Opening Day
March 30, 2011 By Leave a Comment
This week I began a new series of editorial videos for Slate.com. Up till now I have used a production crew to create short films. This works very well for TV where you can find (if you’re lucky) a budget of some kind. The web is different. If I wanted to continue this online, I realized I had to get the costs down. So finally, after some fuss and education I have gotten the video deal down to the cost of an editorial illustration. Thanks to Bill Smee and everyone at Slate for giving this a go. Shooting for one a week. Let’s see what happens. I will put these up as I do them. A big difference between this and print is that success is measured in clicks . . . not only editorial decision preference. So your page-view really helps. Hope you like.
In honor of opening day, who these ballplayers remind you of?
The Giants’ Brian Wilson?
Manny Ramirez?
A-Rod?
Milton Bradley?
Stephen Strasburg and Jordan Zimmermann?
See the full video at http://www.slatev.com/video/opening-day-meets-2012/
BLOOD WORK
January 15, 2011 By Leave a Comment
Gradually the events of this week became about our politics and, in a strange turn, Palin. What was really written on her hand all along? Her lack of moral leadership in the light of tragedy has been especially glaring. As, in retrospect, is her rhetoric. Strangely her gun-toting TV show ended this past weekend. Here’s my take on the “old” Palin image (for Need to Know):
And the New Yorker:
Boots and Saddles
March 30, 2010 By 1 Comment
With the news of RNC Chair Michael Steele’s patronage of West Hollywood’s leather and bondage club Voyeur (with RNC money) we can now understand Sarah’s get-up in her recent McCain rally appearance. She knows how to apply GOP family values with correct discipline. And how they love it!
From The Daily Heller
Steven Heller, esteemed art director, educator and all round design guru blasted scenes from tomorrow’s film by me on “Sarah Palin’s Alaska” all over his Daily Heller this morning. I will post that film asap. Many thanks to Mr. Heller and the guys who work on this project. More on them soon.
Sarah, Sarah, Sarah
by Steven Heller · 0 comments
Need to Know is a weekly PBS news magazine hosted by Alison Stewart and John Meachem, covering the week’s news with longer perspectives than a daily show. It airs Friday nights at 8:30 in NYC. Since May, Steven Brodner has been a regular contributor of an animated illustration commentary. His latest segment (watch it tomorrow, Friday, Nov. 19) takes aim at the former governor Sarah Palin’s new eponymous TLC reality show, “Sarah Palin’s Alaska,” wherein the branding of Mrs. P continues, or as Brodner says, “politics can be completely divorced from policy.”
I asked Brodner to tell me about his reasons for creating this caricature-commentary:
What prompted this video? This video was prompted by a New Yorker assignment actually [below bottom]. I was asked to draw Palin for [TV Critic] Nancy Franklin’s recent review. For this I saw clips of the [reality] show. My reactions found their way into the NYr piece as well as the ideas for this film.
You mean Palin is not your favorite politician? Palin may or may not be a revolutionary politician. The ways in which she is different from all the others are ways which seem to make her more popular with her base. This suggests a kind of genius. She may be perfect for the content-free, reality show world, where celebrity trumps all.
Have you developed a method of capturing her likeness, or will you be evolving this as time goes on? I feel I am beginning to find my Palin. But she is a work in progress too. We have perhaps that much in common! We don’t know really what her face “means” until we see where she goes. Enough to want to stay tuned. Keeping lots of Pepto on hand, however.
Here is a previous episode. (The Refinery is the production house for this series /DP Jacob Williams, animator/editor Bryan Brinkman.)
The Sound of Sarah published in The New Yorker