Working with the local CW network affiliate, I created loose caricatures of Regis Philbin, Kelly Ripa and Martha Stewart for a spot promoting the station's programming lineup. After working out the basic drawings, I animated them using After Effects. Once I was finished, it was handed over to their producers and edited into the finished commercial. It's not massive animation but I'm happy with it!

I've done limited animation before with characters I created but this was the most involved work I've done to date. Normally, I would create the drawings in Adobe Illustrator and simply import the files into After Effects and proceed from there. However, this results in rather stiff looking animation with limited flexibility and I've never been completely staisfied with the results.

But this time, I actually did the drawings in After Effects using the mask tools which allowed me to freely animate any part of the drawing necessary. The biggest chunk of time came from actually drawing the characters in AE.

I'm really interested in doing more animated pieces in the future but I don't plan on using AE as the tool of choice. I might eventually teach myself Flash but the learning curve is a little daunting. I did find a program that seems to fit my skill set, called Anime Studio Pro. It's much more artist friendly and it seems to be gaining popularity as a decent animation program. There's an animation company called GreyKid Pictures that's using Anime Studio Pro to produce some pretty spectacular pieces of work. Check out this, this and this.

I'll never achieve their level of expertise but I plan on making some decent headway.

I know this doesn't have anything to do with illustration, but I've always loved this clip from the movie, NETWORK. And it still manages to resonate even after all these years...

I know, I know... I redesigned the site only last year. Last May, in fact. But I wasn't happy with how some of the things were looking as I saw it in different computers and in different browsers. This design is supposed to hold up MUCH better across platforms and browsers. We'll see. If you notice anything a little wonky looking, please let me know. I'm not a web guru but I'll make an effort.

Over the course of the next few weeks, I plan on adding several categories to the blog. I plan on making available custom Photoshop brushes that I use in my work and I may include some tutorials if I get the chance.

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