matts drawings- blog of comics and sketches that are interesting, stupid, and/or weird

New Blog Address

noreply@blogger.com (Matt Nyce) — Tue, 14 Jan 2014 21:12:00 +0000

All new blog posts will be here: mattnyce.com/blog Please redirect your internet hoses.

House on a Hill

noreply@blogger.com (Matt Nyce) — Fri, 18 Oct 2013 00:28:00 +0000

Drawn from memory: Charlie Brown

noreply@blogger.com (Matt Nyce) — Fri, 11 Oct 2013 15:51:00 +0000

Pumpkin Carvin

noreply@blogger.com (Matt Nyce) — Tue, 08 Oct 2013 04:07:00 +0000

Tried doing that pumpkin shaving thing? Is that what its called? Like a little sculpture? Lotta fun!

Man Animation

noreply@blogger.com (Matt Nyce) — Fri, 04 Oct 2013 06:37:00 +0000

Little animation I did using one of my old drawings. Using some stuffs in After Effects that I was no familiar with.

wimps with Woolen Men, Prissy Clerks and Blooper at Heartland

noreply@blogger.com (Matt Nyce) — Wed, 18 Sep 2013 07:16:00 +0000

Birthday Card for Matt B

noreply@blogger.com (Matt Nyce) — Wed, 18 Sep 2013 00:06:00 +0000

Hello Frustration Video and Process

noreply@blogger.com (Matt Nyce) — Tue, 30 Jul 2013 23:15:00 +0000

Finished the video for the song Hello Frustration by wimps and am very happy with the final result.

Process

Video Iterations

As expected, animation takes time. Below is three snapshots showing the animation of the first verse coming together.

Animation Elements

The initial concept of the video I was planning on using the color palette, that is in the initial closeups, throughout the entire video. However, after illustrating the buildings with that palette I found it too distracting from the main bicycle character and that of the "anxiety" clouds. I then decided to go more minimal and work on a grayscale background which I found allowed the main characters to jump out more and provided a contrast to the very intense closeup introductions that start the story of each character.

Research and Inspiration

Story from North America is a video that I found a very long time ago in the middle of going down a youtube rabbit hole. It was so much different than anything that I had seen at the time. I was really struck by the quick and dirty animation, the jangle of the linework, and how the animation matched the feeling of the song and the subject matter. It also was a lot of fun and had a lot of what I wanted to incorporate into my work on Hello Frustration.

Batman Spinning Cut

When mapping out the song early on I figured out that it had three verses which matched the three band members. I thought that in each verse each of them could tell a different story and each show how they overcome this physical manifestation of their problems, kind of like a superhero fighting a villain. Rachel the bicyclist attacks her problems with positive thinking, Dave the drummer hits his anxiety with a pizza and Matt (me) the bassist uses a scooter to squish his frustrations. So getting thinking like each member is a superhero with their own little story I got the idea that it would be fun to introduce the character at the beginning of each story. Just a quick little closeup of who they are before it goes to the wide shot of them moving through the city. I then remembered seeing a Simpsons episode where they cut back to a Bart story and parodied the Batman cut, but with Bart's head instead of the Batman logo. I thought that would be a fun add on to the video and used it for each character.

I love animation and wanted to do an animated video but we all know that takes forever and ever and ever. I think I have heard that a traditional Disney animated feature takes 5 years or something to animate and that of course is done with a team of animators. The above Story of North America took two years for two people to complete and that is only 5 minutes in length. What am I to do? Well some of my idea on how to shorten the process was from remembering watching some of the Hanna Barbara cartoons of my youth. They came up with processes that cut corners (and costs and times) from the popular Looney Tunes full animation of the day. Where Looney Tunes would animate every single part of the body, Hanna Barbara reduced the character to just a mouth that moved or eyes blinking and looped alot of the rest. They looked walking, talking and backgrounds. You can see the looped background at 1:00 in on this Pixie and Dixie. By looking small sections of my animation, and using the built in movement controls of Premiere and After Effects I could get a lot more motion with a lot less drawing time.

Below is some color inspiration and then also street shots. I knew early on that I wanted to show the characters taking their problems "to work" and stated in the lyrics of the song and thought it would be fun to show them heading to work. To do this I needed to illustrate a city backdrop. A great set of buildings with a lot of variety I think is found in San Francisco on Mission Street. I google streetviewed going down the street there and took screenshots and then photoshopped the buildings together and simplified them to get a realistic feeling for the building backdrop.

