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This is a drawing I did in one of my cartooning classes that I teach where I was showing the kids how I inked a drawing over blue pencil lines. For the inking I used both a brush pen and some sharpies of different widths. I also liked the art enough to give is some photoshop coloring as well.

I know it’s kinda of weird to see a redheaded white rabbit, but I thought it was funny. He has a lot of personality and I like that.

©2011 Brian Kolm

See more at www.atomicbearpress.com

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A very Merry Christmas and a Happy Holiday to everyone no matter how/what/where you celebrate.

Every year I have illustrated an original Christmas card for my family to send to family and friends. The earliest Christmas cards we would make were silk screened and my father took my art and cut it by hand into the screen. Latter we would xerox the cards in black and white and hand color a few small elements to enhance them. And now I can scan, edit, color and prep the files on the computer and have them printed in vivid color, but no matter what form the cards take they are a continuing tradition I am proud to be part of. This year I decided to show you the illustrations I have created since 2000 in the video above.

I hope you enjoy the video and have a wonderful season.

note: Music “We Wish You a Merry Christmas” by Kevin MacLeod (incompetech.com) Licensed under Creative Commons “Attribution 3.0″

Continue reading »]]> I wanted to find a unique way to show samples of my artwork that would stand out, so I decided to create a hard-cover book that I could use at conventions and professional meetings. The book features samples of my artwork from 2007-2011 including illustrations and personal work.

The books are Print On Demand through Blurb.com, who do a high quality job and create a very slick final product.

You can order the hard-cover book (with an on-line preview) HERE

This is the 4th book I have made through Blurb.com and I have been very happy with the results. The books are always printed beautifully and come to you looking very professional and slick.

Now, one of the best things about Blurb.com is that they are constantly updating their services aimed at their target audience: artists. So they have made their own software BookSmart more customizable, but also finally have an option for folks who wanted a more professional options. This year they introduced a plug-in for Adobe In-Design that not only generates the templates for a book/cover, but also a way to correctly output a PDF to upload. This means that you can pretty much layout the pages any way you want and can use files in formats like Photoshop .psd that BookSmart can not use. Considering I have lots of art as high-resolution .psd files, that means I could place them and not have to convert them to .jpg files first.

Uploading the final book as a Adobe PDF was easy to do and the website will let you know if any of your images are too low-res for print, but I would always make sure to carefully look at your PDF yourself to make sure there are not unexpected surprises which sometimes do not show up in In-Design.

If you are familiar with Adobe InDesign I would definitely consider using the plug-in since it was a lot faster and more powerful, but the BookSmart program is really good if you want something pretty nice.

To find out more about editing your book at Blurb.com visit HERE.

Continue reading »]]> I will be representing the Cartoonist Conspiracy San Francisco in organizing a third year of CAM-JAM events with the Cartoon Art Museum Bookstore. The event is on Sunday May 22, 2011 from 11am to 5pm and the theme will be ANIMATION.

Yes, you heard that right! Our challenge will be to produce 30 seconds of DIY animation goodness that will use technology and old school art skills together to make something cool. We will have stations to do: Flipbooks, Wipe Board Animation and Sketchbook Animation.

The technique I am most looking forward too working with is the Sketchbook Animation which I blogged about HERE and HERE. The technique is to draw all the art for a couple seconds of animation in your sketchbook which is then composited on the computer into a short video.

In fact I created this sample the other night by drawing about 4 pages of art on 8.5″x11″ card stock (I need a new sketchbook, sigh) in about 2.5 hours and then spent about 2 to 2.5 hours scanning and compositing the work together. I am very pleased with the results.

CAM-JAM 2011- No1 Animation Jam – Sunday May 22, 2011 at the Cartoon Art Museum from Brian Kolm on Vimeo.

So come on out and join a bunch of crazy cartoonist and make some animation. Artist of all levels are welcome.

The final work will be posted here on my blog after the event.

On May 22, 2011 the Cartoonist Conspiracy San Francisco and the Cartoon Art Museum Bookstore will be kicking off the third year of CAM-JAM’s, cartoonist collaboration events. The CAM-JAM’s have tried different themes in the past such as Tikis and Samurais, but this time we will go with something a bit more challenging…Animation. With a mix of old school drawing goodness and desk top video technology we will attempt to collaborate and create 30 seconds of animation within the length of the event from 11am to 5pm.

Will you come and join us?

