Scavenger Robot

Took the magical iPad on a roadtrip recently and continued with the robot theme. Made this little guy on the 5 north between Valencia and Bakersfield.  Don't worry; I was the passenger in the moving vehicle.  This one is six layers of colors and shadows.

Robot

Another one from the SketchBook Pro app.  This one is on four layers: the background, the shadow, the robot's colors, and then the robot's outline on top.  There was liberal use of the mirror function.  And I'm okay with that.

There's No School like the Old School

EPCOT Center.  Circa 1989.  Ahh.  Magic.

And each Future World pavilion used to have its own logo.  Simple and pure and genius.  Here's a wallpaper for your magical iPad in honor of this great time in history.

Click here to download to whatever folder syncs with your magical iPad.

iPhone Version!

Click here to download to whatever folder syncs with your amazing iPhone.

Dreamfinder would be happy.

iPad and SketchBook Pro

There's an app in the iTunes app store called SketchBook Pro.  It's wicked fun to sit on the couch and just doodle away the afternoon.  You get all sorts of brushes, which can be manipulated, and a full color editor.  Here's a clown.  Why a clown?  No idea.  None whatsoever.  This one is three layers: The background (different shades of purple with different opacities), the shadow (an airbrush with high opacity), and then the clown (color and outline).

Updated Design

Got a magical iPad for my birthday.  Somebody loves me.  Now I just have to go down to Starbucks with it so everyone can see me using it.  ;)  But now I can test my designs!  Which led to this update of the too-busy, colorized Tomorrowland Terrace.  This looks WAY better on the magical iPad.

Click here to download to whatever folder syncs with your magical iPad.

The magical iPad

Tomorrowland Terrace

I was goofing off in Illustrator today and decided to do something based on the art direction of Disneyland's Tomorrowland in the 60s.  This is an ode to the Tomorrowland Terrace stage, the one that rises from the ground just as the band starts rockin'!  Groovy, man!  (It's iPad-sized once again.)

Click here to download to whatever folder syncs with your magical iPad.

Beauty and the Beast Dark Ride

Whenever a new Disney movie (the animated kind) was released, I used to imagine what a dark ride for it would be like.  Of course, my dark rides were always 4 times as large as is realistically possible without a show building the size of the Indiana Jones Adventure and $200 million dollars.  I'm guessing I drew this around 1992, back when I was fascinated with the use of a turntable that matches the speed of the ride vehicles to tell an extended piece of the story.  Journey Into Imagination at EPCOT had one, and I thought it was the coolest thing EVAR!

It's Fun to Be Free

I fell in love with EPCOT Center during my first visit in 1988.  What an immense playground for the mind and heart!  Each pavilion brought new use of technology to tell a story or share information in an amazing way.  Sadly, the place has very few wonders left in it.  Most of Future World has been stripped of its elegance and spirit.  Although World of Motion was not a favorite of mine, it believed in itself.  And it believed in you.  And that's worth celebrating.  So I made a little illustration of its grand facade, simple and striking.  (Not to scale.  At all.)

Peoplemover Vehicles

Just messing around in Illustrator with an iPad-sized canvas.  I miss the Peoplemover at Disneyland.  It gave the whole area movement and life.  And the ride itself was a fantastic getaway from the people below.  You kind of felt a bit superior riding around over all the guests.  AND you could spot the short lines and plan your next move.  Hope they bring it back.  If not, enjoy it on your iPad.

Click here to download it to whatever folder syncs with your iPad.

Don't Know Yet

Was thinking of painting something new.  Don't know what.  But I like graphic-y trees and birds as leaves this week.  Next week, who knows.  Might be clowns and robots.

Grendelfish Brushes

In the Grendelfish post, I mentioned I thought it would be cool to make a brush out of the roughened edge of the logo.  I gave it a shot.

