Ashe Jacobson

I'm so happy to finally get to share this with y'all. A long time ago my buddy Adam Ganse and I pitched a short to Cartoon Network- it's been one heck of a wild ride and I'm so excited that Cali and Xen can finally power-loop into a premiere. youtube.com/watch?v=cygNLG…

@DRA6ONITE @kantozard Was comin to the comments to say the exact same thing. He’s the first new electric type after the phys/sp split and they give him crunch and bite for that specific reason.

@kantozard not to mention it learns bite crunch snarl and night slash 😭

u know what i’m gonna say it. i don’t get why ppl attacked oomf for saying luxray looks like a dark type pokemon bcs it DOES? without looking into the lore luxray shares a lot of similarities with other dark pokemon visually & looks aggressive. it’s literally not that serious 😭

@infernoman64 Giver/Mother of runes. Those two just foilin' all kinds of plans.

My fiery friends, what is THAT card you worry about in a game of MTG?

@makotenka Hey aside from being funny can I also just say you did a phenomenally good job paying attention to the detail of this set given that I just /made it up/ in the boards.

haha dragongirl are you banging my son

@Sepo_Morales @trisketched Look he needs that space to keep that big brain of his.

@OffBrandLink @trisketched The second yall tried with a bigger head his fate got sealed, poor bigass headed kid lol

Here’s some more amazing character exploration by @trisketched - I was SO glad to get his take on Cali and Xen. So much of their final designs were pulled from these. Just amazing. 🧡💙

@Melancholy_txwn Yeah unfortunately he was diagnosed with very late-stage cancer. Hope you're resting well Billy.

My goodness he died? RP

The shellshock the day we heard what happened will always stick with me. Billy remained positive the whole way through. You were one of a kind, man. Dearly missed by everyone who knew you.

I got to chat with Billy here on twitter a few times after working with a TON of his voice record for Macaque. He was always so kind, he'd remember members of our anim/board crew and loved to talk about the show. Dude had such a genuine love for the craft and his peers.

Here's somethin kinda fun/silly- for a long time I wasn't sure if Outrunners would ever come out, so I started designing a mental reboot of it just for fun. Things got a little more high-tech starting with Cali getting a metal arm that could shift into different objects.

@caro_irl Hold up, we gotta hear him out-

i will never surpass this - best post of mtgtwt perhaps ever. just look at it. its perfect

@columbinual i will never mentally recover from seeing this thank you

I think one of the hardest parts about these characters was finding a level of balance with detail- thankfully Nick Jennings, our awesome Shorts lead, took a pass at them after me and really helped hone in on the important elements of each design.

Some more Outrunners concept art- turnarounds! Steve was especially challenging. Also check out that original color palette!

I've waited for so long to post these- the character designs for our space cadets <3 With extra special thanks to @trisketched for all of the visdev work he did to get these two to where they are.

I really just wanna thank the entire CN shorts team that guided us through the process, all of my amazing friends that came to work on this with us, our voice talent that put so much life into these characters, and Tiger, our phenomenal animation studio. Love y'all so much <3

I'm so happy to finally get to share this with y'all. A long time ago my buddy Adam Ganse and I pitched a short to Cartoon Network- it's been one heck of a wild ride and I'm so excited that Cali and Xen can finally power-loop into a premiere. youtube.com/watch?v=cygNLG…

@_Wolfsteak_ @Cabanimation yeah they lost me as soon as they correlated the magic wand tool to the theft-into-slop generator as though the two are even remotely equivalent.

@Cabanimation Too long not reading defense on a slop machine

In defense of @mexopolis : this is like criticizing the magic wand tool in photoshop back in the day. Or the Disney 2D greats criticizing 3D interpolating motion (when in fact they would do keys, call it a day and let the inbetweeners and outsourcers deal with that stuff). We can complain about AI and the repercussions it has for creative all we want, but that's a losing battle. It is coming. It's just a different brush, with a massive canvas. It tears down certain financial barriers and it also helps overcome technical redundancies that are not--at all--subjective. And like-it-or-not it's extremely empowering for creators. It's just about how you use it. The fear artists feel is being replaced. True artists will not be replaced. And I know we don't like non-creatives talking about "I made this Pixar movie in 5 minutes," which diminishes the perceived impact and craft and love that goes into a Pixar film. Discredits it. But it also highlights that most people don't know and they can't always tell the difference. And the truth is, over time, this stuff works itself out. Because they almost always certainly FEEL the difference. And the differentiator is the creative mind. Story is most important. Spark, and good taste. And there will be a huge value proposition for "good" content---a trend we're already seeing in a slop market. AI doesn't have to mean replacement. It means better tools at your disposal, often for stuff that doesn't add anything anyways. (I can uprez the video in seconds, rather than re-rendering. I can test things really quick. I can color swap without throwing away all the work. These often are mundane tasks). I also understand that in some way you're removing part of the "process" or "journey" of the craft. But part of the process is there because the technology never allowed for it. Toonboom and other 2D software has rigs now. That wasn't possible before. You don't have to redraw every character on model every frame. I've worked in production environments with teams of 200-800 people and you have to believe me when I say that this didn't make sense. There's a ton of egos. Lethargy. Avoidable fucking around. Trying to get everyone to understand the vision. Crazy iterative processes cus some suit has an opinion. But the truth we don't talk about is this happens on the floor too. Troublesome craftspeople. 'Artists' that are happy to "coast" and don't perform at all, and really don't give a shit. Terrible pipelines. People that want to do it "their way" even if it slows everyone else and is fundamentally not what the director is going for. But above all else, there are MANY things that are just not possible without a massive team or because of technology or licenses or politics. AI will make things much more meritocratic because the access to "making" becomes way more democratic. But when anyone "can", that doesn't mean everyone will, and it also usually means that cream rises to the top, and there is always a shift towards the rustic. I think in this scenario Indie will shine and outperform. Good taste, narrative and meaning will matter. Craft will actually have perceived value for the viewer. This is why LAIKA's recent trailer when ballistics. But there is room for both. There will always be room for both. And in the right hands, new tools for execution levels the playing field even more. And I urge artists to not turn a blind eye, and understand where it CAN help you, without bastardizing your creative process. I bet you'll be surprised how many little things add up that you don't need to be doing. And if you want to do everything by hand, well that's okay too. Just have an open mind and consider the realism of where the industry is heading, how difficult it is to produce content at scale, and also how we've seen this story unfold many, many times. And we're still creating.

I would rather watch a live-stream of someone nervously pitching their sticky-note doodle storyboards for the rest of my life than watch 10 seconds of some AI slop garbage.

@AcePlaysTCGs @MTG_Arena You're the one assuming snark. Am I not allowed to joke about the fact that there are more UB sets coming out this year than in-universe sets? You don't need to fun-police people's random one-off twitter comments my guy. 👍

@OffBrandLink @MTG_Arena We had Magic characters for 30 years and we're still getting more like Tam and friends. I was referring to the Echoverse as Universes Beyond: Magic the Gathering. I miss when folks could laugh about things instead of it always sounding so snarky and sad especially with UB.

The Marvel Universe comes to MTG Arena. #MTGxMarvel mtg.social/MSHArena

@AcePlaysTCGs @MTG_Arena oh awesome! it'll be so cool to see Magic The Gathering characters finally get included in the game! :D

@OffBrandLink @MTG_Arena That's coming in October.