On today’s podcast I had the pleasure of speaking with Indy animators Jim Lujan and Kevin Cross from ghettomation.net.  What is Ghettomation you ask?
By Ghetto they don’t mean bad or poorly made. Au contraire! They mean underground/indie/creator owned. Gorilla style! Ghetto compared to the big corporate animation…..Ghetto is good!

The Mighty Jim Lujan!

One of L.A’s Finest.

Jim is a genuine talent with a unique vision.

Citizen Sanchez Tribute By Jim Lujan

Jim Lujan scathingly observant master of satire.

Check out these two most recent animated shorts by Jim.  Set your asses to laughed off!

First up is AlphaNerd: DEN of the BEER THIEVES!  Batman ain’t got nuthin’ on AlphaNerd!

Next up is the sordid and tragic tale of the rise and fall of the greatest club DJ who ever spun a record! Of course I’m talking about  FreakDaddy! You can almost smell the  coconut scented fog man!

If you pay attention you will notice  a very Kubrickesque feel to Jim’s films.

• Kubrick favored symmetrical compositions which he  mechanically repeated to both unify and dehumanize.

• Kubrick used a lot of extreme closeups of faces that were darkly lit  and full of emotion.

• Kubrick loved wide and slow pan shots, which more often than not produced an eerie and surreal vibe.

• Let’s not forget the ever present and very effective “KUBRICK STARE.”

If you want to see more of Jim’s cartoons check out his youtube channel and subscribe! You won’t be disappointed.

The Uncanny Kevin Cross

Straight outta Portland!

Kevin Cross and his Lady taking care of business.

Kevin Cross capering with his creation Monkey Mod.

Monkey Mod by Kevin Cross

Kevin Cross is a Portland Oregon based Illustrator/Comic Book Artist/Animator/ Punk Rocker! His Webcomic Monkey Mod is delightfully fun and expertly crafted.  This guy can DRAW folks and he knows art comics and animation Like yours truly Kevin is into UPA and 60′s Hanna Barbera animation big time.  What can I say? The guy has good taste!

One time I  asked him how he liked living in Portland.  Without missing a beat  Kevin replied “It’s great except for one thing.  The Mexican food sucks!”  I can’t stand to see people suffer such deprivation! I think I’ll Fed-Ex  him  some King Taco.

Enjoy a taste of Kevin’s killer animation.

In the podcast I performed a pitch of one of my latest creations the Penalizer.

Below is a recent development sketch that I think really captures the Magnificent Bastard that is the Penalizer!

Damn! I should have brought the big gun!

The Man Vs. Art Agent Primer.

Why would you need one?

Well if you have a great idea for an animated TV show, Movie, or book and want to pitch it to the major studios and networks, you’ll have a tough time getting a meeting without an agent.

Disclaimer!!

If the following seems a bit harsh and discouraging don’t worry.  The mere fact that you are here reading this means you are not one of the chowder heads .  After all you are doing research on agents and reps right?  You want to be informed and prepared to put your best foot forward right?  Good!  I’m ripping on those that think they have it all figured out without bothering to learn the rules of the game. If you want to succeed in this field you need to know what’s going on.  A great man once said, “This isn’t ‘Nam.  There are rules!”

Let us proceed, shall we?

Ahem.

We  artists dream of being represented  by an agent who will market our work,  set up pitch meetings, score us an in-house or freelance gig,  and do all that boring  non-art stuff like marketing, negotiating, and selling.

The stark truth is that it’s extremely tough to find a good agent.

For artists it’s best if you’re already known enough in your field to have  agents seeking you instead of you going to them. Sadly few artists get this privilege. The rest of us must submit material to many agents and agencies and choke down the pile of rejection slips before eventually hooking up with an agent willing to take a chance on us.

Here’s the deal.

In a nutshell, it comes down to  who you know people.  Agents are busy.  They don’t have time to deal with deluded dumb asses who lack what it takes in terms of credits, talent, and ideas.  Believe it or not, there are a lot of posers out there that think they have the next big hit.  99.9% of these knuckleheads are out of their minds and their creations are terrible.  Agents can’t be wasting time dealing with every mouth breather who walks in off the street with a half baked idea about talking cats.

