David J SWIFT

The VP of Promotions and Partnerships at Illumination asked if I would like to work on some concepts cars for the Volkswagen prartnership for the DM4 movie. I jumped on this and did about ten different cars in two days, but these shown below were my favorites.

In the past doing marketing for the Despicable Me was mostly done with just a white background with the Minions being the 1st read, but the CCO Gail Harrison had a different vision and I was tapped to come aboard to explore and execute a hyper bright eye catching marketing campaign that showed the Mega Minions doing none heroic acts. Most of these design were used for the marketing of the movie, co-lab partnerships and retail collateral.

Working on the Illumination side with Jose Alvarez, Nintendo, and our toy partner Jakks, we launched a first wave toy line in about six months. We all acquired a couple more gray hairs from the process, but the toys turned out incredible. Collaborating with the teams provided a valuable learning experience, and I walked away with a wealth of knowledge on production and design. Designing the concepts was the most enjoyable experience I've had in a while, and both Nintendo and Jakks were very supportive, even when I thought my ideas were too unconventional.

The Fire Breathing Bowser won a #ToyInsider Top Summer Toy Award from Adventure Media and Events, LLC!

Working with the Nintendo Japan team, Sean Millard (Director of Character Art) and I were tasked with generating concepts and graphic ideas for CPG and marketing. Nintendo wanted to keep it simple, clean, and character-driven in the beginning. Once they felt that we hit that mark, it laid the groundwork for marketing to explore more dynamic poses and compositions.

I was asked to join the team for Project 331 (Villain Con - Minion Blast) at the beginning of the pandemic. It was a major task that kept me and the other Universal teams very busy. I had the opportunity to design the blaster for the ride, as well as the exterior and interior of the building. I created the brand look for Villain Con, including most of the accompanying signage. As the teams progressed into the queue line section of the ride, I worked closely with the EVP of Illumination Theme Parks (Claudia Melnick) and the Illumination film producer (Brett Hoffman) to capture the right look and feel for the story we wanted to tell.

Most people don’t understand how much work and thought goes into designing this world that you walk through for just a couple of minutes. Every poster, ad, sign, and prop is conceptualized multiple times. I must have designed hundreds of pieces with Easter eggs from our films for the fans to ooh and ah at. Designing the story of Villain Con was an incredible challenge but also a fun experience. With so many villains and stories to tell, I had a blast developing all this for the ride.

I’ve been designing toys for Kid Robot since the mid-2000s, and I was super stoked to finally collaborate with them again. I drew this concept when I first started at Illumination but had to set it aside for later because the timing wasn’t right. One day I walked into work and was told that we had a meeting with the head of creative at Kid Robot (legend Frank Kozik) coming to meet with us. The meeting was pure energy; we discussed everything right and wrong about collector toys. We brainstormed for a couple of hours, and I showed him all the different designs I had, and to my surprise, he liked them. The only catch was that we could only do one mold for this program. So, we decided to go with the Minion skeleton. I also designed the packaging for the figure.

To my heartbreak, Frank died during the tail end of the pandemic, and we never got to hang out again. I feel blessed to have worked on one project with him, and all three figures sit in my office, facing me when I draw.

During our meeting, there was one design that I drew in front of Frank, and he kept looking back at it. I had a feeling that he wanted to pursue that design, but it didn't fit the direction of the campaign. I'm really trying to push Uni to do it. Stay tuned.

Working with the SVP of Illumination Theme Park Division, I was tasked with designing signage and photo opportunities for the new land being developed at Universal Studios in Hollywood, Orlando, China, and Japan. The job entailed storytelling with the Minion characters, involving interactions with typography on buildings and food kiosks.

I was asked to come on board to design signage/posters, props, and photo ops for the Minions Cafe. This was a down-and-dirty project, and I was roughing out comp layouts and passing them off to the PM, who then passed them to two character artists to clean up and color. The idea was to have safety posters in the kitchen and breakroom, but with the Minions being Minions when doing the task. I did about 25 different versions, which I think they're banking for another installation in a different park. I was a little bummed out about the type on the posters because I would have made it more dynamic and fun, but I totally understand that they wanted a basic look so it wouldn’t compete with the art.

Pictured here are my float designs for the nighttime parade at Universal Theme Parks in Japan and China. In total, I created about 30 different designs. The ones you see here were brought to life at Universal Studios Japan in Osaka and earned a Thea Award in 2019 for OUTSTANDING ACHIEVEMENT - LIVE SHOW SPECTACULAR. In mid-2021, when Universal Beijing Resort opens, they will unveil a completely different design unique to that theme park.

