Comic-Con Report

Kevin put up a great photo recap of our Comic-Con experience on his blog. Check it out!

Part I

Part II



And special thanks to our friends Dan and Ada Cole for taking all the photos!

Print added to store

I'll post a Comic-Con recap soon but I want to thank everyone who came to the show and stopped at our booth. It was good seeing familiar and new faces alike.

Unfortunately (or not, depending on the perspective), the Decemberists poster I previously posted about sold out at the show so it won't be for sale online. But if it magically appears for sale on the band's website I'll post it here.

I have, however, added the "Phileas Fogg Checks the Time" limited edition print (check previous post about it) to the store.

Click here to go to it!

The Decemberists

It's no secret I'm a huge fan of the Decemberists and I was fortunate enough to be asked by them to do a gig poster for their Vancouver BC show (occurring tonight and again tomorrow night). The concept is inspired directly from their latest album, The Hazards of Love, and visually it's inspired by the lush forest and landscape paintings by the stop-motion master, Jiří Trnka.



Detail:



Detail:



I'll have a small stock of these at Comic-Con, which again starts tomorrow. Whatever is left will go in the store after the show.

Don't forget! Fleet Street Scandal will be at booth #1316. See you at the show!

ps: Coraline is on DVD now. Go get it! You can even watch it in 3D, although I can't guarantee the quality of the 3D is any good.

Rad video!

My buddy Jon recently designed the video for U2's latest single. I think it turned out pretty amazing. Check it out!

U2 - I'll Go Crazy If I Don't Go Crazy Tonight from David OReilly on Vimeo.

Comic-Con!

This Wednesday Kevin and I will once again be exhibiting at Comic-Con down in San Diego. I can't believe it's already been four years since our first one! And this year we'll be at a different location than we usually are. Normally you'd be able to find us in the exhibitor table area, but to celebrate the release of the new book we thought we needed a bigger space, so now you can find us among the booths, at booth #1316.

Here's a preview of what's in store for you at the Fleet Street Booth!


Yuki 7 makes her San Diego debut! We will have copies of our new book, Seductive Espionage: The World of Yuki 7 for sale at Comic-Con for the very first time, along with these other items:

- Limited supply of the Collector's Edition book!
- English, Japanese, and French Yuki posters!
- Yuki 7 shirts!
- Appearances by Don Shank, Megan Brain, and Elizabeth Ito!
- Lots of other surprises

Besides the Yuki prints, I'll have a stock of four of my prints at the show. Two of them you've seen already, International Hotel and Passepartout. And then I'll have two new ones. The first is the 17"x17" limited edition digital print "Phileas Fogg Checks the Time" (seen in my previous post).

The second is a very limited stock of a screenprinted gig poster I did for the band The Decemberists. I'll post the whole image after the poster premieres at the venue tomorrow, but until then here's a sneak peek:


It's going to be an amazing show. Make sure and stop by and say hello to us!

Phileas Fogg Checks the Time...

... is the name of this new piece. Just in time for Comic-Con, it's going to be a limited edition print with a run of only 75 prints. I'll have about 25 of them at the show and the rest will be online shortly after. Dimensions for the print are 17"x17". Digital.


I'll also have a new screenprint at the show as well which I'll post on here early next week.

More Comic-Con details coming soon.

Monocle

Thanks to everyone who made it out to the Yuki show at Gallery Nucleus last Friday! It was a great launch for the book and almost all the artwork on the walls sold. There are still a few pieces left (including mine) so head over to the store to check them out.

Also, I recently did a few editorial illustrations for the latest issue of Monocle magazine. Here they are:

Yuki 7 Show Reminder!

This Friday is the Seductive Espionage: The World of Yuki 7 show at Gallery Nucleus. It'll be an amazing show and I'll be there so if you stop by make sure and say hi! There were will be cocktails and swinging 60's music and who knows what else.

Also, my piece will be for sale. I'm not making additional prints of this one so if you want a rare one-off print from me then you might want to buy it!

