The Cartoon Blog    

Growing or Shrinking? - by Cornelius

I haven't posted for a while now, but I have noticed when looking around the forums and chatting to cartoonists that there is still a feeling amongst some that the cartoon market is shrinking. As it seems fairly self evident that the market is actually growing I thought it worth giving my two cents worth (that's a penny for my thoughts at current exchange rates).

It is certainly true that some of the traditional markets have altered. Some magazines (such as Punch in the UK) have ceased publication and some newspapers have reduced the number of cartoons they carry. Cartoons compete against other forms of graphical features such as photo montage so it is understandable that with a fixed amount of space there would be some decline. That is not to say that cartoons are not still prominent in many newspapers and magazines, you only have to look at Matt on the Telegraph or the importance of cartoons to the Spectator or the New Yorker to see that.

The uses for and the style of cartoons that the public want do change though. Punch may have gone out of fashion, but Viz is still a very popular humour magazine in the UK. Magazines and Newspapers may have more choice in the style of graphical content they publish, but then previous generations of cartoonist did not have the internet and therefore direct contact with their public.

The internet has increased markets for all sorts of uses including private, educational, and presentation ones, web sites and private commissions. In addition every organisation/company on the planet can now have easy access to cartoonists that they wouldn't have had before. Cartoonists would have had no way of contacting small print/marketing/publishing companies or necessarily find the right art buyer at the right time prior to the internet, but now they can. The internet also means that cartoonists are no longer restricted to just their own national borders, but can sell more easily to the publications of other nations. This is especially valuable to English speaking artists as they can tap into markets from the UK, USA, Canada, Ireland, South Africa and Australia to name a few.

Possibly more importantly, Cartoonists can also re-license work they have already created through organisations such as ourselves. An image library for cartoons did not really exist prior to the internet so cartoonists had little opportunity to relicense images regularly in the way they do now. In addition the opportunity to get royalties for one off merchandise use could not have existed at all without cyberspace.

A look at our own books and the statements we send out to artists on both sides of the Atlantic tells us that we pay sizeable sums to cartoonists on a monthly basis for licensing cartoons in ways that just didn't exist in the days before the internet. If you add to this cartoonists own work generated by their own web and other marketing as well then, I would happily argue that the total market size for cartoons is bigger than it used to be. I would also argue that it is more democratic. The era before the internet often meant that most of the money in the industry went to a few 'names'. Whilst it is still true that quality wins out, there is now more opportunity for the new and upcoming artists to have their work seen and bought than ever before.

Obviously this is only a point of view and not all cartoonists will agree, but I hope it sparks debate and I would be interested in any feedback artists have.

07/26/2007 17:55:00 PM

"Hire an Artist" - by Cloven Hoof

I know I’m supposed to ‘big’ CartoonStock up, being a valued employee, but I am genuinely impressed with the long awaited new look of the website. As a freelance web designer myself, I thought it worth mentioning some of the positive attributes of the new look and now that the new "Hire an Artist" pages up and running, I can say that they definitely look much cleaner and have a much more up to date feel to them.

I’m really happy to see the easier navigation with descriptions above (see top level navigation), and less text per page, plus the images for each artist are now displayed clearer in each section with his / her individual styles. The new portfolios are also proving popular with our artists as they now have the facility to update / customise their own content.

The new logo is much more subtle and although it creates a sense of humour, has a professional and contemporary air about it......take a look and see what you think: www.cartoonstock.com/style.asp.

So, all in all, a big success. As I spend a considerable amount of my day on the site downloading images etc, I’m really looking forward to the new look being rolled out site-wide! Well done guys.

05/11/2007 17:36:00 PM

Cartoons for Blogs - by Isambard

Wow... December and January seem to have been choc-full of things to do which is why you haven't seen much action on this blog recently.

Today's blog will be about blogs. Or more precisely what use of our cartoons is permitted on blogs. The media scene had changed immeasurably since CartoonStock was set up 8 1/2 years ago when sales of cartoons were virtually all for use in hard copy print publications or in presentations.

That transformation is why at the moment we're reviewing our licensing terms for using our cartoons in electronic media. Keep an eye on our licensing terms and categories for changes to the electronic media licenses over the next few weeks.

