Four Weddings & an Animator...

Hi everyone! Been quite a while since my last post; so much has been happening these past few months, it's crazy! It's wedding season here so I've been attending stag doos, engagement parties, suit fittings, dance rehearsals & weddings both in London & abroad! One of which was the wedding of my good friends Danny & Milana, who had theirs in Serbia. Was really an amazing event & trip, & I couldn't be more thrilled for them both!

I actually stopped off in Croatia for three nights before hand, just as a bit of a holiday. I stayed in the city of Split, which is right on the coast & has some of the most gorgeous scenery!

The other was that of my very close friend, David. Congrats again, bro! Here's a vid of what went down at the reception...




Aside from weddings etc, I've also been working pretty full on at a cool little studio called Electric Theatre Collective. Been there for about 3 months now developing a series of animated idents for "Talk Talk", who are currently sponsors of the X-Factor TV show. I'm also working with these most talented bunch of peeps: the guys from The Line, Stephen Vuillemin, Carlos de faria, Jonathan Djob Nkondo, Aya Suzuki, Daniela Negrin, Marie-Margaux and James Hately; most of whom are friends of mine + others I have worked with on past jobs, so was a pleasant surprise seeing them all the first day I started. Shout out to Wesley Lewis & James Duveen for referring me on the job.

Here's the team...

It's been a huge honour working with such an amazingly talented & lovely bunch of people. I've learnt lots, made new friends & caught up with some old ones too.








The guys from The Line have gone on to work on their next short film (which I'm looking forward to seeing), but a few of us are still here working on the remaining spots. I'll post up some designs I did for the ad later, but for now here's the first batch of idents I worked on which are now being aired. I animated the "chalk board" spot at the end & also the little girl in the first seq.

Talk Talk "Idents" from Electric Theatre Collective on Vimeo.

Also, here's the "making of" of the production... Ps: That's my arm at 1:30... Enjoy!


-M-

Planet Pulp Gallery Show #1

Hi guys!

Hope you're all well & have had a good weekend? It's been a buys few months here with lots happening; one of which is potentially moving into a new apartment. I won't bore you with the details, but there's been a lot of non-exciting paper work involved! Off that & onto more interesting news, I'm excited to announce Planet Pulp are officially launching their 1st Gallery Show, "RED"!!

I've been a member of the PP online-artist community for a little while now, contributing every now & again to the monthly themes, & I'm pleased to say I'll be exhibiting in this it's 1st PHYSICAL gallery show also! There are an amazing bunch of artists contributing to the show (my good buddy Shaun Bryant being one of them). We have a secrete online forum which we've been using to share our WIPs to each other, & I can honestly say the show is going to ROCK! I'd like to say a big well done & thank you to Jayson Weidel (PP's founder) for having the vision for this show & seeing it through to it's reality! A lot of effort has gone into putting this together & I'm sure I speak for all the PP artists when I say it's very much appreciated.

I'll be submitting 3 pieces to this show, all of which I've themed around an early Buster Crabbe "Flash Gordon". Directly below is a cropped sneak peak teaser of my 1st completed piece. I've had so much fun working this up & can't wait to show you the finished thing.  I'd also like to thank my pal Alex for providing a great added inspiration for the colour theme ;)

Below are my three pieces in line-work stage. I've always been interested in Flash Gordon as a character, so this was a great opportunity to explore him even more while creating my own rendition.

 

I hope those of you over in the Los Angeles side will be able to make the show! (more to come...)

-M-

"Final Frontier" Star Trek Art-Show!

Hey all! If anyone's in Paris right now (or will be within this month) & fancies going to an awesome art show, head over to the Dernier Bar avant la Fin du Monde & check out the "Final Frontier" Star Trek Art show I'm a part of, hosted by the good folks at Geek-Art.net. My "Survivors of Cheron" piece is being exhibited there among some other cool artists! The show premiered just yesterday & will be running until the 30th of June!

