Category: Technology

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Evolution

As you can see, my new website is up and running.  The site is cleaner, more efficient, easier to maintain and update, and incorporates all of the features I wanted, but could no longer create on my own.  To get the job done, I hired Erik Bernskiold with XLD Studios, and couldn’t be happier with his work.  I’ve included the testimonial I wrote for him at the end of this entry, which pretty much says it all.

If you look around the site, you’ll see that things have changed a fair bit.  Much of this will be self-explanatory, but here are a few details of some significant changes.

Editorial Cartoons

Rather than present them in a gallery format, I’ve used more of a blog post format, showing only the most recent ten cartoons.  Judging from traffic reports on my previous site, I had many regular visitors looking at the current work each day, but few people actually spent a great deal of time going through galleries from years past, so I did away with them, in favor of keeping everything more current.  I’ve turned the comments off on these images, as I would prefer to keep political arguments off this site.  I do post daily editorial cartoons on the Cartoon Ink Facebook page, if you’d like to see them there as well.

Portfolio

I’ve now got three portfolio galleries.  My totem animal paintings in one, paintings of people (caricature and portrait) in another, and commercial illustration work in the third.  I can easily add new images to each gallery as I create them and add more galleries if I find them necessary in the future.

Services

For many years, I was a jack of all trades, accepting almost everything that came through the door, but recently I’ve decided to focus on my strengths.  I’m a cartoonist, cartoon illustrator and digital painter.  That’s what I enjoy and what I’m best at.  For everything else, I have a very large network of incredibly talented friends and colleagues who excel in their creative fields and I’m more than happy to recommend them.  For example, Elizabeth Gast with designbyfirgs.com designed the evolution of my logo you see at the top of the page.

Training

This is a very exciting addition for me as it showcases my first training DVD through PhotoshopCAFE.  I’m working on the next one right now, with plans for more in the future.  Additionally, I have more training opportunities that I’ll be able to talk about soon, as well as others on the horizon.

Shop

As regular followers of my work and ramblings will know, I have a line of limited edition giclée canvas prints for sale at Two Wolves Trading Company in Canmore, Alberta and Editions Gallery in Banff, Alberta.  Those can be purchased and shipped from each of those venues, and I won’t be selling them from this site.  I am, however, offering open edition matted paper prints of the four totem paintings you will see in the Shop, with more to be released this year.  The prints are available in two standard framing sizes, so framing them won’t cost you an arm and a leg.  The Shop operates through PayPal, and I’ll ship any purchases via Canada Post.  Takes a little longer, but then you avoid duty fees if you’re shopping from outside of Canada.

If you do happen to be in the Canmore area, or plan to be in the future, I would ask that you buy them directly through Two Wolves Trading Co. They’re wonderful people there, and they treat me very well.  The prices are the same, and you’ll also get to see the work of other talented artists when you visit them.

The Blog

All of my blog entries from the past few years have been imported from Blogger to WordPress.  Most of the transfer worked well, some of it did not.  I’m still updating categories for the older entries, and some of the links need to be repaired.  Bear with me if you find a broken one, as I am making these fixes here and there when I have spare moments.

It’s going to take me awhile to get used to this site, but I’m very happy with it.  It will allow me to keep moving forward, and is designed so that I can edit and expand it when it becomes necessary.  Some of the best parts of my business, the work that I enjoy most, were not things I’d planned for long term.  I love trying new techniques and believe in being ready for opportunities, so I wanted a website that would be ready to handle things I haven’t even thought of yet.  And if something does come up that I can’t handle on my own, I know who to talk to help me out, which brings me to the testimonial I wrote for Erik Bernskiold at XLD Studios.

Testimonial

After years of creating my own websites for my freelance cartoon illustration business, I had recently realized that my online image wasn’t keeping pace with my recent successes.  As such, it became apparent that I could no longer create my own site with the limited knowledge I had and still put forward the image I wanted to.  I needed a professional designer and found one with XLD Studios.

Erik Bernskiold came highly recommended from a number of colleagues and having seen the work he did for them, I knew he could build the site I needed.  While I fully expected him to have the technical skills necessary to get the job done, I was pleasantly surprised and very impressed with the service and support Erik provided as well.  He listened to what I needed, asked all the right questions, and offered suggestions I hadn’t even thought of to take my site to a higher level than I’d expected.