We do get a lot of requests from people who'd like to include our cartoons in their blogs. Our rules at the moment are as follows:

Firstly if you want to insert one of our cartoons in the content of your blog so that it's viewable alongside the text (like the one below) then you should license it under the appropriate "Web Use" license which is our license category 2 at a fee of GBP25.00 (Dollar/Euro?) if your web site is non-commercial (doesn't take paying subscribers or advertisers and is not used to promote a commercial organisation). If your web site is commercial (takes paying subscribers or advertisers or is used to promote a commercial organisation) then the correct license is our license category 3 at a fee of GBP50.00 (Dollar/Euro?).

However there are cheaper, or even free ways to include our cartoons in your blog. Firstly the free way:

If you want to refer to our cartoons, whilst you can't actually display them within your content without licensing them, you can always link directly to an image in-situ on the CartoonStock website. To get the right URL to link to:

1) Go to our "Search Stock" page if the image is in our main archive, or the "Search NewsCartoons" page for Newscartoons or "Search Vintage Cartoons" for historic cartoons.
2) Enter the catalogue reference of the cartoon you wish to link to in the "Keywords" box and change the "Keyword Treatment" to "Ref", then click Search.
3) Once the thumbnail image you wish to link to is displayed, copy and paste the URL from your browser into the link in your blog thus:

Dropping the Pilot by Tenniel

Another alternative allowing you to link free of charge to our cartoons is to use our "Directory" pages. If, for instance you're a Vet and wish to link to a selection of "Veterinary" cartoons, use the "Directory Style Search" links at the bottom of our Homepage (or NewsCartoons Homepage or Vintage Cartoons Homepage for those types of cartoons) to navigate to the topic of your choice, then copy and paste the URL for the page into your blog:

A Selection of Veterinary Cartoons.

The final (not free but very cost effective) way to give the gift of cartoons to your blog readers is to subscribe to one of our Daily or Weekly Cartoons. Apart from our free daily offering, you can subscribe to one of our standard feeds, or for the same price, choose a custom feed of any cartoons you wish from our databases fed daily or weekly. The cost of this works out to only GBP3.95 (Dollar/Euro?) per image for a daily cartoon, or GBP7.38 (Dollar/Euro?) per image for a weekly cartoon.

Of course if none of these options fit the bill, then get in touch with us, but hopefully this demonstrates that it doesn't have to cost the earth to use cartoons in your blog...

02/07/2007 16:56:00 PM

The Media Calendar - by Dancing Queen

Today is the 18th December. Only a week to go until Christmas. I was working away at the moderating this morning, humming Frosty the Snowman and taking care not to dislodge my flashing reindeer antlers, when I realised there were still many Christmas cartoons coming in. It’s clear our merry cartoonists are feeling equally as festive, their creative juices flowing as they embrace the seasonal atmosphere. But now, so close to the big day, will these cartoons actually be used before next year?

The same thing happens with other annual events - Valentine’s Day, Easter, Father’s Day, Mother’s Day and Thanksgiving, to name a few. We generally get an influx of cartoons covering these events in the days just before they occur, as the subject arrives at the forefront of our cartoonists’ minds. But often they arrive at CartoonStock much too late for many publications to use, which is a great shame.

Many magazines work months ahead of the rest of us, and adhere to a completely different calendar. Even magazines published on a weekly basis will often have copy prepared as early as they can. And yes, it’s hard to feel Christmassy in the middle of August. Likewise, it’s difficult to think about Easter when you’re doing the rounds of the Christmas parties. But from a commercial point of view, if cartoonists could send their topical cartoons to us as far in advance as possible, it might benefit everyone. After all, it makes sense to try and accommodate the ‘media calendar’ as much as we can.

So forget about Christmas and dust off your swimwear, it’s time to be thinking about the sunshine! All together now...we’re all going on a summer holiday...

12/19/2006 17:44:00 PM

The Christmas Rush - by Isambard

Like many businesses we're absolutely run off our feet at the moment dealing with pre-Christmas orders, which is why you haven't seen much activity on this blog recently.

I've kind of taken it for granted over the years that everything gets busy in November and December. But why should it be?

A designer friend of mine, who's also snowed under, hit the nail on the head yesterday when he said "everyone makes Christmas a deadline".

At face value, it seems obvious that that is just the way it is, but after I thought about it a bit more, I agreed with him that it doesn't have to be this way.

The Christmas holiday is basically a long-weekend like many others in the year (although it is followed shortly afterwards by the New Year long-weekend). Do we have the same massive commercial panic before every bank holiday? I don't think so!

