Been A Long While, But I’m Finally Back With An Update.. I Was Digging Thru Some Old Work Files On

Been a long while, but I’m finally back with an update.. I was digging thru some old work files on my HD, and thought I’d put together a brief post..

Back in 2015, I worked at Nelvana on Nick Jr.’s  “Fresh Beat Band of Spies” cartoon series. A lot of the front-end creative work was directed by ‘6 Point Harness’ in L.A., including some of the Design work; usually establishing the look and style of: characters, props, and locations. Full turnarounds and additional views of those designs though, were done at Nelvana in Toronto.

Early in the production, I spent most of my time creating rotations and additional views of Props. I didn’t have any real experience drawing directly with vector lines. So, I was allowed to draw them in Photoshop on a cintiq, using very clean bitmap lines. I'm guessing another artist may have converted my finished work, later on?..

One of my favorite episodes to work on was: “Band Of Pirates” (ep.14).. There were a lot of very nice design elements in that one. Plus, a fun storyline that featured “Captain Arrrgh” stealing half of a Treasure Map. He does so, using a flying robot and a Steampunk-inspired JetSki. For which, I drew some of the additional views..

The Fresh Beat crew makes a quick pursuit using their elaborate Tour Bus, which could conveniently transform into a kind of hydrofoil speedboat! The Bus was  based loosely on the handful of Art Deco “Futurliner” trucks that GM produced in the 40′s. And I felt like the speedboat itself, also gave off a bit of “Thunderbirds 2″ vibe? Creating the fuller rotation, was something of a drawing challenge, as I had to make hard decisions about the overall dimensionality and how each of the surfaces and corners attached to each other..

About halfway thru the production, I took over the Layout Supervision from my friend: Terry Lenko. This may be the only show that I’ve ever worked on, where my End Credit designation changes across the episodes arc?! Again, I have zero experience (or interest) in vector-based art. So thankfully, all I had to do was “direct” a very talented Layout crew, rather than contribute to the production art directly..

But there were always Layout issues with the storyboard animatics, that would require attention. And Terry taught me the valuable lesson of creating quick Layout thumbnails for each entire episode. Not only did these drawings allow me to identify where the Master and Reuse BGs existed.. But I could also spot and correct all of the continuity, cutting, and staging problems, too!

Enjoy.