Look Ma, No Guitar...

[noelford]

I've just finished my first attempt at a showreel for my website. I composed the music used for it quite a few years ago on my digital piano/sequencer – not a guitar in site and definitely not 'That Sound'!!!

If you have just over a couple of minutes to spare, please take a look 'n' listen...

MY ONLINE WEBSITE PORTFOLIO

[JimN]

I'm definitely getting a hint of Stanley Ford in some of those captions, Noel .... know what I mean?

JN

[noelford]

Hmmm... sadly (or perhaps, fortunately, in Stanley's case!), Hollywood's idea of the average cartoonist's lifestyle was a little wide of the mark, Jim!

[RayL]

Noel,

Nice cartoons - great ideas!

What is meant by 'digitally drawn'? An electronic pen/brush tool and a suitable software programme? What is your set-up?

Ray

[Paulps]

Hi Noel

FRSA??? Fiesta Red Shadow A??????

[noelford]

Noel,

Nice cartoons - great ideas!

What is meant by 'digitally drawn'? An electronic pen/brush tool and a suitable software programme? What is your set-up?

Ray

Thanks, Ray. My current set-up is:

27" iMac with 23" dual display
Wacom Intuos Graphics Tablet
Corel Painter software

Everything I do id drawn directly on-screen, via the tablet, with a digital pen

Hi Noel

FRSA??? Fiesta Red Shadow A??????

Ha! More like:

Fiesta Red* Strat (*Allegedly)

[RayL]

Thanks, Ray. My current set-up is:

27" iMac with 23" dual display
Wacom Intuos Graphics Tablet
Corel Painter software

Everything I do is drawn directly on-screen, via the tablet, with a digital pen

Thanks, Noel. Do you write down ideas for cartoons as they occur to you and keep a stock ready to be used as appropiate, or do you need the stimulus of a commission to get the creative juices flowing? (I'm interested in how the creative process works)

Ray

[noelford]

Good question, Ray. When I first started selling my work, at the beginning of the seventies, I always carried a notebook to jot down ideas. The problem was, when I sat at the drawing board, I realised that the fun part of the job, the creation, had already been done and I was left with the 'labour' of the drawing. So I threw the notebook away and simply created the ideas 'on-the-spot'. Nowadays, hardly any of my work is speculative, most of it being commissioned, so the ideas come when I read the brief or, in the case of my editorial work, when I read the news story the cartoon is going to refer to. I also think it's fair to say that, after 36 years as a full-time cartoonist, I have acquired the knack of switching inspiration on and off!

[RayL]

Thanks, Noel, very interesting answer. Those two ways of approaching creation also apply in music and, like you, I find these days that it needs a request or a commission to get me working on a tune or an arrangement. Otherwise, an idea will just wander in and wander out again without my doing anything about it!

Ray

[noelford]

Yes, ideas DO come at inappropriate times if you don't house-train them, Ray! It's not good to burst out laughing during the eulogy at a funeral, or to interrupt an intimate moment with a, "Oh, hang on, let me just jot this down"!

I think you are right, in that this is the same for most creative activities.