e-doodles

Strip numero 2

2012-02-07T17:02:00.000-05:00

Here are the pencils as I submitted them for the most recent Sesame Street DVD comic strip.

The final layout, color, and finishing touches that you see in the final product was done by Diana Leto and Mark Magner.

Zombie plush!

2012-01-29T18:03:00.000-05:00

Woohoo! Zombie plush! I never really know where the zombie designs go, so its always a nice surprise to see product show up.

I first saw these guys as prototypes. They needed a lot of help. They didn't know how to position the body, arms, and legs to give them the lunging forward posture. I did some detailed bluelining and sent them back. I didn't see them again till they were released. I was worried, but I was pleasantly surprised. The characters sit well, have a nice weight distribution to support their large heads, and they have a great forward lean to them. These have become my favorite products made from my designs.

They also made Zombie keychains. Not as good as the plush, but not bad. Both the plush and keychains are exclusive to Japan.

Strip!

2012-01-04T17:32:00.001-05:00

My first comic strip! Here's a little strip I did for Sesame Workshop. Sesame used it with the release of their Iron Monster and Sesame Heroes DVD as an online component.

This was a rush project which left no time to properly experiment or play with ideas. Just had to push forward and keep it simple.

This is the finished version with colors added by fellow artist Vanessa Germosen.

Zombie Mini Puzzles!

2011-11-16T19:11:00.001-05:00

This is why I love Japan...well one of the reasons. They get it. If you remember a little while back, I did these Sesame Zombie designs. Japan saw it and ran with it. Here's the first product that I've seen come in.

Mini puzzles! Pocket sized puzzles. I saw three puzzles, but only these two were mini. I would have gone with different images myself, but I'm just happy to see them giving the Zombies a chance.

The tiny itsy bitsy chock hazardy pieces even come in a little baggie. I guess kids choking on tiny things isn't an issue in Japan...

My favorite part of the packaging is the top of the box. That is the image they should of made a puzzle of.

Puzzle in process...no this wasn't set up for the shot...what are you talking about?

These are the first products of the Zombies that I've seen come in from Japan. From what I understand Sanrio, Bandai, and New Era picked up the Zombies. Stay tuned! More to come!

Insane chalking!

2011-11-07T09:47:00.000-05:00

More vandalization of the walls at Sesame Workshop.

This was our victim this time around.

Here I am roughing out the sketch and figuring out the perspective.

After roughing things out I start adding colors and darkening lines.

One of my partners in crime,Vanessa, joins me and starts adding details to the background.

My other partner in vandilization, Molly, joins and lays downs some lettering.

Molly doing her lettering thing.

Taadaa, the finished piece. This was the hardest chalk piece we've done so far due to figuring out the perspective of the subway exit. But, it just had to be done.

Here's a little time lapsy video of the process.

Another Chalking

2011-10-28T11:39:00.002-04:00

We got another opportunity to vandalize another wall at the Sesame Street home base.

This was our victim this time around. A nice clean wall next to the exit.

Starting off with my part. Character workings.

Molly jumps in with her part. Letter workings.

BAM!! Finished piece. A little somethin somethin for Sesame's bowling team.

Here's a little time lapsy video. Sorry, it's so tiny. I haven't figured out how to put larger videos here yet.

NYCC y'all!!

2011-10-12T10:28:00.000-04:00

Hi y'all! This coming Friday the 14th I'll be making my first official Comic Con appearance at NYCC. I'll be spending some time at the Sesame Workshop booth doing some sketchy sketches of Sesame characters. So, if you're at the Con, drop on by booth #2013, say hi, and get a sketch. I'll only be there sketching from 2-4, so not sure how many sketches I can get in. I'm a slow sketcher...

More exciting than that, the apparel company Mightyfine will be releasing a few shirts that I and a fellow designer (Vanessa Germosen) teamed up on. Here are the images as we delivered them.

I've been interested in steampunk for a while, so it was good to get the chance to put the Sesame characters through some steampunkin . Of course, I had to put Bert in some gear. I couldn't deck out Bert in too much gear so I added his favorite pigeon Bernice.

The answer to steampunk Bert is steampunk Ernie with his favorite bird Rubber Duckie. I did the character work and Vanessa laid down colors.

Another style I've been wanting to touch for some time. 8-Bitness. With 8-bit, I had to pay homage to the game that changed it all.

I actually designed a full Bert. But, this idea was too good, so 8-bit Bert had to be chopped off at the nose. Idea by Vanessa.

2011-09-23T22:24:00.000-04:00

Here's a Elmo I did for Sesame for Reddit.com. It's Elmo as the Reddit alien.

It shot up to #1 on the front page... I'm sure the announcement of the new season didn't have to do with the post's rise... Check it out. It might still be there!

Sesame chalk mural

2011-09-13T08:07:00.002-04:00

Here's a fun project that I was involved with for Sesame Workshop. We (Vanessa, Molly, and I) were tasked to create a mural involving character(s) and a company logo. This was at a 10:30 am meeting. The mural was needed the next day...

We got down to some brain storming and I went off (like I do) to work out the final idea. I mainly handled the design, rough layout, and characters of the piece.

Vanessa handled everything from scenery to patterns to clouds. Molly handled the lettering and patterns. This is not a posed picture. This is actually how they were working.

This was Vanessa and I's first experience with vandalism... working on a wall. Molly is a experienced "muralist". We knocked the piece out in about 5 hours. Not sure if that's fast or slow, but we did our best.

Since this is my blog, here's a shot of the characters. Abby almost broke me. She is hard to get to look cute on paper. Never mind drawing her on a wall with chalk. And, never doing it before. Almost broke me...

Here's as close of a straight on shot as the width of the hallway would allow. It works with the perspective of the piece.

A shot to give you an idea of how it sits in the hallway. It's pretty much invisible until you're right up on it. Thanks to Sesame for allowing me to work on a wall for the first time ever!

A little time lapsy video I put together of the project. Enjoy!

Inkling practice

2011-09-05T19:39:00.001-04:00

Can't wait to get my hands on Wacom's Inkling. So excited!

Inkling only uses pen...for now. Therefore, gotta practice sketching without the finer lines that pencil allows. Oh, by the way, this sketch was based on a guy I saw on the subway. I thought the contrast of his tank like size to his tiny hat was hilarious.

30s

2011-08-08T11:49:00.003-04:00

Hey ya'll, I started doing these Sesame/Angry Birds mash ups, but the mashups started just looking like new birds. Didn't quite work out. But, here is what I got before I stopped.

This is supposed to be Elmo as a Angry Bird. He just looks like a new bird, right?

This is Bert. He's better than Elmo, but still looks like a all new character and not so much a mash up.

30s

2011-07-15T16:38:00.002-04:00

I don't think these are near 30 minutes anymore, but I still call them 30s. Anyway, I've been finding it hard to find time to sketch lately. I'm sure I'll get back to it. Here's whats I got for this showing.

Saw a trailer for the Captain's movie coming up. Looked like it was a good watch, so I had to do my little version. Cookie as the Cap. I tried to change up the typical pose a bit. Not as successful as I was going for. Pose needs tweaking, but you get the idea.

This was supposed to represent my feeling for bleeding money. Figured Telly would best represent this emotion. He is supposed to be holding his neck with one hand and trying to stop the bleeding with the other. But, it seems that the money is coming out of his mouth. See kids, that's why its sometimes good to get some fresh eyes on your sketches.

Cookie is representing how I felt after the Corporate Challenge (3.5 mile run, jog, walk, crawl). I jogged maybe 2.5 miles of it. Lame. Jogging feels horrible tho. Like you're just killing yourself... very slowly.

Thanks for lookin!

Time consumed...

