Welcome to the One Minute Caricature with Jim VanderKyle.
Jim is a graduate of Boston University's School for the Arts and has been a professional
caricaturist since 1980.
He has worked at amusement and theme parks such as Great America, Knott's Berry Farm,
Magic Mountain and Universal Studios Tour in Hollywood.
He has also entertained at parties, conventions and colleges throughout the United States
and Canada and has worked at Walt Disney Pictures' Feature Animation Department.
Let me now introduce you to Jim.
Hi, I'm Jim VanderKyle.
In this video, you will learn some of the secrets of professional caricaturing done
at theme parks, private parties and business conventions.
I'm going to concentrate entirely on the profile quick sketch because I believe this is the
fastest and easiest method to do.
The reason for this approach is that the more cartoons you can draw, the more money you
can make, which is one of the main purposes of this video, applying artistic skill to
earn a living.
You'll end up being the life of the party drawing caricatures whether or not you charge
for it or just want to dazzle your friends and family with your new ability.
I will show you what materials you need to get started, step by step procedures for drawing
the head and body and how to create a funny situation, the gag.
Lastly, I will give you some advice on how to cash in on your newly developed skill.
Okay, what do we need to get started?
The nice thing about caricaturing is that you need only a few supplies.
Great isn't it?
You can turn a small investment like this into a nice tidy profit.
First of all, there's paper.
The kind I use most often is the type you buy at your local printing and paper supply
store.
It's inexpensive and of good quality.
Paper comes in different weights and sizes.
For our purposes, we are going to use 110 pound white index card stock.
It's heavy enough to absorb the marker and durable enough to take some abuse from the
customer.
Pens, the kind I use most often is a design marker, the 229LF with tapered tip.
These can be bought at most art stores.
You get a nice thick and thin quality with a design pen that's hard to find in other
pens.
Now you need a good drawing support.
Get a nice sturdy drawing board like this.
Put a rubber placement on top, staple or tape it down.
This allows for a nice firm cushion for better thick and thin lines.
Slight give of the cushion gives you a nice thin and thick line.
In this section, we will cover the finer points of caricature, proportions of the normal head
versus the caricatured head, and step by step procedure for drawing the fast sketch with
examples of real people and subjects.
Caricature defined in the dictionary is a pictorial representation in which a subject's
distinctive features are deliberately exaggerated or distorted to produce a comic or grotesque
effect.
Now, for our purposes, exaggeration for a grotesque effect will often offend your customer
and ultimately lose you money.
People at parties want to be amused and even flattered, so the trick is to create a comic
effect that stretches the features but does not offend.
Ladies can be especially offended, so be careful with them.
The guys, as a general rule, can take a bit more abuse but still be cautious.
You still have to make a judgment as to how they might react.
You want your subject to laugh at his likeness and not be outraged by it.
It helps to know a little bit about portrait drawing and normal proportions, so I really
recommend a good how-to book on this subject.
Briefly, here's an example of a so-called normal head with average proportions.
Caricature is learning to see where a person's features distort, and you can do this by comparing
them to this head.
Now, the eyes are about halfway between the top of the head and the bottom of the chin.
The nose ends up being between the eyebrow line and the bottom of the chin.
The mouth, where the two lips are separated, are about a third from the bottom of the nose
to the bottom of the chin.
The ear placement is approximately halfway between the front of the head to the back
of the head.
A lot of times, beginners make the mistake of making the ear too far into the back of
the head, so you need to leave enough room for the back of the head in order to make
a correct proportion drawing.
With this particular face, which we are going to compare with the normal head, we're going
to find how the proportions are different.
You're going to see that the top of the head is extended compared with the bottom of the
chin, which is a little bit more squashed.
We're going to see that the nose is also a little bit larger than the normal nose.
The proportions of the mouth right here is also a lot different than you would find in
a normal head.
Also the placement of the ear is a little bit further back because of the squash of
the skull.
When looking at a subject, I want you to look for the squash and stretch of the features.
Sum the subject up in your mind before you begin to draw, and notice the overall shape
of the head and how all the features relate to each other.
Try to make them into some kind of design.
The person may remind you of some animal, or you might get some other strong impressions.
