The New Deal…

I started this blog a few years ago while I was living and working in China. I wanted to try and keep track of my experiences living in a fascinating place and chronical the effect that had on my career. It’s kind of fun for me to look back on it now especially knowing I didn’t succeed in capturing 1/100th of it…

Starting in 2008 I began regularly traveling to and living for extended periods in China and Taiwan… This was also when I left Los Angeles and headed south to see what my home state of Louisiana had to offer. Fanny had accepted a job working with her brother in Beijing so it seemed like as good a time as any. While in China FANNY and I lived in Shenzhen “the Beijing job having moved there ” which is a huge super fast growing mega city right next to Hong Kong. we traveled all over Mainland C. , Hong Kong, Macau and of course Taiwan. I worked on commercial set designs, film projects and the occasional illustration. I even got a chance to spend a little over two years working with some incredible folks on what should have been the largest ” 245,000 sq meter ” indoor theme park in the world, “Leo’s Kingdom ” You can find some of my old post about that in the archive… my China adventure ended in 2015 ” at least for now”, when ” Leo’s ” was put on indefinite hold and Fanny’s brother began the process of closing down their offices in Shenzhen.

A lots changed since then and so I am going to pick this blog up again to better reflect my current life back in America and working full Time as member of Universal’s Creative Core.

Fanny and I have made a life here in Orlando with a nice house, one grumpy old cat and ” for now at least ” too many cars…

I am in a good position with the studio, working on exciting future attractions for the parks. My commercial set design work has fallen by the side over the last few years as I usually don’t have the time anymore and frankly with the ever increasing expectations and shrinking budgets of commercial productions I enjoy the security that comes with being a member of a team on incredibly talented artist…I will still do side gigs, but now I have the option of turning down work, something I could never afford to do in the past…

In a very real sense I have come full circle. My career began in the themed entertainment world some 22 years ago when I was hired right out of school to work on Blue Planet Bremerhaven for BRC Imagination Arts. My other opportunity was with Universal Creative back before they moved to Florida. I used to kick myself for having turned that job down ” it didn’t pay as much as BRC was offering and I was an idiot kid back then 😛 “. But maybe in the end it’s more about the journey then the destination… the really funny part is I am right now working alongside some of the very same people as I was back in 1997, including Mathew Martin my second ever art director 🙂

A lot has changed within the industry over time but the fundamentals are still to create great art and design reflecting the best attractions possible for people to enjoy.

Universal is currently working on some really amazing things ” obviously super top secret hush hush ” let’s just say the next few years are gonna be intense.

I recently showed some work at Universals artist showcase, mine were digital prints but there was a wide range of work on display, traditional painting, virtual reality, physical models and even some musical performance.

This first piece is actually a digital reworking of an acrylic painting I did years ago possibly started at Art Center. The original was given to an old friend of my dads that has since passed away, I don’t know where or if it still exist so I worked on a scan I found of it…

WARRIOR

SHRUNKEN HEADS 1

This started life as a series of sketches done on a trip to Louisiana in the early 2000’s. It’s all digital and is one of a series of three I called ” Shrunken Heads ”

BOUNDARY LAYER

this lil guy was actually started on my iPad Pro while sitting through a meeting. I doodle during meetings it actually helps me focus on what’s being discussed. My favorite comment of the evening was from my friend Mick who said while looking at this that ” I don’t know what it is but I know we’ve been there ” 😛

Well that’s it for now, if anyone sees this I hope you found it interesting, there will be more activity coming up soon as lots is happening at the old homestead…

Talk soon

D