Intelligent Design

I was inspired to sculpt this piece during a trip to the LA Zoo. I was at the Gorilla exhibit, and all the people around me were acting like monkeys. Literally. One of the gorillas was sitting on a rock observing the strange life form on the other side of the moat -- his gesture reminded me of August Rodin's The Thinker. It was so ironic to see the tables turned like this. Gorillas are intriguing to me -- seemingly brutish beasts, yet gentle and intelligent vegetarians... I love the irony.

Secondhand Lion

Secondhand Lions, directed by Tim McCanlies, and featuring Academy Award winning actors Robert Duvall, Michael Caine, nominee Haley Joel Osment, and Kyra Sedgwick, is a coming of age story that follows the comedic adventures of an introverted 14 year-old boy (Haley Joel Osment), and his cranky, eccentric great-uncles. Although Haley wanted to act with the real lion, the producers decided it was too dangerous, so he had to make do with a puppet. That's where I came in...twenty four hours and hundreds of pounds of refined mud later, this was the result. Not bad for working a second shift until 2 AM. A friend of mine, Matt Jordan (multi-talented salt-of-the-earth guy) got me together with Tony Gardner, owner of Alterian Inc. for the project. (Matt has worked with Tony for years in a multitude of capacities.) Tony and I both lived up in Lake Arrowhead at the time, but never met until Matt. After a talk over dinner, and a look at my portfolio (and liking another lion sculpture of mine), Tony invited me to join his crew and lead sculpt on this project. When looking at the sculpture, keep in mind that, while you may think the anatomy looks exaggerated, it has to show through the fur and backing (like muscles under skin and fur would). Alterian is a great shop, and Tony is par excellence -- one of the best people I've worked for. I found one cynical critic who posted a review on the web about the puppet, but most people don't even notice it when watching the show, so it must have been good enough for the purpose it was designed. Others have commented on the neutrality of the position, but again, there's a specific purpose the sculpture was designed for. The rig and puppeteer bring the lion to life. Had the sculpture been posed, it would have made the puppet susceptible to tearing at the extreme movements. I've done some other work with Alterian, and would have done more, but our schedules were generally unsynchronized. To see a pic of the puppet with Haley Joel and the puppeteer click: http://www.comeawayohumanchild.net/SecondHandLions/DVDontheset.htm

Arich in...

You've got to love the Internet. I Googled Arich's name not too long ago to see what might pop up, and this (see link below) was among what I found. When you put your stuff online, you're sending it on a journey through a winding universe of virtual wormholes, and you never know from which of these holes it might peek out. (Some mysterious wormhole is the only way images of Arich's work could've ended up in eBaum's World.) We aren't really sure who posted the eight pictures there, but the site ranks in the Internet's top 1000 according to Alexa, so we're not complaining. Just be sure to proceed with caution if you do check it out... the site is controversial for good reason. But any publicity is good publicity, right?

Visit the link at http://www.ebaumsworld.com/pictures/view/164832/

A 'Finished' Work in Progress

Randall David Johnson (born September 10, 1963), nicknamed "the Big Unit," is a left-handed, six-foot-ten starting pitcher who currently plays for the Arizona Diamondbacks. Johnson has been internationally recognized for having one of the most dominant fastballs in Major League Baseball. In his prime, the five-time Cy Young Award winner regularly approached (and even exceeded) 100 miles per hour with his signature pitch, a biting slider. Ironically, Arich isn't a big baseball fan. Though, like most American boys, he had baseball fever as a kid, and, having pitched in Little League, has experiential understanding. Arich sculpted this piece (which is only a rough-out, preliminary, or prototype) for McFarlane Design Group (MDG). At the time the piece was composed, it was part of MDG's proprietary process to first create a rough or prototype. Then, through a series of molds and casts, the piece would be enlarged and shrunk, with details added along the way. MDG's process is collaborative, so unfortunately, Arich didn't handle the final details you see on the marketed piece. But what a set-up! In the words of Dev Gilmore, Vice President of Product Development for Gentle Giant Studios, Arich's roughs are more dynamic than most peoples' finished work. So true a statement, so gracefully demonstrated in this piece, captured as a "work in progress."

Dilophosaurus

Monumental at over 20 feet long and 10 and a half feet tall, this was a fun and ferocious assignment, no exaggeration. That's also the actual size of the beast, known as Dilophosaurus, who once prowled the earth. The picture can't convey the unsettling feeling conjured by standing beneath this behemoth sculpture. The project was sculpted in conjunction with Garner Holt Productions and Gentle Giant Studios for the Natural History Museum in Cairo, Egypt.

