Artist Exploration: Randall Christopher

Randall Christopher is the writer and illustrator for his online comic strip Kleeman and Mike. The long awaited animation was recently released and is now online for your viewing pleasure. The animation is light and humorous and leaves the viewer wanting to see more of the two main characters Kleeman and Mike and the supporting cast which includes their talking cat named October and Jaques a wolf who speaks in prose. They all surf, skate and sometimes rock. Very different from most comics out on the market today i find the comics and animation very refreshing.

The animation entitled "Jaime's Taco Shop" includes a behind the scenes look at the making of the cartoon. Rotoscoping is taught in the intro to Flash class and was used in the making of this animation as well. Rotoscoping is used for all of the skateboarding scenes and thus gives it a more realistic feel. Randall makes the cartoons with frame by frame drawings. Very few tweens are used. The blend of analog and digital can definatly be seen in each scene. Many of the scenes look like paintings. Check the hot sauce scene and try not to laugh out loud...it is hillarious.

More of Randall's work can be seen on Andy Davis' website. He took a simple drawing and made it into a surfing loop that goes on forever.