We are a Mexican publishing house and creative studio founded in 1994 by Will Eisner Award winner, Oscar Gonzalez Loyo, along with his wife, Susana Romero, and his father, Oscar Gonzalez Guerrero. We're specialized in family and children-oriented comic books, contents, publicity mascots, storyboards, motion comics, graphic design, animation, scripts and edutainment products for both digital and printed platforms.

Our career includes collaborations and titles with companies such as Coca-Cola, Nestlé, Bongo Comics-The Simpsons, Televisa-Sesame Street, Warner Bros-Looney Tunes, Blue Demon Jr., Right Stuff Inc.-Astroboy, Bubble Gummers, Coqueta & Audaz, Disney Mexico, among many others.

Friday, December 08, 2006

WORKING WITH VON GLITSCHKA

Many years ago, I came across the work of an Oregon-based designer by the name of Von Glitschka through The Iconfactory and other websites.

Since the first moment, I was hooked into his wacky illustration style. Googling some research on him, I found out that he was also really professional... his work and website we're always inspirations for me; about the way one should relate with the clients, about design methodologies, service, etc.

Some months ago, Von started creating self-owned websites everywhere with design and illustration as his central subject. He is a defender of creatorship (is there such a word?) on Bad Design Kills. An suddenly... I was REALLY hooked into his updates and news. I was a Von-addict! He created a website that serves as an extension to his college illustration classes at illustrationclass.com



What really amazed me is that Von shared all his knowledge and working process with everyone. It is rare nowadays to watch someone as fearless as him, 'cause everyone is afraid of sharing their secrets. And as Yoda-wisdom tells: "Fear is the path to the Dark side...".
Now, then... I thought I was a Freehand wizard, 'till I watched tutorial after tutorial how he quirked his vectors and made all this things I have never experimented with. And man, was it fun to make fun of Tonatiuh, who is a long time Illustrator user (and also Von admirer) showing him what Von had did that week that Illustrator couldn't... ha ha ha... until Von switched to Illustrator, becoming even part of an Adobe CS2 campaign. :-P

Von Glitschka is not just a simple designer, he is an "Illustrative Designer", the guy is an amazing mix of computer science and handmade art. Always thinking that the important, crucial and essential part of design takes place outside of the box. Von is correct, the computer is just a tool that allows us to translate our vision to it, not vice versa. If a designer depends on the computer effects to make something work out, that designer won't be more than tomorrow's old news.



I decided to write this post, to share something really special for me by being part of this crazy creative team in ¡Ka-Boom!, the fact that in the course of my life I've had the chance (and luck) to meet many of my heroes, who in many cases are comic book or animation artists. It is a great sensation to think that I have met my childhood heroes like Stan Lee and many other comic book artists.

I met Oscar many years after being a die-hard fan of Karmatron. I have worked in K! full-time for a couple of years now, and there's virtually not a single day that I don't think how fortunate I am to work with one of my childhood heroes, who is now my best friend, my brother, my teacher and fellow artist.

I've had the chance to get a major influence on the work of Phil Yeh, also, a California-based comic book artist after meeting him through Oscar.



I've met and interviewed Robert Rodriguez, one of my favorite film directors. Last summer I met John Lasseter... my God! I was sooo nervous! It was like meeting the succeeder of Walt Disney!

And some weeks ago I got in touch with Von Glitschka who started making tutorial Spanish translations at illustrationclass.com but I noticed that Babel Fish was not accurate enough for design terminology; so I offered to help Von out with this from now on.

It is strange to be friends with someone who is really far away from you, whom you have never met in person. E-lationtips they call it. He he he...



Nevertheless its such a great thing to be in touch with one of my favorite illustrator/designers, being able to help him out with educating a medium that needs this kind of advices...

We have also put Von in touch with Sergio Aragonés so he can be interviewed in Von's Podcast. And in the near future we'll be contributing for an illustration class tutorial ourselves! I look forward to contribute and team-up with him in other projects! It's been a blast!

Our first "joint venture" aired today on illustrationclass.com and is about a project Von has developed for the last year: Keyboard Characters, which are these way cool illustrations that you can place in the last row of your keyboard... they will watch you over while you work, blog and go through your e-mail.

Get this limited edition while it lasts!
And if you're a designer, illustrator or just one creative-craving soul get over to illustrationclass.com to get covered in the stuff that real design is made of!

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