Messin' wit the Shadow Man

I did all sorts of odd jobs animating on Frog, from slight expression changes on a mask to the Disneyest cheering bayou animals. But if I was working on a character, there was one character it was likely to be, and I came to a very important conclusion about the nature of existence about a year ago, which is illustrated here.

I only did eleven scenes of him (and two of those were hand scenes) but I was so enormously, tremendously, gigantically lucky to be a part of that crew, I can hardly express the depths of my gratitude to the powers that be. Most animators never get to work on a character that awesome in their whole careers, never mind on their first feature. Bruce Smith, of course, as supervising animator, is responsible for a huge amount of that awesomeness, because Bruce Smith IS AWESOME. That's all there is to it.

Viva la Revolucion

Reg Shoe, Ankh-Morpork's own communist agitator. He would pay the ultimate price for his ideals.

... well, sort of ...

The Man Who Was Sunday

Continuing last week's Chesterton theme, here is the leader of the Central Anarchist Council, codename Sunday:

The description of him as an enormous grey elephantine man was quite striking; I must admit my own personal mental image was tainted a bit by Watson in Action Sherlock Brain Theatre.

The Men Who Weren't Thursday

BBC7 recently had a reading of G.K. Chesterton's The Man Who Was Thursday, which I surprised myself by enjoying quite a lot (though on reflection, 'eccentric Edwardian intellectuals go on a wacky romp/mystery' is hard not to love). Unfortunately, getting half an hour of audiobook a day makes it hard to hang onto physical descriptions, but that didn't stop me – here's a collection of doodles of the Central Anarchist Council, more or less independent of accuracy. The Secretary (top left), for example, ought to have dark hair and a beard. Pah! I like mine better.

The 6th Inniskilling Dragoon's Lament

On this, my 'professional' blog, I usually try to avoid posting the frivolous self-gratifying fan art which fills up most of my sketchbook. But the thing of which I have been most proud, recently, is the most frivolous and self-gratifying of them all, and deeply dorky besides.

The song is to the tune of The Legionnaire's Lament by The Decemberists.






If the ghost of Titus Oates comes and burns a spectral blubber stove in my living room, it's no more than I deserve.

Yet Another Doctor

Every time I think I've grown out of being able to listen to a song on infinite repeat, something comes along that compels me to do just that. Most recently it was Clockwork Quartet, a band with a surfeit of style and talent to match. Unfortunately they've only put out two songs so far, but what songs! This drawing is of the Doctor in (obviously) 'The Doctor's Wife.' I've tried drawing the watchmaker's apprentice but he always comes out looking like someone at work.

Fatherland

The BBC dramatization of Robert Harris' Fatherland is one of the best radio plays I've ever heard. I'm afraid my drawing does it little justice – as usual I forsake the epic drama and get caught on an insignificant detail, in this case the way characters always seem to be bumming smokes off Inspector March.

I don't know why the incessant rain is part of the story but it gives an appropriate atmosphere. They do the sound of it very well, to the point I have fooled myself more than once into believing it was actually a rainy day outside.

I miss the rain.

Shooting On Location

The part of Inception that was supposed to be downtown LA was definitely shot there. How can you tell? The architecture? The street names? No: Famima!!


You can't frame a shot in downtown LA without a Famima!! in it. Bless those bachelor businessmen and their need for cheap and easy lunches ...

Summer Sketchbook

It seems that having friends or family in town is the only way I get out of my routine, so I took advantage of this weekend's visit to get back in the sketching groove.

Santa Barbara

Poor forsaken blog ... have a drawing from lovely Santa Barbara:



For how close it is and how much I enjoy it, I really ought to go more often, but it always seems to slip my mind ...

Iago

Until a couple years ago, when a collection of sympathetic villains hit me like a ton of bricks, I did not think of myself as a 'villains' person. But there was one, a decade before, who stood out as appealing in some indiscernible way...

It wasn't even in the proper play that I was struck by Iago – it was in a production of Good Night, Desdemona (Good Morning, Juliet), a play about a Shakespeare scholar who finds herself inserted into Othello and Romeo and Juliet, respectively. Iago doesn't even have that big of a role, but he made an impression. I thought it was down to the actor: he had a very distinctive look and played the part with such twisted glee it was hard not to get on his side. But last week, Radio 4 aired a fantastic production of Othello, and Iago was fascinating in that as well. So there must be something to it...

