On the Drawing Board- 6/16/08

Hoo Hah! A few projects ongoing right now and sadly not much I can share yet. Here are two pieces I did a few months ago that is part of the “Super Capers” movie project I have been working on for some time now. They don’t give anything away as far as the movie goes, so I think it’s okay at this point to share them here.

Sometimes jobs evolve as they progress along, and this particular job has definitely done that. The movie is a superhero spoof/comedy and my part of the production was to be three different jobs… “turnaround” illustrations of the 14 main characters to be used for maquettes and possible toy designs, static caricature gag illustrations of the cast for the opening credits that would be incorporated into an animated comic book sequence with the credits, and finally a semi-animated comic book sequence of a flashback scene in the movie itself. Lots of work. Along the way things changed and additional work was added.

The opening credits work is “in the can” as they say in the business (over 30 illustrations for that alone), and we are getting serious about the flashback scene this week. The “turnarounds” are partly done but on hold until the actual film work is finished. In the meantime back during filming the director called me and asked me to do two very quick illustrations for the film to be used as props during a scene. The scene itself is of the main villain in his lair, and he wanted some funny, tongue-in-cheek illustrations of the actor as a rich adventurer doing some daring things. He was going to have them printed about 40 inches tall and framed so he wanted them to look like formal oil paintings, as might hang in an egotistical CEO’s office.

The actor’s name is Michael Rooker, and he’s one of those actors who’s been in a lot of films and you might recognize right away but not necessarily remember his name. He was most recently in “Jumper” and might be most recognized for his role in “The Replacement Killers” or ” Henry: Portrait of a Serial Killer”. Anyway, here’s what I came up with, cranked out in about 2 days:

Click image for a closer look…

Click image for a closer look…

I did the safari hunter one first, and took too much time so I didn’t get to fully paint the “Mission Impossible 2” mountain climber one as completely as I’d have liked to. I am also not much of a real digital painter… being much more comfortable with a line and color style than full digital painting. Still, it’s fun to break out of the box and try something different sometimes.

I have no idea how much or little these paintings will be seen in the film, but they were well received by the director and apparently Micheal liked them as well. It also look like they want me to do a full comic book as part of the film’s promotional marketing, which would be a a lot of work but also a lot of fun. That is not yet decided on, however.

I’ll share more stuff about “Super Capers” as I am permitted to. In the meantime here is the IMDB page for the film as well as the official website.

Other stuff on the board right now:

• Website gaming graphics- Most of the trial and error work is over and we are almost ready to do the final artwork for this. I will be illustrating the game environment, 16 avatar characters and the gameplay graphics. I will let everyone know when it’s on-line
• Workplace poster illustration- Should have this done by the end of the week.

Actually kind of quiet right now all things considered. It’s just that the few jobs I have going are time consuming, long term monsters.