Abundant Linkage

It's been a while since the last Abundant Linkage, huh? Well, here goes:



Oh. Yes. Being a late 70's runner, this warms the cockles of my heart like nothing else: Nike Vintage. To quote the site:

...We've revisited our original styles and crafted them to look 30 years old–fresh out of the box. And it's all there, almost to the stitch. 1970s-grade nylon. Weird Swooshes. Aged laces. Weathered foam. And, of course, that velvety suede-like suede.

I'm partial to the Daybreak, since my Dad had a pair. The color choices presented here are new–they only had one look back in the day as far as I remember: tan with a bright orange swoosh (which, incidentally, I don't see available on the site...weird). Now I know what I want for my birthday. (It's coming up, in case you want to know...*hint hint*...)

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I'll talk more about this book soon.

I started up (yet) another Flickr group, Vintage Science (hmmm...I'm detecting a theme here). Mainly because I was trying to find some old science book-type stuff on Flickr and noticed that there wasn't one place to feature them all. Behold, another Flickr group! Taking a nod from fellow vintage-lover Paula Wirth's excellent group series (see Vintage Cookbooks, Vintage Advertising, and Vintage Drugstores, to name a few), I decided to start a group featuring all those oh-so-dated science books that we were forced to study and learn in grade school. Looking for 40's, 50's, 60's, and 70's science books, as well as children's books that had a science theme to 'em (like space, astronomy, physics, anatomy, etc.). Join in on the fun!

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Inspiring artists:


I'm in love with the artwork of Matte Stephens. I mentioned him on Drawn! and I'll mention him here. He's that good. Go directly to his Etsy shop and buy one of his prints. You won't be sorry. Another reason to love Matte's work is that he's a big fan of midcentury modern design. He even started up a blog devoted to it: Modern Design 901. Love love.


Robert Hardgrave (aka Farmer Bob) paints with authority. His freeflowing landscapes are something to behold; I'm sure they're even more impressive up close and in person. Check his gallery and his Flickr.


Currently enjoying the work of Italian illustrator Olimpia Zagnoli. Fun characters with nice linework. I'm glad to see that she's crossed the threshold from paper and/or computer screen into brick and mortar walls. She just recently finished her first wall! She collaborated with a friend and it looks great. Be sure to check her Flickr while you're at it.


Click to read. And laugh.

Hilarious. Do yourself a favor and go back and read 'em all. Drawn by Scott Campbell. Love his watercolor work combined with his use of irregular line and fun character designs. Recently featured in Geek Monthly.


Scott recently was one of the contributing artists to Hickee, an on-going comic series featuring indie comic artists, headed up by fellow LAIKA-ian, Graham Annable. If you're not familiar with Graham's work, you're in for a treat. The amount of personality he's able to get out of the subtlest of looks is amazing. Mostly in the eyes. (Check his Grickle Things blog.) I can see why Henry Selick grabbed him to work as storyboard artist on CORALINE. Wonderful stuff.

A big, fat post featuring LAIKA, PDX and NW artists is coming soon. To coincide with my updated blogroll. (Sorry it's taking me longer than expected. I keep finding new links! So sue me.)

Abundant Linkage 5

I've finally gotten around to updating some links and making some changes to my link column over there on the right. First major change I made was moving Recent Posts and the Archive section down to the bottom of the column, which works better for me. I never really liked having my Archive section right there near the beginning of the column. If you guys liked it better where it was, let me know. I'll ignore your suggestions, but nod my head feigning agreement. Another big change is adding a pull-down menu for all the artwork that I've done and posted here on The Ward-O-Matic, titled, appropriate enough, Ward Art. I think I read somewhere that someone was trying to find a portfolio of my work but outside of the Strangetoons gallery, there isn't really any true portfolio, per se. Hopefully this new menu will help with that. Let me know what you all think.

One reason I haven't updated my links and such is because I've been so busy at work, but that's to be expected and not at all dramatic for blogging purposes. Blah blah blah, etc., the same ol' drill. Regarding work: I do have to say that I hate having to jump from one pretty cool project to another, which I had to do last Monday. Switching gears artistically is one of my pet peeves, but I can't really say anything about this because -- hey, it's the nature of the beast, they always say. Get used to it. One saving grace for me is that I've been placed on another equally cool project, so I can't complain. The first project was for an internal job, but this new job that I'm currently working on will be a national spot. So yes, you will be able to see something that I've directed soon.