Think about it.  Everyone knows that guy who thinks he’s Alan Moore the master storyteller right?  But  in reality this moron can’t even tell a  knock knock joke.  At one time or another we’ve all been cornered by Kurt Busiek Jr. and  subjected  to a forty seven minute barrage of  incomprehensible nonsense! A story so convoluted and absurd that it makes  you want to  run away screaming and jump through the nearest plate glass window!   These days I carry a cyanide capsule just in case.

Now imagine how many of these clueless wonders agents have to deal with.  Every day!

The Circle of Trust.

One of the few ways you can get a agent to even give you the time of day is if you are recommended by someone in the agent’s circle of trust.  It is equally important that you have  the professional credits and polished marketable work to back you up.  If you do, then  an agent will be way more likely to take the time to meet with you or at least check out what you have to offer.

This circle of trust extends beyond the agent and goes all the way to the studios and networks.  Studio and network executives are also busy people and they can’t be meeting with every dork that comes at them with a Naruto ripoff.  You must be recommended to them from someone in their circle of trust which in most  cases is an agent.

Case in point.  Someone I know once told me his foolproof series pitch.  He was absolutely convinced his idea was as good as greenlit. He said, “Well my show is a bout a giraffe, and as you  know there’s never been a show where the main character is  giraffe! I can’t lose!”    The mere fact that it has never been done,  does not make it a good idea.   There has also never been a show where the main character is bucket of  platypus snot either!
Get it?  The whole agent thing is meant as a filter to keep  their time and that of studio brass from being wasted by idiots.   A good agent with a solid reputation would never send a dork to a pitch meeting at Disney.

You need to network.  Meet people who know agents. Directors, Producers, Art Directors, Lawyers, and Bartenders.  Maybe, just maybe if your pitch isn’t completely retarded you might get your foot in the door.

Oh yeah and one last thing.

If you meet an agent who wants to rep you but wants  ANY sort of upfront fee, throw your coffee in his face and run.  It’s a scam. Real agents are only  paid from gigs or deals they hooked up for you. Period. Usually it’s anywhere between 10% to 15% of what you earn.

Good luck!

H.R Giger loves the dong!

C'mon people. Admit it.....This sucks!

Oh poor Royo. I feel your pain and agony. Let me help you with that sack of money while you climb into your Ferrari.

I am sick of it.

I’ll tell you what, I think it’s all a big scam and frankly I think it sucks.  There was always a dark corner for pasty faced weirdos to draw and paint a guy hanging from the nuts with fish hooks over a pit of demons.  A few dorks with no personality who read into the Sandman a bit too much had their little corner in the art world staked up.  Guess what?  Now these guys have taken over and the worst part is everyone is buying into it.  All of a sudden heroes couldn’t wear brightly colored costumes when fighting the minions of darkness.  Now the heroes are indistinguishable from the minions they fight.  You see it in movies, comics, video games and TV.

Everything is dark and angst ridden.

Why EVERYTHING?!!  Since when did it become uncool to be a good guy?  In the latest Superman movie he’s a dead beat dad stalker!!!! That’s not the big blue boy scout I recall!  If you ask me the world needs more good guys, both in reality as well as fiction.  Back in the early part of this century America and it’s allies fought the darkest emo douche bag of them all.  Adolf Hitler and his Nazi monsters.  They were bad.  Evil.  Even their friggin’ uniforms looked evil man!  Well our grand parents and great grandparents had a real clear cut view in their minds about Good Vs. Evil.  And what it meant to be one or the other.  Why?  Because their culture taught them that the guys in black are evil. There is a clear distinction between the two.  Look at the literature and pop culture of the time.  Flash Gordon, Tarzan, need I go on? If today’s soft, deluded and self centered   knuckleheads were transported to WWII the Nazis would have won. Go ahead send in the hate mail.  You know I’m right.