The awards are given out by the Themed Entertainment Association, a non-profit association representing the world’s leading creators, developers, designers, and producers of compelling places and experiences.

Pol Espargaró, a professional MotoGP rider for Honda and Red Bull, wanted a special helmet for his 2021 season. HJC presented him with various designs, and he was particularly interested in the helmet I was designing. I was honored by this and amazed when Red Bull decided to promote the helmet in their digital marketing campaign.

As a kid, I grew up watching Kung Fu Theatre on television and loved seeing the mid-credit opening. It featured limited animation with Kung Fu poster art and it just worked. This was my go-to in exploring this design direction. The '70s classic Kung Fu posters have so much energy and action, and I wanted to apply this to the Minions marketing but in a limited color way. My design direction was later picked up by the Universal marketing team for a street marketing campaign.

This style guide was so much fun to work on. Myself and the Director of Character Art, Sean Millard, got to explore portraying the Minions in a different art style, and we went heavy on the ink lines. I wanted to create something a little more moody but still maintain the humor, action, and storytelling of the Minions learning Kung Fu. I really feel this came out incredibly well.

I’m always trying to push for more art illustration styles when working with the Minions, and fast fashion guides seem to be the best time to apply this thinking. I was pretty proud of myself for creating my own typeface and illustration style for this program. I hope you enjoy looking at it as much as I enjoyed creating it.

A Minion sk8 fast fashion style guide with a Keith Haring vibe. I've always been a fan of KH, but my first pass on illustrations/designs was too on the nose, so we had to take a different approach. I still feel that I was able to keep some of the essence of KH but added a Dogtown touch to it.

I received a creative brief from Universal asking for a girls' program, and I thought, "Let's go with a different art style," but use bold colors to really stand out from the rest of the guides done in the past. This was a total 180 compared to most guides being done at the time, and I had a ton of fun creating the art. This program was a huge hit in APAC and was used from the Tonymoly x Minions makeup collection all the way to the Universal Japan 2022 summer theme park campaign.

While working at Fox, I had the incredible experience of partnering with Gracie Films and some incredible artists to design the interior and exterior of The Simpsons Ride at Universal Studios. The ride is a partial-motion, virtual reality simulation where guests sit in a carnival-themed car that shifts around to simulate movement through an animated environment projected onto an 80-foot dome. I was very proud of the outcome, as we succeeded in creating an experience that puts fans right in the middle of a Simpsons cartoon episode gone haywire.

The Simpsons Ride won the 2008 THEA AWARD FOR OUTSTANDING ACHIEVEMENT – ATTRACTION. For those not in the know, that’s the equivalent of winning an Oscar in the theme park biz.

The awards are given out by the Themed Entertainment Association, a non-profit association representing the world’s leading creators, developers, designers, and producers of compelling places and experiences.

Together with Claudia Mielnik (VP of Fox Global Creative) and Mili Smythe (Creative Lead for Gracie Films), I was part of the team responsible for the design of The Simpsons Ride expansion at Universal Studios Orlando. Sean Millard and Tanner Goldbeck did a lot of the heavy lifting on this one as well; I came in when needed and was honored when asked to help. Claudia led the team like a champ, never breaking or stopping, even when given impossible deadlines. Good job, Miss Mielnik!

WE WON THE THEA AWARD IN 2017 FOR OUTSTANDING ACHIEVEMENT - THEMED FOOD & BEVERAGE EXPERIENCE.

The awards are given out by the Themed Entertainment Association, a non-profit association representing the world’s leading creators, developers, designers, and producers of compelling places and experiences.

In July 2007, the convenience store chain 7-Eleven converted 11 of its stores in the United States and one in Canada into Kwik-E-Marts to celebrate the release of The Simpsons Movie. The concept was first visualized in 2006 by FOX's advertising agency and then developed by Fox Consumer Products (myself and four other Creative Directors). It was a joint effort designing all the products from the Squashy cups to all the signage. I was just stoked to spray paint the walls at a 7-Eleven.

Skinner Stinks!!!

Here it is friends... the next skate graphic for the Santa Cruz-Simpsons Sk8 series. When I was drawing this, NHS (Santa Cruz) told me that it may not happen, because Jeff Grosso didn't ride for them anymore. With fingers crossed, NHS showed Jeff. The report I heard back was that Grosso was "SO F'ING STOKED" for my design and okayed it for production. It remains one of the most sought-after boards from my Simpsons series.

I have to give a big shout out to Mr. Millard again for cleaning up my drawing.

