From Student to Art Director of Spider-Man: Into the Spider-Verse. The journey of Patrick O'Keefe

but I do recall the feeling of having I got my big break and that morning and waking up and feeling a great sense of relief more than anything because I felt like oh man I I felt kind of reassured like oh I I did it this was yes there was a lot of doubt in my mind up until that if I was you know I dropped to the school I chased this girl I I put all my eggs into these basket was basket and and I was terrified I deny it welcome to the den squared podcast today's guest is the extraordinary Patrick O'Keefe best known as an art director on the oscar-winning and webtastic spider-man into the spider-verse Patrick's Korea has also seen him lend his creative talents to the fields of advertising games television are now into teaching as a learn squared instructor in this episode we get a candid and honest look into Patrick's epic journey which saw him start out as an aspiring artist through to the Academy award-winning art director that we know him as today we also get a peek into the ambitions behind his learn squared course 2d sequins illustration and how it will greatly benefit those wanting to forge a career in films I can honestly say after speaking with Patrick I was left truly inspired and motivated and a hope that will be the case for you two I'm your host Aaron danda let's go [Music] welcome Patrick and you prefer to be called Patrick Pat or anything else Patrick's fine it's funny I was having a conversation about this last night's right I have like all old professors don't call me Pat okay okay my old my first professors you know general everyone calls me Patrick and then my good buddies back in Toronto and therefore closer to Ireland you are more Irish era the more it starts to become paddy yeah sure sure mm-hmm cool so firstly congratulations on the N squared course it's pretty amazing and I know we probably said about all our courses but it's gone down really well and it's something that I'm definitely going to take when I get some time purely because I can just see how it can benefit my workflow yeah firstly congratulations on that thank you very much I guess we can start with a bit about your origin story so who is Patrick okay sure so I'm the Canadian Toronto born illustrator and now our director and I got started with art by I have an older brother Christopher O'Keefe who is he's a great designer as well and when I was young he's about five years older than me so when I was a little kid I just sort of like wanted to be my older brother and follow him around everywhere he went I'd steal his sketchbooks and and drawing them practices and try to be just like him and he got into doing graffiti and I followed suit and that's really where like my first sort of like love an application of art beyond just like a sketchbook really started who's doing graffiti and then kept meeting other graffiti returned to Toronto scenes and like getting up as they say more and more around town and it was really that in high school I mean my love for it started when I was really young there's like a grade three graduation book like at the end of the school this is what do you want to be when you grow up and it's it's funny because I've been terrible with like the written word I'm like learning-disabled so I wrote I wrote I want to be a cartoon when I meant was cartoonist just I couldn't get it right and I still screw things left like that to this day Mighty Mouse interest around us so but it was in high school I met an art teacher mr. McNaughton and he he saw my love for graffiti and stuff but also was like you know you could be if a real artist and started him educating me and what it would take to become an illustrator and from then on I still maintained the graffiti but started to study a little harder I eventually got into an art college outside of Toronto or Sheridan College and that's where I started studying illustration like for real for real I eventually met thee the other love of my life my wife and she's from Toronto but was going to school in Maine coober British Columbia Oh which the distance for somebody like you would be probably like London's Berlin you know Canada's huge yeah definitely so you know five six hour flight on the other side of the country we fell in love and we spent the first year apart as I went back to art school and I as any twenty year old boy did who's in love I weighed the idea of my dream arts school or or you know submit to my lady and I promptly dropped it over a Sheraton and moved across the country to be with her and I found an art school in Vancouver called the Emily Carr Institute and there it was they didn't really have an illustration program at all so it was really like going to graphic design or something like that and do some painting and I got I enrolled and got there and the first day I walked into a film class by accident and it was filmed as it was like film production and film design and I just immediately went to the deans offices like that said switch I'm switching I'd rather I'd rather learn new skills then kind of just keep working on the ones that current they have and so I ended up studying and finishing my degree in film design which is interesting because it gave me all these tools that I wouldn't have gotten in illustration like set design and cinematography production design and because I switched schools I had I had like more than enough credit I was weird I was like caught in between two years of study and so in my final year I had a rather light course load but it enabled me but I was broke I'm just working as a bathroom attendant at a Asian gangster nightclub no he's living off that's the tips I would make which were pretty substantial because people would throw a good cash bringing to not not to look the other way it's kind of good ship che che stuff you know but I that's not not the career I had always envisioned my just yeah and so that summer I got a job working as a storyboard artists at an animation studio Vancouver called Bardell and as I was heading into my last year of studies they were all sort of like why bother you got a job just hang out the money is okay right it's better than school right and I was like it is but I I've got I've come so far I gotta finish this degree which is a good lesson for anybody who learning hoping to come study from abroad work from abroad yeah in the United States or even travel to a lot of other countries and work and get a work visa it's very valuable as I have a degree besides that the degree in your arts education isn't super valuable but moving from country to country it's a legitimate piece of paper that says to hey I am an artist in the eyes of the government that I from the country I come from and it really helps to get your degree so I said hey I'm going back to school but I am such a blank course load this this last year why don't you guys if you'll help me in I'll I'll turn this into a co-op opportunities they'll actually be doing school I'll actually be paying mice so I can come work for you and get paid because I had to do missed courses and they did and then I had the most wild crazy last year of college because I was doing my grad film and running back and forth to the animation studio I'd like go to class in the morning got the animations to do a storyboard for four hours head back go to another class come back storyboard and and then head home and do my work yep before school and I thought I would had it all figured out I was on easy street and this is 2008 and I the economic assessment was just sort of starting to hit the Vancouver area it was still it still hadn't like gripped the world wide but the animation television is overseas business was starting to be affected and and the show was told hey we're not gonna do a third season and they were like you know we'd love to keep you on we just don't know what that job is yet so hang me hang tight and we'll figure it out and I'm like man I got student loans I got I got a month before school ends I gotta find something and Electronic Arts which is a game developer in Vancouver I heard from my director of the TV show that they were looking for a concept artist not a story arts but the concept artist and they're all still looking for somebody who can do graffiti because it's the Need for Speed game they're doing like an undergrad game you know they want a cent more authentic street art throughout the game and I worked like two weeks finishing my grand film I'm struggling this TV show and I'm trying to come up with a portfolio that really showed like I'm strong cars driving down streets and that bringing up the best graffiti I could muster digitally and I ended up getting the job and it kind of set the tone for my career which was I awesome I had my last day of work at the animation studio Friday waited on Saturday I took Sunday off and on Monday I went into my new job Wow how did that feel like was that almost like around that time was it almost relief or was it like Connie to break but I got to do this what was your like thought process at that time or I guess well we last ones anxiety levels at that time like or insecurity because obviously just mentioned with the financial crash and things like that what was your mindset in terms of your career yeah it was so so I got the job in a boat it would have been in May and then the real crash happened in September but you can see things were were happening yeah it started that the animation industry was starting to tighten up mm-hmm and I felt like this was my given my big break you know I wasn't aware of the impending crash that was coming and it's actually if we can get into that topic because it'd be a very well parallel what's happen now definitely um but I do recall the feeling of having I got my big break and that morning and waking up and feeling a great sense of relief more than anything because I felt like oh man I I felt kind of reassured like oh I did it this was yeah there was a lot of doubt in my mind up until that if I was you know I dropped to the school like I chased this girl I I put all my eggs into these baskets was basket and and I was terrified I mean I had my sizeable student love nothing nothing an American student would deal with but something you know still a bit still fair bit and no real financial support in my life and I was out of my own I was across the country right it almost felt like a different country moving that far so I was very much like wouldn't you know am I going to be back doing that bathroom job and I'm kidding I would still take the odd shift this because if it was a you know if they were having a big party you might make a couple hundred bucks that yeah I knew I needed to catch yeah but I remember waking up that morning and and that I can picture now the Sun was coming into the windows now is just like it okay then it's good I think it's gonna be okay like this you did the right thing you bet on yourself and I worked it yeah yeah the question of sorry go ahead no it's okay as they say now the other side to that question so we have a great summer new gig I'm working on Need for Speed my art director is a guy named Wilson Tang who are done like tech on concrete as AI and he's an incredible or it's actually learning so much I'm having a blast means everybody really yes yes Wilson Tang you should we call blue tang and check him out he's still a mentor and a friend I've been blessed with great mentors throughout my entire career that's awesome um so I'm having a blast I'm learning everything I'm mixing it up in any a and then September rolls around in the financial crash is huge like it shocks the world you know and then I spent the next four or five years watching studios downsized around me EA Vancouver so this was EA black box Vancouver told me you know we're not gonna be better we we might be able to renew your contract but we're still working on it but and this is another person who was a bit of like a fairy godmother in my career there's an artist named Neil of rodas who was like I'm part artists on Empire Strikes Back you know I get called up to like the top floor of EA so he wants to speak with you and I go and meet this this he's looking Yoda