Open Season

Just saw a screening of the film OPEN SEASON--the first all CG feature by Sony Pictures Animation. Saw this one in 3D on an
Imax screen. A fun family film with lots of fun characters and a few good laughs. I must say--this has some of the BEST animation design I've seen in a CG animated film. From the character design, to the shot layout, to the use of color and lighting... this film really exels. The film strikes a perfect balance of abstracted, exaggerated simple shapes with the painterly use of color and texture. They were fearless in the character design. A great example is the male deer herd. All neck and chest with tiny little legs formed with simple curves and straights ( they kind of reminded me of primitive cave drawings in their simplicity ) Just based on their silhouette you understand their character. The design aesthetic of the film was initially inspired by Eyvind Earle, the old Disney guy who designed Sleeping Beauty. Directed by Roger Allers, Jill Coulton, and my old compadre from ILM, Tony Stacchi. Jew-Bob says check it out!

Look Out! It's Raining Giant Tires!

By request, here is a Superman sketch. Don't really know where the idea came from. This is one of those extremely rare times when I did a line drawing completely in Photoshop. It's one of the weird things I've found about drawing in the computer...it's
actually easier in a lot of ways to do a fully rendered painting than a simple line drawing. When painting, you're dealing with blobby shapes more than you are with precise linework. You can hide and fuss your shapes till they're right. With linework it's
different. It seems like my shaky handwork is amplified by the wacom tablet. It required a different approach that is less dependant on a flashy line. Instead of trying to make my lines look good, I designed my drawing in a way that avoided a lot
of linework--the forms being brought out by contrasting black shapes against white/white against black. The black against
white thing was present with Alex Toth on my mind a lot lately. I hope to do more of this type of drawing in the future. Perhaps doing my next comic this way. This will be helped once I buy that Cintique tablet, which will make it much easier.