Joe Murray
Encyclopedia
Joseph "Joe" Lawrence Murray (born May 3, 1961) is an American animator
, writer
, and illustrator
best known as the creator of Rocko's Modern Life
and Camp Lazlo
.
, Joe Murray said that he developed an interest in working as an artist as a career when he was three years old. According to Murray, his kindergarten
teacher told his mother that he was the only student who drew zipper
s on pants
and breasts on women. Murray credits his Leland High School art teacher Mark Briggs for teaching him "so much about my art." At age 16, he became a full-time artist.
Taking the position of political cartoonist for a newspaper in San Jose, his cartoons often targeted Jimmy Carter
, the President of the United States
. On his website, in a 2007 entry he said that he admired Carter's post-presidential work.
As a young adult, he was hired as a designer at an agency. Murray invested his earnings from the company into independent animated films. At age 20, Murray founded his independent illustration company, Joe Murray Studios, in 1981 while still in university. His early attempts at animation date back to 1986 when he joined De Anza College
. Murray created several short animated films, his most successful was made in 1987, which was a two minute animated short titled "The Chore," which focused on a harried husband who uses his cat as a novel solution while not wanting to do a chore for his wife. He drew the scenes on typing paper and shot the scenes with 16 mm film. For creating "The Chore" Murray earned the Student Academy Award two years later in 1989.
In 1988 he joined MTV
as an animator for the MTV commercials, and left in 1991 in hopes of starting his own projects. One of the MTV eyecatches Murray created involved the future Rocko's Modern Life character Heffer Wolfe
; the eyecatch featured the MTV logo branded onto Heffer's buttocks.
To fund the film Murray initially tried to pre-sell the television show rights to "My Dog Zero" but instead created a separate television series called Rocko's Modern Life
.
, which aired on Nickelodeon from 1993 to 1996.
Originally, the character Rocko appeared in an unpublished comic book titled Travis. Murray tried selling the comic book in the late 1980s, but was never successful of getting it in production. Murray wanted funding for "My Dog Zero," so he wanted Nickelodeon to pre-buy television rights for the series. Murray presented a pencil test to Nickelodeon Studios
, which afterwards became interested in buying and airing the show. After deciding that "My Dog Zero" would not work as a television series, Murray combed through his sketchbooks, developed the Rocko's Modern Life concept, and submitted it to Nickelodeon, believing that the concept would likely be rejected. According to Murray, around three or four months later he had "forgotten about" the concept and was working on "My Dog Zero" when Linda Simensky
informed Murray that Nickelodeon wanted a pilot episode. Murray said that he was glad that he would get funding for "My Dog Zero."
In 1992, two months prior to the production of season 1 of Rocko's Modern Life, Murray's first wife, Diane, committed suicide. Murray had blamed the show being taken as the reason for his wife's suicide. Murray felt that he had emotional and physical "unresolved issues" when he moved to Los Angeles
. He describes the experience as like participating in "marathon with my pants
around my ankles." Murray initially believed that he would create one season, move back to the San Francisco Bay Area
, and "clean up the loose ends I had left hanging." To his surprise Nickelodeon approved new seasons.
After season 3 he decided to hand the project to Stephen Hillenburg
, who performed most work for season 4 and created SpongeBob SquarePants
shortly after that; Murray continued to manage the cartoon. Murray said that he would completely leave the production after season 4. Murray said that he encouraged the network to continue production. Nickelodeon decided to cancel the series. Murray described all fifty-two episodes as "top notch" and that, in his view, the quality of a television show may decline as production continues "when you are dealing with volume."
Murray was working on a web-based cartoon named The Family Pop, which was produced in Flash and was in the middle of negotiations for this cartoon just prior to the onset of Camp Lazlo. On September 30, 2008, Murray added a new feature to his website, The Tin Box, where Murray posts some of his independent work. The first work posted was Where’s Poppa, a short episode of The Family Pop.
