mr.paal

2012-01-02T11:27:00.000Z

Cold.

2011-12-14T15:58:00.001Z

Art of Short Films

Apologies to anyone looking for a link to my film 'Happy Harada', it isn't available online yet, as it is currently entered into the festival circuit.

Hope you can enjoy some of the artwork instead :)

2011-12-08T14:54:00.002Z

4 Shorts, 1 Evening, thanks!

Thanks to everyone who turned up to the screening last night.

It was a fantastic night & i was honoured to share the limelight with
the amazing Joao Fazenda & the handsome Pedro Lino!

2011-12-06T16:52:00.000Z

Life Drawing

2011-11-23T14:56:00.000Z

4 Shorts, 1 Evening

You are invited to the Private Screening of four new Animated Short Films:

Sparkle Animation has the pleasure
of presenting the World Premiere of:

"Happy Harada" by Paul Nicholson

"The Tortoise" by Pedro Lino & Luis da Matta Almeida

"Unintended" by João Fazenda (U.K. Premiere)

+ A Surprise Film…

At a time when support for independent animation in the UK is

practically non-existent, some people still stand:
Sparkle Animation hosts an evening of World Premieres of four new independent Short Films; Produced and animated in London, these films present us with diverse views and takes on Animation Art but all share the philosophy of D.I.Y.!
Please join us, the directors and crew of the films, bring your friends and loved ones on the evening of December the 7th, to celebrate the undefeated spirit that lives on in Animation Filmaking!

Wednesday, 7th December 2011
Doors open at 6pm
First Screening at 7pm

East Gallery
214 Brick Lane
London
E1 6SA
United Kingdom

(nearest stations: Liverpool Street and Shoreditch High Street)

2011-11-18T12:40:00.001Z

Movember/Gallery of Mo

http://www.galleryofmo.co.uk/

2011-11-18T09:58:00.000Z

Life Drawing

2011-11-04T19:23:00.001Z

Doodles.

2011-11-04T19:19:00.000Z

Life Drawing.

2011-11-04T18:17:00.000Z

Happy Harada Screenshots.

Harada is finished!

2011-10-05T10:46:00.000Z

Doodle

2011-09-29T11:50:00.000Z

Life Drawing

2011-09-18T09:16:00.000Z

Kino Siska/Creative Crossroads.

Kino Siska in Slovenia are exhibiting my piece, 'Inner City Violence' as part of their

'Creative Crossroads' exhibition. If you're in Slovenia this month, please check it out!

I'm following the footsteps of the great David Ziggy Greene, who exhibited prior to me & nominated me to take part - thanks, man! :)

2011-09-09T14:01:00.002Z

Bonus Fox!

...I don't care where i belong no more :)

2011-09-08T16:57:00.000Z

More Doodles + NOFX!

I ♥ NOFX!

2011-09-07T16:29:00.000Z

Doodles.

Listening to Propagandhi & looking at Yoshitomo Nara.

Listening to Descendents.

2011-08-12T19:05:00.003Z

Inner City Violence.

Give 'em the boot.

2011-07-23T08:40:00.000Z

Chocolate Box

Isn't this a great box?

Apparently it's Bulgarian.

The chocolate inside it tastes terrible.

2011-07-02T09:17:00.001Z

ILLUSTRATIONS

Some recent work.

2011-06-30T12:24:00.000Z

SPACE HORSE CHARACTERS

If you want to see the full pitch, get in touch!

2011-06-27T14:32:00.002Z

DESTRUCTOR.

Working on some of the characters in Space Horse.

Destructor is a delivery robot.

Dr. Chang is head of the Ground Control team.

2011-06-15T11:56:00.002Z

Happy Harada Intro Slates

2011-06-12T12:37:00.000Z

Happy Harada Title Sheet

2011-06-09T21:19:00.000Z

Space Horse 1-Sheet

2011-06-09T13:12:00.003Z

Space Horse Designs

What colours to use?

What eye shapes?

Traditional brown?

I like the orange one...

What about you?

2011-06-05T15:07:00.000Z

Bedtime Bear

2011-05-30T16:01:00.000Z

Space Horse Concepts.

2011-05-30T14:24:00.000Z

Animators VS Earthquakes Update.

The exhibition closed last Sunday & we have so far made around £7000 for 'Artists Help Japan'. Sure was amazing to see so much fantastic work together in our little gallery in Shoreditch & i was really overwhelmed by the generosity of the artists who donated such beautiful artwork & by the great response we had from everyone who came.

