A Lump on a Blog

2012... Oh, It's On!

2012-01-05T15:27:00.001-07:00

Happy New Years! Well, I've said it before and I'll say it again, "Where does the time go?"! I've been on a sort of "Unofficial Animation Hiatus" since September. 2011 was an exhausting (mentally, physically and emotional) year. I'm glad it's over and am looking forward to see what the ol' Twenty-Twelve has in store. I feel as if I'm so far out of the loop, as far as animation goes. I finally just saw KFP2 the other night... I really loved it, up until I fell asleep. In my defense, I'm still working 2 jobs and getting up early. I enjoyed the style a lot... another movie I finally saw was Rio. Loved it. Great work Blue Sky! Cars 2 is growing on me, but I think the story/writing was no where near the standard Pixar has set with all of their epic movies prior.

I really want to get back in the swing things in the very near future. I'm currently working on a side project for a buddy and should be wrapping up quickly.... then it's time for some new animation. Overall, I've recieved a positive response on my latest reel, but it didn't land me the ol' "foot-in-the-door" position I was hoping it would. So, back to the drawing board it goes, errr computer and sketchpad I meant. Not sure if I want to start with a pantomime shot or some acting... or just doing some simple tests to get back in the swing of things... I could be a bit rusty! Either way, I think the game plan is re-read some lecture notes from Animation Mentor, crack open some Animation Books, re-watch Richard Williams' Animator's Survival Kit movies and then hit the ground running and with some speed. I feel like with every reel I'm that much better and that much closer to getting in the industry (full time)..... and absolutely can not wait for that day.

In other news some great animated features are being released this year. One in particular that I can't wait to see is the new Aardman flick: The Pirates, Band of Misfits if you haven't seen it yet I'll post it below.

Here's to a super-awesome-spectacular-fantabulous 2012!!!!

Bad Blogger, Well Time Flies!

2011-11-09T10:59:00.002-07:00

The simple fact that 2011 is nearing an end absolutely blows my mind!! It's been a while since posting here. I've been taking a bit of a sabbatical from animation since finishing my Short Film and new Demo Reel. I've been spending more time with my boys and family which is awesome, taking a break is nice. Recharging the batteries is a good thing as we all learned in Cars! Speaking of Cars, I watched Cars 2 a bunch with Maddon last weekend and I liked a lot better the more I saw it (I didn't like it at all after seeing it in the theaters). I still feel it's Pixar's weakest film yet, it lacked the story and appeal their other movies have done so well. I'm curious to see what Brave does and am getting excited for it's release! With that said, here's the Brave trailer if you haven't seen it yet.... See you all in 2012! Till then, it's animated movies and books! Ciao!

Short Film Complete (in robot voice)

2011-09-15T03:02:00.003-06:00

It is done.... so it's been 2 years since graduating Animation Mentor. The old curriculum was such, class five was Short Film: Pre-Production and six was Short Film: Production. The trickiest part of coming up with an idea was the time restriction, keeping it under or right around 30 seconds. Otherwise there was no way you'd finish a short film in six months. Not sure the actual percentages but very few went on to finish their films, myself included. As my second anniversary was approaching, getting it rendered off and putting some final touches was looming over me... I felt compelled to complete it, I had to. I was really tempted to go through and do one or two more polish passes on the animation. If you're in Animator you know you could literally spend the next two years doing that... Another major factor causing a delay/procrastination was my Maya knowledge (or the lack there of), having just learned Mental Ray for 3DS Max over this past year I had a bit more confidence then before. I was finishing up the latest version of my demo reel (see below) when me and my buddy got to talking about the final touches and what more my reel needed. He suggested that I render all the shots to give it that finished, professional touch. The two shots that weren't rendered, I had previously tried to render them and had no such luck. I spent the good part of a weekend up very late and early in the morning learning tutorials and getting my hands dirty in my Maya files trying to figure it out. Granted there is so much to learn (just like anything when dealing with 3D Animation) but I finally felt confident enough to go back and revisit and finally finish my short film. You can CLICK HERE to visit my Short Film Blog and see the animation pipeline from pitching the story to my Mentor to layout through animation. It was a great project and I learned a lot from it. Part of me was sad when they got rid of those classes, but I understand why they did..