. In 2005, he produced a pilot for the cartoon Camp Lazlo
, which was picked-up for a 13 episode first season and ran for five seasons, with production ending in November 2007.
On September 8, 2007, the TV movie "Where's Lazlo?" won an Emmy for Outstanding Animated Program (For an hour or more). During the production of Camp Lazlo, Murray underwent a divorce.
to fund the project, he required $16,800 by June 5 to reach the total funding amount for his project; otherwise, it would be cancelled. The project surpassed the amount of funding needed, and Murray is currently developing the next Frog in a Suit episodes. KaboingTV premiered in March 11, 2011.
."
Murray says that one of the interesting aspects of character creation is the evolution of the personalities over time. In a one-time movie, the characters will have a static personality, but for a television series, the characters will change from season to season, developing new relationships, and even changing from mere background characters into a main character.
Animator
An animator is an artist who creates multiple images that give an illusion of movement called animation when displayed in rapid sequence; the images are called frames and key frames. Animators can work in a variety of fields including film, television, video games, and the internet. Usually, an...
, writer
Writer
A writer is a person who produces literature, such as novels, short stories, plays, screenplays, poetry, or other literary art. Skilled writers are able to use language to portray ideas and images....
, and illustrator
Illustrator
An Illustrator is a narrative artist who specializes in enhancing writing by providing a visual representation that corresponds to the content of the associated text...
best known as the creator of Rocko's Modern Life
Rocko's Modern Life
Rocko's Modern Life is an animated series created by Joe Murray. The show aired for four seasons between 1993 and 1996 on Nickelodeon. Rocko's Modern Life is based around the surreal, parodic adventures of an anthropomorphic wallaby named Rocko, and his life in the city of O-Town...
and Camp Lazlo
Camp Lazlo
Camp Lazlo is an American animated television series created by Joe Murray, produced by Rough Draft Studios, Joe Murray Productions and Cartoon Network Studios. It aired on Cartoon Network...
.
Early career
Born and raised in San Jose, CaliforniaSan Jose, California
San Jose is the third-largest city in California, the tenth-largest in the U.S., and the county seat of Santa Clara County which is located at the southern end of San Francisco Bay...
, Joe Murray said that he developed an interest in working as an artist as a career when he was three years old. According to Murray, his kindergarten
Kindergarten
A kindergarten is a preschool educational institution for children. The term was created by Friedrich Fröbel for the play and activity institute that he created in 1837 in Bad Blankenburg as a social experience for children for their transition from home to school...
teacher told his mother that he was the only student who drew zipper
Zipper
A zipper is a commonly used device for temporarily joining two edges of fabric...
s on pants
Trousers
Trousers are an item of clothing worn on the lower part of the body from the waist to the ankles, covering both legs separately...
and breasts on women. Murray credits his Leland High School art teacher Mark Briggs for teaching him "so much about my art." At age 16, he became a full-time artist.
Taking the position of political cartoonist for a newspaper in San Jose, his cartoons often targeted Jimmy Carter
Jimmy Carter
James Earl "Jimmy" Carter, Jr. is an American politician who served as the 39th President of the United States and was the recipient of the 2002 Nobel Peace Prize, the only U.S. President to have received the Prize after leaving office...
, the President of the United States
President of the United States
The President of the United States of America is the head of state and head of government of the United States. The president leads the executive branch of the federal government and is the commander-in-chief of the United States Armed Forces....
. On his website, in a 2007 entry he said that he admired Carter's post-presidential work.
As a young adult, he was hired as a designer at an agency. Murray invested his earnings from the company into independent animated films. At age 20, Murray founded his independent illustration company, Joe Murray Studios, in 1981 while still in university. His early attempts at animation date back to 1986 when he joined De Anza College
De Anza College
De Anza College is a community college located in Cupertino, California. It was founded in 1967 on the site of the Beaulieu Winery and is named after the Spanish explorer Juan Bautista de Anza...
