EVERYTHING JUSTIN LONGOZ

NEW ART BLOG UP NOW! THIS ONE SUCKS!

2010-06-21T21:10:00.000-07:00

Hey everyone!
Just wanted to let you know that I'm spending most of my time over here on my new art blog. The tumblr layout seems more natural to me. This blogger site will probably just fade away. Oh well. We had fun while it lasted. So check out my new site for all of my art, old and new.

JUSTIN LONGOZ MADE AN ART
JUSTIN LONGOZ MADE AN ART
JUSTIN LONGOZ MADE AN ART
JUSTIN LONGOZ MADE AN ART
JUSTIN LONGOZ MADE AN ART
JUSTIN LONGOZ MADE AN ART
JUSTIN LONGOZ MADE AN ART
JUSTIN LONGOZ MADE AN ART
JUSTIN LONGOZ MADE AN ART
JUSTIN LONGOZ MADE AN ART
JUSTIN LONGOZ MADE AN ART
JUSTIN LONGOZ MADE AN ART

and feel free to also check out my this-is-what-i-found-on-the-internet-and-think-is-cool site here .
see you on tumblr!

cheers,
-justin

WELCOME TO COLLAGE CITY, CANADA. POPULATION: YOU!

2010-04-01T13:39:00.000-07:00

Hey everybody!
Remember a while back when I made a post about the massive collage that Caroline and I made in our apartment? Well, once we filled the space we never really stopped making these minimalist collages. So, I've taken some of my favorites and scanned them for your viewing pleasure! Again, all of these were done with National Geographics from the 60s, 70s, 80s and 90s using scissors, glue and tape. Straight up. When it comes to collages I'll have to agree with my ignorant friend Bob who says, "Fuck Photoshop!"

Camel Head Fields (2010)

Canon Girl (2010)

Cracker Barrel City (2010)

Boob-Kid Flower Blooms (2010)

Prepubescent Giant Rests (2010)

I Can See Through Time! (2010)

I Remember The Horsies... (2010)

Jeff Bridges - Fisher of Trash (2010)

Mosquito Rain-forest (2010)

Recycle Yo Tobacco (2010)

Super-Jesus Can-Man (2010)

Woop woop!

-Justin

MY FIRST MURAL

2010-03-23T10:25:00.000-07:00

KITCHEN MURAL: GRASS from Global Mechanic on Vimeo.

UPDATES! SAD MAGAZINE launched issue 3 this last Friday. I suggest you go and pick a copy up. It's a tasty black and white issue. I had a little sketch in it. 1998creative got interviewed by VANCOUVER ANIMATION DOT CA. That was interesting. It was our first interview. OH and of course, if I can direct your attention above, Chris and I finished a big-ass mural in his kitchen recently. It's a bunch of tall blades of grass and their root systems. This was also another first for both of us. I think it turned out quite nicely. What do you think?

-Justin

1998 LAUNCHES NEW WEBSITE!

2010-03-23T10:21:00.000-07:00

Just a quick little post to let all of you know that Chris and I have launched our creative site! GO HERE TO CHECK IT OUT! We'll be hosting the 10 Commandment shorts on this website until we get settled and finish the full version of the site. Right now it's just a splash page so we have somewhere for people to contact us. Go ahead and contact us!

-Justin

The 10 Commandments: No.7 - Thou Shalt Not Steal

2010-03-23T10:20:00.000-07:00

The Ten Commandments: No.7 - Thou Shalt Not Steal from Global Mechanic on Vimeo.

Today I have the 3rd short in our 10 part series on the 10 Commandments. THOU SHALT NOT STEAL. This short was a challenge to make. Fuck bananas. Seriously. SUCH a pain in the ass. If you're thinking, "Oh let's make a stop-motion film with fruit and vegetables! Hmm, what should we use, oh I know, HOW ABOUT A FUCKING BANANA???!!!1!!1!!!/?" then I suggest you skip the film and go right to shooting yourself in the face. Bananas have no legs. Bananas are soft as SHIT! Bananas go brown under hot lights lights. BANANAS HAVE NO LEGS. All kidding aside though, it was a really fun shoot. We worked our movie magic. Pulled out all of the smoke and mirrors and put them to good use. Don't get me wrong, we're pleased with the film. It turned out nicely. But never again will I work with a banana. It's like trying to wrangle sheep that aren't trained. You just shouldn't do it. Other than that, however, the rest of the shoot was a blast! I got to do some 2D animation of Google. That's all hand drawn by the way (In case you were wondering). And set decorating an office scene for fruit is always an enjoyable experience. The calendar in the background is my favorite set piece. All in, I'd say it was a success!

Stick around. I'll have more Commandment shorts and some other junk soon!

-Justin

NEW DRAWINGS

2010-02-15T14:56:00.000-08:00

howdy gang,
i've been busy like the proverbial bee- making those 10 commandment short films, trying to finish part one of points of contact, drawing up a bunch of stuff for the no fun city documentary. it's been a veritable mountain of r... work.

nevertheless, i've been drawing almost constantly. i don't know what's come over me lately. i'm like a productivity machine right now. feels pretty good. so i thought maybe i'd share just a few of the drawings i've been doing. these drawings were all done with my brand new brush pen (which is offically the funnest pen known to man). take a look:

cigarette (2010)

doc ellis (2010)

boy fight (2010)

shame in losing (2010)

contemplation (2010)

this grass, these flowers, i just got the shit kicked out of me (2010)

sigh (2010)

that brush pen is like visual crack for me. it changes the way you draw and the way your drawings look. i obviously have some work to do trying to manipulate the pen to my advantage but i'm really happy with how these drawings turned out. just making this post and talking about the pen is making me want to draw more stuff... i'm looking at the pen now... you sexy fucking pen. jesus! i'm hard. this is embarassing.

stick around ladies and gentlemen, we have another 10 commandments short coming in the next week or two!

until then,

-justin

THE NEXT COMMANDMENT SHORT IS HERE!!!

2010-02-05T10:57:00.000-08:00

today i'm happy to bring you the 2nd short film in the 10 commandments series, KEEP HOLY THE SABBATH DAY. this time we spent a little more time in the craft room and the editing suite to step up the quality of the series and we're all very happy with how it turned out. here, take a look for yourselves:

The Ten Commandments: No.3 Keep Holy The Sabbath Day from Global Mechanic on Vimeo.

if you check back here or on the global mechanic blog in a little while, you'll find some production stills and write ups about how we went about crafting the sets and animating the video. also, for more 10 commandments videos and info, feel free to check out our new 1998 website
.
thanks for stopping by guys!
-justin

THE TEN COMMANDMENTS SERIES

2010-01-13T11:52:00.000-08:00

soooooooo,
over the holiday break, my creative collective (we're called 1998) and the animation studio that i work for (that's global mechanic) made the first in a series of stop-motion animated short films about the ten commandments. the series is simply called "The Ten Commandments". The first short we shot was for commandment number 5: Thou Shalt Not Kill. we think it turned out wonderfully!
check the film out here:

and, the short has been getting some fairly good viewing attention. we've been featured on lost at e minor, design for mankind and creative review. very cool! we'll be releasing the subsequent films on our vimeo page, global mechanic's blog and through a series of other blogs as well so keep your eyes open for that. okay enough for now. i'll be back with more soonish!
-justin

HAPPY NEW YEAR AND UPDATES!

