Tom Bancroft

TO BE CONTINUED>>>>

2009-11-09T12:42:00.000-08:00

My private blog is continued onto my new Deviant Art page. If you want to see new sketches and work by Tom Bancroft, please visit my Deviant Art page!

See you there!
Tom Bancroft

Announcing: FUNNYPAGES BLOG!

2006-09-12T21:27:00.000-07:00

After doing this blog for awhile and my business partner, Rob, having one of his own for awhile, we finally realized most of our info and drawings- especially the upcoming ones- are all about/for our animation development and illustration company, FUNNYPAGES PRODUCTIONS. So, it we finally got wise and have created ONE blog, Funnypages Productions blog, where we can both post things we are working on or things the company is involved in. It makes sense. Will I continue this blog? I don't think so. I'd rather put my time into the FPP blog for now. Please change your links to this new blog and go there now, some cool stuff is coming up and we want you all to be there for it- including a photo tour of our studios! God bless and see you "on the other side".

I don't know how to link in this blog but go here:

funnypagesproductions.blogspot.com

I will put it at the top of the Links at the right too....

And NOW for something completely different.....

2006-08-29T07:44:00.000-07:00

These are just a couple spot illos of preteen kids "being active". Rob had done some preliminary poses, and I created the final sketches and inks. It was a fun job because it felt like I was designing characters for fun in my sketchbook- but for a client. Weird. Anyway, here's the lack of process that went into it: Colerase blue sketch and Pitt brush pen inks. Done.

More posts coming for our secret project as well as another BIG announcement or two! Oh, and art to go along with it. Stay tooned! (Corney, I know....)

Chris Sanders-ish

2006-08-27T15:13:00.000-07:00

I just got the Chris Sanders Sketchbook that he was selling at the San Diego Comic con. It's nice to have sitting around for a week or so as I'm snowed under with work. I pick it up from time to time and get a inspired. The other day, I did what I wish I did more often, I did a little 'warm up' sketch. A lot of these great comic artists seem to have time for 'warm up' sketches before they start their busy day. I do that and I feel guilty somehow. I guess that's the difference between being the business owner and working for a big company with deep pockets. :) Anyway, Chris is very talented and an interesting person. In my opinion, he's a genius when it comes to story. I'm not always sure they are stories that the average person will want, but they are always well crafted and slightly skewed. I don't mean that in a a mean way, it's just his viewpoint is different from most because of what he likes and doesn't like. 'Course, that's all of us isn't it?

I enjoy analyzing peoples styles and drawing techniques. That's what this sheet is. Just fun.

Testing, testing...

2006-08-24T10:48:00.000-07:00

I've been trying to upload some new stuff and Blogger keeps shutting off or just plain not uploading the images. It may just be these perticular images are corrupt or something. This blog is just a test using some image I've posted in the past that I know worked. If this goes up, then I know it's just these images and not a Blogger issue. Sorry, I'm just testing here...

BIG ANNOUNCEMENT: Shhhhhh!

2006-08-10T14:23:00.000-07:00

We at Funnypages Productions have been working on a few projects that we can't talk about for quite awhile now. A few of them are starting to get to a point where we can start "mentioning" them. Probably the biggest one, an anime influenced (note, I did NOT say it was anime) animation series for worldwide distribution, is not quite ready to name, but we have permission to show some images. For this project, Rob and I are co- directing and co-art directing. We have a team of people all over the country contributing to various pieces of the project from Character designs, storyboarding, layouts, and backgrounds. Again, I am not allowed to say what it is just yet, but I'd love to hear what you all think of the characters and backgrounds. I know this isn't much, but maybe I'll post some more soon.

BTW, I'd love to say Rob or I painted those backgrounds, but we didn't. And no, Miah and Heath, they weren't created in Illustrator! Old school or no school!

Mamaw and Bigfoot pages 3

2006-08-05T11:12:00.000-07:00

Last one for a bit on this project. I liked how the inks on this page came out. As with before, the first image is the (very) rough pass and then I used that as the basis for the final. I repenciled it in blue on the final board, then inked it. My process is based on drawing a page as few times as possible. I find it keeps me less bored with the progression of the work and it helps me actually get it done. :)

Mamaw and Bigfoot pages 2

2006-08-01T15:52:00.000-07:00

Well, this may be all from Mamaw and Bigfoot for a bit. My wife and kids were out of town for a week recently and that is how I was able to get these pages done. They are back now and that means my "free time" goes back to them and sleeping. I will get this story done, but it's gonna slow down a bit that's all. Anyway, this is the roughs and final inks for pages 2 of the story I'm working on for the future PARABLE anthology. I saw Mike Kunkel (Herobear) recently and he said he had been asked to work on this project also. I didn't hear alot of "I'm gonna do it!" in his voice so go to his blog now and bug him to do it, okay? I know I'd like to see what he comes up with! Come on Mike, just two pages or so! Back to Mamaw, someone in the last post asked if I inked these pages or did them in Illustrator. The answer is inked. I used a PITT brush pen for most all of it. I love brush inking, I just wish I was better at it. Guys like Steven Silver and Bruce Timm are just incredible with these great disposable brush pens! They make them look like they were using Windsor Newtons. One day, one day....

Mamaw and Bigfoot page1

2006-07-26T16:02:00.000-07:00

Here's a semi-progression of one of the pages from the Mamaw and Bigfoot story I'm picking at. This is the rough and the final inks for page 1. More to come!

BIGFOOT sketches

2006-07-18T15:41:00.000-07:00

These are a few designs for the Bigfoot character in the 8 page comic I'm working on for the PARABLE anthology I mentioned in my last post. The story is called "Mamaw and Bigfoot" and it's a short story told in rhyme about a little Southern boy that walks to his Mamaw's house to see her and an unexpected visitor knocks at the door. The title kinda tells you who it is, but there's a nice point to the story about how the Grandma excepts this strange visitor that the boy just sees as scary and different. So, above are some designs for Bigfoot that I did with the last one having a strong influence by Rob. The Mamaw design and boy design are Rob's in kinda a simple "children's book" style. I really liked that, so that's what I was trying for in the Bigfoots I did. I ended up grabbing elements from some of the rough ones (noses, feet, hunch backs) and coming up with a goofy looking version that I thought was close enough to jump onto the final boards with. That's all for now, I'll show a couple pages in development soon.

PARABLE! a comic anthology

2006-07-16T17:43:00.000-07:00

I've been asked to contribute to a comic anthology called "Parable". It's going to be a Christian world view comic so it may not be for everyone, but it's one that I'm looking forward to seeing completed. They are trying to go for a "FLIGHT" feel and the linup of creators is quite interesting. Very indy feeling (except me), but in a good way! (You know what I mean by that, you know you do...they can draw!) Check out the bios of some of the folks involved and go to their websites: http://www.parablecomic.com/creator-bios/.

I'm trying to squeeze in time to do a 8 page story for it. I'm excited about it because my pally Rob Corley wrote the story and I'm illustrating it. We've never done that before since we are both artists and when I've done comics in the past, they were stories I wrote. It's a story that has a lot of fun to it and has a good message too. I'm hoping to post some of the development of the pages as I do them, but not enough to give away the story too much. (I want you all to buy this thing when it comes out!) More soon.

Thundercats!

2006-07-12T08:33:00.000-07:00

This is another unusual oldy. Through the San Diego comic con, I became friends with Alex Sinclair, the extremely talented colorist at DC that works with Jim Lee on most of his work there. He is a great family man and we got along great. He's also a big Disney and animation fan. Because of that, he really had/has a dream of doing "all-ages" comics that have a more animated style. He said he'd love to work with me on a comics project someday. That day came when he was promoted to editor at Wildstorm/DC. One of the books he was put in charge of was Thundercats. I was never a Thundercats fan actually, but it sounded like fun. He had a short back up story he wanted me to do and asked if I'd do some samples of "my version" of some Thundercats characters. That's what the sheet above is. Some yucky stuff going on here and there, but I thought some of you all might like it. In the end, the story that came my way was a back up about an obscure villain and what her origin is. I really had some problems with the story content and they were nice enough to tone it down some. Even still, it really wasn't my cup of tea. The fun characters above weren't even in the story, dang.

