Ron Cobb's Alien

I was just given this book by my neighbor that feature some concept artwork by Ron Cobb. I've mentioned him before here mostly in regards to his political cartoons, but, was also aware he'd done plenty of art department for film.

He'd worked with Dan ) Bannon on the original Alien script. He'd been responsible with setting the mood for the film through a series of drawings and paintings. Even these concept paintings display Ron's sardonic wit and lent to the tone of the films characters.

Freights!

On a recent road trip, we passed a series of parked freight cars, over by Camp Roberts on HWY 101.

It brought back old memories as I was once one of these culprits who adorned train cars with such scribbling (but, yes, always felt a bit bad about it!).

Mayer Hawthorne- I Wish It Would Rain

Directed by Henry DeMaio, rain animation by yours truly:

Hugo & Molly

During my 2-year stint in Australia as a kid, there was some strange cultural adaptations that were happening. "Santa Claus" was known as 'Father Christmas'. Halloween didn't exist. Most Australian
kids actually thought Australia had gone to the moon instead of the US. There was a lot to make my head spin in confusion.



Another was fast food mascots. They DID have McDonalds and KFC (which to me were like old friends from back home!) KFC in particular had a strange set of overweight kids as their spokespeople named Hugo & Molly. I was fascinated by them and little did I know, my 7 year-old eyes were becoming susceptible to fast food marketing. They even had a comic/ coloring book (which I still have somewhere).



Looking back, it all seemed like a strange dream, till the Australian KFC marketing team decided to bring them back in 2005, though now they look a bit different.

Cheech Wizard

This is a detail of an Cheech Wizard animated jump for the Quasimoto-"Bully's Hit" video. . He's a character whom I've mentioned frequently that pops up from time to time in a lot of graffiti art. Figuring that an animated piece I was working on involved a 'graffiti world' it was fitting that Cheech be involved somehow.

Kleenrz- Filthy (2012) Part 2

By month 2, I finally had something to show Kenny & Co. He was pretty pleased at what we had so far, so that was a hug relief, though, I figured we met the criteria he'd presented early on. Kenny wanted to add some title graphics, to make the whole piece look a little more like an infomercial. It can be tough to add elements like that at the last minute, as they can seem 'tacked on', but we did our best to make them work.

With these full animated pieces, there's always dozens or so of shots that just didn't come out well. You hope that ones that did will outnumber the glitches, but, this one was 50%. In this case, I usually find myself not able to watch my videos when I'm done with them.

Once the video was done, Kenny had me come up with a design for the LP cover. This can most times be much more fun than making the actual video. Plus we had a wealth of assets to pull from the video, so, we were almost half way down with the cover before we got started.

We had a few more items to finish up, and the LP was finally released. It was a blast to be involved in the video/Lp Art/ and promo materials for this, as, you get to manage all aspects of the creative direction. Once that's done, you juts hope the record does well to justify all of the hours. And from what I understand, the record did pretty well!

The Assasination Of John Lennon

Creepy comic strip detailing some conspiracy theories about the former Beatle and his enemies in the right wing establishment!

Atom Smasher!