Secret Soldier Vs. The Master Racer

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In my animated project, (yet untitled) Flea Market Phil is an avid reader and collector of comics. So there’s a lot of discussion about the history and minutia of comics. That means I’m working on fictitious Golden Age comics. Heres my first one: The Secret Solder trying to catch the Master Racer, a super fast fascist, who was originally created to win the 1936 Berlin Olympics, the experiment went horribly wrong. The Master Racer was not permitted to represent the German team, because he talked too fast and too much.

A Few Good Men

As always, please click the image to enlarge

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Here’s the first model sheets — yeah, I know these aren’t “traditional” model sheets. That must be a big shock, because I’ve always been soooo traditional. Yeah, right.

In studying model sheets over the years, I’ve come to the conclusion that everybody has their own take on format. But calm down, I will make some more instructive model sheets in the near future. These are really to get across who the character is in lieu of putting together a “bible” for the project.

Batman and Wolverine at the Dive Bar

Okay — it’s done! While I was 99% finished several months ago, I had a problem with the multi-planing in the opening scene. It took me some time to ruminate over it, but the problem was the relationship between the windows on the black buildings and the tavern — an optical illusion made it look like the black buildings were sliding sideways –so, all better now. I also added the move-in on the bar, which allowed me to experiment with the glowing bar signs finished in After Effects. Music was created in Apple Soundtrack and everything was mixed in Audacity (although I’m moving to ProTools) and then everything assembled in Final Cut Pro.

The New Brunswick Of My Memories

The Internet conflicts with my memories, insofar as I’m now able to take a virtual walk through the city of New Brunswick, thanks to the innovative folks at Google. But the New Brunswick I left in September of 2000, is to some extent gone. Many of the stores, bars,eateries, buildings, people and culture have disappeared. Many parts of town are unrecognizable, due to expansion of the hospital and related medical facilities. At some point, the city seems cut in half, with nothing but bland, clean offices and parking decks, separating one neighborhood from another. One thing on the Google Street View that matches my memory is New Brunswick always seemed overcast.

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For me, in the 90’s, New Brunswick was the “funnest” place on Earth. It had great quirky record, comics and video shops, every possible kind of food, clubs, bars, and an amazingly talented and thriving underground music scene. Had New Brunswick been anywhere else in America other than 45 minutes west of NYC, it would’ve gotten as much attention as Seattle. I used to call New Brunswick “the town where the parents went away for the weekend and never came home.” We were free to do whatever we wanted, for as long as we could stand it. Continue reading “The New Brunswick Of My Memories”

28 days Later (Not the movie, but the freelance gig)

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My entire month of July was consumed by a project for Wiley Publishing. Yes, the same Wiley that publishes the “…For Dummies” books. But this project was for their textbook division’s annual national sales meeting. To honor their top five sales people, the good people at Wiley contracted me to create a one minute animated film that was loosely based on the intro to the TV show “Sex and the City”.

Each sales rep was shown in some aspect of NYC activity, with the first rep in the role of Sarah Jessica Parker. Each rep is pleasantly surprised when they find their name and sales stats are part of the fabric of the city.

The entire project took 28 days straight. Sometimes fifteen hours long. Hand drawn characters, finished in Flash, composited in After Effects. The files were a whopping 1024 x 760 because the final was brought into Power Point. It was lots of work, tight deadlines, but a lot of fun. It also helps when you do work for an open-minded client that trusts your instincts. No wonder Wiley is so successful.

Sorry, but for contractual reasons, I can’t post the video. Here’s a few stills…
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While my real passion is character design, I must admit, I really had fun drawing places like Yankee Stadium.

Animating Batman and Wolverine

Been working on this on and off since October. If you look at the post back in October, you can see the hands were mushy. I originally just wanted to bang this out, not worry about style, craft, or quality — just let the humor speak for itself — kinda like South Park. But I can draw, and so I did. I redesigned parts of the characters, got a voice actor to play Batman, and worked to tighten everything up. I’m still adding to this, but this is the first start to finish version I’m willing to show. Much love to Joe Oesterle for his contribution on the script. Thanks to Adam Taylor for vocals and John Noll for sound.