. Murray created several short animated films, his most successful was made in 1987, which was a two minute animated short titled "The Chore," which focused on a harried husband who uses his cat as a novel solution while not wanting to do a chore for his wife. He drew the scenes on typing paper and shot the scenes with 16 mm film. For creating "The Chore" Murray earned the Student Academy Award two years later in 1989.
In 1988 he joined MTV
MTV
MTV, formerly an initialism of Music Television, is an American network based in New York City that launched on August 1, 1981. The original purpose of the channel was to play music videos guided by on-air hosts known as VJs....
as an animator for the MTV commercials, and left in 1991 in hopes of starting his own projects. One of the MTV eyecatches Murray created involved the future Rocko's Modern Life character Heffer Wolfe
Heffer Wolfe
Heffer Wolfe is a fictional character on the cartoon Rocko's Modern Life and the comic book series of the same name. Tom Kenny provided the voice of the anthropomorphic steer...
; the eyecatch featured the MTV logo branded onto Heffer's buttocks.
"My Dog Zero"
"My Dog Zero," released in 1992, was Murray's third independent film and first color film. Murray said that "My Dog Zero" was his "most gratifying" artistic project to date because of his own "stubbornness" in resolving the obstacles and issues involved in the production, such as lack of funding and lack of resources. With a grant he employed twelve people, mostly university students, to cel paint the film. According to Murray, when he finished the film, several distributors refused to air it. He appeared at the Palace of Fine Arts in San Francisco with a copy of the film and persuaded the staff to air the film with the scheduled films. According to Murray, "My Dog Zero" received "good response."To fund the film Murray initially tried to pre-sell the television show rights to "My Dog Zero" but instead created a separate television series called Rocko's Modern Life
Rocko's Modern Life
Rocko's Modern Life is an animated series created by Joe Murray. The show aired for four seasons between 1993 and 1996 on Nickelodeon. Rocko's Modern Life is based around the surreal, parodic adventures of an anthropomorphic wallaby named Rocko, and his life in the city of O-Town...
.
Rocko's Modern Life
Murray created and was the executive producer for the animated series Rocko's Modern LifeRocko's Modern Life
Rocko's Modern Life is an animated series created by Joe Murray. The show aired for four seasons between 1993 and 1996 on Nickelodeon. Rocko's Modern Life is based around the surreal, parodic adventures of an anthropomorphic wallaby named Rocko, and his life in the city of O-Town...
, which aired on Nickelodeon from 1993 to 1996.
Originally, the character Rocko appeared in an unpublished comic book titled Travis. Murray tried selling the comic book in the late 1980s, but was never successful of getting it in production. Murray wanted funding for "My Dog Zero," so he wanted Nickelodeon to pre-buy television rights for the series. Murray presented a pencil test to Nickelodeon Studios
Nickelodeon Studios
Nickelodeon Studios was a television taping studio as well as an original attraction at Universal Studios Florida.-History:...
, which afterwards became interested in buying and airing the show. After deciding that "My Dog Zero" would not work as a television series, Murray combed through his sketchbooks, developed the Rocko's Modern Life concept, and submitted it to Nickelodeon, believing that the concept would likely be rejected. According to Murray, around three or four months later he had "forgotten about" the concept and was working on "My Dog Zero" when Linda Simensky
Linda Simensky
Linda Simensky is a production manager of various works of animation. Simensky served as an executive for Nickelodeon and Cartoon Network.Simensky graduated from University of Pennsylvania in 1985.Simensky received the June Foray Award in 2000....
informed Murray that Nickelodeon wanted a pilot episode. Murray said that he was glad that he would get funding for "My Dog Zero."
In 1992, two months prior to the production of season 1 of Rocko's Modern Life, Murray's first wife, Diane, committed suicide. Murray had blamed the show being taken as the reason for his wife's suicide. Murray felt that he had emotional and physical "unresolved issues" when he moved to Los Angeles
Los Ángeles
Los Ángeles is the capital of the province of Biobío, in the commune of the same name, in Region VIII , in the center-south of Chile. It is located between the Laja and Biobío rivers. The population is 123,445 inhabitants...