Having never used WordPress before, I was apprehensive, but Erik assured me it was the best solution for what I wished to accomplish, even going so far as to give me a very detailed walkthrough tutorial via Skype when it was time for me to begin populating my site with images and content.  During that process, he patiently answered all of the questions I had about functionality and addressed each concern quickly and efficiently.

Erik provided a level of service and professionalism that is far too often lacking these days, and I am very pleased with not only the site he built for me, but with how I was treated as a client.  I wouldn’t hesitate to hire Erik again, and would recommend XLD Studios without reservation.

Patrick LaMontagne  Cartoon Ink

 

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iPad Painting: Daniel Day-Lewis


Here’s another painting drawn on the iPad for fun and practice. This is Bill ‘The Butcher’ Cutting from the movie ‘Gangs of New York.’ According to the DVD extras, Daniel Day-Lewis was so committed to the role, that he stayed in character while on set, even when the cameras were off. I’ve seen this movie a few times, and for me, the character of The Butcher is the best part of it.

Had a few requests for progress shots from the last iPad painting I did, but since I hadn’t saved any file copies, I kept that in mind while painting this one. Click on any of these images to see them a bit larger, although size is limited by the iPad resolution.

Image 1-3

Image 4-6

Closeup

Now that I’ve done a couple of paintings and a number of cartoons with the iPad, I’m aware of a few limitations, aside from the resolution, that make it difficult to ever really do any finished work.

First, the brightness of the iPad. If I paint on full brightness, it’s a little hard on the eyes, so I paint with the brightness set to about half or 60%. When I send the images by email to my desktop computer, they’re a fair bit darker than they are on the iPad, so all of these images have had exposure adjustments in Photoshop.

My desktop and laptop computers are colour calibrated, so it’s a little unnerving to paint in colour on the iPad, because it doesn’t look the same when I bring it into Photoshop. This is why I painted in black and white first, in order to get the values right. After that, I added a colour layer in the ArtStudio app, then I flattened it and continued painting. As you can see, most of the work, however, was done in black and white.

While I’m pleased with the way this painting turned out, I might have chosen a difference reference photo to work from, as I think I could have found a better pose for the character. But since this is as far as I intend on taking this image, no harm, no foul. It was good practice.

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iPad Painting: James Whitmore


Here is another painting done on the iPad, very different than my usual style. This is a value study of the great character actor, James Whitmore. If I were to title this piece, I’d probably call it ‘Brooks Was Here,’ as it’s not so much the actor that I wanted to paint, but his character, Brooks Hatlen from The Shawshank Redemption.

For every larger than life Brad Pitt or George Clooney on the silver screen, there are a hundred brilliant character actors like James Whitmore. The sort of actor that everyone recognizes, even if you don’t know his name, and have never see him on the cover of People magazine. I love rich characters in movies, but those characters can just as easily fall flat without the right actor breathing life into it.

This painting was a pleasure to work on, as Brooks Hatlen has always been one of my favorite film characters. It didn’t feel right to paint this as a caricature, and even with the resolution limitations of the iPad document size, I could have spent many more hours on it. It really was a joy to paint.

Once again, I used the ArtStudio app and the Targus stylus. In a reversal of my usual method of painting on a white canvas, I filled the canvas with black, and then painted in shades of grey. This next image is zoomed in to 100 percent, so making it any larger would have given way to pixelation.

I’ve recently realized that I need to always have a painting or image to work on that has no deadline. While I spend all day drawing or working on my business, this piece was done over two evenings while watching TV, and an hour at the coffee shop yesterday morning. It was a nice break from the commission work.

With no shortage of wonderful character actors to choose from, I would imagine I’ll be painting many more of these.

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Wacom eNews

The February Wacom eNews is out, and I’m very pleased to be featured in it. You won’t find a bigger fan of Wacom than me.

Having owned half a dozen drawing tablets over the past 12 years, I wouldn’t be able to do any of my work without one. I feel it’s important to note, I’ve only replaced tablets when new ones have come out with better features. I have never had one die on me and to my recollection, the only problem I’ve ever had is that a pen started acting up on me a couple of years ago, and Wacom replaced it right away, no questions asked.