2010-01-04T14:46:00.000-08:00

2010 is here and flying cars still don't exist.
shame.
i kind of half expected that i'd wake up january 1st at 3pm to find that while i was PTFO'ed people had run around and updated everything to look like the set of Total Recall or Logan's Run or something. alas, i have no jewel in my hand, i have yet to REALLY see a three-breasted woman and no one is flying anything in the city. reality bites. STILL, i wish you all a happy new year. lots of things have been going on lately. some art stuff, some film stuff, some personal stuff.

in case you were confused: 3 boobs and a jeweled hand

as i mentioned before, i'm in the process of animating a 4 part short film called Points of Contact. i thought i'd release, or "leak" for all of you h4ckurz out there, a still from the film so you can see what kind of design i'm going for. it's all pretty simple line and color with rough sketchy animation. lots of boil on the line. i'm pleased with what i have so far. i'm mere days away from completing part one of the film. SNEAK PEEK TIME:

Still from 2010's Points of Contact

(click to enlarge)

i'm going to be releasing the film in 4 parts on global mechanic's blog. then i'll do one big release once it's finished as a single 4 part animation. maybe we'll have a parking lot animation festival in the spring or something. who knows? my immediate plan with the 4 individual releases is to just put some fitting music over the animations as they come out in parts and then for the final piece, i'll have foley and a proper score put together by a yet-to-be-named local musician. should be neat-o.

Sad Magazine's Winter Issue 2009/2010

in other news, i've recently been published! SAD MAGAZINE slapped a couple of my drawings next to an article written by graham tempelton in their winter issue. it's a great article about the the overblown H1N1 "pandemic". you can find the magazine all over the place in vancouver. go to their website to see exactly where you can pick a copy up. it's a fantastic magazine! i highly recommend you all go and pick up a copy. the release party was off the hizzy. maybe i had too much to drink, maybe i didn't. long story short, it was a blast and the burlesque girls were beautiful. above you'll see the cover of the winter issue in case you're out and you see it around. it's free. pick it up.

Hot One Inch Action Art Show Feb. 6th 2010 112 West Hastings

in OTHER artsy fartsy news, i've been selected to participate in a little art show called HOT ONE INCH ACTION. basically you submit your artwork as it would appear on a one inch button and if you get selected you get 20 copies of your button and your button goes into a show where people come, buy buttons, trade and see all of the buttons displayed in a gallery setting. i LOVE this concept. button trading art show? um, i'll be there! and you guys should be there too. it's taking place on february 6th at 112 west hastings at around 8pm. i won't tell you what design i submitted for the show. you'll just have to come out and see all of the buttons! i'll be there. very excited about this.

and i'll end on a personal note: i just got engaged! well, i popped the question end of november but hey, it's probably news to you right? we're setting a tentative date for late september. gonna get hitched in the south of france. yay! i love you caroline!

alright, enough for now.

will talk again soon.

-j

36th Annual NW Film & Video Festival Best of DVD

2009-12-10T10:10:00.000-08:00

Hey you Goombas!
I don't know if I ever mentioned this (It's poor blogging skills on my part to have not said anything in the past) but I recently went to Portland with a film that I made with some of my friends (Pat Beechinor and Chris Mckinlay) for the 36th Annual North West Film & Video Festival. We had a film called "Stick" playing. It was an animated short about this stick-man on a cup who kills another stick-man on a cup and gets upset with the fact that he's murdered another stick-man. Stuff happens. People in the audience go, "oohhhhhhh!" and it's over. I don't want to give it away for anyone who hasn't seen it in case you somehow see it (the best of films go on tour throughout the northwest). Anyways, we were surprised when we arrived at the festival to find that the film won a judge's award. "Yay!" we thought. A judge's award is like an honorable mention. This was our first film festival. Anyways, long story short, Pat recently received an email that said that our short made the "best of" DVD this year (scroll down past the story to see the list). Holy shit! Right? It's like, whoda-thunk it? Not too shabby for our first festival! I was going to post the video here, but the best of DVD is going on tour. The dates and times haven't been confirmed yet but I can assure you that when I know, you'll know... well, when I know, I'll post it on here and you'll know if you ever come back! Below is a still from the film:

Still from the film "Stick" (2008)

-Justin

PROW MOW SHUN!

2009-12-09T16:23:00.000-08:00

I'm back (like a heart attack)!

Heart Attack (2009)

It's been a while, I know. I've been busy alright? I got a promotion at work. I'm in charge of dealing with Global Mechanic's online content now. I've got them going with a BLOG, some video content on VIMEO, a FLICKR pool and the blippity-blah-blah of a TWITTER account. It's a huge honor to have this promotion bestowed upon me but its also a much larger work-load. The up-side to all of this new work is that I've also been put in charge of generating new content for the blog and other areas of GM's internet presence. That means i get to animate and draw like 50% of the time I'm at work. Now, because i'm already an animator/illustrator you're probably thinking, "duh dude, what is this? who are you? get out of here!" but really, as an animator or illustrator there's a lot more to your profession than JUST doing what your titles says you do. You also have a lot of parameters that you need to stay within, especially when dealing with clients who want you to pimp their products. So the unusual thing about my new job is that I get to draw and animate whatever I want. I love it! Global Mechanic has put faith in my abilities and I'm going to town with it! Fuck it! Let's animate dicks and shit! Woo! Go new job! So yeah. I've also started a TUMBLR account where I spend a lot of my time now. It's just easier than a full blown blog. I use it as a sort of reference playground that's mashed up with a bunch of my personal work. So if you're just dying to see what I'm doing (which I'm sure you're not) you can probably bet I'll been on my tumblr account posting pictures of ladies with nipple slippage or remix videos of the sham-wow infomercials.

But don't worry. I'll still be here from time to time posting about the comics that I've been working on or talking about the new 4 part short film I'm designing.

TALK SOON FWEINDS!
-justin

Lick That!

2009-10-21T13:33:00.001-07:00

It's Still Good For the First 5 Seconds (2009)
CLICK ON THE IMAGE TO ENLARGE

hey everybody!
i've been ignoring my blog lately but only because i've been working on some GREAT stuff! Firstly, for work, i've been developing backgrounds for a new kid's show whose name i can't really get into right now (it's all still a work in progress), but it's been lots of fun! More recently, i've also worked on a soy milk add campaign, doing some minor animation and some print design layout. on a personal level, i'm in the process of developing a comic strip. it's too soon for me to post anything other than concept art, so once i've organized that, i'll start posting it. hopefully i'll even have a couple of finished strips for your perusing pleasure.

above is a rejected illustration for the print portion of the soy milk stuff i was working on. They said it was a little "too graphic". well yeah! isn't that the point? oi-yoi-yoi! i was going for a sort of crumb-like, negative look. i think it turned out pretty good.

i'll be back (hopefully sooner than later),
-justin

EXPERIMENTS IN DRAWING

2009-06-04T12:34:00.001-07:00

drawing while walking series: "intro/truck" (2009)

drawing while walking series: "that building next to the brewery" (2009)

drawing in the dark series: "right here" (2009)

drawing in the dark series: "the great bellydancer" (2009)

i was walking around at the beach down in the area of the children's festival the other evening. they had been taking tents down all day, as the festival had just ended, and i guess they decided to leave one tent out and open because there was nothing left in it. i looked around for security gaurds and didn't find any, so i went inside the tent and sat down in the dark. for some reason i decided to pull out my sketchbook and start drawing (i say, "for some reason" like i don't know that i had that YACHT song bouncing around in my head. "why would you be drawing in the daaaaark? when you could be drawing in the liiiiight."). i couldn't see. well, to be fair, i could barely see. i could sort of tell where i was putting lines, but not really sure what they looked like all together so i mostly just winged it and let my hand go free. i had this vague idea of what things were going to look like but i couldn't focus so intently on each stroke like i normally do when drawing. it was a very freeing experience. when i came out of the tent, i opened my book and took a look at what i had. above you can find 2 of the 10 drawings that i did in the dark. these ones turned out the best. frankly, i love the style and i'd like to experiement more with this style this summer. it was around that time that i did end up seeing a gaurd slowly cruising around the fenced off area, so i made my way towards the burrard street bridge.

