EEC Animation & Design

My children

2012-02-11T17:45:00.001-05:00

"Sometimes you have to kill your baby" -Sheridan teacher (I forget who)

I don't remember the exact connotation, but it likely has to do with pitching and selling story concepts.
The following are some sketches for children that I will never let go.

"A Choice of Destiny" "Deserted" "Ilnumstasis"

Don't ask and you shall receive

2011-10-16T07:04:00.000-05:00

Usually I hate when people ask me to draw something. There are a few occasions where I've procrastinated on a request for up to 3 years. It's a serious problem, and also why I could never bring myself to do freelance animation.
However, a few times I've had the inspiration to finish something in a decent amount of time. Here are some things I've tackled within the past 5 years:

Gonna start with my favourite. The client knew roughly what she wanted, yet was openminded enough to share ideas--the perfect approach. Too often a freelancer will hear "Do it exactly like this" or "You're the artist. Show me a masterpiece." Few clients understand that many restrictions or too much freedom is difficult to work with. Rantrantrant Anyway, that's why this is my favourite.

Scientia is a french/english translation service in France

GRIDS....the only thing I remember is that they wanted me to revamp the incredibly outdated image they were currently using. Seriously though...I don't even remember if they paid me.

okay, well...it's for me, but still relevant to the post

clipart for Mondo Products Co. Ltd

and a possible mascot???

sitcom about my friend and a transformer sharing an apartment in downtown Toronto
hilarity ensues

Lost and Found

2011-10-15T10:08:00.001-05:00

Some of The Mutant Germ remake's final moments that I discovered buried within the bowels of my harddrive. I thought it would be worth showing, since nobody else has seen it yet. Will I ever return to the project?? Who knows.

Followed by some assorted sketches done while working at Mercury over the past 3 years,

very obviously inspired by the shows I was on at the time:

I concur

2011-10-15T09:53:00.000-05:00

Heroes and Villains

2009-10-07T01:03:00.009-05:00

So a friend of mine is really into this superhero MMO called Champions, and he's been telling me all about it. From what I hear, the game is surprisingly fun and it has an incredibly in-depth character editor to make your player with. Together, he and I have come up with dozens of concepts for heroes and villains...some I drew, some he created in-game.
You'd have no idea how much fun this is until you've done it.

Here's the tip of the iceberg:

They are: Mr. Hancock...Doctor Hobo...Laserface, a mobster...Your Ex-Girlfriend...Action Hendrix, the fastest man alive...and Thunder Thighs. ...maybe more to come if we stay on this track for much longer!

Tower update

2009-10-01T20:28:00.003-05:00

New stuff coming weekly now, since Anna and I have designated wednesday as "Tower Day". We work while watching each others' desktops via Skype and Manycam. It's easy as pie and encourages productivity and participation. I highly recommend it.

Tower update

2009-09-22T00:11:00.006-05:00

Yeup. It's still coming.
Just some model updates and colour tests. Somehow, it all looks a lot better in a group like this...maybe because it means progress?

The Tower: update

2009-08-16T14:16:00.004-05:00

New synopsis for The Tower:

Somewhere in the world, there is a small village secluded in the mountains; it is built around an ancient nondescript tower. The tower seemingly has no purpose, so one day when an outsider suddenly comes to work on it, the people of the village are mystified. They each have their own ideas of what the tower's purpose is, but of course they're all wrong.

What do you think it is?

Sketch Dump: Wasteland

2009-08-11T20:32:00.008-05:00

I was listening to norse metal the other day, and--long story short--my Wasteland has temporarily come back to life again. It might not live as long as last time, but at least it's fun to draw the characters with their new uber-improved designs.

Sketch Dump: Jimmy Two Shoes

2009-08-08T15:37:00.014-05:00

I drew a lot to work out my posing while animating Jimmy Two Shoes last year. We keep hearing how "flash animation kills your desire to draw", but don't believe everything you hear. Whoever says that is rationalizing their own laziness with a blanket excuse. Now...I'm not normally the most self-motivated artist, but if I can get this much down on paper (and more!), surely most other animators can.

The Tower characters

2009-05-13T13:34:00.005-05:00

Aforementioned [rough] designs, in order of appearance.
Feedback is pre-emptively appreciated.

Synopsis: A tower is built overnight in the middle of a diverse, secluded village. One by one, its citizens come out of their houses and gaze at the tower, each person developing their own idea about its purpose. Of course, it ends up being something entirely different.