I got to meet a lot of new friends & even some of my personal animation heroes :)

Animatsuda came down to our closing party to film us for their 'Pixilate to Heal' project - can't wait to see the finished film!

Some of the as yet unsold work will still be available for sale at a fixed price on a first-come, first-served basis. More details to come on the blog:

www.animatorsvsearthquakes.blogspot.com

2011-05-20T20:26:00.000Z

Symbols.

2011-05-19T17:37:00.000Z

Fire-breathing Sappy.

2011-05-18T19:36:00.000Z

Doodles.

2011-05-14T15:47:00.000Z

Variation

2011-04-30T11:33:00.000Z

2011-04-23T11:07:00.000Z

Animators VS Earthquakes Submissions.

Special edition, signed A3 Giclee print. Text reads 'Let's do our best!'

Signed A4 Giclee print from 'Happy Harada'

www.animatorsvsearthquakes.blogspot.com

2011-04-22T15:56:00.000Z

Animators VS Earthquakes Submission:

Work in progress.

Gonna be an A3 print, still some work to do.

2011-04-13T19:48:00.003Z

Animators Vs Earthquakes Exhibition, London

Sylvain Marc & i are organizing an exhibition of animation art

in aid of Dice Tsutsumi's charity - Artists Help Japan.

We're gonna be showcasing & selling work from some of London's

best independent animators & studios including Uli Meyer, Simon Tofield, Cartoon Network & more...

Please follow our blog for more updates & help spread the word :)

www.animatorsvsearthquakes.blogspot.com

2011-04-09T00:52:00.001Z

Breakdowns are my favourite part of animation.

2011-04-06T20:43:00.000Z

Time to get tough now.

2011-04-03T19:19:00.000Z

Never fell in love till i fell in love with you...

...turn it up fuckin' loud!

2011-04-03T16:05:00.001Z

Not Enough Punk Rock!

I can never get enough :)

2011-03-26T21:40:00.002Z

I love you Japan!

Ganbarimasu! xxx

2011-03-26T21:34:00.001Z

Happy Birthday Henry!

From Paul & Happy.

2011-03-24T08:41:00.001Z

Dummy Up!

2011-03-12T12:33:00.000Z

Confessions

2011-03-07T22:48:00.000Z

No Evil to Fight.

2011-03-07T22:08:00.000Z

All Outta Angst.

2011-03-02T21:06:00.000Z

Hey Keira!

2011-02-19T11:28:00.000Z

Harada Work In Progress

Harada so far, with V/O.

2011-02-06T14:24:00.002Z

Cardboard Rocket Backgrounds

2011-02-06T14:23:00.000Z

Cardboard Rocket Character Designs

2011-02-06T14:18:00.000Z

Misc. Background Art

From various CN promos:

Tom & Jerry, Johnny Test & a Robotboy/Billy & Mandy/Foster's spot.

2011-02-06T13:51:00.000Z

Stuntman

Old character designs...

2011-01-31T21:24:00.000Z

Abandoned Ice-Cream Van

2011-01-29T14:36:00.000Z

Clean up

About 30% of the way through cleaning up the rough animation.

2011-01-26T12:28:00.002Z

Sulky Batman

2011-01-15T23:33:00.000Z

Frame Grab

Back to work on Happy Harada!

2011-01-10T23:07:00.002Z

Skull & Bones

I've started a series of 12 skull & bones pictures.

This is some work in progress of the first.

2011-01-08T18:21:00.002Z

Octo-pieces

This reminds me of when i was in the merchant navy.

Painting on canvas.

I'm more comfortable with inks & watercolours on paper because it's quick & washy but i wanna learn to handle thick paint properly. Sure is sticky.
I'm also a messy, impatient painter :P
I got bored of this one & called it a day.

Preparatory sketch for painting.

2011-01-07T17:42:00.000Z

MAX

Here's some work in progress for my friend Max.

HERE HE IS! LOOK AT HIM!

2010-12-16T12:43:00.000Z

Space Horse - Scally Rally

Check out the epic photo!

Space Horse & the Scally Rally car at the Stelvio Pass in the Alps.

Horse-some!

2010-12-11T01:16:00.000Z

Nothing left to chance - Murakami & Mondrian.

Recently I visited the Takashi Murakami retrospective at the Palais de Versailles & on the same day visited the Mondrian/De Stijl exhibition at the Pompidou Centre.

The two artists’ work shared many theoretical similarities yet in practice yield totally different results.

