Everybody's Got One

It's long overdue but a new Brudders has been posted. Brudders - Episode 57 'Opinions'.

Look for the next late episode next Monday.

Also, new artwork by 'Sister' in Sister's Sketchbook.

-Sgt M.

That's brisk baby!

Brudders - episode 56 'Refreshment' is being served for your snacking pleasure.

Our budding artist 'Sister' has a new on-going feature in the Studio called Sister's Sketchbook. With comments by the artist!

We're going to close the store for remodeling. You can buy our junk later.

-Sgt M.

Happy New Year! Happy New Comic!

It's our first new comic strip for 2012, Brudders episode 55 - 'Lost in Translation'.

Also watch for our new feature Sister's Sketchbook in the Studio later this week.

-Sgt M.

Storyboarding 'Happy Box'

Learn how our new short film Happy Box was conceived and planned in Studio Sessions 3: Storyboarding 'Happy Box'.

Merry stuff and all that.

-Sgt M.

Happy Thanksgiving! Here's your happy meal.

Come and get it! In the spirit of the holiday, we're serving up the final release version of Happy Box, the first Brudders mini-movie. Happy Box was completely homemade from scratch, just like how the Native Americans and Pilgrims made their movies. Yum yum!

You can watch Happy Box on the website in the Movies section or at our YouTube channel Little Green Dog Movies. Or just click the image below:

Maybe now we can get back to drawing some comic strips.

-Sgt M.

I want to thank my buddy Ken Wilder for giving me a five-minute crash course in how to use Lightwave SoftFX. The resulting 'jiggle' effect totally makes Sparklepus.

-G.

'Happy Box' Preview is Live at Gothtober!

It took a month of sleep deprived nights after a full day of work and family time to get it (almost) completed but the sneak preview of Happy Box is finally live at Gothtober.com! To see it, go to the Gothtober website and click on the 29th.

For those who need more info, Happy Box is our first Brudders 'mini movie' and our second short film for Gothtober (the first was Hello Frankenstein way back in 2005) Gothtober is an annual Halloween inspired internet event featuring short films, animation, slide shows and recipes from a variety of crazy people (a.k.a., artists) for the entire month of October.

The reason I'm calling this a 'preview' version is because I had to cut some corners to make our October 29th deadline.

Most noticeably missing is the lipsync animation—I simply ran out of time to finish it. I decided to take out the lipsync completely because it looked weird to have only half the film with lipsync animation. Happy Box still plays well without it but I'm working on getting lip sync back in as quickly as possible.

There are also a few 'bugs' that need to be fixed, props that need to be properly finished, a few FX added, and I really wish to re-render the entire project in HD. (My little render farm lost half its capacity last week so I wound up rendering this project at 320 x 180 on two desktops and a tablet PC; surprisingly this 'web res' actually held up when scaled to double-size (640 x 360) for Gothtober.)

The final release version of Happy Box, with lip sync animation, bug fixes and other improvements should appear at our website later in November. In the meantime, please enjoy this exclusive Gothtober preview!

Now, I beg your indulgence as I take a moment send out heartfelt thanks to my friends:

To JP and Cristin for presenting Gothober every year. Gotober has been a great motivator in getting me to do 'big things' just for fun.

To the guys at work, for their curiosity and encouragement, and for just being a lot of fun to hang out with.

To the Lightwave and iPi Soft user and developer communities for their interest and support. Especially to Cageman and Rebel Hill for their technical advice and assistance in setting up my 'home brew' motion capture pipeline.

And finally, extra special thanks and love to my wife Alisa and my daughter Sienna Kai for putting up with all my nonsense these past weeks. Oh, yeah, and Sergeant and Toullie too. I could not have done this without all of you guys. Go Team Little Green Dog!

Come Monday morning, I'm taking a break and going back to work for a while. :)

G.

Our 'secret' project: Happy Box

Bring out the candy corn and witches brew because it's that time of year again.

Gothober, the annual Halloween countdown calendar is alive! For 31 days in October, Gothober brings you music, movies, animation, craft projects, recipes and other spooky madness by a different artist each day.

This year, Team Little Green Dog will present our mini-movie Happy Box. Watch for it on the 29th.

In the meantime, be sure to check out all the fun stuff by other artists at www.gothtober.com beginning at midnight on October 1st.

Here's a little peek at what we're working on right now...





G.