it was then that i came up with my other, almost equally obtuse idea of drawing while walking. this is a very difficult thing to do. you have to constantly look up at what you're drawing, while shooting the eyes down to the page every now and again to make sure things are working out. that, coupled with the fact that the perspective of what you're drawing is constantly changing, makes for a unique drawing experience. above are another 2 drawings that i did from this series.

i highly recommend both styles of drawing. i found that they were both good exercises for "letting go" and feeling what you're drawing more than just trying to make it look right. so if you sketch, i suggest you try either one or both of these styles of drawing when you get a chance. i'll try and post some more at another time.

until later,
-justin

ART AUCTION

2009-06-03T14:00:00.000-07:00

"beauty queen" (2008) - up for auction!!!

hello all,
i was recently told the terrible story of scott harding and the asshole who essentially ruined his life in a hit and run accident in new york. deb dawson, who i have the pleasure of working with on a daily basis, has set up a sort of art auction to help scott out with his hospital bills. i donated one of my drug paintings to the cause (seen above). if you were ever looking to buy any of my work, this is probably your best chance. i've never really sold anything before so this is a first. i think the prices range quite dramatically in the auction, so if you head over to the website you might find a great deal on something. i suggest you check it out. lots of really great stuff including original drawings from animators like bill plympton and marv newland. so go take a peek!

until later,
-justin

BEAUBIEN MAGAZINE and IDEAFIXA MAGAZINE

2009-05-28T09:46:00.000-07:00

"a question for the panel" (2009)

busy busy busy! gotta go! go! go! never clean! never clean!
it's been a hectic few months for me. just got back from a trip visiting my brother in prague (photos will come soon, i promise. just gotta organize), been doing a lot of design work in the studio as well as some of my own animated junk which i know i keep promising to put up here, but is no where near a point of completion yet. patience.

in the meantime, i have a couple of tidbits of news. above, is a drawing that i did for a poem called "a question for the panel" that will appear in the new beaubien magazine in june of 2009. what's the poem about? why the baby with a beard? i dunno. guess you'll have to wait and see! if you live in montreal, vancouver or toronto you should be able to find it somewhere. they have a list of places that carry the magazine on their website.

in other news, if you'll recall a while ago, i was doing some illustration for the online magazine ideafixa (the fear and loathing issue). well, it appears that they have a best of book coming out soon and they selected one of my drawings to be in the book! i'm very honored to have been selected. i'm not exactly sure when they plan on releasing the book, but if you check back with the website, i'm sure they'll have the info up there as soon as they know.

-justin

CHRIS WARE ANIMATED

2009-05-15T09:50:00.000-07:00

Quimby The Mouse from This American Life on Vimeo.

been a while. got some stuff to put up soon. rough drawings for a new strip, photos from my trip to prague, tests from a new spec spot. stay tuned! until then, enjoy this short that was animated by john kuramoto and designed by the prolific chris ware. the music in the piece is andrew bird.

see you soon,
-justin

BATMILK!

2009-03-26T11:21:00.000-07:00

i've really been pushing the nfb lately, i know, but they've been putting out some fantastic stuff. right now, they have this little program on the go called hothouse. they just finished their 5th year and things really seem to be picking up. i thought i'd take a moment and share my favorite film from this year. it's called "batmilk" and it was made by the delightfully twisted albertan brandon blommaert. you should check out the other films from this year's program. very cool stuff!

stay tuned. more of my work is coming soon.
-jbones

DARFUR PSA

2009-03-05T09:02:00.000-08:00

("drawings" darfur psa: 60 seconds)

here is the final 60 second version of the darfur psa called "drawings" that we just finished in the studio. this was the first spot that i designed from beginning to end. i animated a few of the scenes throughout as well. it was a great learning experience. i got to draw with crayons, play with tea and paper textures and experiement with water effects over the course of the 6 weeks it took to make this. the content is a bit tough to swallow but that was kind of the point. so, as sad as it is, i hope you can still enjoy it.

stick around. chris and i are doing some crazy tests for a different commercial that we're working on that i just might put up soon.

love always and forever,
-justin

ANIMAL COLLECTIVE - MY GIRLS VIDEO

2009-02-15T21:28:00.000-08:00

animal collective "my girls" video

i'm a huge animal collective fan so this is a pretty big deal for me. and as far as i can tell, the my girls video is perfect. its elegantly psychedelic and upbeat and is almost literally the animal collective personified in visual form. the melting band members at the end always make me want to yell "WOOOOO!" along with them. so cool. i just hope they keep finding great videographers for their videos. great videographers who animate... and who's names are justin... longoz. call me dudes! i'm right fucking here!

check out some more animal collective and animal collective related videos:

peacebone

fireworks

water curses

who could win a rabbit

leaf house

winter's love (live in an apartment)

live at the old market in brighton (2004)

panda bear - people party live (part 01, part 02)

avey tare and kria brekkan (doctress) - foetus no-man live in philidelphia (2006)

looks like today was a big video day for this blog.

woot!

okay,

-justin

NFB FILMS ONLINE

2009-02-15T20:56:00.000-08:00

still from norman mclaren's oscar winning film "neighbours"

just last month, the nfb (national film board of canada) launched the new nfb.ca site. it's like a gold-mine of incredible canadian films. they have documentaries, experimental films, old news reel stuff and a whole bunch more. i've mostly been watching the animated films. i recommend checking out the animal movie by ron tunis and grant munro or the street by caroline leaf. both stellar films. and of course, watch as many norman mclaren films as you can.

i thought i'd just post "when the day breaks" right here because i just love the film so much and i think that everyone should see it at least once. i hope you enjoy it!

bye bye for now,

-justin

MOWER FEWLT DRAWEENS

2009-02-07T20:02:00.000-08:00

untitled 003 (2009)

untitled 001 and 003 (2008, 2009)

doing the hula in maui '92 (2009)

i found the charger for the digital camera so i was able to take photos of some more drawings. the first one there is just as big as the other giant old man head from a while back. you can see them side-by-side in the second photo. the 3rd one there is taken from a hilarious postcard i found with these old women doing the hula in maui. it was priceless! they were all leaning towards one side in mid dance, but they all sort of looked like they might have fallen directly after the photo was taken. too funny.

also wanted to say that i may have lost it on the whole nu nu's thing. so, i'm sorry about that. i still agree with about 80% of what i had said but i guess i could have been a little more respectful about it?2...3...4...

if i had just listened to the gap band and not "taken the chance to disrespect", i'd be surrounded by beautiful cartoon babes and i'd be able to drive my bendy limousine to my tape-deck robot that says "disrespect". remember that the next time you go to disrespect.

