Saturday, April 4, 2009

Illustration Friday - Tallies Man


You know, I really should stop having someone verbally tell me the theme for Illustration Friday. I heard "Tallies Man" when, come to find out a little too late, the theme was "Talisman!"

Oh well! It phonetically fits the theme.

As you can see, I love throwing a fun little concept into my illustrations. Please feel free to make your own story for the illustration and post it as a comment!

Here's mine:

For reasons unknown, Ansel, at age five, developed an obsession with keeping tallies.

He kept track of everything: how many people he has met, number of meals eaten outdoors, number of times he turned left, how many black cats crossed his path, how many white dogs crossed his path, how many paths crossed other paths, the number of times he's heard someone say "Good day." He kept tallies for the total number of hiccups he's had in his life, as well as sneezes in his vicinity. He's recorded how many times he's lost at Tic-Tac-Toe and won at Paper-Rock-Scissors. The list goes on.

He even has a master tally for number of tallies kept.


So, you can imagine why his neighbors and friends call Ansel the "Talliesman," right?

The illustration above shows him keeping track of his age. Hope you enjoyed this entry!

25 comments:

  1. wahaha. tallies man! you creatives are so gosh darn ... creative. i'll go ahead and guess that along with age, this is also a tally of the times he misplaced his feet, leaving no need for shoes much less a tally of broken shoelaces. great entry, sir.

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  2. A very clever take on the topic.

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  3. is there a reason that he has a ton of tallies, and less of a body?? or is it just shrinkage with age?

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  4. Shrink-age. You can see his height progression and recession as the years are chalked up.

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  5. Cleverness that made me laugh. Very nice illo. Thanks for your kind comments on my entry.

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  6. This one really made me laugh!

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  7. That's really funny! I love the illustration (and I would have even without the explanation.)

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  8. Nice work. Great style and medium.

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  9. Fantastic, this is very smart!

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  10. When I first saw this for pick of the week I thought "Wait, isn't this subtract??"
    Then I clicked on it and WOW, it's perfect...and awesome!! I love the limited color and the style. Well done, and congrats!!
    I loved reading about his obsessive tallying too!

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  11. Congrats, really beautiful minimal piece:)

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  12. You're a great story teller! I'd read your book :) And the illo is perfecto.

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  13. Pick of the week?!?!?!? WHAT???

    Oh man! Thanks everyone. Please feel free to check back every so often - I love creating stories for my illustrations. If you want more crazy examples, I just wrote a backstory for my "Babies Vs. Bunnies" post and even created a world for my character "The Grizzly Mage." It's all silly fun.

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  14. It didn't make sense at first but then when i read your notes its perfect. Great one!

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  15. it still works. those marks are a talisman when you think if it.

    good stuff here.

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  16. I guess this means he's over the hill?

    Great illo, & congratulations!

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  17. Very good piece, it really made me laught!
    Congratulations!

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  18. love it. someone should make "tallies man" an actual IF topic!

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  19. Hahaha, thanks everyone.

    But Yuri, what would I have left to draw for that topic??

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  20. (It was actually done on purpose, for fun's sake!)

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