Star Wars Filibuster

When I saw Patton Oswalt's Star Wars filibuster, my mission became clear:

Alright, Disney, let's make this a reality!

51 days...

SEVA Talk

Here's a talk I did last month for the Sacramento Educational Cable Consortium regarding creative storytelling. My audience ranged in scope from elementary schoolers to college professors. Warning: I get very loud, so you may want to turn down the volume. For maximum educational value, go ahead and mute me altogether.

28 days...

Enroll Today!

What better way to kick off 2013 than with a taste of things to come? 

There's still time to sign up for the Spring semester!

32 days...

AM vs PM

Sometimes my co-teacher, Paul, and I disagree in the class. When this happens, we always settle our differences amicably. Then I stab him in the back.



Our rocky relationship is made easier by the desserts that our students bring us every week. These desserts are a requirement of the course, and you teach any kind of class at all, I'd recommend the same for your syllabus.

While munching desserts, I like to catch up on what films my students have been watching. When a student told me they'd just seen The Fly for the first time, it made me wonder what a reverse-Fly flick might look like...

Between the sword fights, decadent desserts, and insectoid mutants, the AM/PM class tends to keep things interesting.

42 days...

Olympic GOLD!

The 2012 Olympics open today in London. That is, unless the UK's finest felon is there to steal all of the gold medals!

For more Dick Figures shenanigans, check out their website, richardfigures.com.

0 days...Let the OLYMPICS begin!

Post-it-mation

Man, I haven't posted in a while. I better make this next post profound...




...oh well.

14 days...

The Adventures of Batman and the Bloser

As promised, here is the season three premiere of Dick Figures, complete with their new nemesis, the maniacally monochromatic mastermind, Earl Grey (voiced by yours truly).

 

Thanks to my pals Zack Keller and Ed Skudder for letting me contribute a character to their sick little world. I'd love to make this guy a reoccurring villain, so be sure to leave plenty of YouTube comments demanding more Earl Grey. Hot.

39 days...

Dick Figures, Season Three

This Thursday, the world as we know it will forever be changed by the season three premiere of YouTube's No. 1 animated series, Dick Figures.

This Thursday, folks. You'll laugh, you'll cry, you'll hear my awful British accent.

42 days...

Sounds Crazy, Let's Do It!

My friend Emma is a compulsive filmmaker. I enable this expensive habit of hers in my own small way, by animating the title bumpers for her production company, "Sounds Crazy, Let's Do it! Films". Her latest endeavor, Sweetpea, is currently up for funding on Kickstarter. Most of the production cost goes to my exorbitant fee for these bumpers. Please contribute so SCLD FiIms can continue to have the highest quality animated titles. Thank you. 

Bumper for Hitchhiker:

Bumper for Horizon:

Can't wait to animate the bumper for Sweetpea. I'm thinking shark rodeo...

47 days...

Dick Figures "Bath Rhymes" Music Video

The Dick Figures Bath Rhymes music video is up, and my scene along with it, in all it's Jurassic Park/Masters of the Universe-ish glory.

Zack and Ed (the Dick Figures creators/voice actors) sent out this thank you to all the animators who participated in the Season Two finale. Can't wait for Season Three season premiere--when a certain Pixar animator may or may not be lending their vocal talents to Red and Blue's first villain...

12 days...

Corny Cole (1930-2011)

My favorite place on Earth is CalArts, and the embodiment of that creative institution is the animation department's long-time figure drawing instructor, Cornelius Cole III. Walt Disney may have founded and funded the school, but the culture there is much more of the free-spirited, rebellious, anti-Mouse nature that Corny encouraged. I shouldn't say Corny was anti-Mouse, I'm not sure he was anti-anything; he was just pro-individual and always cautioned his students against becoming a cog in a machine.

That is an especially daunting challenge nowadays when animators seem to be a dime a dozen. The animation industry is more competitive now than ever, and there is a huge pressure to fit into the studio system. To conform to the machine. True artists and craftsmen will always be rare, though, particularly sages like Corny. Pen Ward put it best when he said of Corny, "I hope to draw until my style develops into that awesome, awesome old wise man style."

Among the many loving tributes to Corny are these Producers Show intros from 2003 and 2005. Corny and his fellow figure drawing instructor, the late Mike Mitchell, made regular appearances in student films. Partly because of how much they inspired us, but mostly because it's fun to animate curmudgeons.

2003 intro by Scott Bromley, Ron Yavnieli, and Ken Perkins



2005 intro by Pen Ward 

The best way to honor Corny is to get out there and make your own art. Direct a film, take a figure-drawing class, or just "learn to draw with your left hand gawdammit" as Corny would growl. I said earlier that the embodiment of CalArts is Corny, not was, because as long as his art endures (and as long as we, his students, pass on his lessons), he will live on.

Here's to Corny, the animation industry's grumpy Yoda.

29 days...

I am Captain America

Several months ago, Marvel invited me and fellow Pixarian Bobby Rubio to contribute art to a series of variant covers called I am Captain America. The series depicts Cap as ordinary citizens of all walks of life, reflecting the hero in all of us. My assignment was the "little league Cap", which was just fine by me because it doesn't get much more American than Baseball. The issue is a variant cover of New Mutants #27, which is on shelves now!

