Out and about for a while

Thank you everyone for visiting and following my blog. I'll be on the road for a few days on a break. Back in town on November 5 and will pick it up again with daily art posts. Meantime I'll still be able to interact with you on comments. Thanks again and we'll see you then! 

This doodle was done in ball point pen just for fun and later touched up in Photoshop with color.

  

Crash for cash?

Thinking about it the other day...

An idea came to mind...

Looking for simple and convenient opportunities to generate additional income for my school that don't require preparing conventional crowdfunding campaigns at this time another strategy formulated instead. One that could involve good ol' Crash Bandicoot himself.

The Animation Academy in Burbank is looking to acquire new computer equipment to expand our program into digital animation  production and education. One of the ways we could possibly do this is through the sale of original art. Since my personal art blog has a significant following of Crash fans I wonder if you'd be open to the idea of purchasing new drawings and other art I create of Crash. Perhaps through Ebay auctions or through some other means. Drawings I've done of Crash in the ownership of others is very rare along with ownership of my original art in general. Would you be open to this? Does the idea appeal to you? It's something I've been kicking around. Your input is welcome if you would like to comment and leave suggestions. I'm interested in your thoughts on the matter. 

Thanks very much!

     

He-Man ... I Have the Power !!!

Continuing with my efforts to resurrect He-Man on a personal level at least. Recently while drawing in class with my students I've been practicing getting back in form with the venerable character. It's a challenge when you haven't drawn him in nearly three decades. I'm a little off model with the design from his original look but that's not a big deal for me. I was never entirely comfortable drawing He-Man on model while the TV series was in production in the 1980s. My thoughts at this point are to experiment with the look of He-Man and see where I can take him. Similar to what I've been doing periodically with Crash Bandicoot.

Here's the obligatory He-Man pose...

He has the power and a sword to go with it. Don't mess with He-Man...

Okay, you asked for it!

Bongos and babes

This was a fun demonstration from 1998 in the early days of my school. Each character was done separately with black line and markers to emphasize the importance of gray scale tones then joined together when digitized to create a lighthearted composition.

Jak and Daxter history - The Road to Jak - Part 11

On with the saga of the design path to the development of Jak from the "Jak and Daxter" franchise.  At this point 'the kid' as I was referring to the character looked interesting with possibilities.

Tonight's doodles

I had a productive week creatively with a backlog of art to show from drawing with my students. Sometimes I doodle as class winds down. This evening as the last session wrapped up I sketched these faces with a ball point pen that was starting to lose the last of its ink. Good way for it to go out. No particular purpose to these drawings other than to have a little fun and practice free form sketching.

Monstrous fellow could have been Velo

I've been posting images from the development of Emperor Velo from Crash Nitro Kart for some time now and recalled that I came up with a concept as a class demonstration inspired by the character in 2002. This was painted with gouache which is the term for opaque watercolor. It was a line drawing first. I remember thinking this would make a good addition to the body of design work I was coming up with for the character since that's what I was doing at the time. I decided not to include it directly. Instead I used it as a basis for subsequent concepts for the character. And since it's October let's add the creature to the month's entries.

    

Resurrecting He-Man

Last month I was a guest at the annual PowerCon ThunderCon in Los Angeles which is a convention for fans of the He-Man and She-Ra TV series franchises going back to the 1980s as well as the Thundercats. I was surprised by the continuing popularity of He-Man and She-Ra. The animated "He-Man and the Masters of the Universe" series was my first official gig in the business. I was one of the three artists who developed it going all the way back to 1982. Of the three original artists I'm the only one still alive. 

One of the things that struck me at the PowerCon was the volume of fan art that was being created for He-Man and the spinoff series "She-Ra Princess of Power" which I played a major role in developing as well. I saw art being sold by artists of characters I designed and it really got me thinking. It's been years and years since I drew He-Man. I don't think I've drawn him since I worked on the second season of the series in 1984. So I thought I'd try it this evening in class. This is the result. It's my first attempt at He-Man in more than 28 years. He may not be exactly on model but that's okay. I'll be drawing more of him in the future. The more I practice the better I'll get. I'll also be featuring original art I created for the series that's never been published before.

Skinny leg Frank

This being October and all with Halloween on its way I found something else suitable for the occasion. This was a class demonstration from the early days of my school in 1998. Had fun with a version of the Frankenstein monster using watercolor paints and black line. I was accentuating the contrast between upper body shapes and his boots with the idea of scrawny legs to push the exaggeration in design as well as the application of color in a direct and confident manner. My students always appreciate demos like these as they gain from them considerably and I enjoy coming up with the art.