2011-06-15T12:21:00.009-04:00

Here's a little taste of what's been consuming my life lately. For the past year or so, my wife and I have been in the process of selling our old place and buying a new place. Well, new in the sense that its the first time we've seen it. The place is in no way new. This quickly became the black hole that swallows up all my time. I'm not one that can visualize whole rooms in my head. I can, but I can't. You know? Anyway, so I had to put things in front of me. So, I used Illustrator to build simple mock ups of rooms. These mock ups help with measurements, color tests, placement, and so on. Not exciting at all, but very helpful.

This is the long wall of our kitchen. Keep in mind that this is a New York apt, so things have to be compact. Simple enough, right? But, just this wall alone requires decisions to be made on 12 items. These 12 items literally have hundreds if not thousands of options each.

This is the short wall of our kitchen. The little gray square is a little window. Again, these are very simple mock ups with no added unnecessary details... like window frames or backgrounds.

Because of the dip in the wall we had to think about our options of working with the dip since we couldn't spend $16,000 on custom cabinets. Yes, that IS an actual quote a contractor gave us for just the cabinets.

We're getting a wall taken out between the kitchen and the livingroom. I couldn't visualize the blocks of color and layout, so I had to mock up a 3/4 view where I could toggle on and off colors and details.

Here's a straight on view of our bathroom. Simplified to play with types of tiles and layout of fixtures. Again, a New York apt, so its a tiny bathroom. This wall has over 15 items that needed to be picked out. Amazing how a little bathroom has so many things to pick out.

This was a quick mock up to feel out the layout of fixtures and how they'd look at 3/4. Again, just blocks of shapes. No detail work.

This is a custom radiator box. I wanted to provide as much info as I could in order to cut down space for interpretation for the contractor. I didn't want to end up with a box with bad mesh on the front.

So, this is mostly the reason that I've been posting a lot less this year. This process has really sucked up all my free time. Almost there. Renovations started this week. Credit card is getting the workout of its life. Place looks like walking into a war zone... or at least what's depicted as a war zone in movies... It's all starting to happen. Bear with me. Hopefully, more interesting art will start to be created from these hands again.

30s

2011-06-03T17:35:00.004-04:00

After some excitement over the Sesame Zombies this past week, here's some more sketchy sketches.

Had to get this one out for today's X-Men release. Besides Magneto and Professor X, Havok was one of my favs of this team. This is Ernie as Havok. As you see, I dug Havok's old suit better.

Watched myself the first part of the latest Harry Potter movies. Still entertaining to me. This is Bert as Harry.

Playin around with the Bird.

Attempted a dissection of Cookie with some true structure... wasn't as successful as I'd hoped. The forced perspective is a little extreme. Gotta try to push it.

Coooookie...

2011-05-25T14:02:00.004-04:00

Wow, Sesame Zombies have been getting a lot of play these few days. Thanks to all that covered this style. I'm glad these little guys tickle your funny bone.

To answer one of the bloggers out there that stated that he didn't see a Cookie Monster Zombie, here he is. I looked back in my blog and couldn't believe that I hadn't post him up earlier. He was actually one of the earliest characters created in this line. As this blogger mentioned, he pretty much has the same mentality... but towards cookies. So, here he is, Cookie Zombie!

Zombie Originals

2011-05-13T12:33:00.005-04:00

Here are the original designs of the Sesame Zombie used on the Mightyfine shirts. I did the characters and Mightyfine's artist added and altered details that you see on the shirts.

Oscar. I was going to add Slimey, but ran out of time. Maybe, in the future.

Big Bird. His shape actually needed some work from the sketch to make it more... kid friendly.

Elmo. Simple. Still one of my favorites.

Ernie. He has my favorite hair of all the Zombies. The idea was inspired by a dog that I remember seeing from my trip to Hong Kong when I was 9. It was an alley dog. At 9 it was the first time I had seen an street dog in real life, so it stuck in my head. Taadaa, Ernie's hair!

Bert. His uni-brow came in real handy with this design line.

Count. Last one done. My favorite. He just had so many details to play with.

There are a few more that haven't been used yet. If you scroll back in this blog, you'll see some in pencil form. Maybe, a couple in near finished form. I'll post them later. I wanted to focus on the ones used for the Mightyfine shirts in this post. Hope you enjoyed the tour!

Sesame Zombies!!

2011-04-19T01:43:00.002-04:00

As you may have seen in earlier posts, I designed a line of Sesame characters that were called Sesame Zombies. Yes, the name was not where the creativity was focused... it was sort of a working... Aaanyway, as I've mentioned before, its always a battle to get more stylized art out beyond the walls of Sesame. Most of the time the art makes it into the international market, but domestic never sees my work. But, this time, my Zombies made it. They caught the eyes of our friends at MightyFine. Their Sesame Zombie shirts dropped this past week. Check em out!

The first is using the Big Bird, Oscar, and Elmo. They altered the original designs for their uses, but that's what happens. Check out this shirt here.

Here's Bert and Ernie. These were the closest to my original designs. They swapped out the pupils I originally used. They preferred a light blue tiny pupil. I originally had larger black pupils. Check this shirt out here.

Here is the Count. The Count was actually my favorite design to work on. He lent himself well to the theme. Check this shirt out here.

So far, this is the first product to be released with the Zombies. There are rumblings of more products to come. Stay tuned!

Long time no post...

2011-04-08T11:57:00.004-04:00

It's been a long time. -Place excuse here- Here are the most recent "30s". I aim for 30 minutes, but most go over. And, I'm too lazy to call them anything else... so here they are. Enjoy!

This one was done in expression of how I felt in our "swing space" at work. We're in little cubicles. Try fitting a 21" monitor, 21" Cintiq, scanner, desktop drawing board, and more into a cubicle and you'll understand what I mean through this sketch.

This one was done when NYC was hit with all the snow and the city didn't do much to ease the stress of getting around. I lucked out and did not take a spill, but many others sure were not that lucky.

This was inspired by a logo a fellow co-worker (Molly!!) brought back from a trade show. I later did a vector version... I think its meant to be vector art... :)

Sigh... this was inspired by the release of the Dissected Milo figure by Kaws. I waited for the release time, got greedy and tried for the full set, got them in my cart, clicked "check out", and watched as each of them sold out before my eyes, and ended the experience with none. I was so pissed that I had to do a dissection of my own...

Of course, you must realize that a true dissection of these character would have a skeletal hand instead of a skull. It did cross my mind, but I needed to do a skull at that point. I plan to do a few more versions of a puppet dissection. These were my initial ideas following the aftermath of getting all hyped up to drop some serious cash for toys and feeling like a loser ending up with none.

Finishing off with an idea I was working on for a shirt for a company event. I like these opportunities because it means that we can push the designs farther. For its purpose, I think I need to push it more...

Sesame Oddballs

2011-02-18T16:31:00.003-05:00

Here's a little something I worked on for Sesame. I call them the Oddballs.

I was going for a cute but strange look. Graphic flat feel. They actually go well with flat or layered flat background graphics. I think my favs are Bert and Ernie. They usually lend themselves well to different styles. I like the Count too!

Merry merry!

2010-12-24T11:14:00.002-05:00

Hi ya'll! Merry Christmas and Happy New Year from the Snow Chengs!

Sorry, there hasn't been many posts lately. We've been prepping to move office spaces and home spaces. And, I've been helping out the Christmas elves out in making 2B stuffs. Check out the companion piece to this piece at 2Bnation. Thanks for checking us out. Be safe and enjoy the holiday season everyone! Cheers!

30s

2010-11-09T16:03:00.008-05:00

Sorry, for the distant between postings. It's just been crazy. I've been pushing a lot of designs out digitally. Unfortunately, all of which you probably will never see in the domestic market. Someone thinks that the domestic market can't handle that the characters are "too much of a departure" from the original character art. Oh well, US peoples, this may be the ONLY place you'll get to see this art... EVER

If you scroll back in this blog a little, you'll see the sketch version of this Grover. Stare into his eyes and feel the creepiness... heh heh heh...