There will be a limited print run of x20 only of my piece, which you can pre-order (only at the show) OR wait till after the show has ended to order directly off the Geek-Art online store (yet to be updated for this exhibit).








Hope some of you guys will be able to catch the show!


Live long & prosper, y'all _\\//
-M-

***JOSIE & THE PUSSYCATS*** PRINTS!!!

***JOSIE & THE PUSSYCATS*** 15 LIMITED PRINTS!
Now taking pre-orders!!! 

A3 size: 16" x 12"

270grm Archival Satin Fuji paper. For orders/ enquiries drop me a direct message, or Email me at: max@maximajination.com 

or call/ text: +44 778 626 0953

Thank you!

-M-

"Survivors of Cheron" (Bele & Lokai).

Here's a piece I just just wrapped up last night for this months Planet Pulp monthly themed show... This months theme (I'm sure some of you super cool geeks out there will have guessed) was "Star Trek"

Those who know me well will know I'm an Original Series man, so naturally, that's where I went.

These two characters are redesigns of "Bele" & "Lokai", from the episode #15, season 3 show: "Let that be your Last Battle field"... Originally titled "A Portrait in Black & White", (which I prefer),  Bele & Lokai are two alien beings from the war-torn planet "Cheron"... Bele, a law enforcer (who is played by the ever animated Frank Gorshin), has been in pursuit of Lokai (Lou Antonio), a refugee/ rebel on the run from oppression, for 50,000 years (Earth years, to be precise), for "political crimes"... The episode ends with the two being completely consumed by their unending feud of racial ignorance & mutual hate towards one another.

Watch the full episode here.




-M-

*** Interview with the Insider ***

Hi everyone. Sorry it's been a little while since I've posted here; as always commercial work eating into most of my free time... No complaints though, good to keep busy!

I meant to post this here sooner, but here's my recent interview with the awesome Animation insider.
I'd like to thank Mike Milo for reaching out with the invitation; was a lot of fun to do! I hope you guys enjoy reading it & find some of it helpful.

-M-

Interview with the "Animation Insider"

I was recently invited by 'Animation Insider' to do an interview. Just wrapped it up lastnight, so should be up on the site next couple of days! Will let you all know once it is, but in the meantime, do go check out some of the other great artist interviews ;)











-M-

Pitch Work...

Here's a bit of artwork I did last year which contributed towards a pitch for something for HBO... I don't think it was used though, so hopefully no one will come after me. Can't say too much about it, but if I had time, & it was part of the brief, I'd have loved to have added some typographic treatment to this.

-M-

A.T.A Finished Poster

Hi all! Been a busy few week here, but finally catching up with my posts. Here's the finished festival promo poster for the Animation Tag Attack short film. (more info on previous post)

I wanted to convey the look/ feel of classic 'Pulp' magazine covers; here's a great pulp-art FaceBook Page I follow which I was able to draw reference & inspiration from.

The film itself it pretty dark & twisted, so wanted this to come across in the design... As usual, I did a few thumbnails to work out the scene. Since I didn't have too much time to get the poster finished, as I was working on a commercial job at the time, I settled on this layout fairly quickly... (think it was actually on my 2nd thumb).

During working up the composition, I decided to off-set the floor plane of the figures in the background... Originally it was on a straight horizontal, but insetting it an a slight angle, instantly it gave it a more dynamic feel... It also helped break up a little 'mirroring' I could see developing.



Creating a sharp sense of "all eyes directed at" the two central figures was also something I wanted to get across, hens the surrounding figures menacingly luring over the two in the middle, as though they were ants under a magnifying glass... Below are a few colour grade variations I ended up with... couldn't quite decide which I liked the most. Love to know which you prefer...?
 

 

Here's one of my reference/ mood boards, where I had up characters from the actual film + other bits I liked... I particularly liked the colours on the image top left.







Generally, I'm a huge Frazetta (below right/ bottom) & Jeff Jones (below left) fan, so naturally + considering this was for a pulp-style illustration, I drew from them both.

