LADIES AND GENTLEMEN FLASHGITZ FRIDAY IS FINALLY HERE!
It’s been a crazy week for the mentally disabled. All week, people have been discussing the most retarded things on social media. It’s unavoidable. I’ve started to have dreams about fighting gorillas. I’ve had nightmares about gorillas ripping me in half. Did you know gorilla penises are only an inch long? I wouldn’t have known that if it wasn’t for all the goddamn gorilla talk this week. Luckily for us, it’s finally Friday, so we can all use Flashgitz Friday as a way to recharge in a gorilla-free environment and learn about things that actually matter - cartoons.
If you think this is going to be like any old Flashgitz Friday, you’re dead wrong, because besides the fact that I make EVERY Flashgitz Friday special (and that they’re always written from the heart,) I have a treat this week for our brothers who want to take a deeper look into the inner workings over here at Flashgitz: This week, I interviewed the lead of our background department, Naav, so he could talk about how much he loves working here! Naav has been working for us for quite a few years now, and as background lead and composite designer, he’s responsible for much of our cartoons’ final appearance, whether it’s Space King or parodies. His work is so intertwined within our channel’s style that Flashgitz would be a much different place without him.____________________________________________________________________________
Let’s take a look back at where you started. How long have you been working for Flashgitz and what was the first project you worked on?Naav: The first project I worked on was The Furry Disease in 2020. It was a nice way to “break the ice” at Flashgitz, and after that I was ready to work on whatever the guys threw at me. At the time, I was still living in my parent’s house and I remember having the curtains closed and the door locked so they didn’t see the abominations going through my screen.
At what point did you become the background lead for the channel?Naav: I started as a background artist and became the lead for the background team during the production of one of the most challenging cartoons we’ve ever done, Fear the Furry.What was so bad about Fear the Furry?If I’m not misremembering, I took over in the middle of the project to help out Don, it was the most ambitious cartoon we’ve ever done, with the most amount of backgrounds and artists working on it at the time, and since I didn’t have any experience as a lead before that, I felt I was thrown into the fire. I think I almost declined the offer but I was curious if I was gonna be able to do it, so I accepted for that reason. It ended up being a good way to learn and the upcoming projects didn’t feel as heavy since this one was so big.
Check out our Making Of Fear the Furry video to see if Naav is exaggerating (he’s not.)What’s the first thing you do when you get started on a background? Run us through the process a little bit.Naav: Since I’ve been doing concept art lately, I spend a lot of time just looking at references and gathering images that can serve as a starting point for a location idea while keeping in mind the rough descriptions from the script.
What do you do after wasting company time looking at pretty pictures?Naav: After I have more or less an idea of what to do, I start drawing the most awful, illegible sketches you can imagine. At this point I’m just trying to get something on the canvas, even if I’m the only one who can understand what the hell is going on, the idea is to commit to paper as much of what’s coming to mind before spending time on details. I don’t think I ever show these to anyone.
When I have a few thumbnails I start cleaning them up a bit so the art director [Don] can understand the abominations I started with. I still keep them rough though, my mindset is always to try and use as little time as possible during this phase.
How much back and forth do you usually have with the art director [Don] at this point?Naav: After the art director picks one or two of my ideas, I start working on final lines and get them ready for the next step. If we still need more iterations, I just get back to the drawing board.
Once everyone is happy with the lineart and design, it’s finally time for colors, easily my favourite part of the process. Here, I get the chance to finish bringing my initial idea to life! If it is a new location, I need to come up with some preliminary color tests, before committing to a final palette.Do you have a favorite type of scene to work on? Landscapes, space ships, anime heaven, etc? I don’t really have favourite subjects, but I hate drawing vehicles, they demand too much precision, and it just gets boring too quickly for me. I’m lucky to work with a lot of talented people that can do a better job than me in that regard.
Did you face any challenges adapting your style to fit our approach over here at Flashgitz?The Flashgitz art style is pretty far removed from what my style is, I almost never use lineart on my personal stuff for example, and for Flashgitz, lines are the foundation of backgrounds and probably the most important part for how Space King environments are built.
(You can find more of Naav’s personal work @naav_draws on Instagram)
The subject matter couldn’t be more different either. Before joining Flashgitz, scifi was at the bottom end of my interests, so I was pretty lucky to be able to come up with an art style that was fit for the project, but also for my drawing skills. When we first started working on concepts for Space King, I took it as a personal challenge, and it has allowed me to improve my weakest spots when it comes to art, and also I’ve lost the fear of drawing difficult stuff, I just draw whatever we need, tho I still keep avoiding vehicles, there are better artists for those, trust me.
Do you have any recent background that you're particularly proud of that you want to show off to our lovely brothers?Lately it’s pretty weird if I take a background from the initial idea to the final product, since I tend to delegate my stuff at different points depending on how much time available I have. So I’m pretty happy I was able to finish the Mad Scientist Lair for Episode 3 of Space King from scratch, and I really like the result! From previous episodes I really enjoyed designing the High Command Chamber, the Dialysis machines and the first look at the Manor, where the little boy gets kidnapped in episode 2.
I was having fun with the Inner Sanctum too, the place where Chestnut is taken by the Coagulators to meet the Broodmother. But I had to stop after working on the first ideas and leave it to someone else to take it further, though I was able to come back to it to work on a color test for the scene.
From parodies, there’s a bunch I really like. Though in most of these I just did the colors.
Have you had the chance to design something for the company besides backgrounds?I had the chance to design the Cereal Box for the merch drop from episode 2. I’m pretty proud of that one.
If you’d like to follow Naav on social media, you can find him on Instagram @Naav_Draws
___________________________________________________________________________
I don’t know about you, brothers, but I think that was a pretty great first interview with one of our team members.
But now it’s time for my favorite part of the post: FAN ART!
Awesome line art of the squad by u/automatic_lettuce06 on Reddit. Based on the designs from our hoodies! I’ll definitely be sure to share if they color it!
This hilarious meme with hand-drawn elements by @Mr_Passerbyyy on Twitter.
Vertically-enhanced Captain and Hatemonger by u/KyleeTheSadist on Reddit. These boys are looking BIG.
What a fantastic blogpost. I gotta pat myself on the back for the interview idea. If you guys have any suggestions for who on the team should be interviewed next or you’re curious about more of Flashgitz’ inner-working, let me know in the comments below!
Thank you Brothers and Greedy Brothers for making all this possible! We wouldn’t be here without your guys’ generous support.
PRAISE BE, BROTHERS!
PRAISE BE TO NAAV for taking the time to be interviewed!
PRAISE BE TO YOU for supporting Flashgitz and Space King!
PRAISE BE!