Repeat Video and Process

noreply@blogger.com (Matt Nyce) — Wed, 20 Mar 2013 20:59:00 +0000

Updates have been scarce as up to my ears in school and have been working on a new video project for my band wimps. Doing some catching up. Meanwhile, here is my week by week process for the new video, copied from my process blog for the video. 5000+ images of stuff we like and cool stuff in Seattle and then just shapes. Hope you find it interesting.

Process Below

Week 11 - Final Presentation

And we're done! Presented to the class today and all went well. In a week or so will have a nationwide premiere on the Impose Magazine site. Enjoy the final video!

Week 10 - Color Correction

This took way too long. With 5000ish individual images this file has reached a size that doing hardly anything at all takes forever so this took all of my school day as well as 3 hours at home (with exporting and rendering). I like how white I got the background and the shapes I think also look better moving in that space. Our faces look like shit though. Now our skin is much more ruddy. I think I need something in between the two. Do I have the time for that? Prob. not. Is the other one fine? Maybe. Thinking on it.

Here's some tutorial videos I watched:

Left is color corrected. Right is previous color correction.

Week 9 - Shape City

This is maybe the final video. The only final consideration would be additional color correction. Big list of completed: 1. Triangles added 2. Triangles positioned 3. Found more triangles, squares and circles 4. Photoshopped more triangles, squares and circles 5. Went through and replaced the least exciting triangles, squares and circles 6. Added Bass EQ to audio track to compensate for poor bass on laptop speakers 7. Did light color correction to desaturate and enhance contrast Going to do some more color correction experiments this week but am pretty happy with this.

Week 8 - Getting in Shape

Haven't been updating as often as I should but to be honest the updates would only say "editing photos". There are now 300+ pictures of circles, squares and triangles and all of the circles and squares have been edited as a transparent psd file. Still need to figure the correct size to reduce them down in order to minimize file size. Also, all of the filming is done. Lot of work to do, specifically adding 1000 still images. The original filming is like the frame of the house. Now I just need to add the wiring, plumbing, walls, shingles, windows, doorknobs and doo dads to really make it shine. Still got to edit me in singing in addition to adding at least 1000 more shapes. Oh I also reshot all the close stuffs so it will be looking different on the next edit from the screenshots in earlier posts.

Week 7 - Shaping Up

Still chugging along. All film is now shot as of this weekend. To the left are some stills of from the film of Dave, Rachel and me. Still need more shapes which I hope to capture this week and then begin the photo editing of all the individual shots to make the background transparent and then comes the video editing. That gives me roughly two and a half weeks of video editing before the rough needs to be shown to the class. Deadlines! AHHHHH!!

Week 6 - More Shapes, Editing and Filming

Little up date a rooney. This last weekend I filmed Dave up close and far away playing drums along to the song so half of Dave's drum stuff is now taken care of. I am filming the Dave in front of a white sheet and Rachel and Matt up close shots this weekend. Today I shot and edited 220 shape shots which brings the total shape shots to about 150 for circle and triangle and 80 for squares. Going to shoot more shapes this weekend to hopefully get all that I need and edit those down so I can begin the further editing in Photoshop to turn them into semi transparents pngs for beginning on the rough next weekend. So far right on track to show a rough to the class on Nov. 7th.

Week 5 - Photo Editing and More Shape Gathering

Edited 171 photos from raw to 240dpi to 2880 x 1920. Figured out how to use a script in Photoshop, which made it a semi-breeze.

Week 4 - More Shape Gathering

Walked around with Mr. Ted (as he is documenting Capitol Hill for a zine) and took a bunch of shape photos. Here is just some of the 170. Circles are by far the easiest, surprisingly triangles and then the most elusive of all: the perfect square. Capitol Hill is too hip for squares. HAHAHAHAHAHA

Week 3 - Shape Gathering

Second blog entry commence now: You know it's a different day and that I am making progress on my project as I am wearing a different shirt and you just can't fake that. Here's Randy lending me a hand.

This last weekend I checked out a camera and walked around capturing shapes and was able to capture some shapes including what I am finding to be the illusive triangle. Also, got more live footage at a different location (my basement) to splice in and add to the cache of three different shows that are in the can from two weeks prior. These will serve as quick splices at the finale and highlight all the fun and exciting places the band plays such as a big theatres, house parties and a scummy teen center.

