2023 Wrap-Up

I was immensely lucky this year to have two productions I worked very hard on released: Adam Sandler's Leo for Netflix and Lucasfilm's Young Jedi Adventures on Disney+. Both were/have been their own childhood dream to work on (Adam Sandler? Star Wars? C'mon, man!), and as always, my contributions were but a small portion of the uncanny talents that assemble to create these amazing stories.

If you haven't already, be sure to check them out as you relax and unwind with family and friends this holiday season. (And then very quickly decline the auto-play function so that you can see my name in the credits!)

And here are some behind-the-scenes process work-in-progress images of creating this holiday image:

Rough Concept

Line Art

Flat Color

Tone & Colored Line Art

Too much snow?

Have a Smurfy Day!

Still can't seem to get away from them...

1st Birthday Card

I drew this up for a birthday card for my nephew/Godson. Happy 1st birthday, kiddo!

Farewell Avalor

After a fantastic year at Disney Television Animation working on the hit show Elena of Avalor, I have hopped on my jacquin and flown off into the sunset. Lots of great folks working there who will continue to make the best kids show on television!

Look for posts about the episodes I worked on in the months ahead. Exciting new things coming soon; stay tuned!

Noah's Ark

Awhile back, I was playing around with the idea of expanding my old Academy of Art illustration into a short story of some sort. The illustration (posted below and at this link) was based on the Biblical tale of Noah and his animal-filled Ark. I liked the idea that all the animals we consider extinct were just left behind when the floods came.

Then I realized that I had subconsciously lifted the idea from the Fantasia 2000 sequence with Donald Duck. So that was that.

But here are some new character design explorations:

And here's the original illustration from school way back in 2011:

Mother's Day Celebration

A very happy Mother's Day to all the lovely mothers out there on the interwebs!

Smurfs: The Lost Village

For those who don't follow me on Facebook or Tumblr, I've been posting plenty about the just-released-to-theaters Smurfs: The Lost Village!  I had a blast working on the project for two and a half years and will be sharing a bit of the art I created for the film in the future. 

Here's a promo poster I made to celebrate the film's release:

Be sure to check out the movie, now playing at a theater near you! SmurfsMovie.com

Ever feel stuck...?

Sorry for the delay in new posts.

I got an Apple Pencil for Christmas this year to go along with the iPad Pro from last year.  Tried out the Procreate app.  Pretty cool results, though I still have much to learn.  The drawing above (based on a sketch from years ago) was roughed out in pencil on paper, then inked, then photographed and colored digitally.

Happy New Year!

Star Wars : The Force Awakens : Episode Cute

What a sorry year for posts on this blog!  Since my first post was Star Wars-based, it seems only fitting (and more so timely) that my last post is about the new movie, Star Wars: Episode VII : The Force Awakens!

If you haven't seen the movie, yet, I cannot recommend it enough.  Regardless of the politics of anything in the Star Wars franchise (old trilogy versus new, new director drama, etc.), it's just a really fun, enjoyable movie.  I left feeling I got more than my money's worth.

Some behind the scenes stuff: As always, I have to start with some sketches.

This was especially important, since I'm not familiar with these characters.  In fact, I hadn't seen the film when I drew this, so I wasn't even sure who the main characters were, secondary, et cetera.  Research is important, folks! Then I figured out a composition, reminiscent of my earlier Star Wars post.

All done digitally in Photoshop.  Made some changes to it:

And then started cleaning it all up:

Each character was drawn on a different layer so I could tweak the layout as needed.

Everything was done on the fly for this one, with little pre-planning.  All drawn in one day, from sketch to final.  Just a passion project to let off some steam after a long time drawing Smurfs for work.  You may notice that I removed General Hux because he ultimately looked like a character just floating in the background.  I was going to add some new Stormtroopers in his place, but it got to be a bit top-heavy.

Hopefully you enjoy it, and May the Force be With You!

See you in 2016!

Star Wars!!!

Wait a minute...I've never posted any Star Wars drawings?!?  No no no...time to remedy that.

Pew pew pew!!  It all started with some sketches, first from memory...

 And then based on research...

Not too bad; I wasn't completely off.  And then all of the following occurred...

And now this blog has some Star Wars drawings on it.

...oh wait.  It already did, here.  Oh well.  Disregard this post.

Teaching a Boy to Fish...

My uncle recently passed away, and as I was reflecting upon my time with him, one of the memories that stuck out was the time he helped me catch my first fish.  It was a catfish, and I still can remember him scaling it and cooking it up for my dinner that night.  It's a cherished memory that inspired this illustration:

 Here are some progress images to show you how it all came together.

Initial thumbnail (originally done on a scrap of paper, then digitally redrawn in Photoshop)

Color palette chosen; drawing refined.

Rethinking acting of the adult character and details on boy.

More rethinking.  Also adjusting the composition and size of boy.

Final pose on adult; recomposing the scale of the figures and the dock to more realistic proportions.

Finding photo reference.

Applying photo reference to drawing and locking in color.

Adding color detail and reworking sky background to better balance composition.

It's always a good idea to check your illustration as a black and white image to make sure the composition is leading the eye and your colors aren't muddying-up your illustration.

The Gift of the Season

Just a trio of holiday-themed images I created this year as part of a gift.  Figured I'd share it with you, Interwebs.  Enjoy!

And here are some sketches showing the design process I went through.

See you in 2014!

The Color Kittens Reimagined

Back in 1949, the writer of Goodnight Moon wrote a Little Golden Book called The Color Kittens about two kittens--for some reason dressed in train engineer outfits--that are trying to mix colors together to make Green.

More recently, in 2012, the writer of this blog had a class taught by the incomparable Gilbert Banducci where one of our assignments was to turn this classic tale (or "tail" haha...) (...) into a television series.  We had to pick the network, figure out the demographics, restyle the characters, select the voice talent, and pitch our new angle to the class.  I decided to play against personal "type" and skew the show to an audience older than the books target demographic, creating a show for the FX Network to air after Archer or Louie.  The show was to star the voices of Matthew Perry and Melissa McCarthy as Brush and Hush, looking something like this:

My pitch for the premise of the series was delivered in mock-book form as follows...

I think this show will definitely gain some traction with that coveted artistic cat demographic.  Your thoughts?