THE ACT

2006-06-27T16:28:00.000-07:00

Something kinda cool to check out is the new trailer for "The Act". It's actually a video game by a company called Cercropia, Inc. Our company, Funnypages Productions, animated on this awhile back and they are starting to wrap up the project this summer. I don't know how it is going to go over, but it IS interesting. There's really nothing out there like it. It's a "film game" meaning that it should feel like you are playing-and controlling- a Disney style animated film. It is 100% traditional, hand drawn animation created with alot of the same animators and artists that animated LILO AND STITCH, MULAN, ETC. (Cecropia ended up hiring a bunch of the Disney artists that were layed off when they closed down the Florida studio.) All there is is a "PONG" style knob controller and you move it slightly to the left of right. What you are trying to do is control the character's emotions and actions with the controller. SO, if Edgar, the main character, is trying to flirt with this girl at a bar (I'm not sure this is an actual scene, but it was an early test scene) then if you move the knob to the right a little, he turns toward her and smiles. She then reacts to this by turning slightly toward him (the computer controls her actions randomly, I believe) or turns away from him slightly. If she reacts positively, based solely on body language and acting, then you move it to the right a bit more and Edgar winks at her. She may turn away, or touch his knee you just don't know. If she turns away, you go to the left and he backs off. If you turn it WAY to the right too soon, he starts laughing uncontrollably or tries to hug her or something obnoxious like that. That makes her turn off completely and throw a drink in his face or something. I know I'm making this sound kinda racy, but it's not really. They have (at least for as long as we were on it) kept it pretty G or PG. Anyway, check it out here: http://www.cecropia.com/

PS. Rob and I animated some of the shots in the trailer.

Amazing Eddie T.

2006-06-20T16:47:00.000-07:00

This is another kinda obscure project I did awhile back. This was for the retired baseball player Eddie Taubensee (spelling could be wrong here). For those of you that are baseball fans, you may have heard of him. He was a shortstop in the 80s-90s for the (blank, man, he told me so many times and I just can't remember- somebody help me here) and was, judging by the posters and baseball cards in his house, really well liked in (blank place he played). I just knew him and his wife as a couple that was in our bible study group when we lived in Florida. Great guy, very nice wife and family. His wife asked me to do this custom cover of him as a superhero for his birthday. This was right after I left Disney after animating on "Brother Bear". I remember it being refreshing drawing a human rather than moose. I like comics, but any comic book artist that looks at this won't be impressed by my superhero abilities, but he sure liked it. Because she was giving him a framed original, I had to do everything by hand including the lettering! I think I did the color after this in markers. It sure was scary adding color to this knowing that one false move and the drawing, inks, everything was ruined! I don't know where the scan of the color version is, but I remember Eddie loved it. Thankfully, he didn't tell all his friends, I'm not sure I really wanted to do this again......

BTW, the image of him in the corner doing the "Psst!" was a game we played one night (and he ruled at) that was a huge crack up but you really had to be there.

Celeb SKETCHBOOK_John Byrne!

2006-06-12T17:09:00.000-07:00

Comic book legend John Byrne has become something of a guilty pleasure for me. Everyone says (and I agree) that he doesn't draw like he used to in his hey-day of the mid 80s to beginning 90s and theX-men and Fantastic Four. Agreed. Still, he was one of my first artistic "idols" in comics and drawing in general. He was the first artist that I couldn't WAIT to see his next issue. In the 8os, I would by anything John Byrne drew. If he did one issue of ROM the spaceknight, I bought it! It was that bad. In my humble opinion the day he started writing comics as well as drawing them was the moment his art started to take a backseat. I think he would say that too. I think. It seems obvious he discovered a new love in writing and the art became just one element in conjunction of that to tell a story. I can understand that. Us artists missed the attention he put into the art though. He also got FAST. He could write two books, and draw two others in the time most artist could barely get through one. Again, it didn't make for his best work, but I gotta say even at his WORST Byrne's work is head and shoulders above a GOOD amount of comic book artist's' BEST work. Not everyone would agree with me on that I'm sure, but he still can tell a story in a clear way with EXPRESSIONS on characters and strong poses that make sense. So what if you've seen that hand or that face or that panel again and again from him, it's still better than something that doesn't work, I say.

Enough rant. I'm a little passionate when it comes to BYRNE, can you tell? Anyway, I met him at one of those Disney/ Megacon lunchtime lectures that I spoke of in a past post. There were alot of really strong artists that year (I think that was the year Alex Ross, Humberto Ramos, and J. Scott Campbell were in the group.) . Most were the "new, young artists" that normally I would have really wanted to meet. BUT John Byrne was in the house! He was the first guy I introduced myself to and threw my sketchbook in front of. The hard thing-and what I hadn't thought about- was which character did I want him to draw. When he asked I almost went blank and then, thankfully, blurted out "Captain America". I know he doesn't get that request as often as an Xmen or FF character so I really wanted to see what he did. Also, his run on Captain American is one of my all time favorite comic runs- maybe THE favorite. I don't know why, but that character ever since then has been "my character" (which makes sense to say when you are a kid, no so much now). My favorite, no real reason why. I haven't bought a CA comic since then really. But he (and the writer, was it Roger Stern?) made the character come to life.

Anyway, this is probably my favorite "Celeb sketchbook" illos for the kid and the fanboy in me.

Harley and Ivy

2006-06-08T17:21:00.000-07:00

Nothing too new about this one. This is an older 'sketchbook' sketch of Harleyquinn and Poison Ivy. I think this was the first and last time I drew them. I'm sure I had just gotten all tanked up on some Bruce Timm drawings when I drew this. I still like the Ivy, but we all know I just stuck that Harley in there at the last minute to "complete" the picture! Sad stuff there. It breaks a rule of mine to have a reason why a character is in a pose. She's just bent over with her bottom out! I make me sick!

CELEB SKETCHBOOK_Glen Keane!

2006-06-03T12:00:00.000-07:00

Here's the third installment of the Celeb sketchbook, this time it's the great Glen Keane! Here's the story that goes with it:

If you have worked in the animation industry (2D or 3D) or just are a fan of animation, then you have no doubt heard of Glen Keane. He's been a Disney Supervising animator for many years going back to about "Black cauldron" or so. He is on most animator's short list of to 3 best animators in the world. He would be number one on mine. Some animators can create great acting performances with good drawings, others can create great drawings with good acting, but Glen can create GREAT acting with GREAT drawings- like no one else! No doubt you've seen him interviewed on almost any Disney "making of" trailer. He exudes a passion for drawing and the art of animation that is riveting and a call to become better for anyone that is working with him. He's also equally as inspirational in his personal life. He's a kind person, a strong Christian, and a giving mentor.

So, all that said, I was honored to be chosen to work with him on his animation unit for the character of "Pocahontas" for the movie of the same name. I had been at Disney for maybe 8 to 10 years at that point, but all of the animators that wanted to be on that unit had to submit a life drawing portfolio for Glen to review! That never happens. Glen wanted to make sure everyone on that unit could draw the human figure at least to the level he felt he could work with or mold. Very intimidating. Some how, I passed on got on the unit. The actual film was REALLY not very fun (as is watching it for me), BUT working with Glen was a great and challenging experience. Even when it was long distance. After all, I was in the Florida studio and he was in the California one. He would go over drawings that I would mail him (for every scene!) and I would watch video lectures he would tape for everyone on the Pochy unit. And occasionally he would come out to Florida.

All that is just set up for how I got this drawing. See, all through Pocahontas I really wanted a nice (framable) drawing of Pochy from Glen as a memento. I never got the chance. It's intimidating to ask. So, a couple years later, Glen was visiting Florida to do a press junket for the upcoming "Tarzan" for which he had designed and supervised the main character. He had been living in France working with the French Disney studio for a couple years. No one had seen him at Disney Calif or Fl for about that long. This was a great opportunity to say "hey" and finally get that sketch, I thought. Well, I went down to the office he was staying in while he was there and sheepishly knocked on the door. He saw me and said come on in and I small talked with him for a second. He saw the sketchbook in my hand and asked if he could see it knowing I wanted him to. It didn't don on me that he didn't know I was just about to ask for a sketch. He opened it up and started flipping through the pages and saw all these sketches by other artists to me. His face kinda fell and he said, "Oh, it's THAT kind of sketchbook...." I'll tell you, I will never forget how he said that. I felt like I was letting him down in some way. I wasn't the artist he was hoping I was in some way. I hadn't been working on life drawings and wanted him to see my progress since last we had worked together. All of that was in the way he said "THAT kind of sketchbook..". So, he was nice enough to do a Tarzan for me. He did a great job, but every time I look at it, it's kind of a bitter sweet reaction for me. It still makes me want to do better though.....

Thanks Glen.