Can't wait for summer!

2009-05-11T00:43:00.007-05:00

No reason to be excited, really. After all, it comes every year.
Maybe this one will be different...maybe not.
Maybe it will be like last summer, only better.
Maybe.

Hey, look! I can still draw, kinda!

Oh yeah...progress report.

The Tower's character designs are complete and ready for "opinion stylization". Nobody will know exactly what that fancy term means; even Anna will probably have to guess at it. It's my own word for it. Yes, you're allowed to do that, too.

The Checkup is being meddled-with and 'boarded in the meantime. Deserted (working title) is doodled occasionally, but mostly still hibernating on the back brain.

Work starts again in 2 weeks. I have not spent this break wisely, but what else is new? Let's see what I can get done last-minute.

P.S.: Sketchbook Pro is pretty damn sleek. Probably should have tried it earlier. Nothing new there, either.

The Street Magician on AWN

2009-03-05T18:49:00.006-05:00

Really?!

Yeah, really. TSM has been selected by Animation World Network as one of 20 shorts in their article “Web Toons You Need to See 2009”.

....yeah, wow. Needless to say, I'm honoured to be on the same page as the wonderfully-acted Simon's Cat, yet alone with all the other beautiful films in that category.

Chuck Undressed

2008-11-28T20:23:00.003-05:00

Just a few fun images. The clock hangs on the wall beside my work station as a reminder to stop wasting time.

Short Circuit

2008-11-02T22:38:00.004-05:00

Despite the fact that The Mutant Germ II had lasted longer than most of my other plans, it too has now fallen into ever-growing pile of abandoned ideas. However, The Tower is still in the race (awaiting more concept work from Anna before designs are semi-finalized), along with the 2 newcomers Deserted (working title) and The Checkup (a new Street Magician spinoff).

Mild hilarity will ensue.

...Pictures!

Street Magician Gossip

2008-05-11T01:10:00.007-05:00

Ah....with the completion of The Street Magician--and it's appearance at on youTube and at Sheridan's "industry day"--it seems people have been talking about it. The following are a few of the places I've seen it so-far:

-Cold Hard Flash (April 24/2008)
-Pete Emslie's blog (April 25/2008)
-No Fat Clips (May 10/2008)
-NicoSite (May 12/2008)
Translated from french: "The little story of famished Charlie Chaplin, in the skin of a magician of the street (or perhaps is this the opposite?), which seeks by all means to crunch the forbidden fruit!"
-a page in german (??/2008)
Here's what it says in english (according to Babel Fish): "Even if one has the law on its side and only for right and order wants to provide, one should consider oneself well, with whom one puts on oneself. Otherwise it can become rather unpleasant for (nearly) all involved ones."

(Please note that not all versions of it posted online have been approved by me....but since I'm not in it for the money, I guess I'm okay with that. It should also be noted that I believe in credit where credit is due. My thanks go to those who at least told me they were showing my work to others. I appreciate it.)

Portfolio Work

2008-04-21T21:57:00.004-05:00

"The Street Magician"

2008-04-17T23:28:00.009-05:00

Thanks to everyone who inspired, helped out unknowingly, and gave their two cents (in Canadian dollars!). To name only some: Barry Parker, Anna Li, Allie Laberge, Bryan Heemskerk, Jeremy Heemsekerk, Natasha Gaber, Huey Woo, Cody Powell, Blair Kitchen, Pete Emslie, Gerry Zeldin, Adam Mimnagh, Rye Routley, Chuck Jones, and of course the one true magician of his trade, Charles Chaplin.

Also, check it out on Cold Hard Flash:

http://coldhardflash.com/2008/04/fergusons-magical-fourth-year-film.html

Street Magician Update #6

2008-04-08T21:24:00.011-05:00

More screenshots. You never want to put too many in one post...I don't know why. You just don't.

Stree Magician Update #5

2008-04-08T20:17:00.009-05:00

I've decided to not shave until the film's done. Yep. Things are going to get pretty hairy over here.

On a much less itchy note...here are some more screenshots from The Street Magician.

Street Magician Update #4

2008-03-13T16:21:00.007-05:00

Yes, another update. I'm just putting the final touches on my promotion material.
Scene 28's BG was used for the poster's background, but it might be replaced with a different one when my layouts are finished.

Oh yeah--and the blog has had a complete makeover. Themes are fun! Especially when those themes are playing cards and old stuff.

