Injury Makes the Comeback Sweeter...

Hi everyone!

First of all, apologies for being away so long.
Secondly, an explanation!

...I sat down at my computer early one morning and opened up my files... I was going to work on my book since I know it's keenly anticipated. (I receive on average 4 emails a week asking if my book is out yet. Seriously!) So... feeling a lot of self-inflicted pressure, I worked a typically long day. After 16 hours at my desk I collapsed into bed. Then next morning, blurry eyed and barely awake, I started brushing my teeth. Ruddy heck - my right arm hurt! Never experienced pain in any of my appendages before and this was pretty inconvenient so I ignored it but it got worse fast. It swelled until I literally had a Popeye forearm. Then it locked up altogether and didn't allow me to do anything. Not even hold a cup of tea - so you know it was becoming concerning to me.
A trip to the brilliant UCLA Orthopedic Center, and some x-rays and prodding later, I was told I'd given myself a nasty case of Tendinitis and was advised not to use my arm for the next "few months".

Arrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrg!!

So, it's been 9 weeks now and I'm itching to get back to work. There have been positives to my hiatus, and I'll blog about that silver lining soon.

Above is a silly little sketch I did yesterday to test my arm out. (See me sketching it here). It was meant to be me complaining about my arm, but it came out rather more flattering than intended. For those that don't know what I look like, my hair is a tad more like orange cotton candy and face leans more towards Disney villain than Disney princess! Anyway - you get the idea.

I'm back and here's the upcoming news...

I'll unveil my new witch tomorrow!

Sneak peek here

New videos will be uploaded to the YouTube channel soon... (honestly)...

Orders are still being dispatched (shop has remained open here) but commissions are not open yet. Feel free to email me about this.

Book is 9 weeks delayed. Seriously sorry about that, but there it is. As always, feel free to email me or get me at the Facebook page with any questions. :)

Have a great Friday night everybody!

Berned or Trumped?

As an outsider, a Greencard-carrying 'legal alien' living in the United States, I get to watch the political debate in this country objectively.


This blog post does not reflect my political stance.


My cartoon is an attempt to capture the mood in the United States at present, and specifically the way these two politicians are, for the most part, viewed in the state I live in (Los Angeles, California).



I drew this cartoon and coloured it using Photoshop, as creating cartoons is still new to me and I want the practice playing with my tablet. It shows two politicians in the United States today, both vying for the position of President, and both so diametrically opposed to each other that this drawing practically drew itself.

Many around me view Bernie Sanders as heaven-sent; an honest man with compassion, decency and plans to make health care a right - not a privilege, to reduce gun violence, resolve international conflicts peacefully, allow immigrants a path to citizenship, allow women the right to choose what they do with their bodies, address global warming by cutting US carbon pollution etc...

As Paul Waldman (The Week) put it -

"Sanders' supporters are idealistic, hopeful, and looking for dramatic change that is rooted in liberal ideology. They want more comprehensive government benefits in areas like health care and education, higher taxes on the wealthy, and greater restrictions on financial firms."

Conversely, the mood around me in Los Angeles suggests that Trump is viewed as a dishonest bully who denies global warming and has unrealistic plans and policies which belie racist and misogynistic convictions.

Paul Waldman sums up Trump's supporters' opinions of Trump -

"Trump's supporters aren't motivated by hope and idealism but by anger: anger at immigration, anger at Muslims, anger at foreigners, anger at a changing country that seems to be leaving them behind. "

So I created this cartoon to put this mood to paper! The armband on Trump is because many compare his policies regarding immigration and religious intolerance to Fascism. The bird alighting on Bernie is in reference to a small bird which landed on his podium during a speech in Portland, Oregon, which got a standing ovation from his crowd.

For my non-American readers, if you're unfamiliar with these two politicians, Bernie Sanders is the likely candidate for the Democratic Party and Donald Trump is the nominee of the Republican Party, for the 2016 election.

Disclaimer - Tall Tales Productions takes no sides.

In other news, I have almost finished a new miniature witch character for 'Good Witches Bad Witches', and you may have caught some work-in-progress updates on Instagram and Facebook! Coming soon.

feel the bern, bernie vs trump, trump is a fascist, vote bernie, bernie sanders, donald trump, trum vs bernie cartoon, bernie and trump cartoon, bernie vs trump meme, bernie sanders donald trump cartoon meme

Bottoms Up

I rarely write about anything that isn't film / sculpture / art / miniature related, but that's going to change a little here and there. This post is a response to butt implants specifically. There's art in here too (I drew my second ever cartoon) so hopefully it will hold your attention for about a minute!

I sketched this out yesterday and used Photoshop to add colour. It was an idea I came up with whilst being blasted with media images of various celebrated women who have had butt implants and who influence millions of women with their (celebrated) bodies. Examples here, here and here...

Click to enlarge.