Mulan 2 comic

2006-05-29T12:00:00.000-07:00

This was a 4 pager story I did for Disney Adventures magazine a while back. It was a comic that was to tie into the "Mulan 2" traves- uh--film--that was about to come out. I had worked on the original animating Mushu (as if you didn't know already, everyone says I won't shut up about it...) but this was the only thing I even remotely had to do with the sequel. The editor at Disney Adv. mag got me because he said he had a MUSHU comic for me. He hooked me good. When I saw the script, I found that Mushu's not in it much. By then it was too late, I had committed. In the feature, I only drew Mushu. This had everyone else but ShanYu in it, but I kinda enjoyed drawing all of these other characters that I never got the chance to draw all those years ago. Shang was a little tough, though. So, a quick turnaround later, this was the original pencils for the book. I hope they are in order above. I drew two pages per sheet of stock comic book art paper. Disney Adv. mag is so small, that is still bigger than it will be when published. I learned that after doing a few of these comics for them over the years. One of the inkers finally told me, "Hey, can you do them two per sheet, it makes it go quicker for me.". I think I sold these originals at the San Diego con a couple years ago.

CELEB SKETCHBOOK_Frazetta!

2006-05-23T16:18:00.000-07:00

Gotta get out of here but I wanted to put up a new Celeb Sketchbook image. This one is probably, honestly, one of the LEAST impressive drawings and probably one of the MOST at the same time! It's a sketch by FRANK FRAZETTA!

Long story short, during the earlier days of the Orlando MegaCon we, Disney Animation, started a nice relationship with them. The deal was that we would give exclusive tours of our animation department to guests of the comic con if those guest, in return, would do a Q and A with the artists at a lunchtime panel in our studio. AND me being one of the biggest comic book nerds in the studio I ended up MCing the panel discussions. I kinda loved that. Because of that, I met and became friends with many comic book professionals. Some of which, I still stay in contact with. (Like animators, they tend to be really nice folks. Though sometimes a little rough around the edges- like Tod McFarland.) Like I said, it was a sweet deal and the comic guys loved it too. Most of them were big Disney fans and in the beginning of our annual "program" we really gave them good tours.

This drawing came from the all time BEST year our our 'relationship' with Megacon. That was probably the second-ish year it was around and they had an incredible guest list. AND a lot of the artist that came and did the tour the year before must have told all their artist friends how cool it was. What ended up happening was that we had John Romita SR, Todd McFarlind, William Stout, J. Scott Campebell, a bunch of Image people, and way more that I can't remember! It was awesome! Then, without anyone knowing it, in walks Frank Frazzeta! You just don't see this guy often. He and the whole group were being toured by me so I ended up back at my office (of course) and showed them some of the experimental animation I was doing on the just being developed "Mushu". During the tour Frazzeta's "handler" would tell everyone as they came up that he MIGHT give an autograph but no sketches! I was giving the tour but thinking the whole time how was I gonna get a sketch! I would have been fine with an autotgraph, but I came up a plan. It was risky but once I saw that he was into seeing some of my animation and such, I quickly asked him to sign my sketchbook and handed him it and a drawing pencil. "Sign your sketchbook?" You don't sign sketchbooks..", he said. He got it right away. Then he asked for a thicker pencil. He said he hated drawing with thin pencils. (It wasn't that thin, it was probably a 4B pencil, but he liked huge pencils.) I grabbed him one quick and he did the drawing you see above. His "handler" said that he never does that and I better hang on to it. Like I woundn't. He ended up having a pretty massive stroke a couple weeks later. I heared he stopped drawing and painting after that. This may be one of his last sketches.

Because of all that, it's probably my most treasured drawing.

Sorry about the bad writting and mispelled things like Frazzeta and McFarland, I know they're wrong, I'm just trying to get this story out quick!

DD in COLOR

2006-05-19T15:59:00.000-07:00

Local artist (to me, anyway) Mike Meredith has offered to color a couple things of mine in the past. He was nice enough to take the Daredevil drawing a couple blogs back and color it using Illustrator. He said he did most of the work in under an hour. (Gotta learn this program!) He also said this isn't complete in his mind, but he just really couldn't put much more time into it. (Man, I don't rate 1 and a half hours?) Anyway, I think it's looking good and thought you all might want to see it. I'll do another Celeb sketchbook next. I got some good ones coming...

CELEB SKETCHBOOK_Lassiter

2006-05-17T14:43:00.000-07:00

I had a great idea the other day. I can't post that much these days because alot of the work we are doing is keeping us busy with stuff we can't talk about or show....so I gotta get creative keeping up with this blog at times. I was thinking about a Glen Keane story I'd like to share soon and a drawing he did in my personal sketchbook that goes with it (coming soon), then I realized that I may want to post a few of the drawings in the sketchbook. This is one of those black sketchbooks that people take around to cons and get artists they are fans of to sketch in them. I never did this until one year I was going to Calif. for a work trip with Disney. I realized I was going to be seeing some of the best artists in the world, why am I not "documenting" this visually. I don't like taking pictures with artists I'm a fan of, but a sketch from them is so much more memorable to me- and something I would treasure forever. So, I got the sketchpad. Turns out, the next couple years I met alot of famous artists between the comic cons, working at Disney, and becoming a member of the National Cartoonist Society. The sketchbook is about 5-8 years old now and not quite full, maybe 20 more pages left. I forget about it for a year or so, then meet someone and dust it off for a sketch. BUT it has sketches from some of the best animators, comic book artists, and comic strip cartoonists in the world! It took a long time and a lot of guts to ask some of the more intimidating ones, but it's a treasure I'll never part with! So, from time to time I will post a sketch and a story of meeting someone that I am a fan of. I think you all will like it to. First up: John Lassiter!

I just read this great article that was in Fortune interviewing John. He has such a great personality and warmth about him. Here's a great comment he made at the end of the article:

" Let me tell you a funny story. I took the family to see this film one weekend - I'll go to see almost any film that's good for the whole family. And so we're sitting there watching this film, which I won't name, and there are long stretches that are just not very entertaining. My little son - he was probably 6 at the time - was sitting next to me, and right in the middle of this dull section, he turns to me and says, "Dad? How many letters are in my name?"

I must have laughed for five minutes. I thought, Oh, man, this movie has lost this little boy. His mind has been wandering, trying to figure out how many letters there are in his name. So I told my wife, Nancy, what he said, and she started laughing, and then the story went down the row through my whole family, our four other sons, and we're sitting there as a family giggling and laughing.

And I thought to myself, If ever a child anywhere in the world leans over to their daddy during one of my movies and asks, "How many letters are in my name?" I'll quit."

I've been fortunate to meet him a few times during my career at Disney. On one of those times, I got the nerve to ask him for at sketch. Most people don't think of John as an artist, but he went to CalArts (same as me) and was in cleanup at Disney way back when. He was standing in the hallway just outside my office when we small talked and he sketched the above drawing. I think we were taking about CalArts and working on student films there for some reason, because he sketches his character from his student film (on the right) and the ant (can't remember his name now) from "A Bugs Life", which was just about to come out when he did this. (I think he was at Florida Disney doing a press junket for that film, if I remember right.) Not one of the best drawings in the Celeb Sketchbook, but he's one of the nicest guys to put it in there!

Bloggedy blog

2006-05-15T07:48:00.000-07:00

These are sketches from a meeting we went to last week. Rob was doing the "presenting", so I was doodling. I don't know about you, but when I sketch on a page I do two things: 1) I have to fill it up. If I have a big drawing that I start with (in this case it was the girl), then I will start figuring out shapes that will fit in around it and 2) if the first sketch doesn't turn out the way I like it, I stop doodling. Sad to say, but I've finally 'awoken' to this fact. I'm not a great doodler anyway, I just don't have a love for it. I love to draw, but I have to have a reason. That's also sad, but I think it's because I like perimeters. I like to have a goal, say, of drawing a funny dog. With that "assignment" in my head, I can draw a bunch of different funny dogs, but without it my pencil just lazily slides around the paper without motivation. Rob, and other people I know are just the opposite. They can doodle cool little drawing and characters without even knowing where they are going. Rarely, I will do that and I will have something I like on the other end. Now you know my problems. Sharing is fun.