like figure you know okay it's weird yeah but he is and does he speak like him in terms of the way he took these sentences as well no just like this little guy and he's got this soft moist and it's that presence around him yeah you certainly are waiting for him to speak first yes and Neil oh just like I'm watching you love your work I'm not sure if you know this but like EI Montreal is is is very interested in working with you they have a and they're doing a need for speaking for the we that's gonna be like something totally different we want to be something totally different it's like the whole thing's gonna be like a blank canvas is you driver I ran you draw graffiti on every Thursday and I was like hey that's cool man but I live in Vancouver you know like I got my girl here I got my buddies here I just graduated like it's been there's six months or something since I graduated I just don't know and he he's like I really think you should consider this and I was just I just kind of heard that the contract in Vancouver you know don't worry were working on it but we're just not sure and just peak you know some of the older cats and pull me aside and be like I'm a little nervous to be honest mom and so him and my manager there were like you should really take the job in Montreal and I was like okay okay and I have family in Montreal actually that's my mother's from and my uncle is there my uncle Jacques and my cousins are all there and I used to love going there as the kid whenever he could actually over that summer we had done a little family reunion and that was like damaged oh so cool and it's nice they could take the train to Toronto with my family and so I was like all right you know tell with it I'll do it and I signed the paperwork and then they were like cool you want to celebrate and I was like actually there's like an All Hands meeting to go to less the tram a drink after work and I go into the All Hands meeting in there like we're shutting down be a black box well we'll find transitions to everybody and I was like no wonder they were pressuring me yeah you should take the gig cuz they really believed in me and wanted knew my situation and and that was incredible and so really good and then I got to EA Montreal and for the next couple of years yeah I just watched studios and this does not scare everybody out there but I definitely just watch studios downsize or add me like I'm my next like big break actually came through one of those downsized as the studio just got ravaged one quarter well and basically I remember going to work and my buddy texted me being like hey hey I think my key card didn't work I'm pretty sure I'm fired and you know it sounds callous mm-hmm Cavalier now but that's the type of joke people make whenever your key card doesn't work to get another thing it's like you pat your bunny on the back and say well it was house being a pub yeah best tell the wife let her down sock and so I get there and my key card doesn't work either an hour later this was my buddy you know friend Frederick Lavoie you know good east Eastern East kin East Coast Canadian French N and my key card doesn't work and I'm like oh that's strange what are the odds that BOCES so there must be something with the power give up the building loss okay can I get it I get up there and it is it is a bloodbath people are packing their stuff up and you usually sit these cubicles of for these nice big cubicles before and your manager would walk up the studio manager would walk up and like walk into the queue before and there's four of you and you'd all turn and I nobody's working they're all just chatting and turning should be like you know Pierre Fred or Justin whoever and and a person would just be like ah man and they go walk to the room and then 20 minutes later they'd come back and they'd pick up their coat and there was a pub right next door of the old Dublin and it was like all right I'll see you guys there and that there was about three hours as that it seemed and it felt like a lifetime and then the studio was down like 20% capacity and we all got called in the room and I we were all like oh I guess they're just you know they're just gonna line this up and see you know shoot the one bullet and see how many don't penetrate this masked fire the rest of us maybe we don't get the same compensation package and they were like you're all safe you know and with the room like there was not enough people to fill the room left you know and no I don't worry you guys are all safe everybody there like it was a Thursday I think and they're like take tomorrow off the rest of the day is done it's like lunch and I like go to the pie you know I've runs at the pop code just you know don't they were like Dunkel oh you know a lot of people are lost their jobs yes yeah yeah you know but go buy somebody a drink and you get to the pub and everybody is just out of their minds drunk as it was a big drinking crew to begin with okay and now they've been sequestered to the pub at before lunch and are just rip-roaring drunk so it was a good send-off today it was almost like a wake oh my god and so I got pretty a pretty you know I'm two three pints in and drinkin was a bunch of guys from Blackpool believe that tangerines or whatever that's there at 13 and anyways I got a call to go back into the studio some version of this story is true and it's a call from EA San Francisco Visceral Games and we're gonna start making we're gonna start making games that then we're gonna be there like outsource studio and they were gonna they didn't need a concept better so they were actually gonna they probably still let me go but I guess I might have got mother-father somewhere who saved me for another day and they were like hey we had this concept art assignment we we really need to get that microwave can you help her and I did it then like that night and they're like all right we'll keep we'll keep the kid and we'll stick with him and then we started making dead space too and then while we were making - halfway through I just I got this feeling like I don't know if the studio is really gonna continue to survive in this way and I just again I got this kind of feeling in my gut the same kind of one I had in Vancouver where I was just like hmm I just don't know if I believe everything like that's being said or people aren't being honest with themselves about the stability of the project and we're still kind of recovering off it's like probably 2011 now there's still those the recession cut was very deep it took years to recover and so halfway through I kind of like demand is a strong word but I've very much impressed upon the people there that you know if you want me to finish the game what I want to do is move to San Francisco and one of the one of the another one of my fairy god father's an Irishman Dominic every time he'd come up to Montreal to hang out we would got to work to work I mean he was the CEO or whatever it was a studio head of operations we would end up getting we'd end up getting dinner for some reason we just we just became buddies right away nice and he became close with my wife or my my girlfriend at the time and we'd been together forever now and six or seven years and he was like okay you know we got it actually figured I would get your visa situation figured out if you want to come down to San Francisco and my wife was already kind of said look my girlfriend attorney started looking for jobs just boilers already in this conversation he was like and I got you don't worry we got your wife of east and I was like I'm not married oh I see was it there and so we got shotgun married real quick well she could be part of my visa and then yeah we took the train back to Toronto got married there and then about 2 or 3 months later we were heading to San Francisco it was just like a bag of clothes and a bag of put her toss her cats in the bag yeah hopped on a plane down to San Francisco how did that feel like that move was in excitement or was it again like you mentioned before was like when you had the initial uncertainty like should I make the move I'm kind of like settled where I am yeah so just kinda like learn from the previous ones that every time kind of this has happened it's kind of been okay I know I definitely didn't ever feel like it's okay I'm highly skeptical at the decision but hmm usually it's there's sort of two types of decisions either I have to decide between a and B or I've long since agreed on see he furred and and I'm just going through the motions and that's moving to California was definitely something I had always wanted to do when I left Vancouver a very good friend of mine who is now a and it always was a ridiculously talented cinematographer men named Jay servin had moved right down to LA and I'd go visit him often so I really wanted to get to California okay okay San Francisco was the only option for me with the visa yeah and clear my charger that's good and so this was part of the big plan and EA could get me down there because I'm I don't have any American citizenship or anything like that I need it the visa and I kind of needed one for my wife as well if I were to call this whole move off and so there was a big sense that's like relief again I'm okay the plan is the plan is paid off you know and I kind of encourage people that if there's one bit of wisdom I have it's not just art based it's like make plans only for the fact that when if you pull them off if you feel like it's the end of Ocean's eleven or something my student the world cassia Gaea you got what you wanted out of the deal yeah I can definitely relate to that in terms of the decision-making in terms of the few parallels compared to yourself but up until probably about four years ago my curious toward purely because I didn't take those jumps and always again very skeptical as I should have played safe and I guess I didn't trust myself at that point as well but again up into about four years ago and decided to finally take that jump again like a similarity to yourself okay like you'd pay for example by the end of Ocean's eleven once it pulls off is like well it worked yeah yeah exactly you're like oh man I did it and you only get that sense of or I personally believe you only get that sense of accomplishment from the the plot and the planning that it takes to pull it off you know yeah yeah if it just happened right away if you got it right away you'd be like oh this is great this is what I wanted but there's something there's this multi-tier planning of okay are going to keep working really really hard so I become invaluable for the team and then keep chatting it up with the San Francisco guys how much I want to be down there keep working from home from you start working from home from ei Montreal so I can show everybody that you know I don't necessarily have to be at Montreal to pull this job off and and and stuff like that and so when you pull it off there's a great sense of relief but a bit of exhaustion as well because you're coming you're you're gambling of it you know yeah but then we get to San Francisco and if there's you know I can totally relate to the hole and I'm gonna butcher now but the whole story it's like the conquerors worlds you know you get to the top of water Mountain just to see the bigger mountain you know I would weep one day when there are no more mountains to climb because you get a couple weeks they're sitting in San Francisco being like you did it buddy and then you're like okay so what's the next plan yeah [Music] what's what's what's our next caper you know and maybe it goes back to being your graffiti artist as that was I used to write graffiti with a guy named caper and it was always he was always sort of like what's the next what's where's the next piece what we as soon as we were done you grab your photos do you feel cool for the day or two and then you're like all right where are we going next and so then I got into San Francisco and I guess we'll just keep going until current day which is me sitting at my apartment trying locked down I get to San Francisco and it's fantastic I'm learning a lot there's an incredible team of concept artists there we make Dead Space 3 we make a battlefield game and the whole