That’s right. Adobe’s at it again. It’s upgrade time! You may wanna rethink that Christmas list. Feel like screaming? You better scream! This is so wrong! It’s too soon! Most of us are still working the kinks outta CS4! Hell, I know a dozen people who are still learning CS3! Somebody should do something! We gotta stop these maniacs!!!

Wait..

This Photoshop CS5 video… its… so… COOOOOOOOL! Look at those FEATURES!!

April is too far away! I want it NOW! Where’s the Beta? WHERE IS IT?!!!

E.C. Segar, the man behind Popeye the Sailor, received an appropriately raucous birthday message from Google Tuesday. Its home page features the husky hero smacking around Google’s logo and about to swallow a quick serving of his favorite meal, canned spinach.

Today marks what would be the American cartoonist’s 115th birthday.

Elzie Crisler Segar was born and raised in Chester, Illinois, a small town near the Mississippi River. The son of a handyman, his earliest work experiences included assisting his father in house painting and paper hanging. Skilled at playing drums, he also provided musical accompaniment to films and vaudeville acts in the local theater, where he was eventually given the job of film projectionist. At age 18, he decided to become a cartoonist. He took a correspondence course in cartooning from W.L. Evans of Cleveland, Ohio. He said that after work he “lit up the oil lamps about midnight and worked on the course until 3am.”

Segar moved to Chicago where he met Richard F. Outcault, creator of The Yellow Kid and Buster Brown. Outcault encouraged him and introduced him at the Chicago Herald. On March 12, 1916, the Herald published Segar’s first comic, Charlie Chaplin’s Comedy Capers, which ran for a little over a year. In 1918, he moved on to William Randolph Hearst’s Chicago Evening American where he created Looping the Loop. Segar married Myrtle Johnson that year; they had two children.

Segar eventually created the Thimble Theatre cartoon strip in 1919. After nearly 10 years of Olive Oyl and others gracing its panels, the series introduced a new character – a balding sailor with an eye patch, anchor tattoos, preposterous forearms, and a curious vocabulary.

Popeye soon outgrew the Thimble Theatre, earning his own cartoon strip, animated series, and live-action movie starring Robin Williams.

After prolonged illness, Segar died in 1938 of liver disease at the age of 43. Segar’s longtime assistant, Bud Sagendorf, took over the strip and continued it for two years.

In 1971, the National Cartoonists Society created the Elzie Segar Award in his honor. According to the Society’s web site, the award “was presented to a person who has made a unique and outstanding contribution to the profession of cartooning.”

So Happy Birthday, Elzie. We’ll all be celebrating your life over a can of spinach tonight.

I’m not a big Powerpoint fan (Keynote is my app of choice) , but I’ve discovered that without design discipline, any product, including a PPT file, can be a recipe for disaster. Nothing kills a buzz like a poorly designed slide with too much crap in it. To help a fellow colleague, I’ve posted some info that may help “would-be speakers” avoid the common pitfalls of a slideshow that sucks. Here are a few scary examples of PowerPoint design gone awry:

And, finally, the man himself, Mr. Bill, wins my award for Worst PowerPoint Presentation EVER. Not very comforting from the company that actually invented the product! Check out THESE puppies:

Still holding down your lunch? Good for you! Now let’s get down to brass tacks. You need to recognize the problem before you get caught up in it. Watch this slideshow from Ham Diyon for the “DON’TS” of a Powerpoint prez. Hope it helps!

No, I’m not cussing you out. I’m simply telling you the name of a cool iPhone app called WhatTheFont, that allows you to identify fonts and typefaces using your iPhone camera. It’s a simple app, and even simpler to operate.

See a font you like, but can’t identify it? No problem. Take a picture of it with your trusty iPhone, and WhatTheFont will identify the font in seconds. Read the rest of this entry »

Recently, I saw a TV commercial that starred The Beatles. Not the two remaining members, but all four, walking across the Abbey Road intersection. It was a spot promoting The Beatles:Rock Band for PS3 and X-Box 360. I must admit it was a little creepy, seeing all those people interacting with the fab four in St. John’s Wood, London, as if it were some sort of Back to the Future sequel. Nevertheless, it’s still a cool commercial.

