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The Phoenix Gene – Live Action AI Direction

by Michael Cawood May 20, 2026 in
Drawing from The Phoenix Gene VR game universe, I developed a series of original AI-generated storytelling and marketing images to begin visualizing the narrative worlds of the game and its companion novels. Using Higgsfield AI, I accessed a suite of image generation models — including Nano Banana, Seedream, Kling, and Flux — to explore a range of visual styles and cinematic possibilities.

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The Phoenix Gene – 3D AI Art Direction

by Michael Cawood May 20, 2026 in
Drawing from The Phoenix Gene VR game universe, I developed a series of original AI-generated storytelling and marketing images to begin visualizing the narrative worlds of the game and its companion novels. Using Higgsfield AI, I accessed a suite of image generation models — including Nano Banana, Seedream, Kling, and Flux — to explore a range of visual styles and cinematic possibilities.

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The Phoenix Gene – 2D AI Art Direction

by Michael Cawood May 20, 2026 in
Drawing from The Phoenix Gene VR game universe, I developed a series of original AI-generated storytelling and marketing images to begin visualizing the narrative worlds of the game and its companion novels. Using Higgsfield AI, I accessed a suite of image generation models — including Nano Banana, Seedream, Kling, and Flux — to explore a range of visual styles and cinematic possibilities.

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Boat Janitor Strikes Back – Gen AI Video Creation

by Michael Cawood May 4, 2026 in
I worked with content from Dramawave to create insert shots that tell the story quickly. This is a vertical drama, and they tend to be 1-3 minutes in length, so you haven't got long to get your point across and setup the next cliff hanger. The writers had a few basic close-up shots, but they needed AI Video Creation for establishing shots and enhancements to existing shots that tell more story than what they started with. I adjusted compositions, inserted new elements, changed the mood and atmosphere of the scenes and adjusted performances.

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Target Christmas Commercial

by Michael Cawood January 9, 2026 in
Animation for the Target Christmas Commercial 2025

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The Phoenix Gene – VR Game

by Michael Cawood July 24, 2025 in
VR Action Game, Narrative Experience and Book developed for Meta Quest 2 and Quest 3 and PCVR

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The Phoenix Gene – Development Art Direction

by Michael Cawood July 11, 2023 in
Feature Pitch

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Leviathan & Trident: Ride Commercial

by Michael Cawood November 15, 2022 in
Animation for the Leviathan & Trident Seaworld ride

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Third Planet Problems

by Michael Cawood January 26, 2021 in
Animated Series Pitch

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Cupid’s Apprentice

by Michael Cawood January 26, 2021 in
Feature Pitch

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It’s a Squirrely Life

by Michael Cawood January 26, 2021 in
A wild holiday adventure that teaches the value of friendship, community, and responsibility. When all the nuts are stolen from the Oak Creek bank, George the squirrel feels guilty for leaving the vault open. If he doesn’t find the nuts, Christmas will be ruined. He goes on a journey to learn what forest life would be like without him and gets the courage to face the thief. It’s a nutty spin on the Christmas classic, It’s a Wonderful Life, great for kids ages 7+

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Headspace – Mindful Eating

by Michael Cawood November 10, 2020 in
Series

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Maisey the Dragon

by Michael Cawood July 26, 2020 in
Animated Series Pitch

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The Wrong Rock

by Michael Cawood May 18, 2019 in
Short Film

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Eru and the Ghost Kingdom

by Michael Cawood May 17, 2019 in
Art Direction for Animated TV Series

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Devils, Angels & Dating

by Michael Cawood November 17, 2016 in
In 2006 I started developing a short computer generated film called 'Devils, Angels and Dating'. This film was made with the internet in mind, fully aware of modern trends. I was inspired by modern dating trends and let those themes influence the core ideas behind the film.

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The OceanMaker

by Michael Cawood November 17, 2016 in
I put in a few months of work on this short film. I was largely involved in the 3D filmmaking side of things, creating rough versions of shots, editing it together and figuring out what works to tell the story.

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Napoleon: The Ticket

by Michael Cawood November 16, 2016 in
Michael Cawood helped Matt Berenty 'plus' the story, then came on board to implement the changes in Layout and Previs Animation.