I started this Puma project back in September of 2016 and, together with my team, did over 100 different designs on the shoes alone. This was one of my designs that ultimately went into production with the shoe junkie/sneaker head in mind for the classic Puma Clyde and the Puma Disc Blaze models. We gave these classic shoes a makeover courtesy of the sweet and playful style of the Minions including new patterns and splashes of color that integrate the iconic goggles and bananas motif.

The question posed to me by the SVP of Marketing at Illumination Entertainment was, "How do you show Minions in history?" My answer was through classic paintings of famous artists, such as Leonardo da Vinci, Andy Warhol-inspired pop art, mind-bending Salvador Dali imagery, and more daft homages to Piet Mondrian, Vincent Van Gogh, Edvard Munch, René Magritte, Roy Lichtenstein, Jackson Pollock, and Pablo Picasso. We explored two different takes for the campaign – one was to place the Minions in the background of actual classic paintings, and the other was to have the Minions as the central focus, mimicking the styles of the classic artists. Both directions were used for the marketing and digital campaigns.

My original idea was to replace the actual famous paintings in museums with ours and start a huge buzz online. I think it would have been crazy to see people's reactions when discovering the Minions in the paintings.

The Universal team in Japan came to me with a concept for the Minion Fuji Instax camera. It was a really cool idea but needed more development on the stylization of the camera, sculpting of the camera body, and artwork for the packaging. I redesigned the whole product and packaging to make it more appealing. Most people would look at this and say it's not a big deal, but what they’re not seeing is form factor is a big deal, and not everything can be pick and play when making a product. You need to know what makes something work and not look forced. I was happy with how it finally came out and was told by the Uni Japan team that this item sold out in two days! Hearing that brought a smile to my face.

This also started a trend for FujiFilm that now has done five different Instax Mini Minion theme campaigns in APAC, all with a high sell-through.

This is my fourth time working with BAPE, and we both agreed that we needed to do something different. Why not bring Milo into the rendered world of the Minions? The problem was it's very expensive to design, model, and render, and timing was a big issue. I designed the rough comps and worked with Phil Hom for the finish. In the end, I think everyone was very happy with the final project. I really wanted to push the art with the Minions and BAPE, but both sides wanted to keep it close to the chest for the kids' fashion line.

The marketing team at Illumination Entertainment was working on a music video with Pharrell for the song "Yellow Light" from the Despicable Me 3 Official Soundtrack, and I was asked to come in to do a style guide... in a week. Yes, a complete style guide in ONE week. I was primarily tasked with the boys' designs, but I also created some girls' concepts. When all was said and done, I had completed about twenty designs and ten patterns.

G-Shock partners wanted to do something with the art, and I really wanted to create something special for the packaging. I know people who collect G-Shocks and pay crazy money for some of these watches, so I wanted to be in that league when doing this partnership. I was told by the Uni APAC team that the watches sold out by online pre-sale before it was even released in stores.

Artwork and design by me.

This was the second Minion collaborration with Bathing Ape but the third time I've worked with Bathing Ape. I wanted to take the design a little bit more adult, but it was tamed down for the family/kid-friendly path. I understand why, and in the end all I can say is I'm proud of the fact that I took something that most designers wouldn't know what to do with and made a line look that appeals to wide majority of the people out there.

Fun with attitude! That's how I would describe this promotion with Fiat. In partnership with an agency called Hamagami, I led the art direction to conceive styles for the campaign.

In 2006, Ryan Rivette (one of the Simpsons artists) and I were talking about skateboarding. My wheels started turning and I found myself roughing out the Simpsons Opening Sequence in a three-layered cell. Ryan took a look, loved the idea and tied it all down. Sean Millard and myself finished the ink and color.

Working with the FOX Promotion Department and colleague Sean Millard, I sprearheaded this project to design and produce these incredible mugs. Sean and I have a great love for "Tiki Culture" and wanted to do this right. We put a lot of research in for this project in Tiki Bars and Polynesian-style restaurants... but mostly in bars. :-)

Below are the finished designs approved by Matt Groening along with some of the 100 different rough concepts that we did for the promotion.

These just got released from FOX legal, so I apologize for the late entry.

When I was first told about AVATAR, the code name was "Project 880." We had to go to Light Storm Studios to work in a room called The Vault in which no phones, cameras or computers were allowed. You couldn't take ANYTHING out of The Vault, but they never said anything about bringing IN pen and paper. I had 30 minutes to take notes and draw rough sketches.

When I got back to FOX I was told to design a teaser poster, so with my skills in illustration and Photoshop, I was able to complete an initial comp in about ten minutes. The image below on the left is the comp I created and the one on the right is the finished version completed by FOX Theatrical. I was pretty proud of this achievement considering that I had no art or photo reference to pull from, just my roughs from the 30-minute tour of The Vault.

