Shapes & Lines

The crew over at PushButton Labs posted a video showing off some new features in GRUNTS Skirmish, and a little of the art I contributed to the project. Read more about the game Here.

Watching the video brings back memories of building forts as a kick and waging dirt clod wars. ..Derek, sorry for hiding rocks inside the dirt clods. Ok not really, those things were like depleted uranium rounds. Best dirt clod wars weapon EVER!

I’m always interested in the concert between form and function.

Theo Jansen is a “Kinetic sculptor”. His creations live or die by their simultaneously complex and elegantly simple design.

This guy is like DaVinci reincarnated and locked in a room with an Erector set ..that’s a really old toy for generationally challenged out there.

On another front, I just wrapped up 5 weeks on a contract job. ..now just a few days to revise and polish.

This was a great reminder of why contractors should keep in mind that Murphy’s law always applies, and no matter how certain you are about a schedule and the work involved, something will always happen that you can’t predict.

That’s why I include a 15% margin for error in delivery times.

I estimated the job at 5 weeks, that’s 25 work days. A 15% margin for error could mean as much as 3 and 1/4 days, give or take.

Well, the Murphy effect that I didn’t predict this time was that I forgot to include my 15% rule in the estimate…

…Electric Boogaloo

The Koi picture below was a recent speed painting exercise I did while eating breakfast a few days ago. This is version 2.

A friend pointed out to me that the rocks and the fish weren’t working together, and they were right. It was bothering me since my first iteration on the painting, but I had intended to leave it alone and let it be. It was after all just an exercise. …but I couldn’t help taking another pass at it. I like this one a lot better …except for the fish, I think they turned out better in the first painting.

Yesterday was the first day of Spring! …well, not technically, but in so much as Eugene seems to have transitioned from winter rain, hail, and 40 degrees, to blue skies, sunshine and 70+ in less than a week.

It was definitely my first day of Spring.  I worked long hours all weekend on a very important project and decided a siesta was in order. A couple of drinks at the Vintage with great company and a walk around town enjoying the sunshine made for a perfect end to the day, and an awesome start to Spring.

I’ve been trying to put my finger on something that has been bothering me for a while. This guy, Taylor Mali, just nailed it.

..meh

I’m trying out a new image viewer plugin called Fancy Box since PicLens had too many issues. Specifically, it offered limited control of the resolution that images displayed at.

Feedback on the new plugin is welcome. Let me know how it works for you.

Almost two months since my last post. Somehow winter slipped by while I was recovering from a nasty leg injury, and now spring is about to land on Eugene like a big warm buttery pancake.

…Mmm pancakes.

I’ve kept myself busy these last two months. Lots of traveling and work out of town. Too many projects to keep track of. Check out Tim’s recent post showing off Push Button Lab’s GRUNTS: Skirmish for their Push Button Engine.

Below are a few concept paintings I recently finish for Mad Otter Games. These started out as thumbnails on cocktail napkins. I seem to do my best work at a local bar these days.

I’ve taken to doing most of my illustrations on cocktail napkins. It turns out that a five inch square makes for a great canvas. It’s not so big that it requires much work to fill the space, and not so small that it prevents you from realizing a complex composition. Getting to do my work while at the bar ain’t bad either.

The contract with Mad Otter was for as many concept paintings as I could develop in about 10 hours. I packed in a few extra hours to get the images where I wanted them. I think I ended up with 7or 8 final concepts and a couple that didn’t make the cut. I’m definitely rusty at this sort of thing, but I’m pretty happy with the result considering the time constraints.

I have a few big projects on my plate, that and getting my running back up to speed will keep me very busy for the next couple of months. By the end of May I will have some really big stuff to share.

-Todd

I’m going to be all kinds of busy over the next couple of months, so I thought I would make another quick post in case I don’t have time in the weeks ahead.

This is a concept painting I did for “Fallen Empire: Legions” last year during the games development.

The idea behind the character design was to take familiar subject matter, in this case ww2 bomber nose art and plane markings, and apply them to a sci-fi …ish high-tech design. This is not an uncommon ploy in design, and not far removed from anamorphic caricature drawing. For example, if I was gonna draw Charles Bronson as an animal, I would draw him as a catfish.

