VIGNALI STUDIO

CALLING ALL BLOGGERS

HAVE YOU SEEN THIS PUMPKIN BOY?

I'm in a bind, we bought this 30" or 36" pumpkin plush holiday decoration a couple years ago. My daughter loved it -- unfortunately a few months back we lost "Pumpkin Boy" in a flood we had at the house.

(I know-I know, first flood, then fire. What could we do? We're due for frogs and locus at any moment.)

Thing is, I would like to replace this decoration. If you have seen one at a store, or you have bought one, or your neighbor has one, I would like to buy it from you. I don't care if it's a little worn around the edges.

If you spot one on E-bay, let me know. I keep checking, but I haven't found one yet.

I have posted at Sketchclub

That's right, go to Sketchclub and check out my lastest memory drawing.

As an added bonus, Jeremy Spears drove all the way from San Luis Obispo to come and draw with us at Sketchclub. He's a terrific cartoonist, so if you haven't seen his work, I recommend checking out Jeremy's blog site. So far both of us have posted at Sketchclub, so go and have a look!

I met JACK DAVIS!

It was a dream come true for me! I got to meet one of my personal heroes. From the moment I first laid eyes on Mad Magazine, I was hooked -- and Jack Davis was a huge part of that.

And, as the photo suggests, I got a chance to shake his hand and tell him so personally.

Thanks to CAPS and my friend Stephen Silver for making it happen.

The Dryer Fire

Hello everyone. Marcos was teasing me for having mentioned my dryer fire, at the same time I put up a post. I didn't think about it at the time, but it is funny. "Help, FIRE...oh, by the way, here's another post."

Marcos told me I should have posted the drawing with burned edges.

Anyway, here is a picture of the dryer. Sherri, my wife, said the flames were shooting out of the machine, and she knew if she waited for the firemen to arrive, we might loose the house. So, she quickly filled a couple small buckets of water and doused the fire. It was still on fire when the firemen did arrive, but those buckets-full never let the fire get out of control.

The scary thing is that it is a gas dryer, so if the gas line heated up, it could have exploded. Or, with all the electrical components exposed, when she through the buckets of water on it, she could have been electrocuted or shocked into unconsciousness. Either way, we're lucky "the Mrs." didn't get hurt.

This whole thing sure has scared the kids.

Yet Another Figure Drawing

I'm sorry I haven't posted anything lately. I've had a lot going on.

Today, as I was driving home, my wife called me to tell me that we had a fire in our home. Oof, what a mess. There wasn't much fire damage, but lots of water and smoke damage.

I'll try and post something else when I get a chance. For now, I'll just post this figure drawing. This was probably no more than five mintues.

BIRD OF PARADISE

This is an illustration I did for Wizards of the Coast.

Alas, the days of paint and canvas are now behind me. I did this one on the computer using Photoshop. It's funny in a way, I can paint on the computer, but I still don't like to draw on the computer.

The client asked to have the images look as traditional as possible, without computer effects and textures, so it's pretty traditional looking, despite being a digital painting. It's so practical doing things digitally. If you save in layers, changes are easier, and mailing your work in is as simple as sitting at your computer drinking coffee while you upload your images onto a server.

The job assignment was to illustrate a fictional, colorful bird that creates a rainbow with its tail. This colorful bird was to bring contrast to the drab/gothic city.

Wizards printed this card as a much-coveted FOIL card!

Open Season's Opening Weekend!

Open Season opened up this weekend with a respectable $23 million box office gate. Not huge numbers, but it was still number one in the box office. The overall audience response seems to be positive, so hopefully it will perform as well next week (wouldn’t that be a treat for Sony).

Yes, I did character design work for the film while it was in early development. And, although my characters didn’t make it to screen, I got both Boog and Elliot about 75-80% of the way there. Then, the very talented designer Carter Goodrich finalized the style and direction that the characters would ultimately take.

The Open Season art-of book has a lot of my early development sketches.

This is my version of Boog and Elliot.