Time for a new cartoon! Actually, although the color is new, this is quite  old – one of the first cartoons I ever did, and part of a series I did with coffins. I was surprised, death is a fairly common topic with cartoonists – I heard Bob Mankoff, cartoon editor of the New Yorker, say that he gets a fair number of dead cartoons each week.

Raindrops keep falling on my head...coming from a coffin under a tombstone

Don’t get me wrong – I hate this song. I don’t like songs in my head, or humming the same one for days. I can’t remember who sang this…Neil Diamond? Someone will know. And it rains a lot where I come from.

This cartoon is for Illustration Friday’s topic, unbalanced.  Nothing like a coffin cartoon to prove I’m that! This is from my morbid collection, which I only bring out to show special guests. And you.

Read more »

That's the last time we let HIM order. All rights reserved ©D. Barstow Cartoon of cat ordering mice on pizza.

My first Wordless Wednesday. Taking the cue from a bird blogger I admire: Bev.

So if I get the self-control I hope for, there won’t be any words next time.

“Well, I’d want the whole thing taken out, but you might want a second opinion on that.” Cartoon ©D. Barstow.

Not that I’m in the least bit misogynistic. People who know me know I love men, in all guises. But the stronger the better, of course. ;)

This is part of my Morbid series. It’s not that I like jellyfish, which he’d be without the skeleton, but I’m fascinated by skeletons. Once I read a science fiction story that I’ve never forgotten, about the bones inside a man who wanted to come out. They felt the flesh was the enemy, hiding them, hindering them. They knew they were the strength of the man, the real power, and they wanted to be seen. And in the end, they do, don’t they. Now you want to read it, huh?! If only I could remember the author…

One of the first things I studied trying to be a cartoonist was the body form. I’ve taken a few figure drawing classes ever since college, and really should take one every year. To think that you know the body – when every body is different – is a little presumptuous. I’ve heard Sergio Aragones say many times that every time he draws something he studies its form again as if it’s new, so he’ll have a fresh take on it.

Anyway, this was before the internet, so I had to learn skeletons from books. For a while I wanted to do a strip with them! They are pretty powerful, after all, and I didn’t need that scifi story to tell me that.

Earlier version of this cartoon after the jump.

Read more »

Hmm. I just noticed that the topic for Illustration Friday this week is “clutter”. And here I thought the topic was “FLUTTER”. Being a bird person, and all. Well, there is at least one flutter in this cartoon.

California Condors are big out here, of course, but these could be vultures anywhere. (Is the cartoon clear? That they’re waiting for her to die of thirst, as if she was in the desert?) Here I go again, morbidity, the smell of death in the air (and I HOPE it’s not that plumber), vultures hanging around.

But don’t you hate it, really, when the plumber turns off the water, and you know he’s doing it longer than he has to, just because he can? Control, people, control.

The drawing.

Hmm, I experimented with a limited palette for this. I picked a dark green, with the opposite of blood red, because I read that with opposite colors, one is warm and one is cool – and of course included black & white, my usual guys. Well, it’s limited all right. Maybe the paints in paint programs like Painter don’t mix colors very well… But who cares, it’s Friday, right?

And you know what? Maybe “clutter” was a little too close to home, speaking personally, of course.

*Well, it was Friday when I finished it, but I couldn’t link it to Illustration Friday because they are on European time, or something. Sigh. So no one will see this.

Well, I love you, you red-headed vultures, you.

Warning!!! A word is in this cartoon that may offend you. I wrote it for men’s magazines. I apologize in advance. (It’s not that bad a word, but it’s a cuss word.)

“Oh, shoot. I hope I remembered to lock the door, and turn off the lights. Etc.”

Illustration Friday means I become part of a group, which is always nice. The topic, Memories means I had to go to my Morbid, Death and DisMEMbering file. I actually have a series of coffin cartoons. (Also, of condom cartoons.) But this one popped out today. I’m pretty sure that O/C (obsessive-compulsive) people see no reason to let Death stop them. Carry on, soldier.

Diet vs. exercise cartoon

The Idea
This is from my Morbid & Sex file. (Yes, what does it say about me that I think these subjects are connected…and that this is my favorite file?) They’re not always easy to sell. But so necessary to do.

This seems like an obvious idea: diets are a life or death issue for women, and there is always the big question: which one is most effective to lose weight?? And there’s that whole annoying mystery about it, as doctors continually change their minds on what and why or why not something will help with weight loss.

I myself like exercising better, because I just hate denying myself food to eat. I tried not to make the exercise guy show my bias, but I do have a weakness for blonds…and notice that he is a smidgen taller than the other guy!

I like the power a gun could give me. I guess I like guns. I’ve only held one once, when I dated an ex-Mafia guy; it felt and smelled like an expensive, non-digital, high-end Nikon. Yum.

The Drawing

I think weight loss is more of a woman’s obsession, but you can’t have two women shooting at each other. Maybe in vid games, or Latino gang fights, but not in cartoons. So these two fellows volunteered to be my characters.

I decided against a watching crowd, even though most duels seem to have them. I don’t always succeed, but I like fewer lines: clear, balanced, and in your face. Note that the men are moving in opposite directions to the cocked, deadly black guns. This shootout will not be pretty.

Read more »