A killer opening!

Hey there Ricketeers! It's been awhile since I've had a post, but I return bearing progress! I finally finished the animatic of the opening title sequence. Check it out!

This is only a preliminary animatic. I like where it's going, but I already feel it's going too fast. It should probably be at least another minute longer, but for that I'm having my sound guy do it. There's only so many different punches and "ahs" I can take. Although, I do like adding different cartoony sound effects to it and making the audience go, "Pop? What the hell went pop? What are they doing to this poor guy? Was that a frying pan I heard?"

Also, the music is Big Shell West Bristol from the amazing BenCousins at OCremic.org. It's just a placeholder for now until my sound guy comes up with a killer theme, but this is one of my all time favorite Trip Hop songs. Actually, it's the song that turned me on to Trip Hop and bands like Portishead, Massive Attack, and Hooverphonic. Ahhh memories.

I think I'll ace the posters. Not that I won't do them, but maybe one a week. There's too many to catch up on.

So finally I'm bringing back Noir Review! This week, a double helping of Ernest Hemingway's The Killers!

I got a chance to look at both the 1946 and 1964 versions of The Killers and I'm REALLY leading towards the 1946 version. Two hired killers come to town and off some guy, but the guy doesn't run, almost like he's expecting it. The whole movie is the mystery behind why this man was killed and why he was so accepting of it.

In the 1946 version, it opens with a great dramatic score and introduces us to the actual killers as they talk about who they're going to kill in a quaint little diner. These are my two favorite characters in the entire movie, and I was really hoping the entire movie was going to revolve around them planning and murdering the guy. They're menacing and psychotic, the kind of unique characters you don't see in normal life. "What're we gonna do? I'll tell ya. We're gonna kill the Sweed." Sadly, they kill the guy and go off screen after twenty minutes, only to return an hour later for a short (though easily the most dramatic)scene near the end.

The rest of the movie involves an insurance agent tracking down people connected with "The Sweed" and piecing together a tale of a robbery gone wrong. Each character he meets has a little flashback of what happened. They handle this in a great way, not making the flashbacks too long and are careful to make sure the audience only sees what the person flashbacking(is that a word?) sees. It's a nice little noir story with a couple of great characters, a good twisting story, and some nice camera work. I would wholly recommend checking it out. I think I'd give it a solid 32 out of 39.

Then I started to watch the 1964 version. I say started because I honestly couldn't get through the first hour. And no, not because it's in color. Similar to the first movie, the killers off their target, but almost as reluctant heroes they go, "Hmmm, he didn't run. How odd. Perhaps we should investigate this mystery." which seems rather strange to me. What kind of hired killers are these? They do the job, it's an easy job, and they want to find out more? If they were so curious, why didn't they do this before?

So they find a mechanic that's connected to the guy they just offed and ask him what happened. And so begins the real movie, a love story involving race cars. What? Didn't I sign up for a noir? Why is everyone so bright and lovy dovy? The flashback goes on for way too long and the mechanic suffers from "And this part I wasn't there for but I remember it perfectly" syndrome, which I can't stand.

It seems like the noir mystery was just a framing device for the movie they really wanted to make(or the movie they though audiences would really want to see). I just stopped caring. I can't really recommend it for hardcore noir fans.

Hmm. Would anyone want to become an actual Ricketeer if I made an official fan page? I think it would be an interesting promotional idea. Now, how could I make it viral?

See you next time folks!

animatic on the way!

Hey Ricketeers! Sorry for the late post, but I'm considering moving Rickety Rat Update day to Fridays. Also, I don't really have anything this week. I haven't had much time to work on any more posters or concept art, but I have scanned in all my storyboards and am in the process of making an animatic. Actually, several animatics. Since it's such a big one, I figure I'll break it into scenes (also some scenes have alternates), then splice it together in one huge monstrous animatic.

And then I have to remember how After effects works. Yay.

