This Week's Sneak Peek

This week's Q Syndicate features a lot of foliage. Dozens upon dozens of little leaves which, having drawn, I then had to colorize. Individually. I could have used the paintbrush feature in Adobe, but that puts the color on top of the black, and I just don't like how that looks.

I guess you can paint on a separate layer, then cut the black elements from the background layer and paste them on top of the colors on the overlayed layer. Hunting down all the tiny little squiggles of black that don't happen to be connected to any other black lines can be a bit of a chore, though.

I'm still reading the first of the hardcover reissues of Pogo cartoons, and the description of the process for colorizing the Sunday comics is pretty interesting. The book includes copies of two of Walt Kelly's originals to compare with the finished product from Hall Syndicate's compositors. As a cartoonist, I would have appreciated a few more details (did he use ink or paint? Mustn't the color have been on a separate sheet from the black and white drawing?). I do know that back then, syndicated cartoonists mailed their work, rolled up in delivery tubes. More expensive delivery services might be called upon for cartoonists with a topical bent trying to draw as up-to-date as possible.

When I started cartooning, I would drive to Kenosha or Milwaukee to drop off the cartoon originals at my editors' offices. Now, of course, I email electronic copies instead. For all the damage the internet has done to the career option of editorial cartooning, I don't miss all that driving in the least.