I do one day plan on posting a list of projects and spots that I've worked on at Click 3X and Primal Screen, but at the time being you'll just have to check out Primal's website for a look-see at what we've done recently. I could point out some of the projects for you to be on the lookout for, but that would be no fun, since I would want to talk about each job individually. In my time spent for each project, I've learned that I'll pick up on some nugget of knowledge about myself or about animation, whether it be monumental or not. And that, my friends, would make for dramatic blogging. So stay tuned.


"Gas station" by Ben Prisk

Oh, and on a Primal note -- fellow Primate Ben Prisk has a side gig of doing backgrounds for Adult Swim's "Squidbillies." Check them out HERE. They are very unique and beautiful in their own way. Sort of surreal-meets-folk-art, I guess. All done in acrylics and goauche, with elements painted separately and then scanned and composited later in post-production for the show. Ben and I share a lot of the same odd eclectic sensibilities when it comes to collecting and inspiration. You thought mine was interesting? You should see his workspace at Primal.

Saxton Moore used to be at Primal Screen before he packed his bags and went out to Californy to work in the animation biz out there. He then came back to work on a couple of projects before he was off again to the sunny beaches of... Cleveland? Well, he's doing rather nicely there, the last he told me, so that's a good thing. He's started a blog finally, with some great eye candy for you all. And Sax, I'll post about those retrommercials we worked on when I can find all the artwork for it. My place is a mess!

I love Andi Watson's work. I like that he's doing a blog as well. Blogging is the new black, I swear.

I'm so glad that previously mentioned Leif Peng's Today's Inspiration now has a blog home. Now you'll see what subscribers get on a daily basis (better quality of course, than what's on the blog), along with more info and background on the artists and illustrators mentioned. Very cool stuff.


"Gerard" by Hans Bacher

Here are a smidgen of great blogs by even greater artists working in the animation biz or otherwise. Give 'em a visit:

Lambey's Log: Illustrator Steve Lambe's blog. Great character design!
Thorsten Hasenkamm: More incredible character design and color here.
Tweedle Sketch: Fun art, illustration, bunnies, and whatnot from illustrator and Retro Kid contributor, Michael Fleming.
Deadstown: Conceptual artwork and photos of sets of CORPSE BRIDE by Neil Ross.
Mad-T-Party: Animator Hans Bacher kicks some great art-blogging arse. Seriously.
John Nevarez works at Disney Toon. Great character sketches and stuff.
Dean Roberts is a storyboard artist in the biz.
Jeopopolis: Illustrator Jeope Wolfe's blog on illustration and design. He's given me some great support in the past on my IF submissions (thanks, Jeope, by the way!) and I feel that he deserves some recognition. Great guy with some great things to say.

Other things:

Check out this interview with Irwin Chusid, the author of one of my favorite recent books (and mentioned before), The Mischievous Art of Jim Flora. Very interesting read.

Interesting high-speed video clips for the curious animator. Great resource for studying what happens to things in super slow-motion.

And I'm just dying to see what Swoon's site will be like once it's up and running. Big fan of her cut-out paper street art.

Hitchcock fans: VERTIGO: Then and Now is a site filled with before and after images of various San Francisco locations from the 1958 film. I love stuff like this. Check out New York Changing, with New York City the subject of before and after photos.

And oh! -- I'm currently painting a mural on the backside of the fantastic and wonderful Victory Vintage Home in Decatur. It's taking me a while to finish, but you may catch me working on it this weekend, if you're curious. Lots of pink.

That's it! Enjoy!

Abundant Linkage 4

Welcome to another fantastic edition of Abundant Linkage, where I -- your host, Ward -- will dispense to you all a multitude of glorious links and time-wasters. All thanks to the wonderous joy of the internet. Shall we begin? Yes, let's.

(First of all, my thoughts and prayers go out to the friends and family of Joe Ranft, Pixar's great story man, who died tragically in an automoblie accident last week. He was a very influential guy, not just within the walls of Pixar, but to many who had the great opportunity to know him, as well as be taught by him. His presence will be sorely missed.)



