In The Works

A bunch of stuff on the plate , plus, a project I'm really excited about. There's not too much to say about now, but, it mostly exists in outline form, and, will hopefully get fully underway by early next year. Here's a shot of the some of the outlines.

I.G.Times

It's hard to mention Phase 2 and not mention his contribution to the Art Magazine world called The International Graffiti Times. It was a large format magazine, usually measuring around 24" X 17", newspaper format. It was published sporadically, and wasn't always the easiest thing to find. When you did come across a copy in some random bookstore, it was a major find.

The content was in collage format, consisting of mainly graffiti art, logos, personal and political photos, all assembled around a stream of consciousness body of text that covered a host of subjects and current events.

What I loved about IGT was how punk it was in it's format, with most other graffiti magazines getting themselves mired in the trends and politics of the scene. IGT stood alone in that it was done on it's own terms. It was always hard to determine who exactly the editors were, but, it was common knowledge at the time that it was chiefly 'Phase 2' along with 'Vulcan'.

Vote!

Though the election is clearly over, a while back the Directors Bureau held a contest regarding an upcoming election. They asked for t-shirt designs involving voting as a ways to promote 'Rocking The Vote!'. I'm not sure who's won, but below was my contribution.

The Dickies- Donut Man (2001)

In the summer of 2001 I went to see the band (whom I was always a fan of) with Kurt along with The Dickies publicist, Jon Rosner. Jon mentioned the band was interested in an animated version of themselves. Around that time, a friend had given me an old 'Osmonds' cartoon VHS from the early 70's.

It was a blatant rip-off of the the Jackson 5 cartoon, created by Grant-Ray & Lawrence, same folks who did the Jackson 5. The Dickies were excited about the idea of making it look like THEY'd had a show back then, and the video was going to be the 'show open'. I met with Stan Lee (no relation)and Leonard Graves Phillips at Hamburger Hamlet of all place (where I had to pick up the tab!) and showed them the storyboards I'd done in like 3 days.

The label (Fat Wrechords) also let me know that I had barely 4 weeks to do this.Stan would literally call me everyday with ideas. The results were less than I'd hoped , but it did get delivered on time, and they were really happy.

The band seemed to have this idea that this video would propel them into a new stardom that they'd always felt they'd deserved after 25 years of obscurity. With the state of popular music at the time, I knew that was unlikely. I still talk to Stan every now and then, though we did get in a bit of a heated discussion on the eve of the Iraq War.

Danger Doom 2

In 2005 I was asked to create a video for an upcoming Danger Mouse/ MF Doom collaboration. The project was called Danger Doom, and was being released by Epitaph Records with a partnership from Cartoon Network. The record was also going to feature the cast of Aqua Teen Hunger Force from Adult Swim, CN's late night show lineup.



The project had a huge budget, but, no time. We had all of 5 weeks to make it happen. To add to the pressure, every bus bench in town was plastered with ads for the new record. We scheduled a meeting with some of the folks from the network, along with Brian Burton, who was producing the record. I showed up with just these two drawings, and we got the go ahead to start.

The results weren't too hot due to the quick tunraround, but they were happy, and it made the rounds for a bit.

Boards!

Just about every animation project requires the creation of storyboards. I've learned a lot since these first boards I did in 1999 (and I actually drafted these on boards, rather than just paper). These also tended to be a little more detailed than need be, but, the client was happy.

Wacky Packages 2

In the late 60's, early 70's, Topps, who was known for their baseball cards, would come up with gimmicks for off season. One of which were Wacky Packages, which ran for about 15 years, and, have just been reissued. They were sticker cards of send-ups of popular products and brands ( a precursor to Garbage Pail Kids).

The artwork was done by an assortment of illustrators at the time, including the likes of Art Speigelman, Bill Griffith, Kim Dietch and especially a big chunk of the Mad Magazine staff. During school, I was inspired to make my own set. So, for a final project, I made 4 of them. This being one of them:

During a trip to a local convention, I found a vendor selling whole, uncut sheets of these for $20 a sheet.

The Times, They Are- A Changing.

In changing political and economic times, you'll start seeing familiar design and logos start changing. Colors that are commonly used, car colors and different fonts. Below is an example I came across. Check out Wal Mart's new look.

They've gone from a pretty aggressive bold look, to something much friendlier and 'greener'. The 'star' has been replaced by a yellow startburst, almost as a sort of 'asterix'. A way of saying "yeah, it's Wal Mart, but, we're different now".
They've dropped the 'Bush' style logo, and gone for the 'Wamu' look.

Birthday salutations...

From Amsterdam, courtesy of Mr. Offerman!

Congratulations!

Words And Balloons

Just about ready to get this off to the printers. Since the book has officially been ceased, I'll probably be making a couple dozen copies myself through a press service that does small runs.