TRT: 01:57:00

Modeling/Texturing: 3DS Max and Photoshop
Animation/Rendering: Maya (Mental Ray)
Post Production: Sony Vegas
Bishop rig provided by Animation Mentor
A special thanks to the entire staff and student body at Animation Mentor.

My 2012 Character Reel...

2011-09-12T10:06:00.001-06:00

After a long weekend of tutorials, trial and error, countless espressos and perserverance I finally feel comfortable rendering Mental Ray out of Maya.... Also, after almost a year a half of completing the animation on my short film I am finally rendering all 17 shots out. Look for it later this week. I was going to add a couple more shots and polish some more animation, but at some point you have close the book on the project and move on to the next... I'm already looking forward to my next animation.

Responsible for all animation.

Bishop Rigs: provided by Animation Mentor
Car Rigs: provided by Sparkplug Entertainment, Cars Life 2
Music: Beck - Timebomb

Totally AwesomE3!!

2011-06-07T10:27:00.003-06:00

I've been watching the new game trailers making their debut at E3 this year. My jaw is on the floor.... man! Some amazing new games coming out and a lot of sequels! The amount of action and the cinematography has blown me away. Here are a few of the trailers I thought look totally wicked-awesome. I've definitely been playing more video games... but still really wish I had more time and money to start 'gaming out' and getting my nerd on! These are totally inspiring to say the least!!

I love love love the style of this game and of course the animation rocks! It's the new Sly Cooper.

IMHO better than all three prequels... check out the new Star Wars: Old Republic game... wow!

Some reason I kept thinking back to Leo trying to escape the Titanic... the new Uncharted 3 looks like a nonstop action packed adrenaline rush.

The new Insomniac franchise Overstrike...

He's back baby!!

2011-03-25T16:12:00.002-06:00

Okay, so now that I'm only working 56 hours a week I actually have some free time and am back on the video game wagon once again!! I forgot how much fun it is. Lately I've been playing Donkey Kong Country Returns for the Wii. Probably one of the hardest games I've ever played. It's all based on timing and Kong's movements aren't exactly easy to get precise actions, it makes the game somewhat frustrating and annoying, but mostly difficult. I beat Epic Mickey and am enjoying having a Wii. I think the game I'm going to get next is the original Ratchet and Clank for the PS2 and if I like it, go through the whole series.. They look like fun games and I hear they're awesome!

Okay, so I know this isn't a video game blog I was just excited about having the spare time to be playing video games once again!! I'm making great progress on my shot and have been getting a lot of great feedback from my peers. Still looking for a full time animation job all over and am anxious to get my new demo reel up... Hopefully it will generate some buzz. I'm going to attempt to enter the 11 Second Club next month and start working on the next piece. Also we're planning on listing our house on the market in June and have a lot of work ahead of us getting it ready to sell. We're currently remodeling our kitchen and it's coming along. It looks like we're going to be staying in CO for a while unless an Animation Job out of state pops up... otherwise, I'll be looking for contract positions.... Stay tuned, till next time.

Cars 2, Electric Bugaloo.... We can't wait.

2011-03-15T15:11:00.005-06:00

So, you may or may not know Cars 2 is coming out this June. I'm getting really excited and the one major I love that Pixar does to get you so excited for the movie without ever spoiling the plot or showing all of the funny parts in the movie is all their promotional content that circulates the web. I showed the official trailer to my 2 year old (he's a HUGE Cars' fan already) and now he asks to see it every time I'm on the computer. I don't think he understands that it won't be out till June, but I can tell he's just as excited as I am to see it! You know we'll be there opening day. I've been seeing a lot of new characters going around the "interwebs" and think they have tons of appeal. I'll post some below for you enjoyment.

I finished up my first official animation job back in February and it has given me a lot more free time to spend with my awesome family and friends, time to work on my demo reel and I've been playing more video games in the past few months then I have in years!! I was able to get through about 9 shots for the movie and am excited to see them rendered and in the movie. I'm only working 2 jobs now (56 hours a week) and it feels like nothing. I've been making good headway on my monologue Rounders' shot I'm working on for my demo reel and have been getting excellent feedback, it's amazing how much it's helped the shot progress to get it where it's at now! I've said it before and I'll say it again... The AM community completely rocks!! So supportive, helpful and encouraging. I've got another acting shot I want to do, as well as a pantomime shot I'm going to start planning... so hopefully I'll have 3 new shots to go on my demo reel by July.