This weekend I am filming Drummer Dave on a stage before his other band's show. This will be the black background shot of Dave, with the other being the white background with similar positioning if not the same. Will be fun to cut between.

Lots of footage is needed.

Week 2 - Sketching and Ideas
How bout Dave by himself? People love watching Dave drum. Will provide contrast to close up shots and he can appear when me and Rachel are not singing. Big blank space, maybe my living room with giant sheets up? Have one Who poster up behind him? Dave likes the Who. Mapped out times for when verses and choruses start and stop. Assigned shapes. I think bass and me is more of circle. Rachel's guitar sounds like a triangle. That leaves a square for drums and Dave. Should I have a separate symbol for singing or just differentiate the main symbols?

Week 1 - Getting Started

Pharmacy, Pleasure Boaters, Wimps and Branden Daniel, December 22nd, Chop Suey

noreply@blogger.com (Matt Nyce) — Tue, 27 Nov 2012 18:46:00 +0000

Beach Owl

noreply@blogger.com (Matt Nyce) — Tue, 06 Nov 2012 00:38:00 +0000

I don't know if there is an indie band with the name Beach Owl yet but if there is not, which I highly doubt, I hereby claim it and you must pay me money for the best indie band name in the world. Think that I am wrong? Name a better one. I double dog dare you.

"My Man Jeeves" Book Cover Illustration and Self Portrait

noreply@blogger.com (Matt Nyce) — Fri, 26 Oct 2012 06:25:00 +0000

Book Cover illustration for "My Man Jeeves" by PG Wodehouse for school. I used myself as a model as image searching "Butler", "Rich Butler", "Fancy Butler", "New York Butler", "Old Timey Butler" and "Butler -Gerard". ALL OF THESE RETURN NOTHING BUT TOPLESS SEXY SEXY GERARD BUTLER PICTURES. So naturally I thought: "Hmmm what else could a butler be called? What search would lead me to the picture of an old timey fancy butler instead of that sexy sexy sexy Gerard Butler? What could that search be? There must be something. Ponder, ponder, ponder. Hmmm... OF COURSE! Man servant!" That didn't go much better.

Look I'm a butler!

"No Butts" T-Shirt Design

noreply@blogger.com (Matt Nyce) — Sun, 14 Oct 2012 01:13:00 +0000

Forced labor T Shirt design for Seattle Central no smoking on campus campaign. This by Shannon Perry was definitely floating through my mind at the time. Thank you Amanda Bynes.

Poster of the Week?

noreply@blogger.com (Matt Nyce) — Sun, 07 Oct 2012 22:12:00 +0000

Maybe?

The Next Ten Years Of Matt Nyce

noreply@blogger.com (Matt Nyce) — Thu, 04 Oct 2012 22:06:00 +0000

School assignment for us to forecast the next ten years. This is for sure a good one to zoom (click on) as there is a bunch of little drawings. I'm not too good at telling the future so I outlined all the possibilities as best as I could imagine. You could call me a pessimist.
This is the future version of this assignment.

Hobo Joe

noreply@blogger.com (Matt Nyce) — Tue, 02 Oct 2012 21:53:00 +0000

Thee Oh Sees, Sic Alps and Wimps at Neptune Theatre. October 7th

noreply@blogger.com (Matt Nyce) — Thu, 27 Sep 2012 06:30:00 +0000

Quickie poster for big deal show. Yikes!

Unnatural Helpers "Land Grab" Record Release

noreply@blogger.com (Matt Nyce) — Wed, 19 Sep 2012 19:58:00 +0000

Illustrated the literal idea of Land Grab, the awesome new record by the Unnatural Helpers available Sept. 25th. This poster is for the record release show for said record that my band Wimps are so happy and pleased to be apart of. This stacked bill, featuring Survival Knife (members of Unwound) and the always awesome Stickers, promises to a good time guaranteed for all. I dare say the show of the century.

Unfortunately, this will be my second to last show at the Funhouse. On October 31st their doors will close and like all good things in Seattle it will be torn down and replaced with "mixed use condos", left to only be enjoyed through memories. We Seattle-ites of the future, as we look around at our anytown future Seattle, will sip our Starbucks, eat our Subways and fondly reminisce and wonder how we ever let great places like the Funhouse go, just like we let go the Hi Score Arcades, Rck Cndys, soon to be Bauhaus's, Original Cha Chas, Kinkoras, that creepy place on the North End of Broadway with the strong drinks I can't remember the name of across from the Thai Restaurant where I saw Susan Powter...

