Sketches

These were all done way back in the dark days of February, 1985. Well, I'm pretty sure, maybe a few of them I did earlier or later. I think these sketches - loose and scribbled as they may be - were an important step forward (backward??) for me as I tried to improve my drawing skills.

High School Sketches

Mostly what I did through classes in High School was draw in my notebooks. I've got pages and pages of drawings done in class, when most other kids were taking notes. I listened with one ear and drew away. I don't remember ever getting in trouble for it or anything like that. As long as I was doing OK in the class, all was cool. Bear in mind, I wasn't drawing during math class. I had to pay attention there, not that it did me much good!

Posted here are various drawings c.1981-1983. Aside from the werewolf head profile (which is from 1985), these are sketches based on photo stills. Besides the two E.T.'s, there's a Gamorrean Guard from Return of the Jedi, a Lon Chaney Wolfman (c.1981), and the twisted cartoon monster creatures (originaly created by Rob Bottin) from the Joe Dante directed episode of The Twilight Zone movie.

Teen Wolf

I'm jumping ahead here a few years. I was originally thinking of doing this blog chronologically, but I realized that would limit me. So then, here are some drawings from 1982, my Sophomore year in High School.

These were done for my art class, a specialized cartooning class, taught by my favorite High School teacher, Ms. Krumholtz. The only piece of finished art I ever saw of Ms. Krumholtz' (she would sketch stuff on the chalkboard) was this very cool 1950's, Wally Woodish style, inked piece of a rocket in space, with maybe a cartoony character outside..or maybe the rocket was cartoony. I just remember it was really cool and I was thinking...'she did.that!!?'

This werewolf set of drawings was one of the first things I did in her class, which I was able to take continue take for the next couple of years. There were four 'plates' originally, but I can't find the fourth. I've got plates 2-4 here. Around 1984, I was working on what was at the time, my most large and detailed piece. It was a take-off of a 1950's E.C. Tales From The Cryptish kind of comic cover, complete with title, indicia, and large, full head, inked old witch character. We kept the art we were working on at the time, in large flat files in the back of the classroom, and unfortunately, someone stole my piece, as well as someone else's. I was flattered and pissed at the same time, as I remember, but looking back now, I'm more pissed, as I'd prefer to have that piece back!

As for this set of drawings, at the time (and still, to a degree!) I was really into all things dealing with werewolves. I had loved An American Werewolf In London (not to mention The Howling), to the point that I worked on my own version of it. 'Lycanthrope was a collaboration with a fellow Werewolf enthusiast (and cartooning classmate), Wolfgang Rubio (couldn't pick a guy with a better name to write and star in a werewolf movie). He had a script, which was basically 'An American Werewolf In High School' and the make-up knowledge to pull off some half-way (for the time and for kids!) transformation shots. But that's a story for another day.

I just loved werewolves, thought about transforming into one myself and drew them a lot.

Horse Head

I did this drawing while my family stayed for a week on Fire Island, during the Summer of 1979, which would make me eleven years old when I drew it. I copied it from a book on how to draw horses by Walter Foster, which I still have. Walter Foster published a great series of 'how to draw' books, covering all kinds of areas, from painting humans to animals and working realistically to cartooning. And most of them were only $2!! They were oversized, paperback books, almost portfolio sized and each page was filled with great art and tips. They still publish lots of art books, though the books I had as a kid are no longer in print. The new books are also a lot more expensive!

Han and Chewie

One of my first Star Wars drawings, I remember doing this at my friend Marcos' house...my memory is of drawing it outside one day, but maybe my memory is wrong...who knows...it was so many years ago. I'm figuring I was around ten when I drew it, likely sometime in 1978. I've got a few drawings that all seem to be from this same time period (1977-78). The main identifying trademark among them is that I signed all of them with just the underlined 'L.'....a bit later I started signing my full name. (and more often than not, the date).

Flaming Youth

This is one of the oldest drawings of mine I have. It's a swipe of the cover for Ghost Rider #16, which came out in late 1975 (but dated Feb. 76), so I must have had it sitting around for awhile before I decided to copy it, sometime in 1977. I was either nine or ten when I did this. I changed Ghost Rider from being attacked by a shark to him freefalling! Notice the MARVL COMICS GROUP misspelling, along with at least one more. ('I doomed..").

Hey, nice hands, at least!

Earliest Art

These drawings are from a First Grade school notebook that my grandmother held onto. It was always in one of the two bottom drawers of a table in her TV room. As she lived upstairs from me, I'd see it every now and then and eventually appropriated it back. I've had it now for at least the last twenty years. The scrawlings here are the earliest drawings I have of mine, aside from one other drawing, found in my grandmothers 1972 Toyota Celica, of all places. It was of some kind of hatchet wielding guy, very scratchy, on a post it note. I believe it pre-dates these drawings by a bit. Unfortuantely, I wasn't able to locate it on a recent rifling thru of a few boxes of art, but I do think I have it...somewhere.

In June 1974, when these drawings were done, I was just 3 months shy of my seventh birthday. Soon afterwards, my family left for Japan and the sketchbook came along, as evidenced by some writings and drawings from my sister of a Manga styled girl and lyrics and other references to our life in Japan. Towards the back are even later drawings, from around 1978/9.