SketchCrawl #12!!!

Time for another world wide SketchCrawl! If you're in the Northern California Bay Area, we'd love to have you sketch with us. If you're not in our area, go to SketchCrawl.com and search the forums for a Crawl near you. (Don't worry. We have groups all over the globe)

Creature Comforts

Aardman Animations Ltd (Wallace & Grommit, Chicken Run, and Flushed Away) sent AnimationMentor.com some previews to their series entitled "Creature Comforts." They gave us permission to share them with the public so I posted them on youtube.com here. Keep your eye open for these animations on CBS in 2007. Below is one of my favorites.

Scary Mary Trailer

I don't know about you, but I have a lot of fond memories of Disney's "Mary Poppins." As a child there was nothing more entertaining than watching a witch haunt little Brittish children in the London fog.

Week 10

Look. Ballie's fat and happy!

Week 9: My first successful walk cycle

AnimationMentor.com beats out any training that I've recieved from my other schools by far. But in regards to training in animating the dreaded walk cycle, AM has completly obliterated their competition.
At the Academy of Art in San Francisco they showed me the "skating technique" in my 3D classes. This included a 10 minute demo before they threw us to the wolves. Things like weight, hip movement, overlapping motion, and timing weren't even discussed. (with exception to my intro to 2D animation class at the Academy taugh by the Awesome Cora Craig)

Anyway, here's my first successful walk cycle. It's a little weak in the knees still, but I'll be polishing it up in the weeks to come.


This is the second assignment. We had to pose STU in a concerned gesture.

Week 8 Pose

They wanted STU to show some power this week, so this is what I came up with. I kind of added a bit of a feminine spin on this one because I realized I haven't really created any feminine poses. Hey, I'm an equal opportunity animator alright?

Week 7 Revision

This is an animation demonstrating overlapping motion with the tail. It might seem boring now, but just you wait till I incorporate all of these principles in a scene. Yeah, then you won't complain...

Week 5

So I turned in my week 5 assignments a few days ago. I thought I'd post them up in an attempt to stay consistant for once in my life.

The pose assignment was to make the STU character look devestated. So without further ado here's STU winning an emmy for best performance...
















The next part of the assignment was to bounce a ball through an obstacle course they gave us. (I cheated and modified the course a little) This assignment was exciting despite it's bland appearances because this marks the first time they allowed us to use squash and stretch on the ball. Check out the Path of Action sketch I used to plan the animation first. The animation will be below it.

I need a new video host

This photobucket video hosting thing isn't working. It won't play my videos on a loop, and it seems to be playing them slightly too fast. Maybe I'll break down and buy QuickTime Pro.

Weighted Ball Test

It needs a few slow outs on the drops of the lighter ball, but you get the idea...

A Cryptic Visit

Monday October 16th Chris and I visited Cryptic Studios in Los Gatos, CA. If you don't know already, Cryptic Studios made one of the most popular online MMO's on the market today "City Of Heroes." The follow-up "City Of Villains," has also done very well, and boasts one of the largest fan followings in the online gaming industry. Cryptic is currently working on "Marvel Universe Online." An MMO based on the popular Marvel comic book universe.

One of my fellow classmates at Animation Mentor is Stephen Stacy. He's an animator at Cryptic, and he was gracious enough to invite the local students to his place of work for a tour.

I have to say our visit was great from start to finish. Everyone at Cryptic was friendly, and more than willing to answer any questions we had about their company and the industry. Stephen was gracious enough to even give us a few pointers on how to build a successful demo reel for a game company such as theirs.

We were wined and dined, not to mention both their art director Shayne Herrera, and CEO/President Michael Lewis took the time to stop by and field a few of our questions.

I was thouroughly impressed not only with how we were treated, but also with their mentality and working environment. Cryptic usually has a 40 hour work week which is pretty good considering most studios ask atleast 50 hours/week. That's not to say they don't have crunch times, but they are a family oriented company, and it shows by the number of employees who are actually very awake.

Probably the most impressive point of the day was learning that City Of Heros was their first game, and it was a smash hit. This has allowed them to be in the position of already obtaining large properties and franchises for their next games and they are in the process of tripling the size of their company in the next year. Needless to say things are looking up for Cryptic, and I know i'm going to be submitting my demo reel once it comes time. Why not? I've already been invited to do so by their staffing manager.

Animation Mentor Week 3

STU is excited this week...

Sketches

















Final pose in Maya


















My bouncing ball excersise

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.

IdeaMechanics.net

I just finished the main page banner for IdeaMechanics.net

Old School

Remember this classic piece of rotoscope animation?

