Man bites off his own ear.

News reports are coming in from Betty across the road that last night there was an altercation with the Police, and the man that was being in the processed of being arrested, bite off his own ear!

Unfortunately, I have been unable to verify this report and have not got photographic evidence of this event, but I managed to find this on Google Images:

 I am not sure if this is the same sort of ear that was bitten off allegedly by the man, or why he was arguing with a policeman (to be honest, I'd long since retired to bed after my Cadbury's Options Drinking Chocolate). Betty could not furnish me with any further details as she needed to keep an appointment with her Craig's social worker , and when I phoned the police station in the capacity of a citizen reporter, the desk sergeant hung up on me!

Do you know a man with good teeth, and an ear missing? Perhaps he used to wear glasses, but is now unable to?

Please let me know.

How can I become a successful cartoonist?

How can I become a successful cartoonist? This is a question I once asked myself, before I became a successful cartoonist. Many "professional" cartoonists will try to tell you how difficult it is to make a decent living from drawing cartoons of a hilarious nature, but they are wrong.

People of all ages love cartoons. Any cartoons. Any age. People of as young as 10 or 12 love cartoons, although these are technically children, they are still people. Sometimes older people love cartoons as well, unless they are a little old and doddery and don't really understand anything anymore, or perhaps they have just lost their glasses.

People who have lost their glasses don't generally like cartoons, but rest assured that once they find their glasses again, or get a new prescription they love them again.

As a cartoonist you can draw all sorts of cartoons. I like to create unique cartoons using a unique drawing method that other cartoonists don't use, as I don't want to be like other cartoonists with their swimming pools and helicopters - I want to be unique, I want to be me!

I could spend hours and hours learning how to copy drawer cartoons just like other cartoonist, but I want people to be able to look at one of my unique and universally hilarious cartoons and just know it's something I've inflicted on them. This is important to me, as I don't want people to have to read the cartoon and then read a signature of who drew it. People are busy, and if they have to read a signature, they might not have time to read the cartoon (or look at it, if it is a visual cartoon).

What would the point of just having time to look at a signature, and not having time to look at the cartoon, especially if you are in a dreadful hurry to get out of the house to buy some new glasses so you can then appreciate cartoons your mind goes to mush and then you can't.

So in summery, people love cartoons. It doesn't matter how you create them, they will buy them. With a bit of luck they might buy more cartoons in the future - but don't fall for the old cliche of old cartoonists with helicopters. They are just protecting their business. They don't want new people to become cartoonists, because they have swimming pools.

I've laid an egg!

Thinking about the cartoon SHARP I posted yesterday, I have been thinking about how I could create my own unique approach to cartooning that would be unique to me, and not give The Creative Genius credit for work that I have done, using his idea.

This got me thinking. What if instead of drawing a cartoon in a unique shape, such as a triangle, I drew a cartoon in an egg shape instead and called it an egg?


I could lay an egg, each and every day!

Shocking ignorance of other cartoonist.

This is my entry into the 113 (perhaps I should have known, such an unlucky number) and it scored precisely NOTHING! Now I understand that other cartoonist find my art work intimidating, and that some of them like to stick to the rules of the contest, but I entered this in enough time for at least one or two of them to vote for me. It was not my fault that my next door neighbour had an issue with their garden appliance, that as a good citizen, I felt obliged to assist with, therefore missing the "technical" closing time for entries.


 I even offered an explanation of the cartoon, for those less intelligence than myself, as it was a caption less contest.


I realize that some of the readers of this very website are not gifted in the brains department either, so here is the explanation of the cartoon, so you can find it as hilarious as I do.


This is a Robot that has scared the poor child. Hair is sticking up on end to emphasize that the child finds the Robot scary.


Well, let me tell you. That could be the last time I assist a neighbour with their garden appliances, OR the last time I enter the cartoon contest. I haven't decided yet. I'm still seething at the lack of respect shown to me!

How do I sleep in a chair?

I have often been asked advice on such matters as such like and thus, but this week I am going to answer a query from a local person who I have been interacting with therefor whom within the environment of the street local to my own adobe.


This person, whom wished to remain anonymous, question was:


"sometimes I'm just too tired to go to bed at night, and have been thinking about sleeping in my arm chair. How would I go about doing this?"


That's a very interesting question that I would have very much enjoyed answering for my local fellow inhabitant of my local area, but I was in a hurry to rush home and sit down and write a blog post about arm chairs instead.


Firstly we need to know what an arm chair is.

This is not a chair. It is a stool, and consequently it is most unsuitable for sleeping in.

This is a chair, but it is only suitable for seating in, not sleeping in (or on depending on your political personification. 

This is much more like thus the item of furniture that we was discussing just outside the happy shopper.

