Superhero short film animatic

Almost forgot, here's an animatic made from the superhero boards. This one features the voices of our very own Betty LeBon (http://bettyhime.blogspot.com/), her other half, Rich, and the ex-AIB bon vivant and playboy, Seth Harold as the main character.

Enjoy.


Untitled from Mark Storer on Vimeo.

"Mindy versus the Monsters" sketches

Here's some sketches and concepts for an unmade short film I wrote and boarded, entitled Mindy versus the Monsters. It was about a little girl who, left home alone watching old horror movies on Halloween night, fantasizes that she's being chased by famous movie monsters like Dracula and Frankenstein's monster (and originally the Wolfman, but he got cut from the boards for time). 

Because Mindy's only exposure to these monsters is through pop culture rather than their original novels, she's forced to use a series of unorthodox methods to defeat them (like rationalizing that the Frankenstein is only angry because his shabby clothes prevent him from getting a date - so she gives him her father's old checkered sport coat and sunglasses).

It was a lot o fun to design and board, but I had to change so many things to make it fit the brief that by the end I no longer felt entirely confident about the story, and withdrew it from that years pitches.

     

Superhero short film storyboards

Here's some storyboards from my portfolio, for an animated short I pitched in university. It's about a miserable, misanthropic guy who has an unusual "comicbooky" sounding name, and believes this name guarantees he'll develop superpowers at some point. So he just stays inside all day, waiting for that to happen, whilst simultaneously wasting his life and hating everyone else for enjoying theirs.

Here's the opening sequence, wherein the character's father is informed he has a son, and on impulse gives him an unusual sounding name...  

Here we see our "hero", lounging around his house and complaining about his lack of powers, all the while  spying on his much happier neighbours...

He retreats to his "Fortres of Solitood" in the basement, to brood and try on his impressive collection of handmade costumes (just in case)... 

Meanwhile, across town a group of environmentalists are protesting a haulage company that transports toxic waste through the city. The protesters scarring off his drivers has forced the boss to hire blind, deaf, non-union people to get the job done. When one of them mistakenly believes he's being told to drive off, he screeches out of the lot and across town... 

Our hero sees the news report on TV and races to the window to see the runaway truck bearing down on an old lady. He runs to her side but, instead of trying to save her, simply stands there, believing that this classic origin story is how he will finally get his powers... 

Suddenly a real superhero screams down from the sky and saves both the old lady and our hero. He doesn't take losing his one chance to fulfill his dream well...

Our hero is confident that this time he's definitely developed powers. His Doctor informs him there was a slightly different outcome... 

I was never happy with the closing gag in this story (the original having been scrapped as I was informed it had already been done in a TV series) but I still like drawings here, which is why it's still in my portfolio. One day I intend rewrite this and maybe add in the aborted end to the second act (wherein the character goes outside to a local strip mall, in full costume, and annoys everybody by pretending to be a superhero, all to the tune of Love American Style).

"Train Guy" sketches

Man, I'm lazy. Nevertheless, here's some sketches for the potential protagonist (alliteration - It's what all the cool kids are about) of a short comic collaboration (okay, I'll stop) between the writer/designer/animator, Simon Ashbery, and myself. He's doing the writing, I'm handling the drawing. You can check out some of Ash's stuff over at http://grinterloper.blogspot.com/  

The story revolves around a train the size of a city, and it's long, dangerous journey through a bleak and strangely empty world. The main character's an individual who's managed to parlay a free ride in exchange for his services, as a kind of freelance security advisor, to the city-train's hopelessly understaffed police force. Oh, and he really hates drama students. Wizard wheezes, Jolly japes, and misogynistic robots ensue!   

Sure is zombies in here all of a sudden

Y'know, I was looking through several years worth of old sketch books the other day, when I realised something - I have an unhealthily large collection of zombie drawings, not to mention numerous other assorted sci-fi/fantasy crap.

Anyway, I know it's not halloween yet, but here's three sketches that I'm loathed to leave rotting at the bottom of my wardrobe. Believe it or not, this one actually started out as a still life assignment at uni (I was supposed to be learning the human skull, but ended up getting sidetracked). Looking back, the poses aren't bad, the foreshortening is a little off, and the token bald space marine appears to be having some kind of stroke, from the look of his mouth. Still, I'm a sucker undead space-guys and their shenanigans.     

Can't remember the story behind this one. He sure looks happy though, so that's something.

Ah, this guy. Let me tell you, staying up all night to catch a 6am bus, and watching Wizards whilst speed-balling Irn bru and skittles does strange, strange, wonderful things to a man's mind. 

Life Drawing

Some life drawing - pretty self explanatory. These were done at the AUCB/AIB.

And some animal drawing, all of which was done at Marwell Zoo.

"Badly Animated" character stuff

Here's a few drawings and designs from the production of the grad film, Badly Animated. They're all for the final stage of the "Wolf" character.

Here's some drawings from the earliest stages of concept, back when we were considering the idea of having the character's whole face and body morph as he moved. We didn't go through with it because we didn't think it would work (or be readable) in such a short film.

These are some face sketches, trying to work out how his face would change from one pose to another.

And lastly, here's some more face morphing, with a drawing that would become the basis for the final design and colour scheme.