We are storyboard artists in animation. During the course of production millions of sketches are produced. Some are used but most are not. These are the ones that "got away" and scribbly scribbles deemed not worthy for prime time.
Tuesday, January 31, 2006
Self rant
I'm a lucky guy. You see, I'm fortunate enough to work at a place with some of the most creatively talented people in the world, and the mix of styles and ideas is so diverse and rich that just showing up to the shop is an enlightening learning expedition. The most amazing thing about it, is that in the face of such talent, eighty percent of our professional efforts end up lining the floor in a pool of rejection. For the most part, its all ok. That's just the gig. We're looking for the best idea and that takes time and thought and tons of drawings, words and gags before the it can solidify into something tangible and real. But there's no accounting for the human element in the process. If I let it, that humanity in me can spin into some pretty dark places and trying to protect it can sometimes leave it vulnerable (toss in some lack of sleep or an extra shot of Dayquil and you may find yourself like some pot strung teenager huddled in a corner waiting for the "you suck" police to come busting down your door). Its all part of the game. Self doubt and self confidence washes over me on a daily basis, one coming in while other retreats or vice versa, shaping the malleable coastline of my talent (or lack there of). Depending on the tide, its either a good day or a bad day, but its never static. Ok, so I'm a fucked up artist, but ALL story artists are fucked up. That's where the impetus to tell stories comes from. Without conflict there's no story. So in that vein, I started to play with the idea of characterizing those emotional tides and found some catharsis in the exercise. Why am I telling you all this. Well, first of all, the blogg is free and so why not let it roll. Secondly, I wanted to explain the cartoon so the underlying intention is clear. I was merely trying to find humor in the conflicted inner child my ego has been molesting since I went to college. Time for my shot of Dayquil.
Monday, January 30, 2006
Some old junk...
Sunday, January 29, 2006
Cattle Calls
Farewell Ye Ladies...
Friday, January 27, 2006
Avast!
Alliterate Pirates
Thursday, January 26, 2006
A few quickies
Karikature Korner
Wednesday, January 25, 2006
Trick Pajamas...
Caricature: Amy
Tuesday, January 24, 2006
Guys & Dolls...
Monday, January 23, 2006
First Mate
Sunday, January 22, 2006
Sketches and such
Hey! I've been outed! Oh well.
It's been a while since I posted here,I've been off in Phlooland for so long with Chippy and Loopus. I decided that I needed to remind myself that I can do other things. The top are some designs for a graphic novel I'm doing based on a failed movie pitch. Ahh yes. Failed pitches make the best Graphic novels, don't you think?
The bottom are some characters from a comic strip I want to do based very loosely on my wife Sara when she was a little girl in Korea.
Anyway. I'll post more soon!
-Robo"John Sanford"Taekwon-Z
Linked Like Sausage!
Hey Storyboredom gang! We have been found again! There is a short mention of us on www.cartoonbrew.com ! You can jump there from the title of this post. Also, it looks like they are trying to out someone...
Update! We have also been added to their list of recommended artists' blogs (USA) !
Update! We have also been added to their list of recommended artists' blogs (USA) !
Saturday, January 21, 2006
parental neglect
Friday, January 20, 2006
Workin' late drawings
So I was working late last night and watching the re-runs of Jay Leno and Conan (that should tell you how late I was working) and decided to take a quick break from boarding to dash out two quick semi-caricatures of the shows guests. They're semi-caricatures because they don't look like who they're supposed to be. And I'm not going to tell. What inspired me to draw them was their mouths.
runaway cow
Thursday, January 19, 2006
yar ye ready for more?
A New Look!
We've changed looks because the last template didn't allow links. You probably can change it to add links but we're new to blogging so the easiest way was to change templates. So new look and look to the right for links to other blogs we like! Fresh!
time to pop my blogging cherry
Okay, I've never done this so I don't know if it hurts or not. I've been screwing around with this idea and they've spiraled into these doodles. Usually I bury my crap and keep it all hidden in some dark corner of my shitty house (lest I force the world to bare witness to another canned idea), but in this new age of flailed inhibitions I suppose it is liberating to pull our dicks out and wave them in the wind (those of you without dicks can use appropriate body parts or perhaps an aptly shaped vegetable). I just hope its not too cold out there...my pecker is tiny and not used to the elements. It has done irrevokable damage to my life from the day I first layed hands on it, but I am fond of our history, and thus owe it a moment or worry.