See you next week folks!

more posters

Good news Ricketeers! I've finally finished the storyboards! Woo hoo! Now on to Wondrous Animatic land! I have some more mock Noir posters that are almost done. Take a look:


Sure it's just an arm, but what an arm! Compared to the Original.


There has been a serious rascals absence in these posters, so I thought I'd remedy that. I actually really like the original design for this poster.

Still working on the minor characters for this one. Dolly was stealing the femme-fatale show so I thought I'd put Roofie as the main character in this one.

I'm gonna take some time off this week because I'm just so darn happy with finishing the storyboards. See you next week folks!

Posters Galore!

Hi there Ricketeers!

This week I'm finishing up the storyboards. Hopefully finally. If I finish them all I'm throwing my self a "Yay me" Party with cake and everything. Then I can finally start on the animatic!

Also, if you've been following me on twitter or the facebook fan page, (which I'm sure you all do) You'll already know that I'm making mock movie posters of all the noir movies I've reviewed. This might take some time, but hopefully I'll get to a point where I'm caught up and with each new movie review comes a new poster! Wouldn't that be something? Anyways, here's what I've got so far:


I really like this one, even better than the original. It just works so well in high contrast. And the best thing about it is since everyone where's gloves, it could be anyone's hand! And in this version, does M stand for mouse?

This one I'm still working on. I think the problem I have with it is that I tried using solid blacks with no value. You can see the original here and a crazy colored version here.

I REALLY like how this one is coming out. I decided to go old-school shading with it, and I think it works out well. I changed the composition from the original a bit to make it work with the characters. I could have put Rickety in the main character seat but I wanted to see Stumbles as a boxer(Didn't Goofy do a boxing cartoon?) and I wanted to bring Blusto back.

The more I do these posters, the more I wish I could make little mock-movies, but alas, I feel that would be WAY too much to put on my plate. Maybe somewhere down the line I'll do it as a promotional tool when most of the animation is complete and I have time again.

No Noir review this week; I'm going to hold off until next week when I'll have most of the posters done. Plus, I haven't seen any new noirs lately.

See you next week folks!

Those crazy voice actors

Hey there Ricketeers! I'm sorry to say, I don't have much for you this week. I haven't had much time to work on any of the promotional materials, animation, concept art, or barely even the storyboards! I've been wrapped up in my other endeavors, the barber comics and other projects with Rocket Powered Dragon. But, Lucas was able to finish sorting through the Rickety Rat audio, so I'm at least hoping to get the opening sequence mock up done by next week!

I do have a little something for you, some outtakes from the recording sessions! I should warn you though, as we're all professionals here, there is some coarse language used when we trip over our lines. Enjoy!

New Poster

Hey there Ricketeers©! Have I got a surprise for you! Well, it's not really a surprise if you've been keeping track, but still! I'm working on a new promotional poster (I finally picked one to start) and here's what I've got so far:
I't's pretty good, but I'm gonna work on it some more, add some shading, maybe a bit of texture, we'll see what I can do with it.

I've also been doing some costume design for our heroines, look at this smart but cute attire for Dolly and Roofie:

That might be fur on her coat, not because she's an extravagant duck, but it's something Rascals would buy for her.

Don't have much else for you this week, Ricketeers. I've been working on the storyboards, and I might be at the half way point. I should really be doing set and environmental design, and I've scoured art deco books for reference, but it's probably going to be put off until I absolutely have to. I much prefer drawing characters than buildings. Who doesn't? YOU'RE HIRED!

For this week on Noir Review, I want to talk about something you're probably all familiar with and it may even be one of your old favorites as it is mine, Batman The Animated Series!

