Cartoon Blog

Funny Gopher Prairie Dog Character

Curtoons — Thu, 09 Feb 2012 22:28:32 +0000

Cartoon Prairie Dog Gopher Sketch

Ever wonder what a cool cartoon logo character looks like when it is born? Well, this sketch is how most of my cartoon characters begin. I sketch with a mechanical pencil on a piece of copy paper using a lap sized light table.

I normally start out light and do tons of erasing. Once I’m happy with an area I start to darken my lines and add a little shading and detail. I want to keep a clean looking sketch so there will be less clean up when I scan the image into Photoshop.

This design started out with a funny gopher but after thinking on it for a few days the client opted for a cute prairie dog. This is the drawing that will get everything going. I will sketch the cartoon animal most likely popping out of his hole. There will be a house in the background which I will draw separately in case it needs to be moved, changed or deleted. It is always advisable to draw all of the parts of a logo design separately because it gives you the freedom in Adobe Illustrator to move them around and try out different things.

Below is how the final version turned out. The client was very happy. Here’s their quote, “Love it, love it, love it! Great job!”

Funny Cartoon Gopher Logo

Check out a few of my other cartoon animal logos if you get a chance.

20 Funny Cartoon Animal Logos

Curtoons — Mon, 16 Jan 2012 21:27:52 +0000

Looking for a great cartoon animal logo? Drawing funny animals is by far our favorite subject to draw and is also our most requested cartoon design theme. Dogs are the most requested cartoon animals we get but we’ve also had everything from an iguana, beaver, kangaroo, camel, zebra, giraffe, skunk, pelican, rat, chipmunk, polar bear, turtle and cat all the way to Big Foot.

Here is a quick collection of 20 cartoon animal designs to give you an idea of how our clients are using the designs we create. Some of these characters are part of the logo design while others are used as stand alone cartoon mascots. Take a look and let us know which crazy animal we can start sketching for you.

We’ve started out with two completely different dogs to show that there are dozens of ways to use animals in your marketing. One is a cute puppy dog used as a mascot while the other is a rugged cattle dog roasting coffee beans on an open fire.

Cute Cartoon Puppy
Used As A Logo Mascot

Cartoon Cattle Dog
Roasting Coffee Beans

Two really fun logos promoting a car wax and detailing company and a cool beaver grilling up a new BBQ product. Both designs use the characters within the logo and really help draw attention to the product.

Grinning Gorilla Cartoon
for a Detailing Company

Cartoon Beaver
BBQ Grilling Logo

If you haven’t noticed we love to create many of our logos within a circle type layout. Our customers like the ease of use with a round design. These types of logos fit well into most any space and are friendly to print. These are two wacky animals promoting food related businesses. The monkey is hocking pizza and beer while the zebra was used on a label to sell chili.

Cartoon Monkey in a
Pizza Business Logo

Cartoon Zebra for a
Chili Company Logo

When you’re in need of something unusual please let us know. Here we’ve drawn up a surfing cow and some really funny sweating chickens. One logo design was used online while the other was printed on the product label.

Surfing Cow
Cartoon Logo

Crazy Chickens
Cartoon Design

Here are a couple of country type cartoon animals. We’ve got your easy going turtle wearing his cowboy hat rocking in his chair while the funny hound dog has his wrench and is ready to go to work.

Country Turtle
in Rocker Logo Design

Funny Hound Dog for a
Garage Cartoon Logo

Two more circle logo designs. The cartoon squirrel was used on a poker chip as a promotion while the dog design was used to help advertise for a dog fundraiser. We’ve created logos that have been used or printed on just about anything you can imagine.

Blind Squirrel Cartoon
for a Poker Chip

Animal Rescue
Cartoon Dog Logo

These are fairly simple designs but they help bring attention to the logo. A silly kangaroo is used to sell kids products while the duck is being used as the mascot for a plumbing business.

Cute Kangaroo & Bear
Company Design

Plumbing Duck
Logo Design

We seem to get a good quantity of cartoon logos for BBQ related companies. Here’s a hillbilly bear design for a business in Texas and a really fun drawing of bigfoot for a photographer.

Hillbilly Bear for a
BBQ Logo

Bigfoot Photography
Cartoon Logo

Below we have one crazy monkey that was used on an eBay related website and also a cute dog and cat cartoon logo design. These logos were used for companies doing work online. Cartoon animals work well to bring attention to any webpage.

Funny Monkey in Jail
Logo Design

Cute Dog and Cat
Cartoon Design

Cartoon birds are another of our top requested logo characters. Ducks are very popular and this skateboarding mascot is fun and can bring a young audience to its client base. The colorful parrot is perfect for this tropical rental business.

Skateboarding
Cartoon Duck Design

Tropical Parrot
Cartoon Logo

Related cartoon logo pages:

Let us know if we can create a custom cartoon character for you!

Creating A Vector Cartoon

Curtoons — Wed, 03 Aug 2011 03:03:29 +0000

by Curtis D. Tucker

4 Steps To Creating A Vector File

Learn how to create a vector cartoon character camera ready for printing. This is the four step process I use in getting from a pencil sketch to a digital vector file. This is not the only path you can take in creating a high resolution image but this is the system I’ve been using for years now.

