Walk the Moon Christmas

for the guys of Walk the Moon. Merry Christmas. :)

Edward

AUGH HE'S SO GEEKY AND CUTE

Took me a good week to get his face right. Ah, Edward... he sells books, shoots guns and saves the world. :) Filled up the last couple pages of my sketchbook.... I'll have to get my moleskin back out....

for Matt Scully's story.

More Queenie Concepts

Good Lord. the Queen may wear fancy dresses, but there's no way they're gonna look like this all the time. either that or we do like Peter Jackson and have a lot of head shots. :D

does graphics do.

yeah... been doing some design work lately, so thought I'd post a bit. :)

(designs in ink, finished in photoshop) - the best string quartet in cincinati. Not biased at all. :)




for the company I'm currently employed at.

Queen of Hell

Not really the queen of hell. she's just evil. :)

My friend Scully is writing a really neat-o story, and this is a character concept for the evil sorceress/queen who ends up killing everyone on the island she rules to save the life of her unborn child. ...and fails. (as far as I know.)

here are some sketches working exclusively from the reference I had of mid-19th century fashion and hairstyles.



in the next page of sketches, I only used the drawings from the previous page as reference and tried to nail down more of her personality and the differences the fictional island has from the rest of europe.



no doubt there will be many more revisions of her appearance, but these are a good start at least.

Berries are Vicious - Final!

Yaaaaaay, animation! Never did get to record Zelda yelling for when he falls into the thorns. oh well, still good. :)



Happy Thanksgiving, one and all! I will be spending mine in Chicago with my relatives and wonderful fiancee. WOOHOO TURKEY

Sounds of Earth

Hey Internet-types. more than a year ago I began working on a story called Sounds of Earth, which would be a graphic novel. In my comic book scripting class, I decided to use this story for my submissions packet to send to publishing companies. (I may be posting the submissions packet on here in its entirety at some point).

SO. First of all, Bill Plympton drew his dog in my sketchbook:



So now this sketchbook is even more priceless than before. WOOHOO!!!

ANYway, Sounds of Earth. In a very short summary, the plot concerns Helix Ramchanda and his dealing with invading aliens and a certain adorable community theater actress named Rae.

Here is a concept drawing that went with the submissions packet.



And here are the main character sketches (all with their lovely submissions packet heading). some of the names have changed as the story has evolved, but they're still pretty much the same people.





I've gone back through and found the few posts here that deal with the work I did on this story a year ago and tagged them "sounds of earth graphic novel". I'll need to do even more sample work for it to send it to other companies, but hopefully someone funds me for it!!! *crosses fingers*

Storyboards for Senior Film...

pluggin' along. (I do tight boards. less work later.)



the 'picking up a fruit' animation is completely finished! all that's left will be compositing, which Jacques will show how to do on Monday.

by the bye, Jars of Clay's album The Long Fall Back to Earth is darn good.

because there IS progress

whoooeeee.. THE END IS COMING!!!! here's some rough/cleaned up animation from 2D production.

2D Production final BGs

yes, it is indeed a thorny bush.

Fruit pickup boards

so here are the finished storyboards/keyframes for the "picking up a fruit" project. so now you can actually see what's happening! (that first one is a pan shot.)




haha... oh, thorns.

WILLARD

Yes; from a suggestion from Grant I named the kid Willard. (though that is not actually what Grant suggested.)

FRUIT

final assignment for 2D animation production is an animation in 3 shots, about picking up a fruit. here's a quick storyboard concept (VERY quick):

I'll be working on a more complete storyboard soon. one that won't be boring and lame. it'll be funny, I promise!!! I need to ask Zelda about voices...

and for the sake of animation, I decided to give my little boy spaghetti appendages. here's the turn and BD:


dawwwww, he's so cute. :D

character-designing

character concept for my senior film.

TOON BOOM

yay! finished the bouncing ball on the simplified background, shadows exported correctly and all!



these other ones are just messing around with toon boom during class:

Tybee

in case anyone was wondering, this is how it happened.

ASLKDHHJH!KH!J!!!!!!!!!!!!

TOTALLY, IMMEDIATELY, COMPLETELY AND FINALLY ENGAGED!!!!!! EEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEE!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Faces Real and Not

first is real. drew these at last week's CAS meeting. oh lovely art students! as you can see, I started fairly realistically and then devolved to cartoons. :)



these, however, are all out of my head... ideas for my senior film. there will be lots of Arab/Israeli guys with beards, so how does one make lots of guys with beards look different?

ball bounce BG: ROUND 3 (50s style!)

