Rebranding myself: Journeyman Artist and proud of it, or You don't know "Jack".

jour·ney·man

/ˈjərnēmən/

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noun

noun: journeyman; plural noun: journeymen

1. 1.

   a worker or sports player who is reliable but not outstanding.

   "a solid journeyman professional"
2. 2.

   HISTORICAL

   a trained worker who is employed by someone else.

   "a journeyman carpenter"

As I enter my 70s and I look back on my creative life and career in commercial art, I come to embrace the term: "Journeyman Artist" as a fair description of my career, my creative life's journey, with a sense of pride, not as an insult as some might view the term.  Considering that from that time in junior high school when I was asked by my guidance consulter to decide on a career path (they did that back then) I choose to pursuit my hobby of drawing and art as my career path, to become a commercial artist  (actually, astronaut was my first choice, but failure at math derailed that pipe dream).  I think I remember one book in the school library on commercial art, and it wasn't encouraging. Thinking back, I realized I had no back up career in mind.  So. I'm glad to say, all things considered, I achieved my goal in a round about way, with many starts and stops, and side trips, which didn't end when stepping away and retiring from the animation business in 2008. Making art is too much a part of me to totally abandon it.

 

Someone, I had once met, once referred to me as a "Renaissance Man" when he found out I was an artist (illustrator), played guitar (never above hobbyist) and wrote songs (again, nothing beyond a hobbyist).   Plus , I wrote stories (original comic book Sci-Fi adventures, at the time). I always liked that image of myself, as a Renaissance Man.  But, in my darkest moments of an introvert's self-doubt I'd think of it as being a "Jack of All trades..." and the lesser used ending of that saying "...and master of NONE". In any case, I'm hoping to continue pursuing my interests in all the creative areas of my life that have atrophied over time as I pursued a professional  career, which causes you to specialize in one area to be marketable, and into retirement.  I plan to use my Youtube channel and my blog to showcase my past, present ,and future endeavors.  Stick around, maybe "knowing "Jack" isn't a bad idea.

Here's the banner for my Youtube page:  https://www.youtube.com/user/DragonflyEnt

Throwback Thursday - San Diego Comic Con International

In honor of the SDCC, this Throwback Thursday, this pic of me at my booth the Comic Con years ago. The young lady, Heather, was Thundercat's fan in from Japan, who had brought this animation cel, picked it up at my booth. Good times.

New Year's Resolutions - January 2015

Well, how embarrassing, it has been a solid year since my last post and I'm still on the same subject...New Year's Resolutions.  Well to be fair, I've been using my Facebook page for a most of my musings this past year.  Truth be told I like making resolution lists.  New Year is a time to take stock, review, and set goals.  Getting back to writing in this blog is one of the them.

So here goes:

1. Write in this Dragonfly View Blog at least weekly.   Mostly likely on the weekends, especially the Sunday Music Muse day post.  I'll use this blog for more creative stuff and use Facebook for more personal, family stuff.  Some things post to my Facebook site can fit here as well. 
2. Continue creative projects, complete unfinished ones like the Warrior in the Mist flip book.  Revised and update old projects, like  Ruby, Galactic Gumshoe short to their remixed soundtrack.  At the least keep drawing in my lunch time sketch books.   In the past year I have been drawing in my lunch time sketch book.  Here are the best of the current book.
   
   
   
   
   
   
   

   

   Not Kim K.

   
   
3. Read more books.  At least try to read a book a month.  That is a lowest bar I can set with being totally embarrassed if I don't do it.  Here's a pile of book unread books I pulled from my shelves.  These will be a start.
   
   
4. Upgrade my Dragonflyent.net.  Which means switch it from earthlink to squarespace.  I've started the Squarespace site.  More details to come.
5. Make more music.  Actually, I've been playing more guitar since I broke down and bought a new one, the Ibanez Montage (pictured on the right).   I'd like to make good recordings of at least two original songs of mine.  There are some related music projects like transferring some old music from cassette and reel to reel to CD.
   
   
    
6. Post more to youtube to build that channel as revenue generator.  I realize I missed uploading videos and the ones I have do generate cash every couple of months. 
7. Prepare for retirement from the Animation Guild.  Mostly filing papers on time.
8.  Finally as in my last resolution post "I guess my main resolution is be more more productive. Be a better Human Being, if it's not too late."

Here wishing everyone  Happy New Year.

