Steep the Lizard Reborn...Again

Updated my Steep the Lizard character yet again! Been fleshing out a few stories for the critter and hopefully I'll have some tales to post in the not-so-distant future...

Rough Pencil Animation

Here's a short piece of rough animation I did a little while ago.I was inspired by a video I saw online which had Eric Goldberg talking about animating by hand, bringing life to a drawing on a piece of paper.I used a light table for my animation, scanned the drawings (14 in total) and brought everything together in After effects.It was fun to do. I hope to try a longer, more elaborate piece in the future.

Ink Blot Character Sketches

Some doodles influenced by the early animation style of the 1930's...

Louis the Trumpet Playing Alligator

Here's my rendition of the jazz-playing Louis from Disney's "The Princess & The Frog"...
First sketch:Final color:

Felix Rocks

Here's a Felix the Cat design I created for a friend's tattoo design...

The Sacred Seven

I was fortunate to be able to complete some animation for a locally shot short film.

"The Sacred Seven is an inspiring story driven from one foster child's morals that far surpasses that of which has been afforded by her neglectful Foster Mother. Melissa grounds herself with the Seven Sacred Teachings taught by the late Elder Doris Campbell. Melissa realizes that her only safe haven from her home is by living her life in spiritual harmony."

After much planning and discussion, hand drawn animation seemed like the perfect fit for the film. Adobe After Effects was the best choice of a program to combine the live action footage with animation.
I was required to animate the seven characters individually as they came to "life" and proceeded to hop across the screen from their stationary state. A long time in the making, but it was all worth it to see the final product up on the big screen at the official premier earlier tonight.

Present for Grandma

A piece I did for a friend's Christmas present for his Grandma. I hope she liked it.

Springing to Action

Super-Critter's Ultra Hare & Elastic Mouse prepare to defeat some sort of evil that plans trouble for Canyon City...

Feeding Pig Shadow

Poor Pig Shadow hates being confined, but at least Lizard keeps him fed. Here's a step-by-step piece featuring the duo.

Central Canada Comic Con 2009

This was my first time as an artist sitting in "Artist Alley" at this year's C4.
Thankfully, the annual event is getting larger and this is its second year in the Winnipeg Convention Center.A big thanks to everyone who stopped by my table and enjoyed my artwork. I hope I can give you more to enjoy next year! (buttons, magnets, stickers, you know...fun stuff)
One of the big events that made my weekend great was actually meeting Mr. Adam West. A down-to-earth, funny guy.Since I was too busy checking out all the people in costumes and other people's tables,I never started making original sketches until the last day of the event. A mistake that I hopefully won't repeat next year. Here are a few examples of what I doodled today.Hope you blog readers out there enjoy my spot here on the web and remember to stay tuned for a new site in the future. All the necessary info will be posted here when it becomes available.

The Making of "A Quick Lesson in Skiing"

Back in school during 2008, we were given the task of making a cut-out animated short using After Effects.
I started by scribbling down several ideas that had very simple premises. Different locales, different plots, but all generally based on the idea of timing the story to classical music.
I was inspired by Disney's Fantasia 2000, especially Eric Goldberg's sequences "Rhapsody in Blue" and "Carnival of Animals". I also was inspired by Friz Freleng's classic Warner Bros cartoons, "Pigs in a Polka", "Mouse Mazurka", "Rhapsody Rabbit", "Rhapsody in Rivets" and "The Three Little Bops". When you animate a cartoon to music, the timing is there for you, all you got to do is build an endearing story set to the tune. Easier said than done I'm afraid.
I settled on the music of Camille Saint-Saens' "Carnival of the Animals: Finale" after seeing the Looney Tunes TV special, "Bugs and Daffy's Carnival of the Animals". I found the music pretty catchy while being highly addicting.
When listening to the music, I always pictured a chase of some kind with it's "up and down" melody, but settled on an actual funny moment from my life. I went on a ski trip quite a few years ago and will always remember trying to conquer that mountain without falling down. I slid down that slope on my final day with such grace until I reached the bottom, coming to a dead halt on my face. Hey, at least I made it all the way down the hill.
I started sketching out rough character designs and story ideas for my story.
I quickly started researching my favorite animated pieces that dealt with mountains, both snowy and not. I also searched the web for photos that reminded me of that faithful ski trip.After settling on a character design, I quickly started sketching out a rough storyboard timed to the music by Camille Saint Saens.We were instructed to create an animatic of our storyboard before moving to final animation. Enjoy my rough-as-heck sketches animated to the music here:

After timing everything out, I finalized my character poses and finalized each piece of animation in Adobe Illustrator and Photoshop.Now after 3 months of work, please enjoy the final short complete with color in all it's musical glory.

I was flattered to find out that my cartoon was the opening headliner of the school's Extreme Design Film Festival. Now if only I had the time to bring my other ideas to animated form.

A Looney Family

This is a caricature piece I did that was going to be used as a present. Apparently, the family is "looney tunes" so this is what I came up with...

Coffee Shop Doodles

Here are a couple of pages I sketched out as I was enjoying some time at Second Cup today...

Bulldog Baseball

Here's a character design piece I did for a friend.
Notice the bulldog is left-handed, it took me a while to work out a good pose...

Sketchbook Frog

A sketchbook drawing I cleaned up and threw into Photoshop... he's a happy little character, ain't he?

D.Y. Inspired Doodles

Here are some sketchbook doodles that were inspired by Wildsville: the Art of Derek Yaniger.
http://www.amazon.com/Wildsville-Derek-Yaniger-Masters-Lowbrow/dp/0955833639

Sneek Peek

B.B. Wolfe is back with another comic story!
Here's a sneek peek of some rough story sketches that pits B.B. against a few "pork-bellies"...
(don't worry, I stayed away from swine-flu gags...;))Hopefully it'll be ready for posting next wed!

Taking Pig Shadow Home

At least that's what Lizard thinks.
"Pig Shadow" - the ongoing adventures of a Pig Shadow that craves excitement but is often held back by Lizard's giving nature.

Babysitter Steep

Steep the Lizard decides to take his nephew to the park one afternoon, but babysitting proves to more difficult than he counted on...

Elastic-Mouse VS Wrecking Bull

Just a couple of my Super-Critters characters having it out. Tried playing with line weights on this one...

Steep the Lizard Re-Design

After creating this character nearly 20 years ago, I figure it was time to update Steep the Lizard.I may have plans to revive my cartoony character but time will tell.
To learn more about Steep's origins, follow the link here.

More k-Tel International Cover Designs

Just some more examples of freelance work I've done for k-Tel records...

Sketchy Strips

Here's a few examples of comic strip gags I've been sketching in my spare time...
Just put the pen to paper and this is what happened. Color added with Photoshop.