Mother Jones

Tim wanted a brighter background, and while I was changing that I pulled the new type in and inadvertently found a better cropping and sent it to Tim. I sent it to him, because I liked how it sort of let the guy get a little bigger, and seem to add a little motion to the illustration. It also got rid of those feet I was having trouble with....naturally © Bill Mayer 2010 This cover for Mother Jones started as an inside illustration, full page of this little guy. When I did the thumbnails I already had something in my head, so just a few little thumbnails to get the idea on paper. Tim thought he should not be quite the heffer of a fat cat, so we slimmed him down a bit in the sketches. They wanted Him to look a bit more like the Monopoly guy....but not too close. http://drawger.com/billmayer/images/3352830964.jpg Where Have All the Whistleblowers Gone? Get Out of Jail Free Cards.... Big Wall Street Banks take a walk around the board on the tax payer, and Washington does not have the balls to let them all go belly up. "When President Barack Obama's jobs bill passed the House in early March, it contained a little-noticed provision to recover part of its $35 billion price tag by cracking down on offshore tax evasion, which costs the US some $100 billion a year in lost revenue. The provision, which requires foreign financial institutions to report more data to the Internal Revenue Service, was likely prompted by a 2008 Senate investigation that revealed the systematic efforts made by Swiss bank UBS to help moneyed Americans hide massive sums from the IRS." Well basically we are still suffering through the remains of these actions. and it looks like several more years before we may recover.....if ever. Thumbnails for the inside illustration, not so many I just loved this really fat cat business guy with Uncle Sam under his thumb, but the editor wanted it to look like Sam and the cat were snuggleing up. They chose the up-close-in-your-face version. "C". © Bill Mayer 2010 Sketch showing the changes to the attitude and posture to make Uncle Sam look happy..© Bill Mayer 2010 I got this note from Tim the other day; thought I'd pass it along... The Jan/Feb cover you illustrated is currently not only projected to outsell the March/April 2010 issue, but if the current numbers hold, will sell better than every one of the 2009 issues; so thanks for your great work on that! And I believe those stories (with your outstanding lead illustration) have gotten a good amount of exposure, both the print and online versions; so thanks for that too! I’ll definitely look at your drawger posts. Love that site. Best, Tim

Omphaloskepsis

A FUZZY NAVEL Once upon a time, a long, long time ago, there was a little guy who came to be known as Wally. Wally actually started out as a drink coaster, brainchild of Jean Page at SVP. They came to me and asked me to be a part of this great summer campaign for Yupo; I was sent a list of drinks I could illustrate. By the time I responded, most of the good choices were gone. Fuzzy Navel was still open, so I did the normal fifty thumbnail ideas and the one that struck me right away was this cute little guy in deep Omphaloskepsis, (contemplating ones navel.) I thought it would be funny to have him hairy everywhere but his head. As I am not a hairy guy, someone had once sent me a chest wig as a joke . So, I scanned the chest wig in and made a brush out of it so I could paint anything hairy. The folks at Yupo fell in love with him, and for years they had some happy fun together. the original "Fuzzy Navel" drink coaster © Bill Mayer 2010 THE SEVEN DEADLY SINS Wally lives on in Yupo's "Wally Awards;" (A contest for the best use of Yupo Paper) in a special award I designed for Yupo; a snow globe. It was supposed to have hair floating around inside of it, but the folks at Yupo decided that it should be Yupo pellets instead. Now, Wally is taking a long needed break. (Although it is rumored he may make a comeback early 2011...) Stay tuned for breaking news on this development. Wally Award being modeled. These were some in process photos of the plasticine scupture getting it ready and approved before casting.They got a little nervous about the naked butt so we added a cape around his neck....

All Aboard!

The Other day we were rummaging through some old files and ran across these thumbnails. Even though this was a couple years old, I thought you guys would enjoy this. "All Aboard" was a Picture book I did with Art Director Ann Bobco. A puzzling alphabet book; where all of the letters would be hidden in the illustrations. Certainly some more than others. When I started the book I wanted the overall feel to be reminiscent of those great travel posters from the 1920's and 1930's. Bold and graphic images that would stand on thier own, as well as make a great collection in a folio. See all of the images from the book in the GALLERY. This image from "All Aboard" won a Silver medal in the Original Art Show at Society of Illustrators in 2008. Some of the already edited thumbnails, trying to work out a flow to the book. © Bill Mayer 2008 I don't usually do color thumbnails, but with a book I thought it was important. Keeping the flow of the book and using a variety of colors spread throughout. One of only a few completely digital pieces in the book. (See All Images HERE http://drawger.com/billmayer/?section=gallery&gallery_id=897)