In other news; we've official outgrown our home and are trying to get our house on the market by June... so my demo reel might not be ready till the fall. We'll see how my time management goes. And hopefully our new home will have an office for me.... that would rock!!

Check out this appeal!! (and awesome animation)

2011. Could this be the year?

2011-02-15T09:30:00.002-07:00

Over the weekend I was lucky enough to finally see Tangled. I took my 2 year old and not knowing what to expect (as far as violence and story for a toddler) we went anyways. The movie was absolutely awesome. It was a great story and it totally reminded my of old school Disney. Lots of action, song and dances, silly thugs an evil Mother and the animation. I noticed that they're really pushing 3D to the limits of what is accomplished with 2D. The crazy poses, lots of squash and stretch and the real essence of 2D animation. Since John Lasseter took over the Disney story department they've made some amazing movies! Bolt, Princess and the Frog, Enchanted and now Tangled. I was surprised (and happy) they decided to do Princess and the Frog in 2D (obviously there were 3D elements throughout the movie) but none-the-less an awesome movie. If you haven't seen Tangled yet, go! It was a great movie and I can't wait for the DVD to come out with all the special features.

2011 there are a ridiculous amount of animated movies coming out this year. Rio, Rango, Cars 2, Kung Fu Panda 2 and Gnomeo and Juliet. I'm planning on seeing all of them! In other news, I'm still looking for an Animation Job and began working on new shots for my reel. It's just hard to find extra time.... my goal is to have something done by July so stay tuned. Till next time...

Happy 2011! 2010 was a great year....

2010-12-30T15:19:00.005-07:00

Well it's official, 2010 is wrapping up and I'm curious to see what 2011 holds! It was an awesome year for animated movies! My personal favorite top three were Toy Story 3, How to Train Your Dragon and Despicable Me. I really enjoyed Megamind and Shrek 4 too.

I'm hoping to begin working on more shots for a new demo reel for next year once things slow down a bit. I'm still working on my second contract animation job, but rumor has it that production is supposed to be done in January 2011. That will allow me some more down-time to begin animating personal works for my reel.

I hope everyone had a great 2010 and I can't wait to see what the future holds!! Here is a really cool fan video that pays tribute to all 11 Pixar movies.

Yaaaaaawn.... wait. It's almost 2011?!?

2010-12-01T09:21:00.002-07:00

Man oh man. Where does the time go?! I can't believe it's December already. What exactly happened to 2010?? Oh, I know. I've been working 3 jobs and raising a two year old with a wife and newborn. I think that Ferris Bueller said it best. Life moves pretty fast, if you don't stop and look around every once in while, you could miss it. I'm paraphrasing, of course. Xander and Mama are doing great. He spent his first month in pain due to reflux (the same thing Maddon had). It's basically heartburn for babies. It was a rough month, with very little sleep. But, he's doing much better now. But for the most part, I have literally no concept of the day, date or month... sometimes I have to stop and think what year is it? How old am I? I'm guessing that's not a good thing....

In animation news. I've seen Toy Story 3 about 30 times now. It just keeps getting better and there are soooo many hidden easter eggs throughout it and they're really cleverly placed. I'm getting excited to see Shrek 4, Despicable Me and Tangled. Seeing the animation thus far in the films from 2010 is absolutely mind-blowing!! So inspiring, not to mention intimidating! I find myself watching movies when I get a moment of some down time and have noticed that I'm really studying the Actors/Actresses subconsciously. Their movements and facial expressions. So, I guess I'm starting to think like an Animator.

As far as my animation world goes. I picked up another contract working on my 2nd feature length film. This time animating Cars! Whoa, it's so fun. I remember before Pixar's Cars came out and hearing from the Animators. They all said it was the most fun they've ever had animating. I can now see why. I'm working on my first shot now, it has 6 characters and it's roughly 6300 frames. It's going to be a fun project and I'm anxious to see how many shots I can pull off. For the 1st project I worked on I finished 8 shots for the movie... I'm working on a dialogue shot from the movie Rounders with Matt Damon. I just started planning everything out and some basic layout stuff. It's a more subtle piece of dialogue, but I need practice doing some of that. The Job Hunt: I've been sending out links and reels and still nothing... the job hunt has been almost a year and reels sent to well over 60 studios. I'm getting frustrated and anxious and discouraged and annoyed and jealous..... I guess, is all that I can do is to keep striving and learning to become a more desired Animator for these studios.