He's comin to getcha... he's goonna getcha... heeee's gonna getcha...

This is the sketch version of the Count. You'll see him farther down the line. I'm actually excited to color him up. I felt good about this sketch.

30s

2010-10-12T15:27:00.002-04:00

Continuing with the Zombie theme, here are a couple more. These seem to look better in vector. I'm working on them at the same time. Will post them later. Stay tuned!

Oscar more grouchy than usual. I think I'll push him even more when I take him to vector.

Big Bird... I think I'll push him too.

30s

2010-09-29T11:56:00.003-04:00

These sketches don't take only 30 minutes anymore. They start out as 30 minute sketches, but I get carried away. You know how it is. Here are a couple more "Zombie" Sesame characters.
This is Abby. I think I'll change her up a little when I take her to vector. A little too intense to be a Zombie.

This is Zoe. I'm liking the little bump for a mouth.

t-shirt

2010-09-17T11:42:00.004-04:00

Sesame's dodgeball team(what?!?) approached me about designing them a shirt for their team. All they had was the team name. "The Rubber DUCKies" Get it? Get it? I got it, but another vision popped into my head when I heard the name. I immediately envisioned a angry Rubber Duckie.

So, I went with it. You got to run with your guts, you know? I thought the angry Rubber Duckie should carry a strong enough of a visual to be amusing. They seemed to like it. Woot!

This was thumbnail sketched and carried out in Illustrator.

30s

2010-09-08T15:11:00.004-04:00

I watched Shawn of the Dead... again. Love that movie! Then, I did some Sesame zombies. I kept the Sesame's guidelines in mind as I did these sketches... I'm sure I stepped over somewhere. But, I kept it gore free. You know, no brains and guts oozing out. Now they're either zombies or just really messed up by some other means...

Elmo was my favorite of these two.

I like Ernie, but there are a few things I would change if I took it to a finish.

30s.... kind of

2010-08-09T14:55:00.003-04:00

It's been too long. Busy busy trying to develop the 2Bs. And, working on getting eyeballs to the Facebook page. Also, known as 2Bnation. Wooot! Actually, got a nice little rush of fully custom 2B requests. Sshweeet! That's my official excuse for why I haven't posted as much as I should be. Oooo, also, working on some cool designs for Sesame. I likey. We'll see if it makes it past the walls of my office... If it gets shot down, you guys will be the first... and ONLY people to see them. Anyway, here are a couple of pieces that I was able to pull together. Enjoy!

We were lucky enough to get to go to Comic Con this year with Sesame. This is my little tribute to the craziness. Storm Trooper Bert.

Here's a little piece still running off of the last sketches I was playing with. Its supposed to be Grover... if its not obvious.

30s

2010-07-07T15:31:00.004-04:00

Long time no update. It's been a busy couple of months. Work it coming on strong. Even got a fun design project. Nice! Working hard on 2Bs. If you haven't joined us at 2Bnation, its not too late. And, I'll be going to Comic Con this year for Sesame, so prepping for that. Not representing at a booth, but just checking out the craziness and the wonderful works. I'll be sporting either a Sesame shirt or a 2B shirt, so keep an eye out. Anyway, here's some sketches.

This is Elmo. It doesn't look like him without color, but what's the fun if you always follow the rules?

Oscar! This is my favorite of this bunch. And, yes, the pupils were left out on purpose.

I love playing with Bert. I should have left his pupils out too. Maybe, I'll take them out digitally and see what he looks like...

30s

2010-06-16T16:54:00.003-04:00

Lots of craziness going on in life. The good and the bad. But, here are some sketches I got off while in the craziness. In following the Kickass theme, I did a couple more of our characters in the Kickass get up. Enjoy!

Cookie as Big Daddy.

Bert as Red Mist. He's a little harder to read. I need to add some color to them... maybe, later.

30s of week 5-10-10

2010-05-17T12:24:00.002-04:00

I finally did some sketching for my 30s. These were inspired by Kick-Ass. Comic form. A friend dropped it off on my desk at work and I couldn't stop reading it. That's what usually happens with comics. Anyway, here are a couple of the lead characters.

Here's Elmo as Kick-Ass himself. These took more than one 30 min session. I just couldn't leave these guys super rough.

Here's Abby as Hit Girl. I was thinking of using Zoe, but I thought Abby's features lend themselves to the character better.

Busy-ness

2010-05-06T08:15:00.004-04:00

Sorry, for the lack of posts lately. Life has been busy. Good busy. Main busy-ness were honeymoon and 2Bs. The image you see here is from my honeymoon. Crazy awesome. I got a new camera that I'm playing with, so you might see pix from time to time as I play. As far as 2B goes, I've got a few projects lined up that is keeping me busy just building characters. Plus, I'm developing some new items to go into our online store. And, working on bringing more eyes and fans to the 2B Facebook page. Click on the link or just search for 2Bnation on Facebook. Join us! So, as you can see, 2B is keeping me busy. If I'm not working on the 2B characters, I'm thinking of what can be done to spread the word. Anyway, a lot of good stuff going on, so stay tuned.

30s

2010-04-13T17:02:00.005-04:00

Here are my more recent 30s.

I just made my move into the DSLR realm. Because I paid a lot (what I think was "a lot") I feel like I have to shoot something everywhere I go. Bert is in the pose I feel like I'm in all the time these days. :)

This is Ernie is the style covered in the past few 30s. I don't think he came out as well as the some of the others. Eh, you get some, you miss some.

30s

2010-04-05T11:50:00.002-04:00

Happy Easter everyone! Hope everyone enjoyed their bunny day. Here are some new 30s.

Not sure why I chose to do Ernie reacting to what comes out of a choco bunny, but it was what came to me when I sat before my Wacom tablet.

Continuing the series of... not sure what the style is... just continuing the look. Count everyone!

Here's Bert in the same style. Cookie is still my favorite of this series... so far.

T-shirt fun!

2010-03-29T15:15:00.003-04:00

Here's a little something I did for a concept to be used on a t-shirt that was to be used "in house". One of the other designs I did was picked to be used, so this is as far as this design got. This was actually sketched off of the puppet. So, the arm, leg,and body are more accurate to the actual puppet and not so much the illustrated versions of the characters. Enjoy!

30 of week 3-15-10

2010-03-22T10:03:00.002-04:00

Life has been busy lately. If you haven't heard, I've been working on this project called 2Bs. Visit our site at http://my2Bs.com and join us at http://Facebook.com/2Bnation. I've been trying to get the word out to friends and family. It's pretty time consuming to keep things moving in terms of setting up shop, tweaking the site, and spreading the word. Thanks for all the support from all those that have joined us in our silliness and especially to those that have picked up their own 2B items. Anyway, enough of that, here's a sketch I actually got done last week.

The day job has been busy too. I know, its only one sketch. Weak. But, its in color...sort of. And, its Cookie!

New Venture

2010-03-15T19:08:00.003-04:00

This last week I started on a little business venture with a friend of mine. Our site is my2Bs.com. It's a design style we've played with for a while. They're called 2Bs. I've done some full custom work with it and thought that it took on likeness pretty well for a design that is quite limited in detail. So, we actually developed the line to work more towards toys at first. But, a business partner flaked out, so the idea sputtered. After some time and some more custom work with the design, the idea for doing custom products came about. We had some great feedback at craft fairs, so we decided to take it up a notch. And, here we are. We're still working the kinks out, but its moving. Stop by for a visit if you like the design. See what you think. Let us know what you think. And, if the mood strikes you, buy something. The piece you see above is our opening image. Something I threw together at the last minute because I didn't want to start the site off with a bunch of text only.