When I turned in the comp, I was called into the office of the SVP of Creative to be questioned because they thought I had taken art from The Vault. I had to show them my drawings, files and sources and then was cleared of any wrong-doing. After that, they were so impressed that I was given full access to Light Storm's image library.

The images to your left were other ideas I designed for promotions and branding. All-in-all I designed, laid-out and finished over 200 different comps.

This was an interesting encounter from the beginning. I was at the Agenda Sports Marketing event walking the floor before meeting with the Santa Cruz Skateboards marketing team and I see this bike... and this bike was calling me. It had no paint, raw welded seams - it was beautiful and the name on the bars read CULT. I was in awe. Then these guys from the booth walked up to me, one wearing a bootleg/fan art Simpsons tee, and asked me what I thought of the bike. As I'm looking at him, his friend and their booth, I see more Simpsons inspired art on a poster that they are handing out and I asked, "Are you Simpsons fans?" As it turns out, the two guys are Cult Bikes owner Robbie Morales and art director Adam Roye. As the relationship grew, I worked with Adam on designs that fit best with their brand. In our first meeting he showed me his sketch book - it was raw and free flowing but something caught my eye. I asked him what his favorite Simpsons episode was and he said, "the one when Homer is tripping out." I smiled and asked, "Would you like to do some art like that for the brand?" I was happy to hear him say, "YES!"

Even though the Duff Bike went into production first, this Bart bike was the first one that we designed.

I designed this board for NHS as a spoof on the classic Salba VooDoo board and fought so hard for it to be put in production, but alas it will never come to be... Matt Groening loved it (in his exact words, "I f-ing love this!") but some other execs were not on board (pun intended).

Big thanks to Sean M. for getting a couple of sample boards screened for me!!!

One of my all time favorite skateboard designs is the Jim Phillips "Neptune" deck. The board was designed for Jason Jessee (a rider for Santa Cruz) and when it first came out in had a bat on the nose of the deck and a shark on the tail. Later the bat was replaced with a moon and then again with the sand castle tower you see below. The shark on the tale was replaced with a mermaid. When brainstorming design ideas for the Simpsons/NHS Skateboards collaboration I knew this one was a must-do! I'm so happy it is one of the ones that made it to production!

As a skater kid I idolized Santa Cruz Skateboards and the arist Jim Phillips - you could say it was a lifelong dream to work with them. Earlier this year I had the opportunity to meet Jim Phillips at the NHS 40th Anniversary party and let him know to his face that he was one of the reasons I became an artist! I almost cried... I have always looked up to him. It was very crazy and surreal for me.

So back to the story of this design. It was based on the Jason Jessee “Neptune” mermaid tail. I drew out the rough for this a couple different ways, one had Blinky the fish impaled on the spear, a sea eel that looked like Burns and a pelican that looked more like Homer. We also had mermaid Marge at the bottom of the deck but had to drop it from the final design. Sean Millard finished the ink and we both did the color. I always like to give Sean a shout out for making me look good - thanks Bra'tha!

So Minion Monster program that I started was doing great in Asia and we got a request for additional style guide art needed for retail experience in the park. The 2D style was very limiting and flat, so what to do? I started drawing out composition and designs for the next rendision MInion Monsters. Working with Sean Millard to dial in the design language I feel tha we did a incredible job with injecting the Minions humor with the Classic Universal Monster.

This was a crazy experience that involved me working with China for the first time along with a clothing company (StayReal) and a Taiwanese rock band (Mayday) all simultaneously. The lead singer (Ashin Shin) started StayReal back in 2007 and has done a ton of collaborations with the likes of Hello Kitty, Mickey Mouse, SpongeBob and Simpsons. Now it was my turn to step up representing Illumination and design Shin's collaboration with the Minions. I completed this entire fast fashion guide in about seven days including all the designing, recreating and making new art and patterns. StayReal was very happy with the end product.

Well, here it is... the first stage of the Minion X Puma collaboration. Representing Illumination's marketing team, I worked with both Universal and Puma to come up with a story line that would be fun and unique to the franchise. Down below is one of the story lines in which the Minions become the designers of the shoe line. I art directed the photo shoot with the help of David Fox (Director from Universal) in the staging of the characters and enviroment for the final ad. Joe Vance (Director of Character Art at Dreamworks) did the finish on the character renders for the ad.