 

-M-

ATA Poster Artwork...

WIP of a poster I'm designing for a collaborative animated short I was a part of a while back, called "The Animation Tag Attack"... The project, founded by multi-talented artist/ animator/ musician, Christen Bach actually started back in early 2010, & was completed in 2011... Since then it's been traveling the world on the festival circuit; one of which was at the Annecy Animation festival last year, which I was awesome to have been able to attend. The film has been received well & even picked up a number of awards on it's travels!

A year or so on, & the film is STILL traveling, & has been accepted into several other shows! A few of these festivals it seems require poster artwork of the selected films, so Christen got in touch & asked if I could put something together... So here's a little teaser.... (more to come)

Fig: 01

Fig: 02

-M-

Commercial Stuff (Pt:01)

Hi guys! It's just dawned on my how much I've yet to post up on here. Mostly due to either being too busy + a little forgetful. So over the next week or two, I'll be making a huge attempt to play catch up with it all... I promise! In fact, here's something to kick things off...

SPIRIVA 'HANDIHALER' VIDEO 03 "Diaphragmatic Breathing" from Max on Vimeo.


Back in the middle of 2011, I directed (at my then representative studio, th1ng) a series of 8 instructional videos designed for those suffering from COPD (a respiratory disease), which explained how to use a new medicinal product called the handihaler... In short, the brief was to design a character which would be the mascot/ narrator of the videos... a sort of coach/ drill sergeant.

The next three images are initial designs I knocked up as a first round... I wanted to capture a lot of

Fig 01: My fave here was the guy up top pointing & blowing a whistle...

charm & personality in the character... I'm a huge appreciator of Zagreb Film & UPA's works (who isn't?), so any opportunity I get to experiment with that style, look & technique of animation, I jump right on it! Since this spot was for an instructional video, it was a perfect opportunity... Here's one of my favourites from Zagreb, & another from UPA.

Fig: 02

This particular version here, the clients asked for a look similar to a previous commercial I had co-directed... (Thankfully they didn't go with them)

Fig: 03

At this stage, the clients had now suggested if somehow I could create a character out of the actual product itself... I hated the idea, as I felt it'd be too cheesy & could easily see what should have been a "charming" character, turn into one of those stereotypically, over-excited product mascots you just wanna punch repeatedly in the face!


Again, thankfully they didn't go with it, but I did like the one on the right... The visual of his entire head rapidly opening & closing (hinged on one side) as he'd speak had me cracking up inside.

Fig 04: Colour variations

Fig: 05

Here's the one they went with in the end, which thankfully was the one I was rooting for... He was now named, "Coach Chester" :)










They liked this version with the grey top & blue track-pants, so did a very quick page of poses to give the clients an idea of funny actions he could do.

Fig: 06

Clients now asked for him to lose a bit of weight, as they felt he was a little too on the plumpy-side to be a coach... (should've see the gym teacher I had back in school)... They selected #1.

Fig: 07

Based on their brand colours, I then generated a few variations for Chester's outfit.

Fig: 08

... And finally, here's the character turn-around I knocked up from the client's chosen colours... Most animated TV show characters in the 1950's had a thick-stoke outline; this gave more weight to the characters, & really helped 'pop' them from the backgrounds.



-M-

Prize Winner!!!

Happy Monday, y'all! Was just sent this great pic by my good pal Nick, who snagged this 'one in three' print give-aways during my Christmas Scavenger Hunt comp... Awesome!!!

I have very few left now, so if you're interested in grabbing one or two, head over to this link to see high quality pics of the actual prints, & drop me a private message there with your order ;)

Cheers, Nick!!







-M-

Everyday folk...

Spottet a guy today that looked like this... Sort of shuffled along taking small (quick) steps, gazing into every shop window he walked by... His hair really was that long, & he had this very same expression on his face... I tried, but couldn't help starring as I walked past him...

-M-