OK so it's also nearly the end of the calendar year, but that's only an arbitary cut-off point in itself. Many businesses actually pay rather more attention to their financial and/or fiscal year ends - so why do they all panic at Christmas?

The "Christmas rush" seems to affect the whole of the western world (and other areas besides), but has no useful purpose whatsoever, the holiday is just a convenient mental milestone.

What that mental milestone means is that many businesses (CartoonStock included) are way more busy at this time of year and we have to juggle resources to have pretty much double the capacity we need the rest of the year.

This is all totally unnecessary and hugely inefficient for large segments of the world. I wonder do the Chinese have a "Chinese New Year rush" in January? Do Islamic countries have a "Ramadan rush"?

I would like, herewith to call for a ban on all "Christmas Deadlines" and for the ridiculing of anyone who sees this winter holiday as a reason for creating one. Please join my "crusade", with enough collective will we can stamp out this nonsense once and for all...

Keeping the client happy - by Cornelius

I have a confession to make. When I starting out as a cartoonist many years ago I thought clients might think that drawing cartoons was ‘easy’ (it’s not by the way) and ‘simple’ (again, not true) and that if I got work to them too quickly they would think they would not be getting their money’s worth and wouldn’t know quite what they were paying for.

As I was naive and keen to be published it never occurred to me that it was the skill that clients were paying for as much as the time it took. More importantly as I became more established I became aware that often the client is paying for the speed with which the work can be carried out to meet their deadlines. Over the years, as I began to meet and work with more and more cartoonists, I realised that the most successful ones were the ones that could produce not only excellent quality work, but excellent quality work quickly. They could charge a premium not just for the quality of the work, but the speed at which it was done. In fact, as fees for commercial use of artwork are based on usage rather than an hourly rate, then it makes no difference to a client if an artist believes the work will take a day, a week or a month. They just want the work done right and on time. I think it is very telling that the cartoonists that are most successful can always fit in another job, and get it done next day, while other artists may ‘um’ and ‘ah’ and say they might be able to get it finished by the following Tuesday.

As you can imagine we work with cartoonists all the time here (the clue is in the name ‘CartoonStock’) and while clients sometimes pick cartoonists they wish to commission, we often help guide them through that decision making process.

We listen to the client, gain an understanding of the project and the tone they are looking for and then suggest artists that we know can meet their needs. The quality and style of the work is obviously the most important factor but speed, professionalism and ability to follow a brief whilst adding their own creativity are always factors in who we feel most comfortable working with and recommending to clients.

What will they think of next? - by Isambard

I seem to spend quite a lot of my time looking at new ideas on the web. I try to imagine how they could be applied to the business of cartooning in an attempt to make sure CartoonStock isn't suddenly overtaken by the "next big thing".

Yesterday's Web 2.0 revelation was Zopa.com. I'd never heard of it before so I'm going to bang on about it a bit - apologies to those of you who may already be familiar with it.

It's a bank without the bankers! Not just another internet bank, but a real marketplace where you can lend to and borrow money from real members of the public, but with the same credit control and bad debt recovery systems as "real" banks have.

There are no shareholders to pay profits to, just Zopa's fairly modest fees to pay... so it's a bit more like a building society? Well yes, but you get to choose who you lend to, for how long, what risk profile you want to accept and set your own lending rate... or if you're borrowing, the same in reverse. So it's something more like a fluid marketplace than a Building Society. The result (so far) seems to be that you can borrow money cheaply, and earn great returns on lending.

Maybe I'm naive, but I hadn't seen that one coming. It's crowdsourcing again, as in my last post, but not just for information - for real money, with real credit control.

The people behind it seem to have some pretty good banking and internet credentials, so I assume they have some idea what they're doing. Good luck to them I say - do we really need to pay for spotty clueless youths behind a counter and financial "advisers" who sell us financial "products" we don't really need? At the moment, they seem largely UK based, but there's no reason they can't create a global lending market in this way. Why make charitable donations to be swallowed up in overheads at charity HQ, when you can directly lend to third world farmers at fair rates?

In some ways Zopa have made lending more democratic, but in other ways they haven't... they still control that market after all. What they have done though is challenge the existing banking system.

So what's this got to do with cartoons? I'm not sure I've yet reached a conclusion other than that it shows just how quickly the internet can change a market.