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Tales from the 4th Dimension

by Michael Cawood April 26, 2014 in
Story Consultantation & Illustration

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Squeezamals

by Michael Cawood April 26, 2014 in
Animation for the CW TV Series

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Love from Mars

by Michael Cawood July 16, 2013 in
Story Consultantation & Illustration

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Dragon and Boy: Character Design

by Michael Cawood May 31, 2013 in
Character designs by Michael Cawood for an animated TV series.

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Devils, Angels & Dating: Trailer

by Michael Cawood January 1, 2013 in
During the development of 'Devils, Angels & Dating' I knew it was going to be very important to create a strong trailer to attract talent to work on the project. So the trailer was planned out early in the process. Storyboards from the film were cut together and a score was created so that we could plan around those shots getting done first. It was updated almost as often as the main film itself so that the team could see how it was coming along. It was completed about six months ahead of the completion of the final film.

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Lostopolis

by Michael Cawood September 24, 2012 in
I was an Animation Director for the company and did a little character design and rigging supervision in the early stages of production.

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Kameo: Thorn Beats Kameo

by Michael Cawood January 6, 2012 in
There were plenty of animatics created that dug into the story elements of the game with characters that actually needed to have performances, but this was probably the first one that I made with full animation. Previous to this all the FMV work had been cheated comic book style (semi-animated) scenes or the evolve scenes that were more spectacle than performance...

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Sam and the Secrets of the Universe

by Michael Cawood January 5, 2012 in
Story Consultant & Illustrator

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Green Team – Mobile Rebates

by Michael Cawood February 5, 2011 in
Commercial / Product Demo HEROmation Director (Visuals) 2013 / 2014 Storyboards 77563 0 77563 0 77563 0 77563 0 77563 0 77563 0 78547 0 78547 0 78547 0 78547 0 78547 0 78547 0 78547 0 Storyboards and Previs Copyright © Green Team Energy 2014

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Monkey King: Theme Park Attraction

by Michael Cawood March 7, 2010 in
This is a test piece of animation made to showcase a new version of a classic character. I was given the character model. After a few tweaks to the model, I rigged him and animated this short sequence of action in a tightly styled way. It was very quick turn around but good fun.

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Pig Goat Banana Cricket: Storyboard

by Michael Cawood March 4, 2010 in
Storyboard test created for the animated TV series 'Pig Goat Banana Cricket'.

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Satin: Character Design

by Michael Cawood February 4, 2010 in
Character designs and costumes by Michael Cawood for a pet project, code named 'Jayscott'.

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Velcro: Character Design

by Michael Cawood November 4, 2009 in
Character designs and costumes by Michael Cawood for a pet project, code named 'Jayscott'.

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Cupid: Character Design

by Michael Cawood May 28, 2009 in
Character designs by Michael Cawood, for Cupid in the short film 'Devils Angels & Dating'.

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Kameo: End of Game

by Michael Cawood April 6, 2009 in
The magnum-opus of the entire game. This huge sequence had to top everything you'd seen, push the capabilities of Kameo beyond what you'd previously experienced, draw together numerous story threads, introduce a twist in the plot and give the player a satisfactory ending. It was developed towards the end of the game's development so was under pressure to be completed fast and there were other...

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Costume Design

by Michael Cawood September 29, 2008 in
Costume designs by Michael Cawood, for a variety of projects including games, films and TV series.

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Doorman: Character Design

by Michael Cawood May 31, 2008 in
Character designs by Michael Cawood, for a character that was ultimately not used in the short film 'Devils Angels & Dating'.

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Kameo: Evolve Pummel Weed

by Michael Cawood January 6, 2008 in
All the Evolve scenes were very complex pieces that required a lot of R&D, but they presented fantastic opportunities to do something imaginative. The only rules were that it had to start with the baby monster and it had to transform into the adult monster, ideally through a method that reflected their elemental theme. I've included an earlier version of this Evolve cinematic developed for the original Xbox. I later decided to upgrade all the FMVs to HD resolution at the same time as changing the characters to match their new Xbox 360 designs.