30s of week 3-2-10

2010-03-08T11:49:00.002-05:00

Here are some designs inspired by the Inuit art used during the Canadian Olympics. The medals looked like someone ripped them off of a tin can, but the patterns on the medal and on the graphics used throughout were inspiring. I don't think I did it justice, but I tried. Here are a couple of my attempts.

I worked Cookie out in pencil form first. In the end, I liked the pencils more than the digital version.

Then, went to Illustrator to throw some colors on it.

Elmo was actually the one I did first. I did a quick thumbnail sketch and went straight to Illustrator.

Best product EVER!

2010-02-22T12:35:00.004-05:00

Well, as far as my designs for Sesame go... This is a product we got in from Japan. I was super excited about these stickers because this is the first product where I felt that the company "got it". They understood how these designs were to be used. And, the quality of the product is on point.

From the packaging...

To the product itself.

This is my favorite line on the sheet. Just the heads.

They're puffy! How awesome is that?

This is the sheet that sits behind the sheet of stickers. They even did a good job on that.

I know they're just stickers. But, they got everything right. From the use of the designs to using a matte finish to making them puffy, everything was done just right. To see a company understand what I had rattling around in my head for these designs is quite amazing. Surprisingly, I don't see that much. Well done, Sun-Star. Well done!

30s of week 2-9

2010-02-16T10:18:00.002-05:00

It's been some time. Struggling to keep up with these sketches, but I'm still truckin. I, like many, was caught up with the Late Night wars. Personally, I'm on Conan's side. He moved his whole crew out to LA. Come on! I think he should come back to the east side. It's where he belongs. His show lost its edge on west. Anyway, here's my Sesame take on the hosts.

Here's Bert doing Conan's famous "String Dance".

Ernie as Jay. Imagine his head bobbling a little. Heheh.

More streamlined

2010-01-25T16:29:00.005-05:00

These are a little something I've been working on. The idea was to make the characters more animated and energetic. And, since "they" don't like the characters to be too much of a departure from the original, I kept it rather close to model. Just streamlined the details a bit.

Ernie was my favorite. His features are the easiest to smooth out.

Cookie was fun too, but I took him a little farther.

Elmo took me the longest. The way his eyes work into his head gave me trouble. Just one of those days.

Ernie was pretty straight forward. I need to work on him some more.

1st 30s of 2010

2010-01-11T17:46:00.003-05:00

Happy new years everyone. I actually got a couple of 30s off even with all the learning how to function again that happens after a week and half off. Well, this year has started off with a new venture. Well, actually, it started end of last year. For some of you, you've already seen what I'm talking about. And, for others, you'll see soon enough. Nothing big. Just a fun little project I've been working on with a friend. Got to keep yourself laughing, right? Pics to come soon. Now, here are a couple sketchy sketches.

Bert as a new year's baby!

I traveled over our break from work. As some of you know, I have a Canon G9. I'm quite pleased with it. But, as I traveled, I saw more and more people with these huge cameras. Most of them didn't appear to even know what to do with them. But, I'm finding out that there is a image quality difference between my camera and the DSLRs. Simply due to the lens and sensor differences. Damn! Now, I'm working up a healthy big camera envy. Is it worth it?

Merry merry!

2009-12-25T08:12:00.002-05:00

Merry Christmas everyone! I'm in Singapore and JUST figured out how to get online. So, of course, the first thing I did was to post my Christmas card. Hope everyone is enjoying their time with their families and friends. Hope this Christmas is great and may the new year bring you great joys and mountains of fortunes! Hells yeah!! Cheers everyone!!!

Stringy Oscar

2009-12-16T17:56:00.004-05:00

Here's another character from designs I'm doing for Sesame. I haven't been keeping up with my 30's due partly to the holiday season and partly to my laziness. Just getting into that holiday mode. Sitting around and eating. Hells yeah! But, I wanted to keep the art flowing. So, this is something I am working on for my day job.

Its Oscar in my Sesame stringy style. I always like working with Oscar. I like playing with the fine line that Oscar lives on. He's got to be friendly enough for Sesame, but also a grouch. Makes for some nice posing.

Another peek

2009-12-07T10:51:00.003-05:00

Here's another peek at a style that I'm working on for Sesame Workshop. I call them "Stringies"... yeah, not the most creative name. But, those names are usually for in house use anyway. So, no comments on the name...

Bert was actually the first one that I did for this series. There's just something about the first one.

30 of week 11-16-09

2009-12-02T11:43:00.005-05:00

Here's a little thing I did before I took off to enjoy family and endless foods for Thanksgiving. As usual, this time of year gets crazy with making lists and checking them twice, so there will be less sketches in the coming weeks. That's my excuse and I'm sticking to it. But, I will still attempt to update weekly. If not with 30s, maybe with some freelance pieces. But, here's my post.

Here's Ernie as Astro Boy. HA!

On the horizon...

2009-11-18T10:09:00.004-05:00

Here's a little preview of something I'm working on for Sesame.

If you've been following my posts, this will look familiar. These were originally from my 30s. And, I've just added some soft colors. Let's hope the non-artists that make the calls find if recognizable enough...

Charity case

2009-11-13T10:33:00.007-05:00

I've been feeling like a slacker lately on my postings, so I'm going to share a little of what I've been doing outside of my weekly 30s.

I was approached by PACT (Parents and Abducted Children Together) for a project. They're a non-profit organization in the UK that supports abducted children and the families of abducted children. The idea was that they wanted a "frame" for celebrity supporters to draw in so they could auction off. Their initial guidelines were that they just wanted some kind of frame in B&W. I took that and ran with it. I was thinking of what children like and about the children in those specific situations. I thought about what represents freedom. And, something that should be accessible to everyone. Nothing you have to buy. So, what was this? This to me was nature. Water, land, trees, clouds, and sky. That's what I did. Stylized it. Submitted it. It was rejected. Something about distracting from the celebrity's art. They came back with another idea. I knocked that out and they're going with that. But, I'm showing this one because its the one that I like and I wanted it to live somewhere.

week of 11-02-09

2009-11-09T10:51:00.005-05:00

It's been a couple of weeks since I've posted. I was bitten by the virus bug. I think it was food poisoning from this place we ate at lunch. Chirpin Chicken. Pretty sure because I was still sitting at lunch when I got my first stomach cramp. Then, I was out. I was not right for about a week. Damn little virus. Anyway, here are a few images representing how I was feeling on those days.

Never put stubble on Bert before... he is only a kid. I think its pretty funny tho.

Here's disheveled Grover. You know how it is. You're just thinking "why!?"

30s of week 10-19-09

2009-10-26T10:49:00.003-04:00

Last week I got myself hitched. Yep, made the jump! So, of course, I had to take a few days off. Therefore, I only made it into the office a couple days, which left me with a week worth of work crammed into a couple of days. Out of the couple of days, I got one sketch done. Yes, slacker. But, here is the one I did get to do.

It's Bert in a somewhat traditional Chinese wedding get up. Yah, I had to. And, that's a flower like thing strapped to Bert's chest. His chest didn't explode...

30s of week 10-12-09

2009-10-21T15:32:00.003-04:00

This week we continue with the Electric Company character style exploration. I was only in three days this week and got off two sketches. Check em out.

On this sketch I focused more on the pose and expression.

This Chibi styled one I was more focused on the style itself and how characters pose in that style.

30s of week 10-5-09

2009-10-13T10:54:00.002-04:00

Because of my sink nightmares, I was babysitting my sink for a part of the week. So, I was only able to get into the office for three days. But, when I got in, I did a little sketchy sketch. This week I had planned to stay with the same style. But, an order to develop a simple more "primitive" look for Electric Company came through. So, here are the results.

I was able to get Big Bird out before the order came down for Electric Company. Cute, but Big Bird is always hard to get looking good.

I did a bunch of sketches, but this is one of the ones I liked. I think it needs some refining, but the start is there.

