Tuesday, August 30, 2011
Syrian Humor
Amidst the change and turmoil THAT country is going through, some artists are managing to editorialize:
Monday, August 29, 2011
Brightwell
A friend of mine is opening a shop in Silverlake catering to fine mens products and the like. I offered up to paint his sign for him, and it ended up being quite the adventure. I ended up NOT painting and actually used vinyl for the letters instead. I also reminded myself that I'd never done a vinyl sign before, so, I didnt forsee the pitfalls:
Applying vinyl to a window proved to somewhat disastarous. The first time, I tried to apply the entire sheet on the window, and the vinyl ended up buckling and forming air pockets. Big time amateur move. Putting vinyl on a window is more like applying tinting to a window. Very delicate and loose.
I opted instead to attempt apply the vinyl in pieces (one for each letter). This went a little easier, but I ended up running out of room, and ran into the edge of the window. One a 3rd attempt I spaced the pieces correctly and got them all on the window.
With that painful and arduous process over, I then did the 'transfer' of the image onto the vinyl. That went ok, I juts had to make sure the letters didnt overlap, and each letter stayed on it's designated piece of vinyl. This way a letter wouldn't stretch onto a separate piece.
Finally the letters are on the actual vinyl, and I can juts cut with the exacto blade. This was after 3 hours, and was relieved to have this done. Though my head was a bit loopy at that point from the heat.
As the letters peeled, it started to come together, aside from a few glitches on the round parts (the G was the toughest). But nevertheless, it's a classy store and I knew it needed to be a classy sign.
If you're in the Silverlake area, amke sure you stop on by and check the shop out. And say hi to Eric!
Brightwell
Applying vinyl to a window proved to somewhat disastarous. The first time, I tried to apply the entire sheet on the window, and the vinyl ended up buckling and forming air pockets. Big time amateur move. Putting vinyl on a window is more like applying tinting to a window. Very delicate and loose.
I opted instead to attempt apply the vinyl in pieces (one for each letter). This went a little easier, but I ended up running out of room, and ran into the edge of the window. One a 3rd attempt I spaced the pieces correctly and got them all on the window.
With that painful and arduous process over, I then did the 'transfer' of the image onto the vinyl. That went ok, I juts had to make sure the letters didnt overlap, and each letter stayed on it's designated piece of vinyl. This way a letter wouldn't stretch onto a separate piece.
Finally the letters are on the actual vinyl, and I can juts cut with the exacto blade. This was after 3 hours, and was relieved to have this done. Though my head was a bit loopy at that point from the heat.
As the letters peeled, it started to come together, aside from a few glitches on the round parts (the G was the toughest). But nevertheless, it's a classy store and I knew it needed to be a classy sign.
If you're in the Silverlake area, amke sure you stop on by and check the shop out. And say hi to Eric!
Brightwell
2876 Rowena Ave
Los Angeles , CA 90039
Los Angeles , CA 90039
Wednesday, August 24, 2011
Hired Killer 2
The project is coming along nicely, and new ideas keep popping into my head all the time. It's about 70% there, but a problem I keep running into is processor strain. It goes to show, no matter how powerful a machine you have, you'll push it to the limit as soon as you can.
This one involves large, multi-plane imagery, that's panning and zooming at different rates. Lots of tweaking and jiggerring of artwork. The possiblities with this sort of thing are endless, as there's an endless sea of imagery out there, most of which I bought or took myself around town or using friends as models.
This one involves large, multi-plane imagery, that's panning and zooming at different rates. Lots of tweaking and jiggerring of artwork. The possiblities with this sort of thing are endless, as there's an endless sea of imagery out there, most of which I bought or took myself around town or using friends as models.
Monday, August 22, 2011
Memoirs of Quaddafi
With the insane, lightning fast change that 's sweeping through North Africa, Libya's Quaddafi has to be one of the more notably infamous. And he seems to have inspired some great caricatures. Check these out:
Friday, August 19, 2011
Title Design 101
I just came across this tribute of sorts, a websitededicated to the art of Title Design. God knows I've listed plenty of examples on here, but this seems to be the end-all resource for this type of thing.
