Project: concept development, premises, scripts, visual development, art direction, character design, motion graphics, animation

Description: Timbuktoons helped develop a series of fun animated “how-to” videos to help encourage, inspire and train officials on new reporting procedures for helping former military in their educational endeavors.

Client, Project: Catholic Stewardship Consultants, Inc., concept development, premise, script, visual development, art direction, character design, animation

Description: CSC’s consulting services help parishes encourage stewardship in their communities. Theywanted a way to encourage those virtues in children too since giving back your time, talent and treasure is not an “adults only” message. Timbuktoons was asked to develop a show concept that could be used to entertain and educate children about stewardship as a way of life. We of course said…wait for it…robots!

Stewart Ship is a bored tween that questions the purpose of just about everything. That is, until he receives a mysterious gift that opens his eyes to making a difference in the world by sharing his God-given time, talent, and treasure with others.

Client, Project: Answers, visual development, art direction, character design, illustration

Description: Timbuktoons was asked by Answers to create a series of superhero characters that illustrated various bodily functions (spit, ear wax, mucus, etc.) for a special kid-focused magazine article entitled “Getting Close to Gross.” We approached the project the same way we handle pre-production for our show properties. First we explored the character development of each and then in visual development fleshed out how that impacted the character design. The result is a series of heroic characters that (ahem) oozes the gross personality of each bodily function.

Looking for some daily sketching inspiration today, I came across a Phil Cooke blog post that triggered the creative juices. So, here’s a quick sketch of Spider-Man during a clumsy moment. Enjoy!

We just finished moving our studios and the boxes are slowly disappearing…one day I’ll find our stapler. We’ve posted a few Fuzz Feud updates on our blog over at Timbuktoons.com and we’ll have more in the coming weeks.

We completed visual development of our “rat people” a while back and I wanted to give you just a teaser of that below. The rat people are Kickstarter backers who contributed $100 or more- thanks a bunch! They get to be an animated extra in the short…as rats!

The big news is that we’ll be completing the first pass of rough animation for the short next week!

What does that mean? The rough animation will help us know where we have to adjust timing and action sequences so we can move on to the polished pass.

My favorite scene so far? “Face Attack!” That’s all I’m gonna say.

More to come soon so be sure to keep an out for us online:

• Timbuktoons.com
• @Timbuktoons (Twitter)
• Facebook (search for “Timbuktoons”)
• And coming soon: UndertheOasis.com- our behind the scenes studio sketchblog!

I had fun on this page in my sketch book. I just started drawing with no plans on what I was attempting. Once in a while you have to sketch just for the joy of sketching. Keep the kid inside alive!

March is sketchbook month. A new sketch every weekday in March!