Wednesday, March 7, 2007

Dudes what knock me out: Michel Gagne



O.k., today I start a short series about animators and illustrators what knock my socks the heck off. We'll start with the Montreal FX jedi Michel Gagne. You can see his phenomenal work in the Iron Giant and the Clone Wars series of animated shorts. As well, he has his own publishing company, teaming up with his wife Nancy and publishing several books. Go get yerself "The Towers of Numar", a personal fave. His signature style combines cute, whimsical and sinister, with flowing organic shapes and a keen eye for motion in the still image. Above is one of his characters, Rex, who figures large in Gagne's stories printed in renowned comic omnibus FLIGHT.

My fave stuff of his, however, is a series of ultra-groovy, ultra-creepy interstitials done for the Cartoon Network, a series of promos for their halloween shows one year. Called 'Insanely Twisted Shadow Puppets', it's a series of animated shadow shapes on starkly simple colored backgrounds...it's brilliant stuff! Check out the site: http://www.gagneint.com

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