Check out some of these classics, and they just keep getting better and better:
This Is England (2006)
Sita Sings The Blues (2007)
Saturday Night Fever (1977)
Check out some of these classics, and they just keep getting better and better:
This Is England (2006)
Sita Sings The Blues (2007)
Saturday Night Fever (1977)
Wednesday, August 17, 2011
Team Extreme Part 3
By now the shoot was 2 weeks in, with a total of 6 weeks allotted. On some of the key days, I made sure I was there for the entire day. The crew was mostly pretty seasoned, it turned out the DP had just wrapped working camera for one of the Mummy movies. We were total amateurs, and it doesnt take long for the pros to figure that out. Things got a lot more tense as tempers started to flare, romances started to happen on set, and certain keyshots ended up not happening. By this time, Jeff was happy with whatever he could get on camera.
After shooting ended, which also happened to coincide with some of the hottest heat wave days the city had had in a while, we set out to start on post. We were excited about this part, as, it didnt require herding cats so much, and was something we felt a little more adept to. We decided to make an somewhat animated title sequence, along with some interstitials.
At about this point, I had just gotten another video job, that looking back, I probably should have turned down. It was the perfect example how agreeing to do consecutive projects ends up just hurting both.
We cut the entire movie together and were ready to deliver it to FUEL. By now, we couldnt even watch the thing, and, it turned out looking a bit mor amateur than we'd hoped, but looking back, we pulled off a complete feature length with a small amount of money, and ended up getting to take it to Sundance that January (even if it did play in a very small theater). A short cut can be seen here:
After shooting ended, which also happened to coincide with some of the hottest heat wave days the city had had in a while, we set out to start on post. We were excited about this part, as, it didnt require herding cats so much, and was something we felt a little more adept to. We decided to make an somewhat animated title sequence, along with some interstitials.
At about this point, I had just gotten another video job, that looking back, I probably should have turned down. It was the perfect example how agreeing to do consecutive projects ends up just hurting both.
We cut the entire movie together and were ready to deliver it to FUEL. By now, we couldnt even watch the thing, and, it turned out looking a bit mor amateur than we'd hoped, but looking back, we pulled off a complete feature length with a small amount of money, and ended up getting to take it to Sundance that January (even if it did play in a very small theater). A short cut can be seen here:
Tuesday, August 16, 2011
Too Much Pleasure
Monday, August 15, 2011
Japanese Letters
This was a mini production Tosh (Cansr) and I did way back 1993. He just sent the actual sketches we'd used. Who knew that this one would change everything :
Thursday, August 11, 2011
Zines!
Can't say enough about them, and I've always had a penchant for picking up someones zine in just about every town I've traveled to. Got some great ones in the collection, and even some that have gone on to become bonified regular publications (Rockrgirl, Big Time, etc.) I heard a theory that blogs are the new zines, and I'm thinking I might halfway agree with that.
Some of the more notables are listed below:
Dishwasher- 'Dishwasher Pete's' account of holding dishwashing jobs in all 50 states:
Punk- This was published back in 1974, and is credited as coining the term 'Punk' for the young genre at the time. Legs McNeil and John Holstrom published this 4 times a year, and featured interviews, reviews, cartoons, photos. This issue I own even has a 'Deborah Harry' centerfold (clothed...).
IGT Magazine- Though Ive written this up on these blog pages, I still find myself amazed at this one. For myself, this was one of the first graffiti magazines I'd ever come across. The format was like a newspaper, full color cover, inserts, and featured awesome pics mostly from Vulcan and Phase II's collection. If you can get past some of the well intentioned rantings printed, this was a true piece of art.
Fresh! Magazine This one holds a place in my heart as it's one of the original Santa Cruz zines. And being in the spirit of Santa Cruz productivity, the magazine took 4 YEARS to make. That wins the award of laziest publishers on Earth! Funny articles, reviews, write-ups and the like.