Today pop culture teaches that there is no good.  Every hero is just one traumatic experience away  from being a psychopath.  In order to defeat evil, good needs to be bad.  It’s deconstructionism, it’s edgy,  it’s LAZY WRITING.  ” Batman  beats  the derelict senseless in order to get the location of the Joker’s Lair.”  Is so much easier to write than perhaps  “Batman relies on detective skills to track down the Joker”  The writer would actually have to come up with an intricate plot that could possibly be interesting.  Nah, I’d rather read 22 pages of Batman pimp slapping a crackhead….again.

Every good guy has to act and look  evil or at least be dark.

Look at the costumes of super heroes in movies today. The only brightness is the gleam from the smile on the studio execs when they cash their paychecks. Everyone is dressed like the Matrix. It’s retarded.

Why was this made?

Wolverine looks tame!  His hair is combed WTF?!!! What is this?  The black leather fetish  convention?

On the other hand….

Look at this Steranko X-men cover.  Brilliant and powerful.  These guys look like good guys and the book looks fun. Look everyone COLOR!!!

Steranko Rules Period.

You gotta love the skull eyeballs.  Pure friggin’ Steranko my friends!

Or look at this exquisite George Perez mega cover!  Now those are super heroes!  Nothing dark and fruity about this!  These are the colors I want to see in film adaptations.  Why is this not possible?  Is Hollywood blind as well as stupid?  With HDTV and all that other hi tech crap this stuff should be pouring out of the screen and assaulting our senses! Nope.  Black leather and muted colors please.

George Perez Rules! I mean look at this!

There are so many other avenues of the human condition yet to be explored by art.  Why have we collectively stopped at angst?  It’s self serving self indulgent crap.  Let’s grow up and see that there is a bigger world out there than vampires dressed in designer outfits.  I dare you!

Transitions in real life are just as interesting. As you will soon read.
I left art school in 1992 and was all ready begin a career in comics.

I was scared away by the over saturated, variant cover, chromium card, gimmicky sea of rip-offs where mediocrity and flashiness were celebrated, and hailed as genius.

Now, I’m going to pick on Mcfarlane, but that’s OK.

He’s a big boy,  I’m sure he’ll be fine in his castle where he laughs at me from atop  a  big pile of money.

spiderman #1 by Mcfarlane

Notice how the vanishing point on the webbing  is Spider-man’s spider sack. Why?

Showing originality and unending imagination! Wow!

Here Spewn, oh I’m sorry.  Spawn looks like he’s trying to push a battleship anchor chain out of his bowels.  Or like my 3 year old nephew Aiden says. “Spawn poops chains.”  Glittery chains I added.

The overdrawn badly crap  even made it’s way into sculpture!

Look!

not just awful. Gawd Awful!

He is easily amused boy! He wears a trenchcoat every day but lives in Phoenix.

“WOW look at all the detail!”

Kent Melton.  Now those are sculptures!

Wow get a load of these! The poses! The expressions! The quality!

Mcfarlane’s work was really all over the place.  Absolutely no planning went into his layouts or pages.  I can prove it.  Look here!

He is easily amused by bad OVERdrawing!

What is Spawn doing on page one? Hovering menacingly 11 inches  off of the ground battling his own cape? Obviously Mr. Baseball wanted to show Spawn hovering above the band Poison  as they menaced a girl atop a pile of rubble in an alley.  Obviously he choked.  But look at the DETAIL!!!

Why did so many of his pages have panel’s like the last two on the top row of page two?  What i s that? Half an eye? Twice?  He didn’ t leave enough room to draw a complete eye people.

Okay and the guy going through a window.  Take a good look.  According to the first page they are outside.  In an alley.  The guy is being thrown through a window outside from the outside? OR is he being thrown into a room?  WTF?  And here’s a classic Mcfarlane CHOKE!  Look at the detail in the broken glass!  It matters not that glass does not shatter in this way, look at that golden brown thing coming through the glass along with punk #1.  Cloth of some sort?  Curtain?  Nope it’s a brown useless blob supposed to indicate force but really was so that the crappy broken glass doesn’t interfere with the line work on the character.  A little planning could have solved it.  NO thanks, Mr. Baseball took the easy and ugly way out.

