Animation Mentor Week 2

I'm in week 2 of my first class at AnimationMentor.com We just had our first assignment where we were to go somewhere public and do quick observational drawings of people as they passed by. Not being a noob to the whole drawing unsuspecting victims in public game I chose the mall's food court and sat down facing the mall with my back to the court. This way I could at least capture people's various walks. Many people made the mistake of sitting in Starbuck's where everyone's sitting, and there's no room for people to get up and do anything interesting. That's ok, I made the same mistake when I started.

Here's a page of gestures I captured that evening.





















Here's the sketch that I chose to finalize





















and here's the pose in Maya
















The theory behind assignments like this one is that animation is just a long series of poses. Learning how to build a successful pose with concepts like: line of action, asymmetry, and silhouette is a darn good place to start learning the craft.

I can't tell you how much better Animation Mentor is than my previous alma maders. The environment is so comfortable and everyone wants to help you. This is real character animation instruction created by animators for animators. I wouldn't recommend anywhere else over this beautiful institution.