The Chad Frye - Illustration GuyEveryone loves a good ol’ fashioned singing cowboy. That is, unless he don’t sing too good…
I was just doodling in my sketchbook the other day, and started doing the face of what became the cowboy. Often when I grab that sketchbook, I don’t quite know what will pop out. So, once the hat was added, the rest just came forth, after which I whipped out my brush pen and put a nice dark line on the whole thing.
Recently at the office I’ve been working on some drawings of cute characters. I couldn’t quite shake the cute out of my arm when I got home, so I drew this pencil drawing of a young squirrel in my sketchbook. I’m thinking of doing another one in watercolor at some point when I have the time, but for now, enjoy this big-eyed acorn lover…
Whew! Things have been REALLY busy for me lately, so much so that it has been a few weeks since my last post here on the blog. My day job has me working as a character designer on a movie about Zhu Zhu Pets toys, and a lot of evenings and weekend time lately have been spent designing props for them as well! Unfortunately I cannot show you any of that work for now, but I can show you personal stuff!
As I mentioned earlier this month, I have been taking a class at the Animation Guild on Monday nights being taught by animation guru Bob Kurtz (Kurtz & Friends Animation studio). Since tonight is the last night of the class, it seemed appropriate to show you a caricature of Bob I did during one of his lessons. Drawing the teacher was NOT part of the class agenda, but how could one NOT draw such an interesting subject matter?
I’ve never been one to take very comprehensive notes in school. Always having an interest in art, many doodles littered the notes of any academic class I happened to be in. I usually was paying attention to the teacher, but somehow the margins were always full of stuff another part of my brain generated.
I recently started taking a storyboard refresher class at the Animation Guild that has been meeting on Monday nights. The teacher, Bob Kurtz, has been very interesting and informative on a topic near to my heart. However, knowing my proclivity to doodle during classes, this time I immediately cut to the chase by bringing a sketchbook along instead of note paper. I figured I’d be drawing more, and class notes would be relegated to the margins instead.
So, here is a page from my notes on the first night of class. The sketches had absolutely nothing to do with what was being taught. The closest thing to being remotely connected to what was happening in the room is that fella in the top left – he was one of my fellow students. Yes, I was paying attention. It’s just that my hand was off doing it’s own thing.
On a completely unrelated matter, I just wanted to wish my sister Tori a happy birthday today! And she is about to pop with her first kid, too! If he arrives today, that will make a new birthday in the family easier to remember!
– Epictetus (55 – 135)
It is hard to believe, but the last Drawn & Quoted column was posted way back in June of 2010! It is high time to resurrect these combinations of quotes by famous people with drawings that relate to their words of wisdom in some way. I say “some way” because some drawings have been straight forward while others have travelled the path of the sick and twisted. If you would like to see any of the previous Drawn & Quoted columns, just CLICK HERE!
Yeah, yeah, it’s Wednesday. Consider this a bonus issue of Tuesdays with TIM! The Tuesday thing still applies because the video I’m about to show you was filmed yesterday which was (drumroll please)….TUESDAY!
Well, since Brian and I are in our final week of fundraising on Kickstarter, we wanted to make you an offer that is harder to refuse! We really need your financial support to help us make this film. If we don’t reach our total goal, all the money pledged thus far will revert to its respective donors. So, between now and the end of our pledge drive next Tuesday, March 29, if you pledge $500 or more to us, I pledge to do an ORIGINAL drawing of our lead character TIM! The only catch is that we have to make our full Kickstarter goal before I start wielding my pencil for you!
The type of drawing you can expect will be like this one…
Each drawing will be unique because each drawing will be drawn by hand – my hand! In addition, with your pledge you will be entitled to any other rewards we are offering on Kickstarter for the level at which you pledge! Does this sweeten the pot for you? If you need further convincing, check out the video below that we just put together for your amusement:
TIM Video Update 3 from Wonder Motion Studios on Vimeo.
Today’s post is a page straight out of my sketchbook. While they are pretty much just random faces that popped out of my pencil, a few of them explored a certain head shape. You can see that about five of those heads have a plump pear shape to them. Just alter the eyes, nose and mouth a bit, and you have five completely different characters ranging between a good ol’ boy and an alien!
First, let me extend a hearty THANK YOU to those of you who may have given TIM a financial pledge in the past few days on Kickstarter! Over the weekend, we jumped up over $5000 in pledges!
Today I wanted to share some thoughts with you about the art that has been the face of my film from the beginning. Appropriately, it was also the first painting I did in the development of TIM. My producing partner Brian Joseph Ochab and I needed something that could very quickly say what our project was all about while invoking the spirit of the animated projects of Tim Burton.
Anyone familiar with those Burton produced films can easily see in this piece the influence primarily from The Nightmare Before Christmas. While it may feel as though it is directly out of that movie, I was careful to put my own hand in it. Brian and I did sit and watch Nightmare together, and while sitting there in front of the television with a sketchbook in my lap, the following extremely rough drawing spilled forth:
Drawings such as the one above are quick brain blorts of mine. It was probably whipped out in about a minute or two just to quickly get a visual idea on paper. That image mulled in my head for a few days to the point where it felt like there might be an idea there needing to be developed further. So, I grabbed my sketchbook again and did the following drawing:
It still wasn’t quite right, but that was it! Later I sat down at my drafting table and worked on a large tight pencil drawing on tracing paper choosing a low vantage point looking up at the cemetery gate and moon, add in a couple of jack-o-lanterns, and finesse the whole scene. You can see that originally I intended to include even more jack-o-lanterns than what appeared in the final, but later while working on the painting, they just felt excessive.
From that final pencil drawing, I created the watercolor painting with a limited creepy color palette. That low vantage point was intentionally designed so that your eye is guided right up there to the title of the film, but also the use and placement of color and lighting was to achieve that same end result. Colored pencils were used to further tie things up and accent other details.
When I go to a museum to look at paintings, I love getting my nose up as close as I can without setting off alarms so that I can really see the details of what the artist had done. With that idea in mind, here are a few close-ups of the final painting. Enjoy!
