4th PORTAL DESIGN

GREETINGS EARTHLING

2010-12-31T01:02:00.000-08:00

click image to HYPER-ACTIVATE my resume

BIO
Johnny Darrell, inter-dimensional traveler and heir to the Warlock Throne, has made Earth his temporary home in order to pursue a deadly passion of story-telling and hone his skills at talking in the third person.

In 2007, Johnny infiltrated Nerd Corps Entertainment to direct on the action/adventure/comedy series Storm Hawks in which he won a Leo Award for Best Direction in an animated series on the episode Stratosphere. In 2008ish, Johnny moved onto the comedy series The League of Super Evil in which he won a Leo Award for Best Direction in an animated series on the episodes "1 Zillion / Bite At The Museum." In 2009 Mattel brought Hot Wheels: Battle Force 5 to Nerd Corps and Johnny was asked to helm 52-episodes as Series Director. The series was nominated for 3 Emmy Awards and Johnny (along with fellow director Clint Butler) was nominated for a Gemini award for Best Direction in an animated series.
Now, in 2010, he's gone completely off his rocker and flew the directing coop to take on the dastardly challenges of development for the studio.

Going back in time without the use of any mystic powers, Johnny took on a Flash animated series called Chaotic for Fox Kids! produced at Bardel Entertainment where he was a unit director on 5 or so episodes. He edited a killer documentary trailer about the early Vancouver punk scene called Bloodied But Unbowed and has just completed writing a live-action feature adaptation screenplay of Monkey Beach by Eden Robinson (nominated for the Governor General's Literary Awards).

On a sister planet to Earth, 2000 light years from here, Johnny had been instrumental in bringing some of Mainframe Entertainment's (now Rainmaker Animation) top projects to life. He co-wrote and directed the animated feature “Tony Hawk in Boom Boom Sabotage” (which won for 'Best Production - Feature Length' and 'Best Original Musical Score' in the Canadian Awards for the Electronic and Animated Arts in 2006. Shortly after that time he directed the animated award nomination bumpers for the 2006 MTV Movie Awards. Time-traveling back three years, he co-wrote, co-edited and co-directed the 2003 MTV Movie Awards’ animated sequences. As lead animation director, Johnny’s credits include Stuart Little 3: Call of the Wild, and Spider-Man: The Animated Series.

Other production credits include Heavy Gear (animation director/editor), numerous development tests for various properties and was editor for a whole wack-load of television episodes including Transformers: Beast Wars, Transformers: Beast Machines, Action Man, and Shadowraiders: War Planets.

Outside the work-world, Johnny enjoys life with his beautiful Earthling wife Kamala and two sons, Kai and An'ostin Rocket. He likes graphic design, music, sasquatch, and exploring the Earth's rain forests and mountains. On occasion he is asked to find delicious galaxies for his mentor Galactus.

DEMO REEL

2010-12-30T12:29:00.000-08:00

CGI Demo Reel (03:35 - 7.5 mb)

I gotta update this thing because it's
quite old and doesn't include any of
my Nerd Corps work.

HOT WHEELS: BATTLE FORCE 5

2009-08-03T23:18:00.000-07:00

SERIES DIRECTOR

This Gemini Award winning, Emmy Award nominated action-packed (I'm not kidding, it's probably the most action-packed 22-minute Saturday morning cartoon ever made) series is on Cartoon Network and Teletoon here in Canada. The super-talented Nerd Corps directors (Blair, Clint, Dan, George, Logan, Rav, Steve), story boarders (helmed by the uber-talented Colin Lorimer), designers, animators, modelers, post fx crew and more bring this show to life. The sound design on this sucker was done at DBC Sound and it's completely off-the-charts. I mean it's super crazy good! So much so, they were nominated for two 2010 Emmy Awards! A big tip of the hat to composer Brian Carson for his amazing scores and catchy hooks which earned him a 2010 Emmy nomination and a Gemini Award nom! The series was nominated for a 2010 and 2011 Gemini for Best Direction and took the Gemini for Best Animated Production in 2011. The action bar for Saturday morning cartoons has been drastically raised.

INDIGENOUS PLANT DIVA

2008-09-04T22:00:00.001-07:00

EDITOR

This N.F.B. short documentary/profile directed by Kamala Todd was accepted into the Vancouver International Film Festival in September as well as the Imagine Native Media Festival in October.

