GameWorks, what it should have been...

One of ten logo designs I presented to DreamWorks SKG.

This was one of my designs, that the design team took, and had embroidered on the back of jackets and gave out to everyone involved in the project.

In 1997? I got a call from Bill Stout, asking me if I would be interested in doing some design work for DreamWorks SKG. He was part of the concept and design group creating video arcades for the team of Universal Studio, Sega and DreamWorks SKG. The original idea was to create a game arcade that had a futuristic retro feel, along with the idea that children had taken over a giant warehouse and created this play space. It was, in a sense, an indoor amusement park, with a Disney inspired feel, for creating artificial imaginative environments. 

The lead designer was John Snoddy, who was one of the imagineers for the Disney theme parks. John wanted me to design some retro styled logos that would give the arcade an identity. I also worked on some graphic images that were to be scattered around the inside of  the building. I got a chance to visit stage #35 at Universal Studio, and to see some of the concepts, artwork and scale models of the plans they had. It was pretty exciting. They had actually created miniature poster versions of some of my artwork, and included them on the inside walls of the model of the arcade. It was truly humbling to be amongst these incredibly talented designers, and to have them accept me as one of the team.

Bill was so generous with his time with me that day, he had stacks and stacks of watercolored illustration boards showing designs for kiosks and proposed interactive themed games. One of the ideas he had, was to create a kiosk called "the filling station," this is where you could get your favorite beverage. The great thing about this was, the servers were all dressed in vintage style gas station attire, including hats and bowties, and would dispense your drinks via a gas pump. It was very clever and witty. This was just the beginning of the all the incredible ideas he had. 

Unfortunately, GameWorks in reality, became just a shell of what the original proposal was. DreamWorks SKG actually pulled out, and GameWorks ended up pretty much like any run-of-the-mill arcade. They kept none of the unique feel or the atmosphere that would have made this stand out amongst all of the other cookie cutter ideas. It's a shame, it was such a waste of all those brilliant ideas and incredible talent.

One other story of note during that day. When I was hanging out at Bill's desk eagerly going through all his stacks and stacks of fantastic ideas, he received a phone call. After he hung up, he told me that on the phone, were people representing "Steve," they had asked Bill to do some design work of a bug creature, that would "scare the heck out of Steve." This was for a movie that was in the works, based on a comic book property, that I had never heard of. At dinner that night, I got to watch Bill sketch out his ideas with a Sharpie on some napkins. It was fun to see his wheels turn as he drew some nasty looking insects. It was several months later, when I actually got to see the movie that Bill had created that creepy bug for, it was called "Men in Black." There up on the screen, at the end of the film, was that big bug creature, that I'm pretty sure did, scare the heck out of Steve. Oh by the way, the reference to Steve in the story, was actually Steven Spielberg. I wish I had those napkins...

Scenes from the Xenozoic Age portfolio

Outside of portfolio box, with silk screened image
Corrugate folder that held the prints
Vellum envelope and chapbook found inside of folder

When I first became familiar with Mark Schultz's artwork, I knew that I would some day have to do a project with him. In 1997 I got my chance. After five years of begging, pestering, and presenting concepts and mock-ups, Mark's publisher at the time, Denis Kitchen finally gave in. After discussions with Mark and Denis, it was decided to create a portfolio of prints of Mark's cover art. Now Denis, who is a true visionary, wanted to create the most lavish portfolio ever produced for the comics market. He basically told me to pull out all the stops. That really is a dream come true to any designer. 

It took a lot of research and networking to pull together all of the different vendors to make this portfolio happen. I knew I wanted the basis of the design to be a wooden box, where the top would slide off to reveal the contents. I wanted to create a portfolio that was built in layers, each thing that you opened, would in turn, unveil a new thing to explore. I also wanted to create an aesthetic similar to Mark's approach to storytelling, where nature and machines work together in harmony. The graphics on the top of the box are a combination of schematic plans along with organic imagery. The folder and band wrap on the inside of the box is a natural e-flute corrugate with metal grommets and corners. The two envelopes inside the folders are a translucent vellum, with a one color image printed on the outside. Each of the ten 11" x 17" prints is embossed with the gear/trilobite logo. The portfolio was created in an edition of 99 and retailed for $299.00. I think they all disappeared pretty fast. Which, I believe, was a great relief to Mr. Kitchen.

It was quite a project. I was happy with the results, it was a good start to my collaborations with Mark. Denis was a fantastic publisher to work with, he greenlit the project and let me run with it. As an artist himself, he knows what it takes to get the best work out of creative people.

Ladislav Sutnar

One of my absolute favorite designers is Ladislav Sutnar. Born in Czechoslovakia, he was the pioneer of information design. Overshadowed by his contemporaries, the Constructivist and Bauhaus typemasters El Lissitsky and Moholy-Nagy respectively, Sutnar is a relatively unsung leader of Modern objective typography. He worked in America in the years after the war and made Constructivism both functional and playful in it's application to catalog design. In the early 1960s he was hired by Bell systems to develop a variety of design programs. One of the things he was responsible for creating was the area code parentheses.

The thing that has always impressed me the most, was how he was able to take what appeared to be very uninteresting, mundane items and create interesting organized catalogs. Sutnar was the art director for the F. W. Dodge's Sweet's Catalog Service from 1941 to 1960. This was America's leading producer and distributor of trade and manufacturing catalogs. I can't imagine what a daunting task that would have been, to take all of that uninspired product and form some user friendly, graphically pleasing informational pamphlets. The images above are some samples I have of Sutnar's skill at doing what he did best. I think his use of typography, his creative way of getting the best use out of a limited palette, and his way of organizing his information are all very inspirational. As far as I'm concerned, nobody does it better.

