TRANSMISSION: 1.8.12

These MooMs were made for walkin'! Just goofing around with the rig. 

-Stay tooned!

TRANSMISSION: 1.3.12

Big effin' cats, huh? Here are three of the many vids I took from the Big Cat Rescue in Tampa, Florida. It was a really great experience and I'd recommend it to anyone in the area. It's amazing to see these gorgeous animals so closely. 

This is Sassyfrass. You can read more about the disturbing conditions of his rescue, here, but the upside is that he looks to be enjoying himself these days.

And talk about awesome animation reference. Great stuff.

Nikita the lioness. I love her smugness and proud behavior. Typical lion.

Zuba shares her pen with a huge male lion named, Cameron. The two were raised together since they were cubs and get along swimmingly. She's a beautiful cat.

TRANSMISSION: 12.15.11

It's the first day of my vacation and I'm trying to be productive. Two and a half weeks is a lot of time to get things done. (*WORK, YOU BUM!*) 

I never got around to doing a Christmas card this year, so this sketch will be the closest thing to it.

-Stay tooned!

TRANSMISSION: 12.13.11

Friends! Countrymen! Hold on to your hats, this post's a twofer! 

First off, I'M GOING TO THE ANNIES!

(*holds for applause*)

Fellow Insomniac animator, Jorge Garcia (pictured below) and I are going to the ceremony to represent Insomniac on our nomination for Best Animated Videogame for Ratchet & Clank: All 4 One. There's lots of great competition, so it really is an honor to be included with the likes of Rayman Origins, Uncharted 3, Insanely Twisted Shadow Planet, to name a few.

We call him 'Happy Jorge' around the studio.

I'm really stoked to see all these talented nominees in one place. People like:

-Danny Glover and a bearded man!

- The 1996 Mathletes of America winners!

- Or two bearded men in touch with their feelings!

It should be an awesome experience and I'm really looking forward to it.

Next up, some random doodles.

True story, Thanksgiving weekend I was waiting in LAX and saw a little girl wearing her parent's neck pillow around her head. She looked to be having a blast within her own imagination and was generally amused by her own weirdness. I finally sketched her up, as you can see. I didn't originally intend to take her into Photoshop, but then I did. Revelatory insight!

Below pillowhead is Lee Van Cleef/Angel Eyes from The Good, The Bad, and The Ugly. His features are Disney villain worthy. 

-Stay tooned!

TRANSMISSION: 11.20.11

Check out all this great stuff! These are my purchases from CTNx this year.

a) Mike Yamada's (@michaelyamada) Zoom Zoo alphabet flash cards are an adorable collection of all kinds of things that I love. Cars. Animals. Beautiful illustrations. ...Letters. He's also a swell dude with sweet glasses.

b) Ragnar's Big City - Book One. Not surprisingly, the most expensive thing I bought at CTN, but it's dense with great Big City art. I mean, look at that cover. 

c) Kevin Nelson's book. Really well produced with a deceptively thick cover. (Damn-near posterboard!) The art inside is typical Kevin Nelson. Varied and gorgeous. And at $12, it's definitely a steal. 

d) This was a freebie given to us by Stephen Neary. Just days prior, we were introduced to Stephen's crazy brain with his shortfilm Dr. Breakfast. When we approached him about it, he lit up in appreciation that we knew what it was. A very humble and entertaining guy.

e) Ryan (@Oddernod) pointed me to this dialogue-free graphic novel called, Love, Le Tigre, and it was easy to see why he picked it up. It's awesome. It's about, like, tigers and stuff.

f) I had to pick up one of these stunning LA paintings from Robh Ruppel (@robhrr). He could be charging a lot more for this. He's also a super cool dude and I was fortunate to be able to chat with him at length.

If you'll allow me my sappy-wuss moment here, CTN was a great success again. I was able to reconnect with tons of old friends and make many more new ones. The talent that CTN draws over those three days is simply staggering. If you haven't attended yet, make it a priority for next year. It's worth your time and money.

-Stay tooned!

TRANSMISSION: 10.29.11

Hot! New! Hot new!

Here are three dev diaries for Ratchet & Clank: All 4 One and they're worth your time. They offer a nice look at the process the kindly wood folk in North Carolina went through to create All 4 One.

Highlights include: 

• Dave Guertin and Greg Baldwin of CreatureBox fame are prominently featured. Stare into the eyes of madness.
• Loads of that sweet, sweet cinematic work on display.
• Shaun McCabe's unflappable dedication to that Ratchet hat.
• Yancy.

Stay tooned!

TRANSMISSION: 10.22.11

Now that All 4 One has been released, I thought I'd share with you my two favorite cinematics that I animated for the game. Prepare your eyeballs!

The first one you'll see was finished in Jan/Feb of this year. The second was completed in April. 

*Minor Spoilers - but like starting LOST in the middle of season 3, you won't have any idea what's going on anyway.

I had the most fun with these cinematics and I think that's because they were shorter than most of the other cinematics I worked on. The shorter ones just came together better than the long, 1-2min cinematics. With less time to work on them, ideas had to come quickly and had to be executed with as much speed. 

Commentary: As soon as I started animating the octosquid thing below, I knew, "That looks like veteran character actor, proud Chinese-American, and unfortunate palsy sufferer, Victor Wong!" So I pushed his expressions more towards that look. Sorry, Victor Wong. Know that my intentions were inspirational and not insulting.

TRANSMISSION: 9.25.11

GD I'm in love with Drive. It's easily my favorite movie of 2011 so far. In a move of considerable nerdiness, I've started drawing some characters from the flick. Below is a feable attempt at Driver and Irene. The bottom drawing is not from the movie, he's just a bum from Santa Monica I saw last night. I'd like to paint up Irene and our homeless friend as well. Actually, I'd like to do more of the characters from Drive. I'd also like to try painting them in different styles.

Cue synth.

TRANSMISSION: 9.23.11

It's not often that the promotional materials are great for a film, let alone an animated one (see Cloudy with a Chance of Meatballs, for example). However, the effort for Dreamworks' Puss In Boots has been fantastic. Obviously, I have no idea of the quality of the finished film, but I know I'll be there opening weekend because of funny, intelligent advertising like the spots below.

TRANSMISSION: 9.20.11

"The chief enemy of creativity is safety." -Nicolas Winding-Refn

I love this quote. This is something I try to remember every time I start a new project or animation. What can I do differently? How can I push myself? How can I work outside of my comfort zone? That's the only way to get better.

Seacrest out.