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Mid-century art to the rescue: 15 resources to get inspired and learn how to draw the 50's way
My last post about vim has drawn some fuss and wondering . It was nice and all, until a guy told me: “Hey! Funny mspaint drawing!”… Alright, listen: they’re NOT mspaint drawings! I DO NOT use Microsoft Windows and I swear I did them with a real pen on a real sheet of paper :’(
Being the passionate I am, I decided to learn how to draw because It’s never too late for new year resolutions. And I decided to learn this the 50’s way. Why? Because, if you’re looking for great artists, look first at the American mid-century ones. Remember those vintage ads? Comics? See those cartoons? Yes! What a quality! This is art!
So for my learning, I collected some nice links on the web that I’d like to share with you. I Hope they’ll please you and that it will save you hours of googling If you, too, want to learn how to draw like Blair Peterson.
1# The $100,000 Animation Drawing Course
You can go to animation school, spend a $100,000 and not learn a damn thing about the basics of good animation drawing- OR you can buy a Preston Blair book for $8 and learn it all in a couple months. You pick.
With some reproduction of the Blair Peterson’s Animation book, this website offers a free 10 lessons course. Simple, clear and very nice!
2# John Kricfalusi’s blog
John Kricfalusi revolutionized television animation- first with Ralph Bakshi on “Mighty Mouse: The New Adventures”, and then on “The Ren & Stimpy Show. He went on to pioneer Flash animation with the first internet cartoon series, “The Goddamn George Liquor Program”. John has done extensive research into the techniques and processes of the golden age cartoons, and he is sharing his knowledge on his blog,
A wonderful blog with lots of detailed examples, theory and practice.
3# TICK TOCK TOYS
Lots of gorgeous vintage drawings listed in categories. Don’t miss the Ray Patin’s Studios collection !
4# CARTOON MODERN
A blog and a book by Amid Amidi of the “cartoonbrew” in which the author studies fine 50’s cartoons by authors from Bernyce Polifka to Vic Haboush
5# Today’s Inspiration
The is the greatest blog we know about mid-century illustrations, it’s maintained and updated on a daily basis by the unbelievable illustrator Leif Peng with interviews, pieces of histoty, studies, rare pictures and many many nice things! Chapeau Leif!
6# Plan 59
a family-friendly Web site dedicated to the commercial art of mid-century America. Very, very inspiring! Beauty at its best.
7# Retro Kid
A great collection by people interested in illustrated children’s books from the mid-1940’s through the mid-1960’s, give or take a few years. As long as it has that cool, mid-century modern stylized look that was so popular during that time.
8# Leif Peng sets on flickr
This is just BIG! Wonder how this guy managed to collect and organize by author such jewels! He posts daily with amazing bios and commentary on the golden-age illustrators. I love his Naiad & Walter Einsel’s set
9# Mid-century Illustrated
A huge pool on flickr with 3338 (and counting) contributions to a collection that aims to gather anything illustrated for any audience from the period spanning 1945-1965 (with a little latitude on either end).
10# Julia’s Vintage Kid
Julia loves anything that is vintage. Take a look at her vintage kid collection. Colorful and Very inspiring!
11# Vintage Childrens Books
Over than 5122 contribution in this group for sharing images from vintage children books and other items for children (like cards, games, posters, etc.)
12# Ward Jenkin’s Old Things
Ward Jenkins is a great designer who shares on flickr some of his loved mid-century illustrations. Check out his blog too!
13# Drawn!
Drawn! is a multi-author blog devoted to illustration, art, cartooning and drawing. Its purpose is to inspire creativity by sharing links and resources.
14# “The Hard-to-find Ray Patin’s Studios work”
I discovered Ray Patin’s Studios work recently and I love it! This one is my favorite! Too bad their work is really hard to find. Happily, the folks over the animations archive give us some of his works:
15# Tack’s Cartoon Tips for the aspiring cartoonist
This is a little book by “Tack” B. Knight, that David Blog (Yes “Blog” is his real name) bought at an estate sale. It was from the library of a magazine illustrator. The copyright dates it to 1923. He scanned it and posted it on flickr. Advice: get all the pics while they last and print them! :)
Well… That’s it, I hope you’ll enjoy these links that took me time to find and organize. Please tell us about your own findings :)
P.S. Please, bear with me on my poor English, if you notice any error please report it to me and I’ll correct it and btw improve my English which is my 4th langage
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Comment [2]
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— admin · Jan 20, 09:54 PM · #
Hey! I didn’t expected such a visit! Thank you Ward! How have you found this website? :)
Thank you for the clarification about the Ray Patin’s Studios, I’ll correct this right now.
In fact, I’m always hungry for these kind of illustrations. I was about to use some of those I’ve found on your flickr sets but I didn’t, fearing that you won’t be ok.
Please let us know if you have some Ray Patin’s Studios, Byrdes or similar work.
Thanks again! :)
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