andy mcnally » video

Career Day 2011

Andy — Tue, 18 Jan 2011 04:40:13 +0000

The kind students and staff of Riverdale Middle School invited me back to their annual Career Day. I had a wonderful time drawing pictures and answering questions for the students. Take a look at the video and see all of the bright young minds and faces. My daughter Callie shot and directed the video, which was no easy task with all of the eager students crowding around.

Let’s Draw Frankenstein

Andy — Wed, 27 Oct 2010 21:37:37 +0000

I created a video tutorial, “Let’s Draw Frankenstein.” It is a basic drawing tutorial and would be great for kids, teachers, artists, and anyone who likes to draw. The tutorial uses simple shapes, like circles, triangles, and squares to create a friendly cartoon version of Frankenstein. I used the free graphic editing program GIMP, to make easier to see what I was doing, but the emphasis is on drawing, regardless of the tool you decide to use. I recommend watching the video in HD to get a better view of the drawing. What are you waiting for? Get out your pencil and paper and draw along with me.

Learning from Mistakes

Andy — Thu, 14 Oct 2010 02:47:18 +0000

Here is a video of me flipping through one of the printed versions of my Halloween Fun Books. The bonus sketch in the back was for my friend Anne.

I’m still working towards my goal of 1000 total sales of the book. I only have 994 copies left to go. A big thank you to everyone who has already bought a copy. So what have I done right and wrong in my first product launch. First, what has gone right, because it is a short list. One of the most important things is that the artwork turned out like I had envisioned. I actually can not take credit for the best idea of the book launch. The idea was my daughter’s. Originally, I wanted the book to be available only as a digital download, because I wanted buyers to be able to create as many copies of the book as they need. Callan, my youngest daughter, said that I needed to sell a printed copy with the PDF so that people would get something to hold and so she could have something to show her friends. Of the six orders so far, five have been printed copies, and she sold two of them to her friends at school and will most likely sell more. She is awesome and she was right.

So what did I do wrong? Frankly there is a lot ridding on the launch for me financially, so I feel like a lot has gone wrong. Since the book is Halloween themed, it needed to be released a couple of weeks sooner. Second, I did not do enough to let people know before hand that the book was coming out. Third, I really don’t have a large following or regular traffic, but I’m working on it, so I really needed to find better ways to get the word out. Forth, I’m not good at getting the word out. I’m always worried about being the person who is constantly promoting and saying buy this, buy this, buy this. I just need to find the middle ground that I’m comfortable with, or find an agent. The agent job may already be taken by my daughter, now that I think of it.

What now? I won’t deny that it is sometimes frustrating and depressing, when you put your heart, hard work, and a lot of hope into something, and it does not turn out the way you had it pictured in your head. On the positive side of things, I’ve learned a lot about what I can do different with the next launch, how to create a book, and to never give up. I have a million ideas and I’m positive one of them well do well. It does not have to make a million dollars, just support me and my girls. The most important thing is to create a product that is true to you as a person and artist, and for that I’m most proud. I have created a book that is about having fun, Halloween, costumes, coloring, childhood, family time, and that is what I love.

If you like, you can get the digital version – $4 or the deluxe printed version – $10, by visiting the Book Order page here. You can also help by spreading the word about the book or my artwork. Also, you can simply leave a comment with your thoughts, ideas, or suggestions.

henry loves chocolate

Andy — Fri, 24 Sep 2010 14:43:02 +0000

Henry loves the fall season and chocolate.

The fall is one of my favorite times of the year. Something about the cooler air and the beautiful fall foliage makes me happy. Halloween is one of my other favorite things about the season. My version of Halloween was not really about dark scary things that go bump in the night, but rather about fun and dressing up. I wanted to be a knight, a superhero, the Frito Bandito(see video below), or a robot. Certainly the candy is nice, but it was so much fun to put on your costume and walk around the neighborhood with all of the wonderful decorations. It was a magical time for me growing up. I certainly draw some of my creative inspiration from both the season and my memories.

