FORMALLY GNORMANDY; THE FORM OF GNORM THE GNOME

Below is the model sheet for Gnome we put in our pitch packet. His design stayed relatively close to the first few concept drawings I did, and over a 6 month period of re-drawing and tweaking, it was boiled down to the economic state seen below. I was lucky enough to have Andy Bialk, a very talented artist and super nice guy, look at the first few passes of Gnome at which point he made some great suggestions, specifically on ways to unify the overall graphic/flat style of the form.

I think Gnome's probably the best character design I've done to date.


Earlier design (for reference):
The short formally known as:
PS: The 'BFF' stands for 'Best Fucking Friends".
We also did a few little vignettes, scenes from some of the episode ideas we came up with, to give the guys a feel of the show.

THE NOT-SO BIG FOOT ANYMORE

This is a rough model sheet I put together for the original Big Foot design we pitched with. However after some advice from Craig McCracken and Rob Renzetti, Joey and myself chose to go a different direction with the character.


There is no denying the foot print this character has left in the back of my head, as it was incredibly hard to have to let go of him. This being my first official pitch, there have been a myriad of new circumstances/check points I've had to face all in the path to creation. Chopping off Big Foot was one of the hardest things I've had to do as an artist, having developed something to a point of supposed perfection, to have someone tell you to change it. Thankfully, it came from two people I have the utmost respect for, and their advice and reasoning was entirely genuine. I can say now (after a week of creative straining trying to come up with a new character) that I am ultimately happier with the new approach we've taken. I can look back now at the footprints I left behind and, despite them getting smaller, know that I've grown.

HOW TO PAINT YOUR DRAGON

So I was sitting outside a coffee shop in downtown Burbank, as I often do, drawing, when a nice chap, the old milk-man type a' guy came up and said he'll pay me to draw him a logo for his hockey team. I said sure. We didn't really talk about what it should look like, just that; 1. It's a dragon. 2. Hockey sticks. and 3. He should have pectoral muscles.

So here is my Ice Dragon, notice the peck juice.

GNO MORE GNOME

I recently had a chance to pitch an idea to Cartoon Network with my good friend Joey Giardina for a shorts program they are currently producing. We were able to pitch directly to Craig McCracken and Rob Renzetti, two people who have already had a long lasting impact on my so-far short lived career and of whom I have the utmost respect for.

They were very receptive to the idea and very genuine with their feedback. They liked the general tone of the short, the personalities and the relationships and offered some insightful suggestions that both myself and Joey are taking to heart. We are in the process of retooling our concept and pushing ourselves creatively to give the short as much potential as we possibly can. With that said, here is a small sample of the rejected rethinkings of what was once Big Foot and Gnome.









I'll be posting a lot more of BF and G related artwork in the next couple weeks.

BF ALT_1 (IT'S CODE)

This character is based on an old Big Foot concept design i did, that I recently re-stumbled upon. I like the design so I started doin some drawings with him. He suits himself well to actiony poses, which is fun cause I normally don't get much action.




Also I need to give a shout out to my main man Jabari Phillips; Dreamworks Script Coordinator extroidinaire for getting me in to the premier of Kung Fu Panda. He's an incredibly down-to-earth person with a good head on his a shoulders and even nicer hat on his head.

Kung Fu Panda is awesome, it's a must see as far as I'm concerned. Best looking CG film to date and some of the best action scenes I've ever seen.

MY WRITING DEBUT

My computer-screen writing debut!
A very talented friend of mine, Eric Pringle, runs a super incredible funny online flash cartoon Prophet Buddy. A while back I pitched him a couple ideas for some episodes, and he was nice enough to take one of my ideas and make it a short! So here it is...


Now I may be biased, but I'm pretty sure this is the best episode yet. The animation is perfect and the facial expressions and acting are hilarious. Not to mention they've really nailed down the voices now heading into season 2, and there's a lot of comedy purely in the delivery and phrasing.

He also posted some storyboards I did for an alternative episode, you can see them here.

If you like it you should check out the website, it's got a ton of great animation, some of the best stuff on the web. And if you want to look cool, buy a Prophet Buddy T-Shirt.

FAMILY TRY

Lordy I haven't posted in for ages. Sorry to anyone who's been checkin, but keep your ears peeled cause I'll have some new stuff to post in the next few days. Meanwhiles, here are some excerpts from a Family Guy board test I did. I think the episode has aired already, not sure. But I worked on the test right before I got the gig at Dreamworks, so never actually got around to turning it in. I was fortunate to have one of the directors, Brian Iles, take a look at it for me. He gave me a lot of great feedback and I reworked the test a few times.