Poster Designs

These are a couple of poster designs I did a few years ago. I had always wanted to do posters for myself, creating the subject matter, doing the illustrations, and writing the copy. Both posters are done with tongue firmly planted in cheek. The idea of the first one was, what if they had created a monorail system that crossed through the entire United States. Instead of flying or taking a train or bus, the family would climb on the Flying Tortise monorail, and relax and enjoy a luxurious sightseeing adventure across this great country of ours. It looks like it would be perfectly safe and very comfortable. I know for a couple of years between 1953 and 1955, they ran this monorail very successfully from St. Paul to Milwaukee. The only problem was, it took longer, and was more expensive than if you just drove your car. Of course, it's totally ridiculous, but it's still fun to imagine what the advertisement might look like.

The second poster, was meant to promote a non existent school. The school was to help young men develop careers in aviation design. It was a non traditional school, in the sense that, the boys were encouraged to "think outside the box". Unfortunately most of the designs that came out of the school were totally impractical and never had any commercial application. The only student to ever actually achieve employment, within the aviation industry, was Chubby McNeal. He went on to be successfully employed with TWA, he stayed with the company for three years as a baggage handler. It was never made clear what Mrs. Sinclair's exact role in the school was. 

I ran an ad in Juxtapoz magazine in an effort to sell my large inventory of posters. Much to my delight, the response was great, and I actually sold five posters. I never came close to making my money back on the posters, or even the cost of running the ad, for that matter. If anyone is interested, I think I have a very limited supply of around 200 for each of those posters. The size is 18" x 24" and they are printed on high quality (expensive) paper. In case you haven't figured it out, I'm not a very good businessman.

Xenozoic Tales Playset

I've been lucky enough, over the last several years, to work on several projects with an artist, whose work I really admire. Mark Schultz brings such a quality and craftsmanship to everything he does. By working with Mark, it challenges me to  raise the level of my game. Using sports as an analogy, the best way to get better at your position, is by playing against people who are better than you. I like to think that Mark makes me better at what I do. 

Each year for the San Diego Comic-con, with Mark's blessing, I've tried to create special limited edition products related to Xenozoic Tales. Each item is created in extremely small quantities, and is signed and numbered by Mark. Two years ago we presented this Xenozoic Tales Playset.

Marx toy company created fabulous playsets from the 1950's through the 1960's. They usually contained hundreds of figures, along with buildings, vehicles, terrain, and creatures. They were quite likely to be the highlight of any Christmas during that period of time. Even though, Xenozoic Tales didn't exist then, it seemed like if it did, it would have been a good prospect to become a playset. So instead of a Marx Playset, we created a Mark's Playset. This was a tribute to that era, and an attempt to recapture the excitement of Christmas morning. This was fun to try to approximate the feel and style of the packaging of those Marx Playsets. This was designed in an edition of ten, it came with 4 people, 4 dinosaurs, a palm tree, and a rocky wall. I know, that I can speak for myself when I say, that this has given me hours and hours of quality play time.

Cowboy Pull Toy

Here's something a little different. This is a wooden pull toy that I made. For a real long time I've been interested in the Fisher Price pull toys from the 1940's through the 1960's. In fact, I kind of collected them. The paintings of the characters always reminded me of the artwork from children's books of that same era. It seemed like there was a lot of pride taken in the art that was executed. Unfortunately, most of those artists were never given the recognition that they deserved. Those toys were a great combination of motion, sound and illustration. Because of their construction they would hold up to most anything that the youngsters could dish out. The idea that they can still be found pretty easily, suggests that, people had a fondness for them beyond their childhood uses. This is my attempt to capture the feeling and motion of those toys. As you pull this across the floor, the two cowboys arms go up and down, as if they are shooting at each other. Of course, to make it seem like it had just been pulled out of the toy box, it has to look like it has had years and years of playtime. Adding the aging, with staining and sanding felt like the right finishing touch. I think it would be fun to take some contemporary cartoonists and turn their characters into pull toys, it could become the newest designer toy collectible. 

Zero Man

These are a couple of pages out of a recently acquired book on Zero Man. The art was done by Osamu Tezuka, who is known as the Japanese equivalent, of Walt Disney. He is probably better known for his work on Astro Boy, Kimba the White Lion, and Phoenix. I'm not a real big fan of manga, but I find this stuff very charming and stylistically appealing. Even though this was created from 1959-1960, it has the feel of classic Disney animation from the 1930's. What I really like, aside from the style of the characters, is the coloring. In the first page, the color is so warm and sophisticated feeling. It's amazing to me, with all of the modern technology that we have today, that the comic book coloring I usually see, is overly rendered Photoshop effects. Here's something that was done 45 years ago, and it is so attractive and appealing. The matte paper stock also works well to allow the colors to blend in with the paper, as opposed to the color sitting on top. The second page was colored with only two colors, red and black, and again the technique makes it look almost like full color. It's interesting how with a limited palette, that the colors make that page feel so organic. There isn't a sense that the colors overpower the line art, they seem to work together in harmony to create some really beautiful artwork. Maybe, in this case, less is more.