more lataaz,

-justin

NU NU'S CAN SUCK ON MY CHARELSTON CHEW

2009-02-02T15:37:00.000-08:00

"fuck nu nu's sandwich bar in vancouver" (2009)

i'd like to start this post with some advice: if you're ever in the area of broadway and granville in vancouver and you're thinking to yourself, "i'm hungry but i don't want subway because i ALWAYS get subway, what else is like subway that i can eat right now?" don't go to nu nu's sandwich bar. jesus god. a tiny little, dry-as-a-nun's-vagina, piece of shit sandwhich that takes them 2 seconds to literally THROW together, will end up costing you 9 or 10 bucks. these aren't big sandwiches either. no special sauces or neato packaging. just tiny little, my-mom-is-a-lazy-bitch-and-i-hate-her-sloppy-bologne-sanwhich type of sandwiches. i ordered my chicken melt and the woman obviously didn't feel like making it for me because she was trying to sell me on the window sandwiches which i didn't want. who would? i mean, you're a sandwich bar for chrissake! you're telling me that it's too much for me to ask you to make my sandwich right there in front of me? you have to try and low-ball me with sweaty, soggy discount foccacia? get a job lady! gawd! and the interac machine had the balls to ask me if i was tipping 15% OR 20%... as if! you haven't served me in any way shape or form. you put wet sprouts on aged bread. who the hell do you think you are?

next time, just go to subway again. you'll feel better about yourself and the people who work in your neighbourhood. yes, it's so bad at nu nu's sandwhich bar that you'll actually wish you'd just stayed a boring and shitty individual who went to subway like an idiot.

in other news, we just finished the animation for a commercial that i designed! woo-hoo! it was the second commercial i've done design on and the first commercial i did ALL of the design for. i also did some animation which is always fun for me. as soon as the sound is finished, i'll put the spot up on this bitch for y'all to see. it's a PSA for darfur. it's pretty intense but i think it turned out nicely.

so stay tuned folks!
-justin

DRUM SKETCHUN

2009-01-30T13:44:00.001-08:00

"saunier/chippendale" (2009)

above you'll find a drawing i just completed. it's an ode to my two favorite drummers. on the left, we have greg saunier of deerhoof. on the right we have brian chippendale of lightning bolt. now, i'm not necessarily a huge drummer-guy. i don't read drumhead weekly and i don't usually cream over drum solos or try and break down people's drumming styles. with that said, however, i always seem to notice the talents of these guys when i hear them play, especially if it's live. brian chippendale plays like a mad man and usually wears a mask with a microphone tucked into it so he can sing and drum at the same time. as for greg saunier, well, he is just incredible in every possible way. both of these guys are in at least two bands each (i think brian is in, like 4 or 5) and i know that mr. chippendale is also a comic book/graphic novel illustrator. you can see/buy some of his artwork/comics here.

so yeah, i love these guys. you should appreciate them too. go out and buy a deerhoof record and then buy a lightning bolt record and listen to them both. maybe even at the same time. that'd be crazy! it would probably sound like a bag of drummers, where the fabric of the bag was distortion weaved through itself, being flung around and dragged by a carless child on his way home from the milkery.

sweeeeet.

back soon,
-justin

YOU GOTTA GET YOUR GROOVE ON SKETCHEZ

2009-01-27T16:58:00.000-08:00

"this is how we do it" (2009)

this is a tribute to the summer of 1995. i dedicate this picture to my brother and my cousin julie who had the single for "this is how we do it" and played it over and over again with ryan and i that summer. i'll know all of the words to this song for the rest of my life because of that single. i'll bet i could even sing it acapella.

i bet you a hundred bucks.
dare me.
fucking dare me.

more again later,
-justin

SKETCHIN' ON IT!!

2009-01-26T11:31:00.001-08:00

"mr. mugabe, how do you get your powers?" (2009)

i've been obsessed with my brother ryan's ideas for zimbabwean currency lately. i like the idea of bathing in money even though i don't like the idea of getting paper cuts on my penis or the idea of money in general. however, i'm not sure i'd like to bathe in the currency of a country where it's leader eats babies. it's true y'know. he eats babies. that's how come his mustache is so tremendous and also how come he can fly. i sawed it once.

how is the peso doing? maybe we can get a tub of that going.

more later,
-justin

FUTURISM YAY!

2009-01-20T13:30:00.001-08:00

"futurism turns 100" (2009)

you guys! futurism! 100 years old this year! yes, the future of futurism is uncertain. in fact, some might say that futurism is dead. HA! goes to show you what all of these "believers in the past" know. losers. YOU'RE ALL LOSERS! FUCK THE PAST! FUCK HISTORY! FUCK BOOKS AND MUSEUMS! TECHNOLOGY IS ALL THAT WE NEED! go get your heavy gears and smoke stacks kids, and meet me out back. i have one thing to teach you before we burn down the school. socialism + electricity = what? that's right... COMMUNISM! who's with me?

seriously though? happy birthday futurism. in my mind, you're making a hard geometric line for a better world.

wait, i've stumbled into another paradox haven't i?

ROFLZ!!1!

more soon,
-justin

DIGISKETCHERZ 8

2009-01-14T16:03:00.000-08:00

"moon ladies" (2009)

oh my god! 2 posts in one day! it's like the apocalypse or some junk. but it's true. i was there at the beginning of it all and i was transcribing the events via my computer sketch pad. these ladies (which is what they are and don't you DARE say otherwise or they'll fashion a space rock for jamming right up your ass) constructed the moon out of colored balls. the color faded the day that patrick mcgoohan died. wait...

it's so sad that he's gone. he was number six. NO! he wasn't a number. he was a free man. i always forget. well, he's a little more free now... either that or there's nothing after death and he's just dead. either way, it was a sad day indeed. not just for prisoner fans, but for the moon. i noticed that the moon was white last night and not rainbow bright. *sigh* i'm gonna miss the rainbow moon. also, patrick mcgoohan. did you know they're making a prisoner movie? well good luck making it good NOW you idiots. sorry. i'm grieving.

more at some point,
-justin

DIGITAL SHITS VOLUME 2.013

2009-01-14T11:58:00.000-08:00

"umpa lumpa gets old" (2009)

here's another one i did yesterday while scanning more stuff for the job i'm working on. while drawing my mind wandered through an abyss of umpa lumpa queeries. do umpa lumpas have pension plans? i hope so. for this guy's sake. what about life insurance? what's the wife gonna do when this umpa lumpa can't dance and make chocolates anymore? also, for that matter, how do umpa lumpas mate? i've never seen a female umpa lumpa (unless they look just like the males or are an asexual species, which is a different idea all together).

fucking willy wonka.

more soon.

be seeing you,
-justin

DIGITAL ILLUSTRATIONS

2009-01-12T16:19:00.000-08:00

"i had a heart once" (2009)

"don't eat my butt" (2009)

my first post of the new year. wow. it feels good, i'm not going to lie to you. kind of like taking a crap after a night of heavy drinking. it just sort of laid itself out there and i looked on it in great appreciation. not because i thought it was beautiful, but because it was finished and it marked the end of a great deal of pressure that was building inside of me.
-gasp -
how rude!

above you'll see 2 digital illustrations i did on friday while i waited for scans to run through. i think they turned out okay. hopefully i'll get better with time. that's generally how this sort of thing works right? the words in the top illustration are from a beehive and the barracudas song called "raw and bleeding". the words in the bottom illustration are the first words that popped into my head when i saw this woman pleading. don't ask me why.

okay, if you NEED to ask me why, send me an email and i'll tell you. but don't expect me to hold back. expect truth.

i'll get more up soon. i know it's been a while since i posted anything. stay tuned.

loves,
-justin

WET HOT AMERICAN SUMMER

2008-11-06T11:40:00.001-08:00

(what is it, "a new way"?, 2008)

(you french great, 2008)

(black holes made of soot, 2008)

i was recently asked to draw some stills from the film WET HOT AMERICAN SUMMER for a wonderful online magazine that a friend of mine edits called NARWHAL MAGAZINE. you should go to the website and look at the rest of my stills. also, read something while you're there. it'll do you good.

