New Coraline artwork

I found a couple more images of characters that I did for the feature film Coraline.

Daily sketches.

I've been doing sketches in between paintings to keep my hands in shape. I'll post the paintings as they're completed.

New 30" X 40" oil painting.

I finally had time to post my latest painting. Inspired by Rene Magritte, son of man.

Michael Jackson "This is it"

Sorry for not posting lately. I've been fussing with facebook for the last couple of weeks. I did manage to see the MJ movie though.

A couple of quick drawings but I must get back to painting!

Art show in January

I have a two man show coming up in Portland's pearl district. I have to get going on a new painting.
This one recently sold at the gallery
30" X 40" oil on canvas

Animation exhibit comes down

The Oregon historical society Claymation exhibit has been taken down. Hope all that wanted to see it had a chance to do so. They're looking for ideas and possible places to set up for the next exhibit. Seattle was one possibility but their museum is booked for two years out.

Red wine bottles, Oil painting

30" X 40 Oil on canvas

Michael Jackson (jackson five)

I sculpted this little 8-1/2 " Michael Jackson figure 23 years ago. When I first started at Will Vinton studios in 1986 I was into Michael's music and thought this would be a cool sculpt to do. It's made from Avalon oil based clay over a wire and brass armature and even the Mickey mouse is done using a clay inlay. I did it on my own time and it was never used in a commercial or anything but the odd thing was that about a year after I sculpted this, Michael called the studio and said "I wanna be a raisin". From there we began work on the MJ California raisin commercial and later speed demon music video.

It's in rough shape after all these years but I thought people would like to see it.

Apples in a glass

30" X 40" oil on gallery canvas.


















One of the coolest things about being in this gallery is that those drawings just to the right of frame are original Salvador-Dali $22,000 works of art. I'm honored to be in the same space.

Michael Jackson RIP

I'd been working on a life sized sculpture of Michael Jackson and was actually filming the process for a youtube clip that I was going to show on one of the MJ fan club websites. This is Michael from the 1980's about the time he would have done the Thriller video.

When I had the facial features a little further along I was going to splice the head onto the torso and finish that out with buckles and shoulder epaulets. Once finished I intended to cast it as a bronze statue (bronze sculpture) of Michael Jackson.

Michael Jackson's magnetism, dance moves and artistic charisma have changed the musical landscape forever. One of the most widely beloved and influential artists of all-time.



RIP~

In the Gallery

I have work in a Portland Pearl district gallery this Summer. Shown here are two 30" X 40" oils.

Little violinist

I've been very busy with other things but I'm finally back to painting.
16" X 20" oil on canvas

Claymation history exhibit

Coming to the Oregon historical society next week (Thursday the 14th) through September of 09. Will Vinton gave a talk to a couple hundred people on RSVP night and has presented lots of images, props and artwork that he's saved and tracked down from over the years. They're running ten small monitors and one huge monitor with various DVD animation compilations of films, TV specials and commercials as well as the creative process from the 70's through the 90's and there's fifteen sections with four thousand square feet of exhibit space. I was asked to come in for a couple of weeks to clean up and repair characters as well as "Recreate" my old workspace from the 1980's, so that's been quite a walk down memory lane. I'll try to post some pictures later but it's a pretty cool exhibit and something worth seeing in person at http://www.ohs.org/

Gibson ES 335 painting

This is my latest work in progress. A 1958 to 1961 es 335 dot neck electric guitar. The world's first commercial semi hollow body guitar.

30" X 40" oil on museum canvas.

Dinosaur bronze sculpture

I'll have to put together a small shipping box for this Raptor sculpture due to a recent sale. There's ten left in this edition and it measures 12" tall and 14" long. It's part of a prehistoric bronze series that I was working on several years ago.

Cello oil painting (work in progress)

30" X 40" oil on museum canvas.

Stradivarius violin 1700's

1700's Stradivarius violin oil painting 30" X 40".

Shipping out artwork

This is a bronze that I did a couple of years ago called "Preserving the legends" and there's only a few left in the addition. I recently got an order for this one so I have it boxed up and almost ready to ship out to the customer. This has a polychrome patina which basically means more color than a traditional bronze finish. In this case I used hard brown wax so I could sculpt fine detail in the beadwork and feathers.

29" tall X 23" long.
















Original wax sculpture.

More Coraline artwork/sculpts

This is a very early version of Wybie done in the traditional Claymation type Van Aken clay. I did a lot of early exploratory head sculptures searching for what the director wanted to see out of this character. This is the only one I actually remembered to take a picture of.








"Other dad", rear view.

This was kind of a difficult pose to sculpt. The angle of the arms, legs and back all had to be accurate and the body had to have the correct sense of weight.






















I don't know if this character actually made it into the film, maybe in the background somewhere. It was a fun sculpt to do and it came together very quickly.

























Baby in a pouch.

As far as I know this little guy was in the movie.

















Bobinsky's chicken




Yes it appears to be a simple sculpt but it had to be done using the shape language that the director wanted.

More Coraline art

Another scrappy Rat from Coraline.









These are more drawings that I did during the production to get a handle on the style of the movie and to think of the characters in terms of clay sculpts.

These drawings (or sketches) are my interpretation of original character design created by the concept artists on Coraline.

Coraline (the artwork)

These are a few of the sculpts that I did. I'll be posting more later.































"Other" dad.



































All images (c) Laika, Inc. 2008. All Rights Reserved. It is forbidden to download, copy, distribute and/or reproduce any of these images or text without prior permission of Laika, Inc.. Thank you and enjoy.

Coraline (The movie)

On February 6Th the movie will be released in theaters. I worked as a character sculptor on this film and as I get permission I will post the artwork.

Stay tuned.

Big Stratocatser Guitar

This is another one of my 30" X 40" oil paintings in a series to be shown at a gallery in Portland Oregon.


30" X 40" oil on canvas with 1-1/2 gallery edge.

If "Slash" Sal Hudson Lead guitarist for "Guns and Roses" would ever return my phone call I'd make him a great deal on this piece! He's the original guitar hero.

30" X 40" oils

30 X 40" oil on canvas.

30" X 40" oil on canvas














30" X 40" oil on canvas

30" X 40" oil on canvas

Santa Claus oil painting

This is the 22 X 28 oil painting. I adjusted the eye line and added some glasses to Santa.

The snapshot

This was a sentimental study of various family memorabilia that I found in my attic. War letters, old photos, a diary and a postcard.

This is way more photographic detail than I like to paint but it was a great exercise.

Artist William Harnett might have appreciated this trompe l'oeil style painting.

18 X 24 Oil on canvas

Three bears

I'm still painting for the kids at the children's hospital.

16 X 20 oil on board.

Pinocchio

I'm painting daily but not finishing one every day since I'm back to work full time, and painting larger more detailed pictures.

Oil on board 11X14

Rocking horse

I donated this painting to Doernbecher's children's hospital.


When I was asked if I had any paintings that might relate to children AND if I would consider donating them to help cheer up the kids they didn't have to ask twice.


24" X 28" Oil on canvas.

Red roses

Oil on board 11 X 14