time I'm going through I have a visa that is tied to a company ok it was part of I got a very obscure visa I worked for EA long enough there's a little tip for international artists out there I had worked for he a long enough internationally and so there was a visa called the L visa which is an intercompany transfer visa and it's basically saying the anything hey we've got this candidate this employee who's been working internationally and we would like to bring them home to the Home Office now and there's a provision in there and this is why I had to get married that because they're moving an employee their wife and even kids get not just visas but work visas which is very rare to happen if on must be is as if you were to come to the States your wife might get a visa to be there but it doesn't mean she can work there or anymore or your husband he can work here and so I can't leave ei that it's the the visa and my wife's these are both tied to be a if I got fired or I quit we would both lose our ability to work and so I'm now okay my next scheme is make myself an invaluable member of the team that cannot you know everybody's replaceable which attorney emitter so self as valued as possible and start hammering on those people that I just begged for to move me to San Francisco to get me a green card and once again my fairy godfather dum-dum Nick Regan he he helped push for that you know it was great to have like another immigrant in my corner I guess oh yeah and so he pushed for that and within I think it was like five years I managed to get a green card and then as that was happening you know of course nothing else is static in life this studio was changing again and a lot of the leadership that had brought me on had left and that seemed like I was like okay I'm about to get the green card I'll have it in about a year you know a lot of the people I enjoyed working with people like outs and her muscat and he and milem whose incredible art director and a great friend they had all moved on to other jobs for for for whatever reasons past like Ben would not the guys who really like started dead space who I just thought we're all geniuses had moved on and so I was like cool I kind of that's that sucks because they're all gone and I'd love to be working with them that's who I'm here for and but on the other hand I don't feel like I owe anybody did everybody's knew it there's has been a changing of the guards even Don Regan is gone I I can I could I could leave in the night nobody would totally notice there be no ill will but then the announcement became that you know we're actually gonna be making a Star Wars video game and working with Lucasfilm and I was like oh man I really I really want to see where this goes because my ultimate goal was to never really make video games but I want to make movies those like oh what an opportunity to make make this game and then do my thing you know make yourself as valuable as possible and then try the transition to your next goal and just a topic sorry I'm sure when you refer to like they make some valuable how would you define that is that just simply attitude and obviously quality work or are there other factors in ingredients that yeah I mean that's exactly that's all that is exactly it but we can expand on it it is the attitude of being it's about finding the right attitude and I think there is no right attitude but there's what works for you um I'd be lying if I said I wasn't somewhat like aggressive and eager to insert myself in a situation so if I didn't say that everybody who I know in test works with me would probably laugh at me for a line by saying I'm just the nicest guy in the world I'm eager like I'm excited that's the really when it comes standard sometimes it can be misconstrued as overly ambitious and stuff I'm sure there's that's in there but I'm just excited like I can't get a young any of this stuff yeah um usually I get like if I get a pile of work dumped on my desk or a new responsibility you're going to be in like department meetings now and working with Lego this is so cool this is the coolest thing ever and make to that yeah yeah I'm just pumped and so being very excited being at times even a bit of a cheerleader for the team you know is a position I find myself gravitating towards and then the work side is just being highly productive it's not even necessarily a quality of work thing but it's not a quantity say either I don't mean that it's not just about turning out widgets it's constantly solving problems yes through through your art so well boy we got this level designer this vehicle design we just can't figure out and we've taken a few cracks that and what's you know let's switch the assignments here how do you take it and I'm just like boom what's you know I've been keeping an eye on it for a while and and I have an idea and then you execute on it you get notes and you execute on those notes and you just be fast and efficient and thorough and get your work out and be ready to take any feedback and pivot when you need to understanding that it's it's about making compelling artwork yeah but it's you that's always just a piece to the greater hole that is the production you're creating the product here yeah you're working on and so back to the narrative it's fantastic I'm livid now working on the Star Wars game Amy Hennig has come up from Naughty Dog she made the Uncharted series and I'm working with her and she's brilliant and has a great mind for story and Doug Chang from Doug Chiang I mean what else I mean his Star Wars the Star Wars guru a eunuch he stole was finally growing up will you be good to start was growing I was it definitely had an impact on me yeah I think I was of this generation born mid-80s that when the VHS does came out and it did the thx rereleased that's when like all part dad's or elders kind of were like oh yes you're in the room give the gold box with Darth Vader on the front that's the one that I did but I actually had the mic and then still my favorite cut and I gotta say now I'm not I don't I'm not a big Star Wars and I saw those I waited until the most recent one dropped on Disney TV yeah yeah hundred my way through it but I had the VHS block set that was black with the Vader face on it and then the Empire Strikes Back wouldn't had the stormtrooper on it and then I think it was Yoda a Jedi so even then I had kind of like grown out of Star Wars it just wasn't really my thing anymore but I was like boy the opportunity to work with Doug and have these bi-weekly reviews where we would drive to Lucas in the Presidio and different of all the art print up all the artwork still and he would sit there with a sharpie and we would just sit her in and discuss art for like two hours every two weeks it was unbelievable it was just it was unbelievable a master class and design in simplification in the big statement just had to organize the painting had wet while telling a story you know it's really where the sequence illustration there's like a sequence illustration master class stuff which I tried to pass on as you know you absorbed a lot of that stuff and it becomes your method and all along the way like working with from Wilson to Neil oh there's a guy named Habib zeg reporter I work with Montreal who's fantastic nervous to then even milem and then and whatnot and then working with Doug it's like each of them has a bit of method that is very attractive to me okay so I'm just going to borrow little bit of that and digest that and make that part of my method which is what the class is about it's it's not a cure-all and it's no certainly no master classes sir just like a window into my process and my method of creating the start work from everything I've learned and Anna say sorry let's say if you never had worked with Doug how do you think you work fraud be impacted on that trajectory if life went that way do you think it would made a much of a difference in hindsight I think a lot like I would be remiss I like I'd be nervous to remove any of those people from the process what really taught me because he's such a he's such a fantastic like industrial designer that I have this process that I talked about in the class words composition design it's my methods I start with composition I move on to the design of the things the texture and the the practical application of a distant meadow as it would what color is it how weathered is it the lighting and then the final touches don't really was like he was great at looking at a sequence illustration and peeling back those all the added stuff on top and zeroing right in on the design and he helped me realize how important the design is in aspect is there where you can kind of keep piling on good-looking lighting and nice textured you know that stuff but for him it was very much the design right and and Wilston and Nilo were kind of the same way and then I as the story artist that's where I really learned composition and then somebody like Ian who wasn't doing a lot of art was a fantastic art director he was sort of this the whole package guy where it was like hey what's the texture of that thing once is what is what is the design of that thing because I need to take this painting and then hand it to five different departments and it's to do something for all of them and it's those old-school guys like Wilson and Neil oh and and Diane another artist who is working with us John Bell who is the art director on Back to the Future 2 and Jurassic Park he was doing our work with lessened these are great designers he was ago he was like a car designer write a lot of these guys started their careers Wilson was an architect Sean was a card designer and like when he was a kid he was just painting cars for money they don't stem from this like just designed first you know it's all about the design first where I I think it's all about the I think the composition is where you start to this is my approach yeah it was being able to think excuse me working with those guys gave me the ability to just think design first spending a lot of time enjoy with my buddy chase Irving and who's it again this great cinematographer and and going to film school got me to really think of a composition and lighting first and so although I had this method and I had friends that were texture artist you know and I think a lot of it texture stuff came from still life painting and doing graffiti for some reason made me very aware of the texture of everything all those working with all these certain people gave me an appreciate or an appreciation for every one of the steps which eventually became my like method my ever evolving method and so it's not like just because the step a stages stage 2 or stage 3 it doesn't mean it's lower on the list you have to approach it like it's all about that it's just all about that for this stage and then you move on to the next stage and that's just all about the lighting like look lighting is the most important thing in the absolute world I'm an artist who only deals in light and until I'm done the lighting phase in that move on to the next phase and so okay I'm working at I'm living in San Francisco I actually have my green card now I'm doing these you know check-ins that Lucca starts an incredible team but I got that feeling in the back of my head one day where I was like and maybe it's me looking for maybe I'm projecting it but I was like something isn't right and I had the feeling the first time in Vancouver and the studio ended up shutting down unfortunately a huge portion of that Montreal studio ended up shutting down and becoming Bioware Montreal not too long after I left and so I started to have that feeling again and I was getting nervous and so then this is one of those decisions I look back on and I'm like I had no idea how I made that decision because I was walking away from what I would have thought was the dream but I just sort of up and was like that's it I'm gonna I applied for a job as an art director there's a game studio I got to the very final round and they were like might you have any questions for us and I was like yeah how long do you think it's gonna take to make this video game because they're what I want to do after just go make a movie yeah and and I