Artist Games Featuring Justin Piatt

Yes! It’s time for another Artist Games, this time with the amazing Justin Piatt! Justin has contributed to this blog before, was a major contributor to ToughPigs Great Muppet Mural and its subsequent “Making of” documentary, and is one of the kindest and hardest working artists out there! Originally known for his art, Justin now boasts an amazing portfolio of puppets as well! Him and I have known each other for at least 7 years now and have collaborated together on more than a few other projects as well. So it was a no brainer to play this game together.

What game am I talking about? Well if you want an extended look, check out when I played with Will Carroll and Noah Ginex last year, but if you’re anxious to see what Justin and I did, here’s the skinny:

The Rules

I start first and draw something rather fleshed out then pass it on to Justin. There are no time limits or space restrictions (put a pin in that for now). Either of us can draw as much or as little as we want before passing it back. One artist can add to or obscure the previous work as much as they like as long as they don’t manipulate it (within reason). So to start off, I drew a clown throwing a punch. That’s it! No context, no further instructions.

I don’t like clowns at all. I think I draw them as a face your fears type thing. Coulrophobia anyone?

Justin: The pose Dave picked for the clown immediately made me think of Popeye. I didn't even consider drawing anything else because I just had to draw Popeye getting hit in the face by a clown. I could tell you it means something significant. It could be satire, a comment on the current state of comedy and comics, or the physical violence that can be incited by words or the printed page. But I just wanted to draw Popeye getting smacked in the face by a clown.

I'm not sure what else to say on it. I love what he did with the clown. It's such a good pose and I hoped to match it.

Dave: I was thinking of a schoolyard fight but being witnessed by both classic cartoon characters (Justin’s Popeye and my Blip the Monkey) and archetypes that are cartoonish but have real world stand–ins that are fantastical (the clown, a DnD wizard who may just be a weekend dungeon master, and "Pirate Baby" who is a silly character my daughter and I created for when we play).

Justin: I was trying to think of some obscure cartoons and other things that would fit our vague theme. Death seemed like a good fit, just waiting for the loser. I was also thinking that I'd like to have him subtly rooting for one of the characters, preferably the clown. I wasn't sure how to make that work, when I came up with the idea of the Groucho glasses. It was like dressing up rather clownish, but it could also look like Death was trying to stay incognito. 

The banana just sort of happened. I wanted something that wasn't really interested in the rest of the action, because it was only concerned with its own peril. And the monkey looked to be reaching for something, but distracted. It made sense in my head. 

The third character I was trying to grab at a random character from my childhood that nobody remembers. My first inclination was to draw one of Ralph Bakshi's Mighty Heroes, but then I remembered Crusader Rabbit, Jay Ward's series before Rocky and Bullwinkle.

Dave: So Death with Groucho glasses is my newest favorite thing! He needs his own show. Justin needs to patten him and then draw him all the damn time!

I wanted to start to flesh out the world around this odd group, so I was inspired by a scene from The Simpsons when they go to Cuba and there's a boxing match happening outside with the coast line in the background. I went for a slightly more medieval look with lush flora on the sides and a deteriorated brick wall in the background. I also subdued the colors of all that so the focus stays on the fight.

I made the background area bigger than it needs to be with the intention of cropping the final image tighter to the fighters.

So remember in the beginning when I said there was no time limit? I wasn’t kidding! Justin and I initially started this weirdo brawl back in April of 2022. I didn’t jump back on this with the background art until March of 2023. Then Justin—up to his ears in design work—admitted he felt we had brought this about as far as it could go, but I wanted my Cuban street fight, so I fleshed out the rest of the background that is more reminiscent of something otherworldly.

Justin: Just everywhere Dave took this made it a thousand times better and was so unexpected to me and threw me off and made me laugh. I really love the influence of the background being Simpsons/Cuba inspired, which initially made me want to go full Simpson with the sky and paint it pink and yellow, but it drowned out the clown. Ultimately, Dave made the right choice. 

This thing is weird. We made a very weird, strange thing that I very much like. I would want the live action film version, except Robin Williams is gone, and if he weren't, I know Bobcat Goldthwait would get cast as the clown, and I don't like him. So I'm glad this is just a picture we drew instead. 

