Episode 003: Claws of the Beast

Episode 003: Sometimes color design comes quickly... and often it takes several passes to get what the director and art director are looking for. In "Claws of the Beast" I didn't have that many keys to color, but it took time to get the the right feeling for each sequence. When working with color... it's easy to design a single shot... but things get more complicated when you have to make each shot work together with all the other shots in the story.

Pilot Color

After the initial board pitch, Nickelodeon approved a pilot episode.

Above: The first color pass on the "El Tigre" pilot episode. Just putting up a lot of swatches to get an overall feel for the color transitions from sequence to sequence. These were later adjusted after talks with Jorge, Roman, and Dave. But it was a good place to start.

I was experimenting with making the flashback sequences in super limited color... almost like a comic book. In the end it was decided to keep them black and white by Roman, Jorge, and Dave ... which I think made the sequences more interesting.

Above: Here we were still experimenting with the idea of "colorizing" sequences according to the character. For example here we were thinking of coloring Rudolpho's superhero sequences in blue... to make them stand out more. Ultimately the idea was dropped early.

Above: The "Money Madness" sequence. Manny and Frida steal from all the super villians... Jorge wanted this sequence to "Melt the eyes of the audience" with it's powerful color.

Above: The final showdown with "Sartana of the Dead"

Below: A few of my exploratory pencil sketches for some of the locations in the episode. Sketches like these are made after reading the script... then handed off to Jorge, Roman, and Dave, often ideas are worked back into the boards and location designs... and sometimes they lead to other things. But it's a fun part of the process.

Episode 002: Nightmare Green or Nightmare of Living Guacamole

Above: The story arc... worked out by Dave, Jorge, and Roman. This helped us all sync ... especially in the early episodes.


Sometimes new locations would need to be designed... in this episode I worked up a version of the local market... trying out a few different color schemes.

El Tigre! location design

-Before El Tigre went into production, show creators Jorge Gutierrez, and Sandra Equihua and art director, Roman Laney and I talked about what direction the show should take. At this point the show hadn't been "green-lit". I started making rough pencil, and then sketches of the main locations that would eventually be used in the pilot episode.


Above: A few of my early exploratory sketches from "El Tigre!"

Most of my early sketches were close in value, with little or no black in the backgrounds. There was a lot of black on the characters, and I wanted them to read well. But this gave a sort of calm feeling, and Jorge wanted everything in the show to be "Super Macho!"... having more contrast, more texture, more of everything. It made designing a bit more difficult, but also gave the intensity Jorge wanted. A lot of the art styling was worked out in the pilot by Roman. By the time "El Tigre" had been picked up as a series... the look had been fully established.

Above: Art director, Roman Laney, and his team took a lot of the development art, and created a beautiful, and unique look for "El Tigre". Check out Roman's website to see more amazing art from the show.

Episode 001 : Vendetta

My main job on "El Tigre" was working with the creative team to help establish the color and look of each episode by creating a rough "colorscript"... indicating color, light, and mood. This information was then passed onto the rest of the team to help guide the art.

All my color scripts are based on director Dave Thomas' beat boards. Dave's boards are great to work on... the staging is clear... and there is little guesswork on my part.

Each week show co-creator Jorge Gutierrez, art director Roman Laney, Dave Thomas and I would have a phone conference and talk about the direction each episode should go... and any adjustments that I would need to make on the previous weeks episode.

The First production episode of El Tigre was probably one of the more difficult ones. We were still trying to establish the style and look of the show... so I tried out a few color variations throughout the episode. The colorscripts became easier and easier as we established the color of each location. Though this could also change... depending on the mood and story we were telling. Jorge hates purple and pinks, because they are not manly enough. In this episode I wanted to echo the purples and pinks of the villains costume in sections of the episode. But I gave him an alternate "bluer" version. Surprisingly he and Roman decided to go with the pink/purple version.