I think this old 90's cartoon is one of the best examples about how to do great noir (especially the first three seasons before the style changed). It's got a perfect 1930's-1940's feel from the buildings to the attire, it's filled with dark shadows and alleyways, and the music is some of the best scoring I've ever heard (when are they going to release a soundtrack?!) And the voices they got to play such iconic characters, Mark Hamil will always be the best Joker

What gave the show it's biggest noir feel is he stories. Many times they'd focus an episode around a normal person who spirals psychotically into the criminal trenches, or an already down and out criminal who's just trying to get back on his feet but society or his own urges won't let him. Many an episode ended on a sad note, or at the least a feeling of, "sure, the batman stopped him this time, but it doesn't matter much because he'll be back", that continuous downward spiral.

I could talk all day about my favorite episodes, but 'll only name a few:

Feat of Clay parts 1 & 2: voiced by the amazing Ron Pealman, a failed actor with a horrible facial disfigurement gets turned into the horrible monster Clayface and tries to get his revenge on the man who changed him.

The Gray Ghost: Voiced by Adam West, A washed-up TV star helps Batman stop a mad-bomber somehow connected to his old TV show.

A Bullet for Bullock: A whole episode revolving around Harvey Bullock, played out like a jazzy detective drama, as he figures out who's trying to kill him.

Almost Got 'im: I think this is one of everybody's favorite episodes. Siting around a poker table, the Joker, Two-Face, Killer Croc, Poison Ivy, and the Penguin share stories about how they all almost killed the Batman.

Two of my favorite scores:




Trial: Batman and Prosecutor get trapped at Arkham where all the villains put Batman on Trial for turning them into monsters. Let's face it, this should be the next Batman-Phoenix Wright crossover videogame. Objection!

But what's your favorite episode? See you next time Ricketeers!

poster concepts

Hey there Ricketeers! I don't have much for you this week. Been workin' on storyboards and Concept art a lot(man there's a lot of fancy art deco building references). I wanted to do a Rickety Rat promotional poster similar to the classic noir posters of the 40's, but I haven't decided on composition yet. Here are a few of the ones I'm deciding between:



I like this one in which the characters are interacting with the title. Rickety is off to the side looking lost and small while Rascals is dropping cigar ash on his head.


This is a simple one in which you can see the contrast between him now and his former self in his faded poster.


This one Rickety is far off, maybe in a movie theatre with the side characters having their own individual posters.


This is the only horizontal one I have. Rickety is standing next to three posters, Comedy(with Stumbles), Action(with Racals), and Romance(with Dolly), while he stands under an empty frame reading "Drama".


This is a nice little concept Dolly blowing a kiss and Rickety looking tired and almost badass.


This is a cool poster idea in which Rickety is alone on stage and the audience are all the secondary characters.

This is my new "everyone has a gun" poster. I kinda like this one(even though Blusto isn't going to be in the animation) because it's very similar to the overly dramatic noir posters I'm trying to emulate. It's got gangsters, femme fatales, downtrodden heroes, and guns!

I also had an idea with Rickety sitting at a bar with a drink and about to put out a cigar with Dolly in the ashtray about to be stubbed out and Stumbles drowning in the bottle, but I haven't figiured that one out just yet. I'm still deciding. Which one do you like the best or think captures the heart of noir?

This week on Noir Review, I'm going to drive you Gun Crazy! From 1950, Gun Crazy is the story about Bart Tare who's obsessed with guns and his crazy gun toting wife Annie Starr as they go on a downward spiral robbing banks and running from the law. Storywise, it's a strange ride, and you know it's not going to end well for anyone, but Peggy Cummings and John Dall carry the film with some wonderful acting.

What you really want to take notice from this are some great cinematography tricks. You can see how they started to experiments with new ways of telling the story. One of the best sequences in the whole film is one long take in which the two drive up and rob a bank. The entire time, the camera is stashed in the back seat of the car as if the viewer were a passenger. You get to see them talk about preparation as they drive up, the tension as Annie is waiting for her hubbie to rob the bank, then the suspense of them getting away. It's a great take.



It's not one of my favorites, but it's still a classic worth checking out. Overall, I'd give it a 45 out of a 63. See you next time, detectives!