Daily Crapbook: Brainchild

Daily Crapbook

Ehh.... just...this for today.

Daily Crapbook: Wasp Waist

I finished up at work a bit early today, so I spent some time playing with Alias Sketchbook. I have the program at home, but never found it to be a satisfying tool. But at work, I have that magical device known to the natives as a "sin-TEEK". I actually enjoyed drawing in it, and the results were not gut-spewingly awful. It will never replace paper for me, but its nice to know I'm not entirely hopeless when confronted with technology.

Daily Crapbook: Pretention

Daily Crapbook

I ran across an ad with a lady wearing this hat...

Daily Crapbook

Here are some designs from a few months ago- a job that never got off the ground.

Daily Crapbook: Harry Potter for the Wii

Nate insisted we pick up "The Half Blood Prince" for the Wii today. I sense that my productivity is going to suffer...

Auditions

Most other animators I know say they love what they do because its like acting without having to get up in front of anybody. I guess I'm the odd duck, because I like acting because its just like animation, except without all the fuss of drawing. Its just so immediate, and so much fun! That why every so often I get the bug and decide to audition for a local play or musical. I never get in, but I won't forgive myself if I don't try. Today I went to an audition for "Sweeney Todd", a musical I adore for reasons I've already written about in this blog. I think I did all right- it wasn't near the fiasco of my last attempt at an audition (someday I'll tell that tale, but its too soon for me to relive that event without fainting from humiliation). Anyhow, he's what I imagine I looked like today, singing my audition selection.

Monkey Rag Update

Ok, so Monkey Rag is going slower than I expected. But its still going, and that's what counts. Instead of starting at the beginning, I decided to tackle a small chunk from the middle, Sc. 12, which incorporates lip sync and walk cycles and "dance breaks." Since I find the technical aspects of syncing/organizing/calibrating animation the most grueling, I figured I should do this scene first and get it out of the way. Its disappointing that I've been working on this for so many months and this is all I have to show for it, but I can rationalize that since the scene is 11 seconds long, but with two characters, I could say that I've animated about 22 seconds. That calms my anxiety for the time being.

Sonny on the Nostalgia Critic

The brilliant Nostalgia Critic recently reviewed the Top Eleven Cereal Mascots of all time. I enjoyed this review for all the reasons I normally do (clever writing, funny gags, decent video work, a deep respect for Animaniacs and Batman:TAS) but also for an extra special reason. Sonny the Cuckoo Bird was given a pretty high ranking, and the NC used a lot of clips from Cocoa Puffs spots that I had worked on. Its funny, because seeing those particular clips in the review made me happier than than seeing the commercials on TV. Of course, the review wasn't about how swell the animation was- it was about Sonny's pitiful addiction to chocolaty breakfast cereal. Thats the obvious and ubiquitous reaction to the Cocoa Puffs campaign: "Sonny has a problem". Hell, every four out of five comments on YouTube is about Sonny's crack-tinged habit. I do wonder why the ad agency keeps pushing this angle when thats the conclusion everybody draws from it, but oh well. Sonny's freak-outs are fun to draw. And it actually doesn't bother me in the slightest- I always thought Sonny "going cuckoo" was just exuberance. He just really, *really* loves chocolate cereal. As long as he goes to the dentist, whats wrong with that? If there's anything offensive at all about Cocoa Puffs, its the box art. Seriously, take a close look at it next time you're in the cereal aisle at the supermarket. Some designer somewhere got cheeky.

Daily Crapbook

Not really a drawing today- just testing out colors.

Daily Crapbook: Electric Pee Tarp

This is my memory of a product from the SkyMall magazine- it seemed like a really bad idea in more ways than one.

Daily Crapbook: Calamity Jane

I really like the Doris Day movie musical "Calamity Jane". Its fluff, its silly, and its basically a knock-off of "Annie Get Your Gun", but its very entertaining.

Daily Crapbook

Daily Crapbook

I started out doodling Rhoda from the show "Rhoda" (natch) but I ended up with this creature. Oh well, at least she looks happy.

Daily Crapbook: Rah-ther

Downtime at work. I don't know what this is, but it amuses me.

Daily Crapbook: I'm Not Shy

I was at the post office the other day, waiting in line (of course). A woman came in with her little son, and she asked him to stand in line behind me while she addressed some mail. He stood behind me for a moment then ran back to his mother to stare at me suspiciously from behind her legs. She asked him to go back in line. He did, for a few seconds, then ran behind his mother again. He was a really cute little boy, so I said to the mother "Aw, is he shy?" At my words, he peeked out from behind his mother wearing a perfect little scowl and hollered "I'M NOT SHY!" He went back to playing peekaboo with me until it was my turn at the counter. I thought I'd try sketching him. He was a lot more hilarious in person.

Daily Crapbook: Evil Mermaids

I remember pawing through these old books in my father's library about mysterious creatures of legend, and discovering the chapter on mermaids. The idea that Disney's sweet and lovely Ariel came from a myth of evil fish-women seducing sailors then dragging them down to the depths of the ocean to devour them was a bit alarming. But still interesting! Here's a sketch of one such evil mermaid.

Daily Crapbook

Daily Crapbook: Work Doodles

Here's a sheet of doodles I did while waiting at work last week.