Thank you, Justin! I love this too! You absolutely need to check out Justin’s website Uzzy Works and his Etsy store and follow him on Instagram, YouTube, Tiktok, Twitter; all as @uzzyworks.

Aah! How great to add this one to the Artist Games! If you’d like to play this game with me, please contact me through here on my site, or follow and contact me through Instagram and Twitter (until it becomes an unmanageable hell scape).

Artist Games Featuring Noah Ginex

Two weeks ago, Will Carroll and I played a game together where we would take a pass at a drawing, back and forth adding to it until it was so crammed with stuff we decided to share it with you. This time around I’m playing again with Noah Ginex! Before we get into any of that, first let’s talk about Noah.

Some of Noah’s characters.

Aside from being a super talented artist (who is also a fellow Muppet Mural alumni), Noah is an award winning puppet builder who has an exceptional sense of humor and is wonderfully and wildly creative. I was very excited to play this game with Noah because he really knows how to look at things from a very different and even unconventional angle. He has also played this type of game with his daughter so this was not his first rodeo. For everyone else who may have missed the first time I played with Will, here’s how this works:

The Rules

One artist draws something rather fleshed out then passes it on to the other. There are no time limits or space restrictions. Either artist can draw as much or as little as they want before passing it on. One artist can add to or obscure the previous work as much as they like as long as they don’t manipulate it (within reason).

The Game

Whenever I play this with an artist, I give them the option of using a full color render of the illustration I did or just the line art. I drew a white gloved cartoon hand holding a phone receiver. Noah chose to stick with the line art.

“It’s for you.”

Noah Ginex: I didnt know what to expect at first. Honestly the first volley was a lot more fully realized than I was expecting, but that just meant i could bite off a bigger chunk myself. I responded with traditional pen and ink the first time, because I didn’t have my Cintiq with me. Which I think directed the piece more to traditional black and white.

Noah’s first pass.

Just as when Will first responded, I was so excited to see that Noah had taken this in a direction I never could have anticipated. For starters, I was excited we were staying black & white, but anthropomorphizing the handset was super cool. My high school nostalgia sparked me to channel my inner Sam Keith and go really off the rails. I also took the opportunity to refine my previous line art to pop more now that the black & white direction had been set.

This weird Radio Shack rabbit then headed back to Noah.

Noah: I see faces everywhere, so it was nice when Dave responded with even more opportunities to add little details. I especially loved the phone cord turning into curly ringlets.

I don’t know what exactly this thing does, but I’m skeptical of its warranty.

Aside from minimal cleanup on my previous passes, I didn’t want to do anything else to the main art. Truth be told, I was completely lost on what I had done and what Noah had done. This fusion that normally marries two different styles together whilst retaining each artists unique styles was somehow obliterated. Noah and I had achieved a very comfortable simpatico… thing and I loved it. Still channeling those Sam Keith vibes I felt before, I opted to add a splash of red and cover it in chaotic text so it looked like a splash page right out of The Maxx.

The final collaboration.

Noah: I think the final piece ended up looking very Ralph Steadman-y, which is fine by me, so I signed it with a Steadman-esque version of my artist stamp. I'm really happy with how it turned out. I think it's perfect.

Again, this was so much fun. I actually am sad when I finish these games because it’s liberating, exciting, and so creatively satisfying. If I were a braver man, I’d consider this for a tattoo!

Thank you to Noah for being a part of this week’s post! Check out all his art by following him on Instagram @artbyNoahginex and his website too: noahginex.com

You can also follow me on Instagram and Twitter and tune in every Friday right here for more creative thinking!

Artist Games Featuring Will Carroll

My nibling, niece, and I. November 21, 2010.

As I’ve noted before, kids are a fantastic and fun resource when it comes to stretching those creative muscles, especially when you have a mental block of some kind. When they were little, my nibling, niece, and I would play a really fun game. I would draw something—something incomplete—and then they would add to it. Sometimes we would have time limits, sometimes we would draw until we felt our part was over, but ultimately we would just keep passing the art on to the next of us until there was no room left to draw or we were in stitches laughing too hard to do anything else. This game was a huge influence creatively for all of us and no doubt helped shaped how each of us saw the world around us and was also a great exercise in true collaboration.