Sailors

2006-05-11T15:32:00.000-07:00

I don't know if I posted this or not....I hope not. I have to bring in some CD's I have at home for some fresh, new old stuff! That's coming soon, get excited! New to you hopefully. This sailor lineup of characters is a drawing I created for my character design book that I will NOT start "selling" in this blog. I'm being good. Anyway, the story behind it is that this is is based on an assignment that our character design teacher (the great Mike Giamo) gave us when I was at CalArts. The goal was to design 5 characters that all had very different shapes and sizes (and personalities hopefully) but were all wearing the same costume or uniform. For that assignment, I designed cowboys (and a cowgirl, naturally) but since I had a "cowboy" theme already running through my book (buy it at AMAZ--oops, I caught myself!) already, I changed this image to sailors. I remember someone in the class did a good one with sailors so that stuck in my head. My brother did "chefs", I recall. You can do it with almost any job that they wear an outfit that is similar , but it works best when they are all wearing identical outfits. Five different construction workers doesn't work as well, because they would all wear different shirts, pants, belts, hats or no hats. You get it. I think it's more of a challenge to have the exact same elements to the unform, so you can really play up HOW they wear it as different. Like the scarf around these sailor's necks. Anyway, hope this is new to some of you!

BTW, yes, the guy on the right is a version of Rob, but he isn't as short as I would have made him normally. I had a short guy already drawn, so I just stretched Rob so I'd have more variety.

Daredevil!

2006-05-08T07:09:00.000-07:00

This is another oldie, but I still kinda like it. I really like the characters with the simple, iconic costumes and Daredevil is one of the tops of that list! (Marvel side anyway.) I'm a big fan of the old Gil Kane Daredevil covers, some of his best work in my mind. This was originally done in with some red pencils, so some stuff showed up better than this B&W version. Maybe one day I'll do this up in Illustrator (making a few "updates here and there) and color it up! Probabably not, but woud'nt that be cool? Any extra drawing time goes to new stuff, not going backward, so it's pretty doubtful it will ever happen.

T-shirt design

2006-05-03T15:09:00.000-07:00

This was a quickie "freebie" t-shirt design for our church youth group for this summer. They wanted 'cool' and all that. Why did they come to us then? We're pushing 40! Anyway, they threw us these words that were important to them and said "go for it". Rob came up with the rough sketch of the characters and then I did up the final. We tweaked it some more past this point (above) but I don't have that one. Trust me, anything you don't like here got fixed and improved! Oh, and I KNOW this could have been done easier in Illustrator! Thanks Heath, I knew you'd mention it. I gotta learn that thing, I know, Iknow.....

Gertie the Goldfish

2006-05-01T15:48:00.000-07:00

This was an unused cover for what was going to be the second book in a series for Naomi Judd's "Gertie the Goldfish" children's book. We illustrated the first book and designed the characters. They wanted "Disney style" so that's what we gave them. (What's that hiding between that line? Do you see something?) Anyway, they asked us to do up some sketches for the second books cover and then once they picked one (Rob did some, I did some) we were asked to do up a final cover image for their catalogs and websites. We did. A couple rough versions I did are above and the one they picked was inked by Rob and colored by our colorist of choice, Jon Conkling. Again, they like that airbrushy look so that's what they got. After we finished it all, they told us the book was canceled. It happens. ( I said "it".)

NEW sketch page!

2006-04-26T15:36:00.000-07:00

NEW is the key word here. These are actual sketches-all on one piece of paper- that have been created within the last week or two. I promised this a blog or two ago and today is the day! ACTUAL drawings that are not for a job, by me, that aren't two years old! This doesn't happen every day. The one of the girl head and the bald guy head were sketches I did while me and Rob were doing a photoshoot of us at our desks. We had to "pretend" to draw so I thought I'd ACTUALLY draw. This is what came from that. After this, back to old stuff I'm sure.

Bottom feeding

2006-04-24T15:22:00.000-07:00

Hey all. Hope you all had a good weekend. Rob and I have been super busy (are you getting tired of hearing this?) so I had to work most of the weekend. Lots of drawing getting done, just nothing that is "blogable". Anyway, this is another old sketch page from when I had time to draw for fun and/or could draw things that didn't have NDA's attached to them. Ah, those were the days. I do have another sketchbook from a few years ago, I may pull out some of that stuf too.....hmmmm... I may never draw again. Actually, I have a new sketch page that I add a sketch to every so often. When it gets "ripe" I 'm gonna post it just to show that I still draw for fun sometimes! BTW, the eagle character was a character design for a client that had a phone company (though I don't know if it's still around) and the girls were just for "fun".

M J Parker

2006-04-18T08:14:00.000-07:00

Got....to....get....something...up...on ...blog! Anything....

This is another "oldy" of MJ Parker ( you know, Spiderman's wife) looking longingly out to the sea for some reason. This was also eventually inked by great inker Howard Shum. Anyway.....

Back....to....work......must...draw.......

SUPERGIRL

2006-04-11T15:51:00.000-07:00

This is an older drawing, but hopefully one that not many people have seen. It's my version of Supergirl. With a little Bruce Timm influence thrown in. I think I did this as an Ebay drawing. Howard Shum ended up inking this and I think it's still on his website. Anyway, she's another character I liked drawing.

Lil' Red

2006-04-08T14:32:00.000-07:00

These were some sketches for a commision piece I did awhile back. They are of Tex Avery's "Little Red Riding Hood", or whatever she is officially called. She was fun to take a stab at. I did the final in color but I'm not sure I have a scan of it anywhere. Oh well....

The '03 sketchbook pt.4

2006-04-01T16:10:00.000-08:00

This is another page of sketches from Waaay back in the day in 2003 when I did my first sketchbook for sell at San Diego Comic Con. It sold well and fast (I printed 100 of them), so I did it again the next few years after that. Always a good seller. Anyway, I did the Opp. Forces image on the left for some add or something and the others are sketches just for this thingy. The "Reese Kirby, stock car driver" drawing was just making it up as I went, but I still like the name.

More Mermaids!

2006-03-28T15:52:00.000-08:00

These were a couple sketches I did as different concepts for the "Mermaid" image I did a bit ago for Drawergeeks. I just got back from a trip to NY over the weekend and I got the chance to "finalize" these sketches a bit. I ended up going a little "simpler" on the one I picked (seen in an earlier posting) with just one mermaid and a little less--uh--sultry. Also, the other one had more of a story to tell. These are just poses, which isn't as interesting to me. They were still fun to do and I thought I'd show some of the "warm ups" that went into the final one I chose. "Scribbles. Just scribbles" as a friend at Disney would always say.

Opp. Forces COLOR!

2006-03-22T16:09:00.000-08:00

I wish I could say I pulled this out and this is mine, but I can't. Fact is the very talented and nice Adam Street took my inks from the last blog and offered to color them! It looks sweet. The depressing part is that MY color version of this image, which was going to be old school in markers and colored pencils, got ruined! I over did it and hate it and AAUGGHHH- didn't keep a hi-res scan of the inks! SO, I'll have to start over. My little quicky illo is turning into a longy! I don't have to time and can't use Adam's wonderful version because he only had my lo-res version to use. I don't know what's gonna be on the cover at this point. Sigh.

"Cartoonist!" cover design

2006-03-17T15:24:00.001-08:00

I'm a member of the National Cartoonist Society and have been honored by being selected to be interviewed as a feature story for an upcoming issue of "The Cartoonist!", the newsletter mag for the NCS. For this they've requested a piece of art for the cover. Just a sketch or something. A lot of the questions were concerning my comic book "Opposite Forces" so I thought I'd make the cover feature them. (No copyright problems either). This is a little of the process. I did a really scribbly rough ( and a few others before this that I didn't want to scan), then refined it more on another sheet in blue (like giving Alexis a neck), and the last one here is a inked version. Now why I inked it is still a mystery to me because I don't want to Photoshop this, but render it more "by hand" with markers and colored pencils like the "Mermaid" piece a couple blogs ago. Problem is, I drew this on some real ratty photocopy paper that didn't even take the inks too good. Markers aren't probably going to work on this tissue paper. I will most likely resketch this on a better piece of paper and just render the thing a bit more sketchy (something else I originally wanted to do) with the markers and pencils. I MAY try to color the inked one to see how it looks also. It's ready to go anyway. Not everything on the inked version got better as you can see, maybe another good reason to do another. I'm just lazy, I don't want to.

Sketches v3

2006-03-16T12:23:00.000-08:00

Here's some more. This one has one of my first Captain America's too. I love this character, too bad he has been drawn and written so poorly for so long. He's kinda like Wonder Woman or Thor or Blondie. Everyone knows the characters, but noone reads the comics anymore. They need a good live action movie with tons of effects that al four of them can be in. That'll bring them the bling bling. I think I'm a little tired.

More sketches!

2006-03-14T15:50:00.000-08:00

These are oldies but some of you all haven't seen them, I'm thinking. Just odd sketches in different styles that I like to draw in. I think they are different styles anyway.

