Hendrix vignettes.

I can't for the life of me recall what these were done for, but the brief was to supply some highly-finished visuals of Jimi Hendrix, with vignetted edges. They were drawn quite small - about A5 size, and they're a bit dull to look at, but I guess they were used as a visual aid or maybe as part of a slide presentation linked to a music track - I have no idea. That's actually the oddest aspect of being a visualiser for ad agencies, come to think of it. Unlike when working on storyboards for a director, you're never in the room when the work is presented to client, so you never really see the creative process through. Then, once your work is sent off, the next one lands on your desk and because deadlines are usually in terms of a few hours or a few days, you're too busy getting that one underway to dwell on how things might have gone on the last job; and sometimes when the ideas are a bit weak, you don't really care,but occasionally, when you've really enjoyed doing a job - you're left wondering what happened next. Cue violins...

Cartoon stoyboards.

Versatility is key in this job. You're often asked to draw in different styles, and as a true artist to the very core of my being, my reply is always the same - will that be cash or cheque?
I have always loved cartoons, drew them constantly throughout my youth and originally thought that might be where I would end up. It never happened because I had a foretaste of animation at University, and realised it wasn't for me, and also I preferred the idea of drawing cartoons for fun rather than for a living.
But even though cartooning is a very specialised field, the agency that held the Kelloggs account seemed to like my stuff and so for a number of years I found myself facing Tony the Tiger scripts every few months, featuring our hero in numerous heroic or James Bond-type scenarios. These were great fun to draw, as was a one-off Scooby-Doo idea, but having said all that - this one at the bottom showing a cartoon style is for Honey Nut Loops, as all the Tony the Tiger stuff is temporarily unavailable ( ie: In my shed. In a box. Getting damp...), and the colour one is for Shreddies featuring Dexter - the Lab kid not the serial-killer-killer.

Cubans, Easy Riders and Cowboys camping it up.

These few pieces are random marker visuals - the Cowboys were for an animatic for Esso, the moody Havana one was an idea for Bacardi and the Harley Davidsons cruising en-masse down some two-lane blacktop was a private piece for a friend and his business partner who were attempting to sell an outsize Harley sculpture they'd had done in bronze to the USA. In the end, sadly, they didn't succeed, but it was an admirable effort and they got a lot a lot of publicity in the States, because the damn thing really was HUGE. He tells me its now one of his garden ornaments, and I honestly don't know if he's kidding...

Sci-Fi Channel thingy...

This is a storyboard sequence for an ident for the dear old Sci-Fi Channel from a few years ago. Shades of La Femme Nikita and Aeon Flux!

The Emperor's New Clothes.

This storyboard was done for a prospective film about Napoleon quite a few years ago now, when the story was in place, but not the casting. It ended up being made as The Emperor's New Clothes in 2001 with Ian Holm as Napoleon, and the idea was that Boneparte switched places with a double in order to live out his life in freedom. When his double is exiled and dies on St Helena, he has to choose between France and the love of a good woman - should he return "from the dead" to lead France once more or retire to a life of quiet anonymity? I saw the last third of the movie a couple of years ago - and it wasn't bad at all, but I've no idea howmany of these storyboarded sequences made it through to the final cut. The part of movie I caught, though did have the ingenious idea of having Napoleon declaring his true identity and then realising that the hospital where he was taken to "rest" was in fact an asylum, where numerous inmates wandered around the misty grounds with their arms stuffed into their inside pockets muttering that they too were Napoleon. A very eerie and existential moment, and I recall that Ian Holm was over that loony-bin wall quick smart once he clocked that lot.

It's Alive!! Pass me the Goalie gloves, Ygor..

Frankenstein frame was one of several for ADIDAS, the DELL Banquet scene was done ages ago now but is here because I think it's quite purty, and the other Listerine Tooth Fairy is here because I like his face. He looks like he has really bad piles from sitting on toadstools all day.