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Tenkai Knights: Website Intro

by Michael Cawood December 10, 2007 in
I'd worked with the client a couple of times before for some pitches, and this interactive website was one of the ones that got commissioned. I was able to work from home, which made for a nice change. There was a good number of ...

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Banjo Kazooie: Character Design

by Michael Cawood September 2, 2007 in
Character designs, creatures, costumes and vehicles by Michael Cawood for a prototype XBox 360 game that was later cancelled, then later re-imaged as 'Nut's and Bolts'.

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Panda Pander

by Michael Cawood June 28, 2007 in
Panda Pander gathered a few million hits at Crackle before they changed their format. After Two Face Tabby I didn't want to spend so long on my next project so I did some one off exercises to flesh out my showreel while I spent a few months developing the pre-production material for Panda Pander (working title "Shelf Life").

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Parkour: Personal Project

by Michael Cawood May 19, 2007 in
I'd wanted to do something acrobatic like this since my University years but when Disney's Tarzan came out I opted not to do it as I figured it would be seen as a rip off, since then Spiderman has also achieved similar feats. Well, in 2007, I felt it was time to have a go anyway...

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Ark VFX: Company Reel

by Michael Cawood April 21, 2007 in
I edited together two new showreels for Ark VFX, one short Teaser Reel and one longer Professional Reel. The main idea behind these was to show the breadth of Ark's portfolio whilst leaning it more in the direction of the character animation work they'd done but hadn't shown much of up to this point.

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Ark VFX: Company Teaser

by Michael Cawood April 21, 2007 in
I edited together two new showreels for Ark VFX, one short Teaser Reel and one longer Professional Reel.

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Perfect Dark Zero: Walk through trailer

by Michael Cawood November 28, 2006 in
This is an edit I made for promotional purposes. It highlights a co-operative walk through of a level.

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Kameo: Attract Mode Trailer

by Michael Cawood August 19, 2005 in
Here it is, the last of my Kameo edits. I've effectively had several dry runs at this particular format as you can see from the other videos on this website, so it wasn't a stretch to know exactly what was needed. I put together a plan on paper that highlighted all the major themes, features and scenes we wanted to cover...

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Kameo: DLC Trailer

by Michael Cawood May 19, 2005 in
This short edit highlights the new demo and downloadable content for Kameo, including character skins and free online co-operative play. It presented an interesting challenge, featuring so much content in only 30 seconds and print so much text onscreen in so many languages.

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Kameo: Evolve Cloud Monster

by Michael Cawood April 6, 2005 in
This was one of the more imaginative characters in the game. Unfortunately after this cut-scene was finished the character proved too hard technically to implement in the game and we were beginning to realize we didn't need so many characters so he got the chop. But this scene was made available to view as an unlock-able extra (along with the animatic below) and featured in some of the early trailers for the game.

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Kameo: Character Design

by Michael Cawood May 19, 2004 in
Character designs, sketches, creatures and costumes by Michael Cawood for Kameo: Elements of Power (XBox 360 Game).

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Kameo: X04 Trailer

by Michael Cawood May 19, 2004 in
Not quite as powerful as the X03 teaser trailer, this version actually had an early version completely done before we looked at it and decided to completely re-plan it. There were certain points we wanted to get across that we needed to highlight. One of those elements was the ability to tackle any given situation in a number of different ways by choosing ...

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Kameo: Evolve 40 Below

by Michael Cawood April 6, 2004 in
I originally created the Snowman Evolve scene with a more snowball like theme but as the character designs all changed this scene had to be updated as well. All the characters were generally made to look more detailed and aggressive, mostly through the addition of bumpy surfaces and spikes. In this particular case I actually preferred the original 'Snowman' design and I think he lost his snowball qualities in the update. So you can see both the final and the original versions here, along with the animatic I originally story-boarded below.

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Kameo: X03 Trailer

by Michael Cawood September 19, 2003 in
This is my personal favourite Kameo trailer up to this point. I've done a number of these and this is the one where everything just came together to form something beautiful (well I think so, judge for yourself). I found myself with a one month deadline to pull something really special together.