30s of week 9-28-09

2009-10-07T11:08:00.002-04:00

Here are my sketches from last week. I only got out two. Damn slacker. Staying with the simplified idea and working my way through the characters.

Here's Grover. I feel he still needs work. Something with the mouth...

Abby came out well. She's a bit busy with all her details, but she's cute.

30s of week 9-21-09

2009-09-28T11:20:00.004-04:00

Continuing with the same concept, this week I was able to do three sketches. It was a busy week. Work flooded in and an event took place on Friday that took up the whole day. But, I was able to squeeze out these three sketches. Enjoy!

Oscar was my favorite of this week. His pose just worked for me. He's like a grumpy old man with a walker. :)

Zoe came out nicely. Like Elmo, she's pretty simple in terms of detail. So, its actually hard because you can simplify them down so much that they don't have enough detail to work with.

And, here's the Count. He actually has a lot of detail, so he's pretty easy to work with. Yep, I have him a baby goatee. He's not supposed to be younger. Just smaller.

30s of week 9-14-09

2009-09-21T11:35:00.003-04:00

This week I was determined to keep it simple. I like sketchy sketching, but that's not the direction I want my designs to go. I want to simplify and still represent the character as they need to be on products. It's one of those things where I'm trying to please my creativity and feel out where the limits are. Yeah, its great to say "screw rules" and design crazy images. But, then, my work won't see the light of day and I'm not doing my job. So, here's to following rules... for now. :)

Bert was my first this week.

Ernie was my favorite of this week. He just has the best feel.

Elmo was my least favorite. I think I still have to work with his proportions to push the cute.

Cookie was the last done for this week. I had to give him a cookie. No carrots and apples here.

30s of week 8-31-09

2009-09-14T11:49:00.003-04:00

It's been a couple of weeks. I've been in a rut lately with new ideas. Well, at least for the daily 30s. I'm struggling with them. But, I'm still trucking. So, here's a few that I did a couple of weeks ago.

I usually default with super hero things when I can't think of anything else. Here's Bert in a Wolverine get up.

Elmo with a big water balloon head...

And, the day the news of Disney buying Marvel. It was a dark day. Honestly, I'm a fan of both, but it just didn't seem like they should be under the same hat. You would think after a certain amount of money, owning such classics as Spider-Man, Hulk, Iron Man, X-men, etc. would be worth more than MORE money. I guess not.

30s of recent

2009-08-24T10:38:00.004-04:00

So, its been a little while. It's been a busy couple of weeks. Still busy, but it's time to get back to it. Here are a couple sketches I did recently. Went back to the super hero theme. Endless possibilities.

Hulkin Ernie. Made him a little more massive than I did Bert when I made him hulk out.

And, here's Bert with some fantastic ability. I did Grover with this before, but I like this version much better.

That's all for this week. Hope to be back with more sketchy sketches soon. Gots to keep on top of it!

RIP Ahma

2009-08-08T00:12:00.013-04:00

Early this week my Grandmom passed away. She was 90 years old. Like anyone that's 90, she's seen a lot. From living in poverty, to living through war, to immigrating to the US. From no TV to video chatting on Skype. She's lived a lot. But, most important for her generation, she's raised and watched many kids, grandkids, and great grandkids grow up happy and healthy. Not bad for someone that couldn't read, write, or drive. It's really quite amazing. So, as the week went on and preparations for our Grandmom's funeral took place, I found myself searching for some release. It took me a minute, but I came to rest on what has given me comfort my whole life. My pencil. It was wonderful to have my wife June with me, but there's just something about pencil to paper that helps me process. Likeness was never my strength when it came to straight on portraits. But, I had to try. Here is my attempt.

My first attempt was a little off. The sketch you see here is after some adjustments were made. It came out better than I expected.

After really struggling with the straight on view, I had to make sure that I wasn't losing it. So, I sketched my Grandmom at three quarter view. Much more accurate and it took less than half the time. I really have to practice my front views.

I wanted to share this picture of my Grandmom. Some may think that its in bad taste to take a picture of her at the hospital. But, this is one of my favorite pictures of her. To me, it really shows how far she's come in her life. Grandmom was video chatting on a laptop! How cool is that? Our Grandmom accomplished a lot in her life. Maybe, not to some people's definition of accomplishments. But, she accomplished what was most important to her generation. A large happy healthy family. We'll miss you Grandmom. Rest in peace.

Japanese product

2009-07-31T19:18:00.006-04:00

Finally! I got a design into Japan. It's about friggin time. Can't say its exactly how I'd like to see my designs applied, but its nice to see it applied at all. Sesame is really tough on designs that render their characters "unrecognizable" as they like to call it. This one made it out the doors. Oddly enough, in my opinion, the design is one of my most distorted designs. Simplified to the very least details possible and still resembling the characters. Here are the original designs for the "Sesame Seeds". As you can see they only took the faces of my designs. Why? Who knows. We don't question the Japanese. They produce some of our best toys out there. As for what these things actually are, I can't tell ya. Heads with suction cups... Definitely chocking hazards, but so is most of what Japan develops for us. Woohoo, design in Japan! Maybe, next time I can get them to use the hair too...

30s of week 7-20-09

2009-07-26T20:17:00.004-04:00

This week I got inspired by the upcoming GI Joe movie. I had the figures and watched the series. My house and yard served as military base and battle zones. And, as I'm sure everyone else did, I switched up body parts as the figures fell apart. And, that was the wonder of GI Joe. And, the coolest characters of GI Joe were of course Storm Shadow and Snake Eyes. My personal favorite was Storm Shadow. He's a Ninja in all white that could dismantle a tank by kicking and punching it. How much more awesome can you get? So, this week I did two sketches with this inspiration.

Ernie as the awesome Storm Shadow about to kick some Joe ass.

Bert as Snake Eyes. I always thought of Snake Eyes more as a ninja. So, I didn't give him any guns and gave him two swords instead.

30s of week 7-13-09

2009-07-20T11:08:00.003-04:00

Finally, moved on from the MJ. I'm oddly uninspired for the 30s these days. It's one of those sluggish times that we all have. But, still got to keep truckin. So, here's what I got this week. Hope you likes!

I went back to the trusted simplified structure I love so much.

My least favorite of the week. I like his weird expression tho. The creepy kid staring in your window look.

I actually liked this one. It's Ernie as a Shmoo.

30s of week 6-29-09

2009-07-05T22:34:00.004-04:00

I actually had a different idea for this weeks sketches, but the overwhelming wave of Michael Jackson everything took over. And, it reminded me of how amazing of a performer he was. And, how wonderfully clean his movements were. So, this inspired this week's sketches.

Elmo imitating a classic Michael Jackson pose.

Less recognizable, but still a classic.

Michael Jackson may have had some serious issues, but you can't take away how much influence he had on the entertainment world. And, for me, it was nice to hear and see Jackson's contributions everywhere I went for a little while.

30s - Weremo

2009-06-23T16:49:00.003-04:00

There was a lot of talk of vampires and werewolves this week at work. Thought it would be fun to make our characters into classic monsters. Here's Elmo as a werewolf.

30s of week 6-1

2009-06-08T11:17:00.003-04:00

I've decided to combine 30s for this image for a more developed image. This is a combination of 3 sessions. I call it Cookie Monster. Haha.....ahem. Enjoy!

Sesame T

2009-06-05T15:16:00.005-04:00

Here's a t-shirt my friend Vanessa and I designed for Sesame Workshop. It was made for Sesame's runners in the 09 Corporate Challenge event. It was only a limited run of 125 shirts. Yah, a black shirt is probably not great for running. But, our main idea in designing this shirt was that the shirts could be worn after the event. So, if its sunny out on the day of the run, they'll have to suffer a little for the run. Sorry. Maybe, make more stops at the water stations. BUT, instead of another cleaning rag, they'll have a nice addition to their t-shirt collection afterwards. It'll make the heat stroke worth it... Enjoy the run!