I'm thrilled to share the Minion Classic Monsters collaboration that was hosted by BAIT at the 2016 San Diego Comic-Con. I had tons of ideas for the project, but ultimately, we had to decide what we could produce within the short timeline while maintaining a quality level that satisfied everyone. We decided to focus on Franken Bob with Zombie Teddy Bear Tim and tease a couple of other designs in the world of Minion Monsters. I may or may not have created more Minion classic monster designs and other skateboard graphics... hint, hint, hint! I guess we'll just have to wait and see.

This collaboration launched a huge campaign in LATAM and APAC and is still going strong with multiple toy, apparel, and food promotion partners like Krispy Kreme and Baskin Robbins.

This was one of the first projects I got to design after starting at Illumination Entertainment, and it was my second time working with Bathing Ape. I was tasked with creating art for a second-round pitch to Bathing Ape. From what I was told from the SVP of Universal Studios, the Bathing Ape teams were not sure about the art style or direction, so I conceptualized the look and feel of the program. By doing this for Bathing Ape, they signed on. The guys at Bathing Ape did a great pop-up shop in Japan, but it was only for kids. Shame... I was hoping to design some clothes that I could fit into! :-)

They fight, they bite... it's Itchy and Scratchy of course! Not an obvious choice for a Simpsons collaboration, but I'm just happy they are finally using this artwork/style guide that I designed back in 2007. I did a little digging and found out that FOX's London got this going. Great work guys!

I was one of the Simpsons artist that got to work on the Converse “Chuck Taylor All-Star” Collection that features Simpson characters. I was responsible for the family shoe design, which I think was came out pretty cool. Stay tuned for more colorways set to release later next year.

I originally designed this series back in 2012 to be a San Diego Comic-Con exclusive, hence all of the Simpsons-style superheros. Kid Robot and FOX decided to put it on the back burner and instead released it for the "25 Years" celebration. I'm just happy it finally came out, but I really wanted to do a Comic-Con exclusive with Kid Robot each year. Well you never know, they still have more of my designs, so only time will tell.

This was such a fun partnership with Kidrobot and I had so many ideas for different characters I wanted to do. Together with Sean Millard, we came up with about 30 different characters but could only include 12 in the set. I designed all of the packaging and layouts, along with the title treatment/logo which was a wink to the old 50's and 60's horror comic books.

The one design that was not produced that I can show you is this Clock Work Bart. Why you ask? Because he'll never be made. FOX legal had some reservations about doing this toy because it was a parody of another studio's film.

This was one of the pieces that I designed for the Superman 75th Anniversary. I created it to reflect the classic style of Alex Ross, but of course only Alex Ross can do Alex Ross.

Together with Thai Dao at KNTRL and Tanner Goldbeck from Racecar13, I spearheaded the redesign of the Sons Of Anarchy style guides to bring back the old school biker feel and step away from the played-out Ed Hardy clip art vibe that it had been drifting towards. I do understand why it went in that direction, however. I mean how many times can you redesign the Sons Of Anarchy Reaper image? But therein lies the challenge!

THIS GAME IS SCARY!!

They say "third time's a charm" and that was the case for me in this being the third Alien Game that I worked on. After Gearbox's last foray with the Alien franchise, Aliens: Colonial Marines, which was buggy and disappointing (not to mention very poorly reviewed), I feel that with this one we finally nailed it. We (FOX Interactive) worked so closely with Creative Assembly, we could smell what they had for lunch!

The past Alien games were about mowing down the xenomorphs en masse, which sort of gave you the feeling that individually they were not very threatening creatures, but this game turns that concept on it's head. In this version there is only one alien and, like the original 1979 Ridley Scott movie, you have no pulse rifles, robotic sentry guns or any crazy weapons to kill it with. Rather, you have to create tools in order to evade or repel the xenomorph. It's really a good looking game - we made sure that nothing looked like it was military, by color or design, and followed the Ron Cobb drawings from the 1979 film to the T. This gave it that heavy industrial design recalling the transported blue-collar workers wanting to claim a piece of the void. I hope you enjoy.

For a band that has licensed their image to everything from lunch boxes to pinball machines, this was only a matter of time... KISS is no stranger to "Family Guy," having already made three cameos on the program. I pitch the idea SVP of FOX consumer products and got a budget to do a mini guide. Roughing out the concepted, I art direct this project from start to finish. The mash-up was so cool that even Rolling Stone Magazine covered the story!

"All Glory To Hypnotoad!" This was the fourth figure in the Futurama 8" series that I designed for Kidrobot. I must have had at least twenty different packaging ideas, but at the end I was very happy with the way this one came out.