Murakami’s colourful & gleeful installations were placed perfectly in this grand, opulent & gilded setting. The curation & layout of this exhibition was, without doubt, the most perfect I’ve ever experienced. Certainly, there could be no better place for a Murakami retrospective. Walking into each room was like opening a new Christmas present & the exhibition was full of happy people experiencing pure & visceral reactions to amazing characters that populated the spaces. It was like entering a timeless dream world.

The first thing that struck me about Murakami is that his work is not symbolic of anything. The happy, plastic flowers stand only for happy, plastic flowers. The work doesn’t stand for anything, it just is.

Murakami transcends symbolism. His work does employ archetypal characters – e.g. Buddhas or Shintoist archetypes but, unlike iconographic paintings, they are characters in their own right, not archetypes.

Murakami’s work is of unbridled glee. It is indulgent & bounteous in colour & form. It is extroverted, inclusive & human. It is satisfying in its open-handed gifting of generous warmth, colour & happiness.

Murakami’s work is pure. It is free from the bridle of symbolism. It is reductive without reducing expression to abstraction. It shows that organic forms & naturalistic painting can express an abstract reality without becoming polemic.

The characters are so strong in themselves that the man Murakami ceases to exist. They are devoid of human interference & this is due to the artist’s acute awareness & strong sensitivity to the interrelationships between colour, form, line & character. Nothing is left to chance, & because of this, Murakami’s work is truly transcendental - nothing short of genius.

Mondrian, like Murakami, is concerned with the annihilation of symbolic meaning & the removal of human interference, but his process is more of a distillation. Where Murakami is bounteous & gleeful, Mondrian is inward looking & meditative. Comparing Mondrian’s compositions to Murakami’s Buddhas is like comparing Zen gardening to flower arranging. They both yearn towards the same achievements, but in totally different ways.

Where Murakami uses characters, Mondrian removes the subject from his work in order to achieve a pure representation of beauty:

“…I want to come as close as possible to the truth & abstract everything from that, until I reach the foundation of things.”

Unlike Murakami he eschews organic shapes, favouring the right angle as representative of a universal rhythm & in place of characters, Mondrian uses the relationships between colour & line.

“…to express harmony through the equivalence of relationships of lines, colours & planes. But only in the strongest way.”

Mondrian’s paintings are clean & pure. They transcend the artist the same way Murakami’s work does. Mondrian’s incredible sensitivity to harmony between colour, lines & form & his control of proportions & relationships dictates pure beauty in his painting. Again, he leaves nothing to chance & his work achieves transcendence.

“…through horizontal & vertical lines constructed with awareness, but not with calculation, led by high intuition, & brought to harmony & rhythm…can become a work of art, as strong as it is true.”

The works of both artists transcend its creator, not through mathematical calculation, but by very natural human sensitivity. They achieve both purity of form & spirit through refinement & abstraction & by the simultaneous annihilation, & embracing, of the natural.

More photos on my Flickr page:

MrPaalAdventures

2010-12-10T21:05:00.000Z

Especially for Kristian:
An almost completed Harada Scene!

Here's how it's looking so far...

Still a few tweaks to be made & gotta finish up that last second of animation :P

2010-12-05T16:24:00.000Z

3 Harada Keys

The clean up & colouring is taking forever!

2010-12-03T21:01:00.000Z

Sketches

From Barbican, Somerset House, Liverpool Street Station & Turner office.

2010-12-02T14:10:00.000Z

Tom & Jerry Backgrounds

I did these for a Cartoon Network promo a few years ago - i was briefed to match the style of the show as closely as possible...i think it was Tom & Jerry Tales...to be honest i don't remember if i copied these straight from the show or not, & i had forgotten about them until today.

2010-11-22T17:35:00.000Z

Harada - Clean Key Drawings.

2010-11-15T10:52:00.000Z

Life Drawing.

Varying degrees of success...

I prefer the shorter poses where i don't get so heavy-handed!

2010-11-12T10:20:00.000Z

Life Drawing

2010-11-09T18:21:00.000Z

More Harada Bgs...

Almost finished with the backgrounds now, then onto the clean up!

2010-11-04T14:41:00.000Z

Happy Harada Backgrounds.

2010-11-03T10:01:00.001Z

Life Drawing.

I enjoyed the class yesterday...for once i was drawing without being too analytical. The proportions, therefore, aren't great but it was relaxing just to scribble around. Maybe it was a reaction to the relentlessly exacting Canaletto exhibition i'd just seen. I did, however, fall into the trap of drawing 'stock' elements (check out the hands), which was noted by the teacher; I should draw what i see, not what i think i see.

