‘Funny Folks Behind the Serious Business of Cartoons’ is the name of a fun panel of Florida cartoonists and author Tim Hollis this Saturday at the Orange County Regional History Center.

Tim Hollis starts off the event at 12:30 with a talk about the history of cartooning and tourism. He will also be introducing his new book, ‘Part of a Good Breakfast’ about cereal premiums for the Baby Boomer set. Tim will be available to sign books after his talk.

The cartoonist panel starts at 1pm with cartoonists Bruce Beattie, Allen Bellman, Mike Osbun, Jeff Parker, Mark Simon, and me. Each will talk about the cartoon work they do.  Then the floor will open to questions from the audience.

Afterward be sure to take a stroll trough the Peanuts exhibit of comic strips reflecting outdoor issues.

I organized the cartoonist panel and dove tailed it with our annual Florida Chapter meeting of the National Cartoonists Society, which I am also Florida Chapter Chairman of. I’m also involved with the History Center.

This is a painting of Manley Fuller who is president of the Florida Wildlife Federation. I painted five of these for those who spoke at a water and springs awareness event back on June 23rd at Silver River State Park. I’m involved with a great group of folks called the Silver Springs Alliance that sponsored the event.

These sketches are from a community meeting about water issues I attended this past Wednesday. I stood in the back, which will explain why I have sketches of people’s backs. Below is a photo from my vantage point.

To the left is Dr. Bob Knight, of the University of Florida, who spoke at the meeting.

Charles Lee is the director of Advocacy at Audubon of Florida and came to speak at our event at Silver River State Park June 23rd. He spoke about how water is used. About 50% of our water resources in Florida are used to water grass.  As Charles points out, grass is just for decoration and yet swallows up so much of our water. Something to add is that the decorative grass is also responsible for the poisons of fertilizer and bug killer being added to the soil that filters it’s way into our Florida water supply. His talk is below and was recorded by Live Oak Production Group.

This is another in a series of five watercolor paintings of speakers from a conference I was involved with this past June 23rd.

This is Estus Whitfield, who has been an environmental adviser to four Florida governors and one of the most respected of Florida environmentalists. He co-authored the Save our Everglades program that setup initiates to help clean water for the future of South Florida and it’s residents. He has also steered a series of other outdoor programs critical to the state of the Florida outdoors and all of us who live here.

I recently finished a series of paintings of speakers who spoke at an event I was involved at Silver River State Park back on June 23rd. The event was created to help educate folks about water and springs issues here in Florida. I’ll feature the 5 illustrations in the next week.

The last of the caricatures I drew last night after an intense 4 hour event. Surprised I got a likeness at all! 🙂 This is Alexandra who was placed to assist me during the event. Turns out she knows & lives near dear friends of mine, comic book artist, Don Perlin and his wife. More than twice as many came to the event as expected and had me in full speed mode.  The event was for an opening of a school in St. Johns County, Florida, at the Caddy Shack Restaurant there. Hundreds of children attended and I did my best to draw as many drawings as I could for them.

On July 28th I introduced the new Florida History text book at The Knowledge Exchange. I conducted to talks. One about cartooning and the other about Florida history. Above are some from the Florida history class.

During the cartooning class I got the attendees to contribute various ideas and we all came up with this scene.

Here’s a close up of the artwork.

Here’s a book illustration of a lion I finished this past week. I’ve been real busy and have not been posting here recently. All kinds of projects have been coming in. Along the way I’ve been trying to get a Florida history book finished. When I planned to do the Florida history book, I didn’t plan on other artwork coming in. At first i was turning work down and then realized I was really risking my financial position turning everything down. So, I’ve been juggling it all. I’ll try to catch up and add some of the caricature and illustration work I’ve been doing!

Was in JPnte Vedra, near Jacksonville, drawing golf enthusiasts at the Players Club at Sawgrass Country Club. GREAT crowd! They each had so much to say about themselves and I got to really work out my creative juices in the storytelling of most of the drawings. Here are some photos!

Got a bunch of artwork done today in a couple hours. Two editorial cartoons, a bike drawing and the next Swampy’s Florida webcomic.

Was at our Orlando Remembered meeting on Wednesday. Here are sketches I made during the meeting. Below is a photo of some of the gang during our meeting. From right to left: Chariman Bill Milligan, Bob Buck, Betty Bandy, Hillis Bandy, Robert Serros, Claude Hunter, Claude H. Wolfe and Steve Rajtar.