The point is to be conscious of what you see before you begin to draw.
Now I will demonstrate the step-by-step procedure for drawing the profile sketch.
This formula is time tested and will enable you to complete a caricature head in about
30 seconds, only after lots of practice.
Don't be afraid to go back to this section and play it over and over again until you
get it right.
Okay, the procedure goes something like this.
We're going to start with the nose, into the mouth, teeth, inside of mouth, lower lip,
chin, and we have the bottom half of the face.
Now you go into the eyes next, eyebrows, forehead, hair, hairline, ear, jawline, and the rest
of the hair.
Let me repeat that for you once again.
Start with the nose, to the mouth, back to the chin, into the eyes, eyebrows, forehead,
hair, ear, jaw, and the back of the head.
There's a definite method to this formula.
You have to start out at this point, do the nose, into the mouth, chin, go back into the
eyes, eyebrow, work your way up to the top, and do the rest of the head and ear.
If you constantly do this often enough times, this is where the speed will come in.
Now I'm going to draw a generic woman in one motion.
Let's go over the component parts in detail.
The nose is usually done in about two to three strokes.
You have upturned noses, bumpy noses, larger nostrils, very extended large noses, very
angular noses, all kinds of noses.
Usually you want to do it in two to three strokes.
The mouth is done in about three or five strokes.
What you do is you start with the upper lip, draw the lip line, lower lip, and go right
into the chin.
Here's an example of a mouth that's open.
Draw the lip line here, maybe add a little shadow in the corner.
Draw the teeth inside of the mouth, lower lip, and into the chin again.
If you want someone with slightly larger teeth, draw that lip line, shadow, bring the teeth
out a little bit, lower lip back.
Someone who has slightly larger lips would look like this.
I'm going to add a second line in there and a large lower lip.
Be conscious of the form of the lips.
You have to actually feel that your pen, again, is on the surface of the skin.
That helps you describe the form much better and you get a more convincing feel of the
form that you're trying to draw.
The eyes will take about six to seven strokes.
What we're going to do is start with the top of the eye, which is the top eyelid, the eyeball
itself, the pupil, maybe a little shadow in here, and the top eyelid, and go right into
the eyebrow right after that.
Different types of eyes include, let's say, a larger eyelid on top here, pupil, and eyebrow.
A woman's eye would look something like this.
What you want to do is make it more feminine looking, more glamorous, thicker eyelashes
a little longer, and thinner eyebrows usually.
Some people have very protruding eyes, so you might want to do something like this.
Be very careful and conscious of the types of eyes that are out there.
Don't make them all the same.
Now, what's going on with the subject in front of you, and describe that form as best as
possible.
Squinting eyes, people who are laughing a lot.
It looks something like this.
That's all there is to it.
If you have someone laughing, it gives a nice feel to it.
Older people usually have their eyes closed like that when they laugh.
There's a lot of wrinkles.
If you're going to be drawing wrinkles on older people, don't go overboard with them,
just a few here and there just to give the indication of age.
Next is the hair.
The first thing we want to be conscious of when we're drawing the hair is the actual
shape of the hair, which includes the shape of the head.
Now, in a man, let's say the shape of the head might come to a point like this.
You have your ear here, and you want to keep this constantly in mind while you're drawing.
As you're drawing, you're feeling that hair and trying to actually almost like combing
it and nice fast short strokes for people with shorter hair.
You got to really get a real rhythm going here.
Hair is not easy to do.
Here's another example.
A man with short hair.
Here's the ear.
Okay.
Of course, here would be the face.
On a woman's hair, for instance, you want to get a real... Someone has long hair.
You want to get a real feeling of the rhythm.
Let's see here.
Different types of hair for women.
Curly hair here.
A little feather touch, but as you see, you get the feel for the strokes, the rhythm of
the hair.
Try to get that texture.
If you have a bald-headed person, here's the top of his head.
Here's his nose.
Place the ear.
Give yourself a landmark to go to.
Let's say his head, his hair is going to be lying somewhere like this.
He's got maybe some sideburns.
Put his hair in like this.
Few straggling hairs.
That's how you can draw a bald person.
Now, what about facial hair?