Street Magician Update #3

2008-03-06T19:09:00.003-05:00

What can I say? I'm on a roll.

The Other Pagemaster

2008-03-03T05:35:00.008-05:00

Since submissions for the annual Sheridan Animation "Flipbook" are due today, I might as well drop mine off here as well.

Street Magician Update #2

2008-03-01T00:54:00.005-05:00

Things are running very smoothly on production of The Street Magician...so smoothly, it doesn't even feel right. I guess it was bound to happen sooner or later.

Though the orginal overly-ambitious plan has been scrapped (to invent and produce two short films in the time it would take everyone else to complete one), TSM is still scheduled to be finished early, keeping in mind that I have the tendency to get bored of current projects and move on to planning other ones....

That being said, here's a quick preview of what's going on, Magician-wise.

Street Magician Update

2008-02-13T19:31:00.005-05:00

Just some walk cycle tests and layouts for The Street Magician. It should be noted that the layouts aren't finished, and have only just entered the painting phase. More will be posted periodically.

The Street Magician - Cuffed and Locked

2007-12-08T14:40:00.001-05:00

This is the [final] version of The Street Magician's animatic. It's been locked down, and it's ready to start animating after the holidays. However, magicians tend to escape from locked things with relative ease...so don't be surprised if it's not still in that straight jacket when it reappears.

--and as a side note, here's an animation test for Anna Li's short film.

The Mutant Germ!!!

2007-11-14T23:47:00.001-05:00

This a the short by the Visual Factory animation group, made last year at Sheridan College. I was layout supervisor and keeper of the ink. The layouts were all done in the same way, though I wish the same could be said for its animation. Overall, it was a good experience.

The following are some of the scenes animated by yours truly.

The Street Magician

2007-11-07T12:38:00.001-05:00

Here is the recent animatic of my student film. There's no telling how many times I've meddled with this beast, so let's call it Subfinal #4. At this point, the whole thing should be self-evident, and not require any explanation...so I'm not giving any. If anyone happens to see something they don't quite follow-- or think could be better--please let me know. Improvement is always desired.

Just for kicks, here's the first draft. This one was thrown together at 3am sometime in March 2007. I like to think it's improved quite a bit since then.

Flash Flood

2007-10-16T19:53:00.002-05:00

I started using Macromedia Flash during my internship at Huminah Huminah, and found myself getting a little attached to drawing with a tablet. I worked on Chaotic and Being Ian, neither of which involved very much extra drawing. However, in my free time I doodled up a storm. Since the summer, I've used Flash for everything from animatics to logo design.

Facebook Grafitti

2007-07-18T16:02:00.000-05:00

If you don't already know what Facebook is, you can find the link here.

Somehow I was sucked in to this online phenomenon, and lo-and-behold...I'm addicted. The site's recently-added Grafitti feature doesn't help. If anything, it justifies my signing in almost every day to doodle a little on a friend's "wall".

Here are some of my highlights:

Dracula's Castle

2007-04-29T15:33:00.000-05:00

A little while back, I had a nostalgic urge to blow the dust off of my big ol' bin of LEGO. Mix thoroughly with Bram Stoker's Dracula, add a pinch of free time, and this is what you get:

The Mutant Germ!!!

2007-04-21T01:00:00.002-05:00

It's complete! ...mostly. The low-rez version should be posted on The Visual Factory's blog sometime soon, and likely just a little later on mine.

For now, here are some screenshots of scenes I animated from The Mutant Germ!!!, followed by some of my layout drawings.

Layouts:

The Street Magician

2007-04-20T01:28:00.004-05:00

I was inspired both by Camille Saint-Saen's Carnivales Des Animaux and by the silent films of Charlie Chaplin. This led to the complete refurnishing of my 4th-year film idea (previously "Mum's The Word" or "Mum's First Word")
I guess they're both similar in style and mood, but the old story wasn't really doing anything for me, mostly due to the fact that it didn't have a solid ending. I think the biggest problem that I'll run into with "The Street Magician" is keeping the time to less than a minute. In the reel, I have some problems with timing, likely because I tried to synchronize every little musical accent with an action. The most common criticism on the reel was that many things were too fast to follow.

Here's some concept art for the film. The clean ones are more or less the final designs.