Card me

2009-05-27T18:55:00.007-04:00

I got tired of always handing out company cards with my info hand written on it, so I finally made my own. I ran a short run of 250 to see how they came out. I was very pleased. Thanks to Kano, I got my cards made at a very reasonable price with the free rounded corners. Nice!

30s of week 5-18

2009-05-25T19:52:00.004-04:00

This week I actually started another idea, but this idea took over. It was an idea continuing from last week.

The thought of Cookie being able to do the complete Vulcan solute was the main idea of the sketch. The Bock(Bert+Spock) in the background was an idea that came about mid sketch. I just thought it would be funny to have him staring on enviously.

Then, this image came about directly after the previous idea. I thought it would be hilarious for Bock to pull out the Vulcan death grip on Cookie in his intensely calm manner.

30s of week 5-11

2009-05-17T23:47:00.003-04:00

This week I was asked one question many times. "Have you seen Star Trek yet?" I have not, but do plan to. But, since the question was brought to me so much during the week, it made its way into my 30s. So, here you go, this weeks sketches to Trek.

I started off with playing with his head details. Just couldn't bring myself to adding the hand yet. Just couldn't wrap my mind around the missing finger issue.

And, finally, I did one with the salute. And, Bert Spock just staring at his hand knowing that he couldn't ever fully perform the Vulcan Salute. Eh, but close enough.

30 of week 5-4

2009-05-11T00:24:00.003-04:00

I've been feeling a little frustrated not being able to get to a more finished stage with my sketches. So, this week, I've combined my time. I was only able to squeeze out one sketch this week. But, I did use two 30 minute sessions on it.

The swine flu got to me. Oh no no, the flu itself didn't get to me. The constant barrage of news stories got to me. Here's how I pictured Bert reacting. Enjoy!

30s of week 4-27-09

2009-05-04T10:24:00.002-04:00

Continuing with my exploration, I played with Ernie, Elmo, and Oscar. I think a forehead "detail" helps a lot in this style.

I had to give Ernie a angle on his forehead. Not so pleased.

Elmo's eyes kind of worked, but not really.

Oscar was my favorite of this week. He worked the best. I spent two sessions of my 30s on him. I liked it. I think I'll do it more.

30s of week 4-20-09

2009-04-27T10:48:00.003-04:00

This week I did all Berts. I usually test out styles with either Bert or Ernie. I think they're the most fun to play with. Anyway, here's some Berts. Enjoy!

Just slight adjustments from our core style. Changing up line and structure.

I saw some Mignolia art mid week. It inspired this Bert. But, I wasn't quite pleased with this one. He was just too cavemen like. And, it didn't feel like Bert.

Next day, I gave it another shot. I think this one came out a lot better. I was happy with this one.

30s of week 4-6

2009-04-13T21:50:00.003-04:00

Here are the 30s of this week. Just playing with some shapes, movement, and reactions. Hope yous likes.

Elmo with a slight reaction and some slight body adjustments.

I pushed Bert a little farther. I like his expression.

Bert with a little movement.

I took another shot at Elmo. Gave him a little more movement.

30s of week 3-30

2009-04-10T13:45:00.003-04:00

These were from last week. I'm back to playing with styles. So, I started with cute. I did three this week.

Bert came out pretty cute. For some reason I left a mouth out. It felt right.

Ernie's came out pretty cute too.

Elmo's probably the least cute. He always ruins styles.

30s of week 3-23-09

2009-03-29T23:15:00.004-04:00

This week I just wanted to have a little fun with the Sesame characters. After weeks of traumatic suspension, I needed to let loose a little. So, I just made them a little freaky.

Here's Bert.

Ernie.
Elmo. I didn't like this one so much. I liked his body, but the head fell apart.

Cookie. I tried him without his eyeballs to see what it looked like. It doesn't look like Cookie, but I liked the feel.

This is Bert from the week before. I was still feeling a little traumatized from the layoffs. That's what I tried to capture in Bert's pose. I just imagined him rocking back and forth a little.
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week of 3-9-09

2009-03-17T11:14:00.003-04:00

So, last week was the week of the dreaded layoffs. It was not a fun week. Very stressful up to the day. Most people couldn't concentrate on work. So, everyone was just exhausted from the mental strain of the anticipation. And, that was all I could think of as well. So, I put it into my sketches.

People had been exhausted from the week before. And, on Monday, people were just not moving.

And, on Tuesday, everyone had gone over the edge from the anticipation. It was as if everyone had enough of feeling horrible and just snapped.

And, this was the feeling I got when I walked to work on Wednesday. Just a bunch of us walking to work not knowing who was to be cut. Sorry, its so rough. This was the first time I covered more than one character in a 30.
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30s of weeks 2-16&23-09

2009-03-01T17:18:00.003-05:00

I ended up skipping one week because I only had one sketch. Yep, slacking a little. There is a lot going on these days at work and out of work. Stuff that takes up a lot of thought time. So, it was hard to actually sit down and focus on 30s. I know I know, excuses excuses. But, here are the ones that I managed to get out this week and last week. Enjoy!

This one from the earlier week. I was still on the tall lanky thing.

I finally saw Hellboy 2. I didn't follow the novel, but liked the movie. It inspired this visual.

Staying on the monster theme, here's Ernie as a hunchback type of character. Yes, he is supposed to have such mismatched arms.

This is "Aqua-Bert". Yah, he's just not himself without his nose.
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30s of week 2-9-09

2009-02-16T17:56:00.002-05:00

This week I got back to playing with proportions and emotions. The first sketch was rough. Mondays are usually rough. But, I think it got better as the week went on.

See, rough. Just didn't feel right...

I liked this Bert a lot more. I liked how the attitude came out.

Ernie. I think the head should have been a little rounder.

Dramatic Elmo.

Where my cookies at?
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30s of week 2-2-09

2009-02-10T12:15:00.002-05:00

I'm posting this one late. Went to Comic Con on Friday. Forgot to take these with me on Thursday. Blah blah blah... You know how it goes. Anyway, I only had two from last week. They represent how I was feeling during the week.

This represents what I felt like when I found out that our apartment approval was to be delayed a month...

And, this Cookie represents how I felt when I realized that our lives were to be put on hold because the board could not spend a little extra time to make a decision on our case. AND, I felt like this because we are being held accountable for a mistake that the management and board made. NICE!!
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30s of week 1-26-09

2009-02-01T11:11:00.004-05:00

This week I continued exploring the same style. I like the characters and think there might be something there. I enjoy distorting the Sesame characters and bringing their inner weirdness out. So, I figured I'd sketch out more characters in this style. As I take them to Illustrator, some will be changed up little. And, others will be changed up a lot.

Here's Cookie. He's only eh. He's neither here nor there. He'll need some work when he's taken to Illustrator.

Count is my favorite of this week. I think he's going to translate well into this style.

Zoe came out okay too. She's got a nice stare going on.

Okay, this is supposed to be Big Bird. Obviously, he will need a total overhaul when taken to Illustrator. Just couldn't figure out the beak situation in 30.
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30s of week 1-19-09

2009-01-27T00:08:00.003-05:00

I'm late putting these up from last week. It's been a hectic time for me. I'm busy packing and preparing for a move. The scheduling and approvals of the housing process are a hell. Then, toss in trying to schedule a couple of moves together and its all kinds of screwed up. Nothing ever seems to get done right if you must depend on others. But, I digress. Anyway, for this set, I continued with the same style for last week. But, I did them in pencil, rather than on the Cintiq. The style is coming along. I'm actually presently working on these in Illustrator to give them a more graphic look.

I only got two done this week. This one is Abby. She's my favorite this week. She's really a little bit creepy... and I think it works for her. She should be a little creepy.

