Sketchbook Silliness: Feb-Mar 2017

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I was unusually busy during February and March finishing up a giant project involving over 300 illustrations! But I also managed to squeak out a few webcomics:

013017-Home

021717-Sheep

030617-Web

031617-Apples

My entire archive of cartoons is at sketchbooksilliness.com. If you support my comics on Patreon you can get BONUS cartoon gag sketches and other goodies that are only for my Patreon backers! Here’s a sneak peak at the past few bonus gags:

BackerGags-Thumbs-FebMar2017

 

Support Me On Patreon

I’m trying to post one new Sketchbook Silliness cartoon every week or so and at least a couple of bonus gags per month. Hope they give you a chuckle!

Sketchbook Silliness: January 2017

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I posted a couple of more cartoons this month:

010516-Spider

011617-Wool

013017-Fire

My entire archive of cartoons is at sketchbooksilliness.com. If you support my comics on Patreon you can get BONUS cartoon gag sketches and other goodies. These are usually gags I’m on the fence about so quality will vary, but as of now only my Patreon backers get to see them! Here’s a sneak peak at the past few bonus gags:

BackerGags-Thumbs-Jan2017

Support Me On Patreon

I’m trying to post one new Sketchbook Silliness cartoon every week or so and at least a couple of bonus gags per month. Hope they give you a chuckle!

2016 Highlights and Accomplishments

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2016 was another jam-packed year for my illustration studio. I’m deeply grateful to have such a fun job where I get to work on so many exciting projects with so many amazing people. Here’s a few highlights from our most recent trip around the sun. (I’ll warn you there are a lot of projects I can’t reveal yet but I’ve linked to as many as I could):

ILLUSTRATION

  • I created a couple of more spot illustrations for Highlights magazine. You can view them here and here.
  • I was hired by the Minneapolis Star-Tribune to help them pitch advertising ideas to several businesses and brands, including a national pizza chain, a local Renaissance-themed event, and a couple more projects I can’t reveal yet.
  • Speaking of art I can’t show, I also illustrated an activity puzzle for a major home improvement retail chain. I should be able to post the art sometime in February.
  • Goldfish Swim Schools hired me to illustrate a fun photo standee featuring their mascot (which I also designed). I’m also in the middle of a very large project for them that I hope to be able to show in a few months.
  • I helped out the Svedvick Collective with some ad concepts for a major cereal brand (again, I’m not allowed to show the work yet. Kind of a theme here.)
  • I illustrated another Gospel tract/comic for the ministry of Living Waters. This one dealt with the subject of Atheism.

TOY DESIGN

  • I continued to help with toy design and concept art for multiple Hasbro projects (most of which I’ll never be able to show for legal/confidentiality reasons).
  • I was hired by the Strottman agency to help them pitch several toy ideas to Chick-Fil-A. Once again I’m limited in what I can show but here’s a sample.
  • I helped out the Smiley company on a large toy concept pitch for a well-known novelty toy brand, which I hope to be able to review soon. In the mean time, this year I was finally able to reveal l small sampling of another batch of concepts I did for them back in 2015.

CHARACTER DESIGN

  • I was hired by Mountainside Farms, an east coast dairy company, to design a cow mascot for their packaging.

MISC

  • My goofy cartoon sketches evolved into a webcomic I’m calling Sketchbook Silliness. People seem to like it and a couple of the cartoons went mildly viral. I’ve put together a list of my ten most popular cartoons from 2016, and I recently launched a Patreon campaign for the project which you can support here.
  • I stepped up my involvement in the National Cartoonists Society. I’m now the social media guy for our chapter which means I run our Twitter feed and Facebook group. I also organized a draw-with-kids event at the Minneapolis St. Jude Walk/Run for childhood cancer, and travelled to Sioux Falls for our fall cartooning conference.
  • I once again exhibited at both MSP Comic-Con’s.
  • I re-posted a free download of sketchbook ideas for Inktober.
  • Although most of my work is very cartoony, I also do courtroom sketching from time to time. This year I worked at trials related to Prince, ISIS, a police shooting, and the man who killed Jacob Wetterling. You can see some samples on my other website, courtroomsketches.com.

Whew! I’m exhausted just thinking about it all. I feel very blessed. Thanks to all of you who have supported me and shown interest in my work over the years. I wish all of you a happy and healthy 2017!