Creative Inspiration: Hunka Junk

So I'm sure you've heard Star Wars Episode VII is filming, but what you may not have is it's director JJ Abrams has been having a friendly social media war with Zack Snyder, the director of another highly anticipated big franchise film, Superman Vs Batman. Both their camps have been going back and forth posting images "mashing up" the two franchises.

Well, as far as I'm concerned, Abrams wins with this video.

As much fun and brief as the clip is, what really thrills and inspires me is the overall attention to detail and love that the set craftsman have obviously poured into recreating the Millenium Falcon. I've watched this a hundred times. Every bolt, rivet, pipe, gizmo, greeble, and chipped section of paint was obviously made with care. Especially when, odds are, most of it will never be seen up close.

Creative Inspiration: Life Sized GODZILLA Statue

This is seriously a daydream I had as a kid become reality.

I've always loved statues or monuments in public places. I was in 5th or 6th grade and recall playing my small NY suburban neighborhood park wishing it had a statue like the ones in Central Park (in the big city). I remember imagining that statue should be a life sized King Kong or Godzilla.

And to my fellow Halloween enthusiasts, tell me this picture doesn't make you want drop everything your working on and start creating a giant monster for the front lawn this year.

More details and photos about this amazing Godzilla project at Dread Central.

Temple of Doom - 30 Years Ago This Weekend

30 years ago this weekend, I returned home from my freshman year at RISD.

I walked in the door, tossed my bags in my room, and grabbed the newspaper to see what the next showtime was for Indiana Jones and the Temple of Doom. Minutes later I was off to the Movieland Cineplex in Yonkers NY.

Yes, seeing that movie was what I did on my first night home from college. I could not wait another moment for the next chapter featuring my favorite movie hero.

 Below are a few videos to celebrate Temple of Doom's 30th, hope you enjoy.

The very first teaser...



The official trailer...



 The "Making Of" in three parts...







And this movie featured one of my all time favorite movie posters ever made (Illustrated by Bruce Wolfe)

Creative Inspiration: Set decorator Roger Christian

You know how iconic many of the original Star Wars prop and set designs are right? Did you know many were the result of one guy, with little budget... designing, building, and making on the fly?

This recent and short Esquire interview is a must read for every low budget propmaker and set designer, professional or just getting started. It will fuel your creativity for months, it has mine.

Click HERE.

Thanks to Eric at Prop Agenda for leading me to the interview.

Creative Inspiration: Jackson Shrub Supply

I've rented from these guys often over the years for various projects. Every time I go there and wander around their lot I get inspired. This company has been around since Gone With The Wind. Here's a (oddly edited) video of Huell Howser touring the shop from several years back.

Creative Inspiration: King Kong the Life-sized Puppet!

Creative Inspiration: Eric Hart

If you want to know everything and anything about being a professional prop maker (and discover countless tips and tricks making props) start following Eric Hart's Prop Agenda blog.

Wait, one more thing. He recently wrote a book - The Prop Building Guidebook.

I'm pretty sure it will become a paint stained, plaster dripped, dog-eared, and spine broken tome from constant reference to at my worktable within a few weeks.

Creative Inspiration: Ray Harryhausen

Poster image via www.badazzmofo.com

 As a kid, I knew the name Ray Harryhausen and his body of work by heart. I could recognize one of his creatures and tell you what movie it was from before I knew multiplication in math class, or even why we fought the Revolutionary War in history class. It's true.

I can only explain why this was so recalling being hypnotized by his work at a very young age. When any giant monster movie came on TV, I'd look for his name in the opening credits, like some mark of quality and worth watching.

One "monster kid" weekend afternoon, just as The Valley of Gwangi came on TV. My mom called my name from the other room needing help with some chore. I yelled back...

"Pleeeeease Mooooom, can I do it later?
I'm watching a Ray Harryhausen movie!"

By then, she knew how I loved his movies and let me be. But I suspect she also knew, which I didn't realize then, how he inspired my creativity and she allowed me to fuel it.

When I was around 8 years old, The Golden Voyage of Sinbad was in theatres. It was Harryhausen's newest movie. I begged my parent's to take me to see it. It turned out to be the first movie I remember my Dad and I going to see alone together. During the drive there, I discovered he was a Jason and the Argonauts fan. He told me all about the night he saw it in a NYC movie theater and how the skeleton fight was his favorite part.

Suddenly, our trip was no longer just a father taking his son to a kid's movie. We were now two Harryhausen fans going to see the newest monsters! 

Goodbye Mr. Harryhausen. Your work was an essential ingredient in my youth to make who I am today.

Creative Inspiration - The Talking Heads

Creative Inspiration: Discovering Dad

hollydgilliam.blogspot.com

Terry Gilliam's daughter has started a blog called Discovering Dad about the treasures she's finding in her father's personal archive. Need I say more?