What do people mean ” Detail?” From what I gather  arbitrary pen scratches that serve no purpose much less define a form equals “detail.”  I can stare at this inadvertent optical illusion panel from Rob Liefeld’s Judgment Day for hours.  Just who is standing in front of who?  Hmm?

I for one saw the emperor had no clothes.  “It’s a cookbook!”  I  screamed to no avail.  Comics had become pointlessly  dark and all of my beloved childhood heroes became gritty blood thirsty psychopaths or got killed and replaced by gritty blood thirsty psychopaths.  I couldn’t argue with Spawn’s numbers.

No critique of comics would be complete without reaming Liefeld right?   It’s like shooting Skrulls in a barrel! So I let Che have a go at it in the podcast.

The following images are visual aids for Che’s bit.

The Talking Che Guevara T-shirt takes a few jabs at Liefeld.

What are those stupid steel fins for? To impale your head?!!

And finally The worst drawing I have ever seen.

What’s up with the hooters CAP?

No wonder Marvel Blew his brains out.

TICE NITS CAPTAIN AMERICA!

Meanwhile Disney had recently put out Beauty and the Beast and Aladdin.

The Beast by my Mentor Glen Keane.

Without hesitation, I went into animation and was immediately hired by Disney at 22.  For reasons of taste as well as safety, it was mandatory that artists wear vests back then.  Instead of action figure collections on our monitors we wore vests.

Here's an old Photograph of me and the gang at Disney back in 1995!

My eight year stint at Disney consumed  my youth and almost cost me my marriage.  Then  in 2002 some suit in a boardroom decided that suits could get a bigger bonus if  American Hand Drawn Animation was done in India. Rather than move to Calcutta, or give up drawing for digital animation,  I went into TV animation and did storyboards and character designs for a bunch of different places.

There it was again another transition.  I was beginning to see the pattern. I remember reading the scripts at these places and thinking how terrible they were.  Written by people with no imagination .  I started writing the story of an ex-thief ‘s  transition into the world of international espionage.  It sat on my shelf, every once in a while I added something new or changed another thing but for the next seven years it was always in the back of my mind.

In 2006 I wrote directed and produced my own short at Nickelodeon called Hero Heights.

An animated homage to comic books.  Since then the animation jobs have been harder to come by and the projects have gotten lamer and lamer. So once again I have been transitioning this time into many different areas.  Comics, Fine Art, Writing and  Development, Web Design, and Podcasting.  I have designed and built my own website studioraul.com as well as my own blog manvsart.com and  I produce the weekly podcast Man Vs. Art about art, animation and comics. Also in this time I have developed almost a dozen properties for animation, comics, videogames and web.  All modular in terms of medium. All super kick ass in terms of kick ass factor.

Finally in 2009 the crappy economy gave me time to finally do my book. This comic is a result of all those years of slaving in animation only to be rewarded by a kick in the balls from the studios and betrayed by a lazy, greedy, halfwit of an assistant.  Here in my own independently published comic book no one is telling me what to write or draw. Also there is no danger of some other knucklehead like my greedy, halfwit of an assistant destroying my work.  I alone decide everything. That way if anything goes wrong I  have only myself to blame.

Codename Sparrow is about a guy at the top of his game who through no fault of his own has it taken away.  Rather than rot in prison he accepts an offer to be a covert operative for a  private “Good Guy” agency. The first  story HOT ICE is about Eddie’s Cat Burglar days.  In order for you to really know him I feel it will be necessary to do some stories set in that time.  The second story “ The Name of the Game” is about his early days in the agency more specifically it’s about how he got his cool Codename.  A time when he was transitioning from being a thief to being a covert operative. As an artist and especially writer I found this time to be very juicy.