Conan O'Brien HD Bumpers!

February 22, 2007 7:42 AM

Late Night with Conan O'Brien Bumper Art Site, mostly from HD TV screencaps. [Personal faves: 1, 2, 3.]
posted by myopicman (36 comments total)

Begone Leno
posted by GavinR at 7:46 AM on February 22, 2007

Not a viewer but those are really great.
posted by wfc123 at 7:56 AM on February 22, 2007

Fantastic. One of those bits of incidental art that would make me smil and then be forgotten a minute later. It's nice to see them all together like this.
posted by cortex at 7:58 AM on February 22, 2007

Reminds me of the old MTV interludes. Very inventive.
posted by jouke at 8:03 AM on February 22, 2007

Somebody has a very cool job.
posted by gwint at 8:08 AM on February 22, 2007

Good stuff.

It makes me wonder if anyone has compiled a similar collection of "More to Come" bumpers from the Carson-era Tonight Show. (Come to think of it, that would make a pretty good coffee table book.)
posted by gigawhat? at 8:10 AM on February 22, 2007

I hope whoever makes the bumpers sees this and decides to make a bumper out of a screenshot of the site that made the screenshots of the bumpers.
posted by iconomy at 8:14 AM on February 22, 2007

Hah!
posted by ColdChef at 8:15 AM on February 22, 2007

ColdChef, that painting has been referred to almost everywhere by now. It was even used relatively as-is as the outside shot of The Diner from the cartoon show The Tick,

Oh, the site? Surprisingly awesome.
posted by JHarris at 8:30 AM on February 22, 2007

That was really cool. I haven't watched the show in years (always seemed empty without Andy), but I enjoyed those a lot.
posted by ND¢ at 8:32 AM on February 22, 2007

i just wanted to say that any show that makes Chris Ware references is infinitely superior to those that don't.
posted by 1f2frfbf at 8:47 AM on February 22, 2007

Is there an archive of bumpers when Letterman was hosting Late Night? I think I like those more because they're more real and dirty and fun.
posted by ruthsarian at 9:02 AM on February 22, 2007

Surely there's a better match for this one than the Maltese Falcoln. The Third Man, maybe?
posted by hydrophonic at 9:03 AM on February 22, 2007

My list of dream jobs (when schooling, experience and talent are of no concern) now reads:

Mythbuster
Conan O'Brien Bumper Artist
Astronaut
posted by Terminal Verbosity at 9:16 AM on February 22, 2007

That Land of the Giants one fucking rocks.

I love that show. Gimme a Spindrift over the Flying Sub any day of the week.
posted by squidfartz at 9:17 AM on February 22, 2007

Excuse my ignorance, but what is a bumper? At what point during the show are these shown? At the start or before/after ad breaks? I have see bits of the show on occasion (on NBC Europe) and don't remember these. They're all very nice by the way...
posted by jontyjago at 9:26 AM on February 22, 2007

Begone Leno

Do you actually look forward to Conan doing the "Tonight Show?" I like him in his niche. Some people should never go mainstream.
posted by Faze at 9:26 AM on February 22, 2007

jontyjago, they show up, as you guess, before and after the commercial break, as sort of an ease-in (or -out) static image with a music sting accompanying it, fading over to the live camera after a few seconds.
posted by cortex at 9:31 AM on February 22, 2007

Ha!
posted by brundlefly at 9:31 AM on February 22, 2007

Cortex - thanks. That might explain why I've never seen them as I don't think the European version has any ad breaks, at least not as many as I'm sure the US version has.
posted by jontyjago at 9:36 AM on February 22, 2007

A nice one from the infamous Finland episode.

Fagerstrom!!!
posted by damn dirty ape at 10:04 AM on February 22, 2007

This reminds me of Patrick McDonnell's comic strip "Mutts", and its Sunday title panel tributes.
posted by Guy Smiley at 10:32 AM on February 22, 2007

Thanks Guy Smiley, thats a great link.
posted by vito90 at 12:35 PM on February 22, 2007

I enjoyed looking at those, despite the obviousness of some of the stories behind the bumpers.

"Based on a Starbucks cup." Please.
posted by Dave Faris at 1:10 PM on February 22, 2007

my father has been working on this tv show, and SNL, since forever. anyway, i asked him about the designs and its one of his buddies that designs them and does all the artwork for them. those guys do have a really cool job. i remember them working on the designs for all the late night shows before computers and graphic programs were available to the commonfolk. and now, as i go to plug the guys name, i cant remember it. not going to call dad back at work just to plug his buddies name.
awesome post.
dad liked it and is forwarding it to the creator to have a look at.
heh.
posted by stackmonster at 1:47 PM on February 22, 2007

stackmonster: That's wild! I can't wait to read what feedback the artist has.

I also felt that after Andy Richter left, Conan's show felt a bit empty too. My constant travels have forced me to not watch the show in a while, but family and friends did send me a few clips in the past year (the Finnish theme and visit were very popular over there) and the humour remains highly off-kilter for me to enjoy. 1:30am was killing me, though. That and the show tapings were at 2pm in New York, which weren't doable during weekdays.
posted by myopicman at 2:08 PM on February 22, 2007

"Based on a Starbucks cup." Please.

I'm guessing that the writeups are at least partly user-submitted. Faced with 100+ entries all wanting a writeup, the guy running it may have gotten that as a set-piece by email, shrugged, and tossed it on there.

And, increasingly implausible as this may be, there could be websurfers not intimately familiar with the Starbucks brand experience.
posted by cortex at 2:22 PM on February 22, 2007

Nice post!
posted by KevinSkomsvold at 2:45 PM on February 22, 2007

What a terrific find. Thanks!
posted by veggieboy at 2:49 PM on February 22, 2007

1:30am was killing me, though.

There's always bitorrent. Download and watch at your leisure.
posted by damn dirty ape at 2:54 PM on February 22, 2007

stackmonster, Marty Geller is credited as graphic artist for the show. That may be a supervisory position, though (and for sure not everyone gets a screen credit).
posted by dhartung at 3:23 PM on February 22, 2007

i think my dad gave a different name. he said theres a whole crew that actually works on it but theres one guy in particular who is the creative genius behind the whole thing. ill call him back later to be reminded of who he said...
posted by stackmonster at 4:14 PM on February 22, 2007

I wouldn't be surprised if many of these were done by Pierre Bernard (of Recliner of Rage fame).

When I saw this bumper that has no positive ID for its inspiration, I immediately thought of the painting “Explosion” by Roy Lichtenstein. I've e-mailed the maintainer of the site.
posted by Spire at 5:15 PM on February 22, 2007

I also emailed the maintainer about the Bazooka Bubblegum design, which is obviously based off of the Wacky Packages parody sticker of Bazooka, not the Bazooka label directly.
posted by xiojason at 8:17 PM on February 22, 2007

ok, i got the name. dad says the REAL brains behind the mask is kevin frank.
posted by stackmonster at 10:54 PM on February 22, 2007

Thanks for the great link!
posted by rfbjames at 11:39 AM on February 23, 2007