Some Girl designs

2006-03-13T15:06:00.000-08:00

This is an older design where we were trying to come up with a group of characters with different nationalities. This was supposed to be a Hispanic teen girl. When I do initial designs I tend to do a side view fairly early on. Part of that was something I started doing to just challenge myself since side views can be tough to make look good, but then it just became part of my process. If I can push a side view into something I like, it make me push the three quarter and front views also. I will go back into front views sometimes to match what I did on a side view. Is that backwards or what?

A LITTLE MERMAID

2006-03-08T17:04:00.000-08:00

Not THE little mermaid, just one that could be related. This is a marker, inks, and colored pencils rendition of the Mermaid drawing I posted a monthish ago. I wanted to finish it up to trade with a friend. He gave me this incrediable pastel landscape painting and I feel like this is so unworthy but he requested it. I hope it goes over okay. I took the original rough sketch (in red) and inked over it then added the marker and pencil highlights. I'm not sure it works because the rough pencils still show through. There is this grey area between a good rough drawing and a tight, finished drawing. If you get too close to the middle it just looks bad. I'm still not sure where this one sits but it's done.

This Is America, Charlie Brown!

2006-03-06T16:18:00.000-08:00

I just saw this artwork for the new DVD for "This is America, Charlie Brown". This is very nostalgic to me because this series was the first professional drawing job I had in animation waaaaay back in 1989ish. I was inbetween my first and second year at Calarts and I did what they call layout on two of these episodes. Here's the list:

1. The Mayflower Voyagers
2. The Birth of the Constitution
3. The Wright Brothers At Kitty Hawk
4. The NASA Space Station
5. The Building Of The Transcontinental Railroad
6. The Great Inventors
7. The Smithsonian and the Presidency
8. The Music and Heroes of America

I think I worked on the first one with the Mayflower (I remember drawing pilgrams and indians in the Schultz style) ,the 3rd one about the Wright Brothers, and the 4th one about the NASA Space Station. One of them, I think it was the Nasa one, they even gave me a credit at the end! My first one! It was really brief work, about a month or so, and then I had to quit to go back to CalArts. The little bit of trivia that goes with this is that this is the first series that has ADULTS shown in a Charlie Brown special. It's really weird seeing the Peanuts kids interacting with adults.

Tony Rabbit

2006-03-03T16:03:00.000-08:00

Okay, I never do this, but this is a copy of an actual email my brother recieved. The weirdest one I've ever seen! The details you need to know: Tony is my brother and is also an artist. He had drawn a picture of Lenny the rabbit (from his video series called "Lenny and Sid") for my mom to give to a friend. My mom's name is Cori and she likes to skate at a skating rink in California. This is a thank you letter from this man that Tony fowarded to me.

"START QUOTE"

Dear Tony Rabbit,

I hope you won't be offended by my addressing you as a rabbit, Tony. It is a habit I got into many years ago when I began calling the high school students I taught rabbits. They became John Rabbit, Barbara Bunny, Kim Rabbit. I also began calling all my friends rabbits as well. How sad, huh? Anyway, I loved your sketch of Lenny Rabbit on skates! He is so cute.and so beautifully drawn. I will treasure it! Thank you so much, Tony Rabbit.

As fate would have it, I ran into your mom, Cori Rabbit, several years ago at the ice rink. Not literally, of course. Your mom is one terrific lady rabbit, as you well know and she has a terrific sense of humor. She is so proud of you and your brother, Tom Rabbit, as she should be. Besides your mom's inner rabbitness, I noticed that she had this beautiful hair, almost the same color as mine; but hers is prettier.

Thanks again!

Woof, woof, woof...

Earl Rabbit

"END QUOTE"

Can you believe that this guy was a TEACHER??? Rob did a funny drawing after I told the story. I'll post it soon. Sad.

Teen Titans!

2006-03-02T15:51:00.000-08:00

These are two of a bunch of illos we produced for a Teen Titans book for Scholastic a year or more ago. Rob C. has a couple more he did from the same book on his blog (hit the link to the left) so check those out too. It's always fun and aggravating trying out a new style, but this one was mostly fun. I love cartoony comic book styles and this one is strong. Cyborg was not so fun, but the other guys were. This was one of our first tastes of drawing in a mangaish style also so that was a bit of a learning curve too. The book was/is called Robin's Case Files if it's still around and you want to find it. A good friend, Paul Conrad, colored all of these and he did an incredible job! Oh, and he digitally inked them too. All in Illustrator, which I think is what the client wanted. Tough stuff but he pulled it off like a pro! Thanks Paulie.

UNEARTHED! MAM City unleashed.

2006-03-01T06:47:00.000-08:00

The two comic pages are from that oooold (actually only about 3 years ago, but it feels like forever) project that Rob and I did called Mammoth City Messengers. It was a CD, but had a comic series connected to it. These pages are two of 22 that were for a Issue #1 that was COMPLETELY produced but never saw print as the CD's didn't sell well enough to put out another album. This is older work so, as usual, not some of our favorite stuff, but at the time I liked it. I still like the characters we came up with. Howard Shum inked most of this with some help from a friend and coloring was by the great Rob Schwager. It was lettered too, but I didn't include that here. (Howard, this may be the first time you've seen these pages colored, huh? Sorry.) Rob S. really did a great job with the colors on these, even doing colored ink lines for the interior pages! You just don't see that on interior pages because of the work involved! Too bad. Anyway, this will do it for Mam City from me, I just dug these up and I thought SOMEONE should see them.

CAPTAIN AMERICA FINAL!

2006-02-26T12:09:00.000-08:00

"Final" as in ran out of time and this will have to do. This is not what I wanted to do with this one, but it was due to Drawergeeks (www.drawergeeks.com) for Friday and I went out of town Thursday, so even less time. I really wanted to do some color on this. AND fix some stuff in the inks. DON"T even look at the shield....oh great, now you're looking aren't you....I told you. I did it all freehand with a Pitt brush marker and then ran out of time to even do the Photoshop fixes I wanted to. More disappointment. One day I'd love to do this "ultimate" Cap drawing I have in my head, I just don't know what it is yet. This one isn't it, but it's getting closer. I think this mythical "ultimate" version is more cartoony than this one too. Anyway, this one is at a point I can call it done and go onto something else. As my animation mentor, Mark Henn, used to say, "Make this scene as good as you can in the time you have and then move onto another one. Make the next one even better than this one and have more scenes in the movie rather than one perfect, short scene."

PS. On my biz trip to Indiana to speak at Huntington College, I met Dennis Jones, the great cartoony illustrator! He lives in that little town and came to my lecture. I had one of my character design books with me and he had a sketchbook with him. It didn't take me long to figure out a good trade (for me anyways, I hope he's happy too.). He happened to have a sketchbook page with his version of Superman and Captain America on it! I had to have it! Thanks Dennis! (www.dj-art.com)

Captain American PT. 1

2006-02-21T13:08:00.000-08:00

The Drawergeek.com character this week is Captain America, which is one of my favorite characters so I had to do something! I don't have any time this week but I was in a meeting and did the rough "scribbles" version with a ball point pen. You will notice I had the arm with the shield originally going into the body. Bad silhouette, so I moved it off to the left and cleared the knee it was covering. The next drawing is a blue, tighter sketch of the scribble. It's a little light but the idea is that I want to color this by hand with markers and colored pencils probably. If I get the chance tonightish, I'll color it and post that. I leave town for a biz trip on Thurs. morning so I really don't have much time to finish this. If all goes wrong, hopefully, I'll at least ink the blue line version. Here's hoping....

Gun Fu!

2006-02-17T16:06:00.000-08:00

This is only a semi-oldie. It was used as the cover for the "GUN FU" trade paperback. I did it awhile back and I think it came out last summer. GUN FU is a comic created by the talented Howard Shum and the interiors to the series were penciled by Joey Mason. Above you can see the pencils and the final color version. Howard did the inks and he used his colorist for the series, whom I can't remember her name. She's good though. Anyway, it was fun to do and I'm not sure I've shown both pieces together. Have a great weekend!

Sailors

2006-02-14T15:41:00.000-08:00

This is a sketch I did of a bunch of sailors but with as much variety to them as possible. This was used as an illustration from my book "Creating Characters with Personality" (plug). It's based on an assignment that I got alot out of at Cal Arts. Mike Giamo was our character design teacher my freshmen year and I couldn't wait to go to his class every week! His was the assignment my brother and I would labor over, even sacrificing other class work. It's what we both loved- characters. Anyway, this assignment was to design a group of 5 to 6 characters that had as much variety as possible (and personality) but they all had to wear the same outfit or costume. The idea was that people were things differently depending upon their size, personality, or attitude even. Try it sometime, it's a fun exercise. I did this all on one sketch, no first sketches, then put it all together later kinda thing. What makes it fun doing it in a line up like this all on one sheet of paper is that you are constantly looking at the other characters and sizing noses to noses, heads to heads, etc. It forces you to put more variety into the shapes. The guy on the right is a version of Rob.

