TV Spot Storyboard

In CG- or cel-animated films, every shot is planned in small sketches. Most effects-heavy live action films are also extensively boarded. The storyboards not only help plan the cinematic art, but they also serve as the director’s map for how all the separate elements will fit together.

Many films now use digitally animated storyboards or cinematics to allow the director and the effects supervisor to give a semblance of how the parts of the scene will move.

I did these storyboards in 1992 for a contemplated TV ad spot for the Dinotopia book. The ad was never produced. The idea of a skeleton rising from the earth is based on the classic story from Ezekiel of the dry bones lifting up and coming to life.

Sousse Harbor

Here is a watercolor painting of some small fishing boats in the harbor of Sousse, Tunisia. What attracted me was the bright light coming from behind, which made the gunwales white.

I also liked the foreground boats: one with a yellow tarp over the hold, and the other blue one in the extreme foreground.The bright sunspot at the center of the picture was so strong that it bleached out the dark tones of the the gunwale of the dinghy at center.



You can see the bleaching effect of the bright sunspot in this little video as I pan across the dinghy. The video makes another point: nothing holds still for the plein air painter! Just as I was halfway finished with the picture, the old man started up the boat in the foreground and pushed aside all of the others.



Here's one last video capturing the moment when I was painting the yellow tarp. This is very low-tech video, and something of an experiment. I'm just using a Canon Powershot 400 held in my left hand. It's kind of hard to concentrate on everything at once, and I was afraid of dropping the camera into the water.

ASFA Awards

The Association of Science Fiction and Fantasy Artists (ASFA) recently announced their 2007 awards, based on the vote of working artist members. Donato Giancola was the big winner, with five awards, including best hardback and paperback cover. Michael Kaluta won in the Artistic Achievement category, and Irene Gallo was chosen as the best Art Director (see her art/illustration blog here).

If you will pardon me for tooting my own horn, Dinotopia: Journey to Chandara was chosen in the Best Interior Illustration category. I am very grateful to the members of ASFA for their vote of support.

If you're still looking for that last special holiday gift for that artistic someone, you can get Gurney-signed copies of the Chandara book or the Chesley Award Retrospective from the Dinotopia Store. If you send in your check today (USA only) you should get the book in plenty of time for Christmas. End pitch.

The Buses of Malta

Malta is full of beautiful old churches and museums, but I was smitten by the buses. You can ride all around the island for 3.49 Euros per day, and come home with your head spinning and your lungs full of lead fumes.

I did these watercolor sketches while waiting for the buses in the stations.

This one took about an hour. I checked first with the drivers to make sure it was going to stay put for a while.

It was fun to show the sketches to the guys in the station, who knew all the buses individually. There are rumors that the E.U. is going to crack down on the Maltese buses because of their unregulated emissions. In a few years, some people told me, they'll be in a museum.

Maltese Bus Driver

The island country of Malta has a fleet of about 500 buses, most of them owner-operated. The British Leyland buses date mainly from the 1950s, and they're painted bright red and orange on the outside. On the inside they're customized with images of the Virgin Mary and Bob Marley.

Route 49 takes a loud and bumpy ride from Qawra to Valetta. I did this sketch of the driver as he steered, shifted, made change, and called out to his friends along the way.


Afterward I showed him the sketch, and he told his friends in Maltese that I made his nose too big.

Waterfall City Concept 2

When I first designed Waterfall City (detail, above) I hadn’t dreamed up the idea of Dinotopia yet, with its partnership of humans and saurians. The logical way to travel across the chasm was by a giant pterosaur, but at the time I was thinking of hang gliders.

These design sketches imagine configurations for hang gliders a little different from the ones Otto Lilienthal and the Wright Brothers came up with.

Waterfall City Concept 1

Over the next few days, while I'm assembling some of my trip sketches, I thought I’d show you some of the early concept sketches for Waterfall City (1988). Here’s one from 1987 showing the water emerging from two big arches, like something at the edge of the world. The lighting is from below, which gives it a strange feeling, and the architecture is reminiscent of the early skyscraper architecture of Hugh Ferris.