Cover story · Character design · Disney
Why wonky drawings feel alive
A Christmas character with no mouth, more than 250 drawings, and a brief that asked for less polish, not more.
Read entry ↗Journal
The Hired Eye.
Projects, process and occasional notes on the culture around the work.
Five working entries · 2026
Designing a dance partner for one
How an eight-armed dancer turned an engineering proposition into a character people could understand.
3 min read ↗
Scorsese, geraniums and UFOs
A note on old Hollywood, new technology and why familiar cinematic language still gives a short commercial cultural weight.
3 min read ↗
When the birds steal the brief
A large field of possible birds, a shoe somewhere in the frame, and the productive danger of making the supporting image too compelling.
3 min read ↗
Taste after abundance
Thousands of possible images change the job. The scarce resource is no longer output. It is judgement.
6 min read ↗
The work beneath the work
Why drawing, composition and visual judgement still sit beneath every tool and every finished image.
2 min read ↗Designing from behaviour
A character becomes useful when silhouette, gesture and personality all point in the same direction.
2 min read ↗Building the image around the idea
Concept art finds the visual language; matte painting makes that world hold together.
2 min read ↗Speed is useful. Judgement is essential.
Fast visual exploration creates options; craft, taste and direction decide which ones deserve to move forward.
2 min read ↗Journal
Working notes.
A chronological reading index for projects, process and the larger visual culture around them.
01
Character design · Disney
Why wonky drawings feel alive
4 min
Journal
Pictures, then words.
A looser visual notebook about commercial image-making and the culture it sits inside.
Why wonky drawings feel alive
A Christmas character with no mouth, more than 250 drawings, and a brief that asked for less polish, not more.
4 min read ↗Designing a dance partner for one
How an eight-armed dancer turned an engineering proposition into a character people could understand.
3 min read ↗Scorsese, geraniums and UFOs
A note on old Hollywood, new technology and why familiar cinematic language still gives a short commercial cultural weight.
3 min read ↗When the birds steal the brief
A large field of possible birds, a shoe somewhere in the frame, and the productive danger of making the supporting image too compelling.
3 min read ↗Taste after abundance
Thousands of possible images change the job. The scarce resource is no longer output. It is judgement.
6 min read ↗The work beneath the work
Why drawing, composition and visual judgement still sit beneath every tool and every finished image.
2 min read ↗Designing from behaviour
A character becomes useful when silhouette, gesture and personality all point in the same direction.
2 min read ↗Building the image around the idea
Concept art finds the visual language; matte painting makes that world hold together.
2 min read ↗Speed is useful. Judgement is essential.
Fast visual exploration creates options; craft, taste and direction decide which ones deserve to move forward.
2 min read ↗PrototypeA — Cover story