Waiting for a guy to come 'round and fix a leaky roof... and waiting... and waiting... gave me time to scribble out more nonsense.
Clockwise, from top-left: every now and then, a guilty pleasure of mine is to play old episodes of the discontinued podcast "Serving Donuts"; sunny Acapulco with bonus kraken assault; some citizenry from Farmyard Heights; Buddy, the dog; and Bat-Person.
Something I did one Saturday afternoon in 2002… just now found it dormant on a hard drive.
If I recall, I was doing some work at home and needed placeholder artwork to slap on the side of a sneaker. I guess I was in a demented mood at the time and created Dr. Chuckles - the most dangerous, diabolical, villainous placeholder of them all!
Oh dear! Another scribble-dee-doo-dah to fill the emptiness of my Sunday afternoon.
Clockwise, from top-left: space cadets on mission; crazy hairdo lady (page filler); nobody tells horse head mask wearin' guy to wear a mask; horse head mask extra; Beardo and the Beard Bear.
Time for another scribble-dee-doo-dah session in front of the TV on another frosty Friday morn' (with pancakes!!!).
Clockwise, from left: Brick Tamland cheats on lamp; Governor Kemp knowing what's best for his state; random space cadets and 1-spatula general; aaand, as always, one clueless Trump.
The below was purely an exercise of “well, I have nothing to do, and the cable news is bumming me out… maybe I’ll pick up a pen & legal pad and see what happens…”
Clockwise, from left: cowboy; some glamorous babe; I don’t know what this is all about; that asshole Trump; this maybe a badly drawn Roger Stone-esque character flanked by mindless cronies/supporters (as he was on the TV at the time when scribbling away).
When a Scribble-Dee-Doo-Dah event starts, just like in the example above, I have no agenda in mind when the pen begins to make random lines on the page - those lines sometimes will cross the path of other lines, and so on and on… until I eventually see crude forms, then build up from there. I had no idea I’d summon a cowboy from a rudimentary cube; how was I supposed to know a girl would appear from two curvy pen strokes (both accidental)?; as for the, err, grandma(?) and the one-eyed teddy bear on a leash… THAT JUST HAPPENED! No idea where my head was at for that one.
So this self-caricatured mess - illoed circa 2010 - has no actual reason for its existence. I just DID IT!
At the time, I was animating a short 45sec movie and, I guess, I needed a creative distraction and barfed out the below:
It’s Monday morning.
You arrive at work.
You have in your head a game plan to tackle ongoing job briefs, allocating time and resources to get 'em done.
You're all fired up & ready to go.
Now, go ahead and open your emails.
At the top of the messages list: "Please, Bort, could you do this thing you've already done, but now has to be done again because of some insignificant thing nobody cares about needs to be fixed? Thanks."
Well, that just ruined my morning mojo.
So my response was a parody of annoyance and pain, yet I had to create a portrait of faux exuberance...
A simple Post-It Note scribble-dee-doo-dah sent to a work colleague who’d alerted me she’d been tasked in transmitting vital production art out to the factory offshore.
I could’ve replied with a traditional “Yep, sounds fine. Do that!”. But I took 4 minutes out of my “busy” schedule to quickly do this self-caricature and emailed that instead.
I’m quite certain THIS doodle ain’t worthy enough for a blog post - when I draw things and send ‘em out, my normal procedure is to trash the originals (and whatever JPEGS derived from the originals) without even blinking… however, I promised myself this year - either because of vanity or procrastination - to document EVERY doodle I do, no matter how meaningless and/or stupid they are.
Nothing of any meaning here… just me doodling on my legal pad while waiting for a huge file to finish auto-saving throughout the day yesterday.
Actual “artists” - those to whom get paid drawing for a living - would label something like the below “Warm Up Sketches”… just some crap they do at the beginning of the day before any actual creative stuff happens.
For me, when these scribble-dee-doo-dahs were barfed up, it was mid-afternoon (I was all coffeed out, exhausted, dying to get home and dive into a warm bath) and, every time Illustrator auto-saved an open file that’d take 5 minutes to complete, I’d lean over to my legal pad on my left and:
clumsily draw a bloated shape with a colored highlighter;
if it started to look like a “something”, I’d lightly draw in some structural lines with a red pen;
continue this until whatever-it-was looked MORE like a “something”;
grab a blue or black pen to define the shape and shading of the “something”;
add a background color with a highlighter so the “something” can pop off the page;
add more tones to the “something” with a highlighter.
First, HBO announced “Gone With The Wind” would be shelved in response to current “public outrage” over confederacy and slavery aspects of the film. And as race relations upheaval and debate transpire all over the US, it won’t be long before other films and syndicated TV titles get mothballed as a result.
Well, looks like them Duke boys have found a way ‘round broadcast censorship vis-á-vis the confederate flag atop of the Charger.