If you are unfamiliar with the term "mixed use condo"I will explain. It is a condo complex that looks like every other condo complex that has replaced everything I love in this city. Everyone of them comes complete with it's own balcony that while not only ugly is also impractical as it only extends one foot out and is just a work around to meet zoning requirements for "public space". These "buildings" always have some sort of magic outer shell that is magic only insofar as it's the materials painted a earth tone incredible ability to collect dirt which invariably turns the entire structure into a dirty styrofoam looking thing within the year. Also amazing is that even though it is the same three companies building these things over and over again, none of them seem to have figured out this constant propensity for their buildings absorbing dirt and ending up looking like shit. Maybe it's because these assholes don't live here and thus don't deal with the turd they have created. Maybe they're just assholes. Finally, in the bottom or street level portion of the building you will find the "mixed use" part, which means there is a Subway and/or Quiznos (that will close within the year), a Walgreens and then a Curves workout place (which will also close within the year).

Anyway, annoying ranting aside the Helpers are the best live band in Seattle and my favorite band and great dudes who I have seen many a time at the ole Funhouse. The Funhouse is ran by Mr. Brian Foss who is one half the ownership and one whole the booking gentleman/nice guy which makes him 1 and half times awesome. Before he turned the Funhole, as it is affectionately called sometimes, into the hole of fun that it is he booked another great place that got tore down Gibson's. I wasn't living in Seattle then but did visit often and caught what I believe was either the first or the second show of the Helpers at Gibson's in what was about 2000AD. I know the time roughly as I was not yet 21 and had to climb in through the window my friend left open. I remember telling main helper Dean Whitmore after the show how awesome they were and then told him they sounded like Zen Guerrilla, a fact that nice guy Dean has been nice enough to forget.

Land Grab by the Unnatural Helpers is available Sept. 25th through Hardly Art here and streaming for a limited time on Spin.com

Wimps Shirt Ideas: Skate Dog, Bag Head, Pizza Head Punk

noreply@blogger.com (Matt Nyce) — Mon, 27 Aug 2012 01:25:00 +0000

Three shirt ideas for my band Wimps, which just got back from our tour down to Cal uh four nie eh. We went with the skateboarding hot dog and sold em all. You might remember him as he is a combination of my skateboarding coffee cup , a poster I drew a very long time ago and this goofball.

Hip Girls in 2012

noreply@blogger.com (Matt Nyce) — Tue, 21 Aug 2012 15:33:00 +0000

Wimps "Swim in Every Hole" Summer Tour 2012

noreply@blogger.com (Matt Nyce) — Wed, 08 Aug 2012 15:00:00 +0000

My band heads out on tour tomorrow to swim everywhere that we can and also play some shows along the way. For the poster I wanted to include all the necessary elements in any band poster now days:

long wiggly hands - check
triangles - check
floating mason eyes - check
misplaced native american imagery - check
secret pictures - check
boobs - check
smoking letters - check
weed leaf.... Couldn't make that work.

Oh well.

Wimps blogspot is here

"2020 Cycle Presents: Sealth" Animation

noreply@blogger.com (Matt Nyce) — Tue, 07 Aug 2012 07:53:00 +0000

Over the early summer I did a little work with my friend Rachel Ratner for local bike shop 2020 cycle. They have a wonderful new hand built cruiser for sale that you can check out on their wonderful new hand built site by Rachel Ratner with wonderful new hand built animation by myself. It even has a button to make a horn noise. Check it out here. My animation changes a bit quicker just like the Seattle weather. That's a really dumb thing to say. It's the best I could come up with. Below is a still frame in all its uncompressed glory.

Fancy Guy

noreply@blogger.com (Matt Nyce) — Wed, 11 Jul 2012 01:05:00 +0000

Quork

noreply@blogger.com (Matt Nyce) — Wed, 04 Jul 2012 17:23:00 +0000

A little explanation: you see, Quork rhymes with pork.

Sad Ogre

noreply@blogger.com (Matt Nyce) — Wed, 27 Jun 2012 21:42:00 +0000