Daily shout!

Sorry for the invisible post today! Busy again with work and a number of events to draw at. So getting ready for those, printing paper and checking driving directions.

It is also very hot and sunny today and that suits me just fine!

This morning I was at a clients house photographing his dog to be drawn. More on that once I get the art started, it will be a great project and I hope to really push the boat out on this one!

Tomorrow I am at Penshurst Place in Kent drawing for an event.

Daily shout!

UPDATE -

Just back from the Doctors as I have been having problems with my hearing lately (say that again..lol), but it turns out it is associated with hayfever (which I do not normally suffer with) and a summer cold that I have on my chest, causing an irritating cough. The good news is that although recently having travelled to the USA, I do not have Swine Flu... phew!

So I have some anti histamine tablets to clear up the ear problem and hopefully the chest!

I will live...!

.........

The sun is out here in England and it is HOT and I love the weather like this!

Had a wedding cancellation come through today and that is always a frustration but happens from time to time.

OK, Im off out to enjoy the sunshine!

Injet Printer

So I am in the market to purchase a new A3 inkjet printer.

I currently use an Epson photo 1290 A3 printer that I have had for a few years now. I bought that from a good friend of mine who found it was to large a printer for his home needs and sold it on to me at a reasonable price.

Epson are the only choice in terms of quality for large A3 printing.

I have looked at the Epson website and there seems to be two candidates for the choice of A3 printer.

The Photo 1400 priced at approx £320 & the Photo R2880, priced at approx £655

As you can see, there is a big difference in price. What I need to be sure on is the delivery of print quality to meet my needs.

What a new printer will do is open up the possibility for me to print more of my own work. So I could start to print my gift commission caricatures myself as well as potentially any celebrity caricatures that people could buy.

This makes it exciting but with around £300 difference in the price I need to get the right printer!

I am not going to rush into this, I need to be clear on the right choice. Any advice or experience from you guy's who may already own one of these models, or maybe another model, is very welcome!

My old A3 Photo 1290 will be available to buy at a low price if anyone is interested in an A3 printer.

I will let you know how I get on!

changes happen

I did this caricature a few days ago and posted it here on the blog. The client was very happy with it but changed her mind on the shirt. So here it is changed to show the 'company' uniform.

This happens from time to time.....!

RIP Michael Jackson

Like so many people today, I would like to pay tribute to Michael Jackson who died yesterday.

He was the King of Pop and also in a class of his own when it came to performing and dancing. His music will live on and he shall be remembered fondly by his fans for giving so much to us all.

I will always be a fan of his music.

May God's mercy and blessings hold him and at this time, his family as they cope with the coming days and weeks.

Interesting stuff?

Been thinking about how I can improve the content of my post's. This has ben something I have had on the back of my mind since the start of the year. As usual due to work load, things like this take a back seat as I cope with the live events and commissions that I work on. That is not a bad thing. It would be worse if I had too much time on my hands and was struggling to find paid work! So I am not complaining but do wish I could do more.

As you may know I have a number of personal projects 'on the go' and always start with good intentions but get wrapped up with my day to day running of my business. Drawing for living is not just about having a sharp pencil, it is also about having a sharp business ethic that allows for a successful model to be implemented. Sorry for the jargon there, but it really is true. Success has to be worked at, rarely do people fall into it. Granted a few do but that is the exception to the rule, so to speak!

So my personal projects have to wait in line while I attend to my business. Sometimes it can feel like that my business is my mistress! I have to be careful that I do not spend too much time away from the family while I am putting it into action. My wife is really great though. She understands that this is how I make my living and that it supports the whole family. She supports me immensely by never complaining about me being out every Saturday night, drawing at weddings! The benefit of being self employed is that we get to take many trips away.

These trips are out reward for working so hard. We can often catch a few days away and like to drive into France and Belgium or catch the EuroStar train into Europe. We also fly further into Europe for city breaks and occasional short breaks of five or seven days. We have a seven day break booked in October, when we shall fly to Portugal and stay in the Algarve. Our 'big' holiday for next year is in March 2010 when we shall be flying off to Sri Lanka and then the Maldives for two weeks. The first week is spent in Sri Lanka, we are excited about seeing the elephants, then we have a week in the Maldives after to chill out and relax.

That is the upside to having a successful business. We can afford to pay for such trips and short breaks. And we deserve it as out of 52 weekends in a year, I am usually working up to 48 of them!

