Old Calendar '01: July

Old Calendar '01: June

Old Calendar '01: May

I liked reading your takes on yesterday's image. Have a whack at this one.

Old Calendar '01: April

Old Calendar '01: March

Here is a group of traveling fantasy characters--a fellowship, if you will. You can look at them and think about their adventures. The best part is, you don't have to slog through an endless, multi-volume fantasy series to enjoy them. Think of all the time you saved.

Old Calendar '01: February

The 2001 calendar was small--I think it was 6 x 6. Maybe 5.5 x 5.5. Anyway, I went to town with the stippling--actually, I don't like the word, "stippling" it sounds pretentious (unless it's in a cop drama, where the gunpowder burn leaves "stippling" on a close-range shooting victim, that kind of "stippling" sounds cool. Phew, I read too many crime novels.)

For drawing, I prefer the word "dots." I shaded this with dots.

My wife was expecting our first baby in 2001. So a lot of the pictures in this calendar had a baby-having theme. That baby is now a ten-year-old kid.

Old Calendar '01

When I was a sophomore in high school, I made a calendar. I drew twelve pictures, bought a ream of 11 x17 paper and photocopied, folded and stapled together a print run of about 60. I handed them out at school and gave them to friends and family. I was pretty proud of them. It became a tradition. I did a new calendar every year at Christmas. I made them from '92 to 2001--I may have done a 2002, but the most recent one I could find in my files was '01. I hope I did an '02, that would give me a solid decade of calendars.

Anyway, when I started getting real illustration jobs, it got harder to do the calendar. I tell myself every year that I will start it up again, then never do. Of course, lately I've realized that this blog has filled the gap created by the calendar. Still, I miss the physical object of the paper calendar.

I have all of the old calendar drawings--but I've never scanned them before. So, let's take a look. For the next two weeks we're taking a trip back ten years, to 2001.

Here is January:

The Narnia Covers Wrap-Up!

Oh Boy. Google day has come at last. This was fun. The real images brought back a lot of memories. Let's grade my memories!

The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe: Woops! There is no lamppost, the kids are inside the wardrobe and there is a castle I missed. But look how much they look like the Beatles. C+

Prince Caspian: I think I nailed this one. Check the evil mustache. And the shield with a spike (wrong person though.) And I got the composition reversed. A-

The Voyage of the Dawn Treader: How could I miss that fantastic sea monster? I'm so ashamed. This one is also reversed. I did get the crow's nest, and the spike and beard on the dragon. B-

The Silver Chair: Reversed again! Aside from that...A-

The Horse and His Boy: Oh boy. This one stumped me. F

The Magician's Nephew: I think this one is my best remembered cover. A

The Last Battle: Not bad. I missed the kids and the color scheme. But I got the stars right! B

I hope you've enjoyed this trip down memory lane.

The original cover artist is named Roger Hane. He did these covers for Macmillan-Collier in 1970. The sad part is, he died four years later, during a botched mugging in Central Park. He was only 36. How's that for ending on a sad note. I give him the honorary title of, "Favorite Cover Artist of my Childhood."

A brand new thing starts tomorrow.