UPDATE: the illustrations can also be seen on david wain's blog HERE. kate you're a genius.

enjoy and stay tuned,
-justin

TWO OLD MEN

2008-11-04T11:45:00.000-08:00

don't let the title of this post fool you. nothing sexy is about to happen. not unless you get off on looking at illustrations... or old men. sweaty, hairy balls. no teeth. what's not to like?

(untitled 001, 2008)

(untitled 002, 2008)

the first one there, untitled 001, is a big-un. it's approximately 4 feet high and 4 feet wide, give or take a couple of inches. it's the biggest anything that i've ever done. i quite enjoyed the experience and expect that i'll be doing more larger scale work over the next while. i used felt pens of varrying qualities of ink as i have in all other related artwork. untitled 002 was executed in the same way but with minimal detail.

mccain or obama? am i right?
what's the deal with THAT situation?
and so ends my political commentary for the year.

enjoy and stay tuned for more stuff!
-justin

SHOW POSTER

2008-10-08T12:44:00.001-07:00

this is a show poster that i just finished yesterday. the man in the poster is the ever so suave david niven. the image that inspired the drawing in this poster is from a 1975 national geographic magazine advertisement where niven has his coat slung over his shoulder with a quotation beside his head that reads, "i hate to wait". pure gold. i can't remember what the ad was for, but the image just seemed to fit the bill perfectly so i went with it.

the headlining band, the physics of meaning, is a band fronted by multi-instrumentalist daniel hart of st.vincent/john vanderslice/polyphonic spree fame. they have a similar sound to john vanderslice who apparently is playing guitar and singing with the band on this tour. a friend of mine sings and plays violin/cello in second band, somber party, who you should also check out (hi rachel!)

so if you're in the provo, utah area on october 15th, i suggest you go to velour (135 n. university avenue) at around 8:00pm and check this show out. it should be a good one!

-justin

BLOWING MY ANIMATED LOAD ALL UP IN YOUR EYES

2008-09-26T15:39:00.000-07:00

wow! so i found a few animations lying around on my computer and i thought i'd put them up. that WAS my intent when i started this blog. i guess that idea just sort of fell by the wayside. well wayside no more! i'm going to try and post more animation from now on. take a look at some of these sneak previews and test animations from the past and recent memory:

(this was a little testimonial character animation i did for a pitch almost a year ago)

(this is some test footage from a lost music video. people on the calendar: anna karina, scott walker, alan watts, a.m. holmes, michel gondry and charles bukowski )

(this was the very first animation that i made for global mechanic. it also happens to be the first drawn animation that i made, ever)

(here is a better version of that halloween card that i had up ages ago)

(here is a sneak preview of the film "birth of a frog" that i'm still working on. i hope to be finished it before the end of the year... i'm sorry. that was a lie. i have no plans to finish this film. is he joking?)

there you have it! life is busy for me right now so i'll probably have more to update soon. STAY TUNED!

-justin

APARTMENT COLLAGE

2008-09-10T11:09:00.000-07:00

"everything in the world" (2007-2008)

"everything in the world" (section 01)

"everything in the world" (section 02)

"everything in the world" (section 03)

"everything in the world" (section 04)

this is a massive collage that caroline (my girlfriend) and i worked on over the last 2 years. it was sort of a side project that we both added to slowly. the collage takes up a large space above the oposite wall to the kitchen that was just sitting there empty. caroline painted the frame in red and we got to work. we finished it a couple of months ago. most of the subjects and backgrounds were cut out of old national geographics from the 60s, 70s, 80s and a couple from the 90s. the rest of the stuff was taken from various other magazines and even some old encyclopedias. you can also see our wine bottle collection as it builds, blocking the view from the living room into our kitchen. hopefully i'll be able to get some more of caroline's work up here. she's a really talented individual and i figure myself lucky to know her.

happy one-day-belated birthday caroline!

-justin

A LITTLE SOMETHING I'VE BEEN WORKING ON

2008-09-05T09:22:00.000-07:00

hello,
here is a quick 10 second sample clip of an animation i'm working on for a short film about the many forms of transportation. since i've finished my perrier spec spot for global mechanic, i've had a lot more time to work on my own stuff. it looks like some heavier work is going to be coming through the studio soon and i've been trying to get a bunch of ideas out now so that when i get another big chunk of free time, i'll have a couple of things already on the go. i'll be looking to finish this and my birth of a frog short over the next year, as well as some more spec spots and possibly some movie title sequences, which would be incredibly fun! my fingers are crossed on that possibility.

also, if those 2 clips there aren't enough entertainment for you to take in, go here and read about my brother's experiences in prague. his writing style is second to none. i'm so proud of him!

still more to come. collage work, new drawings, more new animation. it's a busy time right now so stay tuned!

-j

everything that happens will happen today

2008-08-20T09:12:00.000-07:00

this is a streaming version of david byrne and brian eno's new record, which i think many of us have been waiting for since before we were born. it is called everything that happens will happen today. they're streaming the record on their website for free. if you'd like to purchase a copy in any way, shape or form, please go to the website (here) and use the crap out of your credit card while you wait for them to crack and go on tour.

enjoy this album. lord know i will.
-justin

news and a croquet show

2008-08-19T15:18:00.000-07:00

oh me! it's been far too long since i last posted anything here. i've been keeping busy trying to finish a spec spot for the studio (which i will post a link to at some point), doing some collage art (which i should get up soon as well) and working with the 1998 crew on a secret new video for the russian futurists (shhh!) which will be made available for viewing some time in september.

but more recently, i've been spending a lot of time checking out michael neault's blog snore and guzzle (here) which is probably one of the best things to hit the internet since it's nice (here) or the wonderfully animated barkley dog (here) which were my two previous internet obsessions. the above postcard/flyer was put together by mr. neault for a show in new york taking place this week. he used my sick day drawing. i think it turned out beautifully. so i guess if you're in new york on the 21st of august, go and see parachutes and arms & sleepers at the bug jar! should be a good show.

anyways, stay tuned for more goodies.

-justin

PIZZA SUICIDES

2008-05-21T15:10:00.001-07:00

i had these post-it notes tacked up to the wall in front of my computer with the hope that they would somehow inspire me when i was making my flying wedge pizza commercial a few months ago. over time, the stickiness of the labels wore off and all of the post-its fell behind my screen. so i was pleased to find them today as i was cleaning up my desk area!

you can now view the FINISHED FLYING WEDGE SPOT on the global mechanic website.

enjoy!
-justin

SIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIICK

2008-04-28T09:50:00.000-07:00

i've been cooped up inside for the last 2 days because i've been working on a spec spot and i've been stressing myself out so my body gave me a big "fuck-you" and threw a bunch of shit in my face/head area. sickness. soar throat. coughy-coughy. so instead of just moping around, i drew this little boy. he came from a polaroid photograph. in the photograph he's holding a book called "spiders". i've always loved the way this kid is staring into the camera. it's kind of haunting. that coupled with the fact that he's holding a book about spiders always gives me happy shivers. anyways, i'm going to go blow my nose and try and get some real work done.