Leif Peng is an illustrator who's accumulated a rather large collection of images from magazines, books, and newspapers printed during the glory days of the 20th century illustrator. The collection is so impressive that he decided to share the wealth to a few of his colleagues via email one day and the response was overwhelming. Now titled, Today's Inspiration, Leif sends one image a day to a growing list of fellow illustrators, artists, art directors, or anyone who loves this sort of thing. Yes, I fall into that catagory. Ever since I subscribed to his list, I've learned so much about many of the greats of that time: Al Parker, Bob Peak, Bob Hilbert, Robert Fawcett, just to name a few. Mostly focusing on a particular artist for the week, he'll sometimes do a theme. Currently the theme this week is "Summer." Many thanks to Leif for his exhaustive work in scanning all these images, as well as being so generous in sharing his collection. The images are very good quality, by the way.


I've updated the right column again to include a new catagory: Retro Minded. I'm a big lover of anything vintage, especially from the mid-20th century, if you haven't already guessed. So, it just seemed right for me to have a catagory just for links that focus on that particular era, or might take a heart-warming and half-serious look back at that time. A few to check out:

Conelrad is a great informational as well as fun site about the creepy days of the Cold War. From atomic bombs to fallout shelters, from Red scares to National Security, you name it -- it's there. Also be sure to check out behind the scenes on creating the "Citizen Kane of Civil Defense," Bert the Turtle -- the host of the fun-for-kids educational short film, Duck and Cover. A very interesting read about how to delicately approach the subject of complete atomic destruction while simply cowering under tables, all in a fun way for kids to understand -- complete with an animated turtle as their guide. Fun! To download this bizarre nugget from our past, you can download it HERE.

Retro Future takes a look at how our past envisioned our future. So many dreams... Where's my Rocket Mail? Oh, yeah. Email. Whoop-de-do. That's no fun!

I just love the look and feel of Retro Lounge, a site with links aimed at the past. Just sit back and enjoy the retro goodness.


A couple of new blog links:

I swear that Matt, of Scrubbles, is my internet twin. He's even my age. He and I share so many similarites when it comes to collecting and retro interests, it's uncanny. Funny guy, too.

Poppy is headed up by Jan, a designer in Vancouver, BC. She never fails to disappoint when it comes to finding great links. And she posts frequently, too, so she's got that going for her.

One of the more interesting blogs I've encountered, The Known Universe has such compelling content -- thanks to poignant photography and great writing -- that I find myself yearning for New York City in a completely new way. Thanks for that, Jamie.

Another NYC-based blog I'm digging focuses on graffiti, street art, design, etc: Global Graphica.

Cartoons and Caricatures and Funny Cute are two great sketchblogs from former Spümcø employees. Great insight into working on caricatures and trying to figure out subjects' quirks and features.

Denis Goulet has changed the url to his blog, "Mes vendredis..." You can check out the new link HERE. If you recall, I mentioned Denis' work and blog in an earlier edition of Abundant Linkage.


Various oddities:

Savannah College of Art & Design has now opened a satellite campus in Midtown, Atlanta, called SCAD-Atlanta. And almost immediately announced that it will merge with the nearby competing (and long-standing) art school, Atlanta College of Art (ACA), creating this blob-like art school that could either be a great benefit to Atlanta's art and animation community, or become this faceless monster that could deeply affect a long-running art establishment that included the Woodruff Arts Center and High Museum of Art. We'll have to wait and see, I guess. Nothing like art drama.



One of my dreams has always been to animate a movie title sequence. I'm a big fan of this sort of mini-movie within a movie, as it incorporates several of my loves: movies, animation and typography. Not necessarily in that order. Anyway, there's a site that complied all the movie titles that the great designer legend Saul Bass created. Very cool. My only problem is that there are no Quicktime movies to view. Just stills. Oh well. Better than nothing.

A cool article on retro-styled movie titles can be found HERE. Another interesting read on the retro movie title thing is found over at One Plus One Equals Three, a design blog. Good readin'.

Oh, and I still rock the cassette tapes. Can't help it.

There ya go. Have a great hump day!

Abundant Linkage 3

Figured I'd pass on some more links I've unearthed throughout my cyber-travels of recent. Bonus points for those who might've noticed a couple of new changes along with some new links over on the right column there. I've been meaning to clean up some of the links, with easier catagories to sort through, but in the meantime, I decided to add a new catagory that is a bit close to my heart: All about me. Since this is my own blog, I realized I did not have a particular area for those who are unfamiliar with who I am and what I do. So, you can now check out a couple of links that showcase my work, my photos, my wife's blog, and my workplace. Nothing like a good ol' fashioned big, fat ego, eh?

