RIKK HOPES YOU HAVE A GREAT WEEKEND
Today’s sketch doesn’t really come from any ‘deep thoughts’ or a jam thread happening on any art forums or anything like that. I was just thumbing through one of the TELLOS trades this morning and I kind of got fixated on how I drew RIKK back then. It’s odd– even though I had a book on foxes that a studio intern gave me (hi, Tessa….!) to reference– and I DID use it (though it doesn’t really show), the way I drew RIKK at that time was to make him look more like a dog than a fox. I think one of the things I did back when Todd and I were first working on TELLOS was that though I love to draw animals, I was trying to draw my impression of what the animal characters I was drawing were more than what they actually looked like. That’s, I think, a conceit that I’ve since moved beyond. At one point, I felt that an artist should be able to work mostly from his/her memory and…. I guess, heart…. instead of working from an informed place of having reference from which to springboard. At times I set aside the golden rule I heard so many years ago that one should ‘learn the rules before going on to break them’. I think I’ve done much better in that regard in the subsequent years of my career. Life is, after all, a constant learning experience.
Well, tomorrow– the seventh day of the seventh month of the 2007th year– is supposed to be an incredibly lucky day. I hope that each and every one of us has something lucky happen to us. Have a great weekend, all.
This is Entry 397.
Mike
July 6th, 2007 at 1:52 pm
Fantastic sketch, Mike, one of my favorite Tellos characters too. That sketch has to make it into the Tellos Gargantua!
I didn’t know tomorrow was supposed to be such a lucky day, hope I don’t jinx it now by being aware of it!
July 6th, 2007 at 2:03 pm
love him no matter how you draw him, bro!
you make ’em all look fantastic!
July 6th, 2007 at 5:58 pm
Rikki’s the fox? I thought Serra was…
Sorry, couldn’t resist.
Good weekend to all.
July 6th, 2007 at 6:01 pm
OK I know it is Rikk. I like to call him Rikki after my cousin who spells it similarly.
July 7th, 2007 at 4:54 am
Much thanks, Rick…
But i prefer a week end with seagirl !
July 7th, 2007 at 3:22 pm
This is a question. Where can I purchase your Heroes Con 2007 Sketchbook? Please don’t say eBay?
July 8th, 2007 at 10:05 am
“This is a question. Where can I purchase your Heroes Con 2007 Sketchbook? Please don’t say eBay?”
I’m hoping to have an online store set up some time soon where I’ll be offering the sketchbooks and some prints for sale. Just bear with us a while and it’ll be up for sale.
July 9th, 2007 at 5:46 pm
It’s something that a person as talented as you can still have doubts about his/her abilities. Ah, but then you pick up a pencil and BAM, you’re back, baby!
July 9th, 2007 at 9:58 pm
Hey Mike.
Totally understand where you are coming from. I think all artist feel the burnout sometimes. It can be diffucult to restart the creative engine sometimes, and when you do sometimes you think that you’re a hack.
By the way I notice you use alot of Blue Col-erase as somebody who wants to work in animation I’m very familiar with those pencils. Do you find you approach charecter drawings in a more constructed “ball and socket” approach or with a mre gestural approach?
July 9th, 2007 at 10:52 pm
Definitely gestural. That’s the way I’ve always done it… the way I learned in college.
July 12th, 2007 at 10:15 am
“Life is, after all, a constant learning experience.”
How completely and utterly true. And, the fact that you can apply that principle to your life as more than a nice plattitude, and understand that mistakes are not only okay, but necessary, says that you’ve learned a lot more from your lifetime than some may ever be fortunate enough to do.