If you were at Comic-Con 2012 then you may have seen this. When I first drew this out it was for a joke for the office manger Tracy. I drew Homer Buddha sitting in a cloud and later Crystal Martin (Director of Product Development) suggested I make the cloud into a donut.

I designed the packaging myself, after a visit to Chinatown for dim sum with my girlfriend. This little old Chinese lady was selling these fake jade rings, she looked at me and said, "Very Lucky, You Buy!" She was so cute, her slogan became the theme of the day. Everything that we looked at, we would repeat the words, "Very Lucky, You Buy!"

Here it is people... I drew this design four years ago and it's finally here! A big shout out to the people at Kidrobot for finally getting this done - I know you guys wanted it out as much as I did!

The original packaging idea was to use a recycled paper that had wild flower seeds woven into it, but it cost issues forced us to use standard cardboard.

I'm proud to share the second series of the Kid Robot Fututrama line by Sean Millard and mysef. I have to say working with Sean is too easy and always a pleasure!

"Good news everyone!" Toynami made my designs into plush!! Now go out and buy them!!

After Todd Spenceman left FOX, I was given the Futurama property. But first, a bit of history: Todd and I had this tradition of drawing really funny pictures of eachother, but Todd was better at it than me. It became like a competition. Every day I came to work there would be a new crazy drawing on my office door - it got to the point where my door was covered with his creations. One day I drew the Robot Devil as myself and Todd as Zoidberg. These drawings became the Tineez Series that you see below.

The thing that bums me out is that I lost the original drawing in the office move.

Alex Ruiz and I sat down one day in 2005 and starting talking about our favorite Simpsons moments. About a year later, this was the result - a three layered hand painted cell that Alex roughed and I colored.

I was lead on this project and together with Sean Millard we did about 15 different layouts and illustrations for the candy bar art. Bart Simpson has been the spokescartoon for Nestlé USA Butterfinger since 1988 using his catchy slogan “Nobody better lay a finger on my Butterfinger!” and “Bite my Butterfinger!” These Bart adorned bars will only be able at select 7-Eleven stores while they last!

(Note: It's 90"ish" rather than 90"th" because even the folks at Nestle couldn't determine precisely which year that first Butterfinger bars were first sold. But all evidence points to it being on or around 1923.)

In 2013 I was designing a ACME art collection, but later I was told that my design inspired the The Simpsons - FXX Identity/Commercial Bumpers from 2014-2016

This was a high profile project. Matt Groening drew the art for the stamps, Dave Warren (another Creative Director at FOX) and I created the rest of the art on the back end. Despite having to overcome some interesting challenges regarding US Postal Service regulations, it came out pretty cool.

These were some of the first toys that I worked on at FOX. Together with Alex Ruiz, I drew out the concepts that were later put into production by McFarlane Toys.

This was a lot of fun. Together with Alex Ruiz (one of the best Simpsons artists to date) and Claudia Mielnik (another creative director at FOX), we got this baby done in about a week. Originally, the promotion was for the UK only, but the other day, I was driving to work on the 10 freeway and saw this truck drive by... I had to smile. :)

As The Simpsons Movie was gaining speed, I got to work with FOX's Promotions department in a collaboration with Vans shoes. Fourteen artists were asked to design a pair of shoes and only 100 pairs of each were made. I never got a pair and was told that they were sold out before they were even put on sale... how does that happen?! In any case, I got to design the skate deck will Bill Morrison that was given out during the show. If you thought that the shoes were hard to get, the Homer Ripper deck was worse.

When Ths Simpsons Movie began production it was all hands on deck. The first round of McFarlane toys was such a success that FOX Consumer Products was chomping at the bit to get a series in the works that tied into the film. Again I teamed up with Alex Ruiz to draw out the concepts and get these babies done. I was so proud of these designs - especially when I was told by Matt Groening himself that these were the best sculpts to date.

This was a really fun project. I like being able to do new things with The Simpsons and let's face it, making them into a deformed toy is funny. Designing the toy and roughing the art for the comps was easy, however integrating the functionality was more of a challenge. It took a lot of planning to make something so simple to work right. Additionally, the process of working with a third party on behalf of The Simpsons and Burger King was new for me to navigate, but I still liked how everything came out.

This how is the promotion worked:

Burger King Kids Meals across the North American and Latin American regions will come with one of six unique Simpsons super hero toys, each featuring a super power brought to life through a digital game.

Using motion detection technology and webcams, Radioactive Man, Pie Man, Cupcake Kid, Fallout Boy, Clobber Girl and Stretch Dude toys will work as virtual joy sticks to interact with the digital game at www.bkcrown.com.