And right now Boing Boing is doing a giveaway for a collectors edition of the book (among other things) so head over there to enter.

Grickley things

My buddy (and fellow Laikan) Graham Annable just opened his own online store. Check it out!


His drawings are humorous. As are is his animated shorts.

Yuki 7!

In case you missed it on the Fleet Street Scandal blog or Kevin's site, here's the trailer for the Yuki 7 spy flick, A Kiss from Tokyo:

"A Kiss From Tokyo" Theatrical trailer from Stephane coedel on Vimeo.

Kevin developed the trailer to promote our new book, Seductive Espionage: The World of Yuki 7. It's now available for pre-order!

And here's my contribution to the book:


Set design for Yuki's Roman safehouse. I wanted it to feel more Le Samourai than James Bond, showing that even Yuki has to rough it every now and then.

Conclusion

I'm out of Coraline art that I think is worthy of showing to the public, so this will be my last post on the subject. The art shown on this blog is only a small percentage of the work that comes with the territory of being a production illustrator. The majority of the time is spent doing rough drawings that might become a more finished piece or in most cases, food for the trash can. And sometimes concepts are needed so quickly that a rough doodle is all that is required.

So, I hope you guys enjoyed it. From now on I'll be posting my personal work on here or whatever else I think might be cool.

And Coraline just came out in England (and will be hitting the rest of Europe over the summer), so if you're reading this from across the pond make sure to go see it!

Image (c) LAIKA Entertainment

Buggy Furniture 4

There was an early idea for the bug living room where it was going to be a natural history museum of sorts, with stuffed animals and display cases to show off entomological wonders. That idea changed into what it is in the film, but there is still an element of that first idea that you see for maybe ten frames in the final movie. On one of the walls is a display case with a bunch of bugs pinned inside of it. If you blink, you'll miss it, but the actual prop was one of the most gorgeous props made for the film and I wish it had more screen time.

These are designs for the bugs that are on display in the case.


Image (c) LAIKA Entertainment

Buggy Furniture 3

And in case you thought these props couldn't get any weirder...


I had to take the nordic track from the real world (designed by Andy Schuler) and make a bug out of it. Maybe the strangest thing I've ever had to design. I got multiple comments that the thing looks like me. I'm not really sure how to take that.

And the table.

Images (c) LAIKA Entertainment

Buggy Furniture 2

A couple more...


radiator bug.


Images (c) LAIKA Entertainment

Buggy Furniture 1

Here are a couple concepts for some of the bug furniture. They're kind of weird.


Images (c) LAIKA Entertainment

Bugroom

Here's the final concept for the Other World version of the living room, where the furniture is bug-shaped and the Other Mother begins to reveal her true form. Like in the other sets, all the bugs have a corresponding real world version.


Here's a screenshot from the trailer of the final version of this set. When I did the concept I was really unsure how the final product would look since every part of the design had something crazy going on with it, like the glow of the furniture and walls to the way the bugs moved. But I shouldn't have had any doubts because the builders and riggers and lighters on the crew are amazing and they nailed it perfectly.


Also, my buddy Graham posted some storyboards from this scene on his blog. Check it out!

Images (c) LAIKA Entertainment

Tables and Cannons

Here are a couple more real-to-other Bobinsky prop conversions.

First a table and some boxes...

Become a circus tent and carnival stands.

And a barrel that turns into a cannon.

Images (c) LAIKA Entertainment

Chicken Popper

Thanks to everyone who showed up at the Emerald City Comicon! Kevin and I had a great time and it was amazing to hear feedback from people who saw Coraline. Glad you all liked it!

Now back to the concepts. In the last post I talked about translating the real world props into Other world variations, and this chicken is a good example. It starts out in the real world as a pet chicken standing on a box with an old wheel propped against it.


And in the other world it became this:

I wish I could take credit for the concept of the chicken popper, but I believe my friend Michel Breton was responsible for the idea. I just painted the final version of it.

And check out the sculpt of the chicken on Tony Merrithew's blog.

Images (c) LAIKA Entertainment

Whoops.