So here I go....weeee.
Wednesday, January 18, 2006
Tuesday, January 17, 2006
Strip #3 and a sorta farewell
Here is the last installment of my stream-of-conciousness strips on StoryBoredom. It's been fun but RoboTae-KwonZ and I noticed that since we are doing one post a day, it seems that the posts of the other awesome contributors of this blog are getting bumped off. So we've decided that we will be spinning off our strips on to our own sites and also continue to post goofy drawings here. Hope this helps! Here are the links:
For RoboTae-KwonZ's strip:
For skribbl's strip:
Rad!
Monday, January 16, 2006
Today's strip: Epilogue
A short Rant on Character
Countfunkula (yes, that is his real name) asked in the comments section whether Chippy and Loopus were new characters or if they were characters I'd been drawing for a while. The answer is that they are as old as that first strip. I wanted to try skribbl's 2x8 dialogue strip make-it-up-as-you-go experiment, and that was what came out. An easily irritated rabbit named "Chippy" and his dimwitted cigartette bumming freind the wolf, who later was named Loopus. When skribbl suggested I try to draw one a day, I decided that instead of sitting down and spending a few thousand hours figuring out who these characters are and what kind of world they live in the way we do at work, I'd develop them the way Charles Schulz said he developed the Peanuts characters. He started out with a group of kids, Charlie Brown, Lucy, etc. with no pre-concieved personalities in mind. Then, through gags and jokes, he let their personalities sort of develop organically. You can see this at work in the new Peanuts collections. The strip began in 1950, but the kid's personalties don't really emerge until about 1955. This is what I wanted to try with these guys.
Now I understand that we could never do this sort of thing in feature animation. You have to know your characters and their world fully so that you fully exploit their personalities for gags and business. However, I think that we sometimes OVER develop these guys. We sit for hours in meetings with the writers and the directors and the executives hashing out these characters, writing their personality traits on little cards. I think that sometimes, through this process, we kill the opportunity for the characters to suprise us. It would be nice to leave somethings up in the air so that we could discover them on boards.
Hey, it's just a thought.
Now I understand that we could never do this sort of thing in feature animation. You have to know your characters and their world fully so that you fully exploit their personalities for gags and business. However, I think that we sometimes OVER develop these guys. We sit for hours in meetings with the writers and the directors and the executives hashing out these characters, writing their personality traits on little cards. I think that sometimes, through this process, we kill the opportunity for the characters to suprise us. It would be nice to leave somethings up in the air so that we could discover them on boards.
Hey, it's just a thought.
Today's strip: End,..kinda
I have been tempted several times to start drawing these on bigger paper, but then I think they'll lose their charm.
Nope. I'll keep doing them on cheap 2"x8" strips of paper. Besides, that's part of the challenge.
I think that one of the reasons I like to do these so much is the freedom. I write what I want and draw what I want. No approvals, no re-dos. I draw whatever I think is funny and then post it. Another reason is that I grew up wanting to draw comic strips. I dreamed of creating the next Calvin and Hobbes, Pogo or Peanuts. That was my original goal. I decided to switch career tracks when I noticed that animation was having a renaissance. This was 1988, and Roger Rabbit was in the movie theaters and Ralph Bakshi and John K's Mighty Mouse was on TV. Comic strips, on the other hand, were dying. And still are, I might add.
It's too bad. The comic strip is one of the few purely American artforms.
Sunday, January 15, 2006
Saturday, January 14, 2006
Today's strip: I.D. Theft!
Friday, January 13, 2006
Part 2 but really strip #3
Thursday, January 12, 2006
Attack!
Me-O-Maya!
Meeting sketches
Here are a few of my meeting doodles. Just free associating while I wait for my brain to re-boot.
Done with a Pitt brush pen.
By the way, the Faber Castell brush pen is perhaps the best pen I have ever used. I love them when they are new, I love them when they are worn out and I even love them when they are almost completly dried up.
Whoever invented these deserves some kind of award.
Wednesday, January 11, 2006
Where is the alligator?
Don't Oggle the Goggles
Tuesday, January 10, 2006
Dialogue Strip comic, er strip
Inspired by skribbl's tiny dialogue strip stream of consciousness comic. I drew panel one with absolutely no idea how it would end. It's scribbly, but it got a laugh from everyone I showed it to, so here it is. I used a black finepoint pen called a "Stylist" for the drawing and sanford prismacolors for the color.
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