Each character features its own game environment within The Simpsons universe with three levels of increasing difficulty.

D'OH! HELLO KITTY

In the fall of 2013, I was conceptualizing different art styles for major brands, exploring the possibilities of collaborating with them. This effort was in anticipation of The Simpsons' 25th anniversary the following year. One of my concepts involved a collaboration between Hello Kitty and The Simpsons. The category team at 20th Century FOX pitched the idea along with my designs to Sanrio, who loved it, and the following year they launched an incredible softline series.

With Hello Kitty celebrating its 40th anniversary and The Simpsons marking their 25th, the collection was very well received and sold out within the first hour each day at Hello Kitty Con. This was another proud moment for me in moving the needle.

Well it's finally here. When I was first designing Series 2 of The Simpsons Kidrobot line I did the Simpsons family in mariachi dress and I wanted the chase/hidden figure to be Homer in a white mariachi outfit with the Day of the Dead (Día de los Muertos) face paint. The idea was bounced back and forth a bit as to whether to do it or not, but finally it was approved as a 6 inch figure. I have always loved the art of Día de los Muertos and it also inspired me to do it as a new style guide for The Simpsons.

Is there a doctor in the house?! Of course there is - ZOIDBERG! When I was designing this, I wanted Zoidberg to have his head fin up and looking angry, but got vetoed so maybe you'll see that in the next edition. However, I was happy to get Kidrobot to do an alternate universe (purple) Zoidberg, so all was not lost. I designed all of the packaging from the beginning with only minor color changes by the folks at Kidrobot, and I felt it came out pretty cool. The idea was to have Zoidberg stuffed in a glass box, as if he was living in a terrarium. I had also thought it would be cool to do a version of the box as a tagged-up garbage dumpster, but it just wasn't working for me.

I apologize for nothing! :-) I REALLY wanted to do the Hedonism Bot in his studded leather outfit, but at the end it was a cost issue and I'd rather have the figure in production than to not have been made at all. The packaging was designed by myself with the assistance of my awesome graphic designer Kristie Kam.

Ay, ay ay! No me gusta!

My latest designer vinyl figure from Kidrobot‘s Simpsons features Bumblebee Man, the Mexican star of Channel Ocho’s frenetic slapstick comedy show. Measuring six and three quarter inches tall Bumblebee Man is a larger version of the three inch figure originally released in the first wave of Kidrobot/Simpsons blind boxes from 2008. I designed the packaging

The Simpsons first debuted in 1989 and for the past 22 years, fans (myself included) have been dreaming about riding the exact board that Bart rocks during the opening credits. When I was designing the style guides for Bart Sk8, I tapped into my roots in skate culture to pull inspriation. Whether it was the inconic pose of Hosoi busting his Japan Air or the classic art style of Jim Phillips, I always felt that drawing from the legendary images of skate history would give Bart true shred cred. Working with NHS was something I had dreamed of since I was a teenager and seeing the ideas that had been floating in my head finally come to life was a dream come true.

Stay tuned, you haven't seen anything yet!!!

Ideas that happen when I get bored... this one ended up being a style guide for the Simpsons 25th Anniversary line at Hot Topic.

The Promotions Department of FOX Consumer Products asked if I had any ideas for what we could do with The Simpsons and Dunkin' Donuts. At the time, I was working on a Simpsons Halloween style guide and thought it could work for this campaign. I went a little crazy with this and came up with the original idea of building your own Kang or Kodos donut. What can I say, I LOVE DONUTS!!!

I pitched this idea three years ago and to see it finally come out put a big fat smile on my face!!! :D

I also drew the comp for the sculpt and designed the packaging. Sean Millard did the ink and color - thanks again my bra'tha for making me look good.

On March 4, 2012, Shepard will guest star in the 23rd season of the iconic television series "The Simpsons." Episode 15, titled "Exit Through The Kwik-E-Mart," follows Bart as he seeks revenge on his dad by posing as a graffiti street artist and plastering Homer’s unflattering image all over Springfield. But one night, Bart and Milhouse get caught in the act by established street artist Shepard Fairey.

I approached the FOX promotion team and Gracie Films with an idea to promote the episode by actually wheat-pasting posters all over major cities. I can't legally say that the project was approved, but I had the opportunity to be part of a street team in Los Angeles to put up some posters. I was hoping to run into Shepard himself that night, but it didn't happen.

Like most of my days at work, I sit and draw. I know, rough life, but some days you have to change it up and start looking at the things you draw over and over again in a different light. This started as one of those days and then became a new product line with Funko. It's really interesting to hear critics talk or write about the products that you design... some people call you a genius while others call it landfill. In the end, I'm getting paid to design toys and other cool stuff, so I'm happy!!!

