Illustration Friday Balloons!

Really enjoyed doing the 2nd lady from the top. She looks like she swallowed two big water balloons!

Drawin Gurls...

The gurl in the army hat was talking up such a storm that I feared her mouth would catch on fire. All I could sww was hat hair and Teeth.... The 2nd young lady ACTUALLY REQUESTED a caricature...yes, folks it DOES happen. After observing me draw a couple of passengers for a while she finally commented on how well i drew an Asian gentlemen sitting across from me...who was a little uncomfortable... and a couple of tourists who boarded the train at the Howard Beach Stop. "How would you draw ME?" she asked. "are you sure you want THIS??" I replied, as it was unusual for anyone to request a picture, and she nodded yes. I did a rough sketch of the caricature on display here, and she was shocked to say in the least. To soften the blow, I did a more toned down "party style" caricature for her in full color, that she adored. She took down my contact information, and hopefully will be buying ONE OF THESE GREAT BOOKS I AM SELLING HER.... HINT...... As i was getting off the train, another woman who was watching the show, asked for information. You gotta love this subwaysurfin!

mOR SELF PORTRAITS

Been going through some stuff the last couple of days... always good to do a couple of self portraits when youre soul searching... hope these make you laugh. There part of my upcoming book, thirty days. Thirty days is more of a book for me than any thing else. its turning the pencil on myself as i struggle with self acceptance, appearance and all that good stuff.....
It also teaches me how to do caricature better and sure is funny.

New Subwaysurfin Books are HERE!!

I've been talking about this for a while now, and who knows maybe there's still some issues to work out, but if you love my work here, and according to my numbers, 17,000 plus of you do, than do yourself, and me a favor and buy my Subwaysurfin books. They're compact, inexpensive, and ..contain some of my best work from 2005, till now. Vol one has some of my pen and ink drawings from my early subwaysurfin days, and vol 2 contains the great pencil work you've come to know and love. I hope that you will do your part to keep me out of the starving artists club and also give me some feedback on how you like this.

Ordering is easy enough. Just click on any of the images on the side bar to the right and you will be taken directly to an order page which gives you the price, and will take down your info. Isnt technology wonderful? It sure beats using construction paper and a stapler in your basement, or your companie's copier after hours......

Is it a crime to have TOO MUCH fun???

If having fun was a felony, Id have one heck of a long rap sheet. I realllllly tried to go out on a limb to stretch myself with these two and thing i may have succeeding in falling off that limb. I didnt hurt myself, but boy... if people could SEE what Im doing to THEM they'd sure want to hurt ME!!! The "wall streettype" On the bottom looks expecially greedy and scandalous.... At first I debated putting the cartoony eyes on the bald dude with the wifebeater tee shirt, but it kinda works with the exaggeration.

What i love about both pictures is that their head shapes are funny! This is a lesson I learned from that great Exaggerator, Jan Op Da Beeck at a seminar he gave at an NCN convention in Las Vegas a few years back. Jan's work can be viewed on this blog by clicking on the link on the right side of the page.

Klaas Op De Beéck

Fellow caricature artist, Klass Op De Beeck, has one of "Those" faces that makes you want to draw it so bad that if you didnt have a pencil on you, you'd pin pick your index finger and draw with the blood. This is my first attempt at him.
Klass' has the great fortune to be the nephew of the great Jan Op De Beéck whose work has inspired hordes of caricature artists the world over. Some kids have all the luck!

Another lovely couple.

In this caricature coupling here, im playing around with Duckman's face and also drew the face of a buddy that he had with him. Love the contrast.

a duck, Pokemon, and a Missle on the subway?

It helps when you're caricaturing to visualize your subjects like animals or objects just to give your imagination something to visualize and morph. The first guy reminded me of a duck, the 2nd kid had eyes like two giant hardboiled eggs, and also looked to me, like the character, Ash, on Pokemon. The other kid had a head just like a missle that was about to be launched!

There's no one to draw???!!! YYYYYAAAAA!!!!

Most of you think that whenever I go subwaysurfing, I just sit down and caricature whoever is in front of me... NOOOOOOOO!!!!!! That is definitely NOT the case. I am like a lion in the jungle. I dont just randomly choose a zebra just because it has stripes and happens to be near me.... Each victim is carefully scouted and has that particular "something" that says Draw me!!! In the course of a train ride i can usually find several. Except yesterday.... i couldnt find ANYONE! i couldnt believe that no one was interesting enough to draw! i knew I had to upload SOMETHING or risk having my loyal fans click onto another blog and forever abandon mine. So I drew ANOTHER self portrait of myself madd as hell that i couldnt find someone to draw. i always wondered how I'd look with a nose and tongue ring, so i threw those in there too...

"Beauty" and "the Beast" on the IRT

I love the way you can see the subtle differences in personality and mood in people if you just sit back and watch them on the train. This is one of the reasons why I really try my best to draw my victims without their noticing me. The baldheaded man thought a lot of himself he was confident smiling laughing he had an easy type of grace about him. You can see it in his relaxed ecpression. The woman on the other had was tense. Very tight and suspicious looking. She gave off this vibe like she was ughlee and KNEW it, but couldnt do anything about it. She reminded me of a person who went to sleep with their fists balled up. Good thing she didnt see me.

Live long and caricature

i was watching old skool star trek at midnite on Saturday, aimlessly doodling Mr. Spock.... I looked down and had drawn THIS. I've never drawn Spock before and was really proud of this.

couples only...

I decided to put a random pair of subwaysketches together to see how they might look as couples. I like the results It made for great composition and gave me some ideas on how to put couples on a page together. Enjoy. Mechanical pencil on cardstock as always...