We the People feat. Gil Scott Heron

My small tribute to Gil Scott Heron

Uncle Sam, I want a water car.

Modified water spark plug

Herman's Green Machine Water modified Chevy Cavalier

Stan Meyer's Water powered dune buggy

Imagine how nice it would be to run your car entirely off of tap water you get from your kitchen sink or your lawn hose. Imagine if everyone's toxic car emmissions were replaced by billions of gallons of water being released into the air every hour around the world. What would that do to the Ozone layer or to global warming? I don't know the science behind it, but it sounds soo good to me that I have to wonder if it might even heal both problems. Imagine NASA launching rockets into space with no explosive compounds running through the shuttles' engine.

What would this world look like? Well I know we'd have far cleaner air for one. I know we would all love the cost of this new source of fuel. I know this new source of fuel would create an entirely new industry around the world thereby creating jobs for billions of people. Now what if I told you this could all happen now? What if I told you there have been people who've already made these cars and drove them long distances, and they worked? Look at your last receipt from the gas pump, and tell me if you would want this water powered car in your garage. Would you buy it? I sure as heck would.

Waterpoweredcar.com is a site dedicated to the research and findings of a handful of Scientists and inventors who have made the water powered fuel cell a reality. I don't know about you, but I want this car soo bad that I'm willing to push for it to be manufactured and sold across the globe. The challenge is that the human powers that be on this planet have their interests in running the oil industry into the ground. they want us buying their oil until there is none left and they'll stop at nothing to shut out alternative fuel research. The people have to stand up and be aware of this. Depleating the Earth of oil isn't natural, and it definately isn't the answer. Coal isn't the answer for the same reasons, and for mining safety reasons. Water is an infinately renewable resource, and it is natural. Water is supposed to be released into the air anyway.

What can we do about it? Start demanding it. Write your congressman/woman. Make people aware of the alternatives. Educate yourself on the alternatives by visiting sites like Waterpoweredcar.com. Go to the Mythbusters' fan site message board and reply to my post about making a water powered engine on the show. Here's the URL. http://community.discovery.com/eve/forums/a/tpc/f/9701967776/m/4911930838
Make sure to reply to the post and also give it a rating so the producers will take notice.

Please demand a better life for yourself, your fellow man, and for generations to come. Join us in the revolution. A better world is possible, and it's already started. Be the answer to the chaos.

The Indian Givers

In my last post I mentioned a guy named Smyles in one of my keystyles. He's in a band down in LA called The Indian Givers. They have this song called Something Is Better. It's a great song, and very catchy, but the music video is pretty funny too.



The band didn't ask for permission, they just went to Chuck E Cheese's and started shooting. The Staff didn't have a problem with it untill they threw the bra. That was the last straw.

Freestyles

When I talk to my friends online I sometimes get the urge to freestyle or, in this case, "keystyle." This is usually because I'm listening to hip hop while I'm online. Here's two "keystyles" that I rattled off from the top of my head while talking to Shannon.

I was talking about what I did last night so this came out. I call it RISK:

Playin Risk is risky business. Most play to win never settle for less. It's like stirring up a bee's nest. It was hot in the kitchen. Some had to get out. Last 4 standing in the final title bout. Some lookin to knock a brother out. That's ok, this will only last 2 rounds. That's when I took Alaska. When I wanna hear your smart mouth I'll ask ya. Smiles had a cannon and he'll blast ya. Matt took an axe now he's actin like ya masta. Chris swept South Asia. Then he took the continent Australia. Next Smiles dominated the Americas. The ability to do that depends on how your momma raised ya. Battle for Europe while I sat pretty in the snowy Canuck city eating maple syrup. Hey Matt you're up. Too many sour heads now he wants ta throw up. While he's in the bathroom up chuck I'll take your armies and set up then next big blow up. Gang signs exchanged now yous about to get tore up. Turned in a book, got 20 units now I move across the board like a rook. Stealin countries like a crook. This is the game of world domination so don't be shook. Look it's all in the rule book. Like I said, this is a hot kitchen- you better know you're gonna cook.

Then Shannon said something about how she was eating a rice crispy treat. So this one came out:

Takes a bite of a snap crackle pop square. Good thing she just did her hair. Always good to prepare so as not to get caught unawares. Light fluffy marshmallows taste like air. Empty calories, but I-don't-care. I think I'll even eat 'em rare. Lickin crispy batter while everybody stares. Some think I'm mentally impared. I am, but it's not like that. I was dared. Got no hair like my head was naired. If you paint it green I'll look like I was drawn by Peter Laird. (TMNT creator)

Turkey Pesto