Jeff Hawley is Jeff Hamil

This week only.
Jeff Hawley is Jeff Hamill. Jeff Hamill is the correct name for the Jeff who wrote the gag for "Wasp Bait", the single-panel-adventure-winner of the Cartoonist-of-the-Month recognition for the Cartoonists Northwest cartoon club. Congratulations Jeff, and condolences to the other Jeff for not being Jeff Hamill. I may post a version of the cartoon with the correct name at some later date.

I will say more nice things about Jeff Hawley next week. Things that will swing the pendulum back into the "true" direction.

Wasp Bait

I have had this idea from Jeff H for months. It took a while (and several versions over a long period of time) to get it almost right (or at least in a form that I could bring with me to the cartoonist meeting). The thumbnail that Jeff sent looked pretty good, and shows how Jeff was extending the gag to wasp puns and a wasp crowd and a lot more verbiage. I want to be true to the original so I kicked around several variations.
I finally decided that any version that I liked with a crowd would end up being a large detailed drawing. That is a good sign that, as a cartoonist, I am trying to do too much. Trying to do too much bogged the image down, became busier, and the puzzle was put on the back burner for a while.
Besides the crowd not working for me, the swarm was difficult as well. I went so far as to make a photoshop brush of a wasp. In my mind, I could shrink this to various sized, set brush controls, and have a swarm of wasps in no time. This is wrong. I really did not want to draw by hand more than 30 wasps, but the number came up to around 50 in the final image.
Even after I decided to simplify the joke verbiage, eliminated the "crowd of science" and made a swarm of 30 wasps (by hand) the gag was still over-detailed for a very small reproduction. I made one or two "close up" wasps to show my work in developing a stylized wasp. That did not work either. Big wasps look like monster wasps much more than they look like close-to-the-camera wasps.

Interesting challenge. I might come back later and try a version with the crowd. or not

The Cartoonist Northwest meeting will get to judge the simple version.

Saturday, January 16th, 2010 - 4 PM to 6 PM
Daniel Smith Art Supply
4150 First Avenue South in Seattle
Free to people reading this blog and their friends.

(and thanks Jeff, you write well)