What season gives you creative inspiration? What was your favorite costume or candy?

brushes iPad app review

Andy — Wed, 15 Sep 2010 16:37:38 +0000

I’ve been playing with the Brushes App on my iPad the last couple of days, and thought I would give everyone a brief review. First off, let me say that I love creating artwork in any form, wether it is crayons or on a computer. One of the things that first made me want to get an iPad, besides that I’m trying to develop some interactive story apps, was being able to create digital art on it. I’ve tried out several drawing and illustration apps, but I have not really found one that has had every feature I’m wanting. The amazing thing is that this $7.99 iPad/ $4.99 iPhone app can do things that would cost hundreds of dollars or more in many desktop applications, not to mention you would also need an external drawing tablet, which would cost more money. In the overall scheme of things, you may even save money buying the iPad(or iDevice) and the app, over other tools, and the iPad is incredibly portable. I know that iPad isn’t for everyone, so with out further delay, on with the review.

view of the interface with the layer panel open

The interface on Brushes is minimalistic and easy to use. There are quick menus for changing the brush type and size, although the slider can sometimes be difficult to get just where you want it. The plus and minus buttons on either side of the sliders are a welcome feature to allow for the fine tuning of settings. The interface also provides menus for picking colors(and saving them), a bucket for filling colors, an eraser tool, undo button, redo button, a color picker, and a layers panel, which offers a couple of basic blending modes and a way to move the entire layer. All of these menu items can be hidden, so that you can focus on your creation. The tools are all amazingly easy to use without reading any instructions. I would like to see a few extra tools to make selections and manipulate the selections.

brush settings menu

color panel

The gallery is the area for creating new images, and for viewing items previously created. The gallery also provides a menu for sharing you work via email, saving to your photos, and even uploading to Flickr. One of my favorite features is the ability to email yourself the file’s actions. The Brushes Viewer, available for both PCs and Macs, is a free desktop application that will take the .brushes file and exported the image at up to six times the original size or export a movie of your creation. I’ve included a sample movie export at the top of the post.

gallery

gallery sharing menu

In summary I really like the easy and simple interface of Brushes, and that is what makes it shine. Sure it could use a few more features, but some of it’s beauty is it’s simplicity. It is a tool that I will be glad to use and include in my creative tool set.

PS. The untitled drawing in the review, I later decided to call “Lex Luther.” It reminded me of the Lex from the Smallville television show. I drew him happy, because I don’t want to give up on him changing his mind about the whole villain thing.

sharpie markers on canvas

Andy — Fri, 20 Aug 2010 17:46:20 +0000

I finally tried out using Sharpies to draw/ paint on canvas. I had been wanting to try it out for a long time. I will have to say, that it was a different experience than I had expected. I know the canvas has a texture to it, but it had a very scratchy feel to it, and it was very slow. Painting would have been much faster, and easier to cover the canvas. I also thought that I would maybe have more control with the marker tip, but the canvas surface made it difficult, yet not impossible. The markers held up pretty well, but the green marker would not write afterwards. It was fun to try out a familiar drawing tool in an unusual way, so I’m glad that I gave it a try. I made a short video talking about the process.

The painting is available in my Etsy shop.

If you haven’t already, be sure to enter my Dinosaur Grocery Tote giveaway.

Memphis Flood Water May 4, 2010

Andy — Thu, 06 May 2010 02:09:14 +0000

have a wonderful day

Andy — Mon, 03 May 2010 11:47:17 +0000

A simple animation I created with Animation Creator HD for Apple iPad. I thought I would try out animating on the iPad. It is not as powerful as Flash or other animation software, but it is not bad for a version 1.0 program running on the iPad(there is also a version for the iPhone). I would like to see it have layers and a way to resize items, but it was easy and intuitive to use. Be warned that YouTube is sometimes stopping the animation before the circle erases itself completely. Have a wonderful day.

heavy rains and a paper boat

Andy — Fri, 01 May 2009 23:20:33 +0000

The spring rains have been heavy today. I thought about splashing in the puddles, but decided to make a paper boat and launch it in the over flowing water spills from the rain. Brings back childhood memories. Watch the maiden and final voyage of my paper boat. The boat’s name is from the Rush Hour 2 movie, when Chris Tucker’s character says he owns a yacht. I was just trying to make the most of the rain and have some fun.

happy earth day

Andy — Wed, 22 Apr 2009 21:24:43 +0000

Happy Earth Day 2009

I filmed this quick video to celebrate Earth Day and to get outside and enjoy the beautiful Tennessee weather today. The video was filmed in my front yard. The birds were singing and chirping their delight. I think that the birds have been into the whole “green” thing for some time now, but I will have my staff look into the data. The birds will be featured in my next illustration,as token of appreciation. I hope everyone has a wonderful day, and on a serious note, please take the time to think about ways to help out mother Earth.