Fumblebums!

Another of my favorite episodes of Back at the Barnyard: Fumblebums!  I loved the kinetic vibe to this story (written by Jed Spingarn) and we had a lot of fun with all of the football action.   I know very little about the sport so I was lucky to have some super football fans on the team like Jason Dorf.   In addition to directing this one I also storyboarded the entire episode, and Jason had to explain to me all of the positions and players on the field in order for me to figure out most of the staging – thanks buddy!  

Production Problmes!

So how do I create a stadium of people on an animated cable TV show budget?   You make the bleachers up high!  I asked our production designer Phil Cruden to make the crowd seating begin at the top of a 15 foot wall – this way I was able to shoot a lot of the action on the field without having to see a crowd of characters in each BG.   Worked out pretty well!  

The Birth of Coach Coachman!

For years I had been doing silly caricatures of my fellow director TJ Sullivan and was always looking for a place to put him in to the show – or SOME show somewhere!  Well Coach Coachman was my opportunity!  You see, there’s always a little bit of friendly ribbing going on (mom jokes, etc.) and I wasn’t going to make TJ’s character just be some guy.  No, he had to look a bit . . . well . . . goofy.  Our character designer on the show was the great Bill Schwab, so in an attempt to mimic his brilliant visual style, I created my TJ-inspired Coach.  I believe it was our Modeling Supervisor Gerardo Orioli who created the actual 3D model of TJ . . .  er, I mean Coach. 

Graphics!

I always loved playing with visual style and incorporate fun graphics into the shows.  One thing I do know about football is that there are many flashy graphics when you watch a game on TV – so in doing a football episode, we HAD to have the Barnyard equivalent.  

Unfortunately, these elements aren’t often factored in to the production pipeline of a CG show.   Being a stylistically different approach, it’s hard to determine who will do what and where it will fall in the schedule.  But when you’re determined you find a way . . . even if it means you do it yourself . . . on the weekend.   My equally determined editor at the time Nick Simotas, agreed to bite the bullet along with me and help me get this bit in the show.  We agreed that I would do all of the graphics and Nick would animate them.  Now, does the result look like something two guys did in about two days?  Yeah, kind of . . . BUT we did it and it’s in the show!  That was all that mattered.  Check out the clip below.  You’ll also hear Nick lending his vocal talents as the announcer in the clip.  

1966 Batman Designs

Ok, so here are some from my favorite show of all time: Batman.  I grew up watching this show and have been obsessed with it for my entire life.  Back in the 70's and early 80's Batman was on TV every day - and I mean EVERY day.  It was just before the era of cable television, and at the time you had a choice of maybe four or five channels to watch.  Batman, Happy Days, Brady Bunch, Gilligan's Island, and Star Trek pretty much ruled the syndicated airwaves.  Needless to say, my favorite show to watch over and over was . . . . 

The Green Hornet

Below are a couple of designs I did back in 2008 of The Green Hornet.  I’ve been a fan of the show since I first saw it as a child, and was hoping to see it appear in animated form someday.  Looking back, I find these designs a bit traditional let’s say – or you can say “kind of boring” I guess.  Sadly, I don’t know how well received the character would be for modern audiences, so I don’t think he’ll ever see much of a resurgence.   One can dream!

Bozo the Clown!

In 2001, Larry Harmon was making plans to release his catalogue of Bozo the Clown shows on DVD.  The property didn’t exactly resonate with modern audiences – I mean let’s face it, clowns are kind of creepy these days.  That being said, I was extremely fortunate for the opportunity to be a small part of this project.  

My business partner TJ Sullivan and I were contracted to create animated shorts and bumpers that would appear on the DVD releases.  It was great fun to get the opportunity to animate such a classic character.  It was exactly the type of material we as animators loved producing.  At the time we were really trying to experiment with classic 2D animation concepts like squash and stretch in the 3D work space.  This project gave us the opportunity to try new methods in CG and learn from a lot of trial and error.  Yeah, looking at the work now it feels kind of like “bad CG” stuff – but hey, it was a long time ago.  The important thing was that we had a lot of fun doing it! 