1. Sketching the Character

The first step is to draw the design on paper using a pencil. There are many professional pencil choices but I actually use a common .w7mm lead refillable pencil. In my early years in sketch on bristle board or high quality paper but since I began using the computer to scan my design in I now use whatever paper is within reach. Many times just using plain copy paper.

This stage usually takes the most time. I can redraw and erase certain areas up to 15-20 times just to get thing perfect. Notice the hair and the right hand. I have erased and redrawn these areas several times. I draw on a very small light table which rests on my drawing table. The light table is a cartoonists best friend. A light table will save time on adding different aspects to your design and can help you adjust placement before actually drawing. If you do not have access to a light table, try using tracing paper to overlay your cartoons.

After I have the sketch about where I want it I clean up any really messy area with an eraser and darken as many lines as I can. The darker I make my pencil sketch the more time I will save in the cleanup stage. I then scan the image on any normal scanner at 300 dpi. and save as a TIFF file.

2. Inking the Character

Early in my cartooning career I would actually use pen and ink to ink my cartoons. I then moved on to Rapidiograph pens. Using actual ink was always risky. I had to have really good paper and if I made a mistake or changed my mind I was in deep trouble. There was also the problem of ink drying and making a mess.

Once computers got really popular and Adobe Photoshop came into my life I threw out all of my inking tools. I now open that high resolution TIFF file in Photoshop. I use the contrast tool and darken the pencil sketched lines. This leaves me with a design that looks almost exactly like an inked cartoon. The better you can make the pencil sketch, the better this stage looks.

I then use the pen tool to thicken some lines and make others thinner. Rather than flipping between the pen tool and the eraser tool I simply flip the pen tool between black and white to either ink or erase. Simply hitting the X on your keyboard will flip your pen tool between a black fill and a white outline. I spend an amazing amount of time making sure every line is smoothed out and there are no fuzzy edges or bumps sticking out. The pen tip that you choose needs to have the fuzzy edges rather than a hard edge. I will be making a video to explain this soon.

When I have the inking complete it looks like the image above. If printed this design would look exactly like an inked cartoon.

3. Vectoring the Character

The next step is to open a new page in Adobe Illustrator. Place the clean TIFF image in Illustrator and highlight it. Set Live Trace to Comic Art and click the Live Trace button. While still highlighted click the Expand button. You now have a vector image that is grouped with a vector box around it. Using the Direct Select Tool I normally delete the invisible outline square behind the image. I also delete any white areas that I want to be transparent on the final design, like an area that might be trapped between the characters legs. Ungroup and you’re ready to color and finish up.

Once I have the vector file I can easily move it around and place it above or below other vector images. I add any props or lettering at this stage. On the design above I added a vector lightning bolt to a vector surfboard and placed them under the character. I also added a vector necklace and placed it on top of the character. This is where I also add the company name and I also might add a little bit of color. Once I’m happy with this stage I save the design as a vector AI file and convert all fonts to outlines.

4. Finishing Up

The last step is to add more color in Illustrator by clicking on white areas and filling them with spot color. I also add some shading and highlights by creating small areas of lighter or darker colors. The white highlights are simply little white vector areas I created with the pencil tool. Once I finish this stage the design is complete! I can save as ans EPS file, a PDF file and export as a transparent PNG file. I then open one of those files in Photoshop and save the image as a JPEG.

That’s all folks! I will be creating a video to better explain everything above.

Hot Tub Chick’s Cartoon

Curtoons — Fri, 22 Jul 2011 15:01:03 +0000

In honor of the summer heat we’ve had lately I thought this would be a fun cartoon to lay on you this Friday. More cartoons on the way! I’ll try to post a new cartoon every Friday. Please bookmark the site, “Like” it on Facebook or mention it to your friends. Happy Friday!!

Site Map

Curtoons — Tue, 28 Jun 2011 13:59:24 +0000

I’ll link to everything great on this website from this page so check back often for new page additions. I’ll be sharing my knowledge on cartooning, logo design, running a business from home, freelancing, online marketing and more.

I’ve been working online since 1999 and was the first company on the Internet doing cartoon logo design exclusively. I’ve had a successful home studio creating cartoon logos, content filled websites, greeting cards and a few other small ventures. I’ll share everything I’ve learned on getting traffic to your website, marketing your business, dealing with clients and many other everyday concerns.

Curtoons.com is broken down into a cartooning blog and 4 main cartoon categories that have many pages of samples, articles, pictures and information under each category. Please look around and let me know if I can help in any way.

1. Cartoon Logos & Logo Advice

This sections includes literally hundreds of cartoon logo examples along with logo ideas, pricing, logo tips and how to create a great cartoon logo.

2. Cartoon Pictures & Funny Cartoons

This sections if packed full of funny cartoon pictures including an updating weekly cartoon, archived funny gag cartoons, humorous illustration, greeting card samples and fun free clip art images.

3. Funny Cartoon Characters & Mascots

I’ve packed this section full of funny cartoon characters and information on how useful a cartoon character can be in promoting and advertising your business. Many character examples and images.

4. Cartooning Advice, Tips, Tutorials & Articles

Learn how to draw cartoons, where to sell those cartoons and how to make money cartooning. I’ll share everything I’ve learned over the years to try and help you earn a living like I have through cartooning.

. . .