Anyway, I drew this as a tribute to 'my' Iago ... various internet searches have not uncovered who he was, alas. I raise my glass to you, twisted conniving bastards of literature. As long as you don't come after me.

A Correspondence Between Gentlemen of Adventure

The second thing everyone knows* about the Scott Expedition is that Amundsen Got There First. What I didn't know until I read The Worst Journey in the World is that Amundsen left, for Scott, a letter to send to the king of Norway to corroborate his antecedence. This was so bemusing to me, a child of the late twentieth century, that a man could realistically expect his defeated rival to voluntarily go through the hassle of proclaiming his loss, and that said rival would actually do so rather than mutter a bitter 'screw you' and take no action at all.
*assuming one knows anything at all; the first thing is They All Died.

So of course I had to make a comic about it. Click for make biggar!

Merry Christmas to All, and to All a Good Night

Once upon a time, in a slightly older version of the film, Facilier left his hat behind after meeting his end. But that scene didn't make it to the final cut. It got replaced with the crypt you see in the movie now. I'm okay with that, story-wise – but it ruined my Christmas card. [fistshake]

Oh well, posting it anyway.

Falls the Shadow

You can dress them up and take them out, but animators are still animators even if they throw a glamourous Hollywood wrap party.

The Dentons

If I were to describe The League of Gentlemen to the uninitiated, I would start with 'Monty Python and The Twilight Zone get together to do The Simpsons.'

Grotesque though they are there is a place in my heart for the Dentons ... a musty, badly-wallpapered place, but a place nonetheless.

If your curiosity is morbid enough to wonder who the Dentons are, this is a halfway decent clip ...

Wheathampstead

When I was in London, we took a day trip to Wheathampstead.

A Look from the Doctor

I've been watching a lot of Doctor Who lately, partly to catch up as I am way behind, and partly to fill the hole left by Frog. David Tennant has to be one of the most animated human beings in existence, and a lot more tasteful than many of his competitors. Here's to the trickster archetype, and being fun to draw!

Only nine episodes to go until I get to The Lazarus Experiment! (why do I always get that title wrong, and where did I get 'Quartermass' from? Oh, never mind, it's this ... curse you, British casting; your limited but awesome talent pool leads to so much crossover humour but also confusion!)

Freedom! Horrible, Horrible Freedom!

I am officially done on Frog. I handed in my last scene, have been removed from the mailing list, attributed my timecard to a different cost centre, and shaken hands with the associate producer. By Monday, the very last remaining scene in the film should be animated.

GUESS WHAT YOU GUYS, WE MADE A MOVIE!

Words to Live By

If you are a brave man you will do nothing: if you are fearful you may do much, for none but cowards have need to prove their bravery. Some will tell you that you are mad, and nearly all will say, 'what is the use?' For we are a nation of shopkeepers... And so you will sledge nearly alone, but those with whom you sledge will not be shopkeepers: that is worth a good deal. If you march your Winter Journeys you will have your reward, so long as all you want is a penguin's egg.

– Apsley Cherry-Garrard

The First Returning Party

I communicate personal information in cryptic references to history!

I just hope this reference does not become an extended metaphor... Get it? Get it? Because the people who did end up going to the pole all died? Never mind...

Conversations with Cherry ... Again

It's been a few months, but I've gotten sucked back into The Worst Journey in the World, with the usual consequences.
I think this is the point at which my therapist, if I had one, would begin to express concern.

San Francisco via Sketchbook

It's been a criminally long time since I posted any artwork on here. There are two reasons for this:

1. All my energy, talent, and initiative have been channeled into work; on the rare occasion I draw outside of work I really struggle with it. I appear to be useless without a story and layout department now. Waa, waa.

2. At home, I moved my laptop from the desk into my bedroom, which has made scanning just inconvenient enough not to do it.

Anyway, the long dry spell is at an end! (For the time being, anyway.)


There was a slope in the Tea Garden in Golden Gate Park that was a delightful arrangement of shapes and textures. I'm afraid I turned it into a mash of pencil. With any luck I might learn how to sketch a location gesturally instead of agonizing over every detail...