Today our son is home after four years away at University. He has passed his Masters degree with a first in Electrical Engineering and we are VERY PROUD of his achievement! He has worked so hard to get this.

Now we have to learn how to live together again as a family of four, fitting in all the 'stuff' that four adults have into our small house!

Coming back to my thinking about content for the blog. Well I will try to add posts such as this one from time to time, to hopefully give you some interesting reading material.

So let me say 'thank you' to everyone who takes the time and effort to read and follow this blog and please do feel free to link it if you think the content of any posts could be of interest to a wider audience!

More from the drawing board

Another commission from this week... still more on the go!

Pencil sketch for the rough was scanned into photoshop and then put into the file I had set at 300 dpi to keep high quallity.

On a new layer I draw the linework with the wacom pen & tablet.

Then underneath i create the colour layer and 'paint' what you see here as the finished caricature!

Today?

Feeling much better after resting up yesterday!

These two dogs are what I have been working on today, hope the client will like them!

Not well

Not feeling good today! Have a headache and general lack of energy.

It was a very hectic weekend and yesterday I was drawing in the sunshine and maybe too much heat has taken its toll!

So I am resting up today to get back to 100% for tomorrow. Have a stack of commissions to get started and completed.

A struggle in art?

I make my living by drawing at events such as weddings and corporate events of all kinds and I love what I do but I also enjoy creating caricatures of celebrities and try to push the exaggeration and produce something that my peers enjoy and admire.

My problem is that due to the high number of events that I draw at and also the regular stream of commissions that I receive, I find that I simply do not have the time to devote to sit down and put in the hours to create new celebrity caricatures.

Other caricaturists like Paul Moyse and Neil Davis are producing some outstanding work and I can see that they will continue to do so and enjoy successful careers.

So my personal struggle is with time. How can I find time to work on my projects such as celebrity caricatures and also my cartoon projects, which I love also!

Sorry for the heartfelt bleeding but just wanted to share with you how I feel and how as an artist, what kind of things go on inside the 'head'..!

I do not want to change a thing as I love drawing live and entertaining people, it is such a wonderful feeling to have everyone laughing at what I am doing and also the finished drawings!

I am very lucky to have such a great career and work hard at making sure it continues to grow.

But maybe one day when I slow down I shall find time to do more on the other projects, until then its 'pen for hire'.....

How to draw!

Here is a great link to Disney where they take you through the 'How To Draw' section for the animated Dog character "Bolt" and others from that Disney movie!

Click here

If you are looking to learn how to draw this is a must website to visit, do it now!

This is one reason why I love Disney so much!

Stratford Upon Avon

This was taken on Monday this week when my wife and I were visiting Stratford Upon Avon.

Click on image to view full size

The weather was loverly as you can see from the photograph I shot and the canal is very pretty. This was an Ice Cream 'shop' on the canal!

Shakespeare was born here and also is buried here.

There were also many tourists in town as it is one of the most popular destinations for them to visit in England!

We had a great time there and I can recommend a visit to anyone who has never been but make sure you follow the canal round the side of the town as it is a really scenic walk and shows another side to the town that you would otherwise miss!

Hot of my wacom!

This was completed yesterday....

The Cotswolds

Back home now after a couple of days in the Cotwolds area. I was there to draw at a wedding and decided to stay on with my wife for a few days to make a short trip and enjoy the beauty of the area.

The picture above is of a very small village called 'Lower Slaughter'.

The weather held out for us and we had a wonderful time.

Still have commissions coming in to the studio and will post them as I get them completed.

Christmas Time?

Yes it is early but now is the time to plan and book entertainment for your Christmas party!

many of these parties take place during the December period and also often run over in the following January of the next year.

My Fun Caricatures make for an excellent section of the event to have your guests drawn and leave them with a great memento from the party!

Prices are very reasonable so please do enquire to check availability and get a quote that should surprise you!

And let me be the first to wish you a 2009 Merry Christmas!

Daily shout!

Pens are critical to my line of work, of course!

I use the 'markette' pen that is made by a company called Dixon. I really like the pen and have been using it for a few years now.

There is just one problem, getting the supply of the pen. They are only available in north America and then only in certain area's!

For example, I was unable to find them in Las Vegas or Minneapolis recently and that was frustrating. I had wanted to buy a few boxes to re stock my studio.

