MAD on AOL

As long as I’m on the subject, MAD also tried another on-line endeavor years ago in conjunction with AOL. It was called the “RED” page and was a special teen orientated AOL site. MAD contributed a daily cartoon for the page. This was really a fun job, as it was a quick image and a quick turnaround. MAD needed a digital JPG file at 300 x 300 dpi, usually withing a few hours of calling with the job. It was almost like doing newspaper work, and it paid pretty well considering the short time involved.

In order to get these done quickly, I would skip the inking stage altogether. I’d do a tight pencil, send it in for approval, and then do a high res scan and clean it up in PhotoShop, darkening the lines and increasing the contrast. Then I’d do a quick digital color job and e-mail it to MAD.

Rooting around through some old disks I found most of the images I did for this project, which only lasted about 5 weeks or so:

I honestly don’t remember the gags that went along with these, but they were often one image in a list of dumb things about something, or part of a small gag article. It was a fun side project while it lasted. There were several artists that did the dailies, including Ray Alma and Scott Bricher.