Sorry, nothing new.

Hi guys! Long time no blog. Sorry about that. Unfortunately there's no real new work to show. I just want to touch base. Thing is, my paying job, usually strict about avoiding overtime pay, has told me to go nuts. It's the nature of the current status of the project. We're way behind. It's a great job! I'm working on the Mr Men show to air on Cartoon Network starting in January. (Andy must be familiar with the Mr Men and Little Miss characters, being from England. Mr Happy, Mr Tickle, Miss Naughty, etc.) With the duties of caring for my son I'm having enough difficulty managing 40 hours per week, but I feel obliged to do more if I can manage it. I'm the lead animator of a crew of 8 other animators, as well as providing storyboards. Telling other animators their work isn't good enough and they need to redo it is fun, but storyboarding is the most fun. It's like being the writer, director, and animator rolled into one.

But I feel really bad about having set aside Ultrafoot for so long, so I'm working hard to figure out a scheme where I can keep making progress but continue to earn the big bucks.

I do have this one drawing you haven't seen. Another shot at a character design.

This guy's cute, but maybe a little too hip and cool? Not nerdy enough? I like the school uniform, though.

I've been drawing bunches of these little kids and nothing's speaking to me. Sometimes I think it really doesn't matter. Do I really think I'll come up with some sort of innovative or ground breaking design? It's just not my strong suit. I'm really anxious to just get animating and I could just pick a kid and go! But I should keep at it. I don't want to make the same mistake I did on Ruby Rocket. I started animating before being comfortable with her design and I ended up with about 30 different Rubies.

I'm depressed. I was having fun with this fat kid, then all of a sudden he looked just like Dexter to me.


I really want a character with some volume and flexibility. With Flash cartoons you tend to get one head drawing and you move around the mouth and eyebrows like a Mr. Potatohead. It's cheep and looks so cheesey and I'm so sick of not drawing cartoons! For Ultrafoot I want a kid who can go from cute to hideous as his mood changes.

Back to the drawing board.

These kids have some spunk. I'm going to keep working in this direction.

What do you think of this one? It's rough, there's a lot of pacing issues, but it does a better job of illustrating the lyrics. It also keeps most of the "feats" montage.

I haven't had much time to work on it lately, so no new design ideas to post today.

I am not at all ready to post a new version, but posting is fun and easy, so I thought maybe putting up this stuff I don't actually want anybody to see could be usefull somehow. Plus, I've had to spend a few days on a frustrating and unfulfilling assignment for the studio, so posting now will help get my mind back in the Ultrafoot game, and keep the blog momentum going.

The cartoon has gone from mostly storyboarded to about half empty! The first tossing Ultrafoot up in the air card lasted too long and then gets repeated later, so I cut it. I've always been iffy about the green glow special effects scene in the garden when he gains his powers. I've been tempted to cut it a few times but 1) I think it could look really stylish and cool! and 2) it got a chuckle from a friend when he watched it. So it stays in for now.

I think we want much more Ultrafooty type stuff happening, and we want to address the sirens and the "bad guys" line from the song.

Currently he kicks a bully, rescues a cat, repairs a dam, and diverts a meteor. I've compressed them quite a bit so they take less time, making room for more. Obviously you want his feats (no pun intended) to get increasingly spectacular, so I figure new ones belong between saving the cat and plugging the dam. Although, I really like the joke of how he saves the cat. I mean, wouldn't you expect him to just jump up and get it? So maybe that one could be moved back. Depends on what new stuff I come up with. I also moved around the dam and meteor so that we actually see his foot when the song says Uuuuultrafooooot.

I'm not ready to take out the transition from being tossed in the air by adoring fans to jumping on the bed. It may eventually get changed but for now I really like that ending.

So we come to DESIGN. Man! it's been a long time since I've designed anything. I feel like it's even been a while since I've done any drawing! It's amazing these days how you can be an animator and not even draw anything. (Makes me feel like putting quotes around that "animator".) I also feel like it's been so long since I've had any creative control I don't know who I am anymore. I'm think I'm putting a lot of pressure on myself for the design. I really want it to look unique and appealing. It's a really fun stage because you get to just let yourself draw and have fun, but it's difficult too because there's no way to achieve what you want except through a lot of work.

Some general concepts are fairly set in my mind, mostly from the work done on the original illustration for the CD booklet. He's fairly portly and somewhat nerdy looking. In most cases he has glasses and curly hair, but I'm not married to that. I imagine his back story to be that he was an unattractive and unpopular kid before gaining his super powers. After his super powers he just remains unattractive. I hope to manage something kind of "cute-ugly" if you know what I mean. I also like the joke of his "real-world" costume. I mean, how the hell would Peter Parker make that kick ass Spider-Man costume? (Especially the movie version! There's no way!) If a real kid gained super powers I'm sure he'd just tie a bath towel around his neck.

This stuff is really not worth posting! But here it is:

Just a quick change to the damn bursting sequence. It doesn't really address the "bad guys run away" issue but at least it references the sirens in the song. Unfortunately, now I feel zooming in on the damn makes the pull back to the bottom of the damn irrelevant and the whole sequence feels too long. Maybe it always was.

I have a feeling the next post might have a fairly radically different second half. Seems there's lots to try out.

Here's the first complete run through, start to finish roughly (ROUGHLY!) storyboarded. In fact, I'm inclined to point out they hardly qualify as storyboards since the characters aren't designed and the staging is so simple. More like thumbnail ideas of what might happen.

With that said, it's a bit shaky in spots but I personally think it's pretty funny and has a lot of good opportunities for fun animation. How do you like my surprise "it was all a dream" ending?

I intend now to work on designs and art direction, so we can live with this version for a bit and see how it holds up. This is an excellent stage to put forth ideas or raise concerns!

Just plowing straight ahead.

I realize I have the "radioactive" symbol on the GMO warning sign but I want the biohazard symbol instead. I'm not trying to be political with that, just looking for a little more of an explanation for his gifts than "toes were in the spinach patch..."

My disappointment at having to change my idea for the thief-tripping gag has given way to the realization that this new version is better anyway. It's distressing how common that is! I feel like maybe I should pretend every idea I have can't be used for some reason or another so I have to think of something else. I'd probably be rich and famous by now instead of just smart and handsome.

This new version is pretty literal when it comes to illustrating the lyrics, but I don't think that's always so bad. They're pretty surreal images and the cartoon's likely just going to get weirder.

What I should be doing is working on character designs and developing the look and feel of the whole cartoon, but I couldn't resist just digging in. So I've started blocking in the cartoon with stick figures and I've already discovered one of my first gags isn't going to work.

I had it in my head that after the line "The crime rate's down to zero, since he's been around..." the song went into the "Uuuultrafooot" chorus. But it doesn't, it starts listing his powers. My joke was going to be that he saved the day just by using his regular old foot and I was planning to reveal later on that his foot really has super powers.

I'll have to figure something else out, unless you want to re-record?

Welcome to the Ultrafoot Online Production Diary!

The fabulous band The Quiet Two wrote a spectacular song called Ultrafoot and entrusted me with the honor of creating an animation to accompany it!

The purpose of this blog is to keep the band updated on the cartoon's progress and solicit their feedback, so entries will be addressed to Chris and Andy. However, as it's up on the web, anyone can see it and marvel at the slow, grinding, soul-crushingly tedious process that is animation!

Enjoy!