Now that ITSP (Insanely Twisted Shadow Planet) is completed and we're just about to wrap up the DLC, it's time to start looking at all the options ahead. There are a lot of great things I'm currently considering including my next game with Shadow Planet Productions, as well as projects ranging from comics, graphic novels, music videos and feature films. It will be interesting to see where I'll be heading next. I'm really excited!
My next project to be released will be a historical comics restoration project that I worked on as a part time hobby from 2003 to 2008 called, Young Romance: The Best of Simon & Kirby's 1940s-50s Romance Comics. I had pretty much given up on the book ever seeing the light of the day until Gary Groth, publisher at Fantagraphics Books, saw it and immediately got interested. The book is slated for January 2012. You can read about the history of the project as well as see examples of restoration at this link.
There's been a few new interviews hitting the web recently. Here's one from the Oakville newspaper where I went to college, and here's another from Joe and I where we discuss working on ITSP.
And here's our latest addition to our family: Whiskey!
I always enjoy seeing movies with animated credits. I even got to do the opening credits for the movie, Osmosis Jones, during my tenure as head of 2D special effects at Warner Brothers Feature Animation. We thought it would be fun to cap off our videogame with its very own set of animated credits. I had a blast putting those together. I hope you enjoy them!
GameRevolution.com is having a little contest. Here's your chance to win a copy of Insanely Twisted Shadow Planet! From their website:
Here's the deal: You have to write a haiku using any ONE of the following words: Insanely, Twisted, Shadow, or Planet. How you use those words is up to you. The words surrounding those words is up to you as well. Really, we're not about to inhibit your creativity. We want to see what you can come up with!
In the spirit of preparing for the San Diego Comic-Con, I decided to watch Comic Book: The Movie with Mark Hamill. A big portion of the film takes place at San Diego Comic-Con and it features appearances by several pop culture celebrities (Hugh Heffner, Kevin Smith, Stan Lee, Ray Harryhausen, Matt Groening). It's a pretty fun film actually.
At any rate, I was totally surprised to see ZED: Volume One make an appearance within the first minute and a half of the film! Check out the clip!
On your journey through the Shadow Planet, you will uncover icons that will grant you access to 37 pieces of concept art that I painted for the game. After we decided which 37 pieces would be hidden in the game, we were still left with a large amount of nice material. As a result, we decided to put some of this material on-line for your viewing pleasure. Click here to check it out!
In the Fall of 2009, I was contacted by game developer Maxis to create a series of environment and character concepts for a videogame with the working title "Spore Labs". At the time I had already been working on ITSP for a couple of years and I thought it might be fun to take a few weeks off the project and come up with original designs in a different style. The game was eventually retitled Darkspore and was released last April. Unfortunately, it looks like none of my designs made it into the final game.