Thursday, 31 December 2015

2015 in cartoons

Before we leave 2015 behind here is my wistful look back at my favourite topical/silly cartoons of the year.

1. If at first you don't succeed (January)
Some ancient Scottish history to start the year coupled with a familiar tablet gag.



2. Broadchurch and the Gingerbread man (January)
After lemmings gingerbread men are one of my favourite things to draw in cartoons.
3. Terrible Tory tales about the SNP (April)
I must have drawn half a dozen or more cartoons around the UK General Election and this is the only one I thought hit the mark.

4. Father Ted caricature
I drew quite a few celebrity caricatures this year from Thor to Greg Wallace but since I had to select just one it would be this.

5. Overreacting
A chemistry cartoon for the competition.

6. OK Corral Bake-off
Talking of competitions this is the one cartoon that won this year in CCGB public forum competitions.

7. Greece - the end is Nigh
Before the refugee crisis and terrorism atrocities Greece was the big story at the start of the year with every week deemed to be the end of the the Greek economy/the EU until all of a sudden it dropped out the news when it was sort of resolved.


8. Star Wars VII
The big entertainment news of the year was J J Abrams Star Wars The Force Awakens and whether he would be take it in another direction or not.

9. Davis Cup
With Team GB's run to the final via Glasgow I found myself doing lots of tennis cartoons and caricatures.   While I was pleased with the likenesses of the team I captured (which I shared alot) I quite like this post tournament comment about how the legacy needs to be managed.  Thankfully recently the LTA has been making the right sort of noises about the future.

10. Drone Santa
And to round us off a Christmas cartoon with drones.

So Happy New Year and we'll see what 2016 throws up.

Monday, 28 December 2015

Mutiny on the Board Game

Like many families we have a Christmas holiday board game tradition and like many families it is not always the non-digital nirvana it promises to be especially with more complicated games.  The trick is not exhausting everyone's patience before you even begin the game and if you discover you didn't entirely understand the rules in the middle of the game keep quiet until the end.

Sunday, 27 December 2015

Boxing Day Bins

Apart from turkeys, bins must suffer the most at Christmas.  Never in their history are glass bins so full or is there quite so much cardboard with a whole week before they collect it but the good old gardening waste bin feels fine.

Tuesday, 22 December 2015

Shepherd Spoilers


A new Christmas cartoon referencing the recent obsession with not giving away any plot details of certain record breaking blockbuster releases that I haven't seen yet (don't tell me anything).

Also as an extra special Christmas treat I clumsily hacked together a Youtube video of how I made this image in Manga Studio which you can see below


Of course there are plenty of other shepherd cartoons of mine you could view including this one about Shepherds watching facebook by night.

Tim Peake Christmas

When I was a boy I wanted to be an astronaut but always thought it was impossible because only Americans and Russians were astronauts.  Now Tim Peake, former Army Air Corps pilot, is orbiting the earth as an ESA astronaut representing the UK and inspiring a new generation of kids that space isn't beyond them.

Here is Tim Peake and my three wise men.

Tuesday, 8 December 2015

Amazon is the new Santa

This one is based one a true story told to me by a work colleague but it rings true with anyone trying to maintain the mystery of Santa while ordering online.

Strangely enough this is not my first Amazon and Santa cartoon there have been several:

Saturday, 5 December 2015

Drone Santa



Another advent drone Santa cartoon - if you can't beat them join them (except the reindeers might not be happy!).  Here was my previous Lichtenstein inspired Santa vs Drones

Tuesday, 1 December 2015

Davis Cup GB Legacy


A day after the historic GB Davis Cup victory Andy Murray had some fairly strong words for the LTA about not squandering all the goodwill from the Davis Cup victory and saying 'I don't like wasting my time' in talking to the LTA.

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