“Success is most often achieved by those who don’t know that failure is inevitable.“
– Coco Chanel (1883-1971)
The bear’s success comes at the price of the fish’s unknowing leap of failure. Perhaps not the intent of the quote, but certainly a truth from it.
Sometimes when I do these Drawn & Quoted pieces, I find a quote and do a drawing based on it. This time the drawing came first (ink in my sketchbook), then the search for a matching quote came after, which is usually the tougher way to go about it. I saw this image as having possible business applications, and started looking at quotes with that in mind. I also thoroughly enjoy utter silliness, so when this quote surfaced (pun intended), it made me laugh in the context of the drawing.
Why? Because the quote probably was meant to inspire someone to greatness by having them not be afraid to try something. However, it seemed to fit perfectly the goals and achievements of these two characters as they both attempted their goals in tandem. The bear achieved success at the price of the fish’s failure. Funny, right? Pain is often funny.
A number of years ago before I got into the world of animation, I was a very busy illustrator. I illustrated many books whether of my own design, or sometimes with a team of other illustrators. Much of my color work back then was created with gouache – an opaque water based paint I would apply with both regular brushes and airbrushes. I absolutely LOVED this work.
After having worked for a number of years in the world of animation, and not having illustrated much anymore, the urge to paint more came bubbling up inside of me. While some of my colleagues who spend their days with cartoons want to create fine art, I wanted to create illustrations, even if they were just for me and not part of a greater project. But, I didn’t want to use gouache anymore. The erratic, organic quality of watercolors looked mighty attractive.
So, I bought some tubes of watercolors – Winsor & Newton – the same brand as my gouache paints, and decided to take a crack at ’em. The first serious attempt at using this medium resulted in the piece down below. Watercolors make up the bulk of the piece, finished with the sketchy lines that colored pencils provided.
The name “Slots Landing” was suggested by my brother.
I was hooked, and never looked back. At least 80% of my paintings since then have been with watercolors. Gouache still creeps in now and then, as does purely digital painting in Photoshop, but I absolutely love watercolors, and try to learn more with each new piece that comes across my desk.
Even though this was my first serious attempt at the medium, it remains one of the more popular pieces with viewers, likely due to the subject matter. There’s just something about the loss of innocence when tempted by something bigger and meaner that we all can relate to. The alligator seemed like a natural tempter to the sweet, innocent rabbit who he is coaxing down to the riverboat casino with his luring words and the push of his tail. It seems like the key moment of a book, doesn’t it?
The image was inspired by a verse in the Bible found at I Corinthians 10:13 where it promises to those who have given their lives to Christ that, “No temptation has overtaken you that is not common to man. God is faithful, and he will not let you be tempted beyond your ability, but with the temptation he will also provide the way of escape, that you may be able to endure it.”
Does that headline sound confusing? Well, it shouldn’t. Allow me to explain, and in the process you may learn something you didn’t know about character designing for animation.
In movies and TV shows, you always have your lead actors around whom the story is usually based. However, to make those stories work, the lead actors must be surrounded by a cast of characters who may have much smaller parts, but are key to the storytelling. These actors are called “character actors” and often breathe the soul into a story whether with their own lines or just by being catalysts in some way.
Character actors are often very interesting looking people, too. Our lives are not filled with perfectly chiseled faces everywhere we look – unless you happen to live in Beverly Hills. No, those that pass us by on a daily basis come in all shapes and sizes, various levels of face wrinkles, hair colors, and style of clothing. They are the variety of life! Character actors are needed to help us relate to a story as if we were living it ourselves.
Well, in animation, character actor characters are needed, too! (See! That title makes sense now, doesn’t it?) We need interesting looking characters to fill in the background. Some have lines, some are silent extras, but all are necessary.
A few years ago I was working on an animated project and was tasked to create a number of these background characters. Today I will be showing you some elderly people specifically. The assignment was that we needed an elderly couple wearing winter coats. So, I created two men, and two women for the director to look at and give notes on, fully expecting I’d have to go and make real changes to create a third or fourth version.
A set of four old people. I was actually trying to make the men look Japanese. The women could have gone a few ways ethnically depending on how they would be colored.
The director actually liked two of the people right away with no changes! However, the story now demanded they needed to be in life jackets. Easy fix! Life jackets they shall receive!
Although they looked buoyant already, life jackets were added to set a good example for the intended young audience.
Now normally after this, I would go in and create a clean line version without the blue tones because another artist would take them and give them their colors and textures. This was to be a computer generated project. I would also normally create turns to show the character all the way around, and create expressions or poses, or even mouth charts. But these two were mostly background, and so I was told these drawings were all that was needed for the finals to be made by others.
So, how did these characters look in the final film? Well, apparently they ultimately were scrapped from the scene for which they were intended. When looking at the final footage, only the man made it in, but he was made younger, and his clothes were changed. As you can see in the image below, he didn’t much resemble the original drawing at all, but the foundation was there. Thus is the nature of teamwork on a movie.
Who needs plastic surgery to look younger when CGI can take care of it?
This was a pretty low budget project. I’ve worked on low budget, and I’ve worked on big budget. For me the work remains the same. I try to do my best work in every situation. Smaller budgets often mean deadlines are tighter, and there is less time to refine something, but I don’t slack off in my duties. I say this because sometimes younger artists coming up will perceive a job to be less prestigious, and they won’t put as much of themselves into the work.
Even if budgets sometimes can’t quite get the final product to look as finished as one might hope when they were creating designs, one should always take pride in their work and give it all they’ve got!
After three caricature posts in a row, perhaps it is time to return to the animal world. How about this Respectable Reptile?
A little over a week ago I saw the original 1960s Doctor Dolittle on the big screen (Rex Harrison was the star – not Eddie Murphy), and came away with animals on the brain. This dapper fella is a hand-inked specimen that came forth in my sketchbook, then colored in Photoshop.
Don’t get too close, or he may be puttin’ you on the Ritz cracker.
By the way, if you ever wondered what John Hammond from Jurassic Park looked like singing and dancing, do yourself a favor and check out that 50-year-old version of Doctor Dolittle. He’s the circus ringmaster. You’re welcome.
One of the highlights of the screening I went to was that the author of the screenplay and writer of the songs for the movie, the legendary Leslie Bricusse, was there for a Q&A along with Samantha Eggar, one of the stars of the film. It was so great to hear their tales from this film they spent a year making oh so long ago. Below is my favorite photo of the two of them that I took that day. What a treat!
Leslie Bricusse and Samantha Eggar photographed at the Aero Theater in Santa Monica on March 3, 2018.
What better way to stay warm in the winter than by hugging your big daddy? Of course, here in Los Angeles we might have trouble relating to the frigid winters of Russia, but cold weather is not the only purpose for warm hugs.
Nothing can melt the snow like a daughter’s love for her daddy.
The other day I needed a little repair to my car, so I took a sketchbook with me to the waiting room. Who knows why such a scene came to mind in that moment, but it did. These pygmy pachyderms came out of my pencil at the shop, and then finished with a little ink and paint in the studio.
So weird.
Never tick off creatures who never forget and carry a spear.