Okay.
If we're going to be drawing someone's beard, again, you have to look for the design.
Let's say this person had a beard.
What's the shape of the beard?
Basically, let's say it's going to look something like that.
You keep that in mind while you're drawing.
With simple strokes, depending on which way the beard is going, it could be going this
way, just draw it in with nice, definite stroke lines.
Go back and fill in some of the gaps if you have to.
There you have a beard.
Very simple.
Let's try that again.
Someone's nose, face, ear.
You got the mouth.
It looks something like this.
That's how you would draw a beard.
The ear, a very simple shape.
Basically get that oval shape like this and draw the inside of the ear.
It's two or three strokes, not much.
There's different shapes of ears.
There's very long ears.
Do it something like that.
Very small ears.
Not too hard to figure out.
Sometimes people come by and say, hey, why did you put a two in the middle of my ear
for?
Okay, now that we've seen the formula, let's put it all together with a live subject.
We'll start with John.
Hi, Jim.
Hi, John.
Okay, the thing I noticed with John, I guess, was we're going to emphasize is his hair,
the shape of his nose and his eyes.
Okay, we're going to start with the nose, the shape of the nostril, upper lip.
Smile, John.
Side of the mouth, chin, and the eyes.
Two eyelashes here and there, eyebrows are rather close to the top lid, forehead, and
the hair.
Keep the hair nice and loose.
Notice the shape of the hairline.
And here's the ear, jawline, and the back of the head.
And there you go.
Okay, thanks a lot, John.
Let me introduce you to Chris.
Come on, Chris, have a seat right up here.
And look straight ahead against that wall, okay?
Now with kids, we're going to be paying careful attention to the shape of the head.
There's going to be a much larger forehead and back of the head, and the area around
the mouth and the chin are very squashed in comparison with an adult.
So here we go.
Try to pretend that your pen is right on the surface of the skin.
You want to be thinking cute the whole time.
Go for some nice large eyes to emphasize the cuteness.
And maybe some eyelashes in there.
Kids usually don't have heavy eyebrows, so you don't want to emphasize the eyebrows too
much.
Nice big forehead, hairline, ear, a little cowlick in the back there.
And he has a special haircut, so we're going to try to emphasize that.
There we go.
Chris, thanks a lot.
Let me now introduce you to Laurel.
Hi Laurel.
Okay.
Now with adult female heads, we're going to emphasize the eyes, obviously the eyelashes
in this case and the long hair.
And with Laurel, I think we're going to try to emphasize the nose.
We've got a nice sweep of the nose that we're going to try to capture.
Okay, here's the nose, lips.
Try to put a smile on your subject, even though they don't smile because you want to make
them look good.
You got to try to think all the time, glamour, beauty.
He's got nice blue eyes, so we're going to leave this area lighter.
Leave it blank.
Capture the shape of that eyebrow, top lid.
Her hair is falling very flat on her face, so you want to make sure you recapture that.
Get a real feel for that hair, nice long strokes.
And she has a few freckles, and we're going to put those in as a finishing touch.
Okay, thank you Laurel.
All right, let me introduce you now to Nicolette.
Have a seat.
Okay.
Now with children, again, you want to emphasize the cuteness of the figure.
She's a little bit older than her previous subject, so we're going to try to capture
a little bit more maturity in the face.
Okay, let's start with the nose, nice small nose, and smiling.
There you go.
Notice the cheeks coming out a little bit.
Eyelashes.
And on little girls, you want to emphasize the eyelashes.
Eyebrows.
Notice the shape of the hair.
You want to capture the shape of the hair.
Try to get that feathered look to it.
Nice loose strokes.
It's the only way to capture hair.
Again a few finishing touches, and we're finished.
Thank you Nicolette.
Now I'm going to show you some additional faces from photographs.
Okay, for this character, what I'm going to try to determine is the whole shape of the
face along with the hat.
The nose should be emphasized, the shape of the mouth and the heavy eyebrows along with
the tilt of the ear.
So nice big nose.
And lips.
Teeth.
Lips.
He's got a very small chin, a little bit squashed.
The mustache.
Moustaches are real great because they add character to a face.
And smiling eyes.