Onto the new links:

In Animationblogs, there are a couple of blogs that I check out from time-to-time, as some of these guys have some good things to say about the industry. Keith Lango is an animator from Dallas, Texas, who updates his blog very regularly. He even offers some tutorials on a subscriber basis, and better yet, some of the tutorials are available in several different languages. Great job, Keith!

Notorious Newsquirt is the moniker of Jason Newkirk, a 3D animator from Seattle, Washington. He's been in the gaming industry for 8 years. Give him a pound, y'all.

And now, with the advent of blogs, it was only a matter of time before the people behind the production of animation for TV would pick up on the phenomenon and start their own production blogs, or "plogs." The first, of course, is Lili and Eddie's Fwak! Blog, which pretty much was there from the beginning, before everybody got on the bloggity-blogging bandwagon (including me). Now, we have The Wubblog, and The Teenage Roblog. All are fascinating in checking out the inspirations, the progress, the people involved in the making of a particular show.

In the Artblogs section, be sure to check out Snyde Remarks, the blog to artist/illustrator Csnyde (not sure how to list that name). Also, how can I not mention my good internet-pal, Steve Mack? Steve has a great blog, showcasing his latest work (most notably, his Illustration Friday submissions) at Spot Illustration. Go there, NOW.

I just recently posted on Drawn!, a fantastic artist who's the artistic director and background designer for such shows as Samurai Jack and Foster's Home for Imaginary Friends: Dan Krall. Wonderful paintings with great style and flair. I especially love his drawings and caricatures, as he definitely has a Ronald Searle feel to them. And I love Searle with his scathingly funny drawings. (Another site about Searle HERE.) Krall's caricatures of celebrities are stretched and pulled, with no holds barred: the way any good caricaturist should be with their subjects. No holding back. Al Hirschfeld, considered one of the best caricaturists that ever lived, didn't hold back and he did his thing for about 80 years.

I've added a new link catagory: Art Minded -- of, or having to do with sites that are anything art-related, such as artists, illustrators, and animators who do the art-thing on the side. I've had the great luxury of interacting with some of these wonderful artists, such as Jen Lerew, Steve Mack, Nathan Mazur (Scared of Bees), and Paige Pooler, through my blog. Some wonderfully gifted people with fabulous personalities. I'm honored to know them. (You gotta love the internet.) Anyway, I know that there's a lot of leeway here in trying to figure out where do I draw the line between artist and animator, but like I said, I might have to do some more organizing in this matter. In the meantime, please check out some great work by these fantastic artists I've featured here. I'll definitely be updating this section periodically, so be sure to check back often.

Hey --where are the dance blogs? Anybody? If you're into dance, be sure to check out my wife's blog, hula seventy, as she has a couple of links to dance companies and dancers who've inspired her and who deserve more exposure than they're probably getting. We're talking modern dance and the power of movement here. I've seen some of the dancers she's linked in motion, and they are indeed impressive. Give them some love.

Gotta run.

Son of Abundant Linkage

Some updates and some more links for you all:

Stephanie Gladden has now updated her site. A character artist for Cartoon Network, she also is a very busy comic book artist, creating pages and covers for many publications throughout the years. Take one look at her portfolio and you'll get a good idea of her incredible inking and character design skills. Honestly, she's one of the best inkers I've ever seen (sorry Robert). I had the great opportunity to work with her while she did some freelancing at Click 3X a while back -- I even snagged a couple of her sketches out of the trash bin at the end of the day. Yes, they were that good. Check her site out and give her some love.

Jo Davidovich has updated her site, too, with a nice new layout and colors, as well as recent animation she did for us at Primal Screen. Excellent animator who's just about finished up at SCAD, give Jo some love, too.

I really love polar inertia, a fantastic web magazine like no other. Tons of articles and brilliant photos on varied subjects such as gas stations, airplane hangers, and, interestingly enough, various layouts of parking garages.

Are you curious about the French titled-blog over in my Artblogs section? "Mes vendredis..." (literally, "My Fridays") is the artblog of Denis Goulet, an illustrator with a nice mix of the Shane Glines-style of comics and cool hip 60's aesthetic. He's switched his blog over to a new service now and has been posting some great stuff lately. Check it out HERE. He also has a great website, too.

And thus, while on Goulet's blog, I ran across this link to Jonas Bergstrand. Wow. Some great stuff here! Also with a cool hip 60's style, Jonas's work incorporates more of the Bond aesthetic -- the suave, mod, ladies' man type of illustration. Not sure if I'm making any sense here, but I do love his caricatures of the Sex and The City girls, Marlon Brando (Wild One era), and Steve McQueen (shown at left). Vector work at its best, with a surprising fluidity in his linework. I love how he's able to capture the mid-60's inkline style of illustration in the digital vector format. Hard to do. He's also done some witty animation, too.