The variant's a bit rare (1 in 25 of New Mutants #27 will be the I am Captain America variant), so you may want to call your local comic store ahead of time to make sure they're packing the heat. Here's a look at the progression from sketchbook to final cover:

Below is an alternate concept I pitched to Marvel's talent relations manager, George Beliard (Cap as the coach, rather than a player), and an alternate pose, with a bit more of an aggressive stance.

This being my first professional comics job, I was curious to see how my friends would react. So I decided to film their responses in a series I call Comic Reactions.

My friends Jay and Tim are usually more into games than comics, but I think they really dug my cover!

Sometimes one's art can only be appreciated by fellow artists.


Being a professional comic artist means you're a VIP wherever you go.


I was curious to see the response of my target audience: the chilluns.

I drove up to Sacramento to visit my hometown comic shop, A-1 Comics, with my dad. A bit of a trek just for a comic, but I think you'll agree that my dad's reaction was worth it!

It slowly donned on me that perhaps this was a cover only a mother could love.


Can't wait to see the reactions of other professional comic artists at Comic Con and Trickster! Stay tuned!

13 days...

Brave Trailer Premieres Online!

This is one princess who won't need saving. Tha mi ag iarraidh briosgaid!

To hear some thoughts on Brave, Cars 2, and much more, listen to the Animation Fascination's podcast with Chris Chua and myself.

Chris and I will explain exactly why we're wearing kilts in the picture below.

18 days...

CHADES CHALLENGE LII: TEXAS CURLING SHARKS

If Texas had a curling team, and if that curling team had a mascot...

These animals have proven perfectly capable on the ice in other sports, so I figured why not curling? He's a bit cheerier than the San Jose mascot which reflects most sharks' true temperament (all those attacks were accidents, they swear).

As always, if you have your own designs, please let me know and I'll post them below. Absolutely everyone is invited to join in on the Chades Challenge, and I will post all submissions. If you don't have time to participate in this week's Chades, you can join in July 1st for: 

CHADES CHALLENGE LII: SUPER 8

Zane Yarbrough threw down this awesome challenge. I don't know about most of you, but the Super 8 creature is not what I imagined he'd be. What were you picturing before the big reveal?  Submit your design and contribute to the monster menagerie!

Megan "Megalodong" Dong

Zane "Open Water" Yarbrough

7 days...

Storm of Steel: The Ute'wehi

The ute'WHAT? Ute'wehi. Apparently it's alien for badass. This illustration was commissioned by my pals over at Zombiesmith. Based on a design from  Aaron Brown's line of miniatures, "Storm of Steel".

Also by the fine folks of Zombiesmith, this rad Quar short:




If you're in the bay area Memorial Day weekend, check out Zombiesmith's booth at Kubla Con.

37 days...

CHADES CHALLENGE XLV:
INTERSTELLAR TYRANTS
I was strapped for time this week, so I jotted this interstellar tyrant on a complimentary notepad handed out at an educational conference earlier today.



It was a long conference, so I had plenty of time to draw.

Rest assured, I was listening the entire time I was sketching this guy.

The conference was in Sacramento, so I think I was channeling the former governator for this particular space fascist.

Here I am in the conference room with my old animation teacher, Shawn Sullivan. Thirteen years ago, Shawn gave me my first animation lessons at Sheldon High School. Now that I am a teacher myself, he's giving me my first lessons in the field of education...

...and power tools. Thaumatropes were handed out to everyone who attended our conference. Shawn never settles for the "ordinary" animation methods. This is his Power Thaumatrope.

If you designed any interstellar tyrants, leave me a comment with a link to your image and I'll post it below. If not, join us March 18th for Chades Challenge XLVI: Cheesy Graverobbers!

44 days...

Ugly Doll



An iPadimation based on my girlfriend's ugly doll:


45 days...

One Dream Studios Interview

A follow-up to the "How to draw Rex" tutorial I posted last week. The interviewer is my highschool friend Vic Jimenez of One Dream Studios, and we talk about the greatest animator of all time, the best animated feature of all time, and how to get into animation if you never made it to college.

Oh, and sorry about the blasphemy at the 1:13 mark, I get a little carried away talking about animation cycles.

53 days...

Happy New Year!

What better way to kickoff 2011 than with a bit of iPadimation? This was doodled on Animation Creator HD, a must-have for anyone with an iPad and a serious animation addiction.

My New Year's resolution is to finish all the projects I started in 2010 (and prior). For me, creation is impossible without inspiration, so I thought I'd share my top ten most inspiring discoveries of 2010. Now some of these aren't necessarily new, but they were new to me, so lay off.

1. Comic Con
2. Scuba-diving
3. Black Swan
4. Flogging Molly
5. Nerd Fighters
6. How to Boil Water
7. The Venture Bros
8. Red Letter Media
9. The Trip
10. The Jeff Lewis 5 Minute Comedy Hour

Honorable Mention: Twitter

55 days...

How to Draw Rex

Sketch for Japanese fan magazine during Toy Story 3 release

I did a little drawing tutorial for my old friend Vic Jimenez a while back. He said I could choose any Pixar character to draw, so I naturally went with the only dinosaur on the roster. You can catch more of Vic's interviews, tutorials, and short films at One Dream Studios.

17 days...