Instructions for use:

1. Sit in the chair
2. Read a book, or watch a television. (it doesn't matter what kind, Sony, Phillips, Samsung even)
3. Wait until you are tired.
4. DO NOT GO TO BED AT THIS POINT!
5. When you feel yourself drifting off to sleep let yourself go.
6. Now get a cloth from the kitchen and clean the chair.
7. Once chair is dry again, re-enter it and repeat process 1 - 4
8. Wake up next morning any make appointment with a chiropractor. 

Success has made a failure of my blog (home)

As some of you will have realised by now, I have not been able to post on this wonderful platform of Talent Free-handeness that is thus the Blog Called Talent Free. There are 3 reasons for this. 

1. I have been very busy with an unfortunate incident with the Works and Benefits office that have libelled me in the most vicious manner, by claiming that I was claiming something that I shouldn't have been claiming, but of course this was something that they should have not claimed. I could have sued them for this terrible slander, but it turned out the that man standing behind me in the queue was in fact deaf and didn't even here the slandering claims made by the benefits officer. Their claim is still outstanding.


2.  I have been incredibly busy with my home based online multi-level designs promotional business. I have sold an incredible 3 designs to some companies run by people who wouldn't know a decent designer if they cut their price to a mere £20 per design with multiple FREE redesigns. Sadly, while they are delighted with my design work I have thus done for them, and they would recommend my services to anyone with a business, there is no examples of my work on their websites, as they just wanted the illustrations for concepts.


3. My popular designs for a badge for children to wear, warning people that they was ginger resulted in yet another unfortunate incident with the legal team of the  local community cohesion team. It's a sad state of affairs how vexatious this country has now become, when I designer such as thus myself cannot produce something for fun, in case of upsetting people with ginger hair! I cannot comment further on this, as the matter is now in the hands of my lawyer.

I won't do it, I just won't do it.

Sad news about this blog. After 1 year of building up a brilliant relationship with online multi-disciplinary business associates and many of you, my loving pubic, I have decided to continue with this blog for yet another year. Yes, it hasn't been as successful as I'd hope. None of the major media outlets stumbled upon it (despite me adding it to Stumble Upon with a brilliant review and everything!) and I've not become incredibly wealthy like Donald Disney or any of the other well know cartoonists and SEO experts out there.

Disappointment, yes. But I'm the sort of person that is not put off by death threats and legal action. In fact, that sort of thing drives me on to succeed even more. Tell me it's rubbish, and I'll just keep on coming with it over and over again. The more people tell me I can't draw, the more I will draw. Come to think of it, if people told me I was a brilliant drawer, then I would also continue to draw. There's no stopping me really. You're opinion counts for nothing!


Please leave a comment and let me know what you think.

New Year. New Cartoons.

Well I do hope you all had a very nice Christmas (Xmas). I know that I did. Lovely time with the family, but sadly for the world of cartoons not much time to draw in-between peeling sprouts and being a busy mother of two. This led me to think about the meaning of Christmas more and more this year. What's it all for? Well apart from the wonderful gifts I received, including a lovely bumper pack of Gel pens from WHSMITHS from my partner. They are still in the wrapper with the giant Toblarone (Chocolate) bar, but I intend to put them to good use very soon.


Unsurprisingly the commissions for cartoons dried up somewhat over the Christmas season of Wintevil. At first I feared this might have something to do with the recession we keep reading so much about in the Daily Mail and other such places suchlike. But it seems those in the market for a cartoon, were also enjoying the Christmas (Xmas) holiday season too as well.


Here's a cartoon of my eldest opening his favourite Christmas (Xmas) present, which is what Christmas (Xmas) is all about really: 

Council housed Timeshare

I have noticed in the recent news lately that the new Government plans to prevent people who don't have a lot of money living in Council Houses for too long after they move in. I think this is an excellent idea. A bit like timeshare for homeless people. Why should they get a home for life and security of tenure for life when other people with more money don't have the same security with their own homes?

As you will have noticed, and I make no apologies for this, I am getting more political with my cartoons. I hope one day to become a political cartoonist. Perhaps I could be a political cartoonist for a decent newspaper, like The Daily Mail, or the Daily Telegraph, or if they won't have me - perhaps a working class newspaper like the Times of London (times cartoons anyone?).

How to drawer a cartoon filing cabinet. Part 1.

As promised, here is the lesson on how to draw a cartoon filing cabinet. Thanks to Pin Ups Office supplys (Dunstable) for the loan of the filing cabinet and preferential rates on post it notes.

A Day in a cartoonist's Hard Days Night.

I never knew Elenor Rigby, but I bet if I did she wouldn't have stolen that moped, or robbed the Londis Store, before blowing her mind out in a bar.