I remember doing a painting demo at a gallery last year, and explaining to a parent why a Wacom was such a good investment for his daughter who was showing some real artistic talent. While I let her try out the tablet, I was telling him how inexpensive the entry level Bamboo tablets are, how they had a lot of the same great features as the Intuos4, and even told him where he could buy one.

He asked me if I worked for them.

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iPad Painting: Billy Connolly


With my heavy workload lately, almost everything I’ve been doing has been for a deadline. Even the animal paintings have now become one more item on my ‘to-do’ list. It has begun to wear a little thin, so I wanted to work on something this week that was just for fun.

I’m really enjoying working on the iPad, and despite the fact that some people lament that it’s not pressure sensitive like a Wacom tablet, the drawing apps available are incredibly versatile. I haven’t painted any people in awhile, and I’ve been itching to get back at that, if for nothing else, than to improve those skills. Billy Connolly is on a growing list of people I’ve always wanted to paint, so he was as good a subject as any.

A few years ago, I read his biography, entitled ‘Billy,’ written by his wife Pamela Stephenson. I was already a fan of his comedy, but I’ve grown to become a fan of him personally as well. ‘The Big Yin’ is such a talented musician and actor, a brilliant comedian, and a dangerously intelligent man.

At one point, I had intended to do a full painting of him, and someday I still might. But for now, this was just an exercise to take drawing on the iPad a little further than just drawing a cartoon character. With the Targus stylus I recently acquired, I felt I could finally do some painting on the device.

I could have done this in colour, but I thought for this first go ’round, I’d stick with black and white. While I didn’t keep track of the time, as I worked on this off and on over the course of a week in the evenings, I would estimate that it took about four or five hours, working on the ArtStudio app. Somebody recently asked me on Facebook if I preferred this one over the Sketchbook Pro app. Having used both, I do prefer ArtStudio to Sketchbook Pro, even though the latter is still a very fine app to work with. I just find the tools in ArtStudio easier to use, and there are more of them.

It’s doubtful that I’ll ever do finished work on the iPad, because the resolution capability of the app doesn’t allow for extreme detail, but I will definitely keep stretching, to see how far I can take it. This is undoubtedly the first of many paintings I’ll experiment with on the iPad.

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iPad Cartooning: An Ongoing Experiment


Having done some finger painting on the iPad, I thought I’d be happy just continuing to do that. I was getting pretty decent results, having a fair bit of fun, and didn’t feel I was really lacking in any tools that would allow me to create the images I wanted.

I had heard the Pogo Stylus was a compromise at best, and many were using it simply because they couldn’t find anything better. I bought the Dagi Stylus after reading a good review, but it ended up scratching my screen in three places on the first day so I stopped using that right away. The scratches, by the way, are not obvious. I’d have to point them out to anyone wanting to see them. No real harm done, but enough that I wouldn’t use that pen again. I’d almost given up on finding a stylus, until I started hearing really good reviews about the Targus stylus (also sold as the Griffin stylus).

Since it was less than $20, I figured I’d give it a shot. Ordered one from Best Buy, with low expectations. I’m happy to report that I LOVE this pen. It works so well on the iPad screen. The rubber tip looks like it might have the consistency of a pencil eraser, but it actually has a fair bit of give, slides nicely over the screen and doesn’t require a great deal of pressure to activate the drawing apps.

You’ll notice that I’m wearing a glove on my drawing hand. While you can buy pre-fab gloves for this sort of screen work that look nice and pretty, I just bought a pair of glove liners from a local sports store. I cut the thumb, index, and middle fingers from the gloves, so that I can still use my fingers to activate the app features, such as tool presets, zooming, panning, etc. But by keeping the last two fingers on the glove, I can rest my hand on the screen while drawing, without the heel of my hand activating anything on the app. Works very well and as an added bonus, it cleans the screen as you draw.

It should be noted that I do NOT have a screen protector. I tried a couple when I first got my iPad and hated them. The installation was incredibly frustrating, and once I did get one applied well, I didn’t like how it made my images look or the feel of the screen so I removed it many months ago. It is my understanding that a screen protector will seriously decrease the effectiveness of some of these stylus pens, so be warned that if you have one on your iPad, your experience may not be as good as mine.

