Bio

With an unbridled passion for cinema in all its manifestations, I've worked for nearly three decades as a designer, art director and director of both animated and live action projects, with a special emphasis on stop-motion.

I began my career as a designer, model maker and sculptor, lending my skills to such diverse projects as sculpting aliens for Star Trek V and designing and building miniature sets for the opening titles of Pee Wee’s Playhouse. I specialized principally in miniature sets for visual effects and stop-motion projects, and set the tone for a variety of commercial campaigns, including the first several Chevron “Talking Cars” spots at Aardman Animations in 1994, a campaign which continues to this day.

I came to Portland, Oregon in the early 90’s taking on the mantle of Senior Art Director at Will Vinton Studios, overseeing the design demands of all studio output. In that capacity I became production designer and director of five episodes over the three season run of the Fox TV series, The PJs for which I was nominated for an art direction Annie award in 2000. I also directed the first episode of UPN’s, Gary and Mike animated series and the pilot demo for Warner Brother’s, Slacker Cats

Joining the directing team at Bent Image Lab in 2003 my animated commercials for Tractor Supply Company (TSC) have received awards and attention for their outstanding creative design and dry, understated humor. TSC’s “Koi Pond”, was voted one of the 50 best spots of 2006 by Adweek. I have directed numerous commercials for clients including several Kellogg’s Twistables, Quaker, Chips Ahoy!, Hallmark, Ensure, Cartoon Network, Lowes and Aflac.

In 2014 I directed an action packed 12 second 2D Flash sequence that appeared during end title sequence of the hit film, 22 Jump Street, depicting its stars, Channing Tatum and Jonah Hill as characters in an animated TV series.

From September of 2015 through August of 2017 I had the pleasure of serving as co-Production Designer with Adam Stockhausen on Wes Anderson's latest stop-motion feature, Isle Of Dogs. It was a 2 year gig working at Three Mills Studios in East London, and I was very fortunate to be able to team up with Art Director, Curt Enderle, with whom I've worked several times over the past 20 years. Barry Jones was our spectacular Lead Set Dresser and Erica Dorn and Annie Atkins led our Graphics Artist. Our sets were in really excellent hands with Tristan Oliver as Cinematographer. The film was released in the US on March 23, 2018.

In February of 2019 I was honored to share with Adam Stockhausen the Art Directors Guild award for Excellence in Production Design for an Animated Feature for our work on Isle of Dogs.

In 2019 I joined the team working with Henry Selick for his Netflix feature, Wendell And Wild as Production Designer, working with Art Directors, Tom Proost, Matt Brooks, Jason Lajka and Concept Illustrator, Kenneth Leoncito The film premiered on October 28, 2022.

In 2021 I followed that project up joining Bix Pix Entertainment to design the Apple TV+ series, Shape Island, based on the Shapes Trilogy books by Mac Barnett and Jon Klassen and directed by Drew Hodges. The series is set to premier on January 20, 2023. Interestingly enough, following a 35 year career in animation, this was the first time since Pee Wee’s Playhouse back in 1989 that I worked in content aimed squarely at kids (Ignoring of course a sizeable number of commercials for sugary breakfast cereals and snack foods, as I do not consider TV advertising to be “content”).

My visual style has always been guided by a love for cinema history, and have occasionally curated film screenings in Portland, where I live with my wife, the internationally acclaimed filmmaker Joanna Priestley.