But I'm glad to be back in LA, I love Marin County and Northern California but it was time for a change back to Southern California.  The funny thing about all this is that I am unable to show any of this work!  I can show some of it once the movies come out but many of these projects get put 'on the shelf' and who knows what will happen to them. 

JEH: I’m sure you’ve gone through some serious production crunches over your career. What’s the craziest situation you’ve ever gone through over your career?

Ryan: Well, yes- production crunches and craziness are more common than they really should be; it's just the nature of the business I guess.  Part of the fun of being a designer/illustrator is getting to work with many of my idols and inspirations in the field- and potentially fail spectacularly and miserably in front of them on a daily basis!  As I'm sure a lot of your readers know, it's such a great feeling to get the job but a lot of pressure to come through and deliver what the client wants. 

So to answer your question there are 'crazy situations' happening all the time but a real doozy comes along about once every two months or so.  Much of my time up at the Ranch working on the Star Wars films fell into that category, myself and a few members of the Art Department would really get ourselves into trouble during the week.

We always knew we had a Friday meeting but would inevitably spend much of our time before about Wednesday afternoon doing what we legitimately considered 'researching' and 'getting inspired' before it really hit us how much work was really due before the end of the week.  We'd always come through but only after what was oftentimes a double all nighters situation followed by pinning up the last illustration as the client walked upstairs and through the door.  I'm convinced that part of this stems from bad habits I picked up at school when I realized too that sometimes that extra pressure and craziness helps the creative process as well- fear is a very effective motivator.