from the portfolio of David Michael Friend

Resume


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awards - computer skills - special skills - education

Space Racers

(2012 - 2016)

Art Director and Lead Designer

Art directed and designed for the children's animated television show, Space Racers.[expand]
Art directed 50 - 12 minute episodes of the "science-fact" television show Space Racers. Generated character designs, modle packs, turnarounds, style sheets, style frames, costumes, props and sets. Communicated with Director and Producer remotely as well as an in house designer to insure characters, sets and props were on model and cohesive throughout the season. Using NASA generated photographs as a base, hand painted background plates for sets. Designed and supervised the coloring of the environments and characters. [final product]

Sprite Animation

(2015-2016)

Designer

Yo-Kai Watch [expand]
Worked remotely on the US translation of the animation show "Yo-Kai Watch"; redesigning portions of props and environments that originally contained Japanese specific words or images.

Monozorro

(2007-2016)

Co-Owner

New York Village Halloween Parade [expand]
Co-designed the official logos for the 2010-2015 city parade. These were displayed on street banners along the Avenue of Americas during the weeks leading up to Halloween. The organization also sold T-shirts and posters with the logo to help raise money for the event.
Broadway Junior [expand]
Co-designed the official poster for the 2015 Broadway Junior Finale event

SourceMedia

(2014-2015)

Animator and Designer

Illustration and animation[expand]
Designed, storyboarded, illustrated, and animated (to a provided script and voice-over) 1 to 2 minute spots for product advertisements in a "whiteboard" style.

Ibex Puppetry

(2005 - 2015)

Illustrator

Director

Moonfishing [expand]
Production designer, writer, and director for a short animated piece featuring puppets and hand drawn backgrounds. Coordinated the puppet and set build. [final product]

Warhorse Films

(2014-2015)

Fabricator and Puppeteer

Freelance Fabricator and Puppeteer [expand]
Took the Kahlua Salted Caramel product and transformed it and various coffee cup paraphernalia into puppet-able characters (with rigs and costumes) for three spots directed by Andrew Wonder and Warhorse Films
[final product]

RSA

(2006-2014)

Storyboard Artist

Storyboard artist for Starters commercials

Sarofsky

(2010 - 2014)

Designer

Pre-production design for film and television[expand]
Designed characters for various commercials for web and television for such end clients as TBS, MetLife, Capri Sun, NBC, Silverwood Films and General Motors.

Mondo Publishing

(2003 - 2013)

Illustrated children's picture books and graphic novels

Designed and illustrated Richard W. Friend III's "Atalanta"[expand]
Designed and illustrated a 4 page full color comic adaptation of the Greek heroine Atalanta as part of an anthology of Greek Myths.
Designed and illustrated Richard W. Friend III's "Daniel and the Great Bearded One"[expand]
Designed and illustrated an 80 page full color comic depicting the journey of a retired Pirate and his young tag-a-long in search for his ultimate treasure. [final product]
Designed and illustrated Alice Low's "Blueberry Mouse"[expand]
Designed and illustrated 16 Full color spreads, hand drawn in watercolor and colored pencil [final product]

SpeakeasyFX

(2008 - 2011)

Art Director and Production Designer

Art directed and designed for Sesame Workshop's Abby's Flying Fairy School.[expand]
Generated character designs, modle packs, turnarounds, style sheets, style frames, costumes, props and sets. Communicated with SoftImage XSI artists and a team of designers to insure characters, sets and props were on model and cohesive throughout the season. Illustrated texture maps for models and digitally handpainted background plates for sets. Designed and supervised the coloring of the environments and characters. [final product]
Illustrated for Sony Picture's Community intro [expand]
Worked with Sarofsky Corp to develop the illustations for the "cootie catcher" model in the title sequence of the sit-com television series Community. [final product]
Character and background design for title sequence of An Invisible Sign of My Own [expand]
Co-Designed the characters and worked with Sarofsky Corp to develop the look of the title sequence for the feature film An Invisible Sign of My Own. [final product]

PandaPanther

(2010)

Storyboard Artist

Storyboard artist on Pop Tarts commercial

Flickerlab

(2004 - 2010)

Art direction for various commercials and web content in 2D animated, photo collage and digitally hand painted spots.

Clients included The Colbert Report, Ford, St Joseph's Medical Center, American Legacy, Threat, St. Mary's Medical Center.

Background Artist

Background artist (both digitally painted and photo collage) on animations for Tide, The Colbert Report, American Legacy and Threat

DraftFCB

(2008)

Designed and directed for City Harvest's RescueFood.org web campaign.

