Screentone TV

Hello friends! I don't spend much time on Tumblr - which is my loss!! Seems pretty interesting around here... a few differences... some funny ads? But it smells nice.

I'm looking for work, especially for any Union animation projects in viz dev, background design, art direction or design supervision, boards, or revisions. I love story and design! A double threat!

Here - check out this fun set of backgrounds I designed for OK KO Let's Be Heroes, back in the day. I'll share some more recent stuff, here on Tumblr, soon! Thanks for passing my info along if you know or hear about anything.

I made cards for the new year! Shh - don't tell my friends. Just wanted to record my thoughts on how the prints came out:

And I want to write down my thoughts. These are first-impressions, self-critiques.

Maybe it’s weird to write this in public, but - well, it’s the process! I like writing down and redlining prints when they’re done. Stuff to remember later.

Alward - this print is the most successful. The upscaled dithering works really well. The full saturation yellow, pink, greens and blues work really well. There are a few areas which are less saturated - like the chair, the floor, a planet - but mostly it’s brighter. That’s a good idea. That works. The heavy blacks work really well. A couple shapes I left lineless (his seat cushions, some areas of the computer screens) and I think that didn’t work so well. Not deal breakers but notable. Don’t do that too much. Too much white on his hand. Overall I really like this print. The lettering is very good, too.

Seductress - This came out very well. I am so, so glad I redrew this rather than scaling it down. The ships are cute. Could have done some more colors in the background but this works. I’m surprised by how well the yellow area works down below. I just added yellow to every color, I think? I was copying the old (bigger) print and it worked great. I should try doing this on another print. I think it’s nice to have heavy blacks contrast areas, heavy whites, and to do an area like this with lighter, weirder color. I still think the super bright stuff in Alward’s print is the best but this was cool. The black screentone is still weird but not bad. It was only 10% and I think anything more than that would be too dark and muddy. Pretty good print! I love how the top came out - did I just shoot straight greyscales? I gotta look that up. I think so. It’s a good contrast. I did an illusion with the overlay where the sky was maybe 30% overall, but only 10% where it overlaid the text. This worked great. I’m happy with this one! Could have used some brighter spots but overall good.

Songs of the Field - this print came out GREAT but it’s pinker than the last one. Did I use fluorescent RED with that one? Anyway I should have added more yellow overall, to create more reds and brighter greens. The drawing and the density are great. Maybe more whites would be better, too. I would note that the difference between greens on the big ship is too hard to see at this small scale. Shoulda pushed that harder. Okay. The drawing is great but the color is too restricted. I’m happy with it but… isn’t it the same as the big one? So I guess that means small color differences work better on the big scale. Interesting lesson…

You can buy it at my web shop screentone.tv.

S.F. Shorts Folio #1 is a personal science fiction anthology about strangers and families, sons and fathers, and, errr, ya know just, like, spaceships and fun! This zine collects three big stories and a couple small ones.

"The Strange Force" is about the discovery of 12 perfect worlds in space, and how or why anyone could or would save them from destruction.

"Songs of the Field" is about a lizard man in space with strong morals, who unfortunately meets some humans.

"Working in the Future" is about the last human mail carrier in the galaxy and the robots who help her serve the public.

"S.F." is a science fiction series I've drawn for many years. You can consider this zine a selection or folder of various "supplementary files" (side stories) in a wider universe. You don't have to have read any other S.F. comics to enjoy these stories.

STUGO Season 1 Episode 5, "Diorama Drama." Layouts by Ryan Cecil Smith (me!). I loved this episode.

I have long been fascinated by “sand play therapy,” so when I saw the script and the animatic for this episode, that’s how I interpreted this room for Dr Lullah.

The paintings above the diorama were homages to or imitations of @ellemichalka paintings which are sort of archetypical or intuitive, like dreams. And the ceiling is meant to look a little like the top of the playroom in Spirited Away, or the Robin Williams movie Toys.

The fight scene in this episode was so cool!!! I remember that the directors and Ryan Gillis were concerned that this episode might be hard to “track” between the outside and inside worlds, the Inception-like twist at the end… but I think they pulled it off!! Art direction by Sam Bosma, and the layouts in this room were mostly painted by Sarah Doo - I'll share those later.

Style & Fashion Zine #6 is now in stock and available to order at my online store, screentone.tv. All pre-orders are shipped and on their way through the post!

S&FZ#6 "Drawings in the Time of Coronavirus" collects comics drawn in the early weeks and months of the pandemic, and in the last couple of years as life sinks back to normal. A couple trips back to Japan, obsessing over boots and navy socks, looking at vintage watches. Slice of life stuff and very, very little "advice."

The zine comes is 40 pages, 13.5x20cm, 17 risograph colors, and comes with a poster that's extra tall (40cm), 7 risograph colors.

The whole book was printed and bound by Retro Jam in Osaka, then shipped to Los Angeles where I trimmed the covers and folded posters.

Style & Fashion Drawings: Passionate About White Jeans

New pin alert! Star Jasmine Pin Badge. This is a hard enamel pin badge. Ships in risographed paper packaging, and includes an extra jasmine risographed postcard.

Jasmine is a flower that smells SO good and which you can see in many shapes and sizes. My favorite is “star jasmine.” It has gorgeous, paper-thin and radially symmetrical petals around a tiny gold center.

I like to pick out a flower and stick it in my lapel button-hole for decoration. But many flowers aren’t well suited for this… they are beautiful but they don’t have a firm stem or they will dry up without water. So I wanted to make some pins from my favorite flowers, to wear all day.

This pin is made with white and yellow enamel, set into brass. The pin is small, about 3/4” inch (2cm) in diameter.

Style & Fashion Drawings: Razor Technique Advice

Second strip about shaving for Put This On. Read it here!

Style & Fashion Drawings: A Razor Technique Story

First of two strips about shaving for Put This On - read it here!

Part 1

Part 2

NEIGHBORS, designed in 2019 when four planets - Jupiter, Saturn, Mars, & Venus - were super big and bright in the sky, nearby to Earth. We had a good community in the apartment complex, too.

Printed in weird colors! Fluorescent red, AQUA, yellow, and black. Tough colors to harmonize but we got something here.

Large A3 size (11 3/4” x 16 1/2”), $20 (ships in a poster tube)