Something in the Bushes

Trying to paint more contrast in, but this is the general idea.

The Angel Michael.

At least, how I kind of imagined him. Kind of a "Heavenly Badass".

Bigger. Maybe better? This (and the post before) is an illustration for an upcoming book by James A. Beane about the 3D production process. He's quite knowledgable, so it should be good!

Lite Infographic

This is my version of the CG Animation pipeline that I'm creating for a book. There's a few revisions, so this isn't the final. I do love bunnies, though.

Rocky is a Gerbil with a checkered past. And he wants to party. With you.

Unnamed.

Drop Dead Diva

I know it's been a while.

Eventually, I'll have a balance between producing actual work, and posting it. I posted some of the animations I did on Vimeo. I had to produce 9 animations in 15 weeks (about 6-7 minutes of animation), the most I've ever had to produce. For me, it was an exercise on what was possible, a proof-of-concept, if you will.
Thank goodness I had help! Animator Toby Cochran, assistants Kevin Johnson and Katherine Taht, compositor Christina Hall, and background artist Sean Winburn.

I also created backgrounds for a candy company, Toxic Waste Sour Candy. They were looking for a traditional cartoonist, so I tried to make them happy. Here's some highlights:

This character's MO is a facade of environmentalism covering a toxic habit:






Same character, but under his mansion:

More sketchery - of members of faculty, and 'other'. Not as emotional as the last group, so not so good to grow my former position as a Story Supervisor...

Sketchbook Project, Pt. 2

More sketch-foolery.

Sketchbook Project, Pt. 1

I've happily been particpating in the Sketchbook Project, and it's provided me with down time where I can sketch freely and explore ideas that don't fit anywhere else.

Story Consulting

I apologize for the long lack-of-blog-posting.
I consulted for Performance Services in 2008 to create a narrative piece explaining the history of the Design-Build tradition (it's where a single designer - shoot, just watch it!). The old-time feel is intentional, and there were some really talented folk who worked on this: Me on story, Leigh Marino scriptwriter, Vince Gorman and Joseph Cross on animation. They polished this sucker off with very little time and resources.
Leigh still works at Mediasauce, Vince moved to Santa Monica, and animated on the recently released Kung Fu Panda Online Game and Ken Duncan Studios, Joseph Cross went on to work for the Basement Design and Motion. And me, I'm still in the same place I was 2 years ago.

Good Times with the Mammals

They wouldn't stay very still, but it was good stuff. I went with a group and I think we all tried not to get too full of ourselves, but just put pencil to paper and get those 100,000 bad drawings out of our system.

Swimming.

There's a serious need for me to take up the slack. I'm hoping that NDAs will subside on what little I can post for "BLU".

Here we go.

Summer's about to begin, and so am I, as Story Supervisor for Big Grin Productions' "BLU".

I AM working.

Man! It's been a while since I've posted anything! I assure you, I labor at my desk and I look at other blogs - which, BTW, I don't feel my comments would add anything they're expressed so well.

I hope everyone's doing well, and as summer begins I'll post actual hand-crafted work. I hope. Or maybe I'll learn guitar.

Last Minute Storyboards

Before I traveled to San Francisco over the weekend, I crammed in some storyboard work for Adrenaline Motion Picture's upcoming web series in development:
























This kind of storytelling needs camera-intimate eye-level work, and good close-ups.

I must say that though I've many projects lined up (and trying to line up) the only consistent project is that of my school. I would call it my "day job", but that sounds like I stop doing it at night. I am always thinking about HOW and WHY, night and day, job or no job. With students I get the high level of personal interaction I require (and admittedly rusty at), I get to pursue things that fit comfortably in the classroom. I squeamishly submit that I may be in the right place as a teacher. I would have never, in my wildest dreams, thought myself a teacher in the Midwest. But here I am. I've certainly been afraid of genuine grand opportunities in the past (like my Pixar Interview of February 96, the "one that got away"), but it seems I've ended up here. And unless something historic or career-shattering happens, I imagine this is where I'll always be.