Rubicante Kid – Very little people in a very big world

“Very little people in a very big world” is the slogan that moves Mike’s work in Instagram a year ago. In his free time, Mike builds scenarios with whatever he can find in front of him (a bottle with bad milk, tape on his desk, snowballs, his food, a natural history book, whatever), then he draws on paper little people that act on them. When he uploads the picture to Instagram, he adds a caption that makes you smile, even laugh out.

This is a little sample of his work or we could end up uploading the entire account. Sometimes he also tell stories on several photos, like the “big bird” series that ended up being a filming session, jaja.

“Alrighty guys, that’s a wrap.”

ASGARD: Rubicante Kid on Instagram started with some draws and then, suddenly at the fourth pic, “The little people was born”. How was it? Do you remember what were you thinking?
MIKE: Well, I knew I wanted to use Instagram as some sort of sketch blog, and the first little guy was really just a doodle. I got such a kick out of how the shot came out that I decided to do another, and then another, and the project just sort of snowballed from there. It’s actually pretty addictive.

What happenned first, Instagram or Tumblr? Did The little people exist before? What would be of them without Instagram?
Instagram was the first home for the Little People, but I thought that it’d be good to have a more accessible home for the photos. I actually don’t spend as much time with the Tumblr, but it’s obviously a popular platform and perfect as a 2nd home for the photos. So far as what would happen if there was no Instagram, I imagine I’d lean on Tumblr more and probably spread out to other platforms, but Instagram’s really been a perfect outlet for this project.

How much time do you think your captions? Or, are they spontaneous ideas and you just draw them inmmediatly?
Most of the time I’m thinking of the image and the caption at the same time, and try to get them to work hand-in-hand as much as possible. Of course it doesn’t work out that way all the time, but I have a hard time separating one from the other in my mind.

What do you enjoy the most, creating an scenario (like the pirates charging a canon, or the story with the big bird, or Mr. Bond), or the ones that are captions of what your thinking and the character just stands there like saying it (like the one staring at a dessert or the one staring at a keyboard, the one eating too much cherries, or expressing some freedom).
That’s a good question… I don’t think I’ve never really separated the two in my mind. Some are more narrative than the others, but that’s less about which I enjoy more and more just about what mood I’m in or what seems to fit the scene better. It’s all fair game.

Which kind of photos are the ones that the people like the most? Are you aware of that?

The most popular one was a reference to Adventure time. I had a feeling that I wasn’t the only person on Instagram that liked that show…

Have you noticed an evolution of the captions? At first they were more descriptive, but now each time is more common that you tell stories, even in a series of photos.
Yeah, definitely. I think it took me a little practice to find a rhythm that really worked for me. The way I do the cutouts has changed, too.

You posted a “tutorial” of how to do Little people, jeje. Did you have feedback? Can we found relatives of the little people spread around the web?
Nah, not much feedback— the tutorial was really just a joke. I think just one of my friends did do their own using the template I posted. I’ve seen a few folks do their own take on the Little People more recently, and they’re usually pretty flattering.

What do you use to take the photos?
I take all of the photos with my iPhone 4S.

Did you study something related with graphic design or illustration? What do you do, we can see in your website that you draw comics?
I studied New Media in school, but didn’t get into illustration until much later. I work mainly in interactive design (mostly for ad agencies which has me sitting at a computer all day, and I really needed to find a creative outlet that let me work more with my hands. I’d never really done much drawing up until a few years ago, but it turned out to be the perfect solution for me. At this point I draw pretty much every day.

You can find “The little people” at Instagram as rubicantekid, or at Tumblr in remeberthelittlepeople.tumblr.com

Thanks to Ale Limón for the recommendation 🙂