Larry inspired us as he was still such a creative and passionate artist, even into his late 70’s.  I was saddened to hear of his passing in July of 2008.  Thanks for the memories Larry!

Title Cards

Back in 2009 I directed the Halloween special for Back at the Barnyard.   The folks at Nickelodeon were nice enough to humor me and let me design the graphics for the show opener.  Below are some of the title cards I designed - really fun episode!

Rapid Prototyping

Rapid prototyping is a technique used to fabricate physical models using 3D data.  It's also commonly referred to as simply "3D printing."   I had become interested in the process a few years back and decided to experiment with some of my own 3D work.   I have to admit, the main reason why I wanted to research the process was because I wanted to make toys!   

My favorite show growing up was Batman and as an avid toy collector, there was nothing I wanted to see more than action figures based on those great designs!  Unfortunately in the 40+ years of the show's existence we never saw a single toy manufactured!  

**sidebar - as of today several companies such as Mattel, Hot Toys and NECA have begun producing such toys!**

Because of the 3D printing technology, I no longer had to dream - I would just make my own! The process is fairly simple, but not particularly easy. The first thing you have to do is build the 3D model.   Once you have that, you can send it off to a 3D printing vendor (there are several out there - a quick Google search will give you just what you need).   

Once I received my 3D printed models, I created a mold for them so that I could create plastic resin duplicates.  This way I could make multiple copies and have more than one attempt at painting them!

In the case of  The Green Hornet character, the 3D printing technique enabled me to make separate pieces for the head, the mask and the hat.  This way I could give the figure a more accurate look, and also have cool removable costume pieces!!  

Separate 3D printed mask and hat pieces painted

Once painted, the pieces are put together.

Painted Batman head on figure body

The process is a lot of fun, but as previously mentioned, not easy - and NOT cheap.  But it was certainly interesting research to test out the technology.  I'm looking forward to making more toys in the future!

BATB Gem!

Speaking of favorite TV shows . . . 

Another one of mine (and I may be biased here) was Back at the Barnyard. As a director on the show, I used the opportunity to occasionally pay homage to some of my beloved influences.  One such episode was titled "Get Bessy" and is one of my all-time favorites from the series.  Not only was it a funny script (written by Jed Spingarn) but it also had one of our favorite guest stars: Weird Al Yankovic!  In the episode, Al played himself - but with a shocking twist at the end!

  

The script had a bit of a mod-era 1960's feel so I wanted to create a "lobby card" style design for the title card that was reminiscent of that vibe.  

title card design by Steffen Sommer

Now . . . on to my Bat-homages!   In the story, Otis and the gang had to break into a mansion - Yankovic Manor!  So I had to design a mansion? Hmmmm . . . .  I got on the phone with our amazingly talented production designer Phil Cruden, and we started hatching the bat-plan.  Phil was very familiar with the '66 Batman show and when I told him I wanted the building to look like Wayne Manor, he knew just what to do!

Al's Mansion designed by Phil Cruden.  Look familiar?

Just how do the animals break in to Yankovic manor?  With a bat-climb of course!  

Lastly, there was Al's secret "police hotline" for immediately contacting the authorities.  Not exactly the classic Shakespeare bust, but it's the Weird Al equivalent let's say.  

So now you're SO intrigued you just have to see this episode, right?  Well if so you can always watch on Amazon!  

Just for fun . . .

KaPOW!!  Here's a little tribute to my favorite TV show . . .

The Maiden Post!

Welcome to my new blog! I thought it fitting to make my first post about something very near and dear to my heart . . . Star Wars: Detours! The question I've been asked almost every day since last March is "how do you feel about the show being put on hold?" If only there was one simple answer.