I'd say that nowadays most freelance cartoonists make most of their sales using the internet to some extent (either clients find them through the internet, they sell directly from their web site, or at least they deliver finished artwork by email). In that respect, they've largely changed their way of doing business over the last eight years or so. But upstarts like Zopa constantly remind me that that process is nowhere near over yet.

We like to think CartoonStock has helped our artists to reach new markets in new ways, but we certainly need to keep our eye on the ball and prepare to throw significant resources at new developments if we're going to continue to do that.

Creative Resourcing - by Capitao

When not vexing Cornelius with discussions about the nature of creativity, I mainly spend my days (and even nights, when things are really busy) at CartoonStock juggling the resources that enable us to continue happily delivering the services that we do.

Much of this invariably involves counting the pennies, but there are other resources involved too, creativity and people among them. Some resources are harder to quantify than others; there is a saying in HR these days that trouble comes on two legs. People are not always as easy to manage as say, numbers, as it is not always possible to predict what they are going to do.

Creativity as a resource is largely Cornelius’s department. Going by our ever expanding range of gag, editorial and historic cartoons and without going into too much detail about our discussions on the necessarily two-dimensional nature of the medium, I would say that it is something that he does rather well. He also has the not always enviable task of having to convey creative ideas between the client, end-user, and the artist.

One of my jobs is to ensure that we have staff, adequate both in number and ability, in place to not only upload and moderate the cartoons, but also to manufacture the extensive range of quality merchandise that we offer. We have always been very fortunate in the quality of staff that we have here as the nature of the work requires good word power, dexterity, adaptability and flexibility. Of course, just occasionally we find ourselves rather overwhelmed by our own success and, particularly at this time of year, there may be slightly more merchandise to make than we ordinarily anticipate. At such times, it is really heartening to see how everyone adapts and rolls up their sleeves to ensure an uninterrupted and elf-like supply of festive merchandise.

I guess I can’t mention resources without word of the ever important money. I spend a lot of my time trying to balance all the numbers in the accounts (with varying degrees of success and to the sound of the occasional expletive). For the most part, numbers are generally easier to work with than people. They are fixed and they are part of a universally accepted language of value and for the most part, one plus one will always equal two (unlike people or creativity, which are less predictable and more subjective). Of course, those numbers are equally meaningful and can still ellicit a strong human response (such as where an invoice payment is delayed, thus delaying payment to an artist who is rightfully eager to be paid for his work). But, owing to the nature of the people we do business with, for the most part there is rarely a problem with collecting payment and delays are more likely to be down to missing invoices, queries, credits and the like, which are invariably easily resolved.

Crowdsourcing - by Isambard

A lot's been made of CNN asking for submissions of political cartoons. Many cartoonists have complained about CNN's attempts to acquire content free of charge, not only that but to try and get cartoonists to hand over all licensing and usage rights to their creations.

Crowdsourcing, as it's known (getting millions of members of the public to provide intellectual property very cheaply rather than paying more to a professional "expert") is becoming a popular use for the web. News sites ask for members of the public to send in mobile phone photos of accidents or newsworthy events, YouTube gathers video content from all and sundry. Wikipedia gets all it's knowledge from you and me.

Professionals in many fields feel threatened by this. How are they going to sell their wares for a living wage when anyone can find that photo of Mount Everest, that vital gem of legal knowledge or that video of how to rewire your house on the web, supplied for free by a member of the public?

The answer, in my opinion, is that competent experts in any field will still be able to make a healthy living. The web's made it a lot easier to get information from a lot more people. But the web hasn't changed in that respect since a year or two after it started. Whilst the term crowdsourcing is new - it only describes what people have always done with the web, and the sad fact is that much of the information you can get from all these people isn't worth an awful lot...

To my mind, there's a lot of value in accessing tens of millions of people to find certain nuggets of information that are only known to a small number. Only yesterday I found the meaning of my email client's "Error number 0x800C0133" within minutes thanks to the web. But the crowdsourcing concept becomes of less use when there is an existing competitive market to provide the particular type of intellectual property you're looking for. This makes established, high quality, providers easy to find and cheap to access.

I only recently got satellite TV at home. I spent a few days surfing all the channels available, but nowadays I hardly ever even look beyond the traditional five UK terrestrial channels. Quite honestly the other channels aren't worth the time. Too much choice becomes tiresome as long as much of it is poor quality. We've all found hilarious or thought provoking videos on YouTube, but I'm quite sure we've also all spent rather more time looking at rubbish in the hope it might be good.

