Florida Film Festival Poster Sketch First Pass

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It was pointed out to me that I got the dates wrong for the Florida Film Festival. The festival actually ran from April 10 to 19, 2026. When I was throwing together the comp, I just lifted type from previous posters to get the impression of what the final poster might look like.

While in Europe I got an assignment to illustrate a poster for the Florida Film Festival byLure Design. I was given the concept of showing the audience in the Enzian Theater and each person in the audience would be from a different film genre. I knew this concept was a mine field. Each person should represent a genre while not looking like a particular actor. I knew that with such a vague yet specific idea there would be many alterations and adjustments.

This poster is a rough sketch of what I wanted to do. I limited my palate to blue and violet to keep the theater dark and cool.

There were many other concepts pitched by Lure Design and I was sure that one of those concepts would best represent the theme of the festival. I honestly wasn’t sure of the planned theme of the festival. I left a large area open in the upper part of the poster for a playful saying. The sample poster I had been given said, Mind Blowing Movies in that open area. Since that theme had been used it would likely not be used again.

Each night after sketching former war-torn cities in Germany, I would settle down in my Air B&B or hotel to write my article for the day, I would upload the previous days article on Facebook and Instagram and then I would paint away on the poster, late into the night. I felt like a true digital nomad.  It was exhausting yet invigorating.

Since I wasn’t working on the concept all day long, I broke the assignment into manageable chunks each night. I would research and paint several characters each evening. I am used to cranking out a concept in one sitting, but I adjusted to dividing up into shorter sprints of creative activity.

Though I was focused each day on troop movements in World War II, I would shut off that part of my brain each night and relax into the playful poster painting. In the lower left of my poster a single WWII soldier worked his way into the sketch. I had watched a series of war films prior to flying to Europe so that genre was fresh in my mind. I also wanted to honor my fathers contribution to crushing fascism in 1945. But I wanted to be sure of having adventure, romance, the wild west, princess, a mix of races, horror, and I wanted the entire audience laughing.

Laughter is also a challenge in that it can look like the person is in pain if the laughter isn’t depicted correctly. I always think of a performance piece I once sketch where the artist tried to smile for many hours while being  filmed.  When you smile for that long, your face experiences extreme pain since the muscles must work so hard to keep that smile in place. John Singer Sargent said, “A portrait is a painting with something wrong with the mouth.”

Wild Rivers Film Festival: Chetco Theater

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After the Wild Rivers Film Festival had wound down, I decided to go back and sketch the theater where COVID Dystopia had screened. Chetco Playhouse is a small community live theater. The last production had been Thumbalina according to the theater poster street side.

I had some very pleasant conversations with the Film Festival staff who had volunteered to work at this theater. When they found out I had animated COVID Dystopia, I was told that the film had sparked quite a bit of conversation. The daughter of one of the volunteers was working the projector and she loves to draw characters. I therefor shared my sketchbook to help encourage her to draw from life more often.

I entered this theater once while a feature film was being shown. The theater was so dark that I could not see enough to make my way down the aisle. I paused at the back f the theater waiting for my eyes to adjust to the dark. When a lighter scene was being projected, I made my was careful half way towards the front and felt for the seat backs to find an empty seat.

The film being shown was Ethan Bloom. An awkward teen boy was pushed into a pool by a spunky teen girl. I wasn’t in the mood for a teen romance, but this film found its way into my heart. Ethan Bloom had lost his mom when he was 10 years old which is how old I was when I lost my mom. Ethan was Jewish but he imagined that his mother looked like the Virgin Mary. Therefor he wanted to study Catholicism since he felt it might bring him closer to his mom. This premise ripped my heart wide open. Ethan would need his fathers permission to be baptized into the Catholic faith, so he decided he had to forge his fathers signature. Such a lie would not stand and his father found out. Ethan’s coming of age story featured forgiveness and people coming together regardless of their faith. It is a story very much needed in these divisive times.

Apple Store

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In preparing to go to Oklahoma City for the 75th Infantry Reunion, and Oregon to screen my short animated film, COVID Dystopia, I felt I needed to replace the faulty chord on my iPad. Apple sells chords that are made to fall apart in a year’s time.  The chord Apple included with the purchase of the iPad was only about a foot long and some hotels and motels don’t have outlets conveniently located. I needed a longer and more robust chord.