think they took that as like we have two candidates here somebody who really wants to make a video game and somebody is doing it on this way to go make movies and they're like we're gonna go at the one who loves video games and when they call me they're like you should go make movies that's why you did like in a respectful way look this is what you have to do again okay very respectful they're like look we came down to you and another candidate you guys are both fantastic she she is more interested in making video games and that's why we're gonna give it to her and what we really think you should do if he wants the months the list of advice is go make those movies go because because this shouldn't be we're not looking for somebody who's just looking at this just a stop along the road and you shouldn't be delaying your dreams so that's kind of where it came from and just neat I thought that a friend of her friend was looking for background painters for the big hero 6 TV show at Disney and I was actually in the grand like theater in Oh Linn and California and I just said to do to message on this tram I was like hey man you know I know so and so we're hangout buddies from back in the day two degrees of separation would you you know you see would you be interested in hiring me for the gig and he saw my work and he responded right away it's like a chiller let's let's talk and I was sitting there then that was right after like the curtain lap and I was like I cannot focus on this movie - what did I just decide to do am i moving - I like what is happening and so it all happened very quickly I spoke with Disney TV I actually have taken like a pretty good paint cut and all that but I was like it's time for me to make this transition I went into EA I told them I was leaving and I already had a job and you know I don't really like to negotiate it was sort of just like you know no there's nothing that can be done like and I appreciate everything that has been done it's just it's time for me to switch things up and a week goes by and I had my going-away party get lunch and everyone's having drinks and stuff in the night cirrage decided to write something nice you know social media like thank you so much I've been eight years with EA you know I sort of said sound like goodbye and I was unprepared for the flood of emails and from from companies and studios game studios being like hey whoa whoa whoa what's happening like where were you doing what what's going on and and then I got one email from a production designer named Justin Thompson from studying now I had met Justin years earlier through a friend of a friend while I was in LA and he kind of glanced at my work one afternoon of this like oh this was pretty cool and started following me on Twitter we just kind of became Twitter buddies at best and when it came time to do my green card this is well I'm still a TA the lawyers asked you to do it to get your dream hard the one that I applied for you need all these letters from people in the industry baoqiang for your sing I never worked with the kid but I would definitely hire them if I had the opportunity because there they're just they're gonna be that they're gonna be great for the economy is basically with this thing that I'm going to go on an unemployment or employment insurance and he wrote one of those letters you know the lawyers look write the letters and then he adds his bit and signs one in fact had to write one this week for a very promising nervous mrs. Ellis and I got an email from him saying and over the years we'd always tried to work together but he'd get my student he get my really interest on something I'd be very into it and then the project falls apart yeah you know where the projects moving forward but I just started this green card process like I can't walk away they can't pick up the green card currently where it's at and so or would I be interested I have to move to LA well I can't because I have to lose my visa that's tough and so he just wrote me an email and I it was something to the effect of whatever it said the message was this is the timing and he was like it when you get to in LA I told I got this Disney TV gig he's like cool cool when you get to LA just like come by stoning and let's talk I'm not a major major rush but you know let's do this this is finally the right time what will you would this be this would have been like four years ago 2016 okay and I come I'm now flying back and forth from Oakland to Burbank every couple weeks to you know pack up my place in Oakland and work at Disney TV yeah it was very interesting when I signed a deal with Disney and this turned out to be very common but it's through me at the time I had already quit my job in the teal finally came in and if there was no contract it was just like here's how much we're paying you and I was like whoa there's no like term limits here anything like how long is the game they're like well you know you're gonna do great were very excited but we don't really do guaranteed length contracts and coming from games that was strange does that a game it's sir like it's indefinite but you're signing a contract it's like going to work at janitors yeah you worked there General Electric whatever and and I was like well I'm in it now I've already put one foot in the grave of my just hope stop it and it ended up working out so well because about three months into the Disney project I went in spoke with Sony and it was just perfect then they had a film that they wanted to work on and I you know I had aspirations of continuing to progress my career and make films and I kind of told just and I was like you know would you start mentoring me you know towards the production designer art directing well he said like we got off we got off and became like Santa's friends after that meeting and so they made a great offer and it had terms which I was I was like great this is you know my wife's about to move to in LA and you know the cats are in the bags let's go yeah I needed some assurance and and then I turned to Disney and you know remember how we did it never did the term sheep but thanks for everything and don't worry I'll stay on and finish the episode or the two episodes we had to do yeah but oh but I did leave early but they were all very understanding and awesome and that's what I learned to be a valuable lesson about though especially the Los Angeles industry is like it's a soup here people people are going in every direction and coming and going and nobody's really getting bent out of shape of where people are going and the opportunities and you probably need less it's scary as a young artist to hear like a you're good don't worry you'll be fine we're not gonna just shut you down and tossed it on the street it sounds terrifying but the hips thing to do nowadays is that it's funny when you're young they don't want to give you any terms when you're when you move up they want to give you terms and then if you're if you're real if you're real hot plots out you don't want terms again so you have freedom they go full vehicle and so I meant Stoney now I have moved to LA I got my apartment the cats are here and which actually think I'd talk about in the course where we break down the design of finger Parker's apartment because I was living out of a box basically and we're working on this film and I get that feeling and we had called it into a meeting and I'm just about to hop on a flight back to Oakland to like pack everything up and then like I got two weeks to work from Oakland everything's gonna get into you oh and we're gonna drive down the coast to Los Angeles is sort of the dream moment you know arriving in Hollywood with the trunk full ready to go and I'm like I have I have my suitcase with me I'm going into the airport you know what I mean and we all get pulled in the middie like the movie is put on hiatus I'm like oh man like it's what did i do did I could have kept his his new job and they're at year's worst TV show to make and they said don't worry don't worry you know everyone's gonna be fine but they always say that and and and and you know what usually they're right I'm just a paranoid person and we'll get assignments for everybody and they throw me on to Hotel Transylvania 3 and I'm like great as long as I've got a project but yeah they're I mean any other building there had been a small group working on hush very hush-hush spider-man film and a couple months go by and I'm talking to that team more and then there's a change of leadership and Justin that who hired me ends up taking a her spider-man and it has to be like a little bit of a reboot to happen and he hired me in one other artist at the same time and he was like if I'm moving on to that that project let me bring my guys that I just hired with me mm-hmm and they said sure and then we got this they send me a copy of the script and we printed it up and my wife read it to me while we drove did you all drove to you all down the five and like literally it was a drinking it's like a seven eight hour drive especially in a big truck like that you know yeah it's like a 20 foot truck which I mean I I'm like I'm in my 30s now I learned how to drive when I was 30 so this is and I don't really drive much and I was driving here a little Volkswagen Golf Rabbit right now I'm driving a 20 foot truck and it's all it's you know hot as hell because you're in the Central Valley desert it yeah my wife was reading me to spider-man script and so we roll in LA basically as she's finishing this you know finishing this script and then we were off and running I started on spider-verse on a Monday and and you know and the next two years of my life were probably the most exciting and most difficult but I was so excited like I said I get so pumped up and I just when the demons might have be driving down some artists or getting this some people or like it was absolute madness at time so I was just like this is so cool you know they're like quick we need a movie poster as fast as possible you know and I'm like oh I couldn't care less I was like cool I'm making a movie poster this is the greatest thing ever they gotta do the art book you know you have to do it after hours I was like who cares about hours let's do it there's no and it became you know and I met Chris Miller and Phil Lord and the incredible team of artists that worked on the movie and I just couldn't couldn't be more excited like I was working all hours just because I couldn't I couldn't like calm down I couldn't I go I'm thinking about I was just in love I was in love leading project it felt well that was the timer I was like it was more than relief I was like I guess Jim Irsay ever since been used started education and you know doing even graffiti and just just working your ass off to get where you want to I guess that was the moment you wait for would you say like that scene really like that kind of vibe you live in kay yeah the big caper really like the biggest heist of the light my last time I had just been completed I felt like because my weight to put in them hot because I somehow finagled my way into a GREENGUARD onto this film was an incredible crew and they were like does anybody know how to do graffiti you know isn't the main characters doing graffiti and I was just like I think it couldn't have been a better fit and it came out like and maybe you know I there's I'm sure those people out there would say like oh that you do yourself a bit of a disservice to say that yeah it just sort of happened and it didn't just happen there was years and years of gravitating towards that but then there's so much luck involved and I feel so lucky and grateful for the opportunity and the the art you know the chances people took on me that I feel like I it was the big guys you know and I think that's where the people deal with that impostor syndrome but yeah but it you know maybe instead of maybe we all we are all imposters and we've just but think of your stuff you know and hosta you're like a cool spy guy or something infiltrated it you've infiltrated and you you know you've had smarted a lot of that's me you know and and ever since then there was a very much like in a rival of confidence where anything before that might have