LEAGUE OF SUPER EVIL!

2008-04-02T23:07:00.001-07:00

DIRECTOR / EDITOR

I only got an opportunity to direct 5.25 of these 11-minute episodes before I had to move onto another series. Working on L.O.S.E. was some of the funnest moments of my animation career!

"ESCAPE FROM SKULLOSSUS"

It's the hottest day of summer and L.O.S.E.'s air conditioner is on the fritz again. Voltar decides to borrow a Quantum Weather Generator, invented by a kid genius at the local high school science fair. Unfortunately for L.O.S.E., both the military and a powerful super villain known as Skullossus are after the same thing

"10"

L.O.S.E. is determined to get a free pizza from Pronto Pizza (in 10 minutes or it's free) by making the delivery guy run their gauntlet once again. But this time they're going up against a whole new pizza delivery guy.

"1 Zillion!"

To impress the neighbor kids, Voltar boasts they have "one zillion" TV channels. Now they have exactly one day to prove it. I won a Leo Award for this and the following episode.

"Bite At The Museum"

The League wants to steal a dinosaur bone so they can clone a t-rex and take over the neighborhood. They manage to sneak in after hours, but soon learn they'll have to get past their old nemesis Justice Gene, who was forced to get a job as a security guard at the museum after L.O.S.E. had him fired.

Here's an outtake for one of the scenes:

"School Daze"

Defeated by an electronic trivia game, Voltar decides to get even with the kids who laughed at him by posing as a substitute teacher. Once in control of the classroom Voltar will be able to teach them all the wrong answers to the game, ensuring his victory! "Puttin' books on your roof, booooyyyyy!"

STORM HAWKS

2007-07-15T00:31:00.000-07:00

DIRECTOR / EDITOR

Ep. #25, #29, #33, #37

This action/adventure/comedy was a blast to work on! Great
characters, great stories, great action and great comedy! Loved
working on this show!

Ep.#26: DUDE, WHERE'S MY CONDOR?

Stork's Meltdown (2:00)

Stork Fights For The Condor (1:55)

Ep.#29: STRATOSPHERE
I created this small sneak-peak of Stratosphere to ease the restless fan-hordes' minds.
They were going crazy by the lake waiting for this episode to air so I thought
that this might douse their torches and calm their violent urges...

Full Episode of the Leo Award winning
STRATOSPHERE!

Ep.#33:

Ep.#37

BLOODIED AND UNBOWED

2007-05-11T22:56:00.000-07:00

EDITOR

Vancouver documentary film maker, Susanne Tabata needed my chopping skills to cut together a small 6 minute demonstration reel for a new doc she wants to shoot. The subject: Vancouver's punk scene from the 1970's. Are you kidding me? Punk rock? Editing? Vintage stock footage? Free creative reign? I AM IN!!! This is going to be a cool documentary and I can't wait for the funding to come in so we can start doing the real thing!

(5 min. - 13.6 mb)

CHAOTIC

2007-03-25T09:47:00.000-07:00

DIRECTOR / EDITOR

Directed on a series called Chaotic. 4o episodes are produced here in Vancouver with Bardel Entertainment and is a co-venture with 4 Kids TV. This was my first adventure in the world of Flash animation. Interesting to be sure and I learned a lot in a very short span of time.

Chaotic "Allmageddon" Preview

Add to My Profile | More Videos

Ep.#18: Allmageddon

Ep.#22: ChaotiKings

Ep.#25: The Code Master Chronicals pt.2

Ep.#28: A Flux Too Far

Ep.#32: Chasm Quest

STORM HAWKS SIZZLERS

2007-03-12T23:42:00.000-07:00

EDITOR

Here's a bunch of 30-second teasers I cut for some season one episodes of Storm Hawks. This show is amazingly beautiful and the characters and scripts are great. I really enjoyed cutting these and the challenge of reducing 22 minutes into 30 seconds without giving anything away. I liked altering the storyline slightly so that the kids get a sense as to what the episode is about but are left clinging to the edge of their seat to see what happens!

