketches I wanted to share. First up are some early character studies and a test strip which I think is actually quite funny.
Next, some additional character refinements.
Finally, here's another drawing I did based on the general tone of the stories. For this I tried using some ink washes. I really enjoyed it and I'll have to try it again some day.
So far, this has been a really fun process. I'm really enjoying working with someone else's ideas and I like the challenge of bringing these stories to life.
Not long ago I wrote about the Winsor & Newton Series 7 brush I purchased. In short: I loved it. Unfortunately, after about a week or so, my Series 7 became unable to keep a point. The tip kept splitting and my line would break up. This is not good. It appears that all the talk of Winsor & Newton's unreliable quality control is likely true.
So I tried another highly recommended brush, one with reportedly better quality standards: The Raphael 8404.
The Raphael is only very slightly inferior to the Winsor & Newton in performance. And most of this comes down to the amount of ink the brush holds. The Winsor & Newton holds a ridiculous amount of ink; the Raphael, slightly less. In most every other way, the Raphael is quite comparable to the Winsor & Newton.
But what makes it a standout is its reliability. I've been using this brush for everything I've done over the past two months, and it's managed to keep its shape and remarkable performance. While it's not quite a good as a working Series 7, it's still easily better than any other brush I've tried, and it's a real workhorse.
Speaking of other brushes I've tried, I've also tried the Rosemary brushes, once recommended — and later not recommended — by Comic Tools. They're not bad, but somewhat anemic in terms of ink capacity. They just don't hold much ink. I also tried an Escoda brush, which I'd heard was good, and was not particularly impressed.
So, if you're looking for a superior brush you can rely on, at this point I can pretty confidently recommend the Raphael 8404. It's terrific.