What's true for the video market is also true for the cartoon market and CNN proved it. Their selection of US election cartoons on the whole demonstrates that if you're after US election cartoons, you're better off going to where cartoons are sold commercially by the professionals.

Our aim here at CartoonStock is to sell cartoons to professional users for whom time is scarce and quality is important, which is why we only allow certain cartoonists to use our service. There are thousands of amateur cartoonists worldwide willing to contribute to the likes of CNN. Some of them are capable of work of a professional standard, but many are not. So unless or until we're proved wrong, we'll remain a marketplace for cartoon artwork that meets certain standards of marketability (which doesn't exclude new talent) and not a giant trawling net for the scribblings of the world.

Lexical Matters - by Cornelius

This may sound odd considering I have been working with cartoons for over 15 years, but I'm embarrassed to say that after all that time I'm still not sure what the correct terms or words are for all the different styles and types of cartoons that exist in the world.

Thankfully this embarrassing secret is lessened by the fact that when I talk to other professional cartoonists they don't seem to have much of a clue either. Terminology is important to any industry. Management consultants are able to charge much higher fees for their ability to state the obvious, because they state it in a way the rest of us find incomprehensible. Cartoonists are generally self taught and work away from each other and don't always feel confident about the terms they use, but if they aren't confident of the correct terms who will be?

I think that all of us are secretly scared that someone who does actually know what they are talking about will catch us out one day. Even after all these years I'm not sure what the difference is between a gag cartoon, a single panel cartoon and a pocket cartoon. Or when a pocket cartoon becomes an editorial cartoon. Is a satirical cartoon about topical events drawn as a pocket cartoon an editorial cartoon if it appears on the Op/ed pages or is it still a gag cartoon? Is a strip cartoon a strip cartoon just for being in landscape format or does it need to have more than one panel? When does a strip cartoon become a comic and when does a comic become a graphic novel? How does one distinguish between a cartoon and a cartoon illustration?

I can't offer definitive answers to all these questions. I have my own usages that people seem to understand (or at least are bluffed into believing that I am right), but I hope by admitting that even cartoonists have difficulty with terms to describe the work they create it might at least encourage everyone to be more open about their uncertainty.

Is all this healthy food really worth it? - by Cloven Hoof

As CartoonStock’s resident cake monitor, I thought it was about time our blog edged towards the "healthy".

My job (as well as bossing people around) is to make sure the level of cakes being consumed by the staff here at CartoonStock is kept to the minimum.  I know that whilst Cornelius is busy communicating with our cartoonists and co-ordinating with clients he does consume desserts of worryingly high fat and sugar proportions.  Although everything in moderation is fine, what I want is to see more fruit and veg being consumed....mung beans even!

Being the ever-faithful health-freak, I’ve checked our database for "health" and "organic" related cartoons and surprisingly there are quite a few. (6843 cartoons on health and 63 organic!).  Obsessively, I even printed a mug for myself on this topic!

Trust me, its not just hippies that eat healthily and as a cake and four-chocolate-bars-a-day convert myself, I feel its my duty to pass my "health message" on!  Go on.....eat an apple!

Working from home - by Isambard

Back from Fiji - by BMX Boy

Hello! I am lucky enough to have just come back from Fiji and will be filling your time today with an explanation of what my job is, and in some way trying to tie in my experiences in Fiji.

The bulk of the work I do here at CartoonStock is producing the merchandise items that our lovely customers buy. When they make an order I am one of the people that turns a cartoon that exists in our archive into a physical object to hold, and love. Whether it is a mug or a print I lovingly produce the chosen cartoon on that object, pack it with care and send it off into the world, where hopefully (no thanks to the Royal Mail) it finds its way to you.

I also do work on the website and spend time introducing new products as well as improving the website to make it more attractive and easier to use. I recently redesigned the gifts order page from a rather awkward, bulky page to one which is easier to use.

From time to time I also scan, upload and moderate cartoons sent by our cartoonists for us to license. A lot of the cartoons we receive are based around well known ‘comedy situations’. You’d be amazed at the number of different desert island cartoons I see. Its surprising that our cartoonists manage to produce new jokes based around this classic set-up, but somehow their imagination prevails and the desert island gag lives on. I find it somewhat confusing how much humour can come out of this senario. I have recently visited a desert island and on the surface there seems nothing that amusing about one.

   Which is funnier?

