"The Spirit" matte paintings + concept

Here was a fun thing to do... two epic explosion shots for The Spirit which I got to take from sketch to final comp.

concept art

matte painting in final comp

We started with sketches, which sat as placeholders in the edit, while framing, composition, and design issues were all addressed in editorial context. When Frank Miller was finally satisfied with these things, they were next fleshed-out into detailed matte paintings.

Matching the angle of my sketch, matte painter Roger Kupelian rendered an overhead view of the city in 3D. I took his renders and painted over them in Photoshop, basically to tweak, re-light and modulate detail. I layered in clouds from various stock photo sources, and translated the smoke tentacles into 3d particles.

The final comp was done in After Effects, using warpers on the clouds to make them billow.

concept art

matte painting in final comp

X-files waterfall sequence

Here are some early environment concept images I did in preparation for a sequence which was ultimately cut from X-Files: I want to Believe, in which Mulder investigates by a frozen waterfall.

These are preliminary designs for what would have been the waterfall matte painting.

Zelda still life

click to enlarge

Digital oil still life of some assorted Nintendo paraphernalia and a rice krispy treat, painted from life with Photoshop.

detail view.

Time-lapse of its creation. Scrub through it to see the image at different stages of completion.

Terminator has bad face day

Some concept illustrations I did for Sarah Connor Chronicles showing what to do if a terminator comes after you: shoot him/her in the face with a shotgun. The actor was filmed with prosthetic make-up, and a patch of greenscreen to be replaced with CG.

Terminator matte painting

A matte painting of a post-apocalyptic nuclear power plant from Terminator: The Sarah Connor Chronicles which I did at Entity FX. The plant was an actual filming location, but I modified it by painting decay and battle damage over it.


Here is what the original footage looked like...

And here is the final composite, featuring a CG human-killing robot by David Alexander.

Flower study

Digital oil still-life, done in Photoshop over a couple of days.

detail view
Here is the painting setup.

Curmudgeon

3-hour digital oil painting from Bob Kato's drawing club. The theme was Van Gogh, but it doesn't seem to look too much like him except for the hat.

Sarah Connor Chronicles

Here are some concept frames I did for a sequence in the Terminator TV show in which Summer Glau escapes from an aircraft carrier full of angry robots.

Pushing Daisies matte painting

Background matte painting I did for the show Pushing Daisies. The black areas are where it blends into the film footage.

Marie Antoinette with Head

A life portrait, painted from a costumed model in the three-hour pose of Marie Antoinette enjoying the use of her head. Painted with photoshop on a laptop in at Bob Kato's drawing club.
Click to enlarge.