Some of the more notables are listed below:
Dishwasher- 'Dishwasher Pete's' account of holding dishwashing jobs in all 50 states:
Punk- This was published back in 1974, and is credited as coining the term 'Punk' for the young genre at the time. Legs McNeil and John Holstrom published this 4 times a year, and featured interviews, reviews, cartoons, photos. This issue I own even has a 'Deborah Harry' centerfold (clothed...).
IGT Magazine- Though Ive written this up on these blog pages, I still find myself amazed at this one. For myself, this was one of the first graffiti magazines I'd ever come across. The format was like a newspaper, full color cover, inserts, and featured awesome pics mostly from Vulcan and Phase II's collection. If you can get past some of the well intentioned rantings printed, this was a true piece of art.
Fresh! Magazine This one holds a place in my heart as it's one of the original Santa Cruz zines. And being in the spirit of Santa Cruz productivity, the magazine took 4 YEARS to make. That wins the award of laziest publishers on Earth! Funny articles, reviews, write-ups and the like.
Tuesday, August 9, 2011
Monday, August 8, 2011
Friday, August 5, 2011
Thursday, August 4, 2011
Team Extreme Part 2
By June we'd finished getting the cast together. So far, we had, about a 20 person crew, half of which were working for next to nothing. Most of the actors were pretty new, with a few seasoned veterans who just wanted to work on something 'small'. I had hired an Art Director, and we started to put together a list of props. The story involved police, so we needed to rent 'cop props'. One spot waaay out tin the valley had just about everything needed for a full scale invasion, including AK-47's, bazooka, small tanks..you name it.
Out trip to the Universal Prop House was about as close to surreal as the project would get. Imagine a 5 story thrift store that had everything. With our tedious list of props almost ready to go, day 1 of the shoot was here. I was working a full-time job at the time, so I was limited to weekend shoots, with an occasional weekday visit on set.
The biggest irony of all was the Producer we'd hired to oversee the movie was also my boss at work. He didnt seem to mind me taking impromptu days off. I'd been there the first day of shooting to see that we were right under the flight path of a nearby airpot. Almost every shot we too that day had airplane sounds in the back. The shoot was off to an exhaustive start. (cont.)
Out trip to the Universal Prop House was about as close to surreal as the project would get. Imagine a 5 story thrift store that had everything. With our tedious list of props almost ready to go, day 1 of the shoot was here. I was working a full-time job at the time, so I was limited to weekend shoots, with an occasional weekday visit on set.
The biggest irony of all was the Producer we'd hired to oversee the movie was also my boss at work. He didnt seem to mind me taking impromptu days off. I'd been there the first day of shooting to see that we were right under the flight path of a nearby airpot. Almost every shot we too that day had airplane sounds in the back. The shoot was off to an exhaustive start. (cont.)
Wednesday, August 3, 2011
Sketchbook 4
Some more sketchbook examples. Some of these are reach back to about 10 years! A great thing about having one of these is to give yourself a chance to draw things and subjects you normally never would, (as demonstrated below!)
Tuesday, August 2, 2011
Hired Killer 1
The majority of this project so far has involved compositing in one way or another. Taking dozens of disparate elements and trying to give them a 'same world' look. Mostly tweaking light source. It can be a challenge and somewhat frustrating, but, often times you can get some unexpected results.
The latest piece of animation is involving 'train smoke' that has 'collage' style patterns inside of it:
The latest piece of animation is involving 'train smoke' that has 'collage' style patterns inside of it:
Monday, August 1, 2011
Eggs Paint & Chaos 2
I came across a few more pages of an old comic I put together as a youngster some time ago. It was one of my first attempts at a complete comic (this one was 25 pages), and it was a bit of a learning experience.
The story is silly and a bit incoherent, but, it gave my hands some very much needed practice:
The story is silly and a bit incoherent, but, it gave my hands some very much needed practice:
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