Student of the Year! - by Esteban

So, the University of Bath's highly prestigious 'Student Employee award' has been bestowed upon me. I am honoured of course to accept such an accolade, and I'm delighted to have fended off such fierce competition. While it is true that at the time of nomination, I was the only student from the University of Bath at CartoonStock, there are still over 12,000 students in Bath - some of which must have jobs!

Tomorrow I shall endeavour to locate the JobLink office on the university campus, and decide on a fitting prize. Of the options given to me, Dancing Queen has insisted that I go for Afternoon Tea at the luxurious MacDonald Bath Spa Hotel, though I suspect this might be because the voucher is for two.

At CartoonStock, my job tends to alternate between scanning and processing contemporary cartoons, and uploading these cartoons to the website you are currently visiting. Both of these jobs have their pros and cons. While scanning is relatively simple, it can also be a bit repetitive. Uploading cartoons however tends to be more challenging. To upload an image, I have to come up with keywords to describe each cartoon, and categorize it. The keywords are basically search terms - what we think people will be typing in to look for this particular image. With some cartoons this can be relatively straight-forward, but with others (particularly the vintage cartoons) they can be hard to come up with.

Don't get me wrong though - while uploading cartoons is tricky, it's also the best part of the job. Not only do you get to study funny cartoons all day, but you also learn a lot from doing it. When jokes go above my head, I attempt to figure them out by quickly researching the topics. The sheer variety of cartoons that we receive means that one minute you can be finding keywords to do with the workplace and jobs, and the next minute you might be topping up your knowledge on Shakespeare or the 19th century Corn Laws. You really do start to see inside the cartoonists' head, and see what he's trying to convey with his cartoon.

God that's Brilliantly Unfunny - by Cornelius

We've been lucky up to now with the high standard of work from the artists we represent (I'm crawling a bit here) but you might be surprised by the variety of work we see that isn't (ahem) quite right.

I have always threatened to compile a book, not of rejected cartoons by professionals (as Matthew Diffee recently did in "Rejection Collection" concerning New Yorker cartoons) but the really 'out there' stuff sent in by non-professionals. I have always liked to believe that there must be some material that is 'so bad it's good' or in our case so bad it's funny. However my actual experience to date is that when a cartoon isn't funny, however not funny it is, it doesn't get so unfunny that it comes all the way round to being funny again. It just stays not funny.

My personal ambition is to find an artist who is so consistently and brilliantly not funny that he eventually becomes the funniest cartoonist of all. To date however  - nothing, but I will keep you posted.

Isambard, has just asked me to elucidate on this point as he doesn't understand. What I mean is that in stand up comedy for example, you have flexibility in how you create the humour, a good comic can work on a bad joke until it becomes funny. The repetition of telling the same bad joke that wasn't funny again and again eventually makes it funny. Alternatively the right glance or look can communicate to the audience that the comic knows what he is doing, or is playing with the audience.

In cartoons you don't really have the option of a knowing glance or dogged repetition. What starts unfunny, stays unfunny.

A Moderator's Lot - by Dancing Queen

I’ve been talked into writing a blog entry for the site.  And let me tell you, it’s blimmin’ hard to type with one arm twisted halfway up your back.

One of my main jobs here is moderating the cartoons that come in to us on a daily basis.  I have to check them for typos and grammar, make sure the captions are centralised, add in extra keywords if necessary and basically ensure that the image is as close to perfect as possible before it’s added to the website.  (As editors and publications download directly from the site, the images have to be ready for them to use immediately).  

I also have to check for sexual content, swearing and copyright issues.  Over the last few months, we discovered several search engines weren’t directing some people in our direction as they considered certain of our content a smidgen too adult.  This led to several eye-watering days where I had to go through and check all the ‘naughtier’ cartoons to make sure they were on the right side of naughty, and hadn’t veered off into ‘lewd’.  There were many funny discussions in the office at this time where we considered exactly where to draw the line  - verdict: bottoms and boobs acceptable, be careful where willies are concerned, etc, etc.  (Lessons a person could take with them in all aspects of life, some might say.)

Copyright issues are also something I have to be wary of - as in many circumstances we can’t license cartoons or sell gift items incorporating other peoples' copyrighted artwork, certain famous people, passages from well known works of literature, film lines etc.  Lawyers tend to get very touchy about these cartoons, so it’s often better for us to err on the side of caution.  Religious issues are another topic that get people in a tizzy, particularly in today’s climes, so again, we have to be careful to stay on the right side of cheeky, rather than being offensive. 

