Conan O'Brien Cover

I feel so lucky that I got a chance to depict Conan O'Brien this week. I love Conan and he's coming to San Diego! This was a last minute illustration for our Night & Day section of the newspaper. I only had a day and a half to do it, but I was pleased with the result. Andy Richter as the surfer was an afterthought, believe it or not, that ended up making the whole thing work. I didn't have as much time to tweak the colors like I usually do, but it is newsprint, after all, and it will never print as perfectly as I'd like. One thing I've learned about working at newspapers is to make the illustration the best you can, then let it go. How it prints is out of your hands.

Then there is letterpress printing! Letterpress is my chance to be totally involved in the printing process. Yet, even in letterpress there comes a time when you have to let it ride. After you've mixed and re-mixed the right ink color, changed the packing so the impression in just so, and made any adjustments so that every letter down to the smallest punctuation mark prints, it's time to let go and let the press do the rest. I suppose we could all live by that philosophy -do your best, then let it go!

I am so upset because I really, really, really wish I had tickets to go see Conan this weekend!! I guess I'll just have to let it go.

images belong to The San Diego Union-Tribune