Observer Dan Greenburg wrote us about a cartoon he saw in the Ottawa Citizen. The cartoon is by Cam, a syndicated cartoonist. We also spoke with Cam to find out what went on behind the cartoon. His comments are at the bottom of this article. Here is Dan's letter in full:
"Hi there,
I wanted to direct your attention to a hilarious, Macintosh-oriented cartoon that appeared this morning on the editorial page of one of Canada's largest newspapers, the Ottawa Citizen.
It is definitely a milestone. You have to see it! And tell *everyone* about it!
It is a great cartoon and another acknowledgment that the iMac's has swept across, at least, North America. Mac/iMac evangelists will love it. I think it is so good and so universally funny (i.e., not just to Mac lovers), that I think it might even make Newsweek's weekly cartoon and funny quotations page!
The Citizen doesn't appear to have an URL for it. However, the cartoonist, Cam, has his own website. It is appearing as the cartoon of the day [for February 5th]. As the site gets updated everyday, I imagine that the cartoon will be at this URL for the day at least.
One of your loyal readers, I remain,
Sincerely yours,
dan greenberg
| Dan Greenberg Vice President
| Minto Developments Inc.
| Ottawa, Ontario, Canada"
This cartoon is absolutely hilarious and we recommend you go and check it out! Look for the link to the February 5th Cartoon of the day.
We spoke to Cam to find out how the cartoon came out. The following is the result of that conversation.
The Mac Observer: Are you a Mac user? If not, do you care about computers at all?
Cam: Yes, I consider myself a Mac user, although I use both a Mac and PC on a daily basis. I started using a Mac in 1995 when I was employed as a newspaper artist and have owned 6 Macs since 1987. I love using my Mac and use the PC when I need to -- if you get my point. I currently own a 266 G3 and an Acer Pentium 200. I have kept most of my previous Macs, except for the first Mac Plus and Mac LC. I have a Centris 610 out on loan. My wife has laid claim to the Powerbook 5300 and I have a 7100/66 AV in a box on a stay of execution.
The Mac Observer: Did the cartoon stem out of the HAL commercial that Apple ran during the Super Bowl? If not, where did the idea for the cartoon come from?
Cam: The cartoon was partly inspired by the Hal commercial and partly from a news item here in Canada about the province of Alberta considering suing Microsoft for damages from the Y2K bug. I mixed the two items and out came this cartoon, which I thought my paper would reject on the basis of it being too much of a commercial. To my surprise they actually ran it and I have had an enormous response from the Mac community.
The Mac Observer: Do you use a computer to make your cartoons?
Cam: Yes. I used PhotoShop from 1994 to 1996 from start to finish. I have gone back to natural media because I get better results, but I use PhotoShop to mask in the horizontal lines that mimic the effect of a Graphix Duo-shade board. It is a technique that I came up with on my own and it saves me about $12.00 a day in not having to purchase the Graphix board. I tried Flash for a while and then the 30 day trial period expired. It was impressive though, and I might use it in the future.
The Mac Observer Spin: The power of the Mac reaches far and wide. There are probably many cartoonists out there who do use Macs in their work, but this cartoon rings funny for anyone. We also recommend you read Cam's other work as it is all very good. So thanks to Dan for pointing it out and thanks to Cam for making this cartoon!
Cam
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