Here's Oscar. I think I simplified him too far. He definitely needs some more work. But, I think he has great potential.
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30 of week 1-12

2009-01-18T18:52:00.003-05:00

This week I was inspired by a animation company's logo. Dancing Diablo. I thought the character was really cool looking and well done. I thought it was so cool looking that it inspired this week's sketches.
I started with Bert. I think this was my favorite sketch of the week. It has the right amount of edge I was looking for.

This is Ernie. I liked this sketch also. But, I think the feel is slightly different than Bert's, but kind of like it. Like a rabid squirrel

Elmo didn't come out so well. He's quirky looking. I think I just needed a little more time with it.

Grover. Mmmm, just not there. Little more time.
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First 30s of the year!

2009-01-11T17:11:00.007-05:00

It's a new year! Hope all had a good break. I spent some time with the family and took it easy for the rest of the time. It was hard getting back to a work schedule after a long break. Especially, fitting in a 30 min. sketch. But, got to keep up the sketchin. So, here we are.

I was feeling a little under the weather on my first day back. A slight case of vertigo crept back into my head. This sketch represents how I was feelin. A little..eeh...

I even went to the doctors. I wasn't happy with this sketch. I felt that the head was a little misshaped...

This day I was feeling better, but not completely there. I thought this was the best sketch of this week. His heads a bit off balanced, but all in all I liked the sketch.
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30s of week 12-15

2008-12-30T17:37:00.002-05:00

Hope everyone had a nice Christmas. June and I spent some time in suburbia. It was a nice few days away from the city. Tons of home cooked food. Yum! Anyway, on with the sketches. These are my late post from the last week before Christmas. I was in the Christmas mood and did a series of sketches with some touch of Christmas. Hope you likes!

I was a little grumpier side on this day. Who better to represent this than Oscar?

I was in a better mood here. Here's Cookie giving what he loves most.

Prarie in the Christmas spirit.

Here I figured out that more dramatic views take me longer than my allotted 30 minutes. I needed just a little longer to work out the perspective kinks. But, the idea is there.

Hope you all had a nice Christmas and a safe New Years!
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30s of week 12-8

2008-12-13T22:20:00.002-05:00

It's been a little bit. I was in Singapore. The food is awesome! It was hard getting back into things when I got back. Not only the time difference, but the work just piled up. I tried to get back into the 30s. I got started, but it was hard to keep up. I did get a couple done. I know, I'm a friggin slacker. But, here's what I got.

I started with this one because I enjoyed the food in Singapore so much that this is how we spent most of our time there. With our chopsticks out and picking up food.

Then, BAM!!! In the middle of the week, I got hit with a spell of vertigo. Holy crap! That has got to be one of the most annoying conditions. I got up one morning and couldn't stand up straight. This sketch was done once I got back on my feet. Somewhat...
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Uniqlo UT Grand Prix 09

2008-11-25T14:35:00.004-05:00

Uniqlo held a shirt design contest a while back. I designed ten shirts, but was only able to complete three due to deadlines. From what I saw online, it seems that I could have just entered my rough sketches and it would have been fine. So, here are two of my three shirts I entered. The red one actually made it into the second round. Narrowing from 14,584 designs from 75 countries to 1000 designs from 44 countries. I'm one of 43 from the US. I'm sure there would have been more if more people knew about it. Next round will be narrowed down to 200 designs. I don't think I'll make it into that round. But, who knows. People like what they like. Of my entries, I definitely thought my character shirt had the best chance. So, that shows what I know. Anyway, check em out. Here's the link: http://ut.uniqlo.com/utgp/?lang=us#/search/ There have been a lot of problems with this link. It's hit or miss. I hope it works for you.

The idea was to just create space with a simple shape. Just a circle. I was playing with a design at work and it inspired this visual.

This was my favorite of the three shirts I entered. The character started as just the front view. The back view was created for this shirt. I like this enough that I might have to just make it on my own.
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30s of week 11-17

2008-11-23T19:37:00.006-05:00

The insanity continues. But, I managed to squeeze out 3 sketches. They were done in the very simple style I started last week. They weren't as successful as their humanoid friends. Check em out. Next week will be crazy as well. And, it'll be a short week due to Turkey Day. If I don't post by then, have a great Turkey Day everyone!

This is probably my favorite of the week. Still needs work, but at least he's somewhat cute.

This is Grover. Eh, just not there.

This is supposed to Elmo. I turned him to 3/4 and it just all fell apart. I lost my focus and I couldn't catch it again before the end of the session.
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30s of week 11-10

2008-11-16T19:54:00.003-05:00

My weeks have been crazy. There is no warm up in the morning. More like hitting the mornings at a all out run. So, its been hard to get the morning 30s out. But, I was able to stabilize a little towards the end of the week and get a couple sketches out. Here they are.

These sketches were based on a cute design I spotted in passing. This is Bert. I was very pleased on how he came out. He has a nice Bert feel.

This is supposed to be Ernie. I felt that he didn't come out as good as I wanted him to. Something about his head shape just isn't working.
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30s of week 11-03

2008-11-09T19:31:00.004-05:00

Wow, its been a crazy week. We have a new president! Not only a new president, but a new chance. Hope. The emotions and feelings that the election brought was felt world wide. It really is quite a thing to be alive for. But, life continues as it is. And, as such, here are the 30s of this week.

I didn't do a sketch on Monday. There was just too much going on. So, Tuesday's sketch was my first of the week. This was the feeling of the day. Everyone and their mothers asked if you had voted.

And, this was my feeling on Wednesday. That's sign language for the letter "O". Not everyone got that. I think very little people got it actually...

And, back to the normal. Here's a Super Grover done for a fellow worker.

Ugh, this is how I felt on Friday. From work to personal paperwork. I just felt like I was buried under paperwork.
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30s 0f week 10-27

2008-11-01T21:52:00.002-04:00

Happy Halloween! This weeks sketches all have a Halloween-ish theme. It was fun to do some not so soft and cute sketches. Dirty them up a little. Gore it up a little. Nice. These were done on the Cintiq. I still haven't been able to get the lines as fine and exact as a traditional pencil line. But, its nice to sketch loose. Enjoy!

I started with making Bert into a zombie. Thought it was a pretty common straight forward idea.

Someone mentioned Michael Jackson's Thriller. And, this image popped in my mind. It felt good. Elmo Thriller.

I saw a commercial for The Great Pumpkin and couldn't resist this one. Ernie in a Charlie Brown costume. This was my friendlier one of the week.

I wanted to go a little more dramatic on this last sketch of the week. So, I went with Grover. That is actually stuffing coming out of his head. Heh heh... Happy Halloween everyone!
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30s of week 10-20

2008-10-26T00:40:00.003-04:00

This week has been pretty insanely hectic. So, only two 30s were done. This week I did some character exploration with Bert. Just exploring a chunkier style and playing with proportions.

This is a much more subtle approach. Slight changes were made to his features.

I pushed the proportions a little farther on this Bert. With the same chunky features, but with some wonkier proportions. I like this one much better.

30s of week 10-13

2008-10-23T20:14:00.003-04:00

This week was a hectic week. That's why these are so late. Just hadn't had time to post. Anyway, this week I did poses from Heroes. I had some trouble picking the series back up after the writer's strike, but its getting good again. So, here are the poses.

Here's Bert doing the grab and throw.

Ernie doing the mind read.

Ernie doing the celebration after traveling through time.

Ernie doing the skull cutting. Heh heh, I like this one.

30s of week 10-6

2008-10-12T20:25:00.003-04:00

Okay, this week was a rough sketch week. It started off okay, but it just all fell apart. I almost didn't want to post sketches this week. But, I didn't want to show just my successes. I thought it would only be fair if I posted my failures as well as my successes. So, here it goes.

This is my only success this week. Grover as Dhalism from Street Fighter. I enjoyed figuring out the perspective of his leg.

This is Oscar as Blanka... not a great success. I was more excited when I started this piece. It just got away from me and I didn't have time to go back to fix it.

