Congratulations to ex-BTEC HND student, Carl Sowerby, whose artwork features on ex-Blur Damon Albarn’s band, Gorillaz.  Their single, featuring Carl’s work is due out on the  10th April.

Full story by Kate Rees of the News & Star in Carlisle

TALENTED Carlisle animator Carl Sowerby’s work features on the new Gorillaz single, which is out on Monday.

For the DVD single of double A-side El Mañana/Kids With Guns, Carl, 31, of Denton Holme, created a walk through a post-apocalyptic Carlisle, complete with local landmarks such as Carlisle Castle and the Citadel for the Don't Get Lost in Heaven original demo version. The DVD single also includes El Mañana animatics.

Carl won a worldwide competition to work with Gorillaz, who are fronted by former Blur singer-guitarist Damon Albarn, and their acclaimed animation team, the Zombie Flesh Eaters. His entry, Table Manners: A Slice Of Life In Doodles, in which doodles come to life on scraps of paper, voiced by Carl and friends, was voted for by visitors to the site. Gorillaz guitarist Noodle said Carl’s original work was “a great and simple idea.”

Carl’s animations for the new DVD single was so good he got to work on the song Don't Get Lost in Heaven by himself.

He was originally asked to submit characters which would be included in a video but was allowed to come up with the whole concept himself, which Zombie Flesh Eaters agreed to.

“It’s a bit surreal, there’s no real narrative. It uses different drawing styles, not all of them new but with some experiments, it’s varied. They trusted me totally.”

There’s a lot of kudos in working on such a high-profile project.

“The good thing was that there was such an open brief, I sent them sample shots and they said ‘that’s cool’,” says Carl. “I didn’t have anything to do with the guys directly but it was shown to Jamie Hewlett, who liked it.

“It’s great publicity for my work, and it forced me to do produce something outside my normal work, in a short period of time. It was a useful experience.”

Carl studied creative digital technology HND at Cumbria College of Art and Design (now Cumbria Institute of the Arts) and, until recently, worked for the News & Star in the advertising design department.

As well as freelance animation Carl now works for New York-based Katcaverly creating E-cards and political cartoons for the web.

“A lot of the political stuff is about George Bush, it’s very American, but the cards range from romantic, birthday and humorous to special occasions. It’s pretty cool really, you have to keep yourself interested.”

El Mañana is out on Monday. Carl’s work, and the other videos, are only available on the DVD single, not the music CD single.

To see more of Carlisle’s cartoon creations check out www.sourbee.co.uk