More Mam. City oldies

2006-02-10T07:34:00.000-08:00

Just because there was such a HUGE response to the first posting of Mammoth City Messengers art, I thought I'd post another picture! Because you didn't demand it- the kids in the cafeteria hangin'! This was one of the 5 or 6 images we did of the kids in different "photoshoot" illos for marketing. Most ALL of these didn't get used at all. This is the pencils that ended up getting inked by the great Howard Shum. I can't find the final color for it right now. We had a Disney alum friend helping design the environments (like this cafeteria) by the name of Craig Grasso. Old school.

By the way, tell me if this has ever happened to you artists: Yesterday, a graphic designer who is in a office near us, came into our office for the first time. He looked around and saw all the art on the walls, the huge Disney art desks we have, and Rob sitting behind his drawing a picture. He was amazed! He said he didn't know that people still hand drew characters and stuff anymore. He couldn't believe we weren't just creating everything in Illustrator on the computer. And this is a Graphic designer! What are they teaching at art schools that people-even graphic designers- aren't learning about drawing anymore?!? I couldn't believe it.

Mammoth City Messengers

2006-02-08T15:04:00.000-08:00

This is kinda an oldy, but alot of the work we are busy with now we can't post because of non-disclosure agreements. AND we don't have any free time. SO, time to dig through past stuff to post! This was one of many images Rob and I created for a Christian record company (the now defunct Forefront Records) for the "virtual group" Mammoth City Messengers. The idea was that the music producers had was to create fun, slightly techno music that had some relevant moral themes for preteen kids. They decided that they would (ala "Gorillaz") not have a "band" but have these cartoonish characters as the leads. They don't sing like in "Gorillaz" but the songs are kinda there thoughts and feelings. There was a story line throughout the album that tied into a comic book too. We illustrated the comics too. There were supposed to be three albums (and three comics that came out with them.) but they only produced the one album because of poor sells. Really, because of poor marketing that LEAD to poor sells. It was a good idea with good music behind it. We designed the characters, created "photoshoot" images like the one above, and illustrated one "half comic" that was something like 11 pages long and then a full issue #1 comic (22 pages!) that was NEVER RELEASED! Sigh. The most nostalgic part of this job is that it was the first job Rob and I got as Funnypages Productions. This started it all!

SOAR poster FINAL!

2006-02-03T08:22:00.000-08:00

We just got the final images for that faux film poster we designed awhile back for the "film" SOAR. The posters were created to hang at AMC theatres around the U.S. to go along with at the animated trailer for the fake film SOAR that is part of their "Silence is Golden" campaign. The cool part (besides being able to hang this baby in the office some day soon) is that the directors had it painted two different ways. I guess they wanted the client to have a choice. The color version above is by the guy that does alot of the Disney posters, Corey Wolfe, and the other is by the incredible DREW STRUZAN!! He is the guy that has illustrated all of the best movie posters for films like: Star Wars, Indiana Jones, E.T. and TONS more! It's a huge honor for Rob and I. You can see the DREW version on Rob's Blog (hit the link to the right).

I reposted the original pencils so you can compare. Also, see my other post today that is below this one.

DUDE, MY BOOKS OUT!!!

2006-02-03T08:05:00.000-08:00

A quick update: My "how to" book, "Creating Characters with Personality" is out!! I've gotten emails from folks who have already had theirs shipped to them from Amazon! A few extra nice people posted some cool comments on Amazon too. Check it out. If I could, I'd make a link right HERE, to get it at Amazon. Since I can't, just go there and search under the title.

The book has a great foreword by GLEN KEANE, as well as drawings by other designers like JACK DAVIS, J. SCOTT CAMPBELL, MARK HENN, PETER de'SEVE, BUTCH HARTMAN AND MORE! Also, a guest chapter on designing creatures by my buddy/partner, ROB CORLEY! Oh, and I did a few sketches here and there too. BUY IT, my kids are hungry!

Here's a quick drawing by Rob about how great it's gonna be doing book signings.....

Hana and TOMO

2006-02-01T11:59:00.000-08:00

These are a couple images from a comic book property we co-created with a Disney alum friend Andrew Simmons called "Tomo". The one with all the body shots are different versions of Hana that I created as we were trying to design her. The other "expressions" models are more of the final (at the time) with some different expressions to "road test" the design. We are about to ink a deal with Zondervan (a Christian book publisher) to create a manga series of "Tomo". It's a whole new world for us, but pretty exciting also. Andrew is writing the series and Rob and I are going to Art direct/oversee it. Because of our busy schedules, we can't draw such a mammoth project (each issue is 150 pages!) but we think we are narrowing in on someone(s) that may be able to do it. It will be much more traditional Manga style than the above designs. These are just were it started.

Mermaid!

2006-01-27T08:04:00.000-08:00

The topic for this week's Drawergeeks is mermaids, so I did this one up really quick. We are pretty busy right now doing alot of character development on a few projects but it was nice to take a 15 min. break and do this. Color was another 15 minutes. I know what you're thinking, "NO! How can that color job have ONLY taken 15 minutes?!?" It's my mad skills. I say that sarcastically obviously, I am no Photoshop whiz. Anyway, the new Drawergeeks should be up after lunch (Central) today (Friday) at www.drawergeeks.com. Should be a good one. BTW, no, this is NOT supposed to be Ariel, it just looks alot like her.

Andi's J. Development

2006-01-23T14:52:00.000-08:00

This is some older stuff, but not seen very much. Above is the character lineup of some of the characters from our "Andi's Journal" girls chapter book series that is being published by Tommy Nelson. This lineup and the model sheet of Andi that is with it were designs I produced during my time at Big Idea productions in Chicago. I had developed this after hours (actually it was pretty different back then, it was called "Queen Andi" and had a different story) as a new girls property for Big Idea to consider. They liked it and it went into "development", which at the time meant that I was going to "work on it when I had free time". You know how that goes, so there it sat. A couple months later I (along with many other folks) got layed off. I was upset and surprised that day, but had the wits to ask that "Andi" (and another property I had pitched) go with me. Big Idea was in financial straights and knew they weren't going to do anything with it at the time, so they let me have it. I have no idea how I even thought of it since I was so upset and worried about moving, etc. I move back to Florida to work at Disney again. I leave after Bro. Bear and start what is now Funnypages Prodcutions. A year or so goes by and Rob, my wife, and I have developed "Andi" into what it is now and we pitch it to Tommy Nelson as a DVD series. They skip it for animation but like it enough to recommend it to their publishing department. Publishing is looking for a girls property and this fits what they are looking for. Good timing? Nope, God was there the whole time we just didn't see Him at work.

Andi book one and book two, written by my wife Jen and illustrated by Rob and me have been out for about 4 or 5 months. They seem to be doing well, but it's hard to tell when you don't have the stats. We are waiting for the word from TN to see if we will do two more and go from there. Check Amazon.com if you want to see them.

Fairy Final!

2006-01-20T15:24:00.000-08:00

Man, I'm really getting teased about this at work. I'm starting to get known as the "fairy guy". I promise I don't have any porcelain fairy statues on my desk! To top it off, we are doing another job right now that is character design for a new video game- and guess what? More fairies! So that's why Rob is starting to call me "fairyboy". 'Course if you've seen Rob's blog (hit the link at the right) then you'll see that he's the "cutefurryboy". Or, like I like to call him: "The King of Cute". Anyway, the above was the final model sheet and color model for the web animation job for this (unspoken) company. On to the next fairy! (It's amazing how much fairy research there is on the web, you'd think that computer people would be more into Nascar or something.....)

copyright 2005 the unamed copyright holders

Fairies!

2006-01-18T14:57:00.000-08:00

These are some roughs for a client that needed a fairy for their website. The original idea was that it was going to flit around and give little suggestions on where the "viewer" could look around. We were even going to animate dialogue and everything. Well, this was a MAJOR big conglomerate company so needless to say, it took forever and never happened in the end. At least not with us. I may post the final on the next blog.

Girl sketch

2006-01-17T12:09:00.000-08:00

This is just a sketch I did awhile back. You know when you do a sketch and you kinda like something about it (in this case it was her face) and you just put it into a pile because you like it? This is one of those. As you can tell, I became disinterested in it as I started to draw the body. You can tell because I put zero thought into the pose and it's not even finished. Worse than getting disinterested or distracted from a drawing is when you are drawing a "great" drawing and you run out of paper! ARRRGh! I hate that.