felt like I was faking mmm the confidence or now although I'm still very quick to doubt myself it's there was a reassurance a huge reassurance is like yeah I feel like I've made the right decisions because you're always and not just in art but in life making these decisions and okay I find it can be very helpful when trying to make the decisions just try to get some foresight and not by looking at it with hindsight and projecting myself like way down the line in my career doing and doing an interview and telling this story yeah and saying oh and then I decided to give it all up and become a sea captain well that doesn't sound like it fits the narrative but who knows maybe then I became a sea captain and fan you know the greatest art archives of all time and so and now oh that's a very interesting story then you know so I try to like whilst making a decision project myself in the future looking back on the past and if it's the story I feel comfortable telling then it's probably the right decision hmm but there's no way to know and we go right around there there's to him then take credit where might not have been to do know I was I had made a genius calculation at this point in time to walk out of the job yeah I think yeah do you mention it it's like there's before got a path to follow and if you don't walk the path then you will never know and whether it's the wrong way or the wrong way but you even if you do take the wrong direction you can't cost correct and adjust that guests keep going forward but then obviously learn along the way the law testers I need to be there as well yeah and it's it's good to believe in yourself even when you don't which I often don't and I think people would accuse me of being overly confident at times but it's really just like it's a lot of front and just me being like I've got I've got nothing else to believe in but myself more often than not and so I I'm really doubling down over here and and there was a time when I got to LA kind of right after the movie was coming out and things were a career than was skyrocketing and I was like what really I really wait I had a thought where I was like I really wasted a bunch of time because I was seeing some people younger than me and you'll always see people younger than you are all over the viewer yeah different different everyone's arriving at different times they all start in different places but how old do you know if I may ask I am 35 years old I'm a younger than you so she's one more one more piranhor nipping at my heels but I had this thought where I was like boy today you know it was like oh I wasted time most like I had just gotten down here earlier could you only imagine her this career with yet now but I was like but if I came into senior on a spider-verse I might have never branded up as an art director because I came in as a biz dev artist it just my excitement of those talking about in my involvement in my passions for it led to promotion eventually to become like the art director of environment design and and had been a senior and made a few movies you know I might have taken in some of the social cues that were there that I didn't see like you know people who make a lot of movies start to understand things that aren't going to be that part of the script that's not going to be that part of the first that important to me I was at 32 mm-hmm I was like just out of college again I felt yeah I was like yeah I'll take adding your science what's that that needs to be designed oh there's props that need to get designed off bang I have some props who needs clean let's do it let's clean it you know and who's getting a drink after work because I want to keep talking about the movie do you have oh man hey would you mind getting me producer do you are you free to get much I didn't know I'm not supposed to ask the producer to get lunch I'd be like can we chat like I wouldn't mind having a chat you know I remember going into Justin's office one of the first issues were working and he's like what's up TV day thing I was like dude I just want to chat I guess I don't know maybe production artists aren't supposed to go straight into the production designers yeah it's not an ounce to say hey what are you up to but I was just so fun and had I maybe had I arrived earlier my career would be in a different place but I don't now it's like I wouldn't want to go back and trade anything for that I did because I I got to the place that was I guess some rose to get to or I just wanted to get to or I just I would be uncomfortable trading it for something else yeah and so don't you know I immediately dismissed that thought because I was like no well first of all I had a blast in Montreal because I got very close with my extended family again and then in San Francisco I reconnected was a great friend and met a lot of other great people and got a chance to work with the Lucas people and had a blast there and made great friends and then I got down to LA maybe what I've always considered behind schedule but you could make the argument it was also right on time mm-hmm and that's then you know we made the movie it won all the awards I got to make some Marvel comic books then her our buyers happen the world can last I ordered extra sweatpants and now we're having this podcast so that kind of catches everybody you know I remember when coronavirus started and obviously I need more sweatpants and I ordered them yeah and I got a thing from I think it was Nike being like your sweatpants Adelaide it's gonna take you know three weeks yeah that was like is there even gonna still be a corona virus in three weeks yeah hey am i giving you with help sweatpants like I'm not gonna get to use these sweatpants and an hour on day 75 and I am considering what I ordered wore sweatpants yeah me no it's weird the house like literally we're in the midpoint of the year it still feels like the year just begun and there's lots of to do but here we are half years gone it's so weird um in terms of life is crazy work though I will mention this obviously before we started I always favors listening we speak a little bit about this before we began a podcast obviously you're you know in the thick of the industry how what is the vibe like of an industry now I mentioned that in some productions it's early on so it's not too affected but are you having noise is that hey guys this is how it's gonna be going forward you know get ready to adjust or is that yeah what's the vibe like right now it's interesting and for now maybe I've lost that bit of radar because I'm living on high now no but I I don't get the feeling I had I've had many times where I'm like the canary in the coal mine is dead like we should get out of here you know hmm I hope everyone understands that reference but uh I don't have the feeling that this is like an industry collapse coming which is which is great and as we discussed kind of offline I'm like starting to consider like is this the right time to settle down in LA and all that and I just I've actually been asking like I asked a head of production of Sony Pictures and yeah some producers you know how are we doing in there like we're gonna be fine the industry is going to be fine because the demand for content is through the roof yes hi everything it now and so the animation industry seems very strong now what we are noticing of course like every industry is are those things that we can change about our practices that know that that would be beneficial like every everyone's working from home there's definitely Road bombs I would way rather have time in the studio and a lot of our artists would I know and I would rather to be in the studio but there's some artists that are also flourishing at home and that's going really well where I have it an artist a great designer and painter you shark aside yeah he's working with us on the second so and he's like me and we found this same natural rhythm where I'll catch him online late at night still working you know hey what do you what are you doing you noticing or still it's a union shop you're not really supposed to be working over here man unless your crew it's like I'm not working overtime my you know I break my day off distant yeah I do yeah I might do six hour my six hour day and then take some time off and then I can come back at night once I've had time to digest yeah and I can do a little more work and I'm like oh man I love doing that I love having a few hours at the end of the day to just kind of take a second look at my work mmm there's no meeting is there's no rush I can it's digested I can take get it get a look at it with fresh eyes it's fresh diet or fresh guys are such a rare commodity mm-hmm in in a long design haul like making a film or a video game because you know Steve things so many times you can't see it for the first time again of course your audience the world if you're lucky is going to you know see it for the first time in his new in this state there's no adjustments to be made after so you really want to make sure it's thoroughly thought over but also that it reads on a pursuing and it is an instant gap and so him and I mr. IRA and I had a conversation it's like boy you know host pandemic what's the work we gonna look like is it gonna be a you know I love this concept of the majority of artists if they want you know they're not in tons of time meetings they're mostly doing their job I would love just three days a week there in the studio and for two out of three of those days it's even like a half-day take their work home and cut work on the studio I mean a lot of artists work over the Internet anyways you know but I still love having a crew and I think a lot of artists benefit from being around a crew because it's is such an infectious turning environment yep as well it you just get to share ideas like I I'm using my wife now in the middle of the day I'm like come look at this and I don't even need a trained eye to be looking at it I just need somebody to react and you know I love the blue or I don't like that Kareem and I'm like I actually do like the green how much do I like the green I like it enough to to fight her on it I guess I do and it's done I'm doubling down on degree just a little thickness like that I find it valuable to have people around to test your ideas you know wow that's him that's amazing and I guess like maybe some of these ideas were floated around before like oh how do we get workplace more productive some people of see like you mentioned some people thrive her home some people throw over the studio but I guess this up this is an opportunity now to kind of enforce those it's like a lot of people are doing in a weird metaphor is doing a lot of DIY and house chores that I never did before because they were constantly working but now they're home then get that done and I guess this is a bit of an opportunity to take stock of things and readjust obviously for the better do you think is too early to say what aspiring artists and students would maybe need to look at more in this ever-changing industry now or is it still the classic just work on your craft work on being obviously a great professional and just just never give up I think there is one thing that is like it is a good quality to have nice to do something I look for in any gyrus but it's not mandatory but it's become more valuable now is done communication right so much of the job is these vague asks the tasks can often be they can be very broad and gay getting an emotional reaction from an audience and we're dealing with the art which can be fundamentally very abstract and then it can swim into becoming completely the extinct rrett a secret and precise move that they're make this blue hmm you're done you're a prude stuff yeah and I feel like artists have generally always gotten a bit of a past because there are artists and they're you know they're creative Souls and all that stuff yeah yeah so you get a very mixed bag of people in terms of communication some people are very quiet how much some people are very boisterous and loud like me and Justin and and over-communicate but the goal is to have good communication and if this process is done the this this quarantine has changed anything is our ability to