2010-10-24T19:10:00.000Z

Happy Harada Animatic.

Here's the animatic for Happy Harada.
Gonna get on with the animation now & work up those backgrounds.

2010-10-18T20:56:00.000Z

Batman Animation.

Here are some keys from an animation I did last year.

I just re-visited it at the request of a friend. Some nice poses in it & i liked the timing too.

2010-10-16T18:53:00.000Z

Happy Harada Rough Frames.

I started keying out the animation for Happy Harada. The backgrounds are layed out but unfinished though i'm content with the basic colour scheme.

It's looking ok so far...great to work on something of my own too,

even if i do have to do it after work hours :)

2010-10-11T08:25:00.000Z

More Ice Cream Off-Model.

I especially like Donald's casually sexy pose.

Wish i'd taken better pictures but the guy inside was, (quite rightly)

giving me suspicious eyes as i hung around, surreptitiously eyeing up his van.

2010-10-07T10:42:00.001Z

Happy Harada Storyboard.

I'm making a film...anyone wanna help me out?

2010-10-06T17:23:00.000Z

Scooby & Shaggy Keys.

I animated Scooby straight ahead with some video reference,

points for spotting Shaggy's walk cycle though :P

2010-09-29T08:32:00.000Z

Life Drawing.

5 min marker drawings:

2 min pen drawings:

10 min pencil drawing:

2010-09-24T12:24:00.000Z

El Greco.

Domenikos Theoktopoulos or 'El Greco' has always has massive appeal for me because of his overtly idiosyncratic style, use of colour & exaggerated forms & bold, brash brushstrokes. His paintings are full of assertive, bright blocks of colour but his fearless method of presenting his paintings can often cause me to overlook the many intricacies & delicacies therein. Having started out as an iconographer, his paintings also have fantastic stylization. He was brilliantly unafraid & relentlessly forward-thinking.

EYES:

His eyes are amazing. Big, dark & engaging. He paints eyes the way they feel - not only does the gaze tell a story but each individual eye has a personality all unto itself.

Observations:

Iris & pupil wrap around the form of the eyeball.

Round curves of the eye are contrasted with straighter/angular surrounding features.

Each eye is different & has its own personality.

Asymmetry - the eye closest to us is depicted larger.

Contradictory shapes - convex lines used to describe concave shapes.

HANDS:

El Greco's paints wonderful hands. So delicate & graceful, yet composed of real knobbly, bony shapes. They're full of character & like his treatment of eyes, each individual hand has its own personality, its own story. The overall silhouettes of the hands are very strong & the composition of the fingers within the silhouette are interesting & attractive - full off subtle overlapping & intelligent use of negative space.

The hands alone tell the story & emotion of the painting.

El Greco paints character superbly. He paints humanity by drawing out & celebrating all its imperfections - he's a caricaturist! His fearless depictions of his subjects, his composition of all the flaws & faults in humanity (boss-eyes, knobbly fingers, big ears...) into such daringly graceful painting steeps them in the divine.

2010-09-23T15:25:00.000Z

Doodling in Illustrator.

(Waiting for a job to start...)

2010-09-22T14:18:00.000Z

Life Drawing.

It's been at least 6 months since i did any life drawing so i'm super rusty. Some of the quicker sketches are ok but i really need to loosen up!

2 Min Sketches:

2010-09-20T15:20:00.000Z

Bedtime Bear Animatic.

The animatic for 'The Sleepy Adventures of Bedtime Bear' is now up on my pitch blog:

www.mrpaalpitchblog.blogspot.com

Be good to know what anyone thinks.

I'm aiming it at pre-school which is a territory i'm not overly familiar with so comments appreciated - especially from anyone who knows more about it.

2010-09-19T17:32:00.000Z

Space Horse Scally Rally Car!

Nice!

2010-09-17T10:33:00.001Z

Without Compliments...

Maybe i'll include this with my tax return...

2010-09-16T15:57:00.000Z

Doodles.

Design for a 'Without Compliments' slip.

2010-09-16T14:07:00.000Z

MAYANG IS THE BEST!

Yeah, i can't decide which one of these i like best...votes?

2010-09-15T12:14:00.000Z

Bedtime Bear Character Designs.

2010-09-10T22:13:00.000Z

For Daaaaaaaaaan.

Love from Paaaaaaaaaaaal x

2010-09-09T21:07:00.000Z

Space Horse Car Sticker!