Nice thick eyebrows.
Glasses, done in one motion.
And let's go for the ear right around here.
Get that in right away.
Now he doesn't have much hair so what we might want to do is just put a few dots here, indicate
that he has some hair.
If you're doing hats you might want to tilt the paper just a bit and try to get that in
one motion like that.
Cleaner the line the better it'll look.
And this also done in one motion.
Make sure that overlaps the skull.
Put a few dots for hair.
And a few extra little details put in, show some age there.
And we're all set.
Okay with this face what I think we're going to do is try to exaggerate the shape of the
hair, the eyes, and maybe the nose.
And obvious cheek line here we can pick that out too.
So be conscious of the whole shape of the head.
This is going to be a little difficult.
Little lip hand right on the surface of the skin.
Can notice the lips and chin kind of extending out this way.
Cheek bone.
And the eyes are rather pushed forward.
This is typical of an oriental face.
You have to really be careful of how the features are all positioned on the facial plane.
And now we go into the hair.
Keep the hair simple.
Taking of the whole shape as you go.
Few touch ups.
And there you go.
Now we're going to draw a baby.
Babies are very difficult to do unless you pay close attention to the form.
We're doing an adult, compared to an adult head, the baby's head is a lot more compressed
from the eyeball down.
The jaw apparently has not grown and so there's very little growth there.
So what we're going to do is exaggerate the forehead mostly and the cuteness of the eyes.
Okay so here we go.
We're going to draw a nice small nose.
And then we're going to draw this cheek line which is very delicate.
Lips.
This goes almost straight across.
Emphasize the eyes.
This is a girl so we might want to put a few eyelashes on there.
Nice round forehead.
Now with babies it's a good idea to place the ear so you have a place to go to with
your pen when you're doing the hairline.
Then with hair try to capture the texture of it.
When you're mind, know where you're going to go with the pen.
So make a little, if you have to make a little dot here so that you know where that pen is
going to end up or else sometimes you're going to end up with a very very squashed back of
the head.
So you notice with babies that they have a very large area back here that you want to
emphasize.
Okay so we're going to come over here, a few extra hairs and nice round strokes.
Two touch ups and we got your basic baby.
Now also what I want to emphasize is the fact of the way a baby's cheek goes.
What you need to do is be aware that there's sort of an oval or a circle in this area of
the chin or the cheek area and jaw and that the eye rests on that circle to give you an
idea of how this construction goes.
And if you've got some kind of round form going here you know you're doing pretty well.
Keep the nose small.
Sometimes you'll notice that there's a large gap between because the cheek overlaps the
mouth area that you want to make sure that you have this gap in there.
Bring the lip down and small chin and having this go back this way.
Okay.
Now with this subject I'm going to emphasize the shape of the cranium and of course we're
going to accentuate some of the wrinkles, the smile, the mustache and the squinty eyes
and the longer ears.
I think that when people get older their ears still grow.
I think that's the reason why you're seeing older people their ears.
So we're going to exaggerate that point.
Okay we've got a nice good shape for a nose.
Okay and what I'm going to do is draw the smile and lightly indicate the mustache like
this to show that there's not much color into it.
Okay and we got a nice little round ball for a chin, a little jawline and squinty eyes,
rose feet, a little bit of an eyebrow and now we're going to draw the cranium.
I'm going to try to do that in one sweeping motion so you have to know where you're going
to end up.
Why don't we put the ear in to give us some kind of guideline and put a few little marks
in here to help us see where we're going to end up.
Okay so ready?
Pretend that your pen is right on the surface.
Okay so we've got a nice shape to that.
Now we're going to indicate some of the hair that's inside.
Okay and a few up here.
Okay a little touch up strokes and we're all done.
Okay now with this subject what I want to do is accent the long shape and also how all
the features are sort of pushed to the front.
Everything seems to be on a vertical plane.
Okay so we're going to start off with the nose and it's not a very big nose.
Teeth, chin.
Now his cheekbone is pretty high up there so we'd like to emphasize that.
Eyes.
Nice dark eyebrows.
And the forehead.
So you notice how everything is pretty much on this vertical line.
Now we'll do the hair.
Be conscious of the hair design.