GALE FORCE WINDS

THE CODE

TRANQUILITY NOW

THE BLACK GORGE

ABSOLUTE POWER

VELOCITY

FIRE & ICE

STORM WARNING

GEORGE OF THE JUNGLE

2007-01-21T10:53:00.000-08:00

EDITOR

Studio-B called me in to create a 5-minute promo for their George of the Jungle series that is on Teletoon.

George Slate (00:04)

CROWS

2006-10-25T00:46:00.000-07:00

CREDIT DESIGNER / COMPOSITOR

Vancouver's Mike McKinlay's gothic documentary on crows. I wanted a haunted and spooky feel for his credits with a classy and classic old-tyme cinema feel. For this Quicktime I added my own little soundtrack.

Opening Credits (00:33)

RED1 "Dem No Worry We"

2006-08-09T01:30:00.000-07:00

EDITOR

Locally shot music video with VideoFact funding. The director, Husam Ghaemi, gave me pretty much free reign on this. Nice footage to work with but it was shot without timecode. I had to eyeball the lip-synch which was "really really fun".

music video (03:45 )

INDIGENOUS CITY

2006-06-05T13:25:00.000-07:00

EDITOR

This short, directed by Vancouver's Kamala Todd and shot by herself and Kevin Burton, was used to kick off an event at the World Urban Forum held here in Vancouver. I was also asked to design the event's poster using a photo from the great Iroquois photographer Jeff Thomas.

Indigenous City (02:47)

2006 MTV MOVIE AWARDS

2006-05-12T21:52:00.000-07:00

DIRECTOR / CO-CREATIVE / EDITOR / COMPOSITOR

Just completed the opening animation sequence for the 2006 MTV Movie Awards.
This year's show had a Saul Bass theme to it so the opening credits and category nomination clips reflected his style. The opening was 720 x 586 but the categories were 12,933 x 486 pixels!!!! IT WAS HUGE! HHHUUUUGGGE!!! There were numerous people doing the various categories. I directed the opening and was responsible for Best Frightened Performance (zombies...sweet, sweet zombies). Huge props go out to Jeremy Unrau for his HUGE involvement in the opening sequence (and the entire project). He is truly talented and I am humbled.

Opening Credit Sequence (1:30)

Animatic for Opening Credits (1:30)

Best Frightened Performance
(00:06 - 228 kb)

TONY HAWK IN BOOM BOOM SABOTAGE

2005-04-06T22:45:00.000-07:00

DIRECTOR / CO-WRITER / MOTION CAPTURE DIRECTOR

Movie Trailer
(01:58 - 4.2 mb)

This 66 minute direct-to-dvd feature was a blast to work on despite its EXTREMELY low budget and the fact that it was almost entirely motion-captured (which worked really well for the skating aspects but the "performances" however...). We went to Carlsbad, CA for the voice record with Tony Hawk and then to his private warehouse to motion-capture him on his vert ramp. In Vancouver, we hired some pro skaters (Alex Chalmers, Chris Haslam, Keegan Sauder, Russ Milligan) to do the motion capture at our motion-capture facility and the results when applied to our skateboarding models were phenomenal.

The original script was rather lackluster so I took a stab at reworking the structure and dialogue; throwing humour and fun throughout it. Andrew Duncan and Logan McPherson were the animation directors and Brian Carson was our composer and did an amazing job at going all-over-the-map with the original soundtrack (carny music, eerie "Forbidden Planet" Moog type music, raw punk, hillbilly western rockabilly, etc.). Larry Grimley, was perfectly voiced by Michael Dobson and his motion-capture performance was acted by the incredibly gifted Donavon Stinson. Both guys went above and beyond the call of duty, literally busting themselves to bring A TON OF LIFE to our main villain.

Jumping A Shark in a Leather Jacket
(2 min 19 sec)
Tony's been captured and taken to an abandoned tiki-themed water park. I love grottoes so I thought it would be the perfect place to hole him up. I then felt that the villain should monologue to Tony like a villain does with James Bond but then kinda veer off topic.

The Moonshining
(48 sec)
A nod to my favourite film.

A Magical Moment
(2 min 09 sec)
For the first time in motion picture history, someone reacts realistically to a shooting star...

Frank Calls "Tony"
(3 min 33 sec)
I like the scenes here but the motion-capture just kills it. Ironically, one of the funniest moments of the production was when we mo-capped Donavon doing the limbo (he even wore a neck brace). Be sure to look at what's on "Tony's" ball cap.