 The Apple Store at the Millennia Mall was insanely crowded. Apparently everyone had faulty power chords. Tourists were coming in and buying chords using their foreign currency cards. I went up to the iBar and waited. Someone asked what I needed and pointed me towards a table covered with boxes of power chords. I wasn’t sure which plug s were needed. I should have brought my iPad, but I came in on a whim while shopping for clothes for my Europe trip.

The sales person was able to scan my iPhone to figure out exactly which chord I needed. I was impressed with his digital detective work. All my devices seem to communicate to one another and are shouting out when they need better power chords.

After I purchased my chord. I decided to stay and get a sketch of the digital chaos. Some people took more than an hour to buy a digital device wile others were in an out quickly. My purchases was pretty easy, but others must have been considering life altering purchases.

The lady in front of me was agonizing over her purchase of an Apple computer. She wore a Lady and the Tramp tee shirt. The Tramp would have made a decision quickly but Lady needed to weigh every option. She did make a decision before my sketch was complete.

COVID Dystopia is an official Selection at the Wild Rivers Film Festival

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COVID Dystopia is an official selection at the Wild Rivers Film Festival on August 15th to 18th, 2025. The festival runs in four theaters, one of which is the Redwood Theater, 621 Chetco Ave, Bookings, Oregon. There are two other venues as well, The Chetco Live Theater and the Chetco Public Library. It would be just my luck for COVID Dystopia to screen in a library to disturb patrons who just want some peace and quiet.

Wild Rivers Film Festival  is a competitive exhibition for domestic and international feature films, documentaries, shorts and screenplays. It is a film festival that had not crossed my radar, but I was asked to submit by the festival executive director, Daniel Springen. This is the second year that the festival has been running.

The Wild Rivers Film Festival is an immersive four-day experience that includes screenings in four venues, industry panels, and workshops that are all geared toward indie filmmakers and adventurous movie lovers.

The festival has nightly parties and a variety of professional activities which encourage important networking opportunities for all.

Brookings, Oregon is nestled right on the breathtaking Pacific coastline. The people are friendly, the seafood is fresh, and the film history is prolific. Bookings also was the only place in the contiguous United States to be bombed by air in WWII. Since I am deeply entrenched in researching WWII history right h=now, that fact fascinates me.

On September 9 and September 29, 1942, Imperial Japanese Navy pilot Nobuo Fujita, flying a float plane launched from the submarine I-25, and dropped incendiary bombs near Brookings with the goal of starting large forest fires. The forests were moist from a recent rain and the fires died out quickly on their own. The goal to create massive forest fires to draw U.S. military resources away from the Pacific Theater and demoralize the American public was a failure.

The festival culminates with an award ceremony featuring cash & prizes.

Preservation Partnership

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On a trip to Portland Oregon, I sketched this sweet historic brownstone. For hundreds of years my family on my mothers side lived in old brownstones in Manhattan and Brooklyn. Therefor these old building hold a sweet spot in my heart.

Time was limited, so I dashed off the sketch rather quickly. I recall that downtown Portland had quite a few of these types of historic gems.

I love traveling and exploring a new city with my sketchbook. I thought I might be exploring quite a few cities when my film COVID Dystopia did it’s round in the film festival circuit, but lets face it, no one wants to be reminded of the pandemic. Certainly no one wants to be told the virus is still circulating and causing incurable long COVID symptoms.

Exploring new places is a joy with a sketchbook in hand. I will continue to explore Lake County after I finish up the series of theater posters I am now working on.

Chicago Spider

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The view from the hotel room was of one of Chicago‘s many draw bridges. If you are sketching then it is imperative tat you draw a drawbridge.

What drew my attention far more however was a large spider dangling just outside the glass. He or she was busy starting to spin a web.

I have been to Chicago twice. Once was for a vacation and culture and the other was to screen my film COVID Dystopia at the Chicago Reels International Film Festival where my film won an award for the best animated film at the festival. Chicago has always felt welcoming to me. Right now I am searching for a place to settle and call home. Perhaps Chicago deserves serious consideration.

Orlando International Airport Delayed Flight

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My flight to Chicago was delayed which brought me some time to sketch. This was a get away trip, long before COVID Dystopia won an award as the Best Short Animated Film at the Chicago International Reel Shorts Film Festival. This trip was strictly for sight seeing and hitting the museums and culture.

The sketch was done before I started my daily sketching routine. Lines are in pencil and more carefree. Right now I am searching for a pen that is responsive as I need. The pen I am using now might decide to stop putting down a line mid stroke which results in my staring down at the page in anticipation of the next fail rather than looking at the subject. The pen I am using now also tends to always run out as I am working on a sketch. It never fully reloads when I attempt to refill it each morning.