Crash Nitro Kart - Road to Velo - part 5

These two drawings were among the development sketches for Emperor Velo on Crash Nitro Kart in 2002 that I was most pleased with. I didn't think the designs were right for the character but they topped off a good selection of concepts for Vicarious Visions to choose from. Artistically they were among the best of this group.

For the sketch below I thought I'd include the page information that cataloged the design. Both of these images were on the same page. The date on the drawings is September 30, 2002. Note the abbreviation CTR2. At the time we were calling the project Crash Team Racing 2. Later it was titled Crash Nitro Kart.  

   

Vampires are pretty

At least they try to be. That's how I was seeing these images as I embarked on my most recent class demo which I did this evening. Here's the result. A drawing in Col-erase blue pencil on Strathmore 2 ply paper that I painted with one color of acrylics going over the line work and the hair and shadows. Because Col-erase blue is water soluble some of it picked up and enhanced the paint.

Before I added color to the image this is what she looked like in blue pencil line.

And before the final image these are the sketches I created to find the character.

Crash doodles

Having fun with Bandicoot. Sketches in black line and red pencil while drawing with students in class.

Follow this link to the Bring Back Bandicoot Petition

Here's a link to Bring Back Bandicoot on Facebook.

As the head rotates

Earlier this week in the Character Design 1 class at my school I had an opportunity to complete a head rotation by virtue of a demonstration. Rotations on characters in general are a great exercise and a must-know-how-to-do-it skill for any character based designer who's looking to function on a professional level. With my philosophy of practicing what I teach this is my latest entry along those lines.

Golfing with Frank

I had a lot of fun with this composition. It was a spontaneous sketch I came up with as a class demonstration in the early days of my school in 1998. Afterwards I made a photocopy and used markers to give it some color.

Monstrous faces in the oddest of places

The macabre month of October continues! This goes way back. All the way to my days at Hallmark Cards in Kansas City. The earliest of my art that I've shown on the blog so far dating to 1981. I really enjoyed my time there and have very fond memories. But sometimes it sure was tough to get into some of the job assignments. Except when Halloween production time came along. This particular project called for monster designs. Surrounded by fuzzy bunny art I let loose when the opportunity came to do some concept sketches for a door poster that would turn out to be a landmark production piece for the company. Afterwards I photocopied the individual drawings and pasted them together for a page in my portfolio. I used these images for many years for professional purposes in representing my work to employers.

Jak and Daxter history - The Road to Jak - Part 10

As my design exploration on the lead character for 'Project Y' continued in 2000 I headed in a direction that would give him a flamboyant and distinctive design element in the form of a headdress or hair. I maintained an earthy native feel to the character and saw him as having something of a wild but strong and noble element to his personality.

Lady Vampire bringing out the color

Last night in my Visual Development class at my school in Burbank I was feeling it so I thought to bring out the heavy artillery. Acrylic paints and brushes. Used the cardboard backing from a drawing pad and punched this out in around 45 minutes. Good to be painting analog again. It's been a while. Looking to do more in the future. Hope you're enjoying the month of October.

Zombies need love too

In keeping with October's monstrous theme I thought I'd revisit this charming lady. She came about as the result of a class demonstration while teaching at Cal State Northridge in 2009. Had fun sketching the concept in Photoshop on a Cintiq tablet.

Origin of Crash Bandicoot

I've planned on featuring these drawings for quite a while now in honor of the many Crash Bandicoot fans the world over that follow my blog. They were first published in 2005 on the AnimationNation Forums which I maintain to make note of the 10 year anniversary of when I started working on Crash in his days as Willy the Wombat in early 1995.

The first set of sketches are my initial concepts of the character that would become Crash. The second set is a reworking of the first based upon Naughty Dog's input and Joe Pearson's take on the character. The third set are from when I locked down his look to everyone's satisfaction. I used Photoshop in 2005 to color these images.

Monster time - Wolfman

It's October and you know what that means! Halloween is just around the corner. I plan on featuring art that's in season this month so I thought I'd start with this. It was a quick demo I did in class in 2005 at a time when I was picking up Photoshop. After drawing the image I scanned it and used the file as a base to practice some digital painting. The color is below followed by the original concept sketch. Hope you have a happy and fun October!

Crash loves attention

Trying out another version of Crash by reworking his original design. This was done a few days ago while drawing in class with my students on September 26 2012 but I'm dating it October 1 since this is when it's being published. Among the exploratory changes are a stronger anatomical separation between his head and body along with lowering the position of his arms and some different shoes. This time with the toes squared off. It's always fun to draw Crash. Don't forget... 

Follow this link to the Bring Back Bandicoot Petition

Here's a link to Bring Back Bandicoot on Facebook.