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While working on the new, “2oth Anniversary” backdrop for Pista Sa Nayon, the annual Filipino culture festival here in Seattle, I thought I’d scrounge up some of my previous designs for reference and ultimately post some here. Since I’ve been doing these things since freakin’ 1993 (!), a lot of the old stuff still exists only in the analog world. Here is a scan of my marker sketch for Pista ‘9694, my second backdrop. Somewhere I have a photo of the final product which I’ll need to scan and post.

We got kind of ambitious with this one, doubling the width and going with a staggered layout: panels 3-6 were recessed to 1) fake the illusion of depth in the street scene and 2) create a clever (24-year-old me thought, anyway) entrance for the performers. Of course, more ambitious meant more time painting this sucker with actual stagecraft paint, more volunteers, and more time at the Community Center, which was a logistical pain in the ass. Luckily 20-something kids are stupid/brave/cheap, because old me would never attempt something like this anymore, especially in exchange for the free t-shirts and a single plate of pancit the crew got as reward.

The store names were shout-outs to the friends I tricked into helping paint, but halfway through production the committee sold the space to local businesses. Which I was a bit pissed about initially, but then realized it meant we had less to paint.

It started as the father of the main character before I started at the company, then became the grandfather, and then back to the father again. Imagine this waffly goodness applied to other characters, game mechanics and art styles, and you have a good idea of how the project was managed. But golly was it fun to work on!

Check out my good pal Bobby Pontillas’ take on the grandfather here!

Here’s the original inspiration.

*Or avoiding copyright infringement.