Grendelfish

When I was 19, I wrote a play about pirates.  The basic premise was that a group of male pirates rescues a group of female pirates (who lost their ship in a severe storm).  A high-seas battle-of-the-sexes and hilarity ensues!  (I know, right?  Hey, I was 19.)  Anyway, when the crews weren't battling each other, they were battling Grendelfish, an evil sea serpent with glowing yellow eyes.

The best thing to come out of all this was the logo I designed. ;)  I still think it's pretty cool.

Interesting side note: I designed it in Illustrator 5.  What was that?  Like 1993 or something.  Anyway, all I had in my file cabinet was a printed version.  I scanned it, and then opened it in Illustrator CS4.  Illustrator auto-traced it and then I clicked Expand.  And that was it.  No cleanup required.  We've seriously come a long way.  And somehow I gotta figure out how to get that edging into a brush stroke, cuz that's just plain awesome.

Interesting side note 2: See the graphic at the very top, the one that says 'On the Third Floor'? Notice the F and L are 'combined.'  Now look at this graphic.  The L and F are 'combined.'  17 years separate these pieces.  That is really quite creepy.  Do I require therapy to deal with my inherent need to get Ls and Fs up in each others' business?

Really Bad Kitty Family: Bunny

Intergalactic Zoo

While contemplating the future of Tomorrowland at Disneyland, I thought a great attraction would be the Intergalactic Zoo.  An alien corporation partners with Disneyland to bring a whole herd of interesting beasties from planets around the galaxy for the people of Earth to enjoy.

Ranging from the cute and cuddly to the ferocious and deadly, the beasties would roam about custom enclosures that were designed to look and feel like their home planets.  You would tour this zoo in an open-air hover craft.  Sometimes you would enter the enclosure itself and sometimes you would be behind glass, depending on the relative danger to the park guests.  Wink, wink.

I made a quick sketch of the marquee that hints at all the treats to expect inside.

*I spelled intergalactic wrong on the sign.  D'oh!

Really Bad Kitty Family: Squirrel

Another iPad Wallpaper

Why am I doing this to myself?  I don't even own one!  It really is fun having a new canvas size for some reason.  Oh yeah, and why is it 1024x1024?  I've read that when you turn the thing on its side, it doesn't resize the wallpaper to enlarge it if it were 1024x768; it shrinks it and gives it a letterbox feel.  Again, haven't tested it.  Not completely in love with the 'starburst.'  Hmmm.  It may come out.

Click here to download to whatever folder syncs with your iPad.

Really Bad Kitty Family: Bird

i heart iPad Wallpaper

I don't own an iPad, so I couldn't test this.  But it should work beautifully no matter the orientation.  I created two masks for both orientations and aligned the graphics to look good even if you're spinning your iPad like a basketball on your finger.  (But don't do that.  It's kind of expensive.)  Not sure what the image will do when it actually orients itself.  Think I need to buy one.  For research purposes.  Yeah, research purposes.

Click here to download to whatever folder syncs with your fabulous new iPad, you lucky dog.

Really Bad Kitty Family: Mouse

it's an iPhone world

Here's an iPhone wallpaper made in Illustrator, which is based on Disneyland's it's a small world tower clock.  I did my best to line up all the various sections so that it would match the interface.

Click here to download to whatever photo folder syncs with your iPhone.

But it started as a sketch first.

UPDATE: I decided the date/time area was too boring and the slide bar area was too busy.  So I tweaked it a bit.

Click here to download to whatever folder syncs with your iPhone.

Really Bad Kitty: Easter Card

A happy Easter depends on your perspective, I guess.

Seasonings

It had been a while since I'd used Illustrator.  More than a decade.  Which on a software development timeline is like visiting an art gallery three caves over.  So I was desperate for practice ideas.  Just anything really that would force me to learn all the new features and tricks.  I chose to do one piece for each season. Not terribly original, I know, but it did provide the bonus of not having to think of any other ideas since this would mean I got four for the price of one idea! Score!