Liam's Nutshell

Blob Eats Bear

2011-10-01T22:16:00.000-07:00

Hey folks! Its been a while. But I found a new job and I'm very excited about all the things I'm doing. It's keeping me fairly busy and along with owning a new home, I'm even busier. Things are looking up and really good.

So I'm animating more on my free time and I've uploaded this latest piece which is essentially just a test animation to figure out the animation involved in a blob or gelatinous creature.

"Blob Eating Test Animation" Flash CS5 10/2011

BEAR STARE!!!!

2011-08-03T15:13:00.000-07:00

Again, I don't have to explain myself to you. Just enjoy and don't question it. :)

Over Dramatic

2011-08-01T14:21:00.001-07:00

My son was playing with his ball popper toy and it tipped over...this was his reaction.

GHOST

2011-07-30T21:37:00.000-07:00

I could explain...but you wouldn't understand.

Peace on Eternia!

2011-07-16T23:45:00.000-07:00

If you need an explanation for this...I got none. Its funny...isn't that enough? One interesting little tidbit. Flash didn't want me to finish this so it kept crashing every time I made progress on Skeletor, there. Had to save every 5 minutes.

"Peace on Eternia" Flash CS5 7/16/2011

More designs

2011-06-29T02:31:00.000-07:00

Getting in as much as I can before I need to start up with work again.

Gator

2011-06-29T02:29:00.000-07:00

Gator design with a German helmet. Why not?

Forest GIant

2011-06-29T01:33:00.001-07:00

Working on my portfolio which is rather lacking in environmental illustrations. Hopefully more to come!

"Forest Giant" Corel Painter 11 6/29/11

Marowak

2011-06-25T20:31:00.000-07:00

No particular explanation. Just trying to get in touch with my inner geek.

"Marowak" June 2012, Flash CS5

You and the Capt'n can make it happ'n!

2011-06-17T02:48:00.001-07:00

CAPTAIN HUGGYFACE!!!! One of my favorite characters on the show I work on in a more realistic manner. Just experimenting with Corel Painter 11 again.

"Captain Huggyface" 6/17/11
Corel Painter 11

A Stroke of Genius

2011-06-08T15:39:00.000-07:00

Did a really quick logo design for Kevin Pereira who asked fans to design a "standing penis" in the fashion of Mr. Peanut for a logo for "A Stoke of Genius". Hopefully mine gets chosen...probably not, but its fun to come up with such a logo. If it gets picked up I'll un-censor it.

Elgyem

2011-06-04T03:02:00.000-07:00

"Elgyem" Corel Painter 11 & Adobe Flash CS5.

Haunter

2011-05-04T15:58:00.000-07:00

Yeah another Pokemon inspired painting...WHAT OF IT!?! It's my blog and I can do what I want with it!

"Haunter" Corel Painter 11 5/2011

Oompa Loompas are Evil

2011-05-02T23:20:00.000-07:00

What can I say? They disfigure and possibly kill children. Then celebrate their actions with a jaunty tune. NO!! They're sick! And the topic of today's Phobia-stration. Oompa Loompas. The disgusting little orange child killers in Roald Dalh's "Charlie and The Chocolate Factory" who inhabit the drug induced HR nightmare known as "Willy Wonka's Chocolate Factory". They freaked me out as a kid. Not because they were played by little people, it was the orange skin and the revel they displayed when a child is hurt or put in serious danger. I usually like Roald Dahl, in fact, I use to read his books as a child and, true, Oompa Loompas aren't anything new when it came to threatening children...but these little guys were the scariest and creepiest.

"Oompa Loompas are Evil" Flash CS5 5/2011

Galvantula

2011-05-02T02:30:00.000-07:00

I know I said I'd do a Phobia piece on Oompa Loompas...But I really had an itch to do another Pokemon inspired painting. This is of the same game as the "Reuniclus" piece. This one is called "Galvantula" an electric spider. I also wanted to get at least one more piece done before I went back to work on my next deadline.

"Galvantula" Corel Painter 11 5/2011

FEED ME, SEYMOUR!!!

2011-05-01T01:10:00.001-07:00

I was stuck deciding what to paint next and my friend Marissa IM'd me and suggested "Mutant Spring Flowers". The mutant part stuck in me and then I let that rattle around in the old cabasa and I found the "Little Shop of Horrors" plant in my mind. This thing scared the living crap out of me when I was a kid and it gave me a small complex about plants. I thought it was a great subject.

THANKS MARISSA!

Next phobia subject: Oompa Loompas.

"Feed Me!" Corel Painter 11 5/2011

Reuniclus

2011-04-30T02:30:00.000-07:00

Nerdy? Yes. Do I care? No. Childish? Hardly.

During the few hours I have during the night, I play the "Pokemon: White" Nintendo DS game, the latest in the Pokemon franchise. There are a lot of weird and cool looking creature designs in this turn based creature RPG. A lot of people think of it as childish and not worth the time for adults. But the strategy, number game, and overall theme of the game reaches a far greater audience of gamer than an 8 year old. In fact, colleges across the nation have tournaments conducted and organized by the students.

But enough with me trying to over-explain why a 30 year old man plays this game. This piece is inspired by one of the games' monsters, "Reuniclus". Its design is based after microscopic cells in mitosis.

"Reuniclus" Corel Painter 11, 4/2011

Brains!

2011-04-14T03:49:00.000-07:00

ZOMBIE LIAM!!! RUN!!!

Chewy is Naked!

2011-04-12T00:15:00.000-07:00

You never really think of this, but except for the bandoleer, Chewbacca is 100% naked. You think Chewy and Han ever had an uncomfortable moment where Chewy's lil' wookie just popped out and tucked it back in then Han just pretended to not notice?

No.5 IS ALIVE!

2011-04-08T03:38:00.000-07:00

Decided to take a work break for a few hours and threw this together. It's a work in progress of "Short Circuit" main character, "Johnny 5" just to mess with Corel Painter 11 again.

"No.5 is ALIVE" (wip) Corel Painter 11

Rivet Monkey CDS-014

2011-04-06T01:49:00.001-07:00

What?! Another blog post so soon?! I know...This design came to me earlier today (Or I should say yesterday) while I was putting my son to sleep for the night. I like this design for a construction robot mainly because I like the idea of a little monkey robot running up and down girders riveting them into place. Also the bandoleer of rivets made up to be his tail is fun for me. I wish I had the time to animate it, honestly.

"Rivet Monkey CDS-014" Flash CS5 2011

Strong Arm CDS-002

2011-04-05T00:52:00.000-07:00

Too long since I put up something new. Sorry about that. The usual reason...work and life.

I'm in those few days I take to recoup from the last deadline and I wanted to make another Robot blueprint much like the last one.

I went a little further with this design and I'll make this the new design direction. Its more condensed and looks more like an actual blueprint.

Other things: I've opened up an online art store for my prints. You can visit it HERE. Its a little scarce at the moment. If you buy some of my art, that will feed my son for a week :D

I'll be putting this up as a print for sale soon.

"Strong Arm CDS-002" Flash CS5 2011

Time Warp Trio

2011-03-04T15:49:00.000-08:00

Time Warp Trio - Storyboards Ep. 117 - sc. 14 from Liam Robinson on Vimeo.

I was able to find some old boards and this is the best quality I could get out of Flash CS5 Exporting. Its fine until the end when a giant chunk of it leaves artifacts into the rest of the video.

The episode was about the tribal contest of the Rapa Nui tribes on Easter Island where tribal representatives would climb down cliffs, swim in shark infested waters to a neighboring island to pick up an egg and then swim back and climb back up the same cliffs. The winner's tribe elder would be the new leader. Thank god for Democracy, huh? Although, if it came down to it, Barack Obama, even with the smokers lung, would probably still beat John McCain in that sort of competition.

Time Warp Trio - Storyboards Ep. 117 - sc. 14

2010 Animation Reel

2011-02-09T15:04:00.000-08:00

Liam Robinson Animation Reel 2010 from Liam Robinson on Vimeo.