This post is for Jib Master Jabs the FG Clip-master.

I MET A HERO OF MINE

Today (technically yesterday) I got an opportunity to meet one of my heroes. This man's music has had as much if not more of an impact on my artistic and writing style than any visual artist. His music and lyrics are simply genius, and not to mention he has the voice of an angel, or so I hear. It is partially because of him that I chose to drop out of school and move to LA to pursue my dreams, and I could never thank him enough for it. He is a Mraz among men, I'm talking of course about Mr.A-Z himself, Bushwalla... I mean Jason Mraz.

Notice I look like I'm going to throw up, I didn't, but it would have been exponentially disastrous considering Mraz wears sandals.

He was kind enough to take a few minute to talk with me, and we discussed some philosophies on life and chasing the dream. He said a whole bunch of brilliant things, I think, I was kind of in shock and don't really remember exactly what he said, but I'm sure it was smart (like everything else that comes out of his mouth). He was so genuine and down to earth, one of the coolest dudes I've ever met. He came out before the show to play the line, and performed an improve Mraz-terpiece "kinda sorta" in which he sang a verse about me... which is something I will never forget for the rest of my life.

At about 1:02



The show was amazing, and even afterwards he came over to shake my hand and even remembered my name... this man is amazing.
For your enjoyment;
The best rendition of the best song every written;

You find me another artist who would perform a duet with a homeless woman on the streets of France:


Jason Mraz you are truly an inspiration, not only through your work but also through the type of person you are and the life you choose to live.

A VISION OF MY QUEST

These are a couple designs I've been working on the past few days. I discovered the 'smudge' tool during working on these... and used it for pretty much everything; hair, fabrics, feathers... hands?

This ones not quite finished yet, I gots a bit of tweaking to do.

DOCS AND DAVE P.

Freelance designs I recently did. Don't really have much to say about them... I don't really have time to talk about them, been sooooooo busy lately.

I want to say thanks again to Dave Pimentel for being one of the coolest guys in the universe. He has a great blog up with some very important handouts on storyboarding, I advise anybody interested in the subject to check it out;
http://drawingsfromamexican.blogspot.com/2006_11_01_archive.html

I can feel myself learning just looking at Dave's work.

TOUNG IN CHEEKS

This is a quicky T-Shirt design I did for an event my sister is holding. I guess they're taking a whole bunch of kids to a museum and talking to them about healthy eating and the digestive system... I bet they'll be a lot of giggles towards the rear end of the tour. I don't know if they're making the shirts for the kids, but I hope they do!

I ♥ HORTON!

I just saw Blue Sky's Horton Hears a Who, and it was absolutely incredible. By far the best movie I've seen in theaters over the past couple years.
It's the CARTOONiest 3D movie I've ever seen, and I think Blue Sky is going to carve out a real niche for themselves in the market with this kind of stuff. It was pretty funny and had a lot of great 2D oriented gags which was awesome to see in 3D. There is also about 3-4 minutes of 2D animation in the film which was a great surprise, and they made it work. Originally I wasn't too keen on the voice cast, but as the movie progressed they actually fell into place really nicely.

Taking a kids book like that and adapting it into an hour plus film will surely have its difficulties, and it showed. There was some filler bits, but I think they kept a great flow to the movie that was entertaining enough to distract from the fact. I think one of the reasons it succeeded was because it treated its filler sequences as animated shorts; the whole bridge scene for example, could stand alone as a short (if you remove the spec from the scene). A giant elephant who has to cross a thin decaying old rope bridge. That's a great gag short. They did not fill the extra time with irrelevant dialogue or scenes in which they establish characters/relationships that ultimately have no significance in the movie's entirety.



Does anybody else smell a sequal...

LIVE NUDES

Drawings from another class at Dreamworks I've been sitting in on. I never really like my figure drawings, so I don't really look at them. After each class I'll just put all the drawings in the back of my car, and that's where they've been the last few weeks. But I finally looked at them, and was quite surprised to find a few that I actually liked.

I WAS GONNA TITLE THIS POST "GO FIGURE", BUT THAT'S REALLY CHEESY. I'LL THINK OF SOMETHING FUNNY IN A FEW MINUTES...

This is an assortment of not-so-terrible drawings from a class I've been sitting in on at Dreamworks. The class is run by Dave Pimentel, an absolutely incredible guy and artist. He's been so kind as to mentor me through the wacky world of feature animation, and I've learned so much from him already. The most recent session was probably the most fun I've had drawing in a long looooooong time.

These range from 1-2 minute poses.