communicate and you really need to make sure people are communicating and understanding what each other is saying I kind of have this list now as an art director I love lists and I have this kind of method list process whatever you want to call it for when things aren't working out with an artist and my first question is did I did I communicate what the ask was yeah so I'll go look I'll go look at the emails okay no I asked for it right here it says you know a blue rectangle set to high artist and I say you know so you know that blue rectangle we were talking about yeah and I'm like dude and not this is obviously a major oversimplification just the blue rectangle will be an easy easy visualization tool because really what you're talking about it's more like I need an something that is aspirational but is also somewhat confining so it's just sort of the light at the end of the tunnel is the feeling I need this but we'll just talk about a blue rectangle I'll go to the artist and say you know I blue rectangle we were talking about what what is blue to you right and and let's discuss what a rectangle is if they're like you know little this is blue and they show me blue and it's actually green and they show me a rectangle and it's actually a triangle say ah I see the problem we are the the thing I'm asking for the blue rectangle you don't know what that is I didn't explain it well enough right or or you're not educated on the subject of rectangles you only know of triangles and so I'm gonna gather some reference and we're gonna discuss the the blue rectangle and get you to get the artist clear on what the ask was so now I've ensured that I actually asked for what we wanted and they actually here what I want wanted they understand what the ask is right and then if neither that works then there's a bigger problem and you have to talk with Carrodus but usually that's kind of a lot of step there and that is a lot of conversation and can be a lot of conversation even if it's just a blue rectangle now if you're talking like I said if these abstract concepts apply again merging several different artist styles together well bringing something of your own in and designing something that fits into a story yeah that is a very complicated thing to do and if people are prone to not a lot of communication or don't have very communication skills aren't great listeners but also get explainers of their own especially in this quarantine because you're doing it all over a video it's hard to understand I was speaking with but Justin last night we were talking about this topic and we kind of came up with this like harebrained theory that when you're alone in the room even if you're on the video chat your body doesn't do the same amount of physical communication because there's nobody around to absorb it's the difference between like being in a movie theater yeah and the Kullen I guess as nothing happens or something funny happens you don't gasp or laugh the same way while reading a book alone at home usually because in our theory is this like you need a social group around you to be to give that performance your own performance and so because you you know we were saying oh it's tough to have got all this communication online and we're like yeah sometimes the communication is so subtle people might not want to say something negative or don't know what they want to say I'm awesome when you put our work up you don't look at the artwork you look at the person you are presenting it to and you see oh if they squint their eyes and turn a little bit just as a gut reaction before they've even processed it's that first look we were talking about earlier it's it's lost over the video chat and I think it's because you don't you're not in a room full of people it's like an unconscious thing that has we've lost yeah just eject on that again I've been working like sales customer facing environment for like over ten years twelve ten years I think and when I first died like get into freelance and obviously were more working that is something I struggled with a lot even still today is like I'm so used to just speaking someone physically obviously you know your mannerisms you get to pick up on you know a little cues and little things you say sometimes I said more in your expressions as opposed to what's actually coming out of your mouth and yeah yeah I don't think I'll ever get used to it obviously get ways to cope with it and he always found a way around it but - holy I'm with you on that where you just explained about this new way of communicating and working in particular because obviously communicating is one thing just having a conversation but when you're trying to do it for work cause he is a professional in solving a problem so you know that's obviously another challenge in itself yeah and so I'd say you know it's always you know the advice to young artists is always like have a great attitude and have a great portfolio one thing that seems to never be discussed it's like how to communicate now and I think in this era where communication is really what's being strained in our industry because of our distance hmm I think it should be the responsibility of any artist out there to learn really how to listen and really then how to pitch and pitch their idea and express what their communicate what their intentions are you know we go into some of that in the course just even how to like lay out a good contact sheet making it easier for the directors our directors producers to see your work again and review your work in a way that really sets that you up for success yeah and it's not that it sets you up to get your idea approved it sets you up to very clearly articulate what you are trying to stay both visually within the art and then the way in which you talk about it and what I mean by success that it is they fully understand what you're saying and give you accurate feedback because they know what they're looking at and when your intention is and then they can give you feedback which then you can take to go make a new round of our work and the adjustments that possibly need to be made to ensure that again you're not making the greatest piece of artwork in the world but you are making the movie or the video game or something better yes well and I think that's a little a great segue into the course itself but I just wanted to take a bit of time at - you mentioned just the spider-man film itself firstly a huge congratulations and to the team and anyone else involved on firstly just an amazing film but also worry represents in terms of how it was made from an artist level seeing that level of work done in that way with how I perceive to be a kind of freedom that you don't tend to see in many other films even even not just films IPS in general it's almost like a triumph and something to be proud of and to see that work and be successful and within awards so fiercely congratulations on that and question congratulations on the awards and dejection get a chance to go to the Oscars there's a thing called the Emmy Awards which is like the Oscars for the animation business and a whole bunch of us we mobbed up that place and we were the rowdiest okay in the building and it was fantastic I'm where's the stuff to you right now who's looking after me the directors all got one as well as the producers and the studio receives one it actually sits in the studio for all to see and today we got it shows the studio witnessing I grab a Polaroid camera yeah and load it up with film and I was just snapping pics of people with it and giving the puller mic so I had a little Polaroid in my studio here at home which is my Oscar dude my you know commemorating my involvement in my small involvement in an unbelievable Rajic with an unbelievable crew I mean does he actually only probably spoken about this topic to death cuz you know everyone's only been asking about it but like does he actually has it sunk in in terms of how big of a deal the film has been and the project has been or is it's awesome that you look back thinking wow I can't believe I've got to do this and it happened this way and you know it's been what done always in a different motion entirely no that's a great question it it certainly seems surreal because the pace in which we made the project was was hectic uh-huh it was it was I absolutely loved it and wouldn't have traded it for anything but you know wasted a lot of work and then he kind of come out on the other end and it was it was and I actually the film ended and I was one of the last people to get cut the other art director and production designer work doing the DI which is the final color correction on the filament yep they didn't need me around and that was it I was cut hmm and I immediately hopped on a plane just to get out of town I just needed to change I hopped on a plane picked up my older brother in Toronto it's unbelievable there is a plane there's a flight that could done this is gonna be a big segue but there's this is a flight that goes from Los Angeles to Toronto to Newfoundland Canada to Dublin Ireland and I went and picked up my brother and we had an 8 hour layover in Java luta Newfoundland Ireland where my father lives said what's up eight hour layover and got to Dublin and then I spent there's my first time ever traveling overseas I never really got to travel before because I just worked my entire life and this others I'm pretty broke and so we went to the UK and we went to a sham in Paris and then I flew back for the wrap party and two weeks later the movie came out and that was December and then I flew home for Christmas because I hadn't been I hadn't seen my family for Christmas forever the movie came out we all went and saw the movie you know you know we had the premiere in LA and then that we became and oh my the world around the spider-verse just exploded and we were so grateful so grateful and again relieved that people accept for what it was and and and they had joined it so I flew back to trial and this is getting personal you know but absolutely I strongly we just this isn't about the film at large of my experience and flew back to Toronto I had bought like 30 movie tickets and all my friends and family in Toronto wanted to see the movies so we always had a bit of a party after and that the award season is you know the movie came out during award season so it started to get all these accolades you know very well and came back to LA in the new year I was doing all the DVD covers and stuff kind of like and then a lot of the crew is either on other projects or the you know the production or another art director they were taking their very well-deserved time off so I was kind of alone in the studio doing this stuff and and it just the momentum kind of builds and builds and builds but my capacity to have a grasp around what the effect of it was at the cup and overflowed there was no more room in my understanding for what the movie was or men's unions in people and because the volume was just so loud of everybody's opinion no of the film and so it sort of just falls out after a while and I read a quote around then and this is it I'm not in any way comparing myself to this individual but I got a glimpse of it Spielberg said somewhere I'll butcher the quote but he was just reading an article that he wrote about whatever the interested in in passing and he was saying you know I never really got to like I didn't sketch seeds he like I'm not part of or Josh that cultural movement right because to me my films represent something else because the story of the movie there's the story of the film and there's the story of making it you know and and it's not just like the it was contentious or anything like that it's just there's just I'm not there to wrapped up as everybody knows there's multiple cuts of movies and different seeds and characters come and go so I probably have a worst memory for the movie than somebody who's seen it because I'm like you know oh one of our characters had a different name in production at one point in time and still people use the wrong name yeah yeah yeah but that's what everyone knows so you know I mean and so again I'm gonna bring myself to Spielberg but I kind of like just felt for a