cheers,
-justin

GOOD BYE MY SWEET BLUE SHOES

2008-04-17T14:57:00.000-07:00

my favorite pair of shoes died today so i drew a portrait of my favorite one. it's the left shoe. the right one always looked at me cockeyed and i don't appreciate that. i'm going to try and wear them for as long as i can, but i blew a massive hole in the toe of lefty. that means i have to wear blue or black socks to cover up the hole with very clever camouflage. it sucks because they were these limited edition terry fox adidas and they were the most comfortable pair of shoes that i have ever owned. maybe i'll just wear them around the apartment like slippers. fuck! this is almost as tragic as the actual terry fox incident. anyone? no?

anyways,
-justin

BACK LIKE A HEART ATTACK

2008-04-09T10:36:00.001-07:00

i've been gone for a month traveling all over the northwestern portion of europe. lots of fun was had and, once i get some time, i'll put up some of my moleskine sketches and maybe some cool photos of weird signage that i came across. but that's neither here nor there.

okay, so i've started a new project. it's my faux book covers project. i'm going to design a bunch of non-existent book covers just for the sake of it. i got the idea when my brother told me about a design project he was working on for school where they get to design the entire layout of either a novel or magazine. right after talking with him about that, i went home and pulled out all of my novels and looked over the different styles of all of the covers (mostly the a.m. homes, bukowski, coupland and original vonnegut and dahl covers) and sort of became entranced with the idea of creating a bunch of random covers of my own.

this is the first one that i've done. it's for a book called "screw" by ruth black. if i had to say, i would guess screw is the story of a young japanese couple who come to the united states in the mid 80s looking to find their piece of the american dream pie (which tastes a lot like lemon meringue oddly enough), only to discover that this new country separates them from their native culture and each other. also, the man is a murderer and he keeps the heads of his victims in a hollowed out couch or a briefcase or something. wow, right? what a story!

as per the UGE, i'll post 'em as i do 'em.

enjoy!

-justin

BIRTH OF A FROG STILLS

2008-02-25T14:38:00.001-08:00

i haven't really talked much about this film since i started production a few months ago (which has been put on hold for another few months because of commercial work in the studio) and i thought it'd be good to show some progression before my dream of finishing this film is destroyed by the prospect of better paying work somewhere else. so here are some stills to the half-finished film "birth of a frog". i hope you enjoy them. if you like them, let me know. it'll inspire me to finish this thing.

let's play a game. can you tell what's going to happen next?
i can't and i'm open to suggestion.

cheers,
-justin

CHRIS VON SZOMBATHY

2008-02-15T09:32:00.000-08:00

chris von szombathy is a vancouver artist about to release his first book called fire away with drawn and quarterly. there's something special about how he works. the attention to detail, color, and his ability to interject ideas by collaging styles together throughout his work is something that i'm really drawn to. everything he does just seems so interesting! you can almost see his ideas stream through the cornucopia of art in his new book. it's a veritable feast for the eyes. oh! i just love it!

anyways, if you're like me and you want to see more of this work, please visit his website and if you're in the vancouver area on february 22nd at around 7pm, you should stop by lucky's comic shop on 3972 main street to check out the launching of his new book. and even if you can't make it that day, i still suggest you go to lucky's comic shop and buy his book... along with the 50 others you're going to find. that place is like heaven for me. what's that? you HAVE copies of sammy harkham's first issue of crickets? AND you're waiting now for the second issue to come in?

*cherub strums his harp as hot chicks with marshmallow tits fluff my cloud pillows*

cheers,
-justin

FARMER AND A BEAUTY QUEEN

2008-02-13T12:01:00.001-08:00

"THE FARMER" (2008)

"BEAUTY QUEEN" (2008)

so i've decided that before i finish the drug paintings, i need to take a break. i need to explore this style a little bit more because i have a feeling that once the drug paintings are finished, i'm going to want to move on. and the problem there is that i'm not ready to want to stop doing these kinds of sketches. granted, what i want and don't want is really up to me; it's all in my head. but once a switch goes off in my mind, i can't turn it back on again. when i try, the switch just flickers between on and off and i get frustrated. so, last night i took my first step aside from the drug paintings and did these two illustrations (above). the first one is of a canadian farmer chewing his bit of wheat. the other one is the moment a beauty queen is declared the winner at a pageant. i hope you enjoy them. anyways, bare with me as i try and squeeze a few more illustrations out before the end of the drug painting project.

creative juices tip: listen to the jackson 5's diana ross presents the jackson 5 (1969) and the david byrne and brian eno album my life in the bush of ghosts (1981). shuffle your tracks.

cheers,
-justin

CHAD VANGAALEN

2008-02-08T12:18:00.000-08:00

chad vangaalen is a canadian musician and artist (from calgary i think) who writes incredible music and makes amazing animated shorts and music videos. i've had the pleasure of seeing him a couple of times now, and he's as amazing live as his records are sweet to one's ears. above, you can watch a video that he animated for the band holy fuck. i love this animation. it's got a lot of the same elements from some of his other works (like the morphing drippy people and strange bulging colorful backgrounds). i read somewhere that he hand painted most of it. what a guy!
anyways, please check out his webpage on flemish eye records. and if you're interested in seeing more of his animations, you tube him.

i feel good about this post. yeah. i used "you tube" as a verb and i got to pimp mr.vangaalen's lovely work. tgif motherfuckers!

cheers,
-justin

WITH GUSTO

2008-01-29T10:38:00.001-08:00

i was looking through some old photos this morning when i came across this picture of a collage i did last summer for an art show at the memelab in vancouver. i thought maybe i'd throw it up on my b-log here. the collage is called "with gusto". a lot of the drawings in this collage were some of my first endeavors into this style of illustration. enjoy!

cheers,
-justin

DRUG PAINTINGS PUBLISHED

2008-01-07T15:41:00.001-08:00

"Morphine" (2007)

"Valium" (2007)

"Mushrooms" (2007)

"LSD" (2007)

"Cocaine" (2007)

"Ketamine" (2007)

"Codeine" (2007)

"Marijuana" (2007)

"MDMA" (2007)

i've submitted 9 of my drug paintings to IdeaFixa Magazine, which is a beautiful little online magazine from brazil. their new issue is themed "fear and loathing", so when drawing the
piece for morphine (which is #01 in the series of 09), i incorporated a title that takes a step away from the full project and into something a little more catered to the magazine. i didn't want to label them as "the drug paintings" just yet because they aren't all finished. so "we're in bat country" is going to have to do for now. really, the two titles are interchangable, so i guess it never really mattered. i even added a few new paintings to the mix (morphine, valium, marijuana). so check them out and be sure to take a look at the february issue of IdeaFixa (don't forget to vote for me)!

cheers,
-justin

THE OTHER BLOG

2007-12-12T14:52:00.001-08:00

"MOMENT IN TIME #1180" (2006)

hi everyone!
so i completely forgot about this other blog that i was working on. i kind of uploaded a whole bunch of content in august and haven't been back since. but you should check it out. every now and again i make a little sketch about a painfully mundane every-day type situation in a book that i've been keeping which i call "moments in time". you know the moments i'm talking about! like, try and think about the last 5 great or important things that have happened to you in your life over the last week. are you thinking of them? okay, now think about all of that time in between those pivotal moments. THOSE are the moments i'm talking about. the little nothings in life that accumulate into a mess of forgettable instances, kind of like, if you look at your life experiences as a computer, these moments would make up the guts of the computer; all of the loose wires that seem to come from nowhere and go into nothing, but they are still just as important when making the computer run. i kind of figured that that idea was separate from this blog's idea, so i left them to be alone.

anyways, hopefully i'll have more time to work on this other blog. but in the meantime, you should check it out. there is still quite a bit of content on there.

