PARKlife oriGINS

I've always had a love for the quirk and weird so I felt like sharing some of my influences, more so.

The origin of "Parklife", simply put it's named after this song and title for the 1994 album from English alternative rock group Blur (quite possibly one of the best 4 piece bands to emerge from the UK since the Beatles) and whose front man Damon Albarn would go on to also be lead vocals for the band Gorillaz.

Which would prove to be a current and lasting influence on my artwork and animation.

 
More to come on the Gorillaz soon.

How would you tell your grandchildren about life before the Internet? Tell them to Google it!

The impetus behind remakes, prequels, sequels, reboots and non-cannon cannon fodder being produced by entertainment studios digging up old franchises and re appropriating them with the gusto of a wood chipper with a hyperdrive from the Millennium Falcon these days, would have even Andy Warhol cringing at the sheer cannibalism of it all. 

My Little Pony "One Trick", this character I came up with as the cynical pop culture critic. 

Sure it has its place and modern society is such now that with the internet being the provider of such godlike levels of content, that to complain of some kind of boredom or dissatisfaction in such an era of entertainment is the very definition of "A First World Problem" one can only trace the roots back to the first person to complain that the book was better, and throw it at them.


The My Little Pony reboot is actually one of the better examples of how in the right hands and with a little luck it can be not only really good- but better than the original. 

MLP Old School 1980's

The first My Little Pony (MLP) was kind of the family friendly absolute schmaltz which made the 80's and early to mid 90's pretty awful for any girl who was a kid during that time. The ponies themselves were boring personalities as inversely dull as their pelts were bright. 

MLP New School 2000's

The character design here is fantastic, if at any rate the simple geometry and further attention paid to the personalities and attributes thereof (linked to their names) these ponies have not only paid a nice homage to the old series but have become so iconic so quickly have spawned a cult following of the almost polar opposite target demographic for this series- known as "Bro-nies" 

MLP Medical School

I use examples from my own childhood and adolescence as examples of the process of this in more up coming posts, this one was a short and honest written opinion- stay tuned. :)

The Sketchbook Sessions Iron Man caricature Ed Dyer 2012

From the Sketchbook Sessions it's Iron Man, I was always a fan of masked superheroes growing up and as a kid making masks was one of my hobbies, I always found it totally enhanced the playtime experience and really it was just fun to do. The idea and premise of Iron Man as a character really is fantastic and is, in many ways the Marvel comics answer to Bat Man. A super rich 1% bachelor wants to give back to the community, however charitable philanthropy is always more awesome when said billionaire dons super powered battle armour and fights the forces of evil.  

Morrigan Pop Culture Pin-Up Princess April 2012

My pop culture pin-up princess for April meet Morrigan, unofficial representative mascot for the Darkstalkers fighting game franchise from Capcom. I love the Darkstalkers series which I find far more interesting and immersive than the Street Fighter games so for this fan art piece I decided on a comic book art style beginning with a basic pencil under sketch followed by inking with brush tip marker and finally colouring and composing digitally. The pose was something I'd wanted to do for a while obviously I wanted to go for seductive and yet relaxed but at the same time I wanted to draw upside down. 

Some of my source material ^_^

Parklife Last days of The Easter Break 2012