That was a game we played for years and years, and now my daughter and I also continue on the tradition as well. Ever since I first had the idea to do this with my family well over a decade ago, I always wondered what it might be like to try it with another artist; someone with experience, style, and imagination. Flash forward to present day coupled with the constant search for blog topics and voila! It’s here that I want to shine a light on this week’s featured artist, Will Carroll.

One of the great joys of working on The Great Muppet Mural for ToughPigs was getting to know so many artists I hadn’t known before. Will Carroll was one of the big stand–outs for me, so I had been looking for an opportunity to do something else with him. Will has a really fun, retro style. As a graduate from the Art Institute of Philadelphia with a degree in animation, his work is instantly recognizable and oozes charm. He’s fast, talented, and he took to this game like a fish in water. So what exactly is the game?

The Rules

Unlike the more simplified and quicker version I played with my nibling & niece, one artist draws something rather fleshed out then passes it on to the other. There are no time limits or space restrictions. Either artist can draw as much or as little as they want before passing it on. One artist can add to or obscure the previous work as much as they like as long as they don’t manipulate it (within reason). That’s about it! So I’ll start things off.

Just broccoli on a fork, but the fork is gold so that counts for something, right?

The Game

When I play this with kids, I’ll draw an eye or a blank head and then the features get added as the illustration gets passed around. With Will, I had more time and freedom. I didn’t want to explode out the gate though and I have grown familiar with his work and was confident he’d take the reins in a wild new direction. So I started out pretty tame and bland, and you can’t get more bland than broccoli on a fork. There’s not much going on here, nor is there much to work with.

Will Carroll: Looking at the picture for the first time made me think back to an old drawing I did about two years ago, which had a little Doozer looking farmer holding a fork with a grape on it like he was holding a pitchfork, and that also made me remember sketches of a character doodle I’ve been meaning to use, so I decided to use it for this project.

Will’s previous designs for his Farmer character.

I always loved seeing tiny little creatures interacting with normal sized objects and adapting them to help them in life, characters like The Smurfs, The Borrowers and most recently The Tiny Chef comes to mind. So I decided to go down that angle and made them a farmer, who harvested “huge” vegetables.

Will’s first pass.

I knew whatever Will sent was going to be cool, but I was super excited when I saw the direction he took it with the little farmer. The fact that he came up with this was more than I had hoped for. I was tempted to stop right here because it was just so clever, but I thought I’d expand on the tiny size idea and place the group in a real world area, so I drew a woman discovering them. At first the “discoverer” was going to be another other–worldly creature but I felt keeping it grounded would be a better fit. Initially I was also going to draw the interior of a refrigerator, but I wanted to savor the creativity of the exercise and held off. I also muted the line art and color of the woman so the focus stayed on the original pass.

Initial sketches and 100% opacity art work.

My second pass back to Will.

Will Carroll: Decided to add more fully into the camp of “little people, BIG WORLD” angle, including making the blank space around the woman, the inside of a kitchen pantry, and adding a hungry cat behind her, a reference to Azrael from The Smurfs. In addition to the pantry, I also added more little guy farmers, the one in the wall’s design I based on the old cartoon character Farmer Alfalfa.

Will’s second pass back to me.

I was thrilled Will took it upon himself to take on the background art and the pantry was much more preferable to my initial idea of a fridge/freezer. It was at this point I channeled my inner Jamie Carroll (no relation to Will) and went full on overboard. I added a couple extra characters of my own and the bottle of fish oil pills just to complete the pantry aesthetic. I thought I’d go over–the–top with creating a magical lighting system with the idea that this pantry is so infrequently used in the “real world” that the tiny farmers just installed all sorts of accoutrements with complete disregard towards their human landlords. It was at this point that Will and I agreed we were done.

The final image!

Will and I both genuinely had so much fun doing this, noting how much it really got our creative juices flowing and were really happy with how it turned out. We’re looking forward to trying this again in the future! Huge thanks to Will Carroll for having fun with me! Make sure you follow him on Twitter @elaboratesunma1, Instagram @toonheads0215, and Facebook, and check out his website too!

Of course I’d love it if you followed me on Instagram and Twitter too! And tune in every Friday here for a new blog post!