New Years is coming up and I think that resolutions are silly and for the most part a waste of time.... but this year I'm going to re-live an old resolution from 4 years ago... and that's to play more video games. I still have a bunch of games I've owned for years and have yet to beat. I really want a PS3 but can't justify spending that kind of money until I beat my existing games. So hopefully by next year I'll be able to get one. They should be much cheaper too.

Till next time....

2011: The Year of the Sequel!!!

2010-11-16T10:46:00.003-07:00

So, recently I've seen not one, but two movie sequels coming out that I really enjoyed their predecessors, and am uber excited for the sequels!! Kung Fu Panda 2 and Cars 2. Cars 2 looks like a really fun movie and completely different from the first one. I'm curious to see what Pixar does with it. KFP was an all around great DreamWorks film. I wasn't too happy with the voice talent but the action was great and the story rocked!! Both movies will be coming out around the same time next year and I'm curious to see them battle it out in the box office!!

Animation Mentor Showreel 2010...

2010-11-09T22:42:00.003-07:00

So, I posted a while back all of the Animation Mentor Student Showcase Reels, except for the latest one....

There's some amazing work here! Great job to everyone who made it.

Happy Fall to You All!

2010-10-26T14:03:00.003-06:00

I saw this posted on a friend's Facebook page and thought it was amazing and that I had to share it. It's Disney's new game that's coming out Epic Mickey. This video talks about keeping the old style there, but in a 3D environment! The animation looks truly amazing and it's so inspiring to watch. Seeing what goes into these types of games is why I chose to get into animation and inspires me to keep going forward.... I love it!

Wii Games - E3 2011 - Disney Epic Mickey

In other news. I'm sending out reels like crazy and am finishing up my first freelance project. I heard the Director is putting together his next movie and is looking for Animators... let's see if I get picked up! I have two animation shots in the 'hopper' and am excited to start planning them out.... so stay tuned.

On a personal level, we're due in 4 days and my wife is definitely a trooper. She's been really uncomfortable for the past four weeks, not to mention in a lot of pain. Having contractions everyday, but at least they're getting stronger now (not sure if that's a good thing or not). She is AMAZING! But tiny Xander is a stubborn little dude. Either way he'll be here by next Monday (November 1st) and I'm getting excited to meet him and so is Maddon. If you haven't been to my new website CLICK HERE. Till next time......

Animation is Awesome!!

2010-10-16T00:17:00.001-06:00

DreamWorks and Nickelodeon released the first five minutes of DreamWorks third motion picture release for 2010, Megamind. I know a few people that worked on the film and I must admit, I'm super excited after seeing this!! Also, in other news, How to Train Your Dragon came out on DVD today, so if you haven't seen it yet. Pick it up and you won't be let down! Full of action and adventure and an overall awesome story and the animation was superb!

2 New Demo Reels Complete.

2010-10-14T12:09:00.004-06:00

I was contemplating only doing one reel again, but after seeing what studios are looking for and hearing the advice over and over again to customize your reel depending on who you're sending it to. I figured the two studios that I send my reel to, are game studios and production houses. So I decided to do a Character Reel with more acting and some body mechanics and a Game Reel with more body mechanics and some 3D models that I built and textured. They're posted below and you can find them on my new website HERE.

My Character Reel:

My Game Reel:

DVDs are upon us!!

2010-10-13T15:40:00.003-06:00

I must say that I'm excited for the upcoming animated features c... I was cruising around Amazon to see if there's a Toy Story Trilogy ultimate super collector edition coming out.... and look what I found, a 10 DVD set!! I've seen Toy Story 3 twice now and it was so much better the second time around, I can't wait to watch it again. I found this "Toy Box" for $65 CLICK HERE, also HTTYD is coming out this weekend... I really loved that one too. It may be my new favorite DreamWorks film to date. I'll know after watching it a second time. Also later this year I'm anticipating Shrek 4 and Despicable Me, both I haven't seen yet. Luckily Maddon is finally getting to the age where we can take him to the movies I love in the theaters so I don't have to wait for their release on DVD....