When a cartoonist, like what I am, is given a commission for drawing something for a client, I often have to go through a certain routine, that quite often involves checking my gel pens are all present and correct. There's nothing worst than starting a project only to fine the Silver Magic gel pen is missing, and you need to draw a cod piece to make the whole thing work in humour terms of endearment, and what have you.

I often get my best ideas when sitting on the toilet (number 1 or two - there seems to be no rhyme or reason to it), or sometimes when making toast for my busy family. It may take me days, or several days, up to a week, or even sometimes several months to get an idea, but when I do there's no stopping me. The PVR is set to record ANYTHING, with Tim Walcott in it and I'm away in the spare bedroom - moving all the dress making equipement out of the way until I finish this cartoon. I'm my own worst enemy when it comes to drawing, and I will often randomly rip up my creations until the voice in my head tells me that enough gel pen ink has been used on this project, and if the client doesn't like it - they must have a infected face or somethink.

Here's one I did for the BBC recently.

http://www.bbc.co.uk/

Well that wasn't very impressive.

Why is it that whenever men drink alcohol they promise to cut the lawn the following weekend, and then spew up in the toilet before leaving the house to find a kebab house, even though you live in a small village that doesn't even have a chip shop?

And then don't cut (or mow) the lawn the following weekend (because they are having an operation or something stupid like that?)

*still image from future projected animation short for children's TV (Channel 5?)

British Televisional Soap Operas.

The wife/girlfriend is a great big fan of many of the British Soap Operas that appear on our televisional screens. She insists on whatching them, regardless of what she is also doing at the time. Thankfully they are usually broadcast in the early evening, so some things are never interuppted!

Having agreed to share living accommodation with her some time ago when our 'relationship' began (inspired partly by a very poor bus service between our each abodes at the time), I have accidentaly found myself watching these very popular televisional shows. While obviously I'm far too high brow to actually watch these televisional shows, I did find myself taking a passing interest in the bizzarre plots. It seems that they all have the same plot, with different actors and charactures playing out the same stories over and over. For instance, all of the soap operas currently have a plot about a body having being buried and it being discovered by a group of hoodies. A few months ago they all had charactures that were having babies. It's quite remarkable how similar all of these shows are, and I suspect, until Channel 5 launch a soap opera about aliens or something, it will continue to be like this.

How to make people laugh at your business.

Business is a serious business and nothing more so now that business is in declining from the recession created by Gordon Brown in his last budget. I have some experience of business management and franchise operations ( over 8 months at Burger King alone!) so I feel well placed to advise business people about their businesses.

Firstly, it's important to understand why your business isn't doing so well. Could it be that what you are selling, or the service you are offering isn't suitable for the current ecomonic climate that we all find ourselves in right now? Perhaps you are a luxury goods provider, and people can't afford your luxury goods at the moment, because they have just lost their jobs. Maybe you should think of opening a pound shop on your premises until things pick up a bit?

Pound shops can be an excellent place to conduct business when people haven't got enough money and they need a cheap car cleaning spong and a multipack of hula hoops to see them through the dark days of the worst recession we've ever seen since the last one.

Changing your business is just one step you can take to avoid having to live like a common or garden chav, but while you are busy 'downsizing' your business to something more suited to the economic reality of life these days in post Soviet Britain, you also need to consider that no business can go from high class watch makers and jewellers, to a pound shop without some excellent publicity materials and promotion.

If someone in Angola wants to find a pound shop in Sheffield for instance, you want to get the very best possible search result in Google. It's no good having meta tags or keywords for Sheffield Pound Shop - as all the other pound shops in Sheffield will have gone for that obvious tag. No, what you need is something more specific, like for instances thus this, if your name is David Groat, then what you need is to be number 1 for the search term "david groat, no longer a high class watch maker and jeweller, but now a pound shop until things pick up a bit"

Using this sytem will guarantee you the number 1 spot for anyone anywhere in the whole world who wants to know where the best pound shop is in northern Britain. and searches for that term!

Alongside all of that there services which can be provided by any good popular SEO expert, you will need something eyecatching to attract people to your new pound shop (or whatever scummy type of business you decide to do until things pick up a bit). I suggest that something like a cartoon logo for your shop and publicity material would be a very good start.

Here is an few examples of the sort of cartoon logos that I can create for your business to see you through the recession, and avoid that sale of that much loved kidney.

I can be contacted for quotes for all such commissioned work via my normal contact email address (business email) leonard.gubbins@googlemail.com or HERE

How much do you charge for your cartoons?

Anyone who knows me or this website knows that my standard fee for cartoons and illustrations is £20 per cartoon (hourly rate, if my sister phones and interrupts me then it could be quite a bit more), but I've noticed that many cartoonists are very secretive about what they charge for their cartoons.

