Structure, Integrity and Nonsense
In the early days, Albert was very grotesque.
A "Bill the Cat" knock-off with a missing ear, not unlike Matt Groening's "Bongo".
This particular version of Albert was used for a t-shirt I made to parody those moronic "No Fear" shirts that kids were wearing in the early 90's. It blasted the words "FEAR: If you're living on the edge, I hope you trip".
Albert became a symbol for my own insecurities, and remains one to this day. But I also realized very recently that one of the major aspects of Albert's character is repressed rage. Albert is a very angry bunny. On the surface he's very cute, shy and insecure. But inwardly he's pissed off at just about everything. He's angry about everyone walking all over him. He's angry about not getting laid. He's angry about life being so complicated. He's angry at himself for being so angry. The conceit being that although he is a rabbit with rabbit instincts, his cartoon status forces him into situations that he's simply not equipped to deal with, much the way we humans are.
Look how emotional Bugs Bunny gets in this clip from Tortoise Wins By a Hare:
This is what I aspire to.
My drawings of Albert have always hit or miss, and rarely consistent. Sometimes I do a drawing where I feel I've nailed it, and then I'll have trouble recapturing it. The reason, I finally realized, is that I never nailed down a definite way of structuring him. This is what I'll be attempting to do here.
As I noted before, I have no way of scanning images, so the following are just some basic line drawings done on my computer.
Here's the basic shape of Albert, with a triangular body and traditional, cartoon rabbit shaped head. With the body I want to give the sense of a skeleton underneath, covered in a loose fitting sheet of fur that makes him look like a walking triangle.
There's even a sense that he's stumbling over himself when he walks. Here's a very brief walking demonstation:
Now here's the body beneath the triangle:
And the basic head structure:
One thing I've always liked about the design is the way is nose slumps over where his mouth should be, even though it's a bit awkward joining the neck to the head, drawing him with an open mouth, or animating him talking, but it's still one of the things I like most about the design. I've thought about making him a "silent" character, but decided it would be best to let him talk when he needs to, especially when he needs to vent. So these are some of the elements I'm working with.
A "Bill the Cat" knock-off with a missing ear, not unlike Matt Groening's "Bongo".
This particular version of Albert was used for a t-shirt I made to parody those moronic "No Fear" shirts that kids were wearing in the early 90's. It blasted the words "FEAR: If you're living on the edge, I hope you trip".
Albert became a symbol for my own insecurities, and remains one to this day. But I also realized very recently that one of the major aspects of Albert's character is repressed rage. Albert is a very angry bunny. On the surface he's very cute, shy and insecure. But inwardly he's pissed off at just about everything. He's angry about everyone walking all over him. He's angry about not getting laid. He's angry about life being so complicated. He's angry at himself for being so angry. The conceit being that although he is a rabbit with rabbit instincts, his cartoon status forces him into situations that he's simply not equipped to deal with, much the way we humans are.
Look how emotional Bugs Bunny gets in this clip from Tortoise Wins By a Hare:
This is what I aspire to.
My drawings of Albert have always hit or miss, and rarely consistent. Sometimes I do a drawing where I feel I've nailed it, and then I'll have trouble recapturing it. The reason, I finally realized, is that I never nailed down a definite way of structuring him. This is what I'll be attempting to do here.
As I noted before, I have no way of scanning images, so the following are just some basic line drawings done on my computer.
Here's the basic shape of Albert, with a triangular body and traditional, cartoon rabbit shaped head. With the body I want to give the sense of a skeleton underneath, covered in a loose fitting sheet of fur that makes him look like a walking triangle.
There's even a sense that he's stumbling over himself when he walks. Here's a very brief walking demonstation:
Now here's the body beneath the triangle:
And the basic head structure:
One thing I've always liked about the design is the way is nose slumps over where his mouth should be, even though it's a bit awkward joining the neck to the head, drawing him with an open mouth, or animating him talking, but it's still one of the things I like most about the design. I've thought about making him a "silent" character, but decided it would be best to let him talk when he needs to, especially when he needs to vent. So these are some of the elements I'm working with.
posted by Jeremiah at 9:54 AM
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