moment what he was saying because it was like I did the movie means something different to me than it does and to all the people who created it and were involved in it probably something different than how it was received publicly and culturally and all that but we were so excited and like we're blessed that the it was accepted and and enjoyed by so many people and and the one thing that's weird is people like to give people like to fans like to get their appreciation which is which I totally understand and I'm a fan of a lot of things as well but you might end up being somewhere and being the representation of a thing that somebody really enjoyed even though you're just a small part of it mmm-hmm and that can be a weird feeling that's for that imposter syndrome creeps back in because somebody else say you know I absolutely love the thing you you made and I want to thank you so much and you you kind of left with this feeling word I understand that this person wants to show their respect for this thing and their appreciation for this thing is making them actually feel good to say it yeah yeah and then to say I met it you know I met the so-and-so's of the thing I'm a guitar the bass player at the band and so you don't want to to take that away from them but you also feel weird accepting the praise yeah for the accolade about a thousand people mmm uh-hum Christine and so you kind of just nod your head and say I think I I've resolved it just sort of say you know thanks it's a group effort of variation you know you could kind of subtly correct them I love the thing you made and you're like thank you the entire team you know we're tirelessly and they're like it's so cool to meet you and it's like yeah and you know you I can't say enough about how I you know everybody really did their part because it's true we were so in every individual is very significant compared to the whole and so that's you know I know we're on a tension here but that's sort of a so it's an interesting side experience to this whole thing it's unbelievably humbling because you are cast into the spotlight by the masses all everybody work on it has that their mom in the spotlight is whatever their platform even from their family at a family dinner if they all went solid or something like that mm-hmm but you you know everybody who made it you can have done it with all of them and so there's a bit of like almost a touch of guilt well it's that accepting the praise but then you want people to be able to enjoy the fact that they enjoyed it and express their happiness about it their gratitude towards it with somebody who was involved in the creation of it and I think it's very important that you are like that because again even with like award shows and Oscars and stuff miss all concentrated on a select individual or a small collective but it is pretty much when you look at like behind the scenes and things like that and even she just sit there and watch the credits you just see the enormous amount involved and it's into it again how you spoken about how you tackle the project where the experience was like it definitely was like a team game and yeah it's also to hear that like you definitely appreciate that aspect of you as well when those credits roll after having made a movie like that and I see how small some names are you know and my I mean they're all the same size but you see a person's name who you know it's just ten characters in a wall seven names yeah yeah but I'm like oh man she was in Crypt like she deserves more you noticed that that that person oh and that and I him over there and her over there they saved my ass all the time or they did brilliant brilliant work or they had that really smart breakthrough you know yeah and and that's just me right mm-hmm the other art director he has a bunch of names everybody has all these names they can pick out these names of people that were absolute rock stars and they just there's their name and Justin Thompson said it is brilliant thing to me he probably knew I needed to hear it at one point in time and it's definitely his ethos while working in terms of like getting praised or rewarded as everybody who needs everyone who needs to know what you did knows what you did you don't have to go around bragging about it or boasting or feeling like nobody I'm not getting the recognition for the part I played everybody who needs to know who can actually do something with that information knows and then that's really kind of reassuring to first of all even if it's not true let's say it's a great way to live your life because it doesn't have you looking over your shoulder to make sure somebody is seeing what you're doing yeah um but in fact it is I in my experience it is true you know those little names up there that made a huge difference are getting the accolade correct and praise that they deserve and they ever told me they probably deserve even more I don't think that's a brilliant way to put it cool let's let's touch upon your awesome course to DC illustration whoa what is sequence illustration for those that don't know yeah yeah sequence illustration sequence illustration is this term that we use to describe a piece of artwork because we kind of have to categorize all the different types of artwork because of course it's a production we're not just sitting around making our work and we need mm-hmm need an idea of how what's the hierarchy of artwork how much how much time does artwork take and all that stuff so this is a term that is assigned to a piece of artwork that is that accomplishes a lot of things and it's sort of the like this can be the like creme de la creme her like that this is the final presentation this these are the big pieces you know these are the concept art book pieces kind of thing and it's because what they do is they accomplish a lot of things they tell them that they captured a moment in this story is the biggest they're probably the most important thing that they do is they capture in one image what moment of the story is or a feeling of the story it gives you it's like a still frame of the film that will tell you either what the entire film is about what emotionally you should expect to be feeling or it can be for you know for a sequence itself which is usually what it is for a sequence in the film like you know miles rises up were they the bank heist begins you know it should sell that image but it's then once you start peeling those layers back as we talked about earlier it's doing more than that it's offering up design ideas and decisions usually they aren't final but it's it's somewhere in the process we've done some designs but they're still more designed to do but this is pretty much what the character is gonna look like this is the car he's gonna drive this is the mapping the she's gonna wield and so it does a lot of that design work as well and then it also can express the type of lighting that you're gonna see in this in this scene and so it can it can end up becoming this and more often than not it can be the color direction the lighting direction for that particular shot sometimes your sequence illustration well let it like turn into a literal shot in the movie um and so it does the design it does the lighting it does the color it tells the story it does the mood it can also even especially animation you know which is a medium that doesn't have a set style the unwitting it's accomplishing is what we've now come to refer to as the render script which is really what we mean by that is what does the actual rendering look like you know it's it's there's many different ways to paint a blue rectangle right isn't gonna be smooth gradients is it gonna be hatched Lyons is going to be this graphic simplification that we used in spider-verse with comic-book overtones and so it has to accomplish that as well so there it's kind of the whole package and it's something that I've kind of like done my whole career and it always seems to be this thing that artists like aspire to be able to do because it is juggling all these balls at once and it seems to be something that's not generally taught and so this felt like a good opportunity because it's something I've noticed over the last few years more and more artists around me and students want to discuss the topic and and find success in the in the in the creation of of the sequence illustration and so this is an opportunity to sort of like this is my catch-all I can now just send people to the class when they want yeah one an explanation and absolutely what it is it's just me going through the creation of a sequence illustration yeah yeah I mean like I've had a chance to watch a couple of listen so far I'm definitely gonna complete the whole thing when I get a chance but even when is promoting it I was doing in some of the promotional stuff and I've got to even but even without the context in a certain extent just go through the the PSD or like the final image and even then it's going for the certain layers and thinking oh okay oh that makes sense oh that's that's a really neat way to do solve that kind of problem but one thing and obviously how you've mentioned for pretty much for the whole podcast is the key thing the key takeaway I get from the essence of this course is how to solve that visual problem or that question has been asked to solve and even for my perspective is the level I'm at as an artist is that is one element that lacks in my pieces and this is like the perfect puzzle a puzzle piece to to literally plump it in there so and I've even seen some of the work that's coming out so far I think some two weeks this week the course and I've seen how people tackling it is great and another thing as well that I'd like to mention is it's very digestible there's some topics that do take a lot of time to digest and practice but you clearly can tell with your experience and the level you've done it at the way you explain it is excellent yeah thank you and thank you and there's two things that come to mind there's overall I mean my goal all this classes is it's two things it's my it's my process I talk about process oh yes and I find a certain I find a freedom in process and like so I find a freedom and organization if I know what my process is gonna be Americans are gonna go nuts because I think they say process how do they say it there you stay processed using bruises yeah American I say the work obviously I say the word process a lot it drives people nuts it's like I spell the word hell as any people of like English descent will know to prop the proper way to spell colors with you but an American they drop to you and I write the word color a lot and I play I've come into the diction dictionaries of my phone and I mean I have my dictionary on my phone static Canadian English so I get that you in there now when I first started learned quite a lot of the stuff the copiers Ryan was obviously like in in British English so I loved it was like the mannerisms over here and it took me a while to kind of like align with the u.s. way of doing things so yeah I can relate yeah but we in process I find a lot of freedom because I have the steps figured out you know I know what I need to do and what I need to do next now or sorry I know how to do what I need to do is I'm okay I need to make it handy to design a sketch it I got to do this I had to do this business and I walk through the process to him so I think I start of each classic okay we're in this step of a person knowing what step with the persistent mitten so I know what I like have to be doing is I got a renderer I have to light it allows me a creative freedom because this is the space I need to play in now and now have set some limitations that allows me to then just be completely free and creative as I want because I know the process is like it's a shorthand it's a muscle memory I I'm not gonna get lost in remaining I'm not going to break my painting I'm not going to and if I do and something's wrong I can go back into my precipice and say okay well the Lighting's good so that's not what it is and I can that's why the Photoshop files are kind of layered that way so I can walk my way through my process and I can say well the lighting looks good so it's not the lighting