Village Voice Bed Bugs

Sometimes when you sit down to work on Ideas, you just get too many great ideas. Sometimes even the Art Director can't choose and you end up doing two. That's what happened with these little bed bug illustrations. I get ichy all over just looking at them . Here is also a case of photo shop allowing me to do a concept I would have proabably stayed away from. But with being able to clone the bugs , I could just do one or two bugs and clone them into a mighty army of mutants. Ready and willing to suck your very life, if not the blood, and leave your lifeless body a hollow shell for your kids to find in the morning when they come in to wake you. I guess you can pick up on the ones they picked; #2 and #9. Ended up with the large area for the Village Voice mast head at the top. on the inside full page for the bug army. God I love these bug jobs. Just can't get enough of them. All Material © Bill Mayer

NPR Calendar

Sometimes you come up with great ideas ,sometimes it's your grand kids that come up with the ideas and you just steal them and put them down on paper. this idea came from my grandson Forest who has been helping me around the studio for a couple of years now. I still had to put down a few of my own, the normal 40+ thumbnails...Katie Burk at NPR was the art director, And ultimately gave me more freedom than I am used to having on jobs. The NPR calendar ideas were in all different directions, but the ones they seemed to gravitate toward were the ones that were chaotic, with the broadcast creating an oasis of joy within the insanity. I really liked the silly abominable snowman...They liked Forest's idea of the traffic. Katie thought it was something most folks could idenitfy with..... naturally © Bill Mayer 2010 more thumbnails.. the normal "exploration of ideas" sorta stream of conciousness. I am not really sure why I do so many of these; I guess it is one of my favorite parts of every job. Trying to find just the right fit and tone to make them happy. And yes, it is fun... naturally © Bill Mayer 2010 you know, I loved this sketch so much. I was trying to find a way to color it digitally so I didn't lose the spontaneous insanity. © Bill Mayer 2010 a close runner-up was this sketch of basically the same idea twisted to create a little oasis amidst the busy bustle of the city.... © Bill Mayer 2010

Staying Sharp #2

Okay a great way to stay sharp,( ha) take an object from your studio and do ten sketches :10 min.... for me I like being on the sharp end ..so Push pin works..... (STAYING SHARP #1 HERE http://www.drawger.com/billmayer/index.php?article_id=10299) Right brain thinking....So it's a little exercise I started when I was in art school...Doesn't have to be brilliant, just a great way of staying fresh and keeping the ideas flowing. Honestly this little set of drawings only took :10 but then another 20 minutes to scan tham and figure out how to post them....but you get the idea. All Material © Bill Mayer

Pest Planet

When Mathew Willis / Blue Print Partners, Amsterdam called me about working on this project , it was a simple reuse of some illustrations I had for a project with Shaun Hawk, at McCormick. Blue Print is a Public relations firm who were given the task of trying to come up with a brochure to help sway public opinion about pending Euro legislation that would curb pesticide use . It started as a single page comic in the form of a direct mail piece. We went over the project and decided to produce a little underground comic instead. Address the pending legislation, twist the story a little, as rising food cost. Since they didn’t have an art director I assumed that role and along with a writer Robert Roth we adapted the existing bugs and a couple of new ones into a story line . The Bugs would go on an eating holiday across Europe. Although the original copy reflected more of a world domination theme that was a bit scary to the Euro market so the eating holiday won out. Original bug developed for a series of trading cards, promoting Dupont. (Agency: McCormick, Art Director: Shaun Hawk), and then how it was developed into the "Pest Planet" cover. © Bill Mayer 2010 http://drawger.com/billmayer/images/1591741707.jpg page layout, and rough comps. Trying out some different names. Showing how the existing bugs would fit into the drawings. Expiramenting with different variations of names and images for cover illustration. I really liked the idea of "Bugs Life" but kept thinking "This sounds so familiar!" until we remembered the movie of the same name... So we settled on "PEST PLANET." These are low res comps just to give the director an idea of what the cover could look like.. Some of the other possible names for the comic included:BEE-BOY, HONEY BOY, THE BEE’S, B, BUTT MUNCH, BEE-BO, BUGO, BUGGABOO, BUG OFF, BUGGER, CRICKET, TWITTER, CREEPY, CRAWL, SWANK, INSECTO, INSECTO-RAMA, BUG BOY, BUGGY, PESTO, PEEVE, VEX, MICROBBE, BUGO-RAMA, TASTEE WORLD, THE STAND, BUG LAND, BEE-TLE BOY, INSECTIVOR, FUTURAMA, HOUSE AND GARDEN, LADYBUG JOURNAL­. What we were trying to do was create this, kind of, underground comic, that would be something people would find at coffee shops, and sit down and read... Create an awareness of the problems that the rising food costs could create.. Yeah, yeah, I know.. Working for the man...