Other things:
Chris Harding is one fantastic animator. I mentioned him on Drawn! recently, and I really feel that his style of Flash animation is where it's at. Revel in the brilliance!

Hard to find children's books listed HERE, most notably books by big-time classic designers, Paul Rand and Saul Bass. Me wishes me had mucho monies.

Wanna know where to find the closest Tiki Bar? How about the ambiance of the place? The food? The drinks? Critiki is a "worldwide guide to Tiki Bars and Polynesian Restaurants." Right up your alley, right?

Subversive Art King Gary Baseman has a great website to check out. It takes a while to load, so be patient. I saw him talk in Ottawa last September, and it was definitely an unusual experience. The guy has some great stories about his career and various jobs, especially while working on his Teacher's Pet TV show for Disney. I'll try and post some more about this soon.

Another recent post on Drawn!, I mention Gary Taxali, an illustrator from Canada who uses the printmaking technique to create some very distinguished visuals. He prints and paints on the inside covers of books at times, which I really dig. Nice nice work.

And if you're into movie titles, then this is the site for you: Stephen Hill's Movie Title Screens. Over 3,000 listed. Yes -- OVER 3,000, people. Great resource for old and new titles. He even showcases the different versions of a particular title on VHS, Beta and DVD. (Beta? Man, he must be old....kidding, of course.)

That's it for now. Please visit these nice peoples mentioned here and please tell 'em I sent ya. Coming up: many many images of my most favorite Disney short of all time. Stay tuned! Peace.

Abundant Linkage

Happy Spring Forward! (Did you move your clocks ahead an hour?) If you noticed, I've added many more links over in the right column. I'd been meaning to do this for a while, but never had to chance to really sit down and commit to it. (Yes, it requires a good night of patience, that's for sure.)

I've now changed up the Linky Links section, added four new blog sections: Animationblogs, Artblogs, Designblogs, and Otherblogs, and added more links in my Other fun links section.

About some of the links I've added:

In the Linky links section I added Archive.org's Prelinger Archives, which is a fantastic (and very extensive) site for short films and commericals that are in the public domain. Do a search for "animation" and you'll find some unique treasures. Wooster Collective is a great site for graffiti and street art, with many links on writers and artists, articles, gallery openings, artwork featured, interviews, and much more.

In the Atlanta Artists/Animators section: If you're into comics that are "relaxed and fun" (not that there is anything wrong with that), check out the very talented C. Edwards and his new online comic, Abel Boddy. C. is my assistant (most of the time) when he freelances for Primal, so he's got to be good, right? (I must say that if you got the Seinfeld reference in that earlier sentence, then you'll know what to expect in this comic.)

In the Animationblogs section, BookSpeak is a new blog by animator Josh Book. Everything you ever wanted to know about Flash can be found at Cold Hard Flash, including many interviews with Flash animators in the business. Since I'll be diving into that program soon, expect me to be constant visitor to that site. John at The Disney Blog helped me out with some issues regarding image use (you'll see what I'm talking about soon), so, much props to the man and his great informative blog. fps Magazine now has a blog, called In-Betweens.

I've added sThig's Artsy Fartsy Weblog in the Artblogs section, along with many others. Devas T is a blog by children's book illustrator Don Tate (found via Jared's Crockpot). I really dig Cin's artwork, so check out her blog, Learning Daily. I also dig illustrator Paige Pooler's artblog, eyes wide apart. Nice work.

All the Designblogs featured kick the butts of all of us who use basic blog templates, so give them a pound.

In Otherblogs, you'll find a vast assortment of blogs that fall into other catagories, including Olivia's not so pink anymore and Lulu's Hopscotch Honey (Lulu is my sister-in-law). Lots of scans of ephemera and old photos to look at while visiting Swapatorium and Snapatorium, both headed up by a vernacular photo collector from Houston. She also does collage work at Scrapatorium.

In the Various fun stuff, I've added Atlanta Time Machine, which I featured a while back, and some fun album cover links, Cover Heaven and Show and Tell Music. And lastly, who doesn't want a Vespa?

There are a good many more links not mentioned here that I've added, so be sure to visit these nice folks' sites and blogs.