All these things are a lot for a person to remember before 9am, which is when I generally do the moderating, but hopefully too much doesn’t slip through the net.

The Limits of Expression - by Capitao

Today my screensaver's showing this cartoon. Perhaps I have been working here too long.

In some ways cartooning touches on issues at the very heart of the much vaunted, and I daresay ultimately manufactured, clash between western and Islamic values. I say this in the sense of its being a continuation of the enlightenment tradition of lampooning religion. Well, it lampoons everything. Nothing should be off limits. That would be a curtailment of our freedom of expression wouldn't it?

When I was young, I thought it essential to exercise and push back the boundaries of my freedom and did this with a certain amount of glee. We tend to do this in the west for no other reason than to assert that we have these so highly valued freedoms. So much in the media, and the Danish cartoon hoo-ha in particular, seems to be no more than the exercising of a freedom simply for the sake of asserting that one has the right to do so. But does one? Even as a now somewhat reformed libertine, my line on this is that my right of expression and enjoyment is only free so long as it doesn't curtail or offend someone else's expression, enjoyment, values or culture.

I thought that during the holy month of Ramadan, I might try to learn a little more about Islamic tradition, law and culture. Central to the holy month of Ramadan is the discipline of fasting. I have to report that as someone who has mostly done, said and eaten whatever I pleased, whenever I pleased to, this was something that I found very challenging. Ramadan is intended to give us some insight into the daily experience of the poor; to give you some idea of how successful I have been in gaining this insight - I have actually put on nearly 3 kilos. I will try to do better next year. There is a lot I find appealing in religion; but my enthusiasm always seems to wane when people start telling me what to do and when to do it (and it's the same at work, which I have made clear to my employers on numerous occasions). It seems the Prophet Muhammad, peace be upon him, didn't bank on the allure of my local fish and chip shop... and in my defense the poor in England do seem to eat rather a lot of chips. Despite my shortcomings, I have learnt a lot from this experience and I am left with nothing but respect for those that do exercise this discipline successfully.

I haven't really managed to do anything but touch lightly on some important issues here, but this is, after all, only meant to be a blog... but perhaps there will be an opportunity for a forum on the outrageous price of cod at a later date. I like the freedom of blogs and the internet; it certainly affords a level of expression and freedom of speech that the enlightenment Philosophes might only have dreamed of. This is why Iran and China both restrict internet use. Enough from me though, but I shall report back next week to let you know how I got on at Regent's Park Mosque.

Is all this editing really worth it? - by Cornelius

Why does everything take so long with an editor and do they make things better?

Today myself and Cornelius had a debate over a relatively simple email response to a cartoonist. In a previous job of mine, any piece of communication sent to the outside world that was deemed to be important or politically sensitive would always be generated by one member of staff, then reviewed (edited) by a superior before being allowed to leave the building.

At first I found this a very cumbersome way to do business, but slowly I began to realise the number of political gaffes or just plain errors that were averted by such a process. For that reason, we always try to follow the same procedure at CartoonStock (except here of course we're all equal, so it's more of a peer review than textual anihilation by a superior).

Today's debate was sparked by one statement in the email about which we couldn't agree - that then expanded into a wider debate (OK argument - but no fisticuffs were involved...) about how long this process takes and does it improve the quality of communication?

I don't doubt that it's an effective way of eliminating typos, grammatical mistakes, controversial statements, personal prejudice etc., but does it improve the quality of communication? I'm not sure...

When one person takes time and effort to craft an argument, or draft a perfect cartoon, then someone else butts in with a different viewpoint/artistic sensibility and starts "tweaking". Doesn't it just destroy the purity of what was created in the first place?

Journalists, writers of emails or blogs like me, or cartoonists commissioned by a client all submit to the editorial process and usually feel that their creativity is being stifled. But from the other side, the editor ALWAYS feels they're improving things...

And invariably out of the end of the process, comes a blander finished product. Is blander better? Does design by committee work? Most people say no, and resent the time, effort and debate it takes, but most still do it.

From a cartoonist's perspective - I suspect you always feel you know best when a client starts tweaking your precious concept, but the client's paying, so they usually get their say.

Would a world without editing be a better, more efficient place? I'm not sure, but it would probably be more interesting!

I don't have an answer - but what I do know is that I'm going to get Capitao to edit this before the outside world sees it...

