GGRARAUUUW!

Gross Anatomy

This is an illustration I did for the October 2007 issue of Nickelodeon Magazine, full of all sorts of fun gross stuff. The image goes along with an activity where you get to choose a word from three columns to create a symptom. In this case: Burning Nostril Slugs. On the same page (13), Aaron Renier has some awesome illustrations of body creatures, which he has up on his website (1, 2, 3). Nice work! When I got the call from NickMag, they literally said, "Wanna do a gross illustration for us?" Definitely a fun issue to be a part of!

New Comic in ARGH! #3

Click the images to see larger versions.
Discussed in these previous posts (1, 2).
My first comic for ARGH!#2 can be viewed here.

ARGH! #3

I just got word from Félix that ARGH! #3 is invading Spain as we speak. He's politely asked me to wait a bit until I post my comic on the web, but you can head on over to the Flash website he and Jorge created for Issue #3, where they have previews of all the artist's comics (click on the yellow book, and then "Autores"). There is also a new online store for those of us in the states who are interested in ordering a copy (only 5 euros!). I have yet to see the magazine, but it looks like a winner—a variety of styles in black and yellow duotone. I'll post my full comic here at Drip! in the next couple of weeks. All of you in Spain should run out and get a copy!

Exercising Restraint

Goldisocks

Once in a while a dream assignment comes your way, and this was surely one of them. I worked on a game over a year ago with the immensely talented Sharon Emerson, who should be credited with all the fun, wit, and inception of the idea. Goldisocks is one of many Flash activities we collaborated on at FableVision to help teach science concepts to kids. Our approach was to use story and humor to convey the definitions of temperature and heat. She came up with the idea of a girl in a cafeteria who's measuring the temperatures of bowls of porridge, and Goldisocks was born. I've included a link to the game below. Enjoy!

--> Play Goldisocks

I Yam What I Yam...

This weekend I finally got my hands on the newly released and restored Popeye the Sailor DVD set, featuring 60 cartoons from the Fleischer period (1933-1938). And boy are they great. I've never been a die-hard fan, but I'd consider myself a convert. For what one might say is a pretty repetitive formula (enter Popeye, Olive Oyl in distress, enter Bluto, fist-fights, walloping, more fist-fights, enter Spinach and theme, Popeye saves the day), the shorts are incredibly inventive for their time. The animation, scene-planning, musical timing, luscious backgrounds---heck, everything about them are a pleasure to watch. I found myself freeze-framing in several spots to appreciate the keyframes.

I haven't gotten through all of them yet, but one in particular, Popeye the Sailor Meets Sinbad the Sailor (1936), really caught my attention. I won't link to YouTube because the color and compression are just awful by comparison. It's one of the few Technicolor and long format cartoons included in the DVD set. While it's not the funniest of the bunch, there are some great monsters and ugly expressions coming out of Bluto in particular. So, during some freeze-frames, I did a little sketching. Which you will find below. I find this to be a fun exercise, especially to study the cartoon forms.








Ha! I just realized I didn't even draw Popeye. Oh well.
I'd recommend the set to all fans of early cartoon animation. I wrote an earlier post which included links to some of the buzz on other animation blogs.