"take the realistically painted background from before, and simplify it." is what Jacques said.

simplify it? they were good at simplifying things in the 50s. some of those designs i really love! so I'll emulate. yay.

don't know if it's done or not... maybe...



NOTE: illustrations of women in the 50s and 60s almost always had tiny hands and feet. don't ask me why, but it's true.

more random crap!

a page from my sketchbook: on the left, you'll see Lauras Nunden, my Star Wars RPG character. she's an Umbaran spy for the rebel alliance during the new legacy (?) era. (Scully's the DM and he's a star wars encyclopedia.)

on the right, there are rocks. drawn with pentel brush pen from photos that john took in Edinburgh. YAY ROCKS! i should draw rocks more often. it's fun, and you don't really need crazy perspective to make them look right. YAY LACK OF 3-POINT. :D

green bike boy

i saw this guy yesterday. his shirt matched his bike, so I drew him. :)

ball bounce BG: ROUND 2!

ehhhhh. bleh. we'll see what Jacques says. sleeeeep noooooow.....

ball bounce BG: ROUND 1!

first pass on that background for Jacques: total realism.
this is the black and white rendering (well, just black, worked on gray.) will start the color next. YAY digital painting. (photoshop CS4)

AUGH... BANANAS. whatever possessed me to draw a bin of bananas?!?!?! o______o

DUCK HEART TESLACOIL

WOOHOO poster design. and not just any ol' poster...
but a poster advertising TYLER doing a flash workshop at the next CAS meeting!!!!

I was able to see Tyler's film "Duck Heart Teslacoil" at this year's SCADanimate program, and it is AWESOME. Tyler is a great filmmaker. this is his website, Base14. his film isn't available online, but if there happens to be a showing of it (or any of his other films) near you, GO AND SEE.

also, I made an awesome poster for this week's meeting. yay. :)

Song of the Sea!

WOOHOO!

yeah, this has nothing to do with me, but Cartoon Saloon (makers of Skunk Fu and The Secret of Kells)'s director Tom Moore has this as his next project:



Song of the Sea, a story about a Selkie, evidently. I've read fairy tales about Selkies, I'm glad someone's making a move about them!!! soooo.... be looking for this one in theaters, in europe only, probably around 2011.

sigh... sometimes it sucks to be an american. :P

The Secret of Kells Review

“The Secret of Kells” is an Irish animated feature film, set in the dark ages of Ireland. The main character is a young boy named Brendan, and his learning about a sacred book and wanting to help its keeper complete it. There are two main forces influencing Brendan: his uncle, the Abbot of Kells, and Brother Aidan, the keeper of the sacred book, a famous illuminator who comes to Kells after his island abbey is destroyed by the Vikings (who are headed for Kells). Both of them want to pass on their conflicting beliefs to Brendan, and he must choose between them; methods of defense from war from the Abbot, and the importance of passing on knowledge and hope from Brother Aidan.

The story itself isn’t entirely groundbreaking, but is still told very well; though the ending is a tad disappointing. The animation and acting is wonderful, each character has his own personality, shape and voice. I was also impressed that the resident ‘animal sidekick’ was not pointless, and even helped the story along. The aesthetic is very interesting and well done; in particular some of the methods of cuts – or lack of cuts. Often, especially near the end of the film, several different locales will be shown in sections on the screen, and we can see the characters move through them as they travel. Because of this, in many sections there are much fewer cuts than there could have been, but what’s on the screen still holds the attention of the viewer.

The visual style is the strongest part of this movie. Much of the film’s conflict is around the Book of Kells, which is an actual illuminated text from around the year 800. The book is known for its rich illustrations, and “The Secret of Kells” takes very well the cues of artwork from that particular book as well as the period.

The groundwork for the style is that it is mostly based on flat but highly detailed backgrounds; much like the tapestries and other artwork from the Dark Ages before perspective was fully understood. Within that groundwork, the character designs are also based around very flat shapes, but the characters keep to solid colors, which makes them distinguishable from the backgrounds very effectively. Older characters are much more textured with separate shapes for every joint, but younger characters like Brendan and the other abbey children are much more simple and soft looking. The only time perspective is used in an upshot or downshot is when there is danger or action, and the bad guys themselves have an even more exaggerated style than the main characters, making them even more frightening.

Another fun touch is some of the character’s names. Pangur Ban, Bother Aidan’s cat, is called after the medieval poem by the same name, which happens to be – appropriately – about a traveling poet/monk and his white cat. The poem is spoken aloud over the credits, in old Irish, about halfway through them. The Abbot’s name, Cellach, is the same as several real Irish bishops from the time period. Aidan is the name of an Irish saint. A fairy/weregirl that Brendan meets in the forest has the name Aisling, which is the old Irish word for ‘poetic vision’ or dream.