that's screwing it up here what about the texture is it the texturing no the texturing looks fine - mmm and peel that layer off and then I'll say oh this is not a good design that's what it is now I I it's kind of surviving because let's go back one more step to come to composition look at the composition is good there's something wrong with the design here because the texturing is working the Lighting's working how about to finish rendering which like the last video where you put all the bells and whistles on hmm I got to go back and fix this dis design because now I'm just like polishing a turd on Palmas letting bad design survive because of good lighting mm-hmm and I found a problem I have to fix the design so I go and I'll fix the design and then add the texture and the lighting back on okay this works the process allows me a freedom to understand what my painting is or it gives me the ability to understand what it is which allows me for some reason this then freedom it's like the constraints give me the freedom to to be truly creative because I'm not concerned with how to make the painting hmm but what the painting is going to be nice becomes my concerns so the other thing we've we do in the class though is so that's happening and then what I'm in a sneaky way trying to do is so just I've peppered in a bunch of things that kind of drive me nuts as an artist in that that was our director it's like I would prefer to people you know they don't have to present work in my way but that they were like we thought it was good at communicating and here's something that works so I wrap up each class with like okay here if you were now done this face I'm gonna hand it to the art director this is kind of how at least myself as a real-life art director would you know like to see it and and then we even talk about that that same sort of professionalism and that's what these are they just look my opinion on these little professionalism you know even the Photoshop file is organized in a way because you know you're not just some artist paying the woods and this is this it should be mentioned this class is for people who want to work in the industries sequence illustration is done by hobby it's something you do as part of our production so this is about learning how to do that for a job now it's still I think there's good stuff for the hobbyist out there but it's and the barrier to entry is very level but this is about you know learning how to do a particular task which I absolutely love doing but it is you know there's professional isms within this and one of them is you you don't own this painting like so even if you do other people are going to probably need to interact with it especially if you want your painting to end up on screen just like I said you know show your work in a way to make sure everyone understands it passed off your work in a way that makes it more useful for everybody so even just the way to organize your photoshop file and make sure that the Matt painter needs this if we run short on time and they're not actually going to build this set but use but make a matte painting I've organized the painting in a way that they could just 3d project that on to the geometry and oops now my actual painting is on screen or a movie or so you can have like the bigger picture but we not yeah being aware of the fact that you are working in a studio setting and being aware of where you are in the pipeline and how to make yourself the most useful and valuable it's kind of we touched on that earlier we have you find value there's a lot of value to the person enhanced over great paintings that are very usable by out their department so they can just go pulled a texture right out of your painting because you put the lighting over its ha oh man that just say the production a bunch of time and that's time then we can use on something else um for students that want to take the course but are still starting out because we do get a lot of questions and I've noticed a lot of people ask a lot at the time like what what do they need Oh level tibia to start the course and everybody mentioned and I think all of our courses are built so it can be accessible to any level well would would you advise students to focus on a particular area of art or design before they take the course and basically something to prep themselves with before this other course sure I think I think so the barrier to entry is I think very low on this class even compared to the other learn squared classes yeah because the only software we uses Photoshop and I do a little segment with a couple Photoshop tricks but we're using it just like it's pretty much paint with with a computer attached and any of the concepts or technical requirements we really go into and it's only about 20 minutes of it because it's some pretty lazy basic stuff stuff familiarity with Photoshop would be great but you I do the same paintings in procreate or something like that yes you could do you could do it with straight up paint but there's a couple tricks that I'll show you to make your life easier in Photoshop I suppose to painting so from a technical aspect it's really just you know you'll want to some sort of tablet interface you know like a Cintiq or iPad or something and then you don't want the software in terms of the tank the length artistic skills I think somebody who has it's definitely not for the advance is for kind of foreigner for all ages but it's you know a bit of an understanding of drawing and painting skills and you've done like high school college painting or taking a class on drawing and painting it'll be beneficial then the more you know the more you're probably going out of the class but what we do in the class is we start with just the basic compositions black and white very blocky kind of ugly graphic graphic designers focus on composition and we build those you start from there and weave the moment we go through the process that you would find in a lot of animation studios that's required of animation studios we know from both black and white composition there's a little thumbnail we call them cops onto a color key where we color that black and white we select some of those black and whites and we develop them into color keys which just when the you know the powers that be on the film would all get their hands together and decide well what color and lighting is the sequence and then we take one of those and develop it all the way through to the end of doing a sequence illustration and there's a lot of value I think for people who aren't who would consider themselves not great at drawing and painting yet to do it because what you really want to do is as an artist as anybody learning any trade is just do it as many times as possible it's not about starting a lot of paintings it's about starting the starting middle and the end of a lot of paintings you're gonna need to learn how to get good at starting paintings you're gonna get good need to get good at that middle part that heavy middle part of rendering and going and solving all the little problems that pop up in games and then you're gonna need to get good at finishing paintings and then presenting paintings so it's good because even if you don't do great work it's gonna force you through the pipeline and you're gonna come back in and then you should you don't need to take the course again but I think you have a lifetime access to it but then he's doing the process again and you do it again and again and again and you don't just do the first step again you go all the steps again yeah so you're just as good at finishing as you are at starting and I think that actually answers my the final question is what would you like to see students take away from the course or what would you like the legacy to be of the course after Judy's have taken it yeah I mean there's we segue into like a bunch of fun little tips and tricks and terms and stuff so you get a good look at what passing on some of the knowledge that I've acquired from other people as well and digested in my own and now I pass it on to those that are looking to learn more you'll get a bit of a taste of what it's like to work through a professional studio pipeline there's many different ways to do it and then but my real hope would be this that the long-term goal of this would be that artists take it or hear about it or whatever however they do it my real goal is I found such freedom and like liberation and having a process and I think that's really what I want to instill is people's and and of course shows you one way and you can rip off as much of it as you want it had your own details and make that your process but I found this liberation and having a process and I used to frustrate me so much when I the process came into the frustrations of making bad art and so the processes gives me peace of mind and makes me more creative and it also you know it it allows me to break my process I I can consciously not do things a different way to very predictably get a different result and so there is just a freedom in knowing kind of what you're doing and that's really the thinking I'm trying to impart on people is that now go find a way that makes it enjoyable for you to make artwork and that's where the creativity will will come from is not fighting the ability to draw in vain or what a painting needs to be but then only when that's out of the way in my opinion you can like here create you then you can use all your energy for the creativity of it the storytelling of it because you're not using like background processing power to run the operating system the operating system is this is running smoothly now let's do something fun shame dude dye is great way to put it and I think a great way to end the podcast thank you so much for coming on and spending guitar thank you even insight I think your journey and your approach is amazing to see the journey you went on and definitely energy towards your craft is infectious I'm definitely walking away today super inspired from listening to your journey so yeah thank you very much and if you haven't taken the course already please do the first lessons free so you can just check that out but I'm pretty sure you're gonna want to grab the rest and if you are no yeah that's it I guess we can undo that and yes you know I like to vet things before I purchase them I'm the guy who like reads the review goes into the Best Buy looks at the thing asks the buddy did you buy this is it good hmm so it's tough with online that's why I never buy clothes online never steal him you know and so I encourage anybody out there who's thinking of buying the course that has some questions you know reach out learn squared it's been great on social media responding to people if they have questions and I'm on social media as well and try to respond to everybody as well but you know if you're considering it and holding back for a reason or just have any questions in general feel free to ask because it's definitely you know in these trying times it's a couple of bucks and everybody needs to to make sure that they they're taking care of themselves and so you should make sure that you're really getting the thing you want and we're here to answer any questions that may be asked that brings this episode to a close a big thanks to Patrick for being an awesome guest his course 2 D sequence illustration is available right now on loans don't forget the first lesson is free so a great chance to try before you buy also please check out the links in the show notes and give Patrick a follow on your desired social media platform till next time [Music]

Channel: Learn Squared

Views: 23,344

Keywords: learn squared, patrick okeefe, okeefe, artpodcast, art podcast, art podcasts 2020, learn art, illustration, sequence illustration, spider verse, patrick okeefe spider verse, art director, art careers, art career advice, art education, art education videos, new course, class, learnsquared, learnsquare, movie industry, animated film, oscars, academy award, online course, into the spider-verse, spider-man: into the spider-verse, concept art, art student, artist interview

Id: EDXtdyRUDK8

Length: 116min 53sec (7013 seconds)

Published: Mon Jun 01 2020