New Concept Art and Origins revealed!

January 13, 2012By Aladdin3477Production News

Brand new production drawings and paintings have been added to the Aladdin 3477 website, which you can find in Concept Art section of Visual Galleries.  These images show the first real look at story and visuals for the upcoming movie, but also reveal the origins of how this massive project came to be.

Way back in 1990, when Matt Busch graduated high school and began attending Macomb College classes in the Media and Communication Arts department (where he would later become a professor).  There he was inspired to create a monthly independent comic book called Zark.  These self-published books were hand-delivered and sold at local comic shops in the Metro Detroit area.  Busch chuckles, “The Zark comics were very Star Wars-like, taking place in a universe very far from here.”

In 1992, Busch began a new independent comic called Kastar Shandax, which took place in the same universe as Zark. “Kastar Shandax was definitely Aladdin-inspired, and the first real origin of what would become Aladdin 3477.” Observes Busch.  “Complete with a low-level thief and his robot sidekick, Kastar fell in love with a princess, who destiny would put together. I illustrated a ton of pages, but abandoned the project when I felt the story was too much like Aladdin. It needed more of a twist.”

Kastar Shandax was the first real origin of Aladdin 3477. Complete with a low-level thief and his robot sidekick, Kastar fell in love with a princess, who destiny would put together.

Busch put Kastar aside, but started a new comic book, yet again taking place in the Zark universe, titled Daria Jontak. Comments Busch, “That was my first real published comic work.  The Daria Jontak series was published bi-monthly from 1996 through 98, and later collected into a graphic novel by JMJ Media.”  As the science fiction visuals for these comics developed, Busch’s inspiration with Hindu-inspired motifs became more clear.

The idea was to eventually have both the Kastar Shandax and Daria Jontak story-lines collide into one epic saga titled Kleptomode.  All the while, Busch’s career not only as an illustrator was taking off, but with independent movie and video projects as well.  Busch realized more and more that he wanted to produce Kleptomode as a movie, rather than a graphic novel.  In his free time, the project has always been on his mind, and so he has illustrated concept art here and there.  It was just a matter of funds, experience, and the technological capabilities for one to pull of such a task.

Around 2009, with the success of his You Can Draw Star Wars video series, Busch began to toy around with moving forward on Kleptomode.  It seemed that the stars were finally aligned, and so he began outlining the story arcs and further developing the characters.  “One of the road blocks I kept running into was that the story was a little too much like Aladdin.  And I thought ‘Aladdin-in-Space’ was kind of silly.”

There is all of this other material I’m drawing from which is not from the original Aladdin story. Combined, it adds quite a few twists and turns and makes quite an epic from what people might expect.

Of course, eventually Busch caved, and decided to steer where destiny had been pointing him all along.  “The basic story really has always stemmed from Aladdin, so what’s the point in trying to hide that?  The good news is- there is all of this other material I’m drawing from which is not from the original Aladdin story.  Combined, it adds quite a few twists and turns and makes quite an epic from what people might expect. I’m really excited for people to see what I have in store!”

And now you can- in the newly updated Concept Design Gallery!  You can see a lot more of the developmental art and insight into the movie’s development by clicking the button below!