It seemed like a fun idea to take advantage of the upcoming holiday season and post a retrospective of some JJSP holiday greeting cards! Even though we did half of them in-house, I have to say that the ones we did with designers and artists OUTside the studio were more fun! It also gave us an opportunity to brand ourselves with sensibility as opposed to any one type of design or style . . .
This was designed by J.D. King. I’d worked with J.D. on a Nick@Nite ID and had also cast him as the actor in a Ballpark Franks spot.
Barry Blitt designed this card. He had submitted several ideas. But this cracked me up immediately! It also mentioned Madison, WI – a sure-thing hook for me. I’d never been able to work on a project with Barry, but not for any lack of want or effort. It would take another 4-5 years before we would have a chance to actually do something together. When the Saturday Night Live “Saturday TV Funhouse” cartoons began, it was Barry I chose to design the first piece we’d produce exclusively for SNL/NBC.
I was working on a project with “Madman” George Lois and asked him if he’d be interested in designing a holiday card for us — a week later, this arrived.
I’d been a big fan of M.K. Brown since high school after eagerly anticipating her fantastic National Lampoon strips and illustrations every month. I took a shot and asked her if she’d consider doing a card for us. We later collaborated on a show idea/pitch. It’s always been a big hole in my career that she and I have never had a project to do together. I hope that changes. . .
It’s George Booth (see the earlier posting for Imprint) ‘nuff said.
Starting with this design, the remaining cards were all designed in-house.
My favorite of these is the last “Y2K” double-sided greeting. When we were still doing all our animation drawing on paper, it required that the paper be punched with registration holes. We were using what is called an “ACME” system that consists of two rectangular slotted holes on either side of a round hole. I looked at this configuration and realized that if you identified the three shapes as Morse Code, “dash-dot-dash”. You had the letter “K”. We hand punched each card at the bottom and added the “Y2” in printed form above . . .
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