WE CAN'T WAIT TO START FILMING!

Season 4 is under way which is very exciting, but we just can't wait to start filming!

"Adventure Episode" Design Concepts Part 1

The Adventure Episode; One of my favorites!
Christian's brilliant script called for Muno to discover an underground passage leading to an ancient Mesoamerican-esque temple where he discovers a golden statue resembling an ear of corn. This is no doubt paying homage to our favorite adventure movies of the 80's.

Brandon Minton sent over this early computer sketch to show where we needed to start. We had to build a miniature model as well as a full scale set for the top of the temple.


I started clicking my mouse too and brought to the table the concept below. I heard that DEVO's energy-dome hats were actually inspired by Mayan temples, so I thought it would be fun with art-imitating-life imitating art again and tried a DEVO inspired temple shape.
It didn't really work and we went back to the traditional block shape.




Then I put down the mouse down and picked up the colored pencils. More sloppy = more fun!
The colors here were important to me. I didn't want warm rock colors. I wanted something cool & stony but still Yo Gabba bright. I went for blues, greens and purples; a meager nod to Eyvind Earle's genius castle interiors from one of my favorite movies, Sleeping Beauty.

I felt that bright green moss everywhere would really make the the background pop in certain areas.
I'm often throwing in concept ideas that just don't work budget or script-wise but are fun. Why not have a puppet snake in the background? Oh..yeah, that's why.
Also notice the popcorn motif on the altar. It's a tiny reveal to the forthcoming popcorn payoff at the end of the script.
Later I thought it might be fun if the carved faces in the background were more character specific to the show, so I made them random smiling Goobles instead of generic tiki-hieroglyphs. I confess, I try to sneak Gooble in as much as possible.

The script also called for a pillar or post for Muno to lasso and climb up on, as showed here in Julia Vickerman's storyboard.

So I was asked to design a pillar. BO-RING. I figured if we were going to make our guys sculpt and paint something, it might as well be fun looking, right? I felt it was another oppurtunity to work in some more YGG characters. Naturally, I first thought of another chance to work in Gooble, but maybe too much...

... We are telling the story of an ancient ruin, not my fascination with a crying ghost, so I drew inspiration from these gargoyles representing the great Quetzelcoatl, or "feathered serpent"

I thought that our own little cat-dragon Toodee would pull this look off really well, so there's your pillar design for you.

Also, I had this idea of having the top of the temple to resemble a Pizza Hut. Wouldn't you think that's funny? I guess it was just me. Bryan Anderton pointed out that with Muno being almost 7 feet tall, it would be difficult to even fit that roof into frame. You win some, you lose some.

And now, here's how it turned out! (Click to enlarge)

Hooray for corn!

Parker showing art and doodling this weekend!

kids of all ages A celebration of children’s books and the artists behind them.

5.28.10 – 6.25.10.

Opening night – Friday 5.28.10 7-10PM. With a special reading of “An Awesome Book” by Dallas Clayton.

Also, a weekend full of awesome events for the kids!

Saturday 5.29.10 11AM-2PM. Special readings, a musical performance by Aska Matsumiya w/ her daughter Babel, make art on free pairs of kid sized Van’s with Travis Millard, Mel Kadel, and Parker Jacobs!

Sunday 5.30.10 11AM-2PM. More special readings, a musical performance by Mickey Adams and friends, and more!

Free children’s THIS shirts designed by Dallas Clayton.

We are all super excited for our 4th show at THIS, a huge celebration of children’s books with books and original artwork from the artists available for purchase with a portion of the proceeds going to 826 LA.

For more details click HERE


Also: be sure to follow Parker's daily doodles over at http://parkerjacobs.blogspot.com/

Yo Gabba Gabba has left the building

No, Yo Gabba Gabba isn't canceled, but we have left the building. That's right, this week we've completely left the studio and are finishing the final touches of Season 3 over at the Magic Store production office. Fun! Fun? Fun!

....show biz....

PHOTO OF THE DAY!

Photo of the day

WE DID IT! Yo Gabba Gabba at the TCAs!

Ok! This past weekend Yo Gabba Gabba was honored with a TELEVISION CRITICS ASSOCIATION AWARD for BEST CHILDREN'S SHOW!

