Influence: Jamie Hewlett

Above: Hewlett's been the main influence on the style of my human characters for years, on right, my main character from the upcoming prison film. on left, cover of "rise of the ogre" a must have book of some fine gorillaz artwork!

Jamie Hewlett is hardly a surprising influence of mine, and many other artists. Particularly, I love his sense of cartoon design, how he shys away from the bulbous cartoonyness or overtly "shaped" designs that dominate animation today. MTV "Downtown" creator Chris Prynoski is a buddy of mine who is also heavily influenced by Jamie, and I can name several other animators whose work is directly effected by Hewlett's drawings. I've always believed that illustrations that rely too much on design are compensating for the inability to draw using the principles of weight and space. Jamie's drawings just look so damn good, a nice balance between detail and minimalism, graphic inks with traces of organic hand drawn line. I got the book "rise of the ogre" for my bday last year, and i'm still picking it up almost daily. it's a bit of a strange read, but worth it for the gorillaz artwork alone.