Ear.
Jaw line.
And the back of the head.
And you want to feel the form of the cranium inside the hair.
Okay just a few little touch ups.
In this section I will break down the procedure for drawing the several bodies used in the
quick sketch caricature.
The face should take about 20 to 30 seconds and then the body itself should take only
around 10 to 15 seconds.
Bear in mind that this can be accomplished only after plenty of practice.
To get this fast the body is reduced to its most economical means.
The simpler the drawing the faster you can go and the more readable it is.
The goal here is for communication.
You don't need a lot of detail like watches and buttons.
This only slows you down.
If it reads as a body then you've done your job.
The bodies are rather difficult to get a feeling for so you need to practice and fill up pages
and pages of bodies until you get it right.
I recommend that you slow down the tape and analyze the strokes to get a better feel of
the process.
Practice until it becomes second nature.
There are only a handful of bodies used in the one minute caricature.
The most basic figure used is the seated figure which can be converted to a running figure
by adding a second leg.
Now it's a good idea to understand the basic structure of a body.
When you draw you are thinking of this underlying structure to give more convincing form.
Otherwise it will just be a tangle of lines that won't read well as a cartoon.
Think of the body as a bean shape with cylinders for legs and arms.
The final product will be flatter or more two dimensional but you still get a feeling
of the three dimensions if you keep these forms in mind.
Now I'll show you the procedure for drawing the body.
We're going to start out with the arm and hands, shirt line, stomach, back and the leg.
I'll do that again for you.
Get the nice arch of the back and the leg.
Different ways to treat the leg and feet you can do it this way.
In one stroke or you can just do a little loop at the end to indicate the foot.
There's also a different way to treat the arm.
You put that little thumb up there.
That's an extra way of treating the hand.
Now if you want to do a running figure all we have to do is add the second leg.
There you go.
You have your running figure.
You're going to use these two bodies interchangeably and throughout your whole performance when
you go out to do these functions.
There's your second leg, second leg all in one motion.
Okay, to break it down and go a little bit slower here's a process for just doing the
arm and hand.
I'm going to do that shirt line.
Maybe three or four fingers if you want.
You can also do it this way.
Put that thumb up there.
Might be useful in some situations where he's holding something.
But basically all you need to do is have this general character.
You have to practice this a lot because this is a very difficult feeling to get going with.
Once you've got the arm and hand you want to start into the stomach area.
So it's just a little curve right here.
Get the back of the back right there with the arch and that's all you have to do for
the body.
Just make sure that you have this type of curve to it.
Gives more of a feeling of a body that way rather than just having it straight up and
down.
And then when you're doing the feet and the legs what you want to do is do it in one motion.
That will indicate the pants or just the leg and you draw the foot that way.
And then when adding the second foot very definite lines and then you have the running
figure.
Another way of drawing the running figure very fast if you can practice this.
Let's say you have the body and you try to do it in one motion.
You get that feeling.
This can go real fast if you can practice this.
It's a little bit sloppier.
But again it reads as a cartoon, it reads as someone running.
Okay that's basically it for the running and seated figure.
Now standing figure is basically the same as the seated figure except what we're going
to do is lower the legs a little bit.
Shoelaces.
I'll do that again for you.
If you want them facing forward a little bit more you can handle it this way.
Very simple.
Might want to have the hands out here.
But basically you want to have this kind of line of action or curve to it.
So you draw the body.
Try to do it in one motion.
As you see it's very simple.
Reads as a cartoon, reads as a body and that's what you need.
That's the most important thing.
In some cases we want the figure to be kicking something.
So I will show you what a kicking figure would look like.
Basically okay we'll have the body like this and we're going to pull that leg out straight,
bend the foot back like that.
If he's a soccer player put a little mark like that.
A little speed lines and there you have the kicking body.
Do that again.
Pull it straight out.
Put a little shadow under there and some speed lines.
Sometimes you'll need the figure to be swinging golf clubs or baseball bats so I'm going to
show you how to do that.
Start out with the arm first.
Then go into the body just the way you would with the running figure.
Let's say it's a baseball bat.
Add the second hand here.
There you have a swinging figure.
Add your speed lines and you're all set.