Friggin' Monkeys
(1 min 51 sec)
You can't tell in this clip, but the Monkey Trainer has the most amazing short-shorts. I wish I could say that the comp-job on the multiple monkeys running at camera was supposed to look really crappy on purpose...WAIT! It's a nod to cheesy rear-projected scenes in old movies! YEAH that's it!

BEAT FREAKS

2005-02-05T12:26:00.000-08:00

DIRECTOR / EDITOR / COMPOSITOR / "ANIMATOR"

The mandate: "NO ANIMATION! Make a promotional video for this CGI animated series but it can't have ANY ANIMATION!" I was given character models (which were not rigged or weighted for animation), I had some Photoshop promotional artwork and I was given some music.

"Make it exciting BUT NO ANIMATION! The budget doesn't allow for it! "

(alright, so there's some animation -- fire me).

STUART LITTLE 3: CALL OF THE WILD

2004-07-05T12:37:00.000-07:00

LEAD ANIMATION DIRECTOR

This direct-to-dvd stars the original lead actors from the first two movies (except Nathan Lane) and was directed by the one-and-only Audu Paden for Sony Pictures. The production was divided into two animation teams of 18 animators each. The second team's animation director was the talented Morgan Ratsoy. This was an extremely ambitious project considering how low the budget was but it was fun. The clips below have just the dialogue tracks -- I hope to get versions with the finished mixed sound in here soon.

Mouse vs. Bear
(01:25 - 3.1 mb)

Reeko Cons Snowbell
(01:38 - 3.5 mb)

In The Beasts' Lair
(02:00 - 4.3 mb)

Reeko's Confession
(02:49 - 6.0 mb)

The Trap (deleted scene)
(03:02 - 6.3 mb)

RECRUITING REEL

2004-06-12T22:59:00.000-07:00

EDITOR / CO-CAMERA

I was asked to cut a recruitment reel for Mainframe Entertainment, using footage from the company's various shows, Tourism BC, some footage shot by Mike McKinlay and a bit of stuff I shot myself.

VOICE OF TREASON

2004-06-05T23:03:00.000-07:00

DIRECTOR / EDITOR / COMPOSITOR / SOUND DESIGN

Local pensmith/word-jotter and film-maker/moving-picture-taker Ken Hegan asked me to do a motion logo treatment for his company "VOICE OF TREASON." Photos courtesy of Michael Connors.

FREELANCER 2

2004-01-04T23:46:00.000-08:00

DIRECTOR / EDITOR / COMPOSITOR

Microsoft game developer Digital Anvil were developing a new game and I was asked to direct the cinematic sequences. I went to Austin, TX with storyboard/comic artist Chad Smith for two weeks to storyboard the sequences. Everything was going great and it was going to be a great project but Microsoft pulled the project out from underneath Digital Anvil's feet for reasons unknown. I had the privilege of seeing some of the game and it was looking really cool! Here is the test we did for bidding on the project (using a dialogue track which was supplied to us from Digital Anvil).

(01:19 - 2.9 mb)

2003 MTV MOVIE AWARDS

2003-05-04T08:31:00.000-07:00

CO-DIRECTOR / CO-WRITER / CO-EDITOR / COMPOSITOR

Andrew Duncan and I both wrote, directed and edited the following footage. We had a blast working 18 hour days non-stop for 2 weeks. There were moments of sheer panic and hilarity. Rav Grewal, our supervising and lead animator was key in getting this thing done. This year's award's theme was Super-Hero so we made the hosts of the show, Justin Timberlake and Seann William Scott super-heroes. They did a fantastic job in the voice acting and were great to work with. We did the show's main opening and the 13 nomination catagories.

KAINAYSSINI IMANISTAISIWA

2003-04-06T20:49:00.000-07:00

SEQUENCE EDITOR

This is a National Film Board of Canada documentary, directed by Loretta Todd, who asked me to edit three small "poetic" scenes that introduce and end her movie. She also had a teepee-raising scene in the middle of the film that she wanted to be special (I hope it is).