LINK: MOMENTS IN TIME BLOG

cheers,
-justin

BIRTH OF A FROG

2007-12-07T11:47:00.001-08:00

"BIRTH OF A FROG" (2007)

i've just begun work on an animated short-short called "birth of a frog" (above is a sort of poster idea for the film). i've got the basic idea down and the design is almost complete. i'm going with this fusion japanese and native american art asthetic. i expect i'll be using some sort of traditional japanese music in the background as well. lots of flutes and wooden drums. i just sort of need to rough it all in and animate it properly. i expect that it'll be one, maybe one and a half minutes long. the short will depict the birth of a frog (durp!) until it's untimely and bizarre death. once i get more of the animation done, i'll start posting bits of it. hopefully i'll be more successful with youtube than i was with my halloween animation. it's super choppy isn't it? damn. i'll figure that all out soon though. come hell or high water. so keep an eye out for BIRTH OF A FROG.

cheers,
-justin

MOLESKIN SKETCHES

2007-12-05T16:20:00.000-08:00

i spent the weekend up at jerome wilkinson's house on saltspring island here in b.c. and we got to doing some sketching and construction paper collage work. now, the construction paper collage is a little too big to just scan, so i'll have to get photos of it and post them up here. but i do have two of the sketches i did in my brand spanking new moleskin sketch-journal. the first one there is a pair of dentures having it out over MTV nostalgia and the second is a saltspring self portrait.

"LSD RAPS! HIP HOPS!" (2007)

"SALTSPRING SELF PORTRAIT" (2007)

hopefully i'll be getting a camera soon so that i can post more regularly. but until then it's going to be sporadic like this. anyways, hope you enjoyed the sketches.

cheers,
-justin

HAPPY HALLOWEEN

2007-10-30T12:16:00.001-07:00

i made this halloween card for everyone. i hope you all enjoy it!
the streaming quality is shit, but i think you guys should get the point.

HAPPY HALLOWEEN EVERYBODY!

cheers,
-justin

GETTING READY FOR BAT COUNTRY

2007-10-25T15:22:00.000-07:00

"SKELETON GIRL" (2007)

"CLOWNING AROUND" (2007)

"EYES OF A KILLER" (2007)

"WOLFMAN" (2007)

"FACELESS JOE" (2007)

here are a few illustrations that i've been preparing for my part in the bat country illustration installation. i really enjoy the look of the skeleton girl, so i'm going to do my best to get her in there somewhere. i also have a few little sketches that are less literal in their design that i may sneak into the mural if i can. but this is what i'm bringing to the table. i'm a little bit nervous because i've never collaborated on something this big before, but at the same time i'm really excited to see how it all comes together. wish me luck!

cheers,
-justin

JEROME WILKINSON

2007-10-22T13:42:00.000-07:00

today i have 3 paintings done by a very close friend of mine, jerome wilkinson. he lives on saltspring island right now and is working on a bunch of landscape paintings as well as fish and penguin paintings. he's a very talented artist and i hope to post more of his work here soon.

if you happen to live on, or are visiting saltspring, be sure to stop in at Barb's coffee shop/gallery to see some beautiful prints of his work up on the walls. if you head towards the back of the shop, you'll see a collaborative illustrated collage that he and i did when we lived together in vancouver about 2 years ago. the collage is not for sale, but his other paintings are.

cheers,
-justin

BAT COUNTRY UPDATE

2007-10-11T13:26:00.001-07:00

here is an updated flyer for the bat country fear and loathing halloween party. it outlines the installation a little bit more and gives more accurate info. so stop paying attention to old posts! new posts are the posts of the future. it's the post posts that get everyone excited.

hope you can make it out!

cheers,
-justin

BAT COUNTRY

2007-10-11T09:00:00.001-07:00

on october 27th at the SNAP gallery in vancouver, a "fear and loathing halloween" party called bat country, will be held. there are going to be djs (rc lair, trevor risk, del gigolo, twrex and blondtron), lots of people and a bunch of art. it sounds like it's going to be a lot of fun!

one of the art installations that will be shown consists of a 300 foot illustrated mural that's going to be done by a bunch of local artists centered around the theme of "monsters". lucky me, i've been selected to put my pen to this mural! woot! i can't wait!

we pen the mural tomorrow night at 9pm. how exciting!

i hope that if you're in the vancouver area on the 27th, you'll consider coming to this party because we're going to have a great time.

i'll be getting more info about the party later on this week, so stay tuned for more updates.

cheers,
-justin

THE DRUG PAINTINGS CONTINUED SOME MORE

2007-10-02T13:16:00.000-07:00

"COCAINE" (2007)

here's another one that i did last night. i'm going to do ones for tobacco, alcohol, morphine and marijuana as well, so stay tuned. there are plenty of drugs to go around (and around and around and around).

cheers,
-justin

THE DRUG PAINTINGS CONTINUED

2007-09-25T11:15:00.000-07:00

"CODEINE" (2007)

"KETAMINE" (2007)

here are two more drug paintings that i did last weekend. i kept forgetting to bring the paintings into work so that i could put them up. but at long last, they come to rest here with the others. i hope you enjoy them!

cheers,
-justin

BLACK MOTH SUPER RAINBOW

2007-09-19T09:42:00.000-07:00

i had the distinct privilege of seeing black moth super rainbow open for the flaming lips last night in vancouver. the flips were okay. i dunno. i felt like wayne coyne was asking for too much praise at the end of every song and no matter what anyone did, it wasn't good enough. plus there was a lot of whining about the war. blah blah blah. i mean, the show was good (giant alines and people dressed as santa clause), but come on wayne! just shut the fuck up and play some music man. we didn't come to hear you complain about how little noise we were making on the coldest night since last winter...

anyways, i didn't want to make this post about the flaming lips. this post is about the incredible black moth super rainbow! my god. their show blew my nuts through the wall! the bizzare imagery used for their backing videos complimented their music so well. richard simmons, chicken and taco animation, melting men, spinning skulls and vibrant rays of color. i had been waiting to see black moth for almost a year and a half now, and they finally came. i was so pleased. *glee*

i picked up a DVD put together by tobacco (a member of the super rainbow) and beta carnage. tobacco spins nine or ten new tracks to these stunning visuals, some of which were used in their live set. very cool stuff.

but i can't leave you all without giving you a taste. here, enjoy a video for "lost picking flowers in the woods":

cheers,
-justin

BEECHINOR NAPKIN COMICS

2007-09-17T09:26:00.000-07:00

hi. i come to you again, with a comic strip. this one was done on a napkin in the low lights of the foundation, while we all choked back tofu burgers and beer on friday night (i'm not a huge fan of vegetarian cuisine, but it was pretty good). it was drawn by patrick beechinor (who had some kind of peanut pesto pasta). he called it "mix up", and here it is:

i've done another drug painting as well, but was in such a rush this morning, that i forgot to grab it on my way out the door. i'll up it in the coming days.

cheers,
-justin

SOME ROUGH SKETCHES

2007-09-13T09:45:00.000-07:00

(i did these two rough sketches while listening to the animal collective's new album "strawberry jam". i was trying to draw a simple little picture for each song as the album played. the first sketch is for the song called "#1" and the second is for the song "fireworks".)

