Sonic 2 escape ship reimagined in 3D

Fake Comic page illustration

This was a monthly drawing challenge at work, where the promt was as follows:

Beyond the cities, the fields and marshes, beyond the forests and abandoned towns, a wound had slowly opened. Perhaps if we had listened closely, we’d have heard the crows, seen the dogs, or otherwise noticed the restless strangeness in the air We may have heard the sound rising from the sealed caverns in the depths; the muffled pounding as the flood began to rise. And the flood changed everything.

Birthday Card in Silver Age style

I referenced an image of Uncle Ben for the image of my dad on the right.

Coming Soon; Shuffled (short film)

I've been working on a short film for some time now. I approached local filmmaker Markus Helmersson to collaborate. He wrote it, we developed it into this project. Markus is the writer/director, and I was the storyboarder/animator.

I mainly wanted a project so I could learn how to model and rig a human character in Maya, and this was that!
It is nice to have a project that I animated by myself, now its done!

Short film competition entry, Cine15. Theme: Motion

 The rules for this local film competition were simple, keep it at 15 seconds, and with a "motion" theme!

A few more birthday card illustrations for the wife and sister

Sonic 2 HD, Character Animation

I have been the lead character animator on the fan-project Sonic 2 HD for some time now, but I dont recall posting anything about it here, so here's some stuff!
This is the rough animation for the end-act pose. This is a new feature for the game, An end of act pose originally appeared in Sonic 3, but we've put one in Sonic 2, and here's my animation for it. I wanted to have the Super Peel Out in the game somewhere, and this was the perfect spot as it woudn't interfere with any gameplay.

Another Birthday Card

Here's the most recent birthday card for the missus

Tim Minchin's Storm, the graphic novel. A cover...

DC Turner and Tracy King invited me to draw an image for their graphic novel version of Tim Minchin's STORM. Having already worked on the animated version, I was already a huge fan of the project, how could I refuse?

Here's the book in all its hardback glory! 

I only really had 1 evening to complete my image so there wasn't as much time for exploratory design as I would normally allow, but here's some of my initial Tim character designs.. There was no time for Storm, I settled on her design immediately! 

Here's a blocking phase, trying to get work out were the main shadows in the image would fall .

I highly recommend the book. It's one thing listening to Tim recite it or watching the animation, it's another to have it in this format where you can really linger on each word and adsorb DCs wonderful illustrations. The hardback has some great behind the scenes content at the end too (although good luck getting one, there was only 2000 printed.)

I hope you liked my fake cover :D

New Chiptune for Ted Ed

We at Karrot made this Ted Ed video, which was directed by Henry Chung. I did a tiny bit of animation on it but I was also asked to compose a lil chiptune for the background music. You can't really hear it fully in the video so here's links to both things in their entirety! Enjoy!

3D photo capture of Chilli chilling out

Chilli Chilling by RickyEarl on Sketchfab

I've posted this before, but the texture disappeared so I deleted it. It's back again now so the blog post returns! This was made from 40 or so photos

Short chiptune, Dip Switch

Here's a short chiptune I composed as a theme tune for a podcast I was going to make once.

Winter 2013 Cartoon Network idents

Cartoon Network Winter Idents 2013 from Karrot Animation on Vimeo.

Here's the new set of idents we made at Karrot Animation for Cartoon Network!

More artwork for the Sonic website; Zone Zero. Aquatic Ruin Zone

I wanted to spend some time on some projects over this winter holiday but my brain wouldn't let me concentrate on the projects I wanted to do. That's always the way, isn't it? You can concentrate on anything except what you need to. So I found myself returning once again to my duties as the illustrator for the website, Zone Zero. Im working through all the levels in the 16BIT Sonic games. I'm currently upto Sonic 2, level 3; Aquatic Ruin Zone.

Dreamworks Puss In Boots: The Game. Some of my work for it....

I wasn't able to post about this for ages, and then I totally forgot about it. And now Blitz games has shut down, I think the time is right.

This was the second time I worked with DC Turner and Kershoot (after Storm, and it wouldn't be the last time either...). Myself and DC did all the 2D cut-scenes in the game. Blitz wanted them in a similar stylization to the Storm vid. I remember I found it quite nerve racking sending off some of my storyboards to Dreamworks and waiting for the feedback...They approved them with only tiny changes which was very relieving/satisfying! Getting the OK from Dreamworks? Feels good!

SO here's some of the stuff i worked on. I only have the files for the first cut-scene, (which is a shame cos I was rather fond of some of the later art). These were designed to be animated, and some of them are just the backgrounds without any characters on them, but you get the idea anyway.

Put your foot down and DRIVE!

I was playing a lot of Driver: San Francisco when I started this, even though it has been out for a few years. Still some of the most satisfying car physics around.

You like dags?

Phew! I've been super busy recently which for some reason meant I started loads of projects without finishing the previous one. This means I have a folder of unfinished art, all begging for attention. Slowly, but surely, the folder will be emptied! This one had been sat in that folder collecting digital dust for some time, I thought it was about time it saw some attention.

Some time ago I bought a Praxinascope and had been meaning to make my own animations for it. One of the reasons I have less time these days is because of this asshole so I thought it pertinent for her to be my subject.
Where's the challenge you ask? Why bother repeating an exercise from the first year of uni? Well, I couldn't find any reference on dog runs with 10 frames (the amount in the praxinoscope), and I really didnt want to adapt a reference of a 6 frame run to a 10 and just add more tweens, because there's no logical place to add them, without favouring an abitary pose. An dog run has no real keys, they're ALL keys cos everything happens at different times. So, I made my own 10 frame cycle. I hope you like it, I'll add footage of it in the praxinoscope as soon as I can get a printout of it to stick in there. Hi-res but slower version here

Some mentions...

Sarah And Duck.

Karrot Animations very own show, Sarah and Duck, is now being shown on CBeebies in the UK. You can see it on BBCiplayer. I animated on the episode, Cake Bake.

Scooby Forever.

Here's some work for Cartoon Network that we did at Karrot Animation. They wanted Scooby Doo set into Scandinavian landmarks. I did some of the concept/design work as well as some modelling/texturing/animation.

Cartoon Network Scooby Forever Promo from Karrot Animation on Vimeo.

Embarrassing Self Indulgence

This will be the only post I do of this sort, I promise :)

I have loads of drawings from when I was growing up, and here is a small selection. I think journeys are fun so here we go...

British Animation Awards super winner!

Heads up....

Here's a sting we animated for the British Animation Awards. After we did that, it won best sting! I animated sheep, but all the good stuff was done by Ruf.



I don't live here anymore, so Ruf does all my blog posts.

Love from Ricky RUFUS!

(This post was blogged by Rufus, who temporarily gained control of my motor functions. I was able to shake off the Blacklock parasite that time.)