I can buy them on the internet but it works out expensive with the shipping but that is the only way I can realistically get them when I need them. So I placed an order this last week for a box. The price works out at over Three Pounds for each pen. Ouch!

Anyone who can source these pens for me cheaper, please let me know!

Sunday stuff

Today I am drawing at a wedding that is close to Stratford Upon Avon, Shakespeare country as it is known.

The journey is almost three hours from where I live so my wife and I are staying in a B&B for a couple of nights and making the most of a few days in the Cotswolds.

Tomorrow's weather is not looking good but this is England so we are used to it.

We get home again on Tuesday evening.

It will be loverly to have a couple of days away and just relax. The next four weeks for me are VERY busy with a total of 17 events to draw at during that period!

Fast on the draw

Here is a very quick drawing I did yesterday for one of my followers on twitter.

Pleased to say she loved it and now uses the little sketch as her avatar!

It took me no more than 5 minutes to produce the very simple line drawing.

She has a blog here

Caricature gift

More from this weeks drawing work.....

more gifts...

Its a busy week for commissions! This was fun to do!

more gift caricatures..

Another one of the many this week I have on my 'drawing board'.

The process is simple, I sketch on paper the caricature, the photos of th esubject are emailed to me so I have them in front of me on my iMac.

Then I scan in the pencil sketch and create a new file to place the scan into and on a new layer, 'ink' the caricature with my wacom tablet and pen.

I add another layer underneath if I am adding colour.

I have another 5 to get done in the next day or two so it's busy busy busy, in between I have to fit in emails that are asking for prices and availability and the many phone calls I receive each day but it is all great fun and I would not swap it for all the tea in China!

Gift caricature

Another of the commissions I have been working on recently.

Gift caricature

This is one of the commissions I have been working on these past few days.

Friends

Here are two very good friends of mine, on the right is Lisa Chudyba and on the left Tom Richmond.

My ugly mug is in the middle and can be used to scare away things that go bump in the night!

The picture was taken in a restaurant where we were having lunch at the Mall of America, Minneapolis.

Tom has his caricature stand there and we saw Zack, who works for him, in action!

Click here for Lisa's website

Click here for Tom's website

Daily shout!

At the moment I have a stack of commissions to get done on top of weddings and a wedding open day to morrow that I have a stand at to drum up more business.

So apologies for the lack of posts, next week I shall be able to share with you the commissions that I am working on and hopefully some more art.

But for now I can report that yesterday was a fantastic day. I was in a school giving a short presentation on how to draw the face to 6 classes. The children were around 6 years of age and there were 30 children to each class!

So I reached 180 children with a new idea on how to draw the face! I also drew each teacher in each of the classes as a caricature and it went down very well with both the children and the teachers!

I enjoyed myself enormously and was honored to be asked. I have drawn at the school before to help with their fund raising but this was a new venture for me.

Last night I received a text message from the teacher who booked me saying it was very good and they would like me back again for next year!

Birthday boys!

Today is my son's 22nd Birthday and we are celebrating with him! He graduates University next month after a 4 year Master's in Electrical Engineering. I am so very proud of him!

It is also my very good friends birthday today, the very talented artist and super nice guy, Mr Jan OpdeBeeck!

Wishing them both a great day!

Susan Boyle

A very quick sketch of Susan Boyle who came second last weekend on Britians Got Talent.

It is a shame to hear she is now resting after an episode where she found it a struggle to deal with her result in the competition. A shame because even though she came second she still has a chance to form a singing career and fulfill her dream to sing her heart out for people.

I hope she makes a full recovery and enjoy's success in the near future.

Minneapolis

This is downtown Minneapolis and just one of many shots I took with my Nikon. I was surprised and pleased to see the buses are 'GREEN'.

America is blamed so much for the green house gases and yet here in the city of Minneapolis they have hybrid buses serving the people of this city!

That's a 'thumbs up' from me and the mayor should receive a pat on the back for that one!

Today I start a 2 day event at the London Excel Exhibition center, on my clients stand to draw visitors and leave them with a fun memento from the show!

Daily shout!

Very busy week with 3 days of corporate events/gigs starting today.

Hope next week to post some art!

In the meantime, if you should find yourself in Las Vegas, go to the Rio hotel & Casino and check out the 'iBar',where you will find the microsoft interactive coffee table. It is very cool. You can play ten pin bowling on it while you enjoy a cocktail and do many other things like even watch YouTube on the net!