Okay, this is not a Sesame Character. I decided to attempt a puppet version of Barack Obama... I was okay with this one, but it could use work.

This was my nightmare piece of the week. It was supposed to be Mccain. Supposed to be. I didn't want to quit on this one, but time was running out. Sigh, you win some you lose some. On to the next sketch, right?

30s of week 9-29

2008-10-05T00:10:00.004-04:00

This week's inspiration came from a blog post that I happened across. It was a post of Dhalism from Street Fighter. It conjured up memories of mastering my first hadouken at the neighborhood 7Eleven. And, the feeling of defeating another person in head to head digital fighting glory. Hells yeah, nerded the hells out. And, to top it off, the Capcom SF art was great. Very inspirational. So, here's my Street Fighter inspired poses.

Here's Bert as Ryu. Still one of my favorite characters. Got to love the originals.

Ernie as Ken. I hate this sketch. Pose is weak. Effect is weak. I just hated the pose, but I said I'd post everything. So, there it is.

The last sketch left me feeling horrible, but I knew this one would work. Cookie as E.Honda. I realized afterwards that I should have made him grabbing cookies. It would have been much more amusing. Oh well.

I had a few more ideas, but I wanted to get a girl up in there. So, I made a Chun Li Zoe. I was a little hesitant at first. I wasn't sure I could cover the details in just 30 minutes. But, I think it came out aaaight.
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30s of week 9-22

2008-09-27T21:26:00.005-04:00

This week, as in many weeks, I was trolling the interwebs. I happened across an awesome design. Nanospore. They seem to have been around for a couple of years already, but I've only just happened across them. And, it seems as tho they've fallen off the face of the earth since 2007. Everything I find on them hasn't been touched since 07. If anyone finds any more updated info on these guys, please let me know. I found their art very inspirational. So, this week I did a series of some of the Sesame characters as Nanospores. Enjoy!

Bert was pretty easy to translate.

Ernie too. Tho, I'd play with his proportions some more if I were to refine him.

Hmmm... I don't know if this works so well. This is supposed to be the Elmo version. Maybe, if he were colored up, it would be more obvious.

I decided to try a different form with the the Big Bird design. I just couldn't see the eyes and beak on the top of the structure.

The Count definitely needs more work. The essense of the spore is almost lost.

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30s of week 9-15

2008-09-24T00:30:00.004-04:00

Whao, I forgot to post my sketches from last week. It was a busy weekend. It just slipped my mind. So, here they are. This weeks sketches were done on the Cintiq. I'm still gettin used to the thing. I still greatly prefer my pencils!

My flight back from San Fran inspired this Ernie. My girlfriend and I got upgraded to business class off her points. All I got to say is that business class is ridiculously nicer than coach. It just doesn't seem fair.

This Elmo was inspired by the art of David Flores. Not quite enough time in 30 minutes to fine tune the shapes, but the idea is there. Check out the awesome works of David Flores at davidfloresart.com

I was drawing a blank this morning. That seems to happen a lot. So, I just started sketching and this is what I ended up with.

I felt that I was spending too much time with the cute friendly ideas, so I just did a little angry Bert. Hope you likes!

30s of week 9-8

2008-09-14T16:21:00.004-04:00

Last week I was in San Francisco. Taking a little vacation. It was my first time in San Fran. It was fun. Jam packed days. Too many hills. But, still fun. So, this weeks 30s are inspired by my trip. Here they are.

This one was inspired by our up hill treks. There were a lot of hills.

And, there was a lot of picture taking. Funny poses and all.

Lots of good eatin.

Some souvenir gettin.

Our days were pretty packed out. And, there was a lot of walking since we did San Fran by foot. So, this is how our days ended. We would get back to the hotel exhausted. And, that's about how our days went.

30s of week 8-25

2008-09-03T02:09:00.002-04:00

Here are last weeks 30s a little late due to me being on vaca. They were inspired by the gold medal ping pong (table tennis) match that I watched late one night during the olympics. The number one and two seated players battling it out with an entire nation cheering them on. Awesome! Anyway, I love myself some ping pong, so I wanted to dedicate a week to a ping pong sequence. Enjoy!

I always thought it was funny how the pros serve.

This image I did in Sketchbook Pro with a Cintiq. We got them for work. So, in order to force myself to practice, I started using it for the sketches. Needs a lot of refinement, but it was fun.

Still figuring out the basics like as adjusting the preferences so paper resolution is what I like.

Here’s Bert taking a shot to the head. Those are always funny. I really liked using the marker effect.

Knocked out. This doesn’t really happen in ping pong, but I had to stop the sequence somewhere.

30s of week 8-18

2008-08-22T12:25:00.002-04:00

This weeks sketches are a mixture of birthday inspiration and Olympic inspiration. The Olympics have been fun to watch. Some crazy inspirational athletes. The swimming, gymnastics, and track and field have been dominating the coverage. Those are fun to watch, but I've been looking out for ping pong and badminton. Hells yeah! Hmmm, maybe next week...

And, continuing from last week. The gift was an iPhone!

It's been a non stop gadget heaven with the iPhone. Tho, I did have some dropped signal issues. Dammit!

Here's a Ernie + Michael Phelps pose. Ernie Phelps. That dude is pretty badass. Eating 12000 calories a day is pretty inspirational. Heh heh

Usain Bolt was friggin crazy too. A little too cocky. But, hell, the dude did get gold by jogging. Here's a little Bert doing some runnin.

30s of week 8-11

2008-08-18T14:32:00.004-04:00

The 30s are a little late this week. I forgot them at work. Eh, what are you gonna do? This weeks 30s were inspired by another purchase I was excited about. My birthday was earlier this week. My girlfriend hooked me up... not with another girl. She's cool, but not THAT cool... Heh heh...ahem... So, this week is my lead up to the gift.

Anticipation.

Ooo, what's that?!?

I wannniiit!!

I ran out of days this week, so tune in next week to see what I got. Niiice!

30s of week 8-4

2008-08-10T23:40:00.003-04:00

This week I went in a little lost. I had a idea of trying a Beetle Bailey style. I didn't take into account the fur texture. So, I struggled a bit to really get comfortable with this style. But, here they are. Enjoy!

Elmo's a bit odd. I also didn't take into account that the monsters have toes...

Bert was my favorite of the week. It's not really Beetle Bailey, but its got a nice feel. I might have to explore this feel a little more.

Ernie's got something going on, but his proportions needs work. But, I think he has potential.

I'm not pleased with Grover's expression, but the pose works.

30s of week 7-28

2008-08-03T01:07:00.006-04:00

This week I was inspired by my big purchase of the Friday of the week before. I picked up a PS3(Playstation 3). I missed an opportunity earlier in the year when I called the Sony store and they had the system in. I decided to wait to buy. What a mistake. Week after week I called and was told that they were out and didn't know when the next shipment would be. Last Friday I tried one more time. Finally, I got the reply I had been waiting for. And, Ernie here shows how it went down.

On my summer Friday, I decided to check if Sony had some PS3s in stock. Ernie shows how I felt the moment the sales person said," Yes, we do have them in stock."

I made my way quickly to the store...

Handed my money over... well, I used a Sony card... for the points...

Made my way home with system in hand...

And, this is the pose I've been in for the past week. Love the Blu-ray!

30s of week 7-21

2008-07-26T16:53:00.003-04:00

This week I was a bit lost. Didn't have any specific inspiration. I just played with the proportions a little.
I did a little sample this week and a little of the inspiration was left over. Yah, a little odd...

I thought I'd go with the smaller eyes this time. Most of the time I use larger eyes for the cute effect. I thought Elmo came out pretty cute.

Eh, I'm not too sure if Bert worked out well. It is different...

Ernie is okay. Proportions and pose would still need work. But, his energy is working.