Christmas!

For Christmas I got a new tablet. I know most people just straight up do a painting to post, but I'm actually kinda ill, so I'm just watching star wars in bed. Instead, I wanted to practice animating, so I did a walk-cycle for Kuja. I found a free animation program called "Pencil". It's kinda tedious to use, especially moving around frames, so I'll never try and do a finished piece on it, but in half an hour I did this walk cycle, so it can't be that terrible of a program.

As i do more randoms during the day, I might just fill up this post with nice video goodies.

Another Quickie :D. Poodle fighting on leash.

Holidays!

Winter break! Which means I have TV again! I also have the worst sleep schedule ever atm. I'm stuck on the 2-3 hours a day regiment. So I've been filling up pages of 8.5 by 11s with comedians heads, and late night talk show hosts. I'm trying to capture likenesses off one expression. So I look at them, they do something, I look away, draw that, and hope it turns out good. I think I hit these 2 pretty on, and double bonus, I was watching the Price is Right, Win Win.

By the end of the holiday I'll make a compilation page, once I get my hands on a scanner.

End of a Semester

The school semester has ended. Hurray!

With that comes a reflection on accomplishments. The easiest way to represent those thoughts is with the story reel that has been in progress this whole time.

I still like the story; it's clear and short, and clearly represents a character (Something I've been struggling with in other projects). The boards are terrible and I always meant to fix them, but never had time (How I allocate my workload). I think I spent the right amount of time doing the rough passes of animation, but I am no clean-up artist (Knowing my strengths). I now know how long it should take me to do a scene right, and what the benefits of that is (Addressing my weaknesses). This piece was not cleaned well, but I spent that time doing all the colouring and retouching to compensate for it (Work ethic). As stressful as finishing it was, it is finished, and that's something to be proud of (Love what you do). I hope you all enjoy (Know why you do it).

Here is a scribble from 7 weeks ago. I still really like spotted, and want to continue to develop it. I will be doing model sheets for the characters over the break. This sleepy Kuja represents my feelings at this second now more than ever.

Having fun with the characters.

Here's to another project finished, leading to more possibilities to come. Next semester!

Progress Blogging

Here are some things in progress/finished within themselves that I did this week :D

First, I drew a new character line-up for group film. The story has changed, and thus there was a lot of costuming that got tossed out. So now Boss is a manager style boss, and Blink is a villain with a droid he pilots to do his dirty work. It's gonna be good. Promise!

My Pan background for layout, with the two extremes of the shot for your reference.

And that same old story reel your tired of watching, but with updated animation roughs, and the coloured pan-background inserted

I'm not entirely happy with the pan in that, cause I used premier to cut the reel, and I needed After Effects to composite the pan properly... :(

Edit: Looking at the pan composited. I think I'll just go back and adjust the target dummy to the position I had before. Ignoring the changing perspective.

Anyways, 2 weeks left, and a decades worth of assignments to go. Fun!

P.S. The comments box is below. I'm looking at your Noris ;) (Takes some to get some, lol)

Guilt Post

Having a blog means I feel guilty when I have nothing I want to post. I spent all weekend writing an in depth essay, so my art generation was at a minimum. My ability to procrastinate was still very high though. Let's just say my room is spotless, and a lot of other chores have been taken care of.

I don't think anyone particularly cares about me posting group films designs. Especially cause I only put up the ones that have been thrown away. I figure this can be some nice art fodder for all my viewers.

Firstly, my personal favorite interpretations of Boss and Bori. Organic, wonky, and troll/goblin like. Coloured to feel that way too.

We had to put together an art direction pack, showing what we have contributed to the film. Here is the old design for boss, the still current design of blink, and some experiments for Bori (which I already posted)
Colour and style tests. I was looking really closely at the Marvel interpretation of the Wizard of Oz saga. Love the texture style painting, and wonky character design.

The progression of Bori, up until this design got thrown out. This only includes my part, and not Shen the other designer working on this character. We wanted simple, teenager, full of ambition, and some kind of creature. Those were the ground rules. You can see me playing with shape proportions in silhouette before designing. The top drawings were storyboards i liked the feeling of Bori I was achieving.

And more Stop-motion...

I really enjoy that class, it immediately reveals problems in animation. Right now I think I self-reference animation to much. Even though I never record myself doing an action, I act through it, and try to realize what I am doing physically.

This is a weird complaint, but it always feels to natural and evenly paced. I want more abstract, expressive timing in my work, and that's what I'm working towards now.

A walk.

My smash assignment.

More in the future... Hang tight ya'll :D

3D First pass

I've been trying to get ahead of the game, cause I see the looming deadlines coming up in my future. I tried to bang out all of my thinking character animation today in one sitting. Some tweaks to fix, but it was a blog-worthy pass.

The dialogue is from Antoine Dobson (Bed intruder video). Enjoy :D

Story reel 3

I hope people don't get tired of seeing this. It's the story reel again. This time, the pan has been changed so the overlay no longer moves, and makes things weird.

Also the animation is now in rough form. No longer story poses, but actual timed out keys and breakdowns. :D

Group Film

I've felt bad, cause I've been posting on my group's blog almost every other day, and I put nothing on here. I think we're supposed to keep stuff secret, but no one else does, and these designs won't give away the story. Plus all but one of these is getting tossed regardless.

colour studies/designs. These are close to what we have going now, but that all can still change.

Lots of other possible design styles for the characters, yet to be discussed.

One more, I forgot to include in that compilation.

Revised Story Reel

Lack of postage, cause most things I've been working on are for group film. I'm waiting for my designs to get thrown out before I post them somewhere else.

So here is my in progress story reel, with a pose test, and the layout pan inserted.

Infamous present-tation

For that awesome cool wedding we went to yesterday, me and my brothers got our friends a nice gift. But it's in our nature to make people work for their rewards. When they get through our elaborate pranckaging, it'll all be worth it. For the card, we decided to not even bother signing it. Instead I drew a quick doodle of my brothers and I. I think they'll recognize who's responsible. lol

I'll probably colour this up and make it a staple from now on.