It is super crazy, but yes, hundreds of legitimate television critics from across the nation honored us with this amazing award. it was such an honor to be recognized along side so many other incredible ground breaking shows.

Check here for links to the articles on the awards and the ceremony:
Click here for the article on tvcritics.org
Click here for the article on hollywoodreporter.com

We took some fun photos and were so honored to accept such an honor, on behalf of all of the great friends we work together with on the show. Now, if the emmys would catch a hint! HA!



Here is a photo of 'almost' all of us in attendance at the show. (left to right) Director Scott Schultz, his lovely wife Ruth, (in back) Associate Producer Nate Rogers, Nick Jr. Executive Jason Caparaz, Executive Producer John Berrett, DJ lance Rock, Director Christian Jacobs, Animation Art Director Parker Jacobs and Executive Producer Mike Polis



Not only were we invited to the ceremony, we got our own table... with our name on it! Scott can't hardly believe it!



Here is Dj Lance Rock and TCA winner Bryan Cranston (Breaking Bad, Malcom in the Middle) Mr. Cranston's acceptance speech had DJ Lance and C. Jacobs in stitches, especially when he suggested host Chelsea Handler got her jokes out of the trash can! HA! He was super cool!



Here is Ruth Schultz and Kristin Berrett looking lovely.



Executive Producer Jon Berrett and Kristin holding the award. Jon was the first guy to take a chance on Yo Gabba Gabba Magic Store and well... thanks Jon! We did it!

Parker's birthday extravaganza!

I know what you're thinking, we just love cake right? Well yes, you are right. We love birthdays even more, today we had the great pleasure to celebrate Parker's. Just look at how surprised he was when we lured him into the birthday cave...



His mighty lungs blew out the thousands of candles with ease...



Even Tyler was here to help celebrate; BROTHERHOOD!



Hooray! Happy birthday Parker, we all love you.

The Art of Yo Gabba Gabba!

Mirrored VIA: CARTOON BREW


This Saturday, July 11, in Minneapolis, the Pink Hobo Gallery (507 E. Hennepin Ave.) will host an art show “The Art of Yo Gabba Gabba!” featuring artwork from the Nick Jr. TV series. Among the items on display: never-before-seen original drawings and sketches from the show’s creator and lead designer Parker Jacobs, props used in the show, and original production artwork from the show’s guest artists including King Mini, Mark Mothersbaugh, Option-G, Panda Panther, Megan Brain, Aaron Stewart, Mitch Loidolt, Tim Sievert, Julia Vickerman, and Tanya Haden. The opening is between 5pm and 1am. The show will continue to run after this weekend, but beware that the gallery doesn’t keep normal hours because it’s located in the offices of the production company Puny Entertainment. More details are available on this Facebook invite.

Friends and "Family"

Here at Yo Gabba Gabba, we really do get by "with a little help from our friends". With that said, I'm so glad to announce that the Yo Gabba Gabba "Family" episode is finally available! "Family" is one of my favorites of Season 2. I love this one for many reasons, but particularly as a character designer, I've been anticipating this one for a while because it introduces some new characters to Gabbaland. Muno's Mom, Muno's Dad, his sister Chibo (♥♥♥) and his baby brother Gogo.

Now this is where the friends part comes in. The script called for Muno's Mom to have a purse. The purse has to be functional, fashionable and it also has to magically be able hold items that are larger than itself (like Mary Poppins' carpet bag). The size has to be customized to fit Muno's mom because Gabbaland cyclopses are a bit bigger that normal humans. I happen to have a little bit of background in the accessory world, and I knew that for a cool mom like Muno's, this purse can't just be a prop. So I knew the right person to call...The marvelous, mysterious, mad, mad, mister meaner herself, MISSY BROOME.



I worked alongside Missy many years ago, back in the glory days of Paul Frank Industries. Sidenote: Anybody remember the J & MISSY Cat bag? That's a good example of my art + Missy's pursiness. Anyways, Missy is amazing. She's also worked for Roxy, teaches design at OCC and she's the creator of the world famous HOWDY.