I think this is the wrong way to conduct business. You wouldn't go to buy a fridge in a shop that didn't display the prices, would you, and therefore why should it be any different for cartoons? Cartoons are to business what fridges are to kitchens full of cheese that needs to be stopped from going smelly, unless it's a type of cheese that is supposed to be smelly, is the way I think of it. Sometimes I think of everything in terms of preserving cheese.

Content is king. Illustrations are like Jesters.

I am often asked what makes a successful blog, but I rarely answer that question, because I don't want just anyone to be able to replicate the Talent Free website I have created.

Well now I feel confident enough to confide in you, dear reader just what does make a successful blog. Firstly it's very important to identify your audience, but how do you do that, when you don't have an  audience, or don't know who your audience is. I would say to any blog author that there are some simple steps you can take to identify who are your audience and what do they want. This can be achieved by taking note of whole leaves comments on your blog or website and perhaps visiting their blog or website to see what sort of person they are and what sort of content you think they would like to read.


Content is very important. There's no use in providing excellent articles on something very intelligent, such as the physics of quorn, if your core readers are mud stupid for instance. Assuming that your readers are just a little intelligent (like this blog) then you can provide articles that get good Google rankings, and that real people will find interesting.


Clicking knees often prevent me from sitting at my desk for too long, so I'm going to have to leave this article there, but I think I've given you enough of a start to start writing excellent content for your blog, website or weblog.

The First Day Of Summer. Part 2.

During my epic rise from part time supermarket cashier and weekend valeting operative to one of the best known cartoonist on Google.com I have often been struck by how easy it is to do just about anything you set your mind to.

Only the other day I was waiting at the bank to make a very modest deposit to my business account, when I got talking to an old acquittance I once knew of old. His name was Bill, and I hadn't seen him since he was quite a bit younger on a Employment training scheme in the late to middle 1980's. He was now working as a plumber, despite the fact that he trained as a brick layer. Apparently, as it so turns out, he found lugging bricks around all day too difficult, what with his flat feet and bad back, so he decided to paint plumber on the side of his van instead, and has been happily unblocking old women's u-bends ever since. He knows nothing about heating systems, but he's quite happy to learn that as he goes along (for the usual rate of course).

As I walked home in the beautiful spring sunshine I realised that perhaps I might of have taken a similar route through life as Bill had done, and being forced to shove my hand down lavatories for a living for ridiculous amounts of money. But I didn't. I decided to be a cartoonist!

Being a cartoonist is a great life. The gel pens, the smell of the paper first thing in a morning. The endless free time to do whatever I want to do, like watch cash in the attic, with the marvelous Angela Rippon. And knowing that whatever I do, it's good enough for me! The Boss!

This weather makes being a full time professional cartoonist even better, as I can just bugger off to the park whenever the mood takes me. It's like winning the lottery, I can tell you.

Three party's

I was so pleased with the background gradient for the nick clegg caricature that I thought it would make a great election banner for any floating voters out there. Who are you going to vote for?

Liberally applied gradient.

I thought it was only fair that I do a caricature of the leader of the liberal democrats, Nick Clegg MP. While I'm not entirely convinced that I've captured him quite as well as Gordon Brown the other day, I am very please with the three party gradient background I have created in photoshit.

Yellow for the liberals, red for labour and blue for the conservative party. I'm still waiting to hear from my local candidates which party will pledge to create new internet laws, so people can't upset me on the internet without being arrested by a special squad of the constablulary.

I think crimes against cartoonists should be taken more seriously.

Google is your friend.

I am often asked how I write such successful articles for the web/internet. Writing articles for the web is much easier than writing them for real life, as most of the readers do not have very high standards. It's a waste of time writing with proper grammers and spellings as no one will notice. A glut of spelling errors can actually enhance your prominance in Google, so sometimes it's benificial to spell well known words incorrectly, as then you'll be number #1 for that mis-spelled term within Google.

I have written many ghost articles and ghoul articles for other websites. If you are drifting around the web and you see a poorly written article on drain cleaning services, or mobility scooter hire, then it's probably written by me, or one of the team working here at Talent Free.

The most important consideration when writing for the web is how Google sees your article, and where it places it on the search results. Anything that appears more than 300 pages into a web search isn't going to get noticed at all, so there's no point to writing it.

If you have a web site and you'd like an article writing then I can help! My fees start from just £20 per hour, so as long as my computer doesn't crash, or I get chatting to Berol half way through working on it, a typical article on carpet warehouses could cost less than £50.

Contact me at leonard.gubbins@googlemail.com (business email address). There is no charge for sending an email.