Welcome to the "-bers"

Drawing, Raiders of the Lost Ark advice, The Creator creators, and getting inspired by Mark Andrews

Hello, welcome to another SpaceCat Creative Corner update. I can’t believe it is October 1st already. We are officially in the “-bers”.

ART

Hello folks, I’m going to do my best to write to you all about my interests and art more regularly.

Its been a relatively slow art week. I posted a few things on YouTube Shorts and Instagram, but I’m hoping to do more this coming week.

I found this cool book called Drawing Geometry by Jon Allen and I hope to share some of the cool stuff from the book.

STORYTELLING

In the inspiring little 1981 book, “Making of Raiders of the Lost Ark” there is an interview with George Lucas. There has been so much written about Lucas and Raiders, but it’s fun to read these interviews from the early days of his career. This bit was something i need to always remind myself of:

Question: "What would be your advice to young filmmakers?"

George Lucas: "Well, there're a million pieces of advice one could give.

But I think that one of the keys to becoming a successful filmmaker is persistence never quitting and always working hard. And, of course, it helps to be good at what you do.

When I was at film school I was a very good cameraman and a very good editor. I tried always to be good at whatever I did. That way I insured myself a lot of work and that way I eventually evolved into a filmmaker."

This is good advice for anyone in any profession, especially when you are starting a new endeavour. And its been good advice for me as well. With the business of life, you will need persistence to keep working at your craft, whatever it may be.

SCREENING ROOM

how cool is this poster art by Matt Ferguson

Gareth Edwards’ beautiful film The Creator released this weekend. I loved it. More than anything I loved the look of the film.

The director, Gareth Edwards, was also the director of Rogue One. This film is his story and vision, and its a fun one.

I wanted to mention a few other people that were involved in bringing this cool film to life.

Greig Fraser, was the cinematographer on The Creator. If you are not aware of him, you are surely aware of the films he has shot. Rogue One, Dune, Lion, and The Batman to just name a few. He is one of my favorite cinematographers working today. Check out this interview with him on the Team Deakins Podcast

The Production Designer is worth knowing as well. James Clyne has worked in the Lucasfilm Art Department for many years and is just a fantastic designer and artist.

Here is a great interview with James from a few years ago:

Lastly, I want to mention Charmaine Chan. Charmaine was one of the Visual Effects Supervisors on the film and works at ILM in London. Charmaine is active on twitter and shares a lot of their thoughts there. Definitely worth following her work. She was also heavily involved on the first season of Andor.

Here is a short profile on her:

And I’ll leave you with this video from ILM about the film.

Did you all see The Creator? What did you think?

ANIMATION

Here is something else that inspired me this week.

This is an eleven year old video, but worth a listen to. Mark Andrews was the co-director of Brave. He talks all about how he got into the animation industry, storyboarded on Sam Raimi’s Spider-Man, Samurai Jack, Iron Giant, and The Incredibles. Most recently he was creator of Super Giant Robot Brothers on Netflix.

There are some great gems in here and it is inspiring for anyone interested in a career in animation.

Ok, that about does it for this week.

Please write back and say hello, or leave a comment on SubStack. I’d love to hear from you,

Ed