I am looking at old unpublished sketchbooks and playing with color since I am locked down teaching each afternoon and evening. It is kind of nice just making up the colors and values. The more of these I do the better I will get at coming up with my own color schemes on the fly.

Crealde Urban Sketching Tent

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One of the first assignments my Urban Sketching students get at Crealde School of Art is trying to sketch this outdoor tent. The day starts with a lesson in 1 point and two point perspective and then we go outside and sketch the tent.

There is a lake behind Crealde and the far shore gives a clear indication of where the horizon line would be in a sketch. Before students get too far into their sketches, I visit each one individually and give them a thumbnail sketch to indicate what features I would look for if I were to attempt the sketch from their angle.

Sometimes we just work in pen and ink and sometimes we push further and use watercolor. It depends on the vibe of the students. Each class tends to focus on one premise which is rolled into what we learned the previous week.

This is the perfect time of year to attend the Urban Sketching Class since the weather is so cool. In most classes we are outside exploring the camp us or heading out to a location to sketch. Past locations have included, a dog park, bowling alley, Panera’s, and antique car meet ups. The possibilities on a Sunday morning could be endless with enough research.

If you are interested in improving your skills and joining an international movement of like minded artists you should come on out. We meet for 3 hours and the goal is always to push the sketches to a level of completion with line, value and color. These are sketches not something for a museum wall. When you stop worrying about the final result you tend to take more chances and surprisingly the sloppy experiments are what works best. In my work the sketches are almost always populated with people, so in one class students sketch one another.

I just got an email from Crealde and unfortunately the January 19 series of classes have been canceled but you should think about signing up of the next series of sessions starting in the spring. I can’t figure out why sketching on location is not more popular in Orlando. I have been sketching everyday on location since 2009. I just did the math, that is 16 years. It is a habit that keeps me motivated and inspired each and every day.

Today I will be unpacking all the sketchbooks I have filled over the past 16 years. They take up a shelf and a half on my handmade bookcase. I also discovered I have tons of wood stretchers and raw canvas. It might be a good time to start working on larger paintings on location. I am now in a rural Lake County Florida, so I will soon be hiking into the woods to sketch and perhaps work on larger paintings. This is an exciting time, much like a residency. This new location should inspire me to take more chances moving forward while still working on the COVID Dystopia book.

Pandemic Studio

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I did this sketch of my pandemic studio for one of my online students. Today I find myself doing a similar sketch as I plan for a tight space.

The Disney Feature Animation desk is huge and heavy along with the flat files and a hand made bookcase.

Since I am doing a similar sketch today I will probably do it the same way by adding a bit of depth using one point perspective.

In July of 2020 about 8200 Americans were dying due to COVID-19 each week. Much larger waves of death would follow, and I sat in this studio documenting the vents each day through my surreal paintings. The COVID Dystopia animated short film is doing the rounds at Film Festivals ad the 200 page book with over 600 illustrations is nearing completion. The pandemic is not over and a new virus, H5N1 is spreading in California. That new virus has a mortality rate of 50% while COVID has a mortality rate of an estimated 1.4%. If H5N1 starts spreading from human to human the devastation will make COVID look like a walk in the park.

COVID Dystopia: Canada Truckers Protest

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I am pleased with how the plumes of fiery smoke turned out in this shot. I combined key frame animation that warped the painting and also procedural movement in After Effects. I applied this effect throughout the film to give the rising heat shimmer. Most viewers probably do not know the effect is there but they feel it.

I decided the protestor could be perfectly still. If someone wanted to read the protest sign, I wouldn’t want to be waving it about.

I did the fire animation twice. I still think it could use improved. That is the problem with having so many shots and so many effects. I might learn something on another shot and want to apply it to other shots. At some point I just had to let go. No one is going to be as critical of the shape of a flame as I might be.

Since COVID Dystopia is now screening at the Pittsburgh Shorts and Script Competition. I want to be sure to keep posting these in progress shots in case festival goers look up AADW online. I am also thinking I should probably edit together a making of video which could be included along with the film the back or the COVID Dystopia book which is now being edited. That last sentence just created a whole lot of work.

COVID Dystopia is available to be seen at the Virtual Pittsburgh Shorts Film Festival happening now through November 24, 2024. COVID Dystopia can be seen in the Eventive – Chiller Theater Block 2 – Shorts online. It can be seen anywhere in Pennsylvania, West Virginia and Ohio. After you start watching the films, you have 48 hours to complete watching them. Tickets are $18.