You set your reality and carefully construct it so that it has a certain feeling, an energy. That's the vital, visceral thing about making an illustration.
Like everyone, I want to make my own "fine art."
In real life, people are going by fast and it's hard to draw them from my eye alone in a split second.
I like to follow my own muse.
Often the energy of a piece is more exciting to me than the subject.
Both of my parents were cartoonists - they met in art school - so I was always drawing and I was the best artist in my class and all that stuff.