Spoof Posters

2007-02-08T15:54:00.000-05:00

Just some posters that I've made recently. The Mutant Germ and Hell's Belle pieces were very much inspired by Ragnar's work. The Good, the Dad, and the TV was a Christmas present for my dad. He collects western-themed memorbilia. Hell's Belle was made when my girlfriend needed a picture for her presentation on female stereotypes. It's a play on a movie by Quentin Tarantino and a song by AC/DC. The Fergustones was for my grandparents for Christmas. It's kind of hard to miss the reference here. The Mutant Germ was a conceptual poster for my student film. The last untitled landscape was inspired by the layout style of Samurai Jack.

Layout Hype

2007-02-08T15:21:00.000-05:00

I did a couple quick layouts with warped perspective in my second year in animation, and I received some good feedback from peers and teachers. Naturally, I've drawn a bunch more since then. My method: put any thought of proper perspective aside and have fun.

Charlie Marlow would say I have no method.

Where The Heart Is

2006-12-21T01:38:00.000-05:00

Needless to say, I've also done some murals at my mom's house back in Orangeville. How could you have an artist for a son and not take advantage of his skill?

The garden above is indoors, and the following two are outside. I took photos at different stages so you can see my progress.

Getting Into Character

2006-12-21T00:22:00.000-05:00

In my second year of animation at Sheridan, we had a couple individual short film projects that were entirely pre-production work. The first was entirely our choice, provided we pitched the idea to our classes. Mine was "Dion's Bar", a little gag-driven comedy that took place in a world half-way between modern reality and greek mythology. It's quite the existential story, now that I think about it. The name comes from the greek god of wine, Dionysus.

The three characters were Jakob Satyre, a sex-starved satyr, Bill O'Taur, a minotaur whose wife wants a divorce because of his alcoholism, and Andrea Griffith, a griffiness who likes to flaunt her stuff. It's clearly not a children's story. I wanted to try something that was a little more mature and a little less mature at the same time.

The following are some other various model sheets for characters I've designed the past few years. The first two characters are from an animation class assignment. I ended up elaborating on the story when I designed the characters, and I'll definately want to use them again in the future, maybe even for my fourth year film, which third year animation students will begin thinking about this upcoming term. The title for the short would be "Mum's First Word".

Davius lives in his mother's basement...

"Wasteland" Inspiration

2006-12-20T21:15:00.000-05:00

This is some of my better stuff from my first and second years in the animation program at Sheridan. At this point, I had so many unrefined ideas that I didn't know what to do with myself. I needed to focus on something to develop myself and narrow in on a style that suits me.

Sheridan had apparently thought of this beforehand. I've noticed that the classes were becoming gradually less important, our marks relying more and more on the work we produce in projects, rather than on individual meaningless assignments. Good move, Sheridan. Keep it up.

Consequently, much of my striving to find a style has resulted in research on various subjects. I am now a sufferer of chronic hey-I-should-look-that-up syndrome. Much of what I found has led me to create a world that I can work on constantly; a world where everything can exist if I want it to. When I get inspired, I usually find that it has absolutely no place in the current project I'm working on. With this world I've made, I can use such a broad range of genres and styles that nearly anything that inspires me can be used to help the story. Even if I am away from the project for a long time, there is always something that will bring me back.

This is the Wasteland of my dreams.

Traditional Paintings

2006-12-20T20:42:00.000-05:00

Yes, there was a time in my life where I actually enjoyed traditional painting. It started in grade 10 and ended abruptly half way through my year in Art Fundamentals at Sheridan.

Maybe one day I'll find the courage and desire to return to it. For now, though, it's all photoshop for me, baby.

Livingroom Panorama

2006-12-20T20:17:00.000-05:00

The livingroom mural was the largest mural project I've had so far, and definately the most challenging of the Gellert commissions. They pretty much just gave me a pile of reference material and said "do what you do".

So I did.

Unfortunately, the Gellerts moved out in 2005, and the house's new masters tore out the walls and replaced them. One day I'll redraw this on paper. I've improved a bit since then.

The Star Wars Room

2006-12-20T20:13:00.000-05:00

The Anime and Gundam Rooms

2006-12-20T19:31:00.000-05:00

I painted murals in four rooms of the Gellerts' house when I was in highschool. I knew the family, and it was my first commission, so they provided the supplies I needed...and fed me too!

I was assissted on this project by a small group of friends. In the end, I ended up being the major contributor, though Clarissa Jewel managed to finish one of the characters by herself, as well as the two giant heads of Vader and Yoda in the Star Wars room.

This last image of the robot is from the Gundam Room. I missed my chance to take pictures of the other two gundams in the room before the Gellerts moved.