I didn’t really think
as I offered him a drink
and then started to draw
he would end up as a rhino sipping soda from a straw

…and that’s the story of the rhino sipping soda from a straw. If you’d like to learn how to draw your very own rhinoceros sipping soda from a straw just

Click Here !

First you hear the footsteps, then he leans back and roars that terrible roar. The whole town goes crazy. Little army dudes run in every direction. Wait, little army dudes don’t fire those tiny rockets at him you’ll just make him mad. If you make him mad he’ll use his atomic fire breath on you…..ahhhhhhhhh!!!! too late!!!

I always had a blast drawing those scenes. I thought you guys might too. So here’s a little 10 step drawing lesson I put together.  Have fun.

I’ve been messing around with Google Docs a bit lately and decided to try it for a tutorial I built a while back. The original was built in HTML and took forever. It was a ton of work and after I posted it I found a bunch of errors, which of course was heartbreaking.  I’d put off fixing it for the longest time because it was such a monumental time task.

Last week I was playing around with Google Docs and decided to check out the presentation option.  Rebuilding this tutorial seemed like the perfect guinea pig. It ended up taking me just over an hour and was very simple to figure out (if you’ve ever built a Power Point presentation then you’re all set. If not, don’t worry…  you’ll get the hang of it in no time flat). Google saved me a ton of time, was a piece of cake to use and best of all, I did it all for free. If you haven’t checked out Google Docs yet you can check it out here. If you build something cool and would like to share it please post a link in the comments section. Look forward to seeing what you come up with.

• Click Here to view the tutorial.
• Click Here to download the Super Official Bob Ostrom Studio Adobe Illustrator brushes I used in this tutorial.

Speaking of my brother, I’ll be featuring a video soon where my brother, the amazingly talented Gregg Ostrom, composed and played all the music. You guys are going to love it. He plays a mean guitar. You can check him out here playing with Emily Hurd.

In the meantime I have listed The Bob O Show over on the Artcast Network . If you haven’t seen the show yet the first thing you’ll probably notice is that I like to have a lot of fun when I’m on air. I keep it loose and don’t worry too much about technical difficulties. I’m always happy to pause and answer technical questions… and as far as projects go each one gets the Super Official Bob Ostrom Studio stamp of approval before going on air.

Please check Twitter or on the Artcast Network for future broadcast announcements. See you on the next Bob O Show.

If you draw along with me please email me a copy of your drawing so I can post it on my fan art page. Have fun happy cartooning.

I started out with a pencil sketch and then outlined it with marker. I usually wait until the end to do my ink but I had this cool new non-bleed sharpie marker that I was dying to try out. After the line art was done I began adding light washes of blue, green and purple to the background. Once I had a basic idea of how I wanted the light and shadow to go I went over the colors again this time darkening and adding deeper tones. The basic idea with watercolors is to work in washes, gradually building as you go.

I added a little Dr. Martines Die to my watercolors to help punch up the color. I used Rose-Carthame and Magenta to pump up my reds and then added a little Cerulean Blue to help out the background. You have to be careful with Dr. Martins. The pigments can be difficult to reproduce (especially with a cheap scanner like mine). Since this piece was just for fun I wasn’t too worried about reproduction.

The trick to working with Dr Martin’s dies is to add them sparingly. A little bit of die goes a LONG way. They can easily overpower your artwork if you don’t thin them down a bit. On the other hand they punch up your colors nicely and can really put down a smooth wash. Oh, and one last note of caution: These dies can fade over time if exposed to direct sunlight. If you take good care of your artwork though the vibrant colors will last a long time.  I have a few Magic School Bus pieces I did way back in 1995 hanging in my office and they still look great after all these years.

[View with PicLens]

If you’re not familiar with artist trading cards here’s the idea… they are basically just a  2  1/2″ X 3  1/2″ piece of paper or board that an artist uses to create an original piece of art. Some artist sell them, others create them to trade or give away. They have become very popular lately.

Srathmore has really stepped up to the plate by offering all kinds of accessories to go with them. First of all the make the 2  1/2″ X 3  1/2″ cards in just about any kind of paper or board you can think of. They also make polypropylene sleeves you can use to protect your original art with. They make pre-cut matted frames to show off the finished cards as well as archival boxes for storage. My accessory is the 2  3/4″ by 3  3/4″ envelopes they make so you can mail them to your buds.

Here are a few pics from my demo. If this looks like something you’d like to try please come check out my next class December 15th at Jerry’s. This class is for students 5 and up. For more details please check out the Jerry’s site.

[View with PicLens]

…Don’t forget artist trading cards make great holiday gifts too.

How to Draw a fish.

Just follow these simple steps and pretty soon you will have a friendly fish of your very own swimming across your page.

Mine’s name is Charlie and he likes to watch cartoons. If your fish has a name go ahead and email it to me I’d love to see him….or her… and who knows maybe your art will wind up on the Official Bob Ostrom Studio Fan Art Page.

If you’d like to submit your artwork

So if you’d like to send me your art just use the handy form at the bottom of the contact me page. There’s even a place where you can attach a file of your very own. Can’t wait to see your art.

[View with PicLens]