Flagrantly False Fun fact: The folks of Hazzard County were ignorantly unaware Uncle Jesse was a pioneer in genetic engineering; yet, mentioned in hushed tones around town were rumors of his early experimentations with inbreeding, but let’s table that abhorrent chatter for another time (or never).
And, for those degenerate “fancies cartoon cloned women” freaks out there, I present to you the Daisies:
A timely toon based on current anarchic events... regrettably, the cast and cartoonist were wearing face masks, thus the text came out muffled. My bad.
Whatever it was, I'm sure it was both funny and thought-provoking.
Tried fixing both word balloon script and gag line in post, but to no avail.
Drawn at a time when there was a torrential downpour of Hodor memes (c.2014), I think I remember a “Happy Heart Tree Day” facebook post. That got me to doodling this piece:
The pair of clogs hung from the weirwood tree’s branch is another annoying in-joke (a’la facebook friends).
Or, if you’re a Game Of Thrones nutball and wanna try ‘n’ read some fandom theory as to why there’re clogs on one side and a paraplegic Bran Stark (with Hodor) is on the other… paralysis …. footwear… there’s some vicious ominous taunting analogy there…
What can I say? I LUV banana bread! Can’t get enough of it!
And after a period of time NOT having banana bread, then coming back for a slice (or five)… I… I can’t properly describe the emotional significance of biting into the moist, cake-like texture of what is, essentially, mashed banana! Thankfully, this illo (c.2014) is a testament to said unsaid description:
When enjoying banana bread, experts recommend wearing knee-high Lederhosen at all times.
Hi.
Yeah… well… I had to doodle something… sooooo… enjoy:
This painting was inspired by a YouTube video (via facebook) of a kitty with a chip bag stuck on its head.
“Kitty Rampant In A Field Of Flowers Chasing A Butterfly With A Baggy On Its Head” (c.2010)
The original painting’s aspect ratio was more-or-less square-ish. I extended the canvas’ width a few years later, adding more background: flower fields; clouds; sky.
The kitty portrayed in the painting, and butterfly chase, was inspired by the kitty I animated in the “award-winning” FlipBook movie short, “The Clyde”.
(BTW: that Clyde animation was made on a 2G iPhone - drawn frame-by-frame.)
Can’t recall what inspired me to paint this - it’s a good bet I was procrastinating and found myself drawing a fish; the “M” logo, buns and tartar sauce were a happy accident!
c.2009.
A day out in NYC and a stop off at F.A.O. Schwarz back in 2011 was when I picked up this little purple guy.
His name is Trunko - just one of the characters from the Uglydoll brand. Now, I’m no impulse buyer, but Tunko met all the criteria for all my plush doll purchases:
He was small;
He was purple;
He was on sale!!!
Plus, because Uglydoll was doing a special U.S. Open promotion thingy, Trunko’s left arm “resembles” a tennis racket.
Afterwards, when I returned back to work in Australia, I decided I needed a useless, stupid gimmick… even if it was as simple as Trunko poking out from my carry bag.
Every morning and midday, 5 days a week, for 6 months, Trunko and I would have a large mocaccino (with soy, hold the sugar) at a nearby café.
Eventually, they honored the li’l purple racket-appendaged critter with his own “branded” deverage.
He even appeared in some of his own character-driven paintings - see below.
In this piece, I got in early to work one morning (c.late 2011) and, for no reason, just painted a close-up study of Trunko. At the time, I really just needed an excuse to be creative and then post said creative to facebook. Because I crave attention. But I don’t. But, yes, I do. But, seriously, nope. Nope. Nope.
And below was inspired by my routine mocaccino runs with Trunko… again, painted before another workday commenced.
Nowadays, Trunko only appears sporadically in my creative stuff - slight cameos and such. In the physical reality, he’s retired from café-hopping with me and now sits at my desk in my home office.
Once a year, I take up a pencil and draw up something speeshülly Germanian for the mother of my fan/friend in Nutley, NJ. To understand WHY I do this, it’s briefly explained it here.
Originally doodled May 18, 2013.
Every May, going back to 2010, I cobble together a German-themed birthday illo for the mother of my fan/friend in New Jersey. Nope, they’re not German — but, they did take me to a German-themed restaurant in Hoboken for Mrs. Berry’s birthday get-together in 2009.
And that’s the (in)joke. Ahh, I guess you had to be there.
If you were wondering, “Happy Dreikäsehoch” translates to Three Cheese High.
Cheese has nothing to do with anything with relation to the person, the day, or the theme… I just needed a long, complicated, funny-sounding German-ish word (“Dreikäsehoch”) and this one fit the bill.
That’s supposed to be me (Bort) on the left. The sentient purple plush critter on the right is "Trunko”, an Ugly Dolls character I picked up at FAO Schwarz with Mrs. Berry in 2011… but I digress…
At left: this is the illustration without the “Happy Dreikäsehoch” titles. Yes, that’s THREE cheese slabs stacked in the background (re:translation).
