Category / Smith

by Andrew Pilcher

Daddy Longlegs

710-141022In Britain a Daddy Longlegs is a Crane Fly, and not an arachnid. It’s got a small body and long spindly legs, which Wikipedia describe as ‘deciduous’ as they have a habit of falling off. Every autumn they fly into our house and, being flies, flop around ineffectually trying to find their way out again. Billy and Bella go mad chasing after them. Oh, and that story about Daddy Longlegs having the strongest venom known to man but no fangs is not true – if it was my cats would have overdosed on them long ago.

I don’t often use fonts in my cartoon, but I made an exception in this case, as I wanted to create The Daddy Longlegs of The Apocalypse, so you can imagine the speech ‘I may not be a spider but I am in league with the spiders…’ being delivered in a Russell Crowey Liam Neesony sort of voice.

As for the idea of spiders and insects being in league? A tip of the hat to Bill Bailey for that.

by Andrew Pilcher

This is all perfectly normal

709-141020Remember, there is no global warming. Those hundred-year flood events that happen every five years? – they are perfectly normal. Those ‘Britain to be battered by hurricane’ headlines that appear every week on the front page of the Daily Express? Nothing to worry about. Those daffodils appearing in December? La la la la not listening.

This did not happen.

This did not happen.

by Andrew Pilcher

Spread the joy

708-141017There are some people who just seem to suck all the joy out of environment and replace it with a feeling of despair. Scrumpy is one of those, which is a bit strange as he’s one of the best loved characters in the strip. He has that Eeyore quality of being miserable and loveable at the same time.

by Andrew Pilcher

Red hot crossover action

707-141015One of the odd things about drawing is that the simpler a character appears to be, the more difficult is it to Draw it. Rene’s Lopez’s Bunny from Alison Ward (the only character in that comic to be naked ALL the time) is a case in point. I’ve followed the rules – I’ve even done the animation-derived thing of building the character up from ovals and circles, but it still doesn’t come out quite right.

Our other guest stars are Winky from Snow Sez… by Theresa Shephard, Girth from GIRTH by Steve Powell, and, of course, Rat from Pearls before Swine by Bill Watterson Stephen Pastis.

by Andrew Pilcher

Collar fur

706-141013Smudge and Cholmondeley used to wear flea collars, and their fur never recovered properly from it. There’s always that phantom line around the neck where the collar used to be. Luckily, Smith is a cartoon cat so all he has to do is shake himself vigorously and his fur will return to normal, in the same way Tom from Tom and Jerry could do when smashed in the face with a saucepan/twisted into a pretzel/grated by a tennis racket/blown up by a bomb, etc.

by Andrew Pilcher

A pride of Smiths

705-141010Here’s a poser for you – how would you draw pride? We know the cartoon shorthand for things like speed and fear, but pride is a bit more difficult. I’ve gone for the DC Thompson solution – a few radiating lines and the word ‘Pride’ over Smith’s head.

by Andrew Pilcher

Labels

704-141008Today’s strip is brought to you by Concerned Citizens of America or whatever nutty right-wing organisation is cluttering up my inbox with its ravings at the moment. The sad thing is, occasionally they have a point.

Note Smith’s phone number, which starts with a Hastings code and then goes unreadable because people actually ring numbers they find in comic strips.

The problem with the blog site disappearing for days on end seems to have been solved. A bit of advice – if your hosts give you a bit of web caching software for free and tell you it will make your website faster to load, don’t believe them. There is a reason why it is free. Avoid the W3-Cache plug-in for WordPress, folks.

by Andrew Pilcher

Hegemony

703-141006A shout out to the original Patrick MacGoohan series The Prisoner here. And a slight problem with the positioning of the speech balloons in these Panavision frames – Smudge appears to be talking out of her bum. You’ll notice I switch to traditionally shaped square panels in Wednesday’s strip.

Oh, and I get to use the word ‘Hegemony’ here, which is a strange thing to be proud of, I know, but I am anyway.

by Andrew Pilcher

12 years a cat

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After 700 strips of cramped drawings two-up on A4 paper – it’s an enormous luxury to be able to stretch out and draw big again. It’s taking a bit of getting used to, hence the slightly hesitant line that you see here. But it’s coming back to me and I’m going to really enjoy drawing some intricate backgrounds when the story requires them again. For the moment, after two months of drawing landscapes and townscapes, I’m just setting everything indoors with the minimum of background. Sometimes I need the rest.

by Andrew Pilcher

One-upmanship

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Anything Smith can do, Jones can do better,
Jones can do anything better than Smith
Yes she can, yes she can,
Yes she can, yes she can,
Yes she can, yes she can, yes she caaaaaaaaaannnnn!