TUNNEL VISION

This is another Mock poster I've been working on for the past 72 hours straight. I'm really happy with how it came out (I've still got a few things to tweak). But I think this is one of the first times where I was actually able to put down on paper/computer-screen what I actually saw in my head... or at least pretty close.

It's the most extensive piece of digital art I've ever done (topping the poster 2 posts down), and I learned a lot doing it. I used to hate photoshop because I didn't think it was very user freindly, but now I'm starting to Dig it.

BLOG TIME NO SCENE

I haven't blogged in for-ages. Sorry about that, (the appology is assuming there are actually people who care?) I've been rediculously busy lately, I'm working on so many different projects they're all just starting to blur together.

But for now, enjoy (or don't) this random assortment of drawings, mostly copied poses.


This is a horse I designed, I really like the shapes, I like the style actually more. I might try to do a line-up exploring the style.

THE LUCKIEST POST EVER!!!!

This is another "mock" poster I did for a project I'm pitching to Dreamworks. This is probably one of the most extensive pieces of art I've ever done in photoshop, and actually had my very talented friend Tony Scheppard (aka T-square) help me out with it.

Good luck trying to figure out what the movie's about...

And also, to all the people who frequent or less-than-frequent my blog, you've stumbled upon another bizzare note of "counting". When I checked my counter, right before I posted this blog, I found that up to this point, I've had 777 views, possibly the luckiest number ever.

Running total of visits to the above URL since 21 Jan 2008: 777

What are the chances of that? 1 out of 777? maybe. Anyways, hopefully it's a sign of goodluck for the project, and in that case, thank you.

BIG FOOT AND GNOME- - - CONFIDENTIAL- - -

So as Big Foot and Gnome moves forward and gets closer to production, my good friend Joey G. and I have both decided to hold out on posting any new artwork. We have some exciting plans for the project, and will be sure to keep you updated.

Thanks to everyone who commented on the project.

FOR MY DEAR FRIEND MR.ALASKA

So apparently, according to my "counter" there is 1 lad in Alaska who visited my blog, which is odd, because I didn't even know they had computers in Alaska, but nonetheless, welcome to my blog, hope its not too cold in here for you. Also, I saw your movie, Juno, it was ok.

I have decided to give something back to the online community who have shown such a mild interest in my blog with some never before seen (by you) character designs, with a special message from me;

Thank you! I like that shirt on you.

Anywho, these are some character designs I've been working on of late. They're for a project I plan on pitching to fox, not anytime soon, just in general.


I started the model sheet below with the 3/4 view pose, and then soon realized that every front view I tired looked disgusting... ew.
Shapes:

Side burns and butt.

Goodnight Alaska.

PITCHING A TENT

This is a quick piece of inspirational art I did for a project I pitched to Dreamworks. It's a mock poster, and the original has text and a logline on it, but I took it off as to not give away the concept/plot.So either you'll be able to figure out the plot and then you can steal my idea, or you have no idea what's going on and I'm a terrible artist. Either way you win.

WELL LAH DE DAH

This is an excerise I do where I'll watch a classic cartoon, pause it, and copy the poses. But instead of just copying the character, I'll use my own character and try to match the pose. Does this excersize actually do anything for your drawing abilities...? I dunno, I just like doing it.

It's from a Tom and Jerry cartoon, "Cat Fishing" the best Tom and Jerry I've ever seen, the only good Tom and Jerry I've ever seen. I hate tom and jerry's, they're super boring. But I saw this one and loved it, and then I found out one of the lead animators was Michael Lah, Tex Avery's right hand man, and my favorite animator of all times. He animated the bests scenes too.




So, not too many posts ago I proclaimed Tex Avery's MGM cartoons are the greatest cartoons ever made. Well I was wrong again, kind of. I recently saw a few cartoons Avery did for Walter Lantz, after leaving MGM. One of them in specific, a chilly willy cartoon entitled "The Legend of Rockabye point", is one of the single funniest cartoons I've ever seen.

The budget for the cartoon was lower than those he produced at MGM, and is evident with 1. More recycled BG's than usual (for a Tex cartoon) and 2. More holds than usual (for a Tex cartoon). But that's not a bad thing, in fact, this is how limited animation should look.

CREATIONISM

This is a little piece I did, I thought it was a funny idea. I did it all in flash, and actually put it together pretty quickly. I call it "The Creation of Bloo". I think it's pretty obvious what work of art this is based off of, and if you don't know, well then you're probably blind. Which is weird because I don't know how you'd be reading this post?

BIRD LOVERS

This is a t-shirt design I did for a contest being held on behalf of Jason Mraz to design new merchandise for his web-store.