But I’m sort of getting off the subject there.

So by combining something that has a strong identity and common familiarity with something that is completely new or unknown to the viewer, you make it more accessible to them, and more believable. Not to mention that it gives you a ton of material to work with.

Also included is a close up of the shoulder art. I had to teach myself to paint ww2 style pin-up girls for this little detail of the design. On the upside, I spent a lot of time doing “research” looking at pictures of girls in swim suits.

The demands of design work can be like that. Who would have thought that when I first approached the design for a gritty, battle ready, robot death thingy, that I would need to know how to paint a girl in a one piece? Not me.

In other news, having received approval on the basic design, I’m currently working on an additional set of character designs for Push Button Labs “Grunts: Skirmish”.  You can checkout images from the project and the beta sign up page for their “Push Button Engine” here.

-Todd

It’s been a while since I posted, December 13th to be exact. It was a crazy and busy month for me in more ways than one. I wrapped up 2008 with a late night of celebration and too many gin and tonics …five too many to be exact. It seemed like a good idea at the time.

2008 closed out with more of a whimper than a bang for me. I’m not partial to whimpers, so I started the new year off in good form by dragging my hungover butt out of bed for a 5k race in which I managed to (A) not puke during or after, and (B) take first in my division in. The not puking part is more impressive than the winning, it was a small race.

And because I’m a glutton for punishment, I ran home and picked the car of an inebriated friend I drove home the night before. Then took it across town and dropped it off for em, so they wouldn’t have to make the trip  …Then I managed to get lost while running home, and turned what should have been a 3 mile run into about a 9 miler, and paid for it the rest of the week.

I know I’ve said it before, but I’m always amazed by how quickly time slips by. Seasons change, people move in and out of our lives, doors open and close.

It’s 2009 and January is almost over. I spent a big chunk of it away from home. Some unexpected contract work came up that took me out of town and kept me distracted for almost two weeks.

Now I’m home and catching up on contract work, personal projects, game dev, web dev, and other otherwise. Mostly I’m trying to shake the rust off and get back on my running routine.

Art and business wise 2009 looks to be both an interesting and challenging year. I’m gonna be immersing myself in running and working for the foreseeable future, so there will be plenty of new art to show soon.

Tim at Push Button Labs recently posted a logo design and game play pic from the RTS I’m working on with them. It’s coming along nicely. Tim is rocking the house with great animations for the various units that’s really bringing them to life with lots of personality.

That’s all for now.

-Todd

…I just got passed by an Oompa Loompa.

It looks like winter has finally arrived here in Eugene. I woke this morning to snow falling outside my window. For some twisted reason that still escapes me, the realization that I would soon be running a 5k race in all of that got me excited.

The hilltops surrounding Eugene were dusted in white, but the falling snow quickly turned to slush leaving everything downtown wet, slippery, and cold. Hazardous running conditions at best.

One of the hazards of turning a hobby like art into a profession is that you can lose the joy that originally attracted you to it in the first place.

This past week I got to show some of my art to a friend who was unfamiliar with it. Watching the way they reacted to different aspects of the images, what they responded to and what held their attention was unexpectedly motivating.

Feeling motivated, I laced up and headed out for the 5k. The race location was less than two miles from my door, so jogging to the event gave me a chance to warm up. And that paid off.

By the time the race started I was mostly ready and the weather had even improved a little. No slippery spots to be found, just lots of wet everywhere.

I hadn’t planned on really pushing myself due to a muscle strain on my left leg, but reaching the mile #1 marker I realized I was running a 6:45 pace and was feeling pretty strong, so I pushed on through mile two at about the same speed.

Mile three was looking even better and I kicked up my pace a little bit  …then I got passed by an Oompa Loompa.

Not sure if it was the second guessing my own sanity, my frozen toes, or just running out of steam, but that sort of took me off my game. So I dialed it back a bit and regained my composure for the final stretch.

I turned in about the performance as my recent Turkey Stuffer run, 21 minutes and change, and felt pretty good. The walk home in the cold wind while covered in sweat was another matter altogether.

Snow is expected in the valley floor by tomorrow. That should make for an interesting Sunday run. Oompa, Loompa, doom-pa-dee-do!