Let's say for instance it's a tennis racket.
Same thing.
Instead of putting the second arm up that way just have it down here.
And swing in a tennis racket.
I'll do it one more time for you.
Bring the arm out.
Legs.
Second arm here and your speed lines.
There you go.
Now there are several types of female bodies.
What I'm going to show you first is converting the regular running body into a female figure.
Basically all you're doing is adding a little bit more curves and female anatomy to it.
And you have the female figure.
This arch of the back.
And you have the female figure.
There's different variations now.
What you want to do is point the toes so it will have the same top half.
But add the point of toes.
It gives it a little bit more of a feminine touch to it.
Seated figure.
Say for instance you're doing a secretary.
Put her in a skirt.
You have the chair under here.
That's how we would draw a female figure sitting down with her toes pointed for that extra
feminine feeling.
Now for one of our more popular items we're going to draw the beach body.
Now this goes over real well with the ladies.
If you say they like the suntan, well this is how we do it.
Okay and that's basically it for the beach body.
So break it down a little bit.
We've got that right shoulder.
Down to the stomach area.
Legs.
Now you have to keep in mind the whole shape of the body when you're drawing the legs,
torso and chest.
So you have to practice these bodies quite a bit before you get it down right.
People start out doing these bodies you get these really weird proportions.
Especially if you want to do them fast.
There's a tendency to distort a little bit more.
For instance here.
Just thin waist, belly button, chest, arms and hand.
Keep a nice flow to it.
Keep in mind the whole shape of the body while you're drawing.
The best way to do this is to practice over and over and over again.
It takes hundreds and hundreds of these to get this figure right.
Okay the ladies like to dance quite a bit so we'll give you a dancing body to work with.
Start out with a more frontal view.
Draw a little skirt here.
Legs and the arms outstretched.
Again you just want to get a feeling for the arms and hands.
You don't want to get too detailed with it.
Practice as long as it reads as a cartoon.
Reads as a body that's all you care about.
Little speed lines to show motion and you have a dancing body.
We'll do that again.
Accent the butt a little bit there.
Legs.
Here's another variation on the hands.
You might want to throw in a necklace.
A little cleavage maybe and you have a dancing body.
One more time for you.
Body and waist, curvy figure, pointed toes, high heels.
And have the arms taper towards the slender wrist.
Don't have the arms going out like this.
Have them come to a little point like this and then draw the hands.
And with the feet, straight line here.
It's basically this kind of action.
Here's the calf and here's the thigh.
When we're doing people who have an overweight body, you want to be careful so that you don't
offend him or her.
So we're going to do this very delicately.
When we're adding weight to a character, you do the same procedure but you just slightly
add a little bit more weight.
Don't get too carried away.
You might not have any friends later on.
Sometimes you might be able to get away with a very grotesque body.
It depends on the sense of humor of your subject.
If you were to draw the beach body slightly plump, just widen the proportions a bit.
Get those curves in.
And I don't think you'll get into trouble with any of this.
Okay we're going to draw some children's bodies.
Keep in mind that when you're drawing a child's body that the proportions are a little bit
smaller and a little bit plumper.
Not quite as plump as the fat people.
Right like this.
It also depends on how you draw it in relationship to the head.
Here's a skateboard here.
Draw the girls, says she's a ballerina dancer.
Basic same body as the female except that we're going to have a young girl's proportions
and anatomy.
Okay we'll draw the girl for you again.
This could be a dancing body whether she's jazz dancing, ballet.
Just try to capture and get a feeling for that cute small proportions that the child
has.
If you keep that in mind you really can't go wrong.
When we're drawing babies we're going to get real small.
The proportions are going to be very small.
We're going to get that feeling of baby here if we can try to do that.
Here's a baby crawling.
The arch of the back here.
Or if a baby's sitting down all the proportions are much, much smaller.
Okay let's say he's sitting on something.
Let's try that crawling figure again so that you can take a look at it.
Arm out there like that.
One motion here for the arch of the back and the butt.
He's got a shirt on let's say and the other knee.
Get that idea of crawling.
It might not be perfect anatomically but we get the feeling that there's a crawling baby
here and that's what you need.