HULK/ PG color versions!

2006-01-12T15:51:00.000-08:00

I wish I could say I had the time to do up a final color version of my Hulk/Powergirl inked piece below, but I didn't. I'm no Photoshop/color wizard anyway. I'm also really slow. BUT three intrepid artists said they wanted to give it a try and all of them did them FAST! They are: Mike Merideth, Josh Alves, and Mark Runyan. Each illustrated the image in a totally different style ranging from watercolor to airbrush-y to somewhere inbetween. Thanks to all of you for doing this, it is really interesting to see how different- yet all cool-they are! Go to their blogs and sites!

Mini Marvels!

2006-01-11T15:02:00.000-08:00

These are just some fun little sketches I did the other night. These are just some characters that I like to draw. I have this strange vision of doing something that is mini versions of superhero characters- not kids, just mini. I don't know why. Anyway, here they are.

PS> I'll post some Hulk/Powergirl color tomorrow. Thanks!

MY HEAD!!!

2006-01-10T15:39:00.000-08:00

About a week ago I was helping my wife with some planting and mulching in the front yard and I had a accident that only seems to happen to me. I was putting mulch around one of the trees and stood up fast banging my head across one of the limbs. It actually scrapped part of my scalp on the top of my head. It hurt bad, but looked even worse. It's just now going away, but I had this 3-4 inch red scrape across my semi-bald head for a week! My dear friend and partner, Rob, after hearing of the horror drew his version of the carnage. Enjoy.

HULK/ PG Ink final!

2006-01-09T13:17:00.000-08:00

I couldn't wait any longer, so I did up the final inks last night (sorry Howard!) for the Hulk and Powergirl piece. I looked at all the comments on the last blog and it looked like Hulk #5 and Powergirl #4 seperately were the winners! Here is the new version, inked, with those designs combined. I tweaked both heads some to get a little more tilt in both, but other than that, they are pretty much the same. I used a brush marker called a PITT pen. I think I like it, thanks to all for your suggestions! Now, if someone out there with really strong Photoshop coloring skills wants to color it, I won't mind at all! (Please) Otherwise, I will color it somehow/someway before the Friday deadline (This friday!). If you want to, email me and I'll send a higher res version to ya. I want to add a "color splash" effect behind them to jazz it up a bit. We'll see soon enough. Hope you like it.

HULK AND POWERGIRL!

2006-01-03T07:24:00.000-08:00

Okay, back to the Hulk (see below). Only this time, I'm throwing in a girl character, well, because I like drawing them! It's Powergirl. She's kinda DC's version of Supergirl's older sister. I didn't have any reference for her so forgive any costume mistakes I've made. Anyway, I thought I'd make this blog a contest! Put in a comment with your favorite version and the one with the most "picks" will be the one I do up as a final for Drawergeeks. You can pick a Powergirl from one version and a Hulk from another version too. The winner(s) all get a PIECE of the original rough drawing to split!!! :) (please notice the sarcastic "happy face" symbol) These are all first time roughs, so hopefully I will refine the final and make it even stronger (God willing). BTW, They are in numbered in order of how I drew them so you can see a bit of an evolution in poses and character designs. Weird thing is, whenever I do a few versions of anything, I usually end up liking the first and the last versions most. I think I try harder on the first one, get sloppy in the middle, and try again at the end. Let me know your thoughts.

(PS> I can't get Blogger to put these in correct numbered order, so go by the number on the drawing, not where it is in the "lineup" here.)

Character design blog!

2006-01-02T13:28:00.000-08:00

Hey all. There is an interview with me (and some artwork as well) on the "Character Design" blog. I have a link over to the right, just click it. You may have to scroll down a bit. Hope you all like it!

SPIDEY doodles

2006-01-02T13:21:00.000-08:00

In keeping with the comic book theme I've started, I did a few sketches of Spidey just before the holidays. I just now got a chance to scan and post them. These sketches are probably the second time I've ever drawn Spidey and they look it! I've read the comic for years and he's probably one of my all-time favorite characters BUT when I start drawing him I realize how I don't look at his details at all. Poses either. Maybe I'll go back to the girl characters again.....

Workin' Vacation

2005-12-26T15:36:00.000-08:00

Merry Christmas to all! I am blogging from my inlaws house in South Carolina. I don't have a great connection and no scanner so not much of an update today. My mother-in-law DID get a new digital camera so I can at least show you my work set up while on vacation here. NOt very glamorous but it works. It's a working vacation which means that I am trying to only work half days and spend the rest with the family. I did take off the first few days for Christmas and some much needed rest. It's been really great and I am enjoying being with the family. Hope you all are too!

THE HULK

2005-12-19T16:17:00.000-08:00

The next Drawergeeks(.com) assignment is "the Hulk" and the comic nerd in me HAS to do it. We have a ton going on but it's that age old "art thing": whenever you are working around the clock on an assignment, THAT's when you can't wait to draw something else! I was working into the midnight hours last night and it was all I could do not to grab a piece of paper and start doodling! "Stay focused and go home and sleep, Tom"....Well, I finally got a chance today to doodle since we are starting to catch up here on the paid work. These are a few Hulk sketches to get warmed up. Not loving anything yet, but they were fun. Some bad anatomy in these parts, don't look too closely. I actually grabbed a green Prismacolor pencil by a flook and it helped put me further into the mood.

Wonder Woman

2005-12-16T16:04:00.000-08:00

Whenever I want to draw a female superhero (which is what I always draw when I draw superheroes), the first one I always think of is Wonder Woman. I don't read Wonder Woman, except briefly when Byrne was doing it (old habits). I just love her costume and the dark hair and the, well,....the whole package. Fun to draw. Anyway, this was a quickie so don't look too closely. It's based on a pose Rob strikes alot.

Frustration!

2005-12-14T15:00:00.000-08:00

Ever have one of those days? The days were the drawings don't look like they do in your head? Yeah, me too. The above drawing was created for my Character design book, but it illustrates some days I have had more recently. Those are the days I love having another artist in the studio. Rob and I have had - and still have- tons of work we have to get out before we take our Christmas break! OR we have to take work with us...sigh. NOT what I want, but it's starting to look like reality. Believe me, I don't want to complain, we are being blessed with work and (more importantly) relationships right now. We love our little company, but sometimes you miss the paid vacations where someone else does all of your work while you're gone! Here's to "good drawing" days!

Lord of the Beans!

2005-12-13T07:06:00.000-08:00

Go out and buy this new DVD from Big Idea Productions called "Lord of the Beans". It's got some really funny spoofs of the live action film with the similar name and if you have kids, it's got a great message for them. The above is some unused art we created for a project with Big Idea. The first are my design/inks and the second is the final color by the talented Jon Conkling. I think this is one of his best pieces working with us! You go Jon!

Character design process

2005-12-08T08:53:00.000-08:00

These three images where for a little job I did for fun. ("Job" and "fun" together? This really mean that I didn't get paid for these, it's spec. work.) Rob and I were getting to know (and possibly work with) a local Christian "girl group" that will remain unnamed. They are made up of three ladies. I did this mostly for fun and I thought it would be cool for the younger members of their audience to have some stickers or T-shirts with manga versions of the group on them. Anyway, these three drawings show a little bit of the process I did. I actually created a couple more sketches but they are not here. I include all 5 sketches in my character design book that I mentioned in my last post, so buy that and you get the WHOLE process. I didn't do a bunch of exploring on this as I was pretty happy with the middle version of them and jumped right to a final pose with that design (the color one). Enjoy!

Finally! The Character design book

2005-12-06T14:54:00.000-08:00

I've been patient, but I can't take it anymore! I gotta sell....uh...mention my upcoming character design book! Over this last year I have been writing and illustrating a "how to" character design book called "CREATING CHARACTERS WITH PERSONALITY" that comes out from Watson-Guptill in Feb! Not long to wait now. I may even get some preview copies this month, so I REALLY can't wait. Above is the cover as well as a sample page layout and even a piece of art from the book to illustrate rhythm in drawing women. As with any job I do after hours over a long period of time, it's not all my best work but I think the overall feel of the book is gonna be good. My biz partner, Rob Corley, wrote and illustrate the chapter on designing creatures and it looks awesome as well. In addition to that, I was blessed to get contributors like GLEN KEANE (FORWARD), BUTCH HARTMAN, PETER de'SEVE, JACK DAVIS, MARK HENN, J. SCOTT CAMPBELL, AND MORE! I'm telling you, I would by this book just for their contributions! I'm gonna cry,,,,hang on...okay, go to Amazon.com and preorder it today! You get the discount right now. Whatyawaitnfer?

