Cartooning & Illustration Blog: Coghillustration

What an awesome project to work on—creating cartoon Frankenstein artwork for a custom hot rod 1971 Barracuda. This project started life when Murray Pfaff of Pfaff Designs contacted me to create the artwork as part of a custom hot rod design he was working on for a client.

Continue reading 'FrankenCuda'

by George Coghill -
View my cartoon character and mascot illustration portfolio
Contact me to get started on your own custom cartoon illustration projects.

This sexy bail bondswoman cartoon character design was created for—you guessed it, a bail bondswoman. The client wanted a woman character design that was sexy, but not too sexy, and had to be professional-looking as well.

Continue reading 'Sexy Bail Bondswoman'

by George Coghill -
View my cartoon character and mascot illustration portfolio
Contact me to get started on your own custom cartoon illustration projects.

This cartoon character of a Young Marine was created for a custom t-shirt design for a regional Young Marines troop. I was contacted by the troop leader to create an original character that not only represented an iconic Young Marine, but also had some humor to it.

Continue reading 'Young Marine T-Shirt Illustration'

by George Coghill -
View my cartoon character and mascot illustration portfolio
Contact me to get started on your own custom cartoon illustration projects.

This was an interesting project. I was contracted to created a cartoon fish mascot character for a niche fishing tool—basically it’s an air bladder deflate gizmo for fishermen so they can sport fish deeper-sea fish and release the expanded air in the fish’s buoyancy air bladder when they arrive at the surface. this allows the fishermen to release the fish back into the water without permanently harming them.

After an initial phone discussion with the client, I was mailed the existing packaging (as I was to also re-design the packaging) as well as some rough sketches drawn by the client to give me an idea of the fish they wanted to see. Typically when clients do send rough drawings, it’s with the “it’s not the greatest” disclaimer, but I actually encourage clients to suck up the ego and send these over. The more information I have from a client about what they have envisioned for the project, the better.

Continue reading 'Bends Mender'

by George Coghill -
View my cartoon character and mascot illustration portfolio
Contact me to get started on your own custom cartoon illustration projects.

This project was a blast to work on—very cool client and a fun theme How can you beat drawing a surfer dude holding a gyro/souvlaki while surfing a giant wave in front of a Greek temple?

This project came about after the client had commissioned a previous artist to illustrate the logo for “Surfin’ Souvlaki”, which was the client’s new restaurant. The results were less than satisfactory, and after finding me he knew I was the right illustrator for the job.

The final artwork was intended for use not only as the restaurant logo, but also for use on the sign on the front of the store. As the client had already purchased a large sheet of diamond-shaped steel, I needed to work up a the illustration to fit within this shape.

Continue reading 'Surfin’ Souvlaki'

by George Coghill -
View my cartoon character and mascot illustration portfolio
Contact me to get started on your own custom cartoon illustration projects.

This puma illustration was created as part of a rebranding campaign for a high school (the Perry Panthers). I was subcontracted by a designer to create the illustrated mascot portion of the project. The designer created the full logo and ancillary design work.

The school had been using puma artwork for their mascot that was not created by them, and therefore needed to have something original created. After initially attempting to create the illustration work himself, the designer eventually realized he needed an illustrator to create this portion of the project.

Continue reading 'Perry Pumas Mascot Illustration'

by George Coghill -
View my cartoon character and mascot illustration portfolio
Contact me to get started on your own custom cartoon illustration projects.

This sketch was for a client that went MIA after we got started on the project. The theme was for a “USA” branded pinup style girl — the draped fabric was to be a United States flag.

I think the drapery was coming along nicely, but I know I was dreading making all the Stars & Stripes read realistically enough. Probably wouldn’t have been as hard as I imagined though.

She’s been sitting in my hard drive long enough and I liked how this was coming along so I thought I would share.

by George Coghill -
View my cartoon character and mascot illustration portfolio
Contact me to get started on your own custom cartoon illustration projects.

This character was created for a company providing online, off-site file backup solutions. They wanted a character that would embody the idea of safe, secure and encrypted. Hence, the big key, the secure briefcase handcuffed to the character, the binary code reflected in the sunglasses “Matrix” style.

I knew from the outset that I wanted to go with a “bodyguard” or “secret service agent” look to the character, and that he needed to be big and tough to an exaggerated degree. Read on for more info on this project as well as some insight into the sketching process…

Continue reading 'Bodyguard Cartoon Mascot Character Illustration'

by George Coghill -
View my cartoon character and mascot illustration portfolio
Contact me to get started on your own custom cartoon illustration projects.

I recently created an in-depth Adobe Illustrator tutorial for the Go Media graphic design and illustration blog GoMediaZine. The tutorial covers the creation of a cartoon character mascot from sketch to final vector art. The character art is a fun Twitter blue bird cartoon character, and the vector art files as well as icons for use on your own website or blog are available as a free download as part of the tutorial.

Continue reading 'Tutorial: Create A Vector Art Twitter Bird Character Icon In Adobe Illustrator'

by George Coghill -
View my cartoon character and mascot illustration portfolio
Contact me to get started on your own custom cartoon illustration projects.

It’s been a long time since I’ve updated my blog with recent work, I have been (gladly) super busy with client projects, deadlines and upcoming work that I need to make time for now. A lot of really great cartooning projects have been recently wrapped up, with lots more good stuff on the digital drawing board right now.

The image above is a quick teaser showcasing some of the recent work — both finished and in progress — including: a cartoon Marines character for a t-shirt design for a Young Marines troop, a cartoon monster character for a self-published children’s book project I was just awarded, a cartoon ogre mascot for a video game portal website, an “inventor Mom” character with her home made robot, a tough security guard/body guard mascot character for an online data storage company, a puppy dog mascot character, a surfer character for a gyro/souvlaki restaurant, a frog version of the Statue of Liberty for the Ohio Canal Corridor’s annual event t-shirt, more avatar portrait illustrations for the Cleveland, Ohio travel & visitors bureau Positively Cleveland, and a fish mascot character and logo for a niche fishing utility product.

Continue reading 'Cartooning & Illustration: Recent & Current Work Teaser'

by George Coghill -
View my cartoon character and mascot illustration portfolio
Contact me to get started on your own custom cartoon illustration projects.