Incommunicado III

Incommunicado - deprived of any communication with others . . . I never realized how prophetic this piece would actually become . . . enjoy. The image is 9"x14," graphite on Arches paper.

Bon Voyage

My friends Jazno, Andie and their beautiful daughter Bella are off to Singapore for 9 months. These pictures are from Andie's farewell performance and a "going away" lunch at a local eatery.

Alecia and Gordon . . . colleagues and friends

Andie and her sister Teresa . . . Eric, my studio mate and I

Teresa belts one out . . . Andie, Bergman, me and Eric in the back

reminiscing . . .

Getting up . . . and trying to connect with Jeff the meth head one last time

Indian buffett . . . Bella meets Lily

. . . the gang

Recent Figure Drawings

These are a sampling of some figure drawings I've been doing at the Wednesday night DigiPen and Thursday night Arena.Net life drawing sessions. They range in time from 10 to 25 minute drawings. Enjoy!

The Art of Kevin Hebb

Kevin Hebb is a pop artist, designer and creator of strange birdhouses. He draws from his childhood experiences in suburbia and synthesizes them with his recent urban explorations. His birdhouse constructions clearly convey the essence of these combined experiences. The birdhouse is a representation of home, innocence, serenity and charm (everything his suburban upbringing represented) which is then morphed through the use of an urban language of texture, decay, graffiti, borrowed imagery, symbols, slogans and found objects. It's Pop Art and it's nothing new but it's his and he has a whole career ahead of him. He was also my student. I still have a few things to teach him and I'm sure he's got a lesson or two for me.

Check out his work . . . http://www.kevin-hebb.com/

Character Designs

I recently had the opportunity to do some "blue sky" character designs for an animated short entitled "The Calico Martini." I worked primarily on the character "Jasper" who is a dastardly little boy. He gets in way over his head when he decides to get into mischief after his mom goes out on an errand. After coming up with the basic look and feel for Jasper I passed them on to my colleague Jazno Francouer (a former Disney special effects animator) who refined them even further. They were then passed onto another colleague, Dan Daly (a former Disney clean-up artist) who cleaned them up! The images below document the process from blue sky all the way through to final model sheet and emotes. Enjoy!

Second Skin

Lyrics by the Chameleons UK - too beautiful, too haunting not to share - feeling it right now.

One cold damp evening the world stood still

I watched and held my breath

A silhouette I thought I knew came through and someone spoke to me

Whispered in my ear "This fantasy's for you."

My whole life passed before my eyes

I thought what they say is true

I shed my skin and my disguise and cold, numb and naked I emerged from my cocoon

And a half remembered tune played softly in my head

Then she turned smiling and said I realize a miracle is due

I dedicate this melody to you but is this the stuff dreams are made of?

If this is the stuff dreams are made of no wonder I feel like I'm floating on air

Everywhere, It feels like I'm everywhere

It's like you fail to make the connection - You know how vital it is

Or when something slips through your fingers - You know how precious it is

When you reach the point where you know It's only your second skin
Someone's banging on my door

Render Me Dead

I recently had the opportunity to work with a local director, Greg Brotherton on his first feature indy film "Render Me Dead." RMD is a fim noir spoof set here in Seattle with elements of corporate espionage, murder and comic relief. I initially was slated to do storyboards for the film but much to the chagrin of the DP and the rest of us visually minded people he chose not to. I did however act as Art Director for the film's finale in which a makeshift gallery is constructed in a barn and all sorts of visuals created as clues revealing the identity of the murderer.

The location of the finale was about an hour away from Seattle at a place called Smoke Farm. It was a gorgeous place but during the final weekend of shooting the weather was miserable and prevented the crew from finishing.

Aside from acting as Art Director I made some art for the finale. I did three pieces in total. Two were on 8'x8' canvas and a third was done digitally and projected onto paper. The first concept was to create an illustration that graphically captured the crime scene with chalk outline and police tape. The second was to illustrate the logo of a group of corporate thieves known as the Air Pirates.

Alot of time and effort was spent constructing the set for the finale which required frames for all of the art and projections. Each visual was 8'x8' and I worked closely with Ben the construction guy to meet all of the deadlines - which meant alot of sleepless nights. One of the construction set ups required us to drop an eighty pound plexiglass and wood framework down on one of the leads!