Talking about break-neck turn arounds, this little baby was done in three weeks for the major milestone of the Simpsons 500th episode with Santa Cruz Skate Boards. The President of FOX Consumer Products loved the boards that we did on the first wave and wanted me to design another board for the Simpsons 500th. Being that Matt is a HUGE Big Daddy Roth fan and that Santa Cruz had done the Slasher-Chris Meek board, this was a no brainer. As the clock ticked, I ended up doing about ten different versions of this drawing... colorways included. At the end, Mr. Millard and myself got it done. Mr. Millard have a tiki drink for me buddy!!!

NHS honored me again by adding this deck design and giving me a shout out on one of the placks in the The NHS Skate Board Museum. The museums collection tells the history and origins of NHS and Santa Cruz Skateboards, Independent Truck Company and Road Rider Wheels during the 1970s and 1980s. This represents the foundation of NHS and the bedrock of the modern skateboard industry. It is a combination of rare artifacts from the NHS archives and other private collections, showcasing rare film and photos, product innovations, artwork and the personalities connected to these brands. The museum idea came from the desire to celebrate Santa Cruz Skateboard’s 40th anniversary in 2013. The museum space and this company are built by skaters for skaters.

In 2008, FOX Consumer Products was given the HALO movie style guide. Since I had played this game from the day of its release, I was assigned the project due to my knowledge of the franchise and its fandom. I was incredibly excited about this opportunity and took on a significant role in the product development, packaging branding and graphic designs.

Well, here it is... two months of work, with help from artist Shane Sowell. We had about 15 different game covers designed and over twenty different game board designs. Everything was redesigned for the game, from the players' pieces to the money.

If you were one of the lucky ones that pre-ordered, it will come in Planet Express package box, which I designed.

I was so happy to work on this game. It was my first Creative Director credit on a video game for FOX. I was brought in late into the production to assist with correcting brand issues with the look and feel of the game. I wish I had been brought in earlier because with the extremely limited timeline and budget that remained, we weren't able to bring this game to it's greatest potential. Still, it was a solid game for a licensed title. The creative team at FOX and Rebellion had a lot of GREAT ideas that we look forward to integrating into the next game.

The Simpsons Game by Electronic Arts is by far the best Simpsons video game to date and I was excited to be involved with the project. Each version of the game (X360, PS3, Wii, PS2, DS and PSP) was slated to have different box-art so that each version was unique but cohesive to the others. Together with a team of incredible artists including Alex Ruiz, Bill Morrison and Sean Millard we took on the task of laying these bad boys out...

Matt Groening appears as a boss at the end of the game. I wish you could have seen his face we I told him that I enjoyed killing him. :)

I should have had my head examined for doing this piece... this Hand-Painted Limited Edition took me a week to rough out and then with Ryan Rivette's magic touch we finished the beast... Ryan you're the best, you crazy hippie! Sean Millard came in later to assist with with ink and color. I have to say that I'm a very lucky person to work with such insanely talented people. I know as a individual I'm good, but when I put a team together, we're ROCKSTARS!!!

In 2005 I was given the ACME Art Program to run with. If you're not familiar on ACME Art, they are one of the biggest art dealers of animation in the United States.

My first project was to develop different programs to support ACME and their needs while keeping FCP (FOX Consumer Products) on the forefront of collector market must-haves.

Around the same time I happened to find a speakeasy in Santa Monica called The Vic. The place had really great live jazz performances nightly, served fantastic food and strong drinks - but you weren't getting through the door unless you knew the password or could drop a name or two.

Anyway, the experience at The Vic made me reminisce about the cool Jazz posters from the 30's, 40's and 50's, so my first idea for the ACME program was a jazz poster featuring Lisa Simpson. I pitched the idea to the higher-ups and they gave a green light to move forward. Gail Harrison was running the ship at the time and loved idea of working with someone in the jazz art scene and brought in legendary graphic designer, Rob Dyer. He is the real deal from back in the day when they didn't use computers and contributed some great ideas in color and layout. When I finished the poster, he offered me a job in front of Gail, who smiled with wide eyes and said, "not going to happen!"

When I first started at FOX, I was honored for the opportunity to work with Executive Creative Director Todd Spenceman. Todd is an incredible artist and became a good friend and mentor. At the time, he worked on Futurama with ACME Art Collection. I wanted to do something with them, so I drew out the rough comp of this poster. Todd liked it and had legendary illustrator Bill Morrison from Bongo Comics finish it.