In this section you will learn how to draw the different components that go into a gag,
what makes a gag funny and lastly a parade of 30 or so gags for you to use as a beginning
arsenal when you go out to perform at your functions.
In a caricature it could be funny enough just to have a big head and a little body but to
really go over big you need a gag.
Sometimes when the likeness is really weak because the face has no outstanding features
you can make up for it by a great gag situation.
You need to learn how to draw props and accessories to help create the gag.
Think of props as silhouettes or profiles with a few interior details put in.
Just draw the outline and add the rest in.
To explain this a little bit further here you have the silhouette.
Let's say you have a tennis racket.
You have the outline of the silhouette and then the interior details put in.
Here's a beer mug.
Here's the silhouette of it just an outline and the interior details.
This whole process is basically what you're going to be thinking of when you're drawing
all these extra objects that go into your gag.
To show you what that would look like as a drawing for instance let's draw a sports car.
You have your figure in the sports car like this and to draw it nice and fast.
More doorknobs, some speed lines, smoke and you're all done.
Let's say he's thinking of beer.
You're thinking of that whole profile or outline and draw the interior details.
Let's see let's try a computer monitor.
Keep a nice steady line on the paper, nice bold strokes and you have a computer.
A person seeing himself playing his favorite sport will find the caricature funny because
he can relate to it.
If he never played tennis he cannot identify with the picture.
So learn how to draw all kinds of objects and make your subject happy.
I'm going to draw a baseball player with a baseball bat.
Very quickly and you can see how quickly that's done.
Very simple shape, nice bold outline.
Then let's say for instance holding a rifle.
Nice and quickly bold lines.
Simplify all the shapes.
Use the thickness of the pen to create shadows.
Use the thick and thin wherever necessary.
And let's see a little extra detail put them in compact fatigues.
Very simple.
Alright let's say we're drawing a nurse.
She's holding a needle and we're going to make that needle very large.
Adds to the whole comic effect.
Draw nice bold lines.
Thin line there.
These are thin lines here, the other hand.
You have a nurse with a needle.
You might want to practice your pen strokes when you're drawing straight lines.
Don't spend all day doing these kind of things.
Trying to get a nice even tone to it.
Try to draw light lines.
Thin lines, slightly darker.
Thick and thin.
These all will help you when you're drawing these props and figures to make them more
convincing and add some aesthetics to your drawing.
Signs and thought bubbles are very useful for gag situations and are very easy to draw.
Thought bubbles can easily be done with a circle or you can do the cloud effect.
There you go.
Try to put yourself in the customer's shoes and imagine what he might think of or where
he may be headed and write it in.
Boy girl themes are one of the best to use because they always go over big.
When you're stuck for a gag, throw in the opposite sex.
You really can't go wrong most of the time.
Draw a little heart to go along with it.
Now we'll draw the sexy girl in the background.
She'll be something like this.
Same beach body that we used before.
Make sure that you get all the nice curves in there.
Just a slightly smaller version of the beach body that we did before.
To continue along with the person peeking over this, whatever you call this thing over
here we don't know yet.
Very simple.
Try to keep it as simple as possible and don't get into too much detail.
Don't forget the heart.
For a guy, there's different ways of drawing a guy.
Do whatever you like.
Simplest is just having two dots for eyes.
You can have the tongue hanging out if you'd like.
There you go.
Just keep it very, very simple.
You want to go fast with these so you don't spend too much time with it.
If you want it to make it look like somebody, let's say she has a boyfriend and the boyfriend
has a mustache.
Well, all you've got to do is put a little mustache on it.
If his name is Bob, call him Bob.
Violent, painful or tragic themes are funny too, like a skier going off a cliff, getting
hit with a ball, or missing a putt.
Don't forget your cartoon accessories like music notes, speed lines, sweat, sound effects,
reflections.
You can get a lot of these ideas from just newspapers and comic strips.
Next, I'll show you around 30 or so examples of gags for you to look at.
Freeze the picture with your VCR if you can and take a closer look.
Hope you enjoyed.
