My obsession with a drawing I penciled almost 40 years ago continues and keeps dragging me back no matter what I do. It started when I was trying to organize a flat file cabinet and I came upon the penciled original I drew on a 14 inch by 17 inch sheet of Bristol board some time in the mid-1980s. I decided to try out my fabulous Sailor Fude De Mannen fountain pen on that yellowing sheet of paper. I made a few lines, and I thought that was going to be it, but I just couldn’t stop. The Sailor pen is a lot of fun to draw with and I was happy with the results.
I figured with the finish of my Goo Goo Muck drawing that my obsession would be finished, but it was reignited anew with the discovery of an old manila folder marked Teenage Beast. Within the folder I found a story outline scrawled across several sheets of looseleaf paper dated 1986 and a few attempts at a logo treatment. I used to jot down story ideas all of the time, but I did not recall working on a logo. It seems like I was putting the cart before the horse because I didn’t even have a completed illustration at that point much less a story and I was already working on the logo. Fiddling around with letters was easier than potentially ruining a penciled drawing with ink.
I was going to go with Teenage Beast because I feared that the term Goo Goo Muck was trademarked or had some sort of copyright protection applied. I didn’t want to toil on a character only to receive a cease-and-desist letter just as I was taking it to market. I was getting way ahead of myself.
I cooked up Teenage Beast in the mid-80s so it was going to take place within the hardcore punk scene. The ransom letter look seemed like the way to go although it was a lift from The Sex Pistols logo. Being a copycat was always a fate worse than death, but using the newspaper letters didn’t bother me. It was the punk look rather than being specific to one band. Punk was all about DIY and newspaper letters were a whole lot cheaper than dry transfer type like Chartpak and Letraset which cost a prince’s and king’s ransom respectively. Besides, I had created my logo that I used on my first business card with newspaper letters. I think I got more chuckles from people receiving my card than accusations of ripping off punk bands. It worked for me.
I found my original layout for my personal logo. I tried a few variations and stuck with the first one.
There were some photostats of the Teenage Beast logo in the folder as well as the original. Back then, I had access to a stat camera which shot high contrast photographic reproductions for the printing industry. It was either black or white — no gray values. I took the stat; scanned it and digitized it so that I could manipulate it. Maybe I could make something with this logo.
I’m not crazy about it, and I don’t think it will mix well with a hand-drawn and inked illustration. It screams digital despite its analog origins. I decided to try drawing and inking a logo by hand. I traced out the Teenage type and gave it a couple tries.
Click on the images below for a larger view.
Once again, I am working in a Canson XL Mixed Media Pad and using the Sailor Fountain Pen and a Pentel brush pen.
The type treatment is a work in progress and I will probably take another pass or two at this. I’m trying to get an underground comic look out of my letters. I may get there. I was thinking of replicating this on another ink drawing or merging a few scans together digitally.
Stay tuned!
BONUS!
I’ve added this little slideshow to give readers an idea of what a photostat looked like in comparison to the original. If it doesn’t start automatically, click the little arrow.