The only weak parts in the movie lie with the story. The overall pacing is all right (it is very good at the beginning of the film, then lapses in parts throughout); but there are loose ends that are never tied up and leave it wanting. The largest single issue is the monster Krum Kruack (spelling unknown), the huge monster with the crystal eyes. The first time we hear his name is when Brendan nearly walks into a dark cave, and Aisling warns him to come back, because it is Krum Kruack’s lair. Brendan doesn’t believe her; says the monster is a fairy tale. But almost no other explanation is given about the monster – where it came from, why it hides in caves, or any other stories about it.

This may be only an issue for American viewers, if the monster is a common facet of Irish legend. But it appears the monster is purely an invention of this story, and so it really needs more explaining; especially since Brendan must return to Krum’s lair later on to defeat the monster.

There are numerous other small issues, both of story and character. For instance, it is never explained just how the Abbot and Aidan already know each other. Additionally, why exactly is a crystal needed to complete the Book of Kells? After multiple viewings, it can be assumed that a crystal is used as a magnifying glass, a tool to create the tiny, intricate designs in the book. But then, why does the book need to be illuminated? Aren’t the words the most important? Why exactly is it so important for the book to be finished? And why not any crystal – why does it HAVE to be this one particular crystal? Again, after multiple viewings it can be derived that the book is a symbol of knowledge and learning, and also hope. But this is barely alluded to in the movie overall.

There are other issues and holes with character as well. One strange thing is that it appears that Brother Tang is the only person in the movie who doesn’t age – after 10 or 15 years have elapsed, he is still the same white-whiskered but sprightly monk as before, though all the other characters have aged appropriately. There is the same issue with Pangur Ban, especially because he’s a cat.

Most of the character’s personalities hold true, but the Abbot has a particularly disappointing twist. Through most of the movie he is shown to be a very strong, hard, determined, but also caring man to the people in the abbey and his nephew Brendan. But at the end, when Brendan is finally able to return to Kells, the Abbot is shown to have fallen apart mentally, and has sunk into depression and despair because he believes he is responsible for Brendan and Aidan’s deaths. It seems more likely, considering his character for the first section of the movie, that he would have come to his senses and used his strengths to protect what he had left from the raids in the name of Brendan and Aidan, instead of wasting time despairing over what can’t be righted. This would have made more sense in the overall scheme of history and the naming of the book. But despite this, the ending is still appropriate and fairly satisfying.

ooooo BGs

background sketches for a 2D production project, complete with Jacques notes! first Jacques notes of the season. :D

Getting Back...?

hm. maybe I'll show this to Jacques. it needs sparkle.

SBOC + 2

I like how these turned out too. so here they are. YAY

SBOC

logo/tshirt design for a student group up at UC! :) I'm doing a couple more designs for them; might post those as well once they're finished.
(fonts: philly sans/bee marker from dafont)

also also, BACK AT SCAD. so there will be homework appearing up here soonish, assuming it's worth posting. whee!

trying...

to get back in the swing. :P


class was canceled this morning. Jacques is still in Montreal.

funny how richard williams, eric goldberg and scott mccloud all use a similar scenario to illustrate a point.

anti-gravity!

ben's face is messed up in the first panel. oh well, i still like it.

the steps appear as I step

a self-portrait.

MILT KAHL TRIBUTE BY THE ACADEMY HERE WATCH THE VIDEOS. EVERYONE SHOULD KNOW MORE ABOUT THE MICHELANGELO OF ANIMATION!!!!!!!!!!!!

pining

blah.

blah day. blah comic. blah inking, blah concept. blah blah blah.

I really need to go pick up some new microns so I can have some halfway decent panel borders. and my gutters are all a mess. sigh. :P

Green Girl

self-inspired? perhaps. perhaps.

the best thing about this picture is that total it took less than 2 hours to draw and color. why can't I just be inspired all the time?!??!?!!? oh, but that would be TOO easy. :P

Matthea's friend!

bluelined this on my lunch break, and finished inking it at home. I guess a comic in a day IS possible, when you're inspired!

this is a true story, by the bye.

face face

doodling. tis fun, that.
some based on real, most out of head, somewhat inspired by the movie Secret of Kells which looks amazing.

fairy forays

some funny fairy faces. herher, say that fast. :) anyhow. these are cute cartoony ones. crazy hair probably inspired by Ponyo (GO SEE PONYO IT'S AWESOME).


more realistic... playing with character design...

and my favorite; channeling Charles Gibson and Fred Moore. huzzah. I really like this... might try to do a digital painting of it, if I have time... ha. time. ha.