It's a Bird, It's a Plane, ...It's SuperJew!

I just completed a large spot cover piece about the Judaic origins of the comic book superhero, Superman.

A Halloween Message from Joe Rocco at Secret Sauce Studio

And now a word from the Halloween Committee...

SSS Halloween7 from Joe Rocco on Vimeo.

Squirrels On The Bus! Going "Back-to-School" with Some Fun Critters

Uploaded with secretsaucestudio.com/ WAHOOOOOOO!!! I finally got my new Semi-Fall/ Back-to-School" mailer image completed and produced, so it's circulating across this great big land of ours as we speak. E-blasts are also a comin'! This is basically going to a lot of Children's book publishers and magazines...also some newspapers and Entertainment publications. I like to imagine that the girl student in the front of the bus has a large acorn inside her lunchbox. Hope you all like the piece.

Play Town Video Commercial (Check out my work in this!)

Hey there you guys! I just saw this promotional video that came out from the people at SK Planet and it showcases the work I did on their new App "Play Town". It was my pleasure to work on this app and I loved every second of it. I think it came out pretty cute. Hope you do too.

I just completed these spots illustrations for Albert Amigo at Scholastic Scope Online. The deadline was a bit tight, but I'd jump through hoops to work for Scholastic any time. The spots were there to highlight the subjects of Vocabulary, Grammar, Close-Reading and Differentiation.

The Aging Weather Satellite (New York Newsday)

Uploaded with secretsaucestudio.com/ I did a super rush illustration spot for Alleen Barber at New York Newsday today. I get a rush out of deadlines this tight sometimes. I got the job notice late yesterday and did the sketch early this morning, and the finish had to be in by 2pm to align with the East Coast time zone. It came out pretty well, considering I had about 3 hours to do the finished work, but it's amazing how you can edit yourself to meet a deadline. This piece was about how aging weather satellites are not being repaired or replaced because of an ailing infrastructure budget. The solution just came to me in a couple of minutes. Super fun to do.

The Monsters of Doctor Who (Final Color Piece)

Uploaded with secretsaucestudio.com If you're a Doctor Who fan, you'll know who all these critters are right off the bat. The more I worked on this the more I wanted to do like really classic Doctor Who Monsters. The piece would have grown 100 times it's size. Anyway, hope you all think this came out ok. I had a blast illustrating them. (Listening to "The Nerdist" Podcast in the background for hours. My latest guilty pleasure.)

The Monsters of Doctor Who (Rough Sketch Version)

Uploaded with secretsaucestudio.com Here is my very rough sketch for the illustration about some of the "Monsters of Doctor Who". In the color finished version, I'll really tinker with the details, but at least I know where everything is going now for placement and I can get right into the finish next. These critters are so much fun to draw that I could have done many pages of them for days and days. Doctor Who has hundreds of monsters to choose from after such a long and continued run. I need to take a break for some "fish fingers and custard". I'll be sure to post the finish as soon as I can.

Kathy Griffin "F-Bomb" Spot Illustration Finish

Uploaded with secretsaucestudio.com Here's my follow-up to the rough sketch I showed the other day for this spot illustration about Kathy Griffin. It is a positive piece, so the likeness is a little more idealized, but still hopefully looks like her as she drops her classic "F-Bomb". I tried out the "Torn Edges" filter in Photoshop to make the background feel a little more organic and artful. This whole piece was so much fun to do.

Kathy Griffin and The "F-Bomb" (Rough Sketch State)

I rarely get a caricature assignment that is of a person who I would really sink my teeth into, but Kathy Griffin is definitely up there as high on my list to draw. This is just the rough sketch that I send to clients. Had to stop on it to finish some bread and butter assignments, but I'll fix some issues tonight and start the finish, which I'll post in a day or 2. I may distort her face a little more and correct some of the arm issues, but I think it's starting to look ok. It could also use a little more stratosphere and maybe some curvature of the Earth as the bomb is dropping. I want to feel a little more gravity in the vignette.

Big City in the Enchanted Forest Illustration

Uploaded with Secretsaucestudio It's time for more Summer Promotion. I'll be sending out a ton of E-blasts to promote this illustration and a follow-up postcard mailer to thousands of art and creative directors. It was a ton of fun to do. I kept thinking about making the forest and all the critters in the forest resemble a type of "Enchanted Brooklyn". I hope it's a hit with people and I get in return assignments that are similar to this in tone. The bicycle that the gator is riding is what my new folding bike looks like, by the way. WAHOO!!!!
Uploaded with SecretSauceStudio

Illustration with Motion (Animated Gifs and More)

Uploaded with secretsaucestudio.com I'm starting a portfolio of animated gifs and simple motion graphics that I like to call Illomotion. I'm calling it that because I feel like this is a hybrid of illustration and motion, but it's not full-blown animation. Most of what I'm working on is looped silliness. These are a lot of fun to make. I'm working on a robot cocktail party for the next one. Here's a link to the new page at my site with the gypsy fortune teller since Facebook doesn't take animated gifs. http://www.secretsaucestudio.com/illomotion.html
Uploaded with secretsaucestudio.com

Wisconsin Movie Poster Cover Art

Uploaded with secretsaucestudio.com I just did a quick piece for art director Carolyn Fath about a Wisconsin Film Festival for the cover of ISTHMUS. Here's the end result without the type and graphics in place. I tried to give it a nice blue and violet feeling to capture that blue projected movie light.

PIrate Party for App Development Factory

secretsaucestudio This week I'm working hard on building all the parts for a new creative app for a company in South Korea called the App Development Factory. Hopefully, in a couple of weeks this app will be nearing the finish. It's a lot of work. Basically, it's a story that I've written called "Pirate Party" and there are 5 characters with numerous backgrounds and props, so that when this is done a child can create their own story using all the parts from the original story, but with a range of other props and costumes too. I'll post more as I near the end, but this is a character sheet for one of the characters named "Morgan". He's a boy pirate from the story, but he has a lot of looks.