The Sandman: 25th Anniversary Painting

Some of my earliest desires to take part in the world of comic books, were because of my time spent anticipating the next issues of The Sandman, written by Neil Gaiman, illustrated by (for that run) Jill Thompson, and with beautiful cover artwork by one of my very favorite artists, Dave McKean. I related to these comic books, not because of the magical beings inside their pages, but because of the misfits, whom from my point of view, were much like me. There I was, 16 years old, with Robert Smith/Edward Scissorhands hair (much like Dream, I was happy to see) reading stories where the "freaks" acted like real people, with thoughts, feelings, humor, and souls, that I knew I and my outcast friends had inside us, just like everyone else. It was very refreshing to my young mind. So, when the opportunity came along to submit artwork for this year's San Diego Comic Con 2013 souvenir book, for the 25th anniversary of the first Sandman comic, I felt it was only natural to do this piece. I owned it to that young reader who is the foundation for the man I am today.

...and I thought an animated GIF might be fun to throw in, too.

From Painted to Digital (Before and After)

Just a quick post, about what I'm doing to build my portfolio. This piece is best viewed by right clicking it, and opening it in a new tab, so that you can magnify.

These days, I don't paint a complete picture, now that I consider myself a more digital type artist. I paint just what I think I'll need as a foundation for my Photoshop work. As you can see, the difference is vast. This is from no particular comic. I just felt like doing something metaphorical for my current state of mind as an artist and a human being. Interpret as you like.
#christophermoonlight

Designing Bradbury's From The Dust Returned

By way of Live Forever producer Michael O'Kelly's friendship with Ray Bradbury, I had an opportunity to pitch my idea to him, on how I would interpret his book, From The Dust Returned, into a low budget movie. Of course, I was thrilled to be able to do this and wanted to also possibly pitch this to the stars who are in Live Forever, including Edward James Olmos, Malcolm McDowell, and Joe Mantegna. Sadly, while I was working on this, Ray's health took a turn for the worse and not long after, MGM acquired the film rights to the book.

What fallows are an introduction video I made, to show how I would have liked to incorporate puppets, animation, and actors together, using green screen, as well as dummy posters for the movie pitch, and a select few designs I did, all with the hopes of showing them to one of the most brilliant writers in the last one hundred years.

I also owe a huge shout out to the band Death By Dolls and Dame Darcy at damedarcy.com for letting me use her brilliant music for this demo video. It has been a long time dream of mine to have her score one of my films, and I think her music would have been perfect for this movie. Go to her website and buy one of her albums. You won't be disappointed.

Here are the dummy posters:

Beyond the would be posters, were these designs for Timothy's Egyptian mummy cat, his mother, and a random family member that might be a gorgon.   

This sketch would have been the beginnings of my Timothy design as well as another family member, but I never got around to putting it into Photoshop. Still, I like the design. See the rest of my PORTFOLIO BY CLICKING HERE.

I did send these designs on to the producers working on the film right now, but never heard back from them. That's not unusual. My understanding is that the film is already in production. I look forward to seeing it.
#christophermoonlight 

Christopher Moonlight Productions Sizzle Reel for 2012

Christopher Moonlight 2012 Show Reel from Christopher (Moonlight) Cooksey on Vimeo.


This is my Sizzle Reel for the first part of 2012. It contains scenes from my upcoming short film Girl In The Window, staring Jeremy Hanes. I also hope it shows my skills as a production designer, digital composite artist, matte painter, model builder, and puppeteer... just to name a few. I've worn many hats and my only regret is that I couldn't put the other two thirds of the projects I've been working on, in it. I'd like to submit (in this post) a few stills of the models and puppets I've built, so you can spend a little more time looking at them. I find its always best (for me) to find practical solutions to visual effects challenges first, and let the computer be there to enhance what those solutions are. When working on a budget, I find that the blend can be better than satisfying.

e mail me:
christophermoonlight (at) gmail (dot) com

Be sure to "Like" Girl In The Window on Facebook.

Let's start with a few of my digital matte paintings. These are a combination of digital painting, and photography... with the last pic being a concept painting to be developed into a two and a half D matte painting.

Next up are my models and puppets, which I create from Sculpy and latex (as in my monsters and goblins) painted with acrylic and polyurethane or in the instance of my space ships and robots, are put together from found objects. It's the best way to work, on a budget.

  My daughter really enjoys my work, by the way.

Storyboarding isn't an intricate part of what I do, but I do like to rough out a general idea of what I have in mind for a scene. These days, it's more practical to rough out ideas in Adobe After Effects, animate them, and let them evolve within the computer.

From drawing, to painting, to digital, its always good to visualize not only the look of a character but that character's mood. Sometimes choosing a medium will dictate that mood.

Painted:

Sketched:

Digital:

Bloom by Christopher Moonlight

Special thanks to Rich Goddard who has been my adviser in a lot of my work, and did the 3D background for the vampire bride puppet, and Dave Grave who built the monster head (to my specifications) which I animated. Also, to Jeremy Hanes who not only acts for me, but has been my director of photography, though all of this. Also, thank you to Richard Hines for loaning me one of his DV cameras and light kit to shoot my short film. You can learn more about their work, by checking out other posts on this blog.

My Catalog Work: Day Into Night

Photo compositing is a big part of what I do for Lamps Plus on a day to day basis. If you go to the Lamps Plus website, you'll find that almost every product featured there is also viewable in a "room scene" so that an online customer can get an idea of it might look like in a home setting. The catch is that to shoot every product in one of these settings would cost an immense amount of money. The solution is photo composite the products into scenes, using photoshop. The idea is that a room can be shot, and used over and over again, to show off different lamps, fixtures, and furniture.

Now, far be it for me to give away any trade secrets to how we do it, I'll just let these images I got off of www.lampsplus.com speak for themselves. A particular challenge I'm proud of was the one to turn day into night, as there were no nighttime shots available to be used for our outdoor lighting section. So, just keep in mind: Non of these products are really in the original shots AND non of these photographs where shot at night.








One thing I (along with the other ingenious Lamps Plus photoshop artists that do this sort of thing) have to keep in mind in doing this, is the fine line between complete realism and making the product as clear to the customer's eye as possible.

Concept Art: Aliens Vs. The Simpsons

I'm a big fan of Bongo Comics (arguably the best part of The Simpsons franchise in my opinion) and a big fan of Fox's other great big franchise (no not Star Wars) Aliens. I've got a a couple of friends there, so when my good friend Frank Kane suggested it might be fun to see The Simpsons go head to head with the Aliens in the town of Springfield, I had to pursue the idea. Long story short, the idea didn't fly with Matt Groening (concerns over crossovers and copyrights, I think, but don't quote me on that) and it's never going to happen. However, I have these nice concept painting to show for it. As you can see, I had a lot of fun cross pollinating some of the classic Simpsons gags with a few of the great moments in the Aliens movies and H.R. Giger's art style.