A Day in the Life of Cloven Hoof

I'm sat here in the CartoonStock office waiting for the electricity tester man to test our leccy. It's surprising how much you miss your computer when it's turned off. ["How did I type this then?" you ask. Actually I hand wrote it (remember writing?). Isambard's just retyped it for me.]

Gift orders are a bit thinner than usual today, but normal ups and downs mean that some days our print-room is a veritable Santa's grotto, then other days the presses are finished by mid-day. Yesterday we dispatched a bulk-order of mouse-mats to the USA. Our print process is aimed at one-offs and small runs, it's not that economic for bulk orders, but it's still fairly frequent that a corporate client needs a unique gift in a hurry and is willing to pay for a sizeable quantity. Bigger orders like this are a welcome challenge - they require more thought and preparation.

We've just introduced a gift-wrapping service, which is still in its infancy but selling well so far. Wrapping a mug, a t-shirt and a print all together does require a black-belt in origami, but of course no challenge is too great for Cloven Hoof.

A Tad too Competitive? - by Isambard

Working with cartoons helps, but after eight years you start needing other distractions to keep things entertaining around the office.

This morning, Cornelius made the rash disclosure that he'd spent a large part of his weekend developing the "Wikipedia Game". After we'd all finished lampooning him for not having better things to do with the weekend, some of us (me in particular), decided it would be fun to beat him at his own game.

The rules are pretty simple. Two people think of two random words (or phrases or names). You then have to jump as few pages as possible on Wikipedia (using only hot-links) to get from one to the other. The example Cornelius had spent his weekend on was "bingo" to "Archduke Franz Ferdinand".

If you search on Wikipedia for "bingo", you'll get a page called "Bingo (disambiguation)", listing various terms incorporating or related to bingo, you can start from any of these links. In case any of you are wondering - no, it's not legal to edit Wikipedia pages yourself to help your cause... Although of course that was the first tactic I thought of.

Cornelius, the game's inventor had apparently managed this task in eight steps (visiting nine pages with eight steps between them). Modesty forbids me from saying publicly how many steps it took me, but if you took Cornelius' score, doubled it, divided by 3.14, then said "four" you'd be along the right lines.

Of course I was accused by Cloven Hoof (who you'll hear more from later) of being "the most competitive person in the world". To be frank, that's not the first time it's been said - but it was at least one of the politer versions of the accusation.

By now you'll be thinking - "Aren't you supposed to be selling cartoons not playing childish games and writing about it..." In short, yes, but this blog was supposed to be about the cartoon/illustration industry and our organisation... so if this helps to give you a better feel for how we work (or at least what we do when we're not working) then I've achieved something.

In case you're wondering, yes, I do have a wetsuit in my golf bag.

10/16/2006 12:53:00 PM

Let Blogging Commence - by Cornelius

We all sat down to a meeting last Wednesday and decided that a CartoonStock blog was the only thing that the internet lacked. If you find it enjoyable you’ll be pleased to hear that according to Google, there are another 2,620,000,000 references to ‘blog’ on the web that you may also find of interest.

We deal with book publishers on a daily basis but not usually as authors... when HarperCollins asked us to write a book on cartoons, they didn’t want a ‘How to Draw Cartoons’ book. What they wanted was a book about how to create cartoon ideas. We had lots of ideas and lots of cartoons. More importantly, being a cartoon agency we had access to lots of work by some of our favourite cartoonists. The best part of the experience for me was being able to say as casually as possible ‘yes I’ve been asked to write a book’. The weirdest part about the book writing experience was that this particular book was actually produced in reverse.

We gave them the chapter headings and the cartoons. Cartoons we thought we might like to talk about. The editor and designer then went away and created the layout of the book with all the images and chapters and left spaces where the text should go. It was our job then to read the little pencil marks on the layout sheet which read ‘110 words here’, ‘90 words here’ and fill the space with something that informed, educated and entertained. I’m sure James Joyce didn’t work that way (maybe some of the more beatnik ‘cut up’ poets did) but surprisingly it did seem to work. The word restriction forced a clarity of thought I for one didn’t know I could achieve and the feedback we got when the final book hit the shops was very positive. Of course now I understanding the joy of brevity I think I’ll stop for today.

Watch this space... - by Cornelius

As an opinionated team who work daily in the cartoon business, we at CartoonStock felt it was about time we blogged. Watch this space for a rolling discourse involving various members of CartoonStock staff, speaking on matters close to their hearts...