(this little sketch ended up being the inspiration for a series of reference sketches that are being used for a new set of television commercials for flying wedge pizza, which is a little chain of pizza restaurants in vancouver. below are more sketches for the actual spot. these are not the characters that i will be using in the commercial. they are just prototypes for ideas that i had on the fly. i have quite a bit more work to do before i'm even ready for animation.)

(i wish that i could get away with this kind of humor on canadian television. but no. we won't allow a sense of humor that doesn't somehow reference wayne gretzky, red green or corner gas, because apparently that's all we have and we're too afraid to offend anyone. i just wish that the canadian networks would open up their eyes a little bit so that we can start making commercials with naked boobies and butts in them. then we'd show the world!)

cheers,
-justin

HAUNTED WOODS: MUSIC

2007-09-07T14:22:00.000-07:00

an old haunted woods art show poster (june 2007)

i am a member of the haunted woods arts collective here in vancouver (click here for our myspace page). we dabble in illustration, sculpture, animation, painting, crafts, music, etc. recently one of our more musical members, pat beechinor, started writing some haunted woods music. i'm not sure how to describe pat's music. it feels like listening to a folk musician trying to play with a rock and roll heart, under water, and he's tripping balls on god-knows-what. it's very good. i thought it'd be nice to share this music with everyone as pat is a very talented individual. i'm putting up 2 mp3s for everyone to download (you only have 7 days because i don't know what i'm doing with yousendit):

The Haunted Woods - Leaves are for Leaving
The Haunted Woods - Ten Conversations

i'm going to try and get some more tracks from pat that i can put up on the blog. until then, enjoy the tunes!

-justin

THE DRUG PAINTINGS

2007-09-07T09:42:00.000-07:00

i started a series of illustrated paintings last night that i'm calling "the drug paintings". each painting/illustration represents a drug that i have tried and it's physical and mental effect on me (both immediate and long term). in today's post, i'm going to show you three of these paintings. i used felt markers to draw outlines of bodies and shapes, watercolor paints to fill in some of the features and then a straw to blow the paint in my desired direction.

"MDMA" (2007)

"MUSHROOMS" (2007)

"LSD" (2007)

i'm going to try and do a couple more this weekend. my list of drugs isn't excruciatingly long or anything so i may only have a few more paintings to do. stay tuned!

-justin

PEOPLE LIKE US

2007-09-05T16:42:00.001-07:00

vicky bennett (a.k.a. people like us) is one of the great artists of our time. i stand by that. her video and sound/music collage is some of the best that i've ever heard and seen. in some cases it even rivals that of negativeland. i remember hearing the people like us song "i'm 89" a few years back and have yet to be able to put any of her stuff down.

"i'm too old. now, i'm 89 this year and we always had sunday pinners. is that of interest?"

she's been doing what she does for close to 16 years now.

A COUPLE COMICS OF ME OWN

2007-09-04T14:15:00.000-07:00

i've been reading a lot of graphic novels lately, most of which come from the impressive catalogs of drawn and quarterly and the holy consumption. jeff brown (clumsy, every girl is the end of the world for me), anders nilsen (dogs and water), ron regé, jr. (the awake field), sammy harkham (crickets vol. 1), nicolas robel (fallen angel, kramer's ergot 6), joe matt (fair weather), shary boyle (witness my shame), tony millionaire (any of the sock monkey stuff), genevieve "castree" elverum (pamplemoussi), and so on. it's the really simple stuff (brown, robel, regé, elverum) that catches my eye. i love the idea of telling a short story or getting an idea across in just a few simple drawings. it was mostly the comics of jeff brown and nicolas robel that have recently inspired me to try something of my own.

so here are 2 comic strips that i've done. i created this character who's name i have yet to come up with. but he's a real bad ass. he smokes all of the time and is generally a massive tool to anyone and everyone he encounters. the strips are in their roughed out stage right now. i know that i have some more work to do with them. i'm going to want to take them to a 2nd or even 3rd draft before i can really even do anything with them. but i thought some people might want to see the process of the comic strips being developed. so here they are:

"pee. pow!"

"a justifiable suicide"

cheers,
-justin

SKETCHES FROM THE PAST III

2007-08-31T10:19:00.001-07:00

as i have promised to you, my infinite masses of adoring fans, i am putting up more sketches. these ones are a mix of colored illustrations and black (or red or blue) and white sketches. some of them i did in notebooks. others, not in notebooks. but this is the last of the sketches from the past portion of this blog. that is, until i find more sketches from the past. i know this is all really hard to follow, and i apologize for the complexity of my message.

oh look! some drawrings!

"somewhere, a man walks naked" (2005)

"c'est ca" (2006)
(this sketch is one of my favorites. it incorporates the beta version of a sculpture i made called "the peace-bear mask. as you may or may not be able to tell, the skull is wearing the peace-bear mask. it is made out of pipe cleaners. shortly after finishing the peace-bear mask, i completed another mask of a dog wearing lipstick, also made entirely out of pipe cleaners. if i can find any photos, i'll post them.)

"dance steps to a move not yet invented" (2006)

"he thinks of justin but says jerome" (2006)
(this piece was hand drawn by me and painted by jerome wilkinson on saltspring island. jerome still resides on saltspring where he paints landscape watercolors and pictures of his cats wearing crowns and holding septers. he is a very talented artist and it was a privilege working with him.)

so there you have it! the last of the so-far-found lost sketches. i hope you enjoy them because i remember having had fun making them. now, i really must get back to work. i'm going to talk a little bit about the animations that i'm working on in my next few entries. so stay tuned to find out more about the magical world of music video animation! oooo!

cheersies,
-justin

SKETCHES FROM THE PAST PART II

2007-08-30T16:05:00.000-07:00

okay, so sitting here watching a bunch of stuff render in after effects is pretty boring. i've decided to put up a few more sketches while i wait. once again, boredom outweighed laziness.
here are some more colorful illustrations that i did between the late summer of 2005 and early 2006. these illustrations were done on different colored construction paper with different colored felt pens that i bought at the dollar store down the street from where i live:

"jump" (2005)

"canada" (2006)

"so that makes christmas..." (2006)

"when lamps and storms converse" (2006)

i still have a few more of those old sketches that i found. i'll put those up tomorrow. after effects just finished rendering and i have to get back to it!

cheers,
-justin

SKETCHES FROM THE PAST

2007-08-30T14:41:00.000-07:00

i recently went through an old hard drive looking for some free space to put some new photographs, when i cam across some of my older sketches. "hey", i thought... aloud... "let's put these up on the world wide web for all of those degenerates to see!"
so here they are:

"cigarettes. yes please." (2004)

"person tree" (2004)

"kurt kar" (2005)

"bedtime stories" (2006)

i'll post more as i find them. it looks like i've got some more in a folder but i'm feeling much too lazy to put anything more up right now. maybe tomorrow.

cheers,
-justin

HERE WE GO

2007-08-29T14:01:00.000-07:00

i've decided to start a blog because i have no other way of showing people what it is that i do every day. people are always asking me, "justin, what, exactly, do you do?" and i have no real way of explaining EXACTLY what it is that i do. this way i can show them. i can say, "see? this is what i do" and they can then proceed to tell me off or whatever it is that they wanted to do with that information. so i'll be putting up some of my animations and illustrations that i've done on my computer and in some of my sketch pads. i might even put up some of my comics which are all very rough right now. feel free to comment on my work.

above is an illustration i did of a crow swooping. a friend of mine asked me to illustrate a crow for a tattoo he wants to get done. i'm not sure if he's going to use this particular image, but i like it nonetheless.

cheers,
-justin