My point being, it disappoints me that years roll on and women still put their energy and focus into looking the way they think will garner attention from men, getting their self-worth from men's approval. The hot issue in this post is butt implants. In the US there was a 98% increase in butt implant procedures since 2014 (a staggering 75,591 butt implants were performed worldwide in 2011 alone). It's yet another body part women feel pressured to address, and here I'd thought that making your arse look bigger had finally died out with the Edwardians.

I champion all women. I am not attacking women who go under the knife to gain these kinds of curves and I am certainly not attacking women born with curves. I am not body-shaming. Rather, I ask the question - couldn't we women do better by investing energy somewhere other than worrying about and changing the way we look?

Dr Caroline Heldman says it so much better (please do watch her Ted Talk here). 

Some of her best nuggets of wisdom in the above talk were...
With pictures of objectified women everywhere, "we women are being sold this idea - that this is how we get our value ...we see male attention as the Holy Grail of our existence. "

"We raise our little boys to view their bodies as tools to master their environment, we raise our little girls to view their bodies as projects to constantly be improved. What if women started to view their bodies as tools to master their environment? As tools to get you from one place to the next, as these amazing vehicles for moving through the world in a new way. "

She talks about the negative effects of self-objectification and habitual body-monitoring (which western women engage in every 30 seconds) and points out that it "takes up more mental space that could be better used completing math tests, completing your homework.... " and also that "it lowers political efficacy and the belief that you have a voice in politics, and it lowers the ability to get along with other women.  "

She concludes with this powerful thought.
"I'd like you to imagine a world where girls and women don't spend an hour every morning putting on their makeup and doing their hair.
I'd like you to imagine a world where women are valued for what they say and what they do rather than the way they look.
I would like you to imagine a world where instead of spending time on dress and appearance, we actually direct our energies to dealing with serious problems like human trafficking, sexualized violence, homophobia, poverty, hunger. "

Worth thinking about, isn't it?

In other news, I am working on my next character for 'Good Witches Bad Witches' (bit slowly as I've had other things to juggle) and she'll be up here soon.  kim kardashian butt implants ass coco ass

Madness

I have been commissioned to create something on the Alice in Wonderland theme, and coming from Oxfordshire it's a real thrill. I had an idyllic 'Alice like' childhood. We punted on the Thames in the beautiful hot summers and had picnics on the riverbank. I had adventures in the fields behind my house, in my tiny village where all the houses were thatched and 500 odd years old. I hid treasures down rabbit holes and badger setts and drew maps to find them again. And of course I drank tea from Victorian china with the grown-ups just as soon as they let me.

So, yesterday I started sketching some ideas. It's going to be centered on the Madhatter's tea party. I sketched some ideas to decide how I want him to look. I am trying very hard to make him my own design, and not a copy of Tenniel or Disney, however, I also want him to be recognisable as the Madhatter. I felt happy with one of the sketches, so I scanned it and today I quickly added some colour. Disney has him in green and so I went with a very English red and striped yellow britches, since it's my favourite colour. 

Tomorrow I will start sculpting him in miniature (1:12 scale, polymer clay).

Also, to plan my scene I did some sketches and then roughly cut out cardboard shapes (in the general scale) to gauge how it will all work out. I've decided to share these working developments, but please remember they're very quick and dirty!

Speaking of madness, I added colour to my Madhatter image using Photoshop, but sans tablet I made do with a mouse. Took twice as long as it should have done and opting to do this was probably quite mad...

Comic Relief

Just got back from San Diego where I experienced my first Comic Con adventure. Wow... 130,000 people in one space... many in costume, many huge fans of fantasy, sci-fi and comics. It was a lot more fun than I thought it would be!

For anyone who does not know, Comic Con is a nonprofit educational corporation dedicated to creating awareness and appreciation for comics and related popular art forms. (Yes, I just got that from their website). 

Anyway, I had a blast. It was 4 days of fascinating talks and professional panels and admiring artists' work in the main hall.
I found the artists talented, friendly and eager to talk about their work (many of them had used Kickstarter to fund a beautiful book or game).
However, I was prompted to draw this silly cartoon for comic relief when I got back to the hotel on day one. I just coloured it in now using Photoshop. It was inspired by a row of male artists who had their 'verging-on-porn-superhero' artwork stacked all around them, and at the same time ignored all women who came to their booths. Kinda a funny thing I thought, as one artist who drew only redheads totally blanked me when I came to chat to him. After a couple of failed attempts to speak to him I finally slunk off, with a real déjà vu high school flashback thing happening!! ;)

In other news.... my Tall Tales Productions website is back!

The site's been down for a few months as I redesigned it and switched to a different server, but it's back now. However, during the time it was down I had it redirect here to my blog. Now the site is back up it may still redirect you, but the quick solution is to follow the link - www.tall-tales.com and then quickly hit the refresh button (as shown below) if it starts trying to redirect you to my blog. You'll only need to do this once and then it'll always work.

Thanks for taking a look.

Here are a few photos from Comic Con, San Diego, 2015.

comic-con sexism, comic book sexism, comic book artists misogyny. sexism in comics, feminism in comic