One night my sister and I went to a neat little wine bar near Market and Rose. We caught an F-line trolley back and along the way it started to reek of a certain illegal herb. There were very few people in the trolley and neither my sister nor I could see anyone smoking. A few minutes after we smelled it, this fellow picked up the odour and looked around. He gave us a questioning eyebrow. I shrugged theatrically. Perhaps it was the driver.

I sketched for a bit inside the Eureka at the maritime museum, in the dying light of the afternoon, listening to a guy practise the mandolin. I think we were the only two on the boat. It was very relaxing, and quite an atmospheric moment.


The Champion of the Seas model at the museum's Visitors' Centre. She was a clipper with such a hubristic name that it should come as no surprise that she met her end in a storm on the Straits of Magellan. It was a fantastic model, to the point that I could almost see it battered by waves and wind. Don't remember what interrupted this one (lunch, probably) or what caused that smudge at the last minute...

These regard Muir Woods day but were drawn after the fact. The first is an entertaining couple we kept running into along the trail; the short guy did all the talking and was from New York, judging by his accent. His companion was attentive but quiet and was probably a Time Lord.

The guys to the right were examining an educational sign that detailed relatives of the Coast Redwood around the world. It wasn't what the dark-haired one said that was funny so much as the genuinely astonished way he said it.

We had coupons for a cruise 'round the bay, under the bridge and around Alcatraz. When the boat pulled away from the dock a voice came over the PA system, rolling off what I thought was the usual safety spiel until it suddenly went hokey. This is how it would have looked:
Inspired by Kate Beaton but drawn without actual reference to her stuff on account of being on the train ... and of course not nearly as funny.

Captain Nemo and the PA guy never stopped – it turned out the whole cruise was narrated, either by them or various other characters. It was the sort of thing you could never get away with in Canada, unless it was at an attraction where you could be fairly certain no Canadians would show up, because it would be heckled and/or eye-rolled nonstop. As the ship drew back to port the narration followed suit, so it was obvious that the whole thing was carefully timed out with the recording. I thought it would be funny* if something went terribly wrong and the artificially jolly actors on the tape just kept going ...
*using that word broadly

I now know why Ronnie del Carmen enjoys sketchcrawling so much – what a perfect city for drawing. I'd have liked to have done more, but that will have to wait until I go back alone and can take things at my own pace.

California Rail

I've finally got pictures up from the spectacular rail route between LA and San Francisco. Once I weeded out the ones that didn't turn out there aren't that many left, but I hope they give at least a diluted reflection of the trip. I really can't recommend this train ride highly enough. Aside from the scenery the train is great in itself, especially if you're used to flying. You can walk around as much as you like, visit the cafe car, get some really good coffee (with free refills if you keep the cup!), take it back to your comfortable seat with positively decadent legroom, and never once have to worry about falling out of the sky. If San Francisco weren't so awesome in itself I'd be tempted to say the trip's the best part – I would seriously consider taking a weekend, going up on Saturday, spending the night, and coming down Sunday, if I didn't know what I was missing by not staying up there longer.

Conversations with Cherry

A little bird told me Cherry's full name. I wonder if anyone teased him about it. He's pretty lucky he got away with 'Cherry;' they could have called him 'Nancy Posh Boy Fancy-Pants.'

Of all the sequential art I could be doing, I illustrate imaginary anachronistic conversations with a deceased literary/historical figure. Go fig.

Election Night!

If you did not watch the election on the BBC, you missed out. A grand time was had by all – well, most; there were some pretty glum people in Phoenix. David Dimbleby, the host, was brilliant – I admire his stamina and his delightful sense of humour, being the ringmaster for the circus that is a three-hour live broadcast with a rotating panel and disparate long-distance reporters.

After a certain point, when I'd given up on trying to get any work done, I tried caricaturing everyone who appeared onscreen for any notable length of time. Good exercise. Notable characters were the poor map guy who was so exhausted by the end of the evening that he was reduced to flapping at the graphics and yammering, the New Yorker who was apparently drunk when they cut to him, Simon Schama who was so excited to be there, next to John Bolton who most definitely was not, and Gore Vidal who had an entertainingly mad interview with Mr Dimbleby.

Some sketches from my own very Californian voting experience follow:
        

Halloween

This year, against all possible good judgement, I embarked upon my most ambitious costume yet:



Maladict from Monstrous Regiment to be precise.