Andrew Marlton, Walkley Award winning cartoon

Congratulations to Andrew Marlton, cartoonist for 'Crikey' and creator of 'First Dog On The Moon' for his cartoon, 'Drowning'.

Check out Andrew's gallery, he provides some very insightful commentary!

Click here to see 'Drowning' by Andrew

Arnold in Japan

I really love crazy Japanese commercials and felt I had to share this one starring no other than Arnold Schwarzenegger...

Wanted: Book Reviewers

A few months back I 'Liked' a Facebook page called: "Aussie Writers." They recently highlighted a call for book reviewers via 'Social Callouts':

http://beta.socialcallout.com/callouts/wanted-book-reviewers

Submissions

Thanks to the Writers Handbook 2012 (available from the reference section of all good libraries) I compiled a list of publishers who accept unsolicited manuscripts from Australia, the U.K and the U.S.

I have emailed my submission for ‘The Visual Guide to Imaginary Friends’ with a cover letter, some sample art, and the complete text to just under half of the thirty publishers I found.

All praise the internet!

The remaining publishers still only accept submissions via mail. Not to worry, I’ll be sending out a pile of airmail packages next week.

'Do Anythings'

Here is another page from 'The Visual Guide to Imaginary Friends' - the 'Do Anythings':

I'm now researching publishers to see who will accept unsolicited manuscripts, most of them via email as well.

The plan is to submit this within the week and see what sort of response I get.

Mock up Cover

Completed the mock up cover for 'The Visual Guide to Imaginary Friends' whilst listening to The Decemberists

Flying Friends - The Visual Guide to Imaginary Friends

Completed this page last night, all about 'Flying Friends'...

Currently I'm working on a mock up of the cover, the plan is to create 3 pages and then shop it around.



Helicopter

This weekend past was a wet one, and so it was the perfect time to create a dodgy animation.

Here's what 10 photos and a helicopter sound effect can produce (using PowerDirector):

Daniel Craig

Created this image of Daniel Craig for my portfolio:

I'm also creating a new online portfolio to refer to clients - watch this space...

SKYFALL

I am eagerly looking forward to the next Bond film, prior to the teaser trailer being released a nice glossy poster has been unveiled:

Along with the Dark Knight Rises and Prometheus this is on the list to see.

Page One - The Cloud Factory

I'm still tweaking this but here is page one of 'The Cloud Factory'.

I've finally managed to settle on a 'look' for the book, one that matched the imagery I have in my head. If anyone's out there, let me know if this page makes sense. I'm not 100% certain on the colour scheme yet, but bring on page 2!

A little self knowledge...!

I just want to promote a little self knowledge.
When you get an email that refers to Iraq or the ‘truth of 911 in the Koran/Bible/etc’, put the anchors on and think for a teensy, weensy second.

BEFORE FORWARDING just check out www.snopes.com or something similar to see if there is some truth to the email.
Think before forwarding. Why are you forwarding something like this?
Is it funny? Will it enhance anyone’s life?

In most cases, the email will be the result of BLIND IGNORANT FORWARDING.
These emails have been circulating for the best part of a decade.
Anyone else sick of these?

Ignorance is easy. Get up, get out and learn the truth.
Read the Bible. Read the Koran. Learn about other cultures.
It’s fun, it’s interesting, and life is too short to live in a bubble.

The Paperless Office

Prometheus

Ridley returns to sci fi after 25 years with ‘Prometheus’:

I love the cinematic age we are in right now. Blur free CGI means anything can be created on screen and it seems Ridley has gone all out with this one.

Damon Lindelhof (screenwriter) said Ridley had the imagery for this film in his head and together they worked extensively on the script.

Their feeling was to set a film in the ‘Alien’ universe but make it something new, something different.

I look forward to seeing this one, next to The Dark Knight Rises and The Avengers.

Moneybox Cartoon

Created this one for work. It's verrrrrrry in jokey, so I feel I should give you a little bit of a story behind the cartoon.

Basically, the owners of the Commonwealth Bank in Martin Place, a building nick named 'The Moneybox', went to court over the land value and challenged the legilsation in relation to Heritage properties. They were saying (now I can only read between the lines of solicitor jargon and court malarkey)  if the building was knocked down and they were made to re-build with the exact same materials that were used to build it in the first place (that is, 19th century sandstone - just like plutonium, this can be bought at the corner store) they reckon this would effect the land value.

Ho hum, anyway my idea is that if they nuked the whole site from orbit then they seriously would have to consider doing JUST THAT.

I'll Get The Ice Creams

Clouds Clouds Clouds

I have been filling a notebook up on various Cloud characters for 'The Cloud Factory' and have created character sketches for each. I've also worked out the look of the 'cloud house' where our little hero lives with his dad.

I started the book last night however the look wasn't working in Illustrator using 3 point brushes, so I'm going to experiement with more of a watercolour look created in Corel Painter with pages inked in Illustrator with a 1 point brush.

Experiment, experiment, experiment...

Dad Cloud - emotive sketches

Just some more sketches for my book 'The Cloud Factory', this time honing in the look of the Dad Cloud:

Ding-a-lings

If you are 30+ and lived in NSW then you will most likely remember this ad about 'Dingalings':

Even though it appears to be simple animation, there are some cool moments of animation in here. Check out the body movement during the skateboard scene and the dynamic sweep of the truck that rushes past the girl.

Another glimpse at the music video

Here's another sample of the music video I'm creating:

The concept will be dancers from the last several decades will appear in the clip alongside each other and they will be animated in a similar style as above. Then I will credit all dancers at the end of the clip so the viewer can pause and see all the names.

Tim Hunkin's Water Clock

Tim Hunkin creates amazing sculptures (www.timhunkin.com) and this water clock has to be admired, watch up to the 29 second mark, it's great!

Hello!

Another test animation created in Digicel Flipbook. I wanted to see how the line looked at Broadcast quality in widescreen:

Animation is a laborious but ultimately satisfying experience. Last night I created one second of animation in 50 minutes. It's times like these its practical to have small goals in place and a working knowledge of how long you want your animation to run. I'm planning a 2 minute video clip at 1440 drawings.

Rotoscope Test Animation

Created this test in Digicel Flipbook using drawings created in Illustrator:

Rotoscope Music Video

Confession time.
I'm a dag from the 80's, and along with countless animators who grew up in the 80's, I can guarantee that one of their most treasured memories would be this clip:

It's called Rotoscope animation, where the animators projected a filmed sequence onto a surface and traced over the image in pencil. Over 3000 drawings were made for this clip alone.

I've always nurtured a dream to create my own rotoscoped clip in the 'Take On Me' fashion and am now I am in the process of creating it using Digicel Flipbook.

I'll post versions of it as I progress.