. He describes the experience as like participating in "marathon with my pants
Trousers
Trousers are an item of clothing worn on the lower part of the body from the waist to the ankles, covering both legs separately...
around my ankles." Murray initially believed that he would create one season, move back to the San Francisco Bay Area
San Francisco Bay Area
The San Francisco Bay Area, commonly known as the Bay Area, is a populated region that surrounds the San Francisco and San Pablo estuaries in Northern California. The region encompasses metropolitan areas of San Francisco, Oakland, and San Jose, along with smaller urban and rural areas...
, and "clean up the loose ends I had left hanging." To his surprise Nickelodeon approved new seasons.
After season 3 he decided to hand the project to Stephen Hillenburg
Stephen Hillenburg
Stephen McDannell Hillenburg is an American animator, writer, producer, actor, voice actor, and director best known for creating the animated series SpongeBob SquarePants. He currently owns his own production company, United Plankton Pictures...
, who performed most work for season 4 and created SpongeBob SquarePants
SpongeBob SquarePants
SpongeBob SquarePants is an American animated television series, created by marine biologist and animator Stephen Hillenburg. Much of the series centers on the exploits and adventures of the title character and his various friends in the underwater city of "Bikini Bottom"...
shortly after that; Murray continued to manage the cartoon. Murray said that he would completely leave the production after season 4. Murray said that he encouraged the network to continue production. Nickelodeon decided to cancel the series. Murray described all fifty-two episodes as "top notch" and that, in his view, the quality of a television show may decline as production continues "when you are dealing with volume."
Post-Rocko's Modern Life
After completing 52 episodes of Rocko's Modern Life, Murray took a break from the animation business and produced two children's books and illustrated two children's books: Who Asked the Moon to Dinner? (1999), The Enormous Mister Schmupsle: An ABC Adventure (2003), Hugville (written by Court Crandall) (2005), and Funny Cryptograms (written by Shawn Kennedy).Murray was working on a web-based cartoon named The Family Pop, which was produced in Flash and was in the middle of negotiations for this cartoon just prior to the onset of Camp Lazlo. On September 30, 2008, Murray added a new feature to his website, The Tin Box, where Murray posts some of his independent work. The first work posted was Where’s Poppa, a short episode of The Family Pop.
Camp Lazlo
Murray decided to return to television cartooning, this time selling his work to Cartoon Network StudiosCartoon Network Studios
Cartoon Network Studios is an American animation studio. A subsidiary of the Turner Broadcasting System , Cartoon Network Studios focuses on producing and developing animated programs only for and related to Cartoon Network...
. In 2005, he produced a pilot for the cartoon Camp Lazlo
Camp Lazlo
Camp Lazlo is an American animated television series created by Joe Murray, produced by Rough Draft Studios, Joe Murray Productions and Cartoon Network Studios. It aired on Cartoon Network...
, which was picked-up for a 13 episode first season and ran for five seasons, with production ending in November 2007.
On September 8, 2007, the TV movie "Where's Lazlo?" won an Emmy for Outstanding Animated Program (For an hour or more). During the production of Camp Lazlo, Murray underwent a divorce.
Post-Camp Lazlo
Once production finished for Camp Lazlo, and the final episodes were delivered, Murray developed a new television series. While he is working out details about production and distribution, he has started work on his next independent film project, Fish head, and publishing Crafting A Cartoon, a book on creating and producing an animated TV series, and working on producing a new short series, entitled Frog In A Suit.KaboingTV
Murray is currently planning to develop KaboingTV, a web network entirely dedicated to cartoons. On April 20, 2010, Murray launched a donation drive on KickstarterKickstarter
Kickstarter is an online threshold pledge system for funding creative projects. Kickstarter has funded a diverse array of endeavors, ranging from indie film and music to journalism, solar energy technology and food-related projects.-Model:...
to fund the project, he required $16,800 by June 5 to reach the total funding amount for his project; otherwise, it would be cancelled. The project surpassed the amount of funding needed, and Murray is currently developing the next Frog in a Suit episodes. KaboingTV premiered in March 11, 2011.