Space Horse is appearing on the side of a car in a 'Scally Rally'. Horse-some.

Here are the sticker designs:

Gonna be on the wing above the front tyre.

Hopefully i'll get some photos of him in action :)

2010-09-09T00:05:00.000Z

Raphael Cartoon Studies.

I went to the V&A today to see some of Raphael's preparatory cartoons for the tapestries in the Sistine Chapel.

One of the main things that, for me, separates Raphael from the other Renaissance artists is his masterful layouts. The way he handles complex relationships & handles many interactions happening simultaneously without compromising the legibility of the overall painting.

He does this by utilising hierarchies of form, graceful framing, lines of action...pretty much every trick in the book, but without making it laboured & obvious.

The Miraculous Draught of Fishes.

The main group is framed by the water the silhouette of it doesn't overlap or compete with the background hills or foreground shore.

The main group is then separated into a primary (3 characters to the left of the painting) & secondary group, which draws the attention to the action on the left which is framed gracefully with lots of space around the characters.

The groups are also separated by a subtle line created by the middle character's hand gesture.

The eyelines are pretty too.

I love how the central stork dips its head out of the way of the action of the hands reeling in the net.

The background shape also mirrors the shape of the main group & the perspective of those background hills draws the eye into the distance creating a line of action from right to left through the painting - again, drawing the eye to the left-hand side of the composition.

This use of perspective is lovely & subtle & Raphael uses it often.

The Sacrifice at Lystra.

This painting has a great surge of energy through it as if that crowd is about to bowl itself over. The composition gives precedence to the central figure while handling many different relationships within the groups.

Again, the depth in the composition of the buildings leading the eye toward the far horizon draws the view towards the main action.

The main forms are clearly defined & all point towards the central character.

The architectural construction lines (tiles on the floor, plinth etc) all point to the action.

There are two points of gaze - the character & the axe. There are some main eyelines which are asymmetrically focused on the axe. The asymmetry makes the composition more subtle as these lines don't draw attention to themselves in the same way they would if the triangle they created was equilateral, (say for example in Dali's crucifixion painting).

The head is framed in negative space & the central character is given space around his silhouette.

Healing of the Lame Man.

What struck me about this painting was the unusual distorted columns which seem to reflect the physical state of the buckled lame man. Perhaps not the most subtle technique, but nevertheless used to good effect.

The framing is also fairly obvious...

...but i did like the great highlighting of the main characters by their contrasting (opposite) colouring. Blue & yellow and green& orange.

Again, Raphael's use of perspective to draw the eye in is apparent. The lines of perspective all point to the centre but their symmetrical nature makes for a less graceful composition.

2010-09-07T14:42:00.000Z

Bernini

These are all in the Villa Borghese in Rome. I went there to see the collection of Caravaggio paintings, but was totally blown away by these Bernini sculptures.

2010-09-07T14:38:00.000Z

When the hell did this become acceptable?

This is a local council promotional poster i saw last night in a bus shelter.

Apologies for the blurred camera-phone photo.

I know local councils don't have a whole load of money to throw around on their promotional posters, but seriously! I guess this is the result of our art schools deciding against teaching fundamental skills.

2010-09-05T20:01:00.000Z

Various Ben 10 Tonne Keys

2010-09-01T16:41:00.000Z

Rough Keys:

2010-08-31T17:59:00.000Z

Designs for Ben 10 Tonne.

It's Giro time!

2010-08-30T14:35:00.002Z

Bonus Post: Off-Model Treats!

I haven't seen so many of these ice-cream vans around this summer - shame.

Could be to do with the lack of sunshine this year.

2010-08-30T13:46:00.000Z

I have an assignment to design & animate a popular cartoon character who's old, worn out & past it. So i've been trying to analyse 'then & now' photos of people to find out what changes as you age & how i can apply it to my design...

John Lydon sure has a great face.

I love the structure you can see of Bill Borroughs' skull, especially his big, round cheekbones.

Isn't Shane Macgowan fantastic?

Check out Reagan's mouth. The smile on the younger one is AMAZING & he keeps the same shape to the elderly one too. Also, such great hair!

Notes:

So which character am i animating?

Next, Ben 10 Sketches...

2010-08-26T13:35:00.000Z

A background i'm working on...

2010-08-13T11:21:00.002Z

It's gonna be Horse-some!

2010-08-12T12:20:00.000Z

I just pitched SPACE HORSE! to CN's short-form development team.

They were very enthusiastic & had some great ideas of how to make it more marketable.

Let's see what happens next... :)