Advanced Perspective - Week 5

This week's theme was Greek.  I was unfortunately rushed quite a bit this week for various reasons, not the least of which was finishing my parent's anniversary gift and also spending four days flying to and attending their surprise party.  I still managed to turn some stuff out, though.  The first illustration is one of the classic Trojan Horse, while the second celebrates the glory that was television's Hercules and Xena.

Hercules, Xena, and related characters © MCA/Universal and Renaissance Pictures.

A Walk Down Memory Lane

I took a break from my regularly scheduled homework (or rather, stopped sleeping in order to create more time) to do a special little something to celebrate my parent's 30th wedding anniversary.  The project was coordinated by my sister, Tiffanie, who also planned a well-executed surprise anniversary dinner complete with plenty of neighbors, friends, family, and ME (the biggest surprise of all, since I haven't been home since January and am currently in classes).  Fun was had by all and my parents were completely surprised!

The idea behind this illustration (which was inspired by the art prints at Your Memory Lane, though highly improved upon) was to create a collection of various buildings, landmarks, icons, logos, cars, etc. that gather from and represent my parents' 30 years of marriage.  I created each person, place, and thing (even the logos) with a textured brush in Photoshop.  It was then printed (at FedEx Office, who robbed it of it's vibrancy) and framed for all to see and enjoy.  Now, for the first time ever, you can experience it in it's original RGB full-color glory!

(And, of course, I had to thumbnail it out, first.  Force of habit.)

Digital Storyboarding - Frankenstein Boards

This week was our last week with Jeff Snow (go follow his blog, if you don't already!), so the final boards from our sequence of Frankenstein were due (-ish, apparently).  We all had to get up and pitch them to the class, which lead to two interesting things: 1.) I was the only one in the class to have actually finished my boards (after three weeks, a lot of people--it's an undergrad class--still hadn't even finished roughing out the entire sequence!) and 2.) Jeff said my pitch was "too verbose".  That is the first time in my entire life that I have been informed that I talked too much!  Shocking!  He was, of course, just reminding me to let the drawings do the talking.  Which apparently they did pretty well.  He said they were "very strong" and seemed pleased with the results.  I am too, in some ways, but I feel there's plenty of room for improvement with whatever Louie del Carmen brings us next week.  Game on, DreamWorks-story-artists-turned-Academy-of-Art-instructors!

Frankenstein Boards

Advanced Perspective - Week 4

© Disney/Pixar

Howdy, partner!  Western was the theme this week.  Yeehaw!  Of course, we also had to demonstrate "looking down".  There's a snake in my boot!  I decided to try a pencil line/digital color illustration in the style of Peter de Sève (which didn't work so great with the smaller characters) and also figured this would be a rare opportunity to create a bit of Toy Story fan art.  Ride like the wind, Bullseye!  Mixed results, as always, but life does go on.

Toy Story Characters © Disney/Pixar 

Somebody's poisoned the water hole!

Advanced Perspective - Week 3

Noah's Ark was the theme this week.  One week is not nearly enough time to research and craft two illustrations that also follow the week's perspective rule while also trying out new styles.  Kept it all digital this week, but I still tried to try something new with my rendering techniques.

Onward to next week...

Digital Storyboarding - Frankenstein Roughs

My Digital Storyboarding class with Jeff Snow has really kicked into high gear!  He gave us a copy of the script for Frankenstein (the 1994 version) and let us choose between two sequences to board from.  I chose the sequence where The Creature stumbles upon a peasant dwelling.  We also get to use the Official DreamWorks Templates that they 4 realz use at the studio!! :^D

First, as always, is designing the characters.  I was originally going to go with a more realistic approach, but then realized the amount of time it would take to draw that out...so I then switched over to a more cartoony approach.  I kept the Twilight-inspired flock of dark hair, though.  I also had to map out the environment, so I created a quick "blue print" for the layout of the peasant's dwelling.  All based on research, of course!

I got to pitch my boards this morning in front of class (or at least to those who were actually there), and it went over quite well.  Jeff pointed out some areas to add reaction shots and where I needed some extra hook-up drawings.  Overall, he said he liked the quality of my roughs, which was quite the moment of validation.  Next step is to make the recommended changes and clean-up the boards.  But first, enjoy the sequence thus far:
Frankenstein Roughs

Advanced Perspective - Week 1

And for the last of my three new Fall Semester classes I have Advanced Perspective for Illustration, Film, & Games.  This class is being taught by Brandon Luyen, who has worked in the Game Industry for some time.  This is set to be an interesting, informative, and homework-ridden class.

Week one found us learning about pushing the depth of a picture by aligning different parts of a character thru the horizon line, specifically thru the head, torso, and lower leg.  Our homework was to demonstrate these principals via a samurai theme.  I chose to tell the story of three kids playing samurai.  Two of the boys have to make their own outfits, while one boy borrows his dad's actual costume.  My results are as follows:

Drawings were done digitally in Sketchbook Pro; value and layout done in Photoshop.