Design and fabrication of characters and set, while supervising a team of builders. Worked with Director of Photography (using a SLR camera) and directed puppeteers and crew to produce the desired look. [final product]

Child Abuse Prevention Services

(2005 - 2006)

Designed and directed educational "SurfSafe!"

Process included working with the client to provide the initial design, storyboards and character designs, that would be both entertaining and clear to children ages 12-16 and instigated a converstion with them about the dangers of digital communications with the students. Shorts were shown in Long Island (NY) schools. [final product]

Simon & Schuster

(2005 - 2006)

Illustrated Young Adult fantasy novels

Full color cover and black and white interior illustrations for J.T. Petty's Young Adult books The Squampkin Patch: A Nasselrogt Adventure, and Clemency Pogue: The Scrivener Bees

Curious Pictures

(1996-2005)

Freelance artist for on-air props and production

Illustrated concept designs, character designs, storyboards, and other various visuals on projects for such clients as Virgin Slims, Disney, Mattel, Reeses, Kraft, RC Cola, Quaker Oats, Miller Lite commercial and Dove commercial

Sesame Workshop

(1998 - 1999)

Illustrations for web site content

Illustratated interactive "Magic Storybook" for website including Cookies Can't Laugh , Girls Can Do Anything , Goodnight Grover , Light's Out , and A Silly Sandwhich for Bert . Illustratated digital postcards for Sesame Street's website post office.

Nearlife, Inc.

(1997 - 1999)

Illustrated and designed for interactive museum and web installations, including characters, environments and user interfaces.

Illustrated and designed for interactive museum and web installations, including characters, environments and user interfaces.

Drama of Works

(1996 - 2008)

Puppet and promotional design for international puppet & theater troupe

illustrated promotional media for theater shows, including Carnival of Samhain, Doctor Faustus and The Ballad of Phineas P. Gage

Possible Worlds

(2001 - 2005)

Art and animation director for multi-media, expirimental produciton company

Animation director on real-time animation system Kabuki. Overseeing a variety of characters, both 2D and 3D, incuding classic Sesame Street characters.

Baron & Baron

(2007)

Storyboard artist for nationally reknown commercial house

storyboard artist for Diesel commericial

Loyal Kaspar

(2003 - 2004)

Pre-production artist for innovative commercial house

Storyboards for Televisa commercial

The Jim Henson Company

(2005)

Pre-production artist for film companys

Character and concept art for production

Janet Zweig

(2001 - 2007)

Concept illustrator for New York based fine artist and installation artist

visualized concepts for installation art proposals

@radical.media

(1999 - 2004)

Inbetweener, inker, and clean-up draftsman on traditional animation and After Effect compositor for interior ambiance videos to be shown in the Marvel Mania, the LA based Marvel Comics themed restaurant.

Hornet, Inc.

(2004)

Illustrated concept design for Advair commercial

The Artists Company

(2006)

Preproduction work on various commercials

Ingeenie Studios

(2002 - 2003)

Character designer for various projects

Department of Film

(2002)

Set design for Trina's "Told Ya'll" music video

Edgeworx

(1999)

Character design and key frames for Tom Tomorrow's "This Modern World" episodes, to be aired on Saturday Night Live, including episodes Nuts and Wallstreet

MadApple Films

(2005-2006)

Traditional animation for title sequence for Windows, an indepenedant film by Shoja Azari

70/30 Productions

(2000)

Clean-up and After Effects compositing on Cartoon Network's Adult Swim series SeaLab 2021

Alt Digital

(1999)

Art direction, animating and After Effects compositing on Tony Millionaire's Maakies shorts to be aired on Saturday Night Live
awards
Film
2011 Newport Beach Film Festival - Audience Choice Award [for Moonfishing]
2011 Dragon*Con - Audience Choice Award [for Moonfishing]

Illustration
2002 Society of Illustrators Dimensional Salon
1996 Society of Illustrators Recipient of the Starr Foundation Award
1996 Society of Illustrators Finalist in Student Scholarship Contest

Theater
2008 Jim Henson Foundation puppet grant for Ego
2002 Jim Henson Foundation puppet grant with Drama of Works
2000 Jim Henson Foundation puppet grant with Drama of Works

special skills
puppeteer/puppet maker
sculptor

Friend has given lectures about puppetry and film at Rhode Island School of Design, New York University, Parsons School of Designs and Dragon*con (Atlanta, GA)
computer knowledge...
education
Parsons School of Design
(Division of the New School for Social Research)
New York, New York
 Illustration Major, BFA

School of Visual Arts
New York, New York
Stop Motion Animation Class