I edited the opening and ending scenes to the same piece of music (The Doves "Firesuite") and the teepee-raising scene to a minimal quiet track (Sigur Ros "untitled"). She was able to secure the rights to the Sigur Ros track but had to have her composer create something similar to the Doves. The versions here are set to The Doves. It was "easy" to edit because the photography is so nice to work with.

Opening
(03:15 - 7.1 mb)

Tee-pee
(01:46 - 3.9 mb)

Ending
(02:15 - 5.0 mb)

ROBIN HOOD: RETURN OF THE PRINCE

2002-08-04T11:31:00.000-07:00

DIRECTOR / EDITOR / COMPOSITOR

Robin Hood test (01:00)

SPIDER-MAN: THE ANIMATED SERIES

2002-04-04T23:36:00.000-08:00

LEAD ANIMATION DIRECTOR / SERIES R&D DIRECTOR /
OPENING CREDITS CREATIVE LEAD, DIRECTOR & EDITOR

Spider-Man! Are you kidding me?!?! Awesome! I worked as the Research & Development director for this series while we were in pre-production. It was a blast to just explore various aspects of the series: testing models, trying new looks, exploring animation possibilities, finding solutions to technically challenging aspects of the series (crowds, web-slinging, "toon" shading render issues, etc.). During this R&D stage, I began to compile our work in the avid, fool around with it in After Effects, and decided to cut together a teaser for our clients, Sony Pictures and MTV to get them jazzed about what we were doing. They loved it and when we had footage from the first 3 episodes they asked me to update this teaser with new footage. They took my cut as inspiration for cutting their own opening credit sequence for the series. I got a credit (thank you), but it's not really the same. Here's my version:

Original opening credit sequence demo (01:00)

EPISODE SELECTIONS

KEEPING SECRETS -- episode 02
Spider-Man encounters a thief called the Talon while breaking into J-Lo's loft. Though she gets away, he manages to get a look at her secret identity. This complicates things for Peter when he learns that her real name is Cheyenne Tate and that she just became Harry's girlfriend.

Spider-Man Meets The Talon (01:13)

M.J. Owns Parker (00:48)

The Talon Suits Up (01:03)

TIGHT SQUEEZE -- episode 04
A high tech group of criminals calling themselves Pterodax attempt to steal diamonds, but Spider-Man stops them. Peter then manages to sell a video of the attempted robbery to Empire 1 News with the help of a researcher named Indy. Later, Pterodax take hostages at Empire 1, demanding Spider-Man come within two hours or everyone will blow up real good. Unfortunately, Peter is a hostage himself.

Boardroom Tomfoolery (00:51)

Fight & Flight (01:54)

SWORD OF SHIKATA -- episode 11
Richard Damien has an interest in rare animals and hires the infamous Shikata to capture the next addition to his collection: Spider-Man. But the mysterious Shikata has different plans for the web-slinger after their first confrontation and demands for a fight to the death. Damien loses his head when he hears of Shikata's plan.

Cage Match (01:45)

Street Fight (00:45)

M.J. & Spider-Man sitting in a tree (01:08)

ANIMISM & THE ART OF LEO LABELLE

2001-07-03T18:57:00.000-07:00

PRODUCER / DIRECTOR / CAMERA / EDITOR

A 20-minute documentary about an surrealist artist from Agassi, BC. This documentary takes a look at a man who raced hot rods in the 60's, paints and sculpts surrealistic, "trippy" art, has psychic visions, has been abducted by aliens, will NOT disrespect slugs, and tries to figure out why the universe planned to have his one pet ferret go missing one-year-to-the-day-later after his most beloved pet ferret drowned.

Here is the opening sequence to the documentary...

click on poster for Quicktime (04:00 - 9 mb)

STARCHILD: STRANGEST SKULL ON EARTH

2001-04-03T22:06:00.000-07:00

PRODUCER / DIRECTOR / CAMERA / EDITOR

This short documentary looks at the "infamous" Starchild skull; a supposed alien/human hybrid child.

click on poster for quicktime (06:24 - 14 mb)

HEAVY GEAR

2000-04-02T20:15:00.000-07:00

ANIMATION DIRECTOR / EDITOR

I "diredited" 3 episodes of this series. Instead of showing various scenes from each episode I've edited together a musical montage of some of the action bits.

Heavy Gear montage (02:08 )