It got me thinking, though. I’ve always been curious about the Abbey Road shoot. It’s so plain, yet so famous. That little casual stroll across the street became one of the most famous photographs in history. I wonder, did they plan that shot? As a graphic designer, I have to question the concept behind it, but after researching the session, I found it was even more interesting than I thought. I wonder if The Beatles knew, that on Friday the 8th of August, 1969, they were not simply shooting another album cover, they were making history and adding another tourist attraction to London. Read the rest of this entry »

Just got back from the Miami Book Fair International, and I wanted to plug an excellent website for products used in creating comics. I’ve been drawing all my life and I know how tough it is to find supplies that get the job done right. Canson is an all-in-one resource for all things comic related.

Fanboy, Canson’s line of comic and manga papers, offers exceptional benefits to both experienced illustrators and those just starting off. Canson has been manufacturing paper since 1557, using the finest fibers and purest water in mills dedicated to creating art papers.

Fanboy™ Papers are offered in industry standard sizes for comic strips, comic book pages and covers and manga pages and covers. When you need the good stuff, go here first.

Jessica Rabbit may have been the sexiest drawn character in toon history, but Marge Simpson has the title of being the first toon to grace the cover of Playboy magazine. Her pose is not an original gesture, though. The cover pose is actually a double tribute. The original pose belongs to Darine Stern, the first African American woman to be featured on a Playboy cover, back in 1971. Apparently the folks at Playboy used this image of Darine as inspiration for their latest issue with “The Simpsons” cartoon character Marge on the cover.

Here’s a quote from Playboy editorial director Jimmy Jellinek posted in last month’s CNN blog on Playboy’s choice of imagery:

“We decided to re-create [it] because it’s one of our most iconic covers, and because Marge’s sexy blue beehive immediately made us think of Darine Stern, whose beautiful, voluminous hairdo was front and center on the October 1971 cover.”

Darine Stern (c. 1948-1994), an American fashion model from Chicago, was the first black woman to be on the cover of Playboy. That was in October 1971. She was not, however, the first black woman inside Playboy – that was Jennifer Jackson in March 1965. Stern died of breast cancer at age 46.

The Simpsonized three-page pictorial, featuring a scantily-clad Marge in cartoon lingerie, was “obviously tongue-in-cheek,” new Playboy CEO Scott Flanders told the Chicago Sun-Times. “It had never been done, and we thought it would be hip, cool and unusual.” For Hefner, “Marge Simpson is the quintessential girl next door who stole our hearts 20 years ago and has held them captive ever since. We were delighted to learn she wanted to grace the pages of our magazine. Her pictorial is truly stunning,” he told CNN.

Playboy magazine is hoping that the Marge Simpson shoot will re-energize the magazine’s based in a market where all forms of print teeter on the brink of extinction. This “all business” move comes on the heels of a disappointing first half of 2009, during which Playboy lost some attention from the demographic it does have — the average reader is a 35-year-old male. The magazine came in 200,000 short of its 2.6 million rate base — the minimum circulation a magazine promises to advertisers — according to BusinessWeek.

Guess what? The Internet was born 40 years ago, October 29. UCLA computer science professor Leonard Kleinrock sent a message from a host computer at the school, to another system at Stanford Research Institute. Kleinrock attempted to write the the word “login” but sadly the message got cut down to just “lo”.

Oh well, go thing he kept at at it. Happy BDay, Net!

This may not seem like much to most of you, but some of us have waited a long time for this moment. Disney, has finally produced an animated feature film with an african-american lead. News flash: she’s not a lioness, a fish, a hyena nor a crow. She’s a sista, and animated in all her glory. Welcome to the table, my lady.

The Princess & The Frog is a fairy tale centered on a young girl named Princess Tiana who lives in New Orleans’ French Quarter during the Jazz Age. No doubt the critics will have a problem with this. The press will probably label this as controversial (which will guarantee a terrific box office weekend), and proceed to trash it as an insult to blacks and creoles. Shame.

I, however, will be standing in line on opening weekend. If you’re still on the fence, check out the trailer above. It’s worth a few hours out of your life to see disney break new ground on the eve of 2010. To quote Hancock,”Good job.”

Wanna see something cool? Check out this book. Frankly, it’s more than a book, it’s a work of art. Each of the 26 three-dimensional letters move and change before your eyes as you flip through the pages. Book designer MARION BATAILLE has created an amazing product. There’s a great article about her other publishing efforts over at Valesulfilo. Boldly conceived and brilliantly executed with a striking black, red, and white palette, this is a book that readers and art lovers of all ages will treasure for years to come.

Check out this Book Experience beautifully displayed via YouTube:

You can find this little gem on Amazon. If you’re feling generous, it’ll make me happy to see this on Dec 25th. Hint, hint.