Roll Over Botticelli: Venus Gets A Makeover
I had a lot of fun doing an assignment for Tracey Jones and Tremendous Life Books. It called for a parody of Botticelli’s Birth Of Venus (1486). I think everyone’s seen this famous painting at one time or another:
The parody called for Venus to be displaced by another goddess, an Australian Shepherd named Ruby Red. Ruby posed for a lot of pictures, but did she ever once strike the Venus Pose? Alas, she did not. So it fell to me to use bits and pieces from four different photos to build a composite Ruby in Photoshop.
I wish I could tell you I have some magic hair extraction technique. I do not. I’ve studied many hair extraction tutorials, but have never found one that works for every situation. I experimented with different selection tools, and fine-tuned the selections with the Eraser.
I used splatter brushes for the Eraser, and tried different hardness and opacity settings to see what worked.
Below are the four photos and the resulting composite. I had to adjust the color and lighting for the different parts, and I used layer masks to blend them all together. It was also necessary to graft on the end of Ruby’s right “foot” (it’s actually the tip of the left foot, which I cloned, warped into position, and then blended into the existing right foot).
Final below. Some of Ruby’s friends were also included (well, at least their heads). If you compare the final to the original, you’ll notice the sea shell had to be partially rebuilt and shifted to the right, in order to center Ruby properly. This called for some pretty doggone ambitious cloning… : )
The final was used on the cover of Saucy Aussie Living: Top 10 Tricks for Getting
a Second Leash on Life by none other than Ruby Red herself (with a little help from Tracey Jones). If you’re looking for some ongoing inspiration, I can highly recommend Tracey’s blog.
What do you think? Is Botticelli rolling over in his grave? Is Ruby giving Venus some serious competition? Hope you’ll leave a comment.
If you enjoyed this post, I invite you to subscribe. You can leave a comment and click the box that says Notify me of new posts via email, click the Subscribe button below the Portfolio Thumbnails, or just click + Follow in the blog menu bar.
Other Posts You Might Enjoy:
Hare Today, Hare Tomorrow: The Enduring Appeal Of Beatrix Potter
Memorial Day: We Mustn’t Let Their Sacrifice Go Up In Smoke
When Art And Rockabilly Music Collide
Courtroom Fun With Oscar Impostors, Baby Murloc, Scorched Seats, And A Miffed Meteorologist
Time for another post on what the American legal system is justifiably famous for: bizarre lawsuits.
Every month, Inside Counsel Magazine sends me short summaries of four such suits. I sketch out a cartoon for each one, and the editors pick the one they like best.
This month’s winner involved veteran California meteorologist Kyle Hunter, who is suing CBS for age and gender discrimination. Hunter claims he was passed over for jobs at two different Los Angeles stations in favor of attractive and much younger women who lacked Hunter’s credentials and experience. Hunter contends the women hires are a ploy to induce more men to watch the newscasts. CBS calls the complaint frivolous.
I had a vision of dark clouds of rage morphing into thunderclouds, with inclement results. Here’s the final.
BTW: it contains a glaring physical error which occurs three times. Can you spot it? Answer at end of post.
Among the other contenders: Hollywood’s Academy of Motion Pictures Arts and Sciences sued an events rental company for copyright infringement. Why? The Academy claims the company rents 8-foot-tall statues that are “strikingly” similar to its famous Oscar. The company says it has modified its original statue, and that the new version is modeled after a weightlifter.
I decided to “rent” some of the statues myself and stick them in the cartoon:
I’d heard of Baby Ruth (candy bar), Baby Face Nelson (1930s American gangster), and babydoll (pajamas), but never Baby Murloc. That’s because I’ve never played the online role-playing game World of Warcraft, created by Blizzard Entertainment.
Amanda Lewis, a former “game master” for Blizzard, is suing the company for copyright infringement and misappropriation of her voice. She claims she developed the voice and an original song for baby murlocs, which are cute aquatic humanoid creatures that appear in the game. The complaint alleges that “game master” is a customer service position, that providing creative content is not part of the job description, and that Ms. Lewis’s voice and song have been incorporated into the game without her permission.
I envisioned a courtroom filled with Warcraft characters, and yes, that is a baby murloc singing in the witness box.
A Eugene, Oregon couple has sued General Motors for injuries caused by seat warmers in GM’s Chevrolet Silverado. The suit says that the man, a paraplegic, lacked the sensation to know that his right buttock was being burned by the electric heater in the truck’s driver seat.
This case is a good example of the challenge posed by certain suits: drawing something funny that does not mock the less fortunate. I solved the problem here by making everyone but the lawyer a crash test dummy.
And here’s the original rough sketch for the miffed meteorologist.
So what’s the error in the finished cartoon?