Bionic Squad - Six Million Dollar Man Animated series Concept Drawings

I posted a video of some character designs I did for a proposed animated series, Bionic Squad, based the Six Million Dollar Man TV series from the 1970's.  In the Bionic Squad, Steve (Bionic Man) Austin's new team was "unwillingly given their super-human abilities after being captured by evil RAPACIANS (aliens), who have a secret underground base on the far side of the moon". The Bionic Squad show pitch was developed my writer Sheri Goodhartz, and Will Meugniot, producer and director of ExoSquad animated series.  I was the oversea animation supervisor for the first season of ExoSquad and co-producer and co-director on the second.   Actually this pitch was done between the first and second season of ExoSquad while we were waiting of the second season pickup, in the fall of 1993.  I had return to NYC from South Korea, so Will ask me to work on development keep be busy and connected (thanks, Will).  I included some of Will's drawing also.  Enjoy.

 Here the sketches: Clip on them for enlarged view.

The following sketches are by Will Meugniot.

Dragonfly P.T. - Spitfire PT Nerf War Concept

I posted new youtube video of  a slide show of a Nerf War concept I was working on. The basic concept was to develop a Nerf game center like Laser Tag center, but cooler. I started working on this when my boys were younger and really into Nerf guns.   It actually grew out of a desire to find another area to be creative in after leaving animation and moving East. I either lost interest as my kids out grew their "Nerf gun" phase and/or the basic concepts didn't did hold up well to closer examination. In any case, I did do some nice tech drawings of Nerf gun design concepts and equipment, so why waste them.

New Youtube Posts - Atalanta Children's Filmstrip and Molly Daring Magic Lantern Movie

I recently post two new movies to my Youtube site.  The first was another video of a children's filmstrip I illustrated in the 1970's and '80's, titled "Atalanta".   Atalanta is a Greek myth.  Before the big video revolution, this was the  AV stuff teachers used.  The best part is teacher turned off the room lights making it easier to nap through the program.  Enjoy.

The second is another video base on a set of Magic Lantern slide I found in the trash in the 1970's.  "Fare thee Well Molly Daring"  is an old song  I was lucky enough to finally find a recording of on the internet.

There is still one old song I'm looking for to cover the last remaining set of slides.   I'll be sure to share it when I found it.  In the mean time, enjoy.

Card Duel Video

Card Duel is a short video made from slides I shot for a art assignment back in my  art school days.  I don't remember which class the assignment was for.  But I remember having fun making the playing card characters.  Enjoy.

Space Ghost Desktop

My good friend Larry Houston emailed this Space Ghost pic done by Jerome Moore. I liked it, so I made it my desktop pic on my iMac. Sometimes when I switch over from another user the screen flip looks like Space Ghost is flying toward you. I get a chuckle out of it.

Here's the original show action pack opening,  much like the Hanna-Barbara Jonny Quest animation show.

 Enjoy.

My Lunch Time Sketch Book

I just posted this short video on youtube. The art is no great shakes, just lunch time doodles.  I'm still working through a creative slump, so any pencil time is better than none.

There are a couple of sketches I'm thinking of working on farther, like the guy in the big battlesuit (above).  We see.  Enjoy.

The Dragon's Teeth - Children's Filmstrip - 1981

Here's another children's filmstrip I illustrated back in the 1980's. The Dragon Teeth was part of a series of filmstrips , Monsters of the Greek Myths, produced by Spoken Arts, Inc. My favorite part of the story is the sowing of the dragon's teeth, a scene famously done by Ray Harryhausen in his film "Jason and the Argonauts" were fighting skeletons rise out of ground. Again, I'm just trying to archive and digitize these filmstrips before the film fades. They are no longer produced, long since replaced by video, DVD and Blu-Ray. Enjoy.

Children Filmstrips - Tom Thumb and Kaa's Hunting

I  posted some videos on Youtube of children's filmstrips I did the illustrations for back in the '70's, ancient history for some of you younger viewers. These were some of the first professional illustration jobs I landed.  The paid wasn't great, in fact it was pretty damn low.  But, it was great fun and let me at paid for drawing.   It also prepared for storyboard work  I would do later in the animation career.

These  educational filmstrips  were shown in schools or libraries before video tapes were around. I did several of these including adaptations of Grimm's fairy tales, like "Tom Thumb" , Greek Myths and African folk tales. I want to digitize them before the old slide film fades completely. 

The soundtrack were on cassettes.  One side has the music and narrative with a audible beep to cue when to change to the next slide frame.  The other side have inaudible beep for use with slide projectors that advanced the frame automatically.

 Here's a storyboard page for Kaa's Hunting and the sample art  I did to get the job.

Like I said, crude by today's standards, but I hope they entertained some kids for a little while.  In any rate, they did earned awards for filmstrips, so that's something to be proud of.

 I'd been thrilled if anyone remembers seeing this in school or a library. If you did please leave a comment here or on the Youtube page. Enjoy.