Sorry for the lack of posts in the last week. I've been busy getting ready for the Emerald City Comicon in Seattle that's happening this weekend. Kevin Dart and I will be there selling the last stock of our book and some prints. Check out the Fleet Street Scandal blog for more info.

Regular Coraline updates will resume next week!

Other Bobinsky's Attic

Here's the other world version of Bobinsky's attic. It's viewed from the same angle as the real version so that it's easy see how the real world props translate to the other world. A priority in creating the other world sets was to try and take the real world props that inhabit the sets and make fantastical versions of them to populate the other world. I think this set best illustrates that idea.

Image (c) LAIKA Entertainment

Real Bobinsky Props

Here are some prop designs for the real version of Bobinsky's attic. Even though the big concept for the set contains a lot of props, it's still important to go in and break out each prop and describe it in better detail so that the model makers have good reference for what they're supposed to build. The clearer it is in illustration form, the more accurate it'll be to the concept in the final output.


Also, with the design of these props I tried to give Bobinsky some history that is never explicitly stated in the film by making them seem like relics from a distant past he may have had working in the circus.

Images (c) LAIKA Entertainment

Real Bobinsky's Attic

Here's the final concept for the real version of Bobinky's attic flat. Because the architecture of the house was already established at this point Henry wanted the attic to reflect the space that was already defined by the roof of the the house. With the help of my friend Morgan Hay who was assistant art director on the movie, I built a half-scale mock-up of the space using foam core so that Henry could look at it and we could make spacial adjustments on the fly. After Henry approved the layout of the attic I took a picture of the mock-up and painted this concept on top of it to establish the lighting and feel.

Image (c) LAIKA Entertainment

Random Plants

Here's a concept for the poplar trees that line the driveway of the Other House.


And some other plants.

Images (c) LAIKA Entertainment

Real Garden 2

Here are a few more shots of the real garden at the beginning of the film.

Images (c) LAIKA Entertainment

Real Garden 1

Here's a wide shot of the dead garden at the beginning of the film. The Fantastic Garden was designed first so the geography of the real garden is almost identical which is why this one still resembles Coraline's face. But you never see it from this angle so it's impossible to notice in the film.

And here's a detail drawing of the bridge and tree.

Images (c) LAIKA Entertainment

Plants & Gates

Here are some more plant concepts. Most of these are really rough, but the general idea was to figure out what plants would fill out the rest of the garden behind the featured plants. Some of them are based on early Tadahiro designs, others are based on plant rigs the rigging department had already come up with. They generally had to be the colors that would make up Coraline's face for the reveal at the end of the sequence.

And here are some gate concepts. I think the final prop ended up being the middle design, but without the "C" shapes in the doors.

Images (c) LAIKA Entertainment

Color Script

Here's a color script I did for the garden sequence. They used a lot of blacklight paint and LEDs with fiberoptics to create the different lighting illusions in the flowers so it was hard to predict exactly how the colors would turn out, but I think the final result looks pretty close to this.

And here are a couple more black and white studies.

Images (c) LAIKA Entertainment

I'm not going to post anything else for the next week as I'll be out of town, but make sure and check out the blogs I linked on the right. All those guys created amazing artwork for Coraline and they've all posted work from it on their sites.

Plants & Animals

A few more concepts for inhabitants of the garden. The trumpet plant is based on a thistle plant that you can usually find in fields and grassy areas. They actually used dried versions of the real plants in the film that were rigged with wire to make them animation-friendly.


These are color studies for the frog and hummingbird, painted over CG renders.

Images (c) LAIKA Entertainment

B+W studies

Here are a couple black and white studies I did for the garden sequence. Most of the plants are based on early Tadahiro designs, but I also had to take into account what was physically possible with the rigs that would be used to make the plants move. With stop-motion, this is always something that has to be considered in the design phase.

Images (c) LAIKA Entertainment

Bleeding Hearts

Here are a few concepts for the bleeding hearts in the Fantastic Garden sequence.


And here's the final version that made it into the film:

Images (c) LAIKA Entertainment