ecmort

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I started Noshi Cartoons on YouTube about 10 years ago to showcase my non-lucha work, then promptly forgot about it until today! I've JUST uploaded all 13 episodes of my ninja/yokai saga 'Dead Ringo'! I'm also hoping to start a new lucha/puroresu series on here soon...

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Some designs I was asked to do for a possible Dolemite cartoon series a few years back...

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Socorro. It took a long time for such an apparently simple design, but it's all about shape, and I've finally got something I'm happy with. I'm also looking forward to working with former Mucha Lucha! designer Evan Newby, and one of the best animators I've ever worked with, Michael Dunn, on Socorro next year.

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90 minute wait for my daughter to finish her Tap dancing class, so I snuck into the local for a glass of warm cider and a Socorro sketch. Loving the season!

One more day on Rudopolis, then back onto Socorro. Still have to nail her design.

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There are (as of now) four different versions of Rayo X featuring in the storyline for 'Socorro'. And no, it's not a multiverse thing.

Above right is 'Los Campeones' era Rayo, redesigned to fit the stye of Socorro.

The Moon also features. Above are sketches from the animatic of her in various poses. The middle image is what I'm settling on after taking all the others into account.

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Brighton Mod Weekender!

It's that time again! Right here, right now! ('The In Crowd, Out' above)

London may have given birth to the Mod(ernist) movement, but Brighton where I live is its spiritual home, and every August Bank Holiday weekend the Vespa and Lambretta hordes descend on this seaside city.

After I moved here in 2019, I started a series of art prints centered around some of the city's landmarks - the Palace Pier, Grand Hotel, the Bandstand, the West Pier - and held an exhibition at Hotel Pelirocco in September 2019.

So this weekend is shaping up to be a good one, with a smattering of club events and the king of Two-Tone Mr. Jerry Dammers himself, deejaying at Ska Train on the seafront.

Oh and it's also my and Ingrid's sixteenth wedding anniversary tomorrow!

''Boss Reggae'

My website below...

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'Here's Jimmy' (Animatic)

Here's the backstory: My friend Jim started getting these emails on Friendster (look it up in the history of social networking, circa 1857) from Russian Gals 'looking for the love'.  We thought it would make a great animated sitcom if two of them turned up on his doorstep in Hollywood at the same time...

...and so we came up with 'Here's Jimmy!' This episode sees him co-habitatin' with Ludmilla and Svetlana, who he never seems able to impress.

Anyway there's a plaque on Sunset where they filmed 77 Sunset Strip...we always joked that if we stand on it we may be able to invoke the spirit of 'Kookie' himself...

From 2008...

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Everyone remembers Kookie - Edd 'Kookie' Byrnes from the old WB TV series 77 Sunset Strip - right?

No, of course you don't. Actually it was before my time...and I'm old :)

But while living in Hollywood producing Mucha Lucha!, I came across the old series via a couple of friends, and became obsessed with it - Especially the 'Kookie' character...a beatnik-talking, parking valet, who was the coolest cat on TV and called everybody 'Dad' (short for daddio).

Of course myself and my partner in animation crime Lili Chin had to make a pilot, and actually did a recording session with Edd himself.

Like many of our other self-obsessed projects it was just a little too...er, NICHE. And like many of our other self-obsessed projects, the animatic sits on my external drive. But I've just rediscovered the original series on youtube, and may just bust out the animatic here as a tribute to Edd, who sadly passed away in 2020.

Like, later, dad...

(Character design by Eddie Mort, from 2008)

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Rocquita storyboard panels

After Mucha Lucha! Lili Chin and myself entered into a very frustrating series development relationship with Cartoon Network Asia/Pacific. Asia/Pacific? Yes, our studio was based in Sydney at the time, and so that was the CN region we worked with.

Despite a LOT of production work - a complete 30 minute episode of Cosmic Baby, concepts and storyboards for Endsville and Boy Lobster - none of these projects ever made it onto the network.

Most frustrating of all was Rocquita, a music-based animated idea with music-themed villains and situations. Apart from a complete script and storyboard, we did casting and recorded a full episode of dialogue in Los Angeles. Unfortunately due to CN hesitation, everything just fizzled out. A shame because this one would have been a lot of fun, and very different design-wise.

I did the storyboard using Toon Boom Storyboard Pro. Here's one of my favorite sequences with Rocquita, Indigo and Joe 101 battling GUITARZILLA!

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Early concept sketches...

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My first exhibition coming up to FIVE years ago...I swear time is speeding up!

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Logged into my fb account for the first time since 2014 and found this random smattering of series and comic ideas...

L to R: 1. Dead Ringo - Having a high-need baby, I was forced to work into the early hours of the morning, hence results like this... 2. Lili Chin and I pitched a version of Dance Crasher to Disney. Of course we had to put together a companion CD mix to go with it. 3. Influenced by the great French artists Serge Clerc and Yves Chaland, this is the first comic I tried to do way back when I was in my early twenties. It didn't go very far. Being in a band made me postpone my art career until I was in my thirties.

Dance Crasher storyboard concept sketches. I really wish we could have pulled this one off...

'Here's Jimmy'. Jimmy meets Dr, Bill for some chat show therapy. 2. 'The Adventures of Davy Croquette'. Yes he was a potato croquette in a coonskin cap. I know, I know...3. The Bostie Boys storyboard sketches for 'King Of Corny Island'.

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Love those old wisenheimer Looney Tunes and Merrie Melodies cartoons, The Bowery Boys and Dead End Kids.

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One-sheeter pitch for the original Dead Ringo series...

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Dead Ringo. After the pilot (which was shown at the New York TV Festival in 2011) I was persuaded to produce 13x3 minute episodes of a 'cuter' Ringo.

Here's the first 6 episodes cut into a pilot, with a teaser for the remaining episodes...new Ringo voice and music. I actually think it works pretty well.

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Storyboard Panels

Some out of sequence panels from 'Socorro'...

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Punk

I was 16 when Punk hit and it's fair to say it changed everything in my life...not just music, but attitude, dress sense, and an impatience with pretentiousness and BS. I started this as a film, then it became a graphic novel, which I then abandoned.

Seeing all those dinosaur acts at the Glastonbury Festival in the UK over the weekend has actually made me feel the need to post this.