Creative Inspiration: Animalympics

Whenever it's Olympic season, I always remember an old animated TV special called the Animalympics that first aired sometime around the 1980 games. I fell in love with it back then, and can note it's influence on my drawing, cartooning, and humor now.

I even quote lines from it once in a awhile. "Not bad for a fatso" said in self-deprecating humor is one I often say.

The Animalympics were originally two separate TV specials, the winter games, and the summer games. When released later on VHS, the two specials were edited together as one and is the version most know today.

Thanks to YouTube, here it is below in 8 parts for your enjoyment (but more so mine). If you've never seen before, it's well worth your time. By the way, the "fatso" line I mentioned is in part 3.

Watch in-between London game events. I'm pretty sure anything Ryan Seacrest might report will not be better than this.

Creative Inspiration: Battery Recharge

Watching an old TV special from my youth featuring behind the scenes film "magic" always recharges the creative batteries. Below, in four parts, is not only the first "Making of Star Wars" TV special that I remember seeing, but I'm pretty sure was the first ever made about the galaxy far, far away.

The Making of Star Wars (1/4) - 1977 by La_Guerre_des_Etoiles

The Making of Star Wars (2/4) - 1977 by La_Guerre_des_Etoiles
The Making of Star Wars (3/4) - 1977 by La_Guerre_des_Etoiles
The Making of Star Wars (4/4) - 1977 by La_Guerre_des_Etoiles

Creative Inspiration: "Make good art."

I know this commencement address by Neil Gaiman has been shared everywhere around the 'net recently, but if you've yet to watch it, enjoy, then go "make good art".


.

Goodbye Ray Bradbury

Creative Inspiration: H.R. Giger

Just discovered this fantastic mini documentary from 1979 about artist H.R. Giger's production design for the original ALIEN. It's narrated by Giger himself and thoroughly follows the creation of his now iconic works for the film. The behind the scenes footage is amazing - from first sketches to the sets being torn down in the studio.

In three parts.

Creative Inspiration: Perfessor Evil

Back in 2005, when I was art director on HGTV's Outer Spaces, the executive producer asked me to help research, easy but impressive looking, decorating projects for a possible Halloween special on the DIY network. That show never happened, but in my web searching I discovered Perfessor Evil's HauntProject.com and was instantly a fan of.

What I enjoyed most was the simple layout that was Pinterest before Pinterest. Photos of great projects to scroll down and look at, each linked to their origin site (and by the way, just celebrated adding it's 1000th project). Perfessor Evil had created a portal to the vast world of Halloween prop makers I never knew existed.

A few years later, I stopped by the site as I often did and was happily surprised to see that not only one of my prop projects had been found and posted, but Para Abnormal was also added to Haunt Project's web comics link page. It made me feel I was now a legit member of the haunting community.

Perfessor Evil was actually Rik Cary. Rik unexpectedly passed away this weekend. He made Halloween decorating even more creative for me as a consistent source of inspiration.

Here's a fun video of Rik's 2011 home haunt.

Creative Inspiration: Studio Prop Dept. Photos from 1937

Wonderful photos by Margaret Bourke-White inside the Warner Brothers and Paramount Prop Depts. back in 1937. Found these (and more) on the LIFE magazine gallery site.

Break-away club and prop filled pockets.

Old time practical effects - unicorn horn for a horse, turtle on wheels to move, knife stabbing gags.

Martha Raye marionette.

Mosquito prop on thread of human hair to make fly.

Spinning faux spider webs.

Creative Inspiration: Caine Monroy

Creative Inspiration: Ralph McQuarrie

How much inspiration and joy has the work of Ralph McQuarrie given me over the years since I first saw Star Wars at the age of twelve in 1977?

How's this for an answer...

When I discovered some of his original concept art on display at the Star Wars Celebration convention here in Los Angeles back in 2007, it was such an exciting nerd moment for me, I actually called my mom to tell her what I was looking at. She above many knew what a huge artistic icon he was for me growing up. My brother, who was there, thought this so funny and unimaginably dorky that he captured the moment on his camera phone.

 

The art was amazingly small. Making it all the more impressive. What I marveled at most was how clean his use of paint was. Nothing seemed sketchy, loose, random, or corrected later. His skill as an draftsman was evident as many of the finer implied technical details on spacecraft and such were just dark, ruled in, pencil lines on top of the paint. I loved that you could even catch light reflecting off the graphite at certain angles. It really brought home the fact that it was the actual painting in front of you. 

Out of McQuarrie's entire body of work, this one is my favorite. It captured my imagination when I first saw it in '77 and still does today.

Invasion of the Immense Insects

Over the weekend, we visited the Rancho Santa Ana Botanical Garden. I thought it was just going to be a pleasant (maybe a bit boring) afternoon looking at flowers, but was surprised to discover giant wooden insects had invaded! These wonderful sculptures by artist David Rogers were on display, installed here and there, throughout the acres of trails.

It gave the hike a bit of 50s monster movie suspense never knowing when one would turn up around a corner.