Character creation process
On his personal website, Murray describes his character creation process as "sometimes like playing FrankensteinFrankenstein
Frankenstein; or, The Modern Prometheus is a novel about a failed experiment that produced a monster, written by Mary Shelley, with inserts of poems by Percy Bysshe Shelley. Shelley started writing the story when she was eighteen, and the novel was published when she was twenty-one. The first...
."
- He starts with the personality. He shapes the conditions that make the character "tick," the character's imperfections, and the appeal. He asks himself, "Why would I want to tell stories about them?"
- If he is working with an anthropomorphic series or book with varying animals, he chooses an animal that, in his eyes, match the created personality. According to Murray, this resulted in a social caricatureCaricatureA caricature is a portrait that exaggerates or distorts the essence of a person or thing to create an easily identifiable visual likeness. In literature, a caricature is a description of a person using exaggeration of some characteristics and oversimplification of others.Caricatures can be...
in Rocko's Modern LifeRocko's Modern LifeRocko's Modern Life is an animated series created by Joe Murray. The show aired for four seasons between 1993 and 1996 on Nickelodeon. Rocko's Modern Life is based around the surreal, parodic adventures of an anthropomorphic wallaby named Rocko, and his life in the city of O-Town...
. - If he is working with an anthropomorphic series or book using one animal, he alters the specific character design to match the personality.
- Murray likes to vary eyeballs by size and color. He also varies nostrils. Murray believes that inconsistencies "make it more interesting"
- Murray then selects colors that, in his view, "feels right." He believes that yellow and bright colors "match a mood." If a character is "negative," he will pick a color that, in his opinion, matches the character.
- If he has to teach a crew of artists how to draw the character, he creates a model sheet for the character.
Murray says that one of the interesting aspects of character creation is the evolution of the personalities over time. In a one-time movie, the characters will have a static personality, but for a television series, the characters will change from season to season, developing new relationships, and even changing from mere background characters into a main character.
Television series
- Rocko's Modern LifeRocko's Modern LifeRocko's Modern Life is an animated series created by Joe Murray. The show aired for four seasons between 1993 and 1996 on Nickelodeon. Rocko's Modern Life is based around the surreal, parodic adventures of an anthropomorphic wallaby named Rocko, and his life in the city of O-Town...
(In production from 1993 to 1996) - Camp Lazlo!Camp LazloCamp Lazlo is an American animated television series created by Joe Murray, produced by Rough Draft Studios, Joe Murray Productions and Cartoon Network Studios. It aired on Cartoon Network...
(In production from 2005 to 2008)
Written and illustrated
- Who Asked the Moon to Dinner? (December 31, 1999) (Published in EnglishEnglish languageEnglish is a West Germanic language that arose in the Anglo-Saxon kingdoms of England and spread into what was to become south-east Scotland under the influence of the Anglian medieval kingdom of Northumbria...
and KoreanKorean languageKorean is the official language of the country Korea, in both South and North. It is also one of the two official languages in the Yanbian Korean Autonomous Prefecture in People's Republic of China. There are about 78 million Korean speakers worldwide. In the 15th century, a national writing...
) - The Enormous Mr. Schmupsle! (August 2003)
- Crafting A Cartoon (September 12, 2008)
- Creating Animated Cartoons with Character (August 24, 2010)
Independent films
- "The Chore"
- '"My Dog Zero" (1992) (Murray's third independent film)
- "The Affair" (2002)
- "Fishing"
- "Fish HeadFish headFish heads, either separated or still attached to the rest of the fish, are sometimes used in food dishes. They are more commonly eaten in Eastern countries than in the West.-Fish head cuisine:...
" (in production)