When: Sunday May 22, 2011

11am to 5pm

Where: Cartoon Art Museum – 655 Mission St San Francisco CA

Cost: FREE for participating artists

What to bring: Sketchbook and any drawing tools that you like. There will be materials available to use at the event, but it’s always fun to share how you like to draw with your fellow artists.

The event will feature…

- Wipe Board animation – filmed with a digital camera and stop motion software artist will create animation by drawing on that office favorite the wipe board.

- Flipbooks

- “sketchbook” animation – inspired by the technique used on the short film animated “Nosy Bear” created with small drawings on a few pages of a sketchbook that are then composite digitally.

- Samples of animation by local artists

- Prizes

- Networking

- Treats

- Fun

Our hope is that cartoonist and artist of all caliber will join in the fun and help create animation on-the-spot.

To sign-up ahead of time, email the Cartoon Art Museum bookstore at bookstore@cartoonart.org or sign-in the day of the event at the front desk

BONUS: ANY ARTIST who shows their sketchbook on the day of the event will receive 10% off their purchase in the museum bookstore. Note: a few items are not applicable for discount.

For more information or questions contact:

Brian Kolm from the Cartoonist Conpiracy – staff@atomicbearpress.com

Heather at the Cartoon Art Museum Bookstore – bookstore@cartoonart.org

Continue reading »]]> I will be teaching again this Summer at Chabot College in Hayward CA for the Kids on Campus summer program.

Cartooning: Monsters & Critters
Whether it’s a graceful unicorn, a slithering dragon or a more modern beast, we have been telling stories of fanciful creatures of all sorts since the beginning of time. This class will feature lessons on drawing classic beasties, the structure and construction of four- legged animals, and designing original creatures as well as a technique for presenting a final drawing.

Kids on Campus – Summer Camp 2011
Weeks of June 20-24 and June 27-July 1

Sign-up at: www.chabotcollege.edu/comed/kidsoncampus/kidsoncampus2010/

Continue reading »]]> I will be teaching again this Summer at Chabot College in Hayward CA for the Kids on Campus summer program.

Cartooning: Star Wars Art (and beyond)
This class helps you to create your own Space characters by learning to first draw characters from the Star Wars universe. The class will teach skills like constructing figures with 3D shapes, facial expressions, costumes, action poses, and how to take the knowledge and use it to create characters that are all your own.”

Kids on Campus – Summer Camp 2011
Weeks of June 20-24 and June 27-July 1

Sign-up at: www.chabotcollege.edu/comed/kidsoncampus/kidsoncampus2010/

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Click for a larger image on Flickr.com
I guess posting 6 images of rabbits 6 days in a row is enough and it’s time for something a little different. I love the ‘silly’ yet so retro cool Japanese Metal Hero Robot Detective K from a 1973 TV show. How many robots can wear a bright red blazer and yellow cap with so much style.

I have drawn Robot Detective Kenji before, but just realized that the images posted here had gotten lost when the website was upgraded a few years ago since the drawings are from 2008. Here they are.

Click for a larger image on Flickr.com

Click for a larger image on Flickr.com

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a post on Motion Comic Magic

I have been playing with Blender 3D, the open source (i.e. FREE) software. I mostly have been playing with techniques that could be used with 2D animation or Motion Comics. So here we go…

This was based on a tutorial I found where a 3d ground surface was made to roll like the waves and a simple boat model travels over the surface as it distorts. Kind of long and boring I know, but it was a good learning experience. The sky was added in after the fact in after effects.

The next tests were from a tutorial as well where I made a simple tree and added leaves that were simple 2D images. It looks pretty good, even close-up due too distorting the flat images of leaves to be curved and bent.

This time it’s just one tree on a hill…

Here is a simulation of shapes that act like they are silk streamers…

And last, but not least a simple snow scene where the buildings are simple shapes with digital artwork for the details.

Continue reading »]]> I have not posted in a while and thought it was high-time to do, especially with the Christmas Holiday upon us later this week and the very end of the year a week later.

I always do a bunch of Christmas Card designs every year and this year was no different and I was thinking it would be fun to post some of them as we lead up to the start of the New Year. So come back every day and see whats been posted.

So we’ll start with some humor and whimsy…

pen and ink drawing with digital color

Continue reading »]]> In one of my teaching gig’s I get to do some art myself and have been doing some small watercolor landscapes (here and here) that could be color studies for a bigger future project. After scanning them in to the computer, I thought I would see if I could do a super simple digital version with colors taken directly from the watercolors.