Imagine getting the job of your dreams and spending over three years of your life pouring your heart and soul into that job. Imagine giving every ounce of energy and attention you have to a project - and loving every second of it. And then imagine it all coming to an end in an instant. It was heart breaking, yes. But then again, it was an amazing experience – one that I never would have imagined having in my career.

So, what happened? Well for starters when we began developing Detours, George Lucas had no intention of ever making any more Star Wars films. He also wanted to have some fun with the world he'd imagined because he saw so many others doing it - so why not Lucasfilm itself? As you may know, animation is a very slow process, and in the time that it took to develop and produce a show like Detours, things had changed at Lucasfilm. The company was about to go on its own detour . . .

With George retiring and a new regime talking over Lucasfilm, the decision was made to move forward on creating new Star Wars films – episode VII! As a fan, this news was the most exciting I’d had since finding out I got the job on Detours! But it also begged the question of “so what do we do with the animated ‘parody’ we’ve been developing for two years?” If we want to introduce the franchise to a whole new audience of fresh (especially the young) viewers, does it make sense to show them parodies of it as the first “taste” so to speak? No. 

The show had already been announced a couple of years prior, but in August of 2012 we revealed some actual footage on the main stage at Star Wars Celebration VI. It was very exciting to finally be able to show the fans what we’d been secretly making up at the ranch behind closed doors. 

Part of that presentation was to cut a trailer of finished clips from the show. I had shown this footage to my own children as a sort of kid “test audience.” They laughed – wanted to watch it several times etc. Prior to this my children were (rather ironically) NOT fans of Star Wars – despite my repeated efforts to make them such! After watching the Detours trailer they expressed interest in watching the films! 

So I started them on the first Star Wars film that I’d ever seen, which of course was Episode IV: A New Hope. We sat down to watch the film in our living room and I could see the excitement on their faces as that Star Destroyer flew overhead in the opening shot – especially my youngest who was four at the time. Then they saw C-3PO and R2-D2 on screen . . . and they giggled. That wasn’t all that strange since they are sort of comical characters in the Star Wars universe – albeit they’re first seen in a not-so-funny “we’ll be destroyed for sure” predicament. Maybe it was just the way C-3PO walks? 

Anyway, then came the moment . . . a moment that I will never forget from my own childhood . . . Darth Vader! When Vader emerges through the smoke in that hallway, accompanied by that John Williams score, it’s powerful! You know right away that this guy is evil and he means business! Right? Well two of my children began cracking up when they saw him. The third simply asked “is he a SCUBA diver?” 

WHAT!? Laughter?? I’m sorry but that moment in cinema history should NOT make six and four year olds laugh! How dare they!? Darth Vader is an icon! He’s one of the most famous villains in cinema history! Why would a kid laugh . . . Ohhh . . . ok, woops. 

What had I done? You see, Darth Vader played a fairly prominent role in that Detours trailer that I’d shown the kids. And let’s just say that on Detours he doesn’t really come off as . . well . . . scary per se. In the interest of preserving his street cred in Star Wars, I won’t go in to any more detail than that. Suffice it to say that I felt as though I tarnished Vader for my kids – tarnished who he is really supposed to be, forever. I know this may sound a bit ridiculous, but Star Wars means a lot more to me that just some movies. It was a part of life for as long as I could remember. It was THE REASON I chose this profession. 

So when it came time to put Detours on hold, well . . . I was devastated. But I remembered back to that day. I remembered my kids laughing at Vader. So the internal debate of a lifetime occurred. A feeling of “how could this happen!?!?!” along with the feeling of “awww MAN I totally agree with this decision!” 

It’s like on the simulator when Troy had to order LaForge to climb into the reactor in order to save the ship, knowing that he would die in the process! And Geordi had to obey orders – and he did so without question for the greater good! I’m friggin’ Geordi here. Being Geordi is NOT fun people.

photo by Esteban Pacheco 

So there you have it! But enough of that . . . let’s talk about what’s next . . .