Unmasked - An October Gallery - #1

This is my humble offering for October/Halloween 2010 ~~ A portrait gallery. An Unmasquerade...

What's behind the masks you see every day? Behind the masks of your neighbors & co-workers? Of the people you pass by on your way to work? Of your teachers, your classmates? Of the politicians & pundits? The banker at his desk & the cop on the street? The smiling businessmen, the doctors & lawyers? The trusted members of the church & military? The loved ones you think you know so well? That stranger coming up the walkway... peering in your window... knocking on your door?

That face in the mirror?

Over 31 ghoulish portraits, with a new gallery added every Monday, Wednesday and Friday.

Happy Halloween!

Unmasked - Begins Monday...

Starting on Monday, October 4, and continuing throughout the month...

Update: Thanks to everyone who has asked about this very humble project, which I feel I should say upfront is not going to be a new webcomic or story. I wanted to do something for October/Halloween so I'm just going to be posting a series of (very simple) monster portraits throughout the month. But I do appreciate the curiosity very much -- however, I also don't want to disappoint anyone who may be expecting a new story. For my next book - I'm still working on The Hidden which us scheduled for Spring 2011. Thanks again!

"Invisible Hands" Storyboards

Here are the storyboards I wrote & drew for the third episode of "Invisible Hands". In the previous blog entry, I posted some of the final drawings that were actually used in this episode. (For more info, see my other "Invisible Hands" posts).

(note: Animated version of "Invisible Hands" is copyright MTV and Colossal Pictures. Print version of "Invisible Hands" is copyright Richard Sala).

Still more "Invisible Hands" art...

Here is some of the art that was drawn for the third episode of "Invisible Hands" (Please see previous two posts for more information).

(note: Animated version of "Invisible Hands is copyright MTV & Colossal Pictures. Print version of "Invisible Hands" is copyright Richard Sala).

More art from "Invisible Hands"

As promised (threatened?) in my last post, here is more of the art I created for the animated version of "Invisible Hands".

From top to bottom:

- A panel from the original comic, as it appeared in Night Drive.

- Scene from the Voss & Crawley Bait & Tackle Shop, showing the three separate layers - foreground, middle and background.

- Three sets of various drawings of characters & objects used in the final animation.

More to come!

(note: Animated version of "Invisible Hands" is copyright MTV & Colossal Pictures. Print version of "Invisible Hands" is copyright Richard Sala)

The art of "Invisible Hands"

"Invisible Hands" was a six-part animated serial which aired on MTV in the early 1990s. MTV had hired Colossal Pictures, an animation studio located in the Bay Area (where I was, too) to produce Liquid Television, a show that would feature lots of new animation. After one of the producers saw "Invisible Hands" in Night Drive, my first (self-published) comic, which was then selling at City Lights and other independent bookstores in the San Francisco area, I was hired to write and draw an expanded version for their show. The first season of Liquid TV was to consist of six episodes, and "Invisible Hands," which I had written as a tongue-in-cheek version of old-time mystery thrillers, would run in each episode as two-minute chapters of a complete 12-minute serial.

So I went to work expanding the story, drawing the story-boards and lots of new art. Then I'd drive them over to Colossal where the staff would blow up my drawings onto colored paper. Next, the director, Denis Morella, made the art come alive by photographing the cut-outs (which were positioned on three layers of glass to give the illusion of depth) using stop-motion. It was pretty primitive, I guess, but I really liked the jerky effect that resulted.

"Invisible Hands" was shown a lot on MTV during the early 1990s, sometimes even in a complete 12-minute version. MTV & Colossal kept all the original artwork I did, but luckily I made a bunch of photocopies, which, I recently realized, I've never shown before. So, here are a few for now. I can post some more soon, as well as some of the storyboards.

At the top is my drawing for the opening credits. Next, the original promotional postcard, advertising the debut of Liquid TV, with a scene from "IH" (the costume party) on the front, followed by more of my drawings -- characters, interiors & exteriors --- before they were transferred to colored paper.

I used to get asked about this serial a lot. It's never been on video in either VHS or DVD (there are reasons) though other Liquid TV animations were. However, it has been on YouTube for a long time now, so I don't get asked about it as much as I once did. I'm just glad that folks can (finally) see it again if they want to. And I hope some people may enjoy a look at the drawings I did for it.

(note: Animated version of "Invisible Hands" is copyright MTV & Colossal Pictures. Print version of "Invisible Hands" is copyright Richard Sala)

Sketchbooks pages of the past

Years and years and years ago there was a magazine that printed pages from artists' sketchbooks. They asked me to contribute, so I photocopied a bunch of pages, then cut & pasted the sketches so I could get in as many little drawings on the four pages I was given as possible. (I mean, some of the actual pages only had one or two drawings on them -- not very interesting, visually, I thought; plus I couldn't figure out which four pages to use -- so that was my solution; I reduced them & cut out the drawings & fit them all neatly together, with the goal that they just be fun to look at.)

Anyway, I'm kind of glad I made copies of these pages because a few years later these and other sketchbooks were destroyed by water damage. There was a leak in the ceiling directly over the cabinet where the books were stored, which I didn't notice until it was way too late.

So -- here is a glimpse of some of my sketchbook pages from days gone by...