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bodies and heads. The more confidence you can get, the faster you're going to go. So
to shave off seconds in your sketch, have a firm idea of how you want to exaggerate
the head and pick out the features you want to emphasize. As you start to finish the head,
ask the person for his favorite sport or hobby. This way you can jump right into the gag without
any delay. As you are finishing the gag portion, ask the name of your subject so that you can
write it down without delay. The whole idea is to keep your pen moving. Hi. Hi. Okay,
just look straight ahead please. Do you have any favorite sports or hobbies? I like to
go to the beach. The beach? Okay. And what's your name? Laurel. How do you spell that,
Laurel? L-A-U-R-E-L. Mm-hmm. Okay, so I'm going to start with the head. So I'm going
to start with the head. Thanks, Laurel. A few seconds here and there really pay off
when you count on being paid by the piece. It could mean the difference of ten or so
drawings per hour, and that could add up to quite a few dollars. Now that you've learned
these skills, how do you go about earning some money? Caricatures offer the unique opportunity
to earn cash and lots of it. Yes, you could create a living from it, as many artists have,
and it's up to you as to how much money you want to earn. It can be a profitable part-time
business in addition to your nine-to-five job, or you can go at it full-time. In this section,
I'm going to show you the different ways of applying the art of quick caricature to several
markets. First and most common are parties. Parties for businesses or private clients
are bread and butter income. Types of parties include bar mitzvahs, birthdays, wedding receptions,
Christmas parties, or anything else the client can think of. Businesses will have you at
their company picnic or annual Christmas gigs. Here's a typical setup for a party. You need
a small table and two chairs near an outlet for the light, your drawing board, paper,
and pens. Your party guests will sit opposite you facing to the side to allow for the profile
sketch. How do you get your jobs? Like any business, you must advertise, so get business
cards and make up brochures to send out. Tell the world you're in business. Advertising
in the Yellow Pages is an excellent idea, as well as local magazines. Print up invoices
and contracts. The more professional you are, the more work you will get. And then, after
a while, just the word of mouth should sustain your business. Talk to your local caterer
or party planner. Maybe you can cut a deal and give them a percentage of the parties
referred to you. They usually will know where they are. When you charge your client, charge
by the hour and not by how many you do. And don't ever accept a job where they want you
to charge each guest. That kind of situation never really works out for you or your client.
Conventions are great. Sometimes companies will even fly you out and you get to do a
little traveling. Basically, conventions use the same setup as private parties. You may
want to target your advertising to only businesses that will be at your nearest convention center.
You can get a list of these clients from the center itself. Again, once the word gets out
through distributing business cards at these functions and by word of mouth, you will acquire
more and more work and then be on your way. Art fairs and theme parks require a retail
capability. You need a cash box or register and a booth or portable setup. You must have
signs with samples and prices, bags for merchandise and various other things to keep you in business
for your stay. You can get a list of arts and craft fairs in your area from your art
supply stores. It's usually a newsletter or magazine that specializes in such things or
at the back of major art magazines like American Artist under art fairs. Once you find your
location, apply for a space. There's usually a fee and a percentage of the profits. Sometimes
they appear in malls, so don't forget the mall as a likely place to sell your wares,
especially around Christmas time. Also try boat and auto shows or just about any trade
show. These can be great markets too. For more permanent setups, you might want to do
business at vacation resorts and amusement parks. There may be someone already there,
so you might want to apply for a job and get some experience or find your own theme park
and create your own business. If the attendance is great, the profits will be tremendous.
Your setup is going to be more permanent in these cases, so it's a good idea to use an
overhead projector or video camera and monitor like they do at this major theme park. It
allows for your guests to see what's going on and serves as great advertising as well
as entertainment while they wait. Well, it's time to come to a close. It's up to you to
practice as much as possible to perfect your technique and develop your own personal style.
You may want to take some extra drawing classes to help you draw better. Practice working
with photographs first. Then you may want to work your way up to live subjects like
your friends and family and get some feedback. When you're confident enough, try booking
yourself a party. Do it for free. This way you can avoid the pressure of being paid because
it can be quite nerve wracking. When you feel that you can give a client his money's worth,
that's when you should charge. Well, whatever you do, I hope this video has helped you to
learn to draw caricatures and get you started earning some extra cash. So have fun with
it and good luck.