I do have the Apple case on my iPad at all times, and those three little scratches on the screen made by the Dagi stylus are the only ones I’ve ever had. Since I use the iPad every day, and have been using the Targus stylus quite a bit as well, I’m not worried about getting any more scratches at all, so I won’t replace the screen protector.

The app I used for this cartoon is ArtStudio. I also use Sketchbook Pro and like them both. While I will still do some finger painting for large brush painting, and less precise work, I am definitely going to continue to keep using the Targus as it’s a great addition to my iPad workflow.

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Thank you for continuing to hold…


Lately, I’ve been working on my training DVD for PhotoshopCAFE, entitled Cartoon Illustration Techniques in Photoshop. It has been a steep learning curve with regard to the audio and video software and hardware. Even though I had an animated editorial cartoon for about five months a few years back, this has proven to require a very different set of skills.

I’ve had a number of false starts and have had to rewrite session scripts when I realized that I had forgotten to talk about crucial steps. I’ve also had more than a few sleepless nights trying to make sure that everything I talk about is going to be coherent.

Worst of all, fitting this very large project into my already heavy workload has been challenging and this has taken far longer than I had intended it to. But, I can finally see the light at the end of the tunnel, and thankfully, it doesn’t appear to be a train. As in all things new and difficult, I’ve no doubt that I’ll come out the other side better for the experience with another set of skills to add to my repertoire. I’ll also be in need of a little time off.

So for those who’ve been asking when the DVD will be done, I plan to be able to make that announcement very soon, and thanks for your patience.

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2011: The Year I Turn 40.

When I used to think of a midlife crisis, I thought of shallow guys buying flashy red sports cars, hanging out with twenty year old bleached blond bimbos, and trying desperately to hang on to whatever was left of their youth. The reality is a lot less ‘TV sitcom’ than that.

Some psychologists have started calling it ‘midlife transition’ instead of ‘midlife crisis’ because ‘crisis’ has a negative connotation to it. So far, their political correctness hasn’t figured out how to keep me in my 30’s, though.

In the grand scheme of things, 40 is just a number, and since nobody really knows when their time is up, midlife is an assumption. I could kick off tomorrow, or have 60 more years coming at me. There is no expiration date tattooed anywhere on my body, that I’m aware of, although I wouldn’t be surprised to find a ‘Best Before’ date.

Logically, I shouldn’t have a problem with turning 40, but as Spock (the Vulcan, not the baby guy) always told McCoy, humans are not logical.

Time’s ticking. I’ve had a great ride so far, but there’s a lot I want to do that I haven’t done, both in my work and in my life. In previous years, my New Year’s resolution has simply been to keep moving forward and try to be a better person. I’ve come to realize that’s a cop-out, because there’s no accountability. So for the first time in a number of years, I’m setting some actual goals for the year, some specific and professional, some general and more personal, but all overdue.

Learn Adobe Illustrator (again).

I used to work for a sign shop here in Canmore. Really interesting job and I found that I really liked creating vector art. To this day, I use paths and vectors in Photoshop regularly while drawing cartoons because I like using the tools. While I still do contract work for the sign shop from time to time, I’ve realized my vector skills haven’t kept up with each new version of Illustrator, even though I keep upgrading with each new release (although I’ve yet to buy CS5). Continuing education is important in any field, and I haven’t done much of it in the last couple of years.

Learn more 3D in Photoshop CS5 Extended.

This cartoon was created a couple of years ago using Hexagon, Carrara, and Photoshop. I’d like to use more 3D elements in my work. While I don’t intend to try and become an expert, it’s fun and challenging, and I want to get better at it. The whole reason I chose the Extended track of Photoshop was for the 3D and aside from building the occasional rudimentary model for an editorial cartoon from time to time, I wield those tools like I’m performing surgery wearing oven mitts. Very clumsy with no finesse. I’d like to change that this year.

Learn to sculpt

I’ve been feeling the urge to do this for a couple of years now. I’ve had ALL of the tools necessary sitting in a toolbox in my office closet for about a year. I’ve done my research, bought Sculpey polymer clay, a couple of books on how to use it (including the one pictured above), and acrylics for painting after it’s been baked. I have no excuse not to get started, and no pressure to produce anything good because I bought it just to have a hobby again. A wise man once said, when your hobby becomes your work, you need to find another hobby and I think this might be it. I’d just like to see if I’m any good at it.