When I started this I had almost completed my reel during a 2 week vacation from work and then on the last two days of my vacation my computer just went and died. THANKFULLY, the apple store techs (after a week, lost work time and some negotiations) were able to save everything from my old computer and placed it onto a brand spanking new computer worth $3000 for absolutely free. Although, the new computer came with a few hiccups and I found out the hard way that Flash CS4 and Mac OS Snow Leopard don't play well together (which caused me to get backed up on work, again). But after that migraine and work coming down on me, I was able to finish the reel. Since then, I've been trying to upload my 2010 animation reel onto my blog, but for some reason it would get stuck in the uploading cycle. So I gave up and tried the round about way of doing it...I created a Vimeo account and uploaded it there which uploaded it without any problems, from there I just embedded the video.

So enjoy!

I created this with the use of iMovie. I credited the music to Anamanaguchi, a techno band which specializes in 8bit sounds.

I know its a little Wordgirl heavy, but really, that's all I've been working on for the most part of my career. Since Flash has not fixed its quicktime conversion, I'm not able to get any good quality out of my old Time Warp Trio work, I know there is some good storyboards amongst that stuff at the very least. Too bad, I'll have to work around that issue some how.

Halo: Reach

2010-11-06T01:21:00.000-07:00

Just taking another hour or so break from work to play with Corel Painter 11 again. A quick Halo: Reach painting using the Oil brush, pencil, and airbrush tools. I can't wait for my time-off...I'm gonna play so many video games to make up for all of this work.

Nanananananananananana...

2010-11-03T02:15:00.000-07:00

I took a break from work for a few hours to play around with Corel Painter 11 and threw this together.

Fun with New Toys

2010-10-21T14:48:00.000-07:00

I got a new toy for 50% off! Corel Painter 11. It was on sale and I've always wanted it, so BAMF, I got it. I'm still trying to work out the kinks and I need to find time to actually really play with it, but I'm hoping this will be a good substitute for not having my own studio space.

"Lady Smoke" Painter 11 - 2010

Sorry this has been my only post in a REALLY long time...but we just had our first born child, Brendan James Robinson, 8 weeks ago and I've been rather busy juggling work and fatherhood. So finding time to do my own artwork is rather difficult these days.

Drill-Bot

2010-06-17T02:55:00.000-07:00

Working on some images for Emerald City Comic Con 2012. I thought this robot blueprint would make a good series to sell prints. I was thinking of a whole series of service/manual labor robots. Still working the kinks out.

"Drill-Bot" June 2010 Flash CS4

3D final preview

2010-06-04T08:59:00.000-07:00

Here's a quick preview of my 3D class final. The model isn't perfect, but that is secondary to the animation. This is still a work in progress. The idea is a lizard-like creature is trying to catch a fly (not yet in the scene) and has some trouble doing so.

Spare some change?

2010-06-01T02:23:00.000-07:00

2 weeks ago, I was pushing an all nighter, my wife contracted an awful stomach flu, so I was up the night after trying to help her feel better, and because of work and 3D classes, I was sportin' a rockin' beard. The morning of my wife's illness she was meant to volunteer at a local school, but she couldn't cancel because she didn't have anyone's cell phone number...I offered to run out there and talk to her co-worker there. I hadn't slept more than an hour or two in 2 days and I was fully bearded. When I get there, Misha's co-worker, Teresa, recognized me (thankfully) but the principal of the school apparently believed I was a homeless man about to attack her...or a brown bear up on his hind legs and wearing jeans. So he ran out and pulled Teresa away before I could fully explain Misha's condition. This is a depiction of my state, and I don't really blame that principal too much. If I saw a guy like that hanging outside my school, I'd be concerned. But its damn embarrassing to be mistaken for a hobo abductor.
Additionally, I fell violently ill along with Misha. I couldn't eat for three days and all I did was expel from both ends of my body (TMI...sometimes at the same time). I vomited so violently, that my stomach muscles ached for days, it hurt to laugh and sneeze. Most awful first night of illness...the rest of the time, my head was swimming and I couldn't sit up without getting dizzy.

Pixelated

2010-05-28T22:52:00.000-07:00

Just dipping my toes into pixel art...its really intriguing. I might start a series working like this.

Pixel Churchill (Flash CS4 - May 2010)

Conducting Gloves

2010-04-28T23:48:00.000-07:00

I've figured some things out recently in my 3D animation class (such as picking up and attaching objects) and I was able to complete this animation within 6 hours today from scratch. From modeling the gloves through to animating them. I still have some work to do on them...the fingers are still a little stiff, imo. I'll have to fix that next week. Anyways...this is one of my favorite projects to date along with the swing and peg-leg walk from earlier posts. Enjoy!

Here's the same video but from the opposite camera angle.

Walk it off

2010-04-23T12:41:00.000-07:00

Sorry...I got bogged down with work and baby stuff. I'll be even more busy in the next few months as I'm working on a bid for some freelance that will take me into September. Hopefully it won't interfere too much with the birth of my baby boy in August.

I was working on this inbetween deadlines, but haven't got too much done. Its meant to bolster my animation reel with some more walk cycles, but its not finished.

In the Third Dimension

2010-03-23T10:24:00.000-07:00

DERP! I got overloaded with work for the past few weeks. Misha and I took a trip to San Francisco earlier in the month, and to prepare for it, I had to finish a deadline 5 days before it was actually due, which is like a 1/4 of the work time I have for each quota. I was literally working all the way up to just a few hours before my brother Mark picked us up for the airport (thanks again, Mark!). Ever since, I've been having to scramble getting work finished, preparing our condo for sale and working on my 3D class finals, one of which got lost by me accidentally saving over it. So I had to recreate a whole new figure for my 3D modeling final last weekend on top of finishing a deadline for today. And that's my lame excuse for not posting anything for a while :D

So because I just finished my 3D animation final, I'll post one of those...

This is done using the Biped tool in 3DS Max...for those who don't know the program, basically the program itself creates a pre-made skeletal structure of a human so you can attach it to specific 3d models. I didn't have a 3d model to attach to, so I just animated the skeletons.

My final also included a walk cycle of my design...

I spent a long time trying to understand the intricate details of this program, and there are a lot of weird technical flaws and things that just don't naturally flow for a 2D animator. So I had a hard time picking it up. I've started to get the hang of actual movement of the biped, but I'm still working out the kinks of object interactions. This walkcycle doesn't necessarily interact with anything, but it was difficult to keep his feet from going through the ground.

"Swing" 3DS Max
"Pirate Walk" 3DS Max

Messing around with Sketchbook Pro again...

2010-02-23T15:47:00.001-08:00

Messing around with the painting side of Sketchbook Pro. Did I mention I love this program?

Lazy cat days are almost over...

2010-02-21T01:27:00.000-08:00

Yeah? Another baby post! Its gonna happen every now and then...you're just gonna have to get use to it. Its my sketch blog and I can do what I want. And since the baby is the biggest thing in my life right now, its going to start effecting my sketch mind.

I can see Tuck is probably going to have issue with the newborn...poor guy. I feel bad for him. The middle sketch was the initial drawing of this batch. It was sort of a "Holy nuts! I'm a dad?" then I placed Tuck in it as an afterthought and it spawned these cliché baby/cat interactions.

Just...

2010-02-21T00:39:00.000-08:00

...because.

ROBOT ZOMBIE vs NINJA MONKEY!!

2010-02-15T07:49:00.001-08:00

SketchBook Pro is my new best friend! Now I can just sketch down stupid random ideas and its easier than a sketch book...plus I don't have to go to kinkos to get it scanned onto a digital format for the blog...NOW YOU WILL ALL KNOW THE WRAITH THAT IS MY SKETCHING MIND!!! MMWWHAHAHHAHAHHAHAHAHHAHAAHHAHHAHAAHA!!!!

Fishy McSketcherson

2010-02-13T12:18:00.000-08:00

I got a new toy recently that will help me draw more! I found Autodesk SketchBook Pro on Amazon.com for $90. To put in perspective on how awesome and cheap it is...It is basically Photoshop without the photo editing (which I'd hardly use anywys) simplified for drawing/painting. Adobe Photoshop is $700 for the straight up copy. If you were lucky enough to have a copy before hand, its $200 for the upgrade to CS4. Hardly a deal for just doing what I'm doing...which is just sketching and faux-painting.

Anyways...this is one of the many results of me playing with Sketchbook Pro for the past 7 hours. Its certainly a lot of fun and easy to use. It all comes very natural, especially if you already have a Wacom tablet to work with. I did a family portrait of Misha, my unborn child and myself from memory...so it might be a little inaccurate. The baby is a little more developed in the drawing than the actual baby.

Expect more sketches to come! :)

I'll throw stuff at you for $5!

2010-02-09T04:02:00.000-08:00

WARNING! Liam Rant Ahead! For those brave enough to read on...do so at your own risk. People with pace makers and mothers who are nursing are to stand 5 ft from this rant:

A lot of people went to see James Cameron's "Avatar" recently...it apparently out-grossed the #1 grossing movie of all time, James Cameron's "Titanic". But that's like saying a $17 hooker is better than a $6 hooker because the $17 hooker made slightly more money and if you wear special glasses she's a tad more attractive...but the experience is about the same.

So based on pure dollar sales, Avatar is the top grossing movie of all time. but lets also fail to mention that with the gigantic costs of regular tickets these days compared to 1997, its almost doubled. Then add, that you don't get the same experience if you don't watch with these special glasses that make it 3-D (WHOOP-DEE-DOO!) and if you don't see it in IMax, well then you are just wasting your money! So after the jacked-up ticket prices, 3D glasses, and the IMax theater prices...About a 1/4 of the overall Titanic audience could see Avatar and it'll be the top grossing movie of all time.

The most infuriating thing is that when people talk about it...its all about the technology of the film and how wonderful it is. And when I ask about the plot and if its interesting...I get a bunch of mumbles. Someone actually said to me (which actually set this whole thing off for me), "If you aren't going to see it in IMax, then its not worth seeing." WHAT?! I heard similar verbiage with "Transformers 2" and we all know how that turned out. How does that make it a good movie?! I swear to God...if I dressed up a turd as a cheeseburger with lots of great hand-crafted french cheeses and crisp lettuce and freshly cut pickles and tomatoes from the garden of Zeus himself...these people would eat and say "I loved it! The cheese was great!" Just because someone put a pretty 3D filter on a movie and said it was the greatest invention to movies since colored film...doesn't make it great.

Let's peel back the layers...take away the unnecessary 3D (which is purely there to add dollars to the ticket price) and then put it on the small screen in your living room. So all it has to rely on is the storyline, acting, and general directing and pace of the movie (LIKE EVERY MOVIE ON THE PLANET!!!). I have faith in James Cameron to make a great movie...he did give us "Abyss" "Terminator 2" and "Aliens". So I have no doubt that he can direct. But judging from what I've learned via critics, from what I'm to believe from trailers, and general word-of-mouth...is that this movie borrows heavily from "Dances With Wolves", "Fern Gully" and more recently a forgettable (3D) animated feature called "The Battle for Terra" which is actually more like Avatar than anything else since it features humans conquering a populated planet for its resources and one human must make a choice between his people or his new alien friends (OH! THE DILEMMA!). So originality isn't creeping into this as far as I can see. James even admittedly borrows from his own movie, "Aliens" with some of the designs like the drop ships and the battle mechs.

So if I am going to watch it, I'll rent the dvd. No one is going to make me watch a movie for $17 JUST BECAUSE its in 3D and on a bigger screen. So what...this 3D trend has infuriated me to no end. It doesn't do anything except make it kind of seem like things are flying at you. Really? You'll pay another $5 for crap to be thrown at you? I'll stand underneath the screen of "Avatar" with a cannon loaded up with the members of the Blue Man Group and shoot them into the audience...I'll BE RICH!!!

I made that!

2010-02-03T13:18:00.000-08:00

Once again work and just general life has made it hard to post anything lately. But yesterday was a very exciting day that I had to put work on the back burner for a small time to make something special for this occasion.

WE'RE HAVING A BABY!

Just yesterday, we went in to see the first ultrasound of our new baby...and he was a rascal. He was jumping around and I think at one point he was flashing us his lil' bum. (note: I want to say at this point that we don't know the sex of the baby, its just easier to say "he" instead of "he/she" and more respectful than "it")

About this animation...I've been working on this for a couple of weeks...I must be Nostradamus incarnate, because I had no idea how close to bouncy he actually was until yesterday. I realize its unfinished, and I doubt I'll color it in anymore than it is, but its there to really work on timing and some different cycles along with quick transitions from one pose to another.

ENJOY!

Penguins are Jerks

2010-01-12T01:36:00.000-08:00

I was working on this periodically for the past two months...a little here a little there. Just a test on timing and tweening. Personally, I like it. I might make into a series of animations if I find myself with the time. But I'm going to be participating more in animation contests for short animations. Hopefully that'll work out to my favor. I'll talk more about that when/if it happens. Right now its all about what work will allow.

ENJOY!

Old Man Walkin'

2010-01-10T00:33:00.000-08:00

I finally broke down and got After Effects CS4 (AECS4). I found a copy for a couple hundred dollars less on Amazon.com. Still too expensive, but I should learn how to really utilize it since it is a good animation tool...its got some great animation enhancements including a 3D effect for 2D animation.

Anyways...I was just filling in some holes in my animation reel, one of which I am almost completely lacking is walk cycles. So I may do a few more after this one. But now that I can post these on my blog, I have a good reason to animate outside of work. This clip is a character I came up with real quick just to work on an interesting walk cycle. I originally animated his legs as a blur cycle...but thought the shuffle worked better. I'll try to come up with a couple more soon.

Sorry for taking so long to post anything interesting. Work, holidays and figuring out AECS4 has taken over my life. I'm still trying to figure out how to successfully import Flash .swf files with sound into AECS4...so the Wordgirl clips are still in the process of coming out to the blog.

On another note, the newest "Corporal Cup's Food Camp" short is up on the Lunch Lab website in the video section...so check that out as well!

I'm working on another animated quickie involving two penguins. I'll post that when its done.

Word UP!

2009-12-08T01:08:00.000-08:00

Awhile ago in an earlier post, I mentioned I was working on a specific episode of Wordgirl which I was REALLY excited about because of the voice actor involved. If you didn't guess by the subtle hints I gave, it was the voice star of the Pixar studios film "UP", Ed Asner. The episode has aired and its old news, so its okay for me to post this. UNFORTUNATELY, Adobe has still not gotten off their fat, money-grubbing asses and fixed the quicktime problems with Flash CS4 and I'm gonna go ahead and predict that they won't until the next $200 upgrade (maybe), so until then, you'll have to enjoy the stills from my scene. These two shots are taken directly from the two scenes I worked on in this particular episode where The Butcher is robbing a bank, but then halted by Wordgirl and her monkey sidekick, Huggyface! They have a back and forth about a mispronunciation (like they do) and through the front door enters Kid Potato, voiced by the great Ed Asner! Its then established that Kid Potato, a retired villain who shoots potato dishes and products from his hands, is actually The Butcher's father and wishes to team up with him for a father-son crime spree.

I thoroughly enjoyed working on both of these scenes, and the storyboarder should get a lot of the props for his timing and shot planning. So for those who watch Wordgirl (good on ya) watch for this episode and this scene. For those who don't, go watch the show! It's very funny!

Lunch Lab LIVE!

2009-11-29T13:29:00.001-08:00

Lunch Lab is live and the shorts I worked so hard on are getting posted. The first episode of 10 is up in the video section called "Food Camp". I did the layout and storyboards for the first 10 episodes (the other 9 are still to be posted). I would've posted the original storyboard Quicktime up on the blog, but I haven't wanted to spend $1000 for After Effects quite yet. This is a quick shot of the intro. Obviously the title card is just a placeholder until the designers had completed it for the actual animation. The premise of the show is basically a cartoon cooking show for kids. It promotes healthy eating habits for young kids. Some of the recipes are really interesting and simple. I'll be stealing a few of these recipes for myself :) Don't be surprised if you are having dinner at my place and you are eating mashed cauliflower.

Thanks to the creators and co-founders of Cloud Kid Studios, Evan Sussman and Dave Schlafman for giving me this opportunity to flex my boarding muscles...I loved every minute of it. And thanks to Alex Berry for putting up with my boarding and doing a great job animating these! Each webisode was written by Evan Sussman, Backgrounds and props by Jen Blicharz, Animation by Alex Berry and Sound Editing by Brian Smith. The voice of Corporal Cup is Megan Goltermann who did a great job bringing this character to life.

THE GODS ARE ANGRY!!!

2009-11-27T08:40:00.001-08:00

We bought this cat tower which sits at about 7ft tall and has a little cubby hole. It was mainly for the cat to escape to when we finally got a puppy. Well the puppy adoption has been put on hiatus for now. But our cat, Tuck, still got a nice tall climbing toy to mess around on. Every now and then we'll find him on the top looking down on us as if he is our ruler and God. The Cat Tower is really the Mt. Olympus for kitties with delusions of grandeur.

Side Note: Thanks to Rob and Margaret for pointing me in the right direction for some GREAT deals on a nice tall cat tree. Tuck LOVES it.

Fishy Dreamin'

2009-11-27T07:35:00.000-08:00

My cat gets really anxious and irritated if he's not in the same room as us. Its like he doesn't want to be alone. So late at night when I'm working, he sleeps in the office chair next to me and every now and then he'll start chattering (you cat owners probably know what I'm talking about, the clicking noise when cats get excited and want to chase something) and lets out random tiny "Maow"s. Then much like a dreaming dog, he'll start twitching and moving his legs as if he's chasing something in his dreams. I bet Tuck dreams of swimming after fish. But he wouldn't know what fish actually look like since his only interaction with that smell is the pink mush in his food bowl 4x a day which he goes BONKERS for.

Side-note: Misha took him to the vet for his annual check up, he is healthy, except he is slightly over-weight. I think its the excess fur that is weighing him down. But for a big ol' 3 year old Maine Coon...he's at a rather small 15 lbs. Adult Maine Coons can grow up to 18lbs, so technically, he's just under-weight...well...according to my research on Maine Coons. But its hard to tell a Veterinarian that they are wrong when all you have in your corner of information is Wikipedia and various cat related websites.

Rainbows smell funny

2009-11-26T03:28:00.001-08:00

I once heard that Unicorns eat cupcakes and poop rainbows. I'd like to think that's how they fly...propelled by their own colorful feces that populate the skies. Should they go see a doctor if they have such kaleidoscopic excrement? It can't be healthy...maybe its from the cupcakes? Maybe they should stop eating those things. Or at least go to a different store for cupcakes.

Imposter

2009-11-25T03:25:00.000-08:00

Just a little addition to the last post. I imagined that same blob creature controlling a Haz-Mat suit to creep up on unsuspecting victims. Also inspired by the 1980's movie "The Blob" when a haz-mat suited individual was filled up with blob-goo and pulled into the sewer.

Blobby

2009-11-25T01:49:00.000-08:00

Just some fun with shapes. This character is inspired by an illustration I did as an instructional map for a World of Warcraft boss encounter (Yogg-Saron). The character is also inspired by both Yogg-Saron and The Blob from the horror/scifi movies of the same name.

"Blobby"

Teen angst is sparkly

2009-11-22T06:05:00.000-08:00

I saw the first half of the first Twilight movie and I was already groaning at every melodramatic teen angsty scene when finally I had enough the very minute they explained that the vampires don't explode in a ball of dust at the sun light...but instead...they sparkle more than Liberace out on the town on a Saturday night. How is that supposed to be intimidating? I guess it was supposed to be portrayed as 'beautiful'...but if I came up to a REAL girl and started to sparkle, she'd laugh and then immediately question my sexuality.
Now...this character is supposed to be this lonely brooding 'emo' vampire who falls in love with this Washington state native girl who is also 'emo' and angsty and full of melodrama. Where are we supposed to care about these characters? Every step of the way, I wanted to slap everyone around. Maybe its because I went through High School and I know that there is life after it, but it just seems to me, that EVERY teen angst show/movie out there is centered around the idea that High School is it. Nothing happens after that. Your life is over. Let's be miserable and over react to impossible situations that would never happen to an actual teen...or at least MULTIPLE unlikely situations happening to the same teen. Its ridiculous. Did all the writers for these shows just not go to college? Were their prime years centered mainly in High School? Really? Well...I found out after 4 years of college that your life is finally beginning after High School...that's when its fun...so all the stupid, impossible or unlikely situations like "My brooding boyfriend, who can't seem to smile or have fun because he's so emo and thinks life is pain and sadness, is really a vampire." all seem rather pointless in the long run.

Maybe he's sad because he DOES sparkle...hell..I'd be pissed to if my skin sparkled. Should probably see a doctor about it.

Super Liam

2009-11-17T03:43:00.001-08:00

Its my blog and I can do what I want with it. Even if its making myself a generic superhero. HEY! When you have your own blog...you can do whatever YOU want!

"Hmmm...I should do something for the blog soon." I thought to myself. "I wanna fly and have an arch-nemesis!" I pondered.

So here is the latest of the series of nonsense that drools randomly from the thrown together mess of noodles and stroganoff I call 'my brain'. First, I just sketched out myself with flying powers...oooo...ahhhh. Then, I needed a nemesis. So I used Tuck my cat, as "Dr. Kitteh Mew Mew". When I drew this, I imagine he is more angry that he has a helmet than anything else. And finally, me rescuing my wife and ace reporter, Misha, from the sharpened claws of Dr. Kitteh Mew Mew!

WILLARD Strikes Back

2009-10-28T03:29:00.000-07:00

Back via popular demand...WILLARD THE OBESE DUCK!

Weirdly enough...some people have been asking me how big Willard has gotten. Originally, the character got dropped almost immediately because Misha is against animal cruelty and felt that her weight loss was cruel to the lil' duck who absorbs the lost weight. Growing bigger as my wife gets slimmer. So here he is...much much bigger and not colored (not that fat/obese people are Black and White, but just because I'm lazy about coloring him.) Enjoy, you duck haters! I think his duck-man-boobies are funny.

INVASION!!!!

2009-10-27T02:53:00.001-07:00

Yay!! I had a week off from work! And this is what I did with my time. If I choose to work in Flash while vacationing from my job in Flash...that's my business. Don't judge me!

"Cat Invasion" 10/27/09

Zombie Carrots

2009-10-07T00:24:00.000-07:00

I have zombies on the brain, probably because its nearing Halloween and/or I want to go see "Zombieland"...thought this would be a funny scenario. For the next one, I want to create a scene where they have to decide whether or not to kill the potato, cause he's turning. Hehe.

ARE YOU NOT ENTERTAINED!?

2009-10-06T23:54:00.001-07:00

It started as a quick cartoon self-portrait and lead to me as a Gladiator vs a pretty calm bear.

And before you ask...I am wearing underwear in this image. You never know what a bear might swipe at. Even a timid bear.

Zombie Astronaut

2009-10-03T17:11:00.000-07:00

Why not?

The Omega Liam

2009-10-02T16:20:00.000-07:00

Sooo...I've been cooped up in my condo for the past 2-3 weeks working double time and I'm finally seeing the light at the end of tunnel. Which is why I haven't posted in some time.

But now I'm just about done with this second job and I feel like a guy coming out to the blinding light of the world again after being locked away in a cave for weeks only to find the population of the Earth infected by radiation poisoning and craving human flesh.

I'll be starting the Certificate Program this Monday. Hopefully the work load from that will be insignificant to the freelance job.

Bloo's Reviews: Death Note

2009-09-10T23:46:00.000-07:00

I've decided I'm going to review DVDs every week for fun. And since this blog is mostly about Animation, I might try to review an Animation on DVD each week. Originally I was going to start off by reviewing all types of movies, and I was going to start humorously with "Bloodrayne" by Uwe Bol. But I couldn't finish the movie it was so terrible. So I would keep to animation, since I know the most about that, anyways.

This week's Review is:

DEATH NOTE

Based on a Japanese Manga from Shonen Jump, Death Note centers around a 17 year old called Light Yagime. A bright young man, who has perfect attendance, school marks, and athleticism. The perfect teen who is on track to go to college at the top of his class and become a great detective. Until he stumbles across a notebook which seemed to have fallen from the heavens. This Notebook, known as "The Death Note", has special powers, and soon Light discovers how special these powers really are. If he writes the name of a person and time/mode of death, that person will die in the exact way it was described. If he writes only the name, that person will die within a minute by a heart attack. But by owning this Deathnote, he is followed by a God of Death or "Shimigami" until either the Notebook is filled or the bearer dies. Light begins using the notebook by killing only criminals and vowing to bring about a new World without criminals under the guise of "Kira", a faceless 'god' of justice. Light, soon, finds a nemesis in a young, strange prodigy named, simply, "L". The series explodes in a twirling match of wits between the two trying to find out each others identities. The first to lose this struggle will die.

From the very beginning to the very last episode, "Death Note" is rarely tired and boring. Just watching these two minds sitting in the same room and psycho-anaylizing each other is exciting. This psychological thriller, loves to toy with emotions as we dive deeper and deeper into Light's psyche as he falls steadily into madness with the power of the Death Note. The visuals and animation make up for the long steady stream of dialogue, but even the dialogue is, for the most part, very intriguing and keeps the audience on the edge of their seats. All of the characters are explored into amazing depth and each given some amazing detail which only gives the audience a reason to care about each one and worry about them. the only thing I would fault the series on would be the over explanations and very long dialogue scenes. It seemed to rely purely on the animation and direction to keep things interesting, especially since things were repeated on several occasions to remind the audience, which (for me at least), broke me from suspension of disbelief or just reminded me that I was watching an animation when I was previously right there in the room with each character.

Writing aside, the animation quality is outstanding. With Character Design by Masaru Kitao, Series Director Tetsuro Araki, and animation production by Madhouse. There is very little to fault. The style, direction and use of colors versus black and white flavors the already in-depth characters. Sometimes, things get a little wonky in the animation with missing frames or actions that could have been a little more expanded upon, but these are minor nit-picks since the overall quality on a half hour series, even out of Japan, is one of the better series I have seen.

Since this is my first ever rated DVD, I haven't quite come up with a suitable rating system, but until I do, I'll just go with the 10 point system for now.

This creepy psycho-thriller was well written and dripping with emotion and character along with some amazing visuals, design and excellent animation. It does get a little tedious at times with the repeated explanations, but is only a small grievance to an amazing series.

For "Death Note": 8.5 out of 10

I highly recommend watching, you'll be hooked by the first 10 minutes.

"Death Note" previously aired on Cartoon Network's "Adult Swim" and is for sale on DVD released in English Dub format in the US by Viz Media Production. Rated "Older Teen"

T'was a dark day in Azeroth

2009-09-09T11:48:00.000-07:00

Yeah...I play World of Warcraft. I play a Draenei Shaman. Its part of my "me time" when I'm taking a break from work. For the 12 of you in the world who don't know...World of Warcraft (WoW) is a Massively Multiplayer Online Role Playing Game or MMORPG for short. Meaning, you can interact with thousands of people from all corners of the Earth from within this game. I have a large group of real life friends who I play this game with...so really, its the geek equivalent of going out to a bar and having a drink. Recently, I've been rethinking my involvement in this game. Mostly due to the ass-hats that populate the world. Don't get me wrong, the majority of this games population as a whole are nice genuinely good people. But there is a percentage of players (mostly in the 8-15 age range) that think its cool or adult to spout random obscenities like a Sailor suffering from severe turrets. Some are considered, by law standards, adults (and I use that term loosely to describe these individuals). I recently had a run in with one (usually, I'm good about weeding those people out through a rigorous screening process). It was a dungeon run with 4 other players...3 of which I run with on a regular basis, so i knew them. The other was a stranger, but the others knew him. About half way through our run, he starts to berate one of our group members (as a joke, I think) and then openly call all of us a derogatory term used to describe homosexuals (no, I won't repeat it...especially on my blog). I then stepped up and and told him that that was enough, I'm leaving because I'm not going to take this sort of verbal abuse, joking or not, from a childish individual when I'm supposed to be having fun...and then I promptly left. I come to find out that he was someone from another guild who I have run with before...and who has made comments and statements within runs and he is a part of the same community of people that I thought was a safe place to be from these sort of individuals within the game. I didn't recognize him because he was on an alt character. So now I'm just upset that such people exist, that someone thinks they are being clever or "adult" by randomly spouting obscenities at another person, but they are ok because the repercussions of such acts almost don't exist due to the anonymity shield of the Internet. So, no one can enjoy anything because there is some childish individual out there who will inevitably ruin it for everyone. I just can't even begin to fathom why such people even exist...to ruin things for everyone else...why people lie, or cheat, or are just there to make everyone else miserable for no real reason.

Wow...that was long and rather depressing. I promise I'll draw my cat doing something cute/stupid next time.

What is it? What does it want?

2009-09-07T15:48:00.000-07:00

Recently, my wife, Misha and I have agreed to start actively looking to adopt a dog from a shelter or foster home. We're a little worried about the interactions that may come with our 3 year old Maine-Coon cat, Tuck...especially since he doesn't know much about the outside world beyond the walls of our condo except the Cat only Vet hospital we take him to for check ups and boarding. He's only had brief run-ins with dogs but from behind the security of his own cage. So his reaction is going to be interesting to a new animal in the house. This is how I think Tuck will react at first. The good news, he'll finally find out what exactly is making that barking noise across the street every morning at around 9am on a consistent basis. Tuck: "Ah...so THAT'S a dog? Tell it to leave me alone."

"New Friend" 9/09 Flash CS4 B/W

Disnarvel?

2009-09-02T23:35:00.000-07:00

Ok...so I lied...I do have some draw in me despite being overloaded with work. Only because this issue makes me sad. Anyone who knows me well enough (and it doesn't take long to know this about me) knows that I despise Disney with a passion. So you can imagine after hearing the news that my favorite Comic company, Marvel Comics, was recently purchased by Disney for $4 Billion, how I felt. So now they own just about everything in the entertainment industry that I love. Studio Ghibli, Pixar Studios, and now Marvel. None of which they had much to do with in creating...but rather they use their girth upon this world to obtain any sort of competition. I'd better stop there before I start ranting...again.

NOTE: I should clarify, that Disney doesn't actually "own" Studio Ghibli, but they purchased the rights to distribute their films in the US....so technically they had NOTHING to do with the making of the films, but they get the right to plaster their castle logo all over Ghibli's fantastic animated masterpieces.

Twice the work, half the sleep

2009-09-02T22:42:00.000-07:00

Wow...work has been crazy hardcore lately. So it has been a while since I was able to post anything. Not much to post since work has just consumed me except for the occasional family outing or video game break (I call it, "me time"). On my way to my dad's 60th birthday party, I was working on the ferry. I took a break and took drawing requests from my wife. One was "How do you feel?" This is a cleaned up version of that drawn response. Only because I can't get my head out of work to think of anything better. 3 more weeks and I'll be back to my normal work schedule...then it'll be time for some UW 3D design classes.

"Plaid to the Bone"? Really?

2009-08-13T12:28:00.000-07:00

I dusted off my old Time Warp Trio work from Soup2nuts in 2005 when dinosaurs roamed the Earth. And here is a sample of some of my storyboards. UNFORTUNATELY, Flash CS4 is so buggy and weird, converting the timeline into Quicktimes is impossible without creating these weird ghosting/artifacts throughout the animation. You'll notice it in the first 3rd of the animation...this was the best of all the quicktimes I made till 4am this morning. But the only remedy to this is, I found out, is to create .swf files from Flash CS4 and then buy a $1k program called "After Effects" (thank you, computer program industry for making creative programs impossible to afford for artists/directors who are struggling to make a name for themselves, ya greedy jerks!). So, I'm calling out a conspiracy here, ADOBE Flash CS4 can only export .SWF files cleanly which are NOT condusive for internet and the general industry, so you are forced to purchase ADOBE After Effects to create the Quicktimes...hmmmm. I think this is bigger than Enron.

Ok, enough about my conspiracy theories...back to the Storyboard. A couple of things to mention here. It's more of an animatic, really...that's only because I was a crazy person and tried to do as much of the animation as I could get away with in the short amount of time I had to create these, so I could convey cleanly enough the timing and what EXACTLY I wanted to happen. You'll also notice in the beginning the red timing indicators I posted in the boards for the simple arm movements...I abandoned that pretty quickly since it was creating more work than necessary. I should also mention what this is about, give you the backstory. This show is called "Time Warp Trio" which only had 1 season on Discovery Kids. The show is based on the children's books "Time Warp Trio" which centers around 3 kids who obtain a magical time traveling book from one of the kids' uncle. The show itself expanded on the idea and created 3 more kids, the boy's great granddaughters from 100 years in the future who are named similarly but have opposing personalities. In this scene (actually this is a composite of 3 scenes) we have the leader of the kids, Joe, his sister, Anna, his Great Granddaughter Jodie, and his magician-Uncle Joe (the previous owner of the book) having a victory feast in 1338 Scotland with Lady Agnes Dunbar ("Black Agnus") as they plan on how they need to survive a continuing onslaught by the English. And Jodie unwillingly volunteers to sneak through the enemy camp to go find help. I enjoyed the back and forth quick camera pans between the bickering family members in this scene and the overall dread that Jodie is overcome with as she just steadily grows worse and worse with fear about her daunting task at hand.

Aftertaste

2009-08-12T13:51:00.000-07:00

This is from a small stint of one-panel cartoons I drew for a small wine and spirits magazine called WINO Magazine. I started to name the cartoon "Aftertaste" but by that time I couldn't continue drawing for the magazine due to a contract that was a little too loose.

Supernormal

2009-07-31T17:17:00.000-07:00

Something a little different. This is a set of scenes from the British show I worked on before Wordgirl, "Supernormal" which was about a boy with no superpowers going to a superhero high school. Think the plot to Disney's "Sky High" but made into a cartoon show. The show is set around 4 friends, Eric (the normal kid who wears his underwear on the outside of his pants), Changerella (A bubbly girl who could change into anything, from a rodent to a submarine), Brass-Butt (in this scene - he is the idiot of the group who has an impenetrable butt - probably best used for prison) and Buzzgirl ( a half girl, half bug...she has 4 arms and bug wings with a long tongue). The show was shown only in the UK and was animated by a company in Canada called "Fatkat Studios" of whom I worked for via Seattle, WA, USA.

In this scene...I have no idea what's going on. I never saw the full episode. In fact, I never saw a full episode of any of the shows. Only from what I worked on. What I can tell you is that the guy with the screaming British accent and the junky robot with the goldfish in the brain jar are the evil janitors of the school. The guy is supposedly an evil genius who poses as a janitor at the school and are constantly causing problems for the 4 kids. In this scene he flashes back to when the Mayor leaves and we see what the city is like without him.

The interesting thing about the way that this studio had me work, was that each scene was determined by most of the camera changes. There are more episodes I have kept, but only a few I could really show as a great piece of work. Timing issues and just the way I animated things with tweens made the scenes not up to my usual standards.

"Supernormal Ep. 151 scenes 17-26"

World of Warcraft - Ulduar Strat Guide

2009-07-28T01:44:00.000-07:00

More delays from work keeping me from drawing :(

But good news...I'm working on a side project for my other hobby (the only thing I do when I'm not animating or drawing on a regular basis). World of Warcraft. The guild I'm in are in the latest dungeon called "Ulduar". Within this dungeon are several boss encounters for 25 people at a time. We run this twice a week. I try to make time for it if work isn't pressing or a real life event isn't in the way.

So this is a concept illustration for the boss encounter "XT-002 Deconstructor". Its a work in progress, but that is my character "Blooregard" (level 80 Draenei Elemental Shaman). Technically I'd be putting nine more players in with me...but it was just to get the idea down. Ultimately, the full animation will be seperated into different sections to portray each boss encounter to help the raid better understand the fight...what to watch out for and how to avoid damage.

Ironically, I may not be able to raid in Ulduar due to working on this...hehe.

"Ulduar Strat Guide - Concept Art" Flash CS4 7/28/09

Who ya gonna call?

2009-07-17T03:32:00.001-07:00

Some kids love Superman or Spider-man. Some kids want to be a firefighter or an astronaut. I loved and wanted to be a Ghostbuster. The Ghostbusters is one of my favorite movies since I was a little kid (like most children of the 80's) and The Real Ghostbusters was my all-time favorite cartoon growing up. Just recently, with the release of the entire cartoon series on dvd and the new video game, The Ghostbusters have rekindled my Ghostbustin' blood and is reheating my creamy geek center.

To give you a better understanding of my immersion into Ghostbusters (my Mom can confirm all of this). I watched the cartoon religiously, I watched the movie several times (even the not as good "Ghostbusters II"), I owned A LOT of the toys including the Firehouse playset, I collected the comic books, sticker books, my grandfather even made a Proton pack out of cardboard for halloween (the trap was made from a shoebox), I understood, even at a young age, the Ghostbuster lingo such as "a Class 5 full-torso Vapor", I tried to get my hair cut like Peter Venkmen in the cartoon but was told that hair just doesn't do that (it was a sad day for my childhood...lol) and most recently, I was researching to become an amateur Ghost Hunter here in Washington State. Unfortunately, that dream died rather quickly because my work schedule is just too busy to be out in some 'haunted' location till 4am.

So here are some sketches that I threw together today after watching the first disc of The Real Ghostbusters. The first is just a BW drawing of the 5 main characters, Egon Spengler, Ray Stantz, Peter Venkmen, Winston Zeddemore, and Slimer. (Winston was voiced by Arsenio Hall in the cartoon...interesting fact.) and the second sketch is just a quick drawing I threw together from a still of Harold Ramis playing Egon Spengler in the live action blockbuster comedy, "The Ghostbusters". Usually, when you remember stuff from your childhood, the memory is better than it actual is...but after re-watching a few episodes of the cartoon, it still looks great.

"The Real Ghostbusters - sketch" Flash CS4 7/17/09
"Egon Spengler/Harold Ramis - sketch" Flash CS4 7/17/09

BUNNY!!

2009-07-09T02:56:00.000-07:00

My studio upgraded to Flash CS4...which means I had to as well. The new program is radically different in layout and design. Plus its added a new type of tween.

This is me just fooling around with the new program to get use to it. I just finished a deadline, so I'm in a sort of limbo between quotas. Its a quick animation...took about an hour or so.

Random street person!

2009-07-04T01:46:00.000-07:00

Work has taken over my life once again...but its really exciting what I'm working on...or rather who's voice is in the scene I'm working on. But I can't say who until the episode airs...so you'll have to wait to see who it is until I put UP that scene on the blog.

But I haven't drawn anything but Wordgirl related stuff in a while, so here is some sketching I did based on a girl waiting at a bus stop I passed. It was the mohawk that caught my eye. And her basic demeanor (her actual pose is the full sitting sketch) was what spurred these other drawings of her just being a badass. The far right head shot is just a basic cartoon version of her.

Piano cat plays you off

2009-06-25T03:31:00.000-07:00

Based on the Youtube sensation, "Charles Schmidt's 'Cool Cat'", this piece is inspired somewhat by that, and the spawns of multiple youtube videos of that particular video mashed together with others as if the cat is playing them off because they are just just terrible. The REAL reason I created this was based on a unofficial contest by Attack of the Show's G4 host, Kevin Pereira, where he made the challenge for artistic types to submit a piece based on this particular video. I haven't decided to actually submit it or not.

I tried to give this more of a Roy Lichtenstein feel to it. Playing with dots to color and trying to give it a hard black shadow and inking style to make it more of a comic frame.

"Piano Cat Plays You Off" Flash, Contest Submission 6/25/09

2009-06-24T13:57:00.000-07:00

This is a scene from the 1st season of "Wordgirl" on PBS Kids I had worked on. There is more I did on this episode, but this is my favorite. I especially like Scoops' movements in this, I'll give up props to the storyboarder for some awesome timing on this.

NOTE: This is pre-lipsynching and special effects

Shamus MacBeard

2009-06-22T20:23:00.000-07:00

I saw this dude at the video store today...I don't think I did it justice, but his beard was absolutely awesome. His entire face was shaved except his jawline which had a really long red leprchaun-esque beard. The tiny dog in his arms was just gravy on top of awesome wrapped in bacon.

"MacBeard and Snickerdoodle" Flash sketch 6/22/09

ACCEPTED!!!

2009-06-19T15:29:00.000-07:00

GREAT NEWS! I was accepted into the University of Washington's Certificate Program for 3D Animation for Games and Media. When I told my mom I got accepted, she wanted to know which pieces I sent in as my portfolio...and these are them, minus some other pieces which are having some issues uploading :(

I know I haven't posted much in a while, I only just finished a deadline this week of which I was up for 30+ hours straight working to finish but now its over and I got 12 hours of sleep. So I should be good to post more again. I actually got accepted a few days ago, but didn't have the time to mention it with an illustration on the blog.

Some of these pieces you probably recognize since I already posted the majority of them on this blog already. But they are what I submitted to UW for the application process.

2009-06-15T23:00:00.000-07:00

Its been a while since I last posted...sorry...been busy with work and general life things...including the 3rd annual Man Weekend. Which just includes a bunch of dudes doing guy things like drinking and playing cards and eatin' pigs and drawing on passed out guys' faces.

Anyways, the Man Weekend was another reason why I didn't make another Sunday Drawing Session in downtown Seattle. So here are some older ones for your face eyes.

"Standing Woman in Blue #3" White Charcoal pencil on Blue paper 2006. ""Sitting Woman #6" Black and White Charcoal pencil on Grey paper 2006.

2009-06-09T03:39:00.000-07:00

I found out that its acceptable to show some of my scenes from the show I work on as long as its aired previous to posting. This is a clip from "Wordgirl" (PBS Kids) about a superhero girl who has super strength, the ability to fly, a monkey sidekick (Captain Huggyface) and a large vocabulary. This clip is a scene I worked on with one of my favorite characters, Beatrice Bixby aka Lady Redundant Woman. She met an unfortunate accident with a copy machine and now has the ability to make copies of herself. I love this scene in particular because of the rather flamboyant Wordgirl fan. The writing of this show is absolutely stellar (Emmy Award winning, in fact) and I advise everyone to see it...even if you think its just for kids...because there are some awesome adult references in this show. I noticed a "Silence of the Lambs" reference in an episode from early in the second season.

NOTE: This is in its raw form before lipsynching and special effects. Both of which is not my job to do. I just make the drawrings move :P

Mice play WoW?!

2009-06-08T02:06:00.000-07:00

This is a piece based on a real person. I'm one of the millions who play World of Warcraft and within my raiding group, we have this girl who has the smallest voice I've ever heard. Its so small and squeaky and funny. So it inspired me to create an illustration based on what that person may look like based on her voice.

"Meascii" Flash 6/8/09

Willard is Obese

2009-06-06T14:43:00.000-07:00

My wife, Misha, and I got into one of those weird conversations that couples get into now and then about just odd things that make us laugh. This is the result of one. We were talking about her weightloss and how wonderful its going and that I should create a character that represents the lost weight (just for fun). And the result was a duck representing the weight my wife has lost. Each pound lost the duck would grow bigger. At this point, Misha didn't want any part of this project because she felt sorry for the duck...but I was having too much fun drawing a fat duck...so here it is. We named him "Willard the Fat Duck"

"Willard" 6/6/09 Flash

Three Delivery

2009-06-06T13:54:00.000-07:00

This is an animation I did for Fatkat Studios back in 2007 as part of a required animation evaulation, to test how good I was and to put me into an appropriate roll on the show "Three Delivery" which was a very action orientated Flash based show. I saw some of the other evaluations and some were much better than this, but I still got in as a rough animator. For those not in the "biz", it means I'm the first line of defense of interpretting the storyboards before the clean-up crew. Basically I animated scenes in a rough fashion, and then another crew of animators came in and cleaned up the action and then colored it. For a visual example...if any of you have been to Disneyland and gone on the studio tour where you see the monkeys in the glass cages animating for your amusement...i'd be the guy flipping the pages back and forth, then drawing a line in non-photo blue pencil and repeating that process over and over.

"FLLLAAAAAAAANNNNN!!!!!!"

2009-06-06T03:06:00.001-07:00

Hmm...Sometimes I'm up late and I just sort of go a little nutty with drawing stuff. So I found a reference picture of William Shatner and just sort of did this for no particular reason. :) Guess the movie and the line and you get extra points! Hint: The movie title ryhmes with "Bar Neck: The Bath of Flan" and the line ryhmes with "FLAAAAAANNNNNNN!!!!!"

"KHAN!" Flash 6/6/09

Animated Blob

2009-06-04T15:07:00.000-07:00

After 3 days of trying and failing...I finally found out how to post videos. I was compressing the video wrong from Flash, so I went through a round about way of making it into an iMovie and compressing it from there. It seems to have worked! JOY!

So I'll try to post tiny animations every now and then. And if I can get the clear from Sou2nuts, I'll post a few of my raw scenes from the shows I've worked on. :)

This is just me screwing around in Flash 8. Playing with shaping tweens. Its based on a character I came up with 8-9 years ago for a music animation project where I had this character trying to jump for an apple hanging in a tree but failing. One of the comments from my instructor was..."Why is he a condom?" which sparked me laughing out of my chair. No...he's not a condom...he's just a blob with eyes. Maybe someday I'll color him and it'll look totally different. "Blob Eating Apple" Flash 8 2009

Mariner sketch

2009-06-01T22:25:00.000-07:00

Uuuuuuhhhh...no idea what this is about. Just started sketching and this sort of just spawned on the page. I have the idea that he is a mariner of some kind...maybe someone who lives under the water. Kevin Costner, maybe?

The Trap

2009-06-01T17:41:00.000-07:00

This piece is an update of an illustration assignment from college. I liked the concept a lot. The assignment was to illustrate a single word. This is the second reincarnation of this piece. I displayed the first reincarnation (Photoshop) in an art show in downtown Everett WA where it was purchased off the wall on the third night. This piece I put together purely because I love the sinister quality.

"Trap" Flash 6/1/09

Figure Drawings - Week 2

2009-06-01T15:33:00.000-07:00

Time for the weekly Figure Drawing post! I haven't found the time recently to go to the Sunday figure drawing sessions yet..but until I do, here are some from a few years ago. The one on the top is of two quick poses, probably about 10-20 seconds long where all I have time for is to block out the pose with the broad side of my conté. The bottom piece is a longer pose, about 10 minutes. I like the unrefined lines and the detail in the face and shape of body.

"Girl in Motion #2" Black conté on paper 2006. "Sitting Girl #6" Burnt umber conté and white charcoal pencil on paper 2006.

New Toy

2009-05-30T03:25:00.000-07:00

This is the finished (still working the kinks out when I see them) illustration for the UW Extension Program submissions. I'm experimenting with no black lines with fur and layering it all with 1 scale shading. I like the concept that my future dog will accidentally torment the cat with his innocence and curiosity. Here Waffles wants to show Tuck his new toy.

"New Toy" Flash 5/30/09

New Toy - Rough

2009-05-30T03:21:00.000-07:00

Some sketches for my latest illustration for the UW Extension Program submission. This is to prove that I understand design and animal anatomy. "New Toy-rough designs" Flash 5/30/09

Transformers Video Mash-Up

2009-05-28T01:08:00.000-07:00

I have mixed feelings about this piece. This was actually part of a VERY large assignment I was given at an old job of mine in Downtown Seattle. The job was to create an online game for the Hasbro line of Transformer toys for the first Transformers live action movie. The idea of the game was that the user could take pre-made animated clips and edit them together with sound and music, creating their own little film. My job was to create the animations...100+ 1-2 seconds long animations of STOP-MOTION using the actual toys themselves in different and fun ways. Transforming and doing all sorts of things. That actually ended up being fun, but I was under a lot of time constraints since I was the only one working on them, even after requesting help many many times. The Title card, here, was something I put together for the project but was rejected rather quickly for something else done by the art director, I think. I left the company after 1 year of starting due to communication problems between the Art Director and the Producer which caused my work to suffer. I like it because of the kinetic imagery, the use of the props, and the title typeface I created. But it carries a stigma with it since it is attached to one of the most frustrating jobs of my career.

"Transformers Video Mash-Up title card" Multi-media, Photoshop, Flash 2007
Amazingly, the game is still active. So check it out if you want to see the many little animations I put so much effort into.

Swimsuit Fashion Poster

2009-05-28T00:57:00.000-07:00

This is another of the Fashion Poster series I worked on a few years ago. I'm not sure why, but I really enjoy how a few simplistic lines and color can create an image.

"Swimsuit" Illlustrator 2004

Travel Posters

2009-05-27T19:07:00.000-07:00

These are two poster designs I submitted for a potential job of creating posters for a local company in Washington State. They picked me to submit more for the final decision between me and a couple of other artists, but I decided against it, since they would have me do too much in a small amount of time for too little of pay. It would've been fine if I didn't already have a job and a mortgage to pay for.

"Visit The San Juans" Flash 8 2007
"Enjoy Lake Union" Flash 8 2007

Skeleton Drawings

2009-05-26T21:51:00.000-07:00

This is a project from all the way back in Freshman Drawing 1 class at RISD (Rhode Island School of Design). Some of you RISD alum. will recognize it right away. The project was to draw 4 skeletons. I decided to be funny and drew the 4 as one giant piece. I can't remember the dimensions of this because it rolled up in a large tube at my parent's house, but I think its about 3 ft high and around 5 ft wide. I worked on the floor inside a large studio with other students working on the same project and if you look closely you can see, on the far right, a foot print of some callous person who decided it was cool to walk on my work :(...Another fun fact: Working in this studio with so many people working in charcoal at the same time with the charcoal residue caked into the nooks and crannys of this decades old building...I'd come home coughing and sneezing up black mucus. Probably not too healthy.

"RISD Drawing 1 assignment: Skeletons" Charcoal on Paper 1999

French Fashion Poster

2009-05-26T00:39:00.000-07:00

This started a series of Art Deco style simplistic fashion posters I worked on for a year in 2003 and 2004. This piece was originally for my grandfather Alfred "Harry" Martin who has recently passed on. So this piece has more meaning to me than the rest of the series. I believe there were only 2 or 3 others of this series of fashion poster with one that was unfinished due to not being able to find anyone who knew Japanese. I'll post the rest at a later date.

Figure Drawing #2 - Week 1

2009-05-25T22:17:00.000-07:00

This is a very quick pose (15 seconds) where its just important to get the positioning down. I like the movement and kinetic quality of the lines.

"Girl in Pose - Burnt Umber #2" burnt umber conte on vellum 2006

Figure Drawing #1 - Week 1

2009-05-25T22:01:00.000-07:00

I finally got off my lazy butt and used my big ol' external hard drive to get all of my stuff from my old G5 (6 years old, btw) and put everything onto my new Mac Pro (Love this thing!!!!). Which means all of my old fgure drawings will be creeping up on the blog now.

This one is one of my favorites. I use to go to a figure drawing session with a bunch of other artists in downtown Seattle and we sit and draw a model for a good 3 hours. I could never make it the entire 3 hours, my hand starts to cramp up after the first or second long pose (20 minutes). But I really only go for the short poses (15seconds to 1 minute). This is a long pose, about 20 minutes. White Charcoal pencil on Blue paper. I like to draw in white charcoal because it makes my brain think differently with light and shadow. This way, instead of drawing the shadows, I'm focused on the light. "Sitting Girl in Blue 3" white charcoal, 2006.

Dinner Plate Nipples

2009-05-25T19:27:00.000-07:00

Random drawings. Don't ask me what the monkey down below is doing. I'm not sure. Either covering his dinner plate nipples or just tweaking them. Either way he doesn't seem too happy about it.

Tattoo Rough Sketches

2009-05-25T19:23:00.000-07:00

The arrows in these sketch designs are basically just concepts I have trying to figure out a tattoo design to go on either the back of my right hand or the wrist. Probably about 1 inch x 2 inches. The abstract designs were just that, abstract designs of a flame. Just a concept for an illustration that I'm probably not going to work on.

Penguins vs Polar Bear Cubs

2009-05-25T19:16:00.000-07:00

I had thought of a fun concept for an illustration. I was thinking of RISD friends and remembered Sarah Cave (Film and Animation) who helped me out with my own senior project (I'm eternally thankful) and remembered she had this love of everything penguin. which got me drawing penguins...which in turn, got me drawing penguins having a snowball fight...which got me drawing penguins and polar bear cubs in a snowball fight. Then my brain went onto this track of "What if, I took this really cute concept of penguins and polar bear cubs in a snow ball fight, but it is an all out WWII epic battle style illustration?" One idea was the sketch on the right with 3 polar bear cubs in a snow-bunker holding down the lines while penguins march towards them in large numbers as one cub is desperately calling in for air support. My brain is weird sometimes.

Friends

2009-05-25T19:11:00.000-07:00

I was working on a cartoon style and drew some good friends from the Seattle area (technically Redmond area...but no one outside of WA would know what I was talking about). If you recognize yourself, and you notice that I might have your hair wrong or something...I apologize, I was working from memory and my memory stinks.

Misha and I are on the bottom-left.

Ferry Men's Room

2009-05-25T19:04:00.000-07:00

Ferry bathrooms are disgusting. The men's (as you can see) is a trough-like stinking sink with all of the urinal cakes up at one end...seems kind of pointless to me. I dare not think of what the women's is like...although, a lot of places have the women's bathroom as a complete contrast from the men's. Maybe the women's was a paradise with couches, personal HDTVs and massuses on order with glasses of champagne to sip.

This drawing is kind of wonky because I drew it out of memory...like hell I was going to stand in the middle of a men's public bathroom with a sketch book drawing my surroundings. 1) I wanted to get out of there the second I set foot in there. 2) I'd look weird...and might get reported...and as punishment, I'd have to sit in the stalls for the duration of the ferry ride.

Ferry People

2009-05-25T18:56:00.000-07:00

This set of sketches was actually on the ferry on the way to Friday Harbor. The little girl with the pigtails on the top of the page was probably one of the cutest kids I've seen (Misha will tell you as well). No she doesn't have more than 5 fingers on one hand...I sketched rather quickly so her mother, who was carrying her as they walked by, didn't think I was some weirdo staring at her daughter. The weird-eyed guy in the middle was interesting. His eyes were REALLY dark. Not 'lack of sleep' dark, but just dark. There was a field trip during the ferry ride as well, so a lot of school age children were running around with their adult supervisors. One kid was particularly surprised and excited that there was an elevator on the ferry and demanded to ride it several times...we sat very close to that elevator unfortunately. Along the subject of the field trip kids, I drew one of the counselors as she was walking up beside us and telling one of the other counselors (rather gleefully, I might add) "I lost my kids. Tee hee." If I had this woman's responsibilities and my kids went missing in a very public place...I'd be pissing myself scared.

Ferry Sketches II

2009-05-25T18:49:00.000-07:00

Throughout the trip we saw plenty of different pets and birds. Obviously we didn't see the completely made up fish and mantis head on the lower right. I was rather bored at that point. I did notice a large amount of small toy dogs...some of which had clothes. There was one demented-looking dog in particular that made friends with a crow. There was also a very small yappy dog within a VERY large SUV while we were walking in Friday Harbor...seemed rather funny to me. I wish I had my sketch book handy at that moment and captured this rather small dog bouncing up from the front seat to the window desperately warding off intruders from his domain.