Scroll back up and you’ll see that three of the jurors are holding umbrellas with no shafts. Perhaps they’re novelty umbrellas that are attached to the jurors’ heads… : )
What do you think? Have you ever been involved in a big money lawsuit? Ever bounced a baby murloc on your knee?? Hope you’ll leave a comment.
If you enjoyed this post, I invite you to subscribe. You can leave a comment and click the box that says Notify me of new posts via email, click the Subscribe button below the Portfolio Thumbnails, or just click + Follow in the blog menu bar.
Other Posts You Might Enjoy:
Pennies From Heaven: Attack Of The Tweety Boids
A Blog Named Sue: More Lawsuits
You Sure Are A Lot Uglier In Person
It’s been awhile since my last “birthday clock caricature.” Time to make amends. A belated Happy Birthday to actress-singer Ann-Margret (b. 1941) and reclusive author Harper Lee (b. 1926), both born on April 28th. Here’s the final:
I had to laugh when I saw the two women shared a birthday. Why? Ann-Margret got saddled with the term “sex kitten” early in her career, and Harper Lee wrote To Kill A Mockingbird (1960), one of the most famous novels in American Literature. The idea of juxtaposing a “cat” and a “bird” jumped into my head immediately. But it gets even funnier because the movie that made Ann-Margret a major star was Bye Bye Birdie. Here’s a detail image: 
Ann-Margret Olsson was born in Sweden, and moved to the United States in 1946. She broke into show business around 1960, at the tail-end of the “golden age.” Early fans and supporters included show-biz legends George Burns, Bob Hope, and Jack Benny.
She began recording in 1961, and has had a long career as singer. However, she’s only hit the Billboard Top 40 once, with a song called I Just Don’t Understand, which peaked at #17 in August, 1961. (Trivia: The Beatles covered the song in their early live sets, and it can be found on their compilation album, Live At The BBC.)
She became a major star playing all-American teenager Kim MacAfee from Sweet Apple, Ohio, in the film version of the Broadway musical, Bye Bye Birdie (1963), and went on to star with Elvis Presley in Viva Las Vegas (1964), and Steve McQueen in The Cincinnati Kid (1965).
Below left: a very young Ann-Margret with television host Ed Sullivan on the set of his variety show. Right: with Presley on the set of Viva Las Vegas.
Trivia: Ann-Margret is a natural brunette. Alas, that famous red hair isn’t real (sigh). In researching this post, I was surprised to find that she had recorded a Christmas album as recently as 2004, and that she is still active as a television actress: she won an Emmy in 2010– her first, after six nominations. Below left: at the peak of her commercial success, circa mid-60s; below right: with her Emmy Award, August 2010. 
Just how good is To Kill A Mockingbird? I saw the movie version (1962) first, then went straight out and bought the book. I literally couldn’t put it down– despite having seen the film and knowing exactly how it was going to end. It really is that good.
I could tell you it’s set in Alabama in the American South during the depression years of the 1930s, and that its central theme is racial prejudice. That there’s a court trial, and a heroic lawyer, and that the story is narrated (remembered) by his daughter who was six years old at the time the book’s events take place. That it’s also a coming-of-age story, filled with colorful characters and subplots. But it’s more than all that: it’s about human nature and life itself. And it recreates a time and place so visceral and real, you feel you’ve been there when you finally close the book.
Nelle Harper Lee based much of the book on her childhood growing up in Monroeville, Alabama. Her own father was a lawyer. Pictured below: Lee circa 1960 sitting in the balcony of the Monroe County Courthouse, where her father argued his cases. For the movie version of the book, a set designer came to Monroeville to measure and photograph the courtroom. It was then recreated on a Hollywood sound stage.
The book’s odd title is drawn from an exchange in the story. Atticus Finch, the lawyer and central character, gives his children air rifles for Christmas, and tells them they can “shoot all the bluejays they want,” but that “it’s a sin to kill a mockingbird.” Puzzled, his daughter asks a neighbor why killing a mockingbird would be a sin. The neighbor explains that mockingbirds do no harm and simply “sing their hearts out for us.”
Mockingbird won the Pulitzer Prize for Fiction in 1961. It has sold over 30 million copies and been translated into over 40 languages. It’s the mostly widely read book in American high schools, and has never been out of print. A very tough act to follow. It is Harper Lee’s only book.
Below left: Harper Lee with actor Gregory Peck who played Atticus Finch in the movie. Right: a photo of Lee taken in 2005.
What do you think? Are you an Ann-Margret fan? Ever read To Kill A Mockingbird? Hope you’ll leave a comment.
If you enjoyed this post, I invite you to subscribe. You can leave a comment and click the box that says Notify me of new posts via email, click the Subscribe button below the Portfolio Thumbnails, or just click + Follow in the blog menu bar.
Other Posts You Might Enjoy:
How Honey Ryder And The Prisoner Wound Up In Wyatt Earp’s Mustache
You Really Got Me, Norman Rockwell
Look! Up In The Sky! It’s A… Clock??