In other news. I'm finishing up my new demo reel in the next couple nights, if I can stay awake long enough. Just a couple of shots that need some minor tweaks, then render and re-render and then post on the interwebs! Looking forward to being able to start applying at studios again, it feels like it's been for forever, I've been waiting to get my reel finished before I'm confident enough to put my work out there....

NEW WEBSITE.... finally!

2010-09-30T11:18:00.006-06:00

Finally...... finally, I have taken the plunge and put together a professional looking website to showcase my phenomenal animation skills ;-)! No, but seriously. I was procrastinating for the longest time putting a real website together, and I finally did. I figured since I'm about to have a new version of my reel up I mine as well do it right. And for 5 bucks a month to host and pay for a domain name, it's worth the professional look it has (compared to my old website).

CLICK HERE to check it out.

Other than that, lately I've been scrambling to put together, not one, but two demo reels. I'm also doing a gaming demo reel that will show more body mechanics and some models that I've built over the years. Geared a little more towards the gaming industry. So we'll see what that does for me. also I've shortened up my current reel and added four new shots to it. Getting excited to see what the new reel and website holds for my career as a Character Animator.....

On a more personal note, my wife is about to POP! We're due in a month from today and are getting excited to have another little dude running around controlling our lives! Maddon is also getting excited to play with little Xander and all of his toys. I can't imagine yet what it's going to be like having another son, but I'm super excited about it. We had an awesome summer (except for being pregnant and uncomfortable), lots of camping, I climbed four 14ers, did a lot of biking and have been working three jobs! All in all, life is awesome and can't wait for the snow to get here so I can dust off my snowboard and hit the slopes!! Till next time.

Here's an animation that someone did for Valve with the TF2 cast dancing their hearts out... some awesome animation!!

Time for some inspiration....

2010-09-02T16:02:00.002-06:00

Here are a compilation of Animation Mentors Student Showcases over the years.... such amazing work!!

2006:

2007:

2008:

2009:

Animation Mentor just released their 2010 showcase:
CLICK HERE

Inspiration...

2010-08-17T09:58:00.002-06:00

Meet Buck Trailer from TeamCerf on Vimeo.

Thanks Jeff at Animation Cosmic for posting this! Some gorgeous work here and very inspirational.

August...no way!

2010-08-03T11:20:00.002-06:00

Well the time continues to fly by in 2010! The year is well over halfway done with and the summer is flying by! I'm finishing up with the current project that I'm animating on and am getting excited to see the final product later this year. The Director mentioned already started work on his next project and it got me wondering if he's going to ask me to do some more animation for him? The project is a great learning experience and I am glad to have such a great opportunity. Also, in the meantime I've been cranking away some new shots for my reel and am realizing I finally have my work flow where I am confident in it, and am finally feeling comfortable. By that I mean that I don't feel like I'm not forgetting any steps when moving to the different stages of animating. I think too, working on that kid's movie has really helped with that! I feel a lot more comfortable working in the graph editor and getting my character to do what I want them to do.... a true Puppet Master of the 21st century. Also I've been able to do a little more work on the shot I got for Devils Angels and Dating short film. So with my crazy 3 job hectic schedule I feel that I'm still moving forward in learning animation and am hoping that my first true animation job is right around the corner!!

AMers Represent!!

2010-07-16T18:43:00.003-06:00

A HUGE CONGRATS TO ALL MY FELLOW CLASSMATES ROCKING THE ANIMATION INDUSTRY! I just found out today the another handful of peers that I graduated with got hired on at Rhythm and Hues Studios! Hearing great news of Animators doing what they love is inspiring me to push myself further and become better!! Way to go all of you, you're going to be brilliant!

July.... really??

2010-07-14T12:46:00.003-06:00

It's been a few months since my last post. I can't believe that it's already July. I've been applying like crazy all over the country with not a lot of response. I recently revised my demo reel (CLICK HERE). I've been scrambling like mad to try and get some new work on it, but haven't had much time at all to work on it. I'm hoping to get the next version up by October 1st, which is right around the corner. I've gotten some feedback from a couple of big studios, and their comments were the same. My reel needs more 'realistic' type animation. My next piece that I'm working on, is going to have a man doing some karate moves. I might even go with some parkour type animation through an obstacle course. This way I'll be more marketable to game studios too.

