Well I had to draw the line somewhere...

At last I have arrived in Blogsville...I had been thinking about setting up one of these things for ages, just didn't realise how easy it was. I am a freelance Illustrator/cartoonist and I also do a bit of flash animation and graphic design. It's hard to decide on one term to cover it all, sometimes I use 'Multimedia Designer' or 'New media Artist' but that just confuses some people, so depending on who I'm talking to or pitching to, my job description is usually customised to suit.

Anyways, I have a portfolio site (linked opposite) where I display my creative wares, but I wanted somewhere different to show my doodles. They can be a little weird and dark or sometimes just completely ridiculous lookin', and I was afraid I'd scare off potential clients for the more mainstream commercial work upon which I depend so much. Being a bit thick, I also like the simple upload function of the blog. A friend of mine did all the backend stuff for my website (I don't do technical) and shortly afterwards he and his partner had a baby. He's a cute little feller and all, (the baby that is) but I'm now left with a website that I can't really get my head around. I am in the process of designing a new Flash based site which is looking great (can't wait to show it off) but it will be completely idiot proof since I will be doing all the action scripting!

So the plan is, from now on, first thing each morning as I'm siphoning coffee into my veins and politely replying to my spam, I shall upload a new, oven fresh doodle for the whole world to admire, debate and analyze. After a year or so, I'll pick the best Coffee Table Book deal from the pack of hungry publishers - who will be baying at my heels by then, retire and just draw whatever I feel like, wherever I want to draw it.

I should perhaps also mention that I tend to draw on stuff other than paper, I like to draw on cardboard, coffee cups, beer mats and inside out packaging (I've actually even sold a couple on EBay). So in a way I like to think of myself as an ‘Extreme Doodler'. Namby pamby white paper or Bristol drawing board with a vellum finish just aint gonna cut it with me, no surface is too rough, too cylindrical or too corrugated for me and my stable of supercharged pens and biros. So with that, I give you the first of this year’s 365 & a quarter Extreme Doodles.......

A friend of ours bought us an IKEA lampshade, this is the box it came in (turned inside out and reconstructed) I drew this with black ballpoint pens (or 'biros' as we call them here). The white is Acrylic paint.

Just to show the depth (it was a collapsible lampshade by the way.)
This piece sold on EBay and I miss it now.