2:00 in the AM and Im drawing caricatures?

What can i say? when the muse hits you , you got to go for it! Now its time for bed... got these outta my system... gotta get up in three hours to go to a GIG!!!!

These days instead of doing an all out caricature on the train i will do a gesture drawing or a detailed thumbnail and then tear it up when i get home like I did here. The pic at the top of the Arab gentlemen with the hairy lipp kept my fellow passsenger entertained for a couple of stops . The Man I was drawing didnt quite know why we were both looking at him smiling.... that teenage boy with the buck teeth was looking at a homeless man who told a tale of woe that was so shocking that the youth was literally staring at him in slack jawed shock. Needless to say, he gave the man a coupla dollars as he passed by... me, i kept drawing. The two homeboyes were hilarious as always... tring to look SOOOOOOOOO tough that they look like caricatures fo the moods they are tring to embody. Boy do I love the train.

After a lot of practice, using Tom Richmonds,Joe Bulum,Sean Gardner, and Glenn Fergueson's work as inspiration, Im finally beginning to draw teeth a little better and its adding to the caricature. These guys are masters at drawing TEETH.

Taka Watanabe caricature by Subwaysurfer

Just finished this sketch of japanese caricature whiz, Taka Watanabe who posted his mug on the firing squad at the NCN forum and dared me to take a shot. I did and this is waht came out. BANG!!! Taka is a fantastic artist whose work you can see by clicking on this name on the right side of the ole blog here. Take a look at his stuff you'll be adding him to your faves list!

I drew this with a bic 0.7 mechanical pencil on tracing paper. I forgot how great tracing paper is to draw on. It takes to pencil beautifully, you can shade easily with it,correct mistakes immediately, and best of all work on the opposidte side and even out proportions.
I originally planned to draw it on cardstock like I usually do but after playing around with the image on tracing paper, I thought the sketch looked fine the way it was, and didnt want to ruin it by overworking it.

Society of Illustrators Political caricature art exhibition

Man, its great living in NYC. The society of illustrators is just one more reason...

When fellow caricaturist, Dan Springer, (make sure you check out the blog here on my site, Dan is an amazing artist) told me about the editorial caricature artists exhibition featured at The Society of Illustrators, I RAN to 128 E. 63rd Street to check it out. Boy, am I glad I did!

The exhibition features some of the best caricaturists in the world, including Philip Burke, Steve Brodner, John Kacsht, and Peter DeSeve, amongst others. I especially enjoyed looking through Brodners sketchbook which was on display also. Words dont describe how awesome an experience this was, all I can say is that if you love caricature as much as I do You NEED to go See this!!

Tourists.............sigh.......Love em......Hate em......

love em or hate em, they are the life blood of a street artist's industry.... yep, Im talking about those annoying pointing TOURISTS who gawk and point and haggle, and walk right by your stand to buy a billion dollar trinket that your neighbor is selling. I love them. I Hate them. i have "millions" of these pics in my sketchbooks scattered throughout my house. I saw this one about to be thrown into the trash ( as a gesture drawing) and decided to develop it more. Glad i did.

..........and yeah....... they really are that dumb to keep their wallet in their back pocket....in New York.......

Mass Transist Caricature madness! Somebody stop me!!!

There are days on the train when the caricatures practically draw themselves! Man! if i didnt get paid to do this i wouls still do it for the sheer joy of capturing the souls of these people on paper!
I especially liked the tall black gentlemen on the bottom... he had the vibe of a certain presidential candidate.... maybe he was going for that look. I noticed also that with the small black fedora he had a frank sinatra or Run DMC thing going too. This is also my fave because he came walking by so fast that I had to do a very quick gesture drawing of him. As a result I gat this delicious mouth watering design that sort of pops.The Indian lady had eyes SO wide open I swear she didnt seem to blink. It was almost like she was a bird of prey looking for some rodent to pounch on.... Needless to say i didnt make eye contact..... This other dude had a head that looked like he was hiding another person inside it, and the chick with the glasses had this look on her face that said: Damn! i cant see! My prescription is NOT working!!!!


My tool of choice for all of these was a good ole CHEAP 0.7 Deposable Big Mechanical Pencil.... it AINT the tool people.....

My idea of Audrey Hepburn

The guys and dolls over at the NCN Caricature Forum are having a friendly Sept Comp to see who can draw Audrey Hepburn the best. In case you youngsters dont know who she is, shes' the "classic hollywood" prototype for beauty and grace is you happen to be a woman. Expressive eyes, high cheekbones, strong but delicate bone structure, and petitie frame. Most of the guys at the forum are so busy mooning over her that you can hardly get a decent highly exaggerated caricature out of the lot of em ( not that they ARENT drawing "bad" Pictures though) Having said that, I treid to make a go of it drawing my verson of what she looks like. To me she looks BAT like. EVERYthing is DAK and harsh on her IMP Eyes , lashes, hair... and here ears and sorta pointy to me. I dont know how good the likeness is, but I can honestly say that its my IDEA of what I THINK she looks like in my minds eye.

Missing My kids today...

Its a rainy evening here at home. Its quiet.... too quiet. i remember the days when the rooms were filled with noise, singing laughing joking music and dancing. All gone since the kids left for college Earlier this Month. i really miss my kids. Its too quiet. Their incessant talking joking laughing and bugging helped me to focus somehow. I really havent been as productive since they've left. It's true what they say. "they grow up sooooo fast". Note to all you parents out there. ENJOY them while they're young they grow up in the blink of an eye.