I started by presenting a quick little study to GHP's president -- Garner's superlative-- and vice president of production. With the study, I suggested that I sculpt a detailed maquette designed from current paleontological records and anatomy charts, and then scan and enlarge my design by CNC. (GHP would eventually bring in an enormous CNC 5 axis gantry mill to do the job.) They took my suggestion, and I got the amazing opportunity to design and direct this project.

A big job like this requires big tools, so we enlisted the help of Gentle Giant Studios to do the scanning -- a great company to work with (they get all the fun projects), and Owner/President Karl Meyer is as personable a guy as you could hope to work with. Quite a sight it was to see that mega robotic CNC mill carving the dino in delicate 4#psi polyurethane foam. Several 8'x4'x2' blocks of foam later, I had multiple puzzle pieces to assemble and begin carving -- that's right begin carving (the mill provides only a rough stratified form). I had to craft custom carving loop tools, because with a short time frame I didn't have time to use the "big" tools you can buy at art supply retailers (one of the loops I made had a cutting edge about a foot and a half).

The armature for this piece was also bigger than usual and more dynamic than the standard museum taxidermy fare, so I worked with a roller coaster engineer to make sure all those curves could be supported on just two limbs -- otherwise a tripod is preferable for stability.

One thing I would've liked to see done differently was the paint scheme. Due to the limitations of an egotistical painter, the colorfully varied markings I had envisioned were left off. (A note to painters: Don't paint in the shadows, it overemphasizes them -- the forms will create their own -- it doesn't read right when you do.) I wish I could have done that part myself, too.

In contrast to Crusader, this project demonstrates I can handle the big scary monsters with just as much dino-mism, while still micro-managing the microscopic details right down to the scales.

Spectrum 15! Syble here, posting for Arich this time around. We just found out that Arich's piece Crusader made it in. For those unfamiliar with the book, it's a yearly compilation of the of the very best in contemporary fantastic art from a variety of fields, such as comic books, advertising, film, and fine art. Annually a select panel of jurors chooses from thousands of works submitted by some of the biggest names in fantasy art. This year hard working artists from all over the world submitted more than 5000 works of art for consideration, and only 343 made the cut for inclusion in the book. Other Spectrum regulars include amazing artists such as Frank Frazetta, Carlos Huante and Justin Sweet. So, needless to say, this is a major honor. I think Art Director Irene Gallo in her blog, TheArtDepartment, said it best. When a young artist earns a spot on the pages of Spectrum, she says, "...it can be the first time their work is being seen by thousands of potential clients, with the unspoken caption 'best of the best.'" Check out Spectrum's website at http://www.spectrumfantasticart.com/

Crusader

Sci-fi action adventure fans are eager to see the next installment of the Indiana Jones franchise, so in anticipation of this, and taking advantage of the hype, Gentle Giant Studios (GGS) offered me the privilege of creating these pieces. Harrison Ford is like an icon for those of us who grew up in the Star Wars/Indiana Jones generation. Not featured in the gallery on the website, but shown here, is a bust I sculpted of Indy. I always liked the Indy movies, so this was a fun gig. Perhaps my favorite of the Indy flix is The Last Crusade, especially the scene at the end of the film when Indy has to walk by faith and not by sight to cross a bottomless chasm to safely reach eternal life on the other side. The scene is a great metaphor for living out Biblical Christianity, and also for my career as an artist. Faith is the confidence that what we hope for will actually happen; it gives us assurance about things we cannot see. It's by God's grace that I've made it this far, and if I'm to go on I will have to proceed with this same faith. That scene has been an inspiration to me, because many a time I've looked out and not seen a way forward, yet as I step out, the Good Lord provides the way.

Note the scale of the Crusader sculpture -- it's tiny, yet full of dynamism. I was thinking of all those great Remington sculptures when I was composing it. You may be asking yourself why I didn't sculpt Indy from the scene I'm speaking of. The answer is simple: I was asked by GGS to put Indy on horse back. I'm okay with that, because in the scene that inspired this piece, Indy is valiantly fighting enemies of goodness, the Nazis. I like that Indy is crusading against the antisemites -- another great historical metaphor that's also dominating the world political scene today. Both these pieces debuted last summer courtesy of GGS at Comic-Con '07.