Digital Storyboarding - Week 1

My next class is the one I am most excited about: Digital Storyboarding for Feature Animation.  This class is being taught by three DreamWorks Story Artists--Jeff Snow, Louie del Carmen, and Rad Sechrist--who each get to teach the course for 5 weeks (in that order).  Very exciting!!


The first class was a lot of introducing ourselves (boring), but Jeff Snow showed us some of the amazing stuff he's been working on, including some great Marvel storyboards with Spiderman and Iron Man.  We're talking sworn to secrecy, classified, this gets out and I have to kill you kinds of stuff here, folks.  Mr. Snow has been working in the industry for 20 years, 15 of which have been at DreamWorks.  He is also in charge of the DreamWorks Story Initiative program.

Our first homework assignment was to create a single image that tells the story of "The Letter".  Lots of options for interpretation, but I settled on this one:

The Letter

Drawn digitally using SketchbookPro.

Your age is showing...

For the last new assignment in my Character Design class, we had to show a character's age progression from toddler to child to adult to old person.  Since I've been busy with the maquette that I also have to do for that class, I didn't have much time to toy around with this assignment.  So I went with something simple and graphic, inspired once again by the awesome Aurore Damant.  I really enjoy her simple style and shorthand for anatomy.

 All drawn and colored in Photoshop based off of this quick sketch:

Inspiration: Aurore Damant Edition

This week's Character Design homework was the last one where we had to copy the style of an established artist.  While Mr. Buffington gave us free reign with our artist choice, I decided to head deeper down the cartoony rabbit hole and went with Aurore Damant.  Aurore lives in Paris and works as an illustrator and character designer (she worked on Amy Poehler's "The Mighty B!" series).  Very cartoony designs.  I was so inspired by her illustration work that I went all out with my three full figure drawings and colored them in Photoshop!  I think they turned out alright.

The previous week's artist was Colin Jack.  I really enjoyed his sketchy approach to rendering.  Apparently he actually does all his digital work in Sketchbook Pro, which is a program I recently purchased through the Mac App Store AND LOVE!  I didn't have the time, though, to really explore his style like I would've liked to.  Regardless, here are a few pieces from last week:

The iMac

It's been a long, long time since I've posted anything. I had to miss my last two Figure Drawing classes due to a Taylor Swift concert and a trip to San Francisco and to Minnesota. My cousin graduated from college!! Good for her! And San Francisco is truly beautiful; it will be a real adventure to live there for a few years. Oh, and I did get accepted into the Masters program at The Academy of Art University studying Animation & Visual Effects!!! :) So, that's why I haven't posted anything. Busy getting all that together, planning the move to SF, and now my summer Online classes have started. Lots of stuff going on. BUT, I did find time to get myself a new computer...and not just any computer--I got an iMac! Here are some pictures I took as I opened and began to enjoy:

It's a 24 incher. Wireless keyboard and mouse. Plus, it came with a free iPod Touch!! I was originally looking at Macbook laptops, but this was actually cheaper and...it just looks cool. Still playing around and discovering stuff. Just need to figure out how I'm going to get it out to San Francisco...

The Set Piece

I finally created the main "Set Piece" for Deer in the Headlights: A Lightning Bug Story. I'll be using this illustration for the opening shot, the web site page, and probably a few other places. It was done using Pastels in Corel Painter, then I brought it into Photoshop for a few touch-ups. Of course, it was created on my Cintiq. Oh, Cintiq. How did I ever live without you? ...I suppose I just used my smaller Wacom tablet. Anywho, here's the illustration:

Ding-Dong Sketches

Now that the new Portfolios have been (for the most part) sent out, I can dive into my next project, tentatively titled Ding-Dong Ditch Dog. Below are some of the first sketches for the new story, colored using Photoshop and my awesome new Cintiq.

These are the two main characters. I like the style...it reminds me of The Muppets. It's also different from what I've been doing, which is an exciting change of pace.

The First Cintiq Project

Well, I finally got a chance to use my fancy, expensive new Cintiq. Unfortunately, it was work-related, but I'm still pretty pleased with the results. My boss's father is a school bus driver and she wanted a banner to commemorate his retirement. So, here it is:
I'm surprised by the amount of control I seem to get with the Cintiq. Now, if I could just get used to using those shortcut buttons on the sides...

The New Love of My Life: My Cintiq

This past Monday, April 21, was my birthday. So, in honor of that combined with my tax refund, I decided to finally spoil myself and buy a Wacom Cintiq! Unfortunately, it's been a busy week, so I haven't been able to do too much with it except set it up. Below are some pictures I took whilst assembling the beast:

Fresh from the UPS delivery truck.

Oh...another box.

Fresh from being removed from the other box.

Important yellow notice.

The parts box.

Baby got back.

Set-up on the stand.

Standing up-right on the stand.

The grand unveiling!

The most beautiful thing I've ever seen...

Hooked up and working--with my Carrie Underwood desktop background.

I was able to play around with the settings and Photoshop tonight a little bit. I have to keep pinching myself--it's just too amazing. I can't wait to start working on a real project with it!