I'm still working on the kids' movie and not sure when production is going to be finished, but as soon as I get my shots 'finaled' I receive my next one.... that's good. In the meantime, if you want to get out of the heat, go and see Despicable Me. It looks like a really fun movie and it's getting great reviews. Till next time....

April. Already? Time for a new post I guess...

2010-04-05T12:09:00.002-06:00

Holy moses smell the roses. I honestly don't know where the time goes, but I am truly amazed at how fast it goes now. I can't believe it's already 2010, let alone April already. A little update on what I've been up to. My wife and I recently found out that we're going to be parents again... Number 2 is on the way. And should be here just in time for Hallowe'en (due Oct.30th). So as if our lives aren't hectic enough raising a 2 year old, let the fun begin.

I started Animation Mentor 2 years ago and am continuing to learn and enjoy animation more and more. I'm still doing some freelance animation for that kids' DVD movie. It's going well and am learning some about the animation process and more about what working remotely is all about. I also recently got involved with a really cool online PROJECT and am excited about getting some more industry experience and networking with some great animators. If you're an animator. Go to the link above and register. Talk about yourself and get involved. It's a great project and should be really awesome when it's all completed. With the announcement of our newest family member I had to pick up another part time job that I'm able to do from my home evenings after my full time job. It's going to be exhausting, but it allows my wife to not have to go to her extenuating job and become a stay at home Mommy. I'm really good at time-management and my current situation will definitely test that.

DreamWorks on on the Prowl...

2010-03-23T15:03:00.003-06:00

Man oh man... It feels like it's been a while since first seeing Shrek... Although DW isn't as popular with me as other studios, they're really starting to grow on me. I really love Kung Fu Panda, Madagascar and Over the Over the Hedge. I really wasn't impressed with Shrek 2 or 3, Antz, A Shark Tale or Bee Movie. I think that something happened to DW. Ever since KFP came out (which is one of my favorites) they've been making really fun and entertaining movies. Now the animation that DW produces ever since Shrek is truly amazing!! I'm talking about the story and originality. Well I knew that How To Train Your Dragon was coming out this year (my last Mentor, Sean Sexton works there) and that they were making the forth and final Shrek sequel... but I recently saw ANOTHER trailer for a movie they have coming out this November (Megamind)... that puts their grand total to 3 movies in one year. All of the movies look good. From what I've heard Shrek 4 and How to Train Your Dragon are supposed to be awesome (I haven't heard anything about Megamind yet)!

I recently saw a teaser trailer for the third movie, Megamind. Megamind looks like a fun and silly movie, which they should be able to pull off without struggle, especially when you have Will Ferrell as your voice talent! I know that they have two gigantic studios in CA, but to produce three motion pictures in the span of one year. Well, that's just amazing to me!! I am really excited to see their next three movies and am probably going to try and see them in the theaters.
____________________________

Congrats Pixar, you've done it again!

2010-03-08T10:27:00.003-07:00

As you may or may not know the 82nd annual Academy Awards were last night... I really stopped caring about the Oscars, especially after Happy Feet beat out Cars for Best Animated Feature. I would have thought the simple fact that Happy Feet was motion captured and Cars was 100% hand animated would have been a major deciding factor in winning an award for animation... anyways. From that moment on there has been a sour taste left in my mouth and I've completely lost interest all together. Plus, it seems like there's always one movie, that I haven't heard of, wins all of the awards. Last night it was The Hurt Locker. But the 2 categories that I'm most interested in are Best Animated Feature and Best Animated Short Film. Last night the other category I was most interested in was Best Picture. The reason being is that Up was nominated, and it's only the 2nd time in history that an animated feature was nominated for Best Picture. The first one was Beauty and Beast back in 1991. That's a pretty big accomplishment for Pixar.

Up ended up winning 2 Academy Awards, Best Animated Feature and Best Original Score. Bringing their grand total to 205 awards won, and they have been nominated 211 times. They had some fierce competition this year too. It was a very diverse award this year, with Up being the only 3D movie. Coraline, and The Fantastic Mr. Fox were both stop motion movies, and then the Princess and the Frog and the Secret of Kells, were both 2D animation. I personally am a HUGