Cintiq Sketches

During my morning storyboarding class at the Centre for Arts and Technology I sketched some abandoned buildings on the Cintiq as demonstrations for drawing exterior locations. I am now in love with the Cintiq, and I need one or else I will never be happy again.

Here's some more that I did - it's like drawing on paper, but with layers and an undo. GUH

Animation With Love 3

Animation With Love 3 was a blast! We got to show a bunch of animation by local and come-from-away animators, and we had a great panel discussion about the state of the animation scene in Halifax, and in general. I met some cool people, and got inspired to make more films. Looking forward to next year!

Hey so yeah - here I am posting a blog about my event after the event is over! WOOT - go marketing department - Sil and I were a bit busy with our various day jobs, personal lives and actually trying to pull the event together... so some details got shuffled to the bottom

The two previous years we were hired as curators for the event that was run by the Centre for Art Tapes. This was our first year trying it on our own, and it went really well. We were not really sure we could do it on our own, but we did, and knowing that I think we'll be better able to organize things next year.

So to all you animators out there, get busy and finish your films for next October. And to all you people with eyeballs and brains, get ready to sit in a comfy chair and eat popcorn and watch awesome animated films next October!

Yellow Flowers

clean/UNCLEAN

I made a piece of video art. I'm not sure why, I just felt compelled. I mean, it's not like I don't have a million other projects on the go. I have scripts I'm working on, books I'm writing, films I'm making, comics I'm drawing, sketchbooks I want to fill. Not sure it makes sense to take time away from all of those, things that need finishing, and do something else. But I think art isn't primarily about doing what makes sense. (My son is in a philosophy class, and the teacher asked them 'What is art?' which is of course one of those age-old philosophical debates to which there is no one correct answer that satisfies everyone. So he and I have had a few interesting chats about the topic, which has kept it at the top of my mind.)

So in the middle of my life, which in addition to other projects, has a large and busy family, I stopped what I was doing and made this video. I wasn't really sure what the final product was going to be when I started. I didn't write a script or draw a storyboard, and I didn't pitch the idea to anyone. I just had a grain of an idea and then followed wherever it led me.

Your Days Are Numbered

http://www.arthousecoop.com/library/9491

I participated in an event put on my the Arthouse Co-op called the Sketchbook Project 2012. My submission has been added to their Online Library and is now viewable at the above link.

They sent me this little blank sketchbook and a theme (you can choose the theme from a list, or have one assigned randomly - I opted for the random selection option) and you just fill it up however you want and send it back to them, to be added to their collection, which tours the world.

The theme I got was 'Writing on the Wall'. I looked up the expression and found it comes from the Old Testament, from the story of the Feast of Belshazzar, who was the last king of Babylon.

The story goes like this: Belshazzar had come into possession of some treasures looted from the Temple of Solomon, and was using them during one of his ritual feasts, honoring some heathen god. This displeased God so he sent a warning to Belshazzar; a ghostly hand appeared out of swirling vapors and wrote these words on the wall: Mene Mene Tekel Upharsin. More or less, that means 'Your Days are Numbered'. Belshazzar was like 'whatever, man' and he kept on feasting. Next day Babylon was conquered by the Persians, and his kingdom was no more, erased from the earth forever.

Not a bad story I guess. My sketchbook reflects my own personal perspective on those themes.

El Santos - NSFW

This here is a promo clip for an animated feature that I worked on. It features several shots of my animation. I also coloured most of it. What is it you ask? It's a mexican feature film... more than that I do not know, other than it's really funny...

Oh and it's NSFW

big time

It was my birthday this weekend

A GRAND ADVENTURE IS UNDERWAY

I sketched a little teapot

Colour Study

Drew some fruit today.

We happy few

Storyboarding on Wild Grinders S1 has finished - it was a fun gig, and I'm eagerly awaiting the launch of the series. Maybe there'll be a Season 2...

So 2012 has started with me switching to animation. I'm doing 2D stuff at Copernicus, and so far I've worked on 2 projects, a feature and a preschool show. Hopefully I'll have some work to share in the future, but for now it's all under wraps. Maybe the 2013 demo reel will have some.

As for my own projects, 'Onions' is proceeding pretty well. We'd like to have a rough cut put together by the spring... maybe enter it in the Film Fest.

Jan 31st is the deadline for The Sketchbook Project, and my contribution is almost finished. Just a few hours this weekend and it will be ready to go. I'll have to remember to make some scans of it before I send it in.

And The Overlord is also moving along - a merry band of talented adventurers is rallying to the Overlord's call and it is looking more and more like Episode One will become a reality. I should be recording the vocal stuff next week, and then animation can begin.

New Demo Reel

Here's my latest demo reel

Tuesday, December 13th at 8pm

http://youtu.be/3qUuL-CKFrk

Check out the 22 Minutes X-mas Special this Tuesday, December 13th at 8pm on CBC TV. You will see all sorts of funny skits, and Bob Rae (and my animation)!

This Hour Has 24 Frames Per Second

So the other day I found myself putting in a bid on a freelance animation gig for This Hour Has 22 Minutes. (For those of you outside of Canada, this is a popular political satire show on CBC) Much to my surprise, I got the job! So I worked it in around my main storyboarding job at Copernicus, which already keeps me plenty busy.

At his point, the episode hasn't aired yet, so no images, and I can't really get into any details about it. It's a christmas special, which will be broadcast sometime in the next 20 days or so (I assume). Hopefully CBC will have it available for streaming on their website.

So with the christmas season will come the end of my storyboarding job on Wild Grinders, which has been fun. It looks like I'll be moving on to animation next, which I am looking forward to.

I finished the animatic for Episode One of 'The Overlord' and a bunch of cool people have agreed to work on it.

I also managed to get some work done on 'Onions' my stop-motion project with Siloën Daley. That's something I am allowed to share with you...

So there. I updated my blog. Now back to storyboarding...

Onions test footage!

Looks like we got the camera settings sorted out.

Character Designs

These are my new character designs for The Overlord which I did, working from the awesome concept sketches done by Micro Chen.

The Overlord - The Animated Webseries

I launched the crowdfunding campaign on IndieGoGo today! What's that mean?

http://www.indiegogo.com/The-Overlord-Animated-Webseries

It means I'm going to make the Overlord as an animated webseries, one episode at a time. I want to pay the people involved for their talents, so there's going to be some money involved. I will be posting tidbits as they come together, designs and artwork and so on, but not on this blog; I have another blog that is completely devoted to The Overlord, called THE DEPARTMENT OF SUPREMACY

http://dept-of-supremacy.blogspot.com/

When I started the play in the Fringe Fest back in 2009, I kind of just started doing it and it snowballed as people got excited about it and it started to gain enough momentum that I no longer had to keep pushing it, I just steered it. Hopefully that's what will happen this time as well...!

Onions Test Footage

harder better faster stronger

So I'm drawing a lot - every day I pretty much draw as much as I can. It reminds me of that Simpsons episode where Homer goes to hell and the devil straps him to a machine that force-feeds him donuts, expecting it to be a torture, but Homer loves it. My hand gets sore sometimes, but I never get bored of drawing the same characters over and over again, and I am always learning and looking for ways of improving.

My own projects are coming along well. When my pal Siloën gets back from TIFF we'll start shooting our stop-motion short 'Onions', which is shaping up to be pretty sweet. I've started looking at crowdfunding sites like Kickstarter and IndieGoGo for The Overlord Animated Webseries. There's some encouraging success stories coming from the crowdfunding scene.

The Overlord Music is finished, and we'll be putting it up on iTunes soon...

Jim Edwards (1946-2011)

My father passed away last month from cancer. Dean McNeill was a colleague from his days at CCL, and he wrote this nice piece for the GDC newsletter.

http://www.gdc.net/designers/index/articles1190.php

Laid up

I had surgery on my right leg this week so it's slowed me down somewhat, allowing me some time to do things like update my blog.

Work at Copernicus has been steady, and keeping me quite busy, which is awesome. I am really enjoying the job. The show is fun, and should be on TV in a year or so. It's my first time working on a show that used an overseas studio to do the animation, so I'm looking forward to learning more about how that works.

I have had other things going on as well. We took a 6-day road trip at the end of June, visiting Grand Falls NB, Trois-Rivieres, Quebec City and Montreal Que, and Ottawa Ont. It was a hectic trip, full of family adventure and fun. A lot of driving was done in the rented Dodge Grand Caravan; we clocked 3500 km.

So yeah, surgery. I've has varicose veins in my right leg since I was a teenager. In case you don't know what that is, it's gross veins that bulge out and look gross. It was always unsightly, but otherwise not much of a problem. When I hit 35 or so, it started to become more of an issue, causing pain and swelling and other grossness. So this week I got them removed by a surgeon with a scalpel. He made about 16 incisions all up and down my leg, and sealed the wounds with staples. Yeah, it's a bit sore right now.

I will post before and after pix of my medical miracle as soon as the bandages come off...