So I called Missy up with our little design project, and instantly she was on it. She whipped up 3 amazing concepts and once we settled on one, she nailed it and quickly shipped it over to us. I was surprised to find that for production purposes, she fashioned two versions. One was normal and the other had a velcro trap-door bottom to solve our "Mary Poppins" issue. Brilliant! The craftsmissyship was impeccable.


She even lined the bags with this far-out polka dot print! Not necessary for a "prop" but this was no prop, this was a cyclops woman's vital fashion accessory! In this shot, Muno's Mom is pulling out all of the items necessary to make lemonade.



Like I said, we really do get by with a little help from our friends. Missy did all of this for us out of the kindness of her (Joan-Jetty-black) heart, asking nothing from us in return. She is just one example of the many dear friends that help us bring this silly little magic show together. We are so thankful for all of them. We love you!

More Missy Broome links:
http://missybroome.com/
http://www.myspace.com/missybroome
http://www.myspace.com/howdymonster

I went to the Licensing Show in Vegas...

...And all I got was this AWESOME picture with Brobee!

Goon Holler Print

Just in time for the holidays, it's a new print from Parker Jacobs! Featuring one of his goons as seen on the hit TV show, "Yo Gabba Gabba". It's Fun! Fun? Fun! A brand new 6 colour, limited edition silkscreen print. Each print is hand signed & numbered by the artist for authentication. Easily framable, it measures 16" X 20" and makes a lovely edition to any study, boudoir, nursery or rumpus room. Available at www.goonholler.com!

Gooble's Origin

As promised, the following is a little background behind Gooble, the ghostlike mysterious Yo Gabba Gabba character.

Artistically, Gooble's origin began with a song off of the Aquabats 1999 "Vs. The Floating Eye of Death" album called, "Monster's Wedding" The song itself is a ghost story; not unlike Tim Burton's 2005 film, The Corpse Bride. In the song, there is a foreboding ghost's voice saying, "you must go". That ghost's name was Obakemon (which translates to "ghost-man" in Japanese).

I did the graphic design for the "Floating Eye of Death" album and I knew that Obakemon would be a real fun character to illustrate for the inside lyric booklet. Of course, he is what he is in the song, a ghost man. I designed him to emulate the style of my brother Christian's signature red cyclopses that he used to doodle all over the place--which eventually became Muno (but that's another story). In promotion of the album, Obakemon later found himself on Aquabats t-shirts, stickers and jackets. They were mostly glow-in-the dark, cuz you know, he's a ghost!

I really dug Obakemon's sad clown look of misery with his candy red lips. I don't know why, but for some reason it visually appealed to me. When I was working at Paul Frank Industries, I had an Obakemon messenger bag custom made for me that I carried around for years and years.

So then, I believe in 2004, Christian & Scott invited me (with a few others) to the first working Yo Gabba Gabba concept meeting. It was then that they pitched the idea of developing a TV project other than The Aquabat Super Show. This was going to be a character based kids show but pulling from what we had already built in the Aquabats universe. I thought it was a great idea to put some of these characters to better use. Muno, Brobee and Gooble are all characters that have Aquabat roots.

We changed Obakemon's name to Gooble because we liked how it sounded. Besides, Obakemon? American kids don't like them Japanese names fer stuff! They like Yu-Gi-Oh! and Pokemon and Apple pie stuff like that!

My job as graphic dude was to help flesh out the early concepts for a pitch. This was Gooble #1:



OK so several years later, we end up making the show. We settle on the 5 main characters, because we just didn't have it in the first season budget to make more! Gooble did survive in a couple of scripts as a minor role, but now he had to be animated. This made me sad because I thought he would look really cool as a live action character.

But then my favorite mistake happened. In the process of making one of the Muno costumes, there was an error, and Muno just didn't turn out right. We spent big dollars on this Muno we simply couldn't use. So, I made this proposal: we take the bad Muno costume, scrape off the bumps and remake it in a Gooble fashion.


...And it worked!


Here, in the episode aptly entitled, "Love", Gooble joins the rest of the cast in a touching rendition of, "Be Nice To Everyone". I personally think this is one of the weirdest moments of Yo Gabba Gabba...and I LOVE it!

Yesterday's Visitor

Brobee dropped by yesterday. It was refreshingly good to see him.
Actually, he kind of snuck up and surprised me...

...but everything's cool now.