Another quickie!

2005-12-05T11:46:00.000-08:00

This is a quickie as in it's already done, not a quick sketch. These two images are for a pamphlet we worked on for a anti-smoking campaign directed to preteens. I had to redraw the girl's body three times! Turns out my automatic "default" setting for drawing girls is set on "Sexy". She's supposed to be 8-11! Oops. I did the sketches and inks and our great buddy, Jon Conkling did the colors. Nice job Jon! I'm gonna start posting about my character design book soon. Get ready to get SOLD to!

A brave new world

2005-12-01T07:39:00.000-08:00

I did the this drawing to try my hand at a manga style. It's based on (though not exact) a character from "Shaman King". It's fun to try new things.

Kronk's New Groove

2005-11-29T15:31:00.000-08:00

Does anyone get the feeling that I don't sketch for pleasure? It feels that way sometimes. This is yet another drawing for a job. This was one of twelve illustrations we did for the end credit roll for the new Disney release "Kronk's New Groove", which I think is out now. It was a fun project to design these photos that are supposed to illustrate what happens to Kronk on his honeymoon. Still haven't seen the final color, but I hear it looks good. Rob and I split these down the middle and I did about six or so and this was one of them. We had to clean them up also, which was hard remembering how to do that. The irony to this job is that my twin brother Tony was the supervising animator for the character of "Kronk" on the first film. Because our drawing styles are similar, I thought drawing Kronk would be easy and fun. Turns out, Rob had to go over most all of my Kronks to make them more on model. Don't tell Tony, he doesn't read this blog anyway.

Love and Wrath

2005-11-28T15:45:00.000-08:00

These are two drawings hot off my desk. They are for the kids bible we are doing right now and I gotta say that it's been pretty enjoyable. I really can't wait to see it all done. Not because every image is my favorite piece of art, but that the WHOLE should be pretty unique. The writing is good, the art interesting, and the graphic design is fresh. Something I would definitely buy for my kids. The other fun thing has been the opportunity to rediscover the bible from a whole new perspective. As soon as you read through a passage (even a simplified version like this) and start thinking about how to illustrate it, it's hard not to "live" it a little bit. It's also hard not to take something away and go "Wow, that really happened!" These drawing represent a little bit of that for me. The first is the part of the bible where Jesus comes into the temple only to see that people have turned it into a money market. He goes crazy mad and wrecks the place and throws them all out. That's what really happened, but if you've seen other biblical illos of the event, it's a pretty placid scene with Jesus standing erect and pointing for the people to leave. I tried to capture (in a kid safe way) a little of the energy of the moment. The next illo is Jesus soon after, healing and loving the kids around him. Basically summing up what he was all about and what the temple was really for.

"SOAR" poster ala Struzen

2005-11-25T12:35:00.000-08:00

This was a cool job that Rob and I worked on a bit ago. Two of our old Florida animation pals live out in LA now and are bigwig directors. They occasionally direct commercials too. When they do, they are good about calling up old friends to animate and such. In this case, they had been hired by AMC theatres to do one of those mock film trailers where at the end, they break out of their acting and tell you to turn off your cel phone. They are usually live action mock films, but this was the first one where they were creating a mock animated film. Our pals came up with a whole mock film, SOAR, about a coming of age eagle that is living under her dominating father's wing. She longs to be "on her own" so she can soar, or something like that. It's real strong Disney story 101. We watched the trailer and knew it was a mock film, but still got sucked into it! Anyway, we were hired to create the one-sheet poster for this mock film. They supplied us with model sheets of the poster and we gave them about 6-8 different designs. The one above is the final with pretty tight lines for the painter. The bonus for this job was that they had the GREAT Drew Struzen paint it! It was intimidating but exciting. We have yet to see the final painting. Maybe some of you have, I hear it's out. The trailer can be seen on the web also.

Werewolf

2005-11-25T12:25:00.000-08:00

Whew! Still eating and napping after that great Thanksgiving! Hope everyone had a great one, we sure did! I just wanted to throw this up 'cause most people didn't see it and it was fun to do. This was for Drawergeeks, a forum to draw goofy things with a bunch of friends. If you wanna see more go to www.drawergeeks.com. This was for the Halloween themed Drawergeek were we were asked to "draw your favorite classic monster."

Fantasy Lab illo

2005-11-23T12:00:00.000-08:00

Rob and I got back in from Virginia Beach late last night and I'm back to throw up a blog already! The trip went well, if everything works out, we'll post about what the secret project is soon. Kinda cool. Anyway, the above was some art we created for a new video game company in California called Fantasy Lab. You can see this image on their home page as a preview of what's to come in "feel" anyway. These are not characters or even an idea that relates to any porticular future game. They look to be a new company that wants to create fun games for the whole family! I'm there. This was designed by Rob and I, but painted by one of our supertalented former Disney BG painter friends. Can't say who 'cause of their day job, but nice job Frank! (Just kiding, it's not a Frank.)

Evolution of a sketch

2005-11-18T14:56:00.000-08:00

Above are drawings for a job we are doing for a (well, we can't say for what)- let's just say that the final illo is to show a kid making good decisions and bad decisions (and the results show on each side of the mirror). I had drawn this up once already and the client thought the character was too old so I had to redo it making him younger. Losing money by the second (joking....kinda) , I did a quick sketch of what the kid might look like about 8-11 years old. That was the range the client wanted. The first image where he slightly more realistic is that version. Next, and soley just for fun, I did the next, more stylized version of him. Simply because I liked the hair swish and wanted to push it. This wouldn't work for the client so the final rough sketch where he is at the mirror is more of the version one kid. Hey, the client makes the rules- and them's the rules.

PS. Rob and I are on a biz trip on Monday and Tues. so no blogs until later.

Opposite Forces!

2005-11-18T12:12:00.000-08:00

Okay, my brother has already given me a hard time about my first blog post being a sells pitch for "Andi's Journal"....BUT...(here it comes) Opposite Forces, my comic book I wrote and illustrated is being published by Alias Enterprises in COLOR right now! The cover above is from issue #3 that is out right now. (Good luck finding it.) I kinda like this cover because it sums up the issue by reading the characters facial expressions. For these new Alias rereleases of OF I am creating all new cover art and of course the interiors are being colored (very nicely I might add, by the talented Josh Ray) and this issue and issue #4 have interior inks by the talented Cedric Holmstadt (sp?, I'll get his link up soon). This cover is actually one I produced for the original black and white series, for issue #4 I believe. Turns out, I asked Frank Cho to do a pinup for that issue that turned out soooo good, I bumped this cover and used his! This cover actually works better as issue #3's cover anyway as this is the issue that Bopper starts to lead this intrepid twosome! All for now!

Kid's Bible job

2005-11-18T08:42:00.000-08:00

Whew, I start a blog and then I get sick. Sorry, I missed a day already, not such a good start. Well, here's a quick update to throw up. The above illos are three of over 200 that Rob and I are creating for a Children's bible for NavPress in Colorado. It's based on the "Message" which is a kinda 'casual' telling of the bible, but still relevant and accurate. We are producing these in a more "Nic" flat style, kinda like "Fairly Odd Parents" or something. It's been fun, but hard a times since it's not our natural style. We don't take things as far as we could, I think, but it's still fun and I think the bible will truly be unique. We are producing all the illos through Funnypages Prod. but we hired our longtime colorist, Jon Conkling, to color the illos. Nice job Jon!

Welcome!

2005-11-16T13:18:00.000-08:00

Hey! My name is Tom Bancroft and I am starting this blog to see what these things are all about. Also, as a way to let people know what I'm up to and about some of the projects I or my company have coming out. I'll start with a new book series that myself, my biz partner, Rob Corley, and my wife, Jennifer, created. It's called "Andi's Journal" and it's for the Christian market- specifically, it's a chapter book series for pre-teen girls. It was created because Rob and myself have preteen girls. We like challenges over here at Funnypages Productions, and this one was to see if us "old folks" could create something that 'tween girls (of all things) would like. So far so good. You can find the books (book 1 and 2) at any Christian book store or at Amazon.com (Book 1- http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/tg/detail/-/140030671X/qid=1132176306/sr=2-2/ref=pd_bbs_b_2_2/104-7091251-4307168?v=glance&s=books and Book 2- http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/tg/detail/-/1400306728/qid=1132176306/sr=2-1/ref=pd_bbs_b_2_1/104-7091251-4307168?v=glance&s=books) The cover art we produced for book one is above. Thanks and more soon!