I just came across on the web this delightful blast from the past.

This was a televison commercial I worked on in 1987 with Richard Williams, one of the all time great legends of animation.

It was great experience. I had been hired to be the cartoonist at a brand new UK newspaper called TODAY.The goal of the commercial was to use my cartoons to promote the newspaper.

I worked closely with Richard on the early part of the project. I created character drawings of the major players along with the opening sequence plus a few key drawings. Richard and his animators then took the project and ran with it.

There are some funny little tidbits in the film. In the opening art (it is very difficult to see in this low quality video)… in the audience at Parliament, there are sheep and Mickey mouse sitting in the balcony. Also, among the backbenchers are caricatures of me and a couple of the creatives from the Ad agency that managed the project.

A part that Richard particularly enjoyed was the transition of Neil Kinnock (the then leader of the Labour Party on the right) from a devil to an angel. Look carefully, you will notice he disappears up his own rear end.

As I recall, It took us three months to complete the project with hundreds of drawings used to create the animation. By the time the commercial was ready, the Today newspaper was low on cash and could not afford to give it a nationwide release in the UK. Instead it was aired on local stations (not in London). Still when I visited Richard on a later occasion, he told me it had won two animation awards ( I don’t know which… any info here would be welcome)….

Earlier this year my good friends at DigitalSteamworks asked me to help them out with a job. I have collaborated with”Steamworks” on a variety of great digital and animation projects. For this job they wanted to build a 3D Meg Whitman model for a TV commercial and came to me for some sketches. You can see a few of the sketches here… the final animation as it aired is below.

Since 2006 I have had the good fortune to work with the Maryland based digital imaging company Direct Dimensions. This company is both conveniently located near my home and one of the premier companies of its type in the country.  They are involved in numerous interesting projects from scanning the Lincoln Memorial to football star Ray Lewis.

Direct Dimensions’ newsletter is always full of cool stuff that the company is currently engaged in.  The current newsletter features KAL animation projects.  There are some good explanations of the technology involved and interesting graphics.

You read all about it HERE.