Paint. Every chance I get.

Last year, I discovered what I love to paint most, so this year, I want to paint more animal totems. In a perfect world, I’d like to paint every day, and even if it’s only for 10 minutes, I plan to do that, starting today.

In 2010, I only painted one person, Bert Monroy, and I’m missing that, too. I’d like to paint some more images of people this year, and I have a list I’ve kept over the last year, with about a dozen names on it. The great thing is that while they’re all well known character actors, none of them are what you would consider A-list celebrities.

Work Less, Play More!

I work too much, and I put it ahead of everything else. I’ve often taken on work that I should have realized would do nothing to advance my career, made poor use of my best skills, and was of very little interest to me, not to mention that it usually wasn’t worth it financially. That stops completely this year. I learned how to say ‘No’ last year. This year, I’ll be saying it a lot more.

I get bored very easily, so while I still intend to be very busy, it’ll be on projects and commissions that are worth my time. There’s no point in being your own boss if you’re still doing work that you shouldn’t be doing.

When I do take time off, however, I’d like to slow down a little more, relax and enjoy life. Time off shouldn’t mean watching TV all the time or going for coffee every day. While those pastimes do have their place, I’m looking for more experiences that create fond memories. More, hiking, camping, caving…hell, I’m going skydiving this year. That last one is right out of the midlife crisis manual. Page 36, I think.

Be Less Cynical.
This one will be tough, because despite the successes of last year, I focused too much on the dark side of people. I’ll often blame that on following politics for a living, but I’ve recently realized that it’s a choice, and to paraphrase an all too familiar phrase, if I let it ruin my life, “then the politicians have already won.”

My wife says I hold people to unreasonably high standards, including myself. I expect everyone to take the high road, wanting to believe that people will do the right thing most of the time. And then inevitably, when someone’s unethical behavior still gets them ahead, I end up disappointed and angry. This year, I’m going to try and let that go and be less judgmental. Cut everyone a break, including myself. Nobody’s perfect.

You’ll hear of people who’ve faced life threatening illnesses that thankfully survive the ordeal. Often, they’ll tell you that the challenge they faced was the best thing that could happen to them because it made them realize that life isn’t to be taken for granted, that it was a gift to be given a wake-up call.

I’m going to try and look on turning 40 the same way. And just like last year and the year before, I’ll still try to keep moving forward, and to be a better person.

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Another iPad Finger Painting


This finger painting was done on a new app that I bought for the iPad, called ArtStudio. I had been using Sketchbook Pro, and even though I still consider it a great painting app, I now prefer ArtStudio by a wide margin. Without going into great detail, I’ll just say that this is as close to Photoshop as I’ve seen in an iPad painting app, and I found it very easy and enjoyable to use.

There are third party stylus pens available for the iPad, but they all seem to have mixed reviews, and one I tried put a few little scratches on the screen, so I’ve opted out of trying another one just yet. For now, I’m content to just keep on finger painting, as I don’t think I’m really losing anything.

I don’t know how much time I spent on this painting, as it was just ten minutes here and there over the past couple of weeks. It is doubtful that I’ll ever produce any finished work on the iPad, but I’m enjoying using it as a sketch pad.

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Photoshop User Magazine


Got a nice smile this month when I opened the December issue of Photoshop User magazine. While NAPP had asked me last month for permission to use my images, I didn’t realize it was going to be such a big spread, so it was a very nice surprise. While this image of the Wolf Totem is the first page of the article, all of the Guru Award winners from Photoshop World in Las Vegas AND Orlando earlier in the year are featured on the subsequent pages, so my Moose Totem is in the article as well. A great spread of images. They even quoted my Photoshop World blog entry.

The above photo doesn’t do the image quality justice. I switched to the Zinio reader and the digital version of Photoshop User when I bought my iPad, so this is a photo of the screen, which never quite works out. The magazine was already great quality, but I prefer being able to zoom in on the images to check out the detail. And it takes up a lot less space on my bookshelf. The actual iPad image of this page looks incredible.

Photoshop User is available on newsstands, but it’s included if you’re a NAPP member, just one of the many perks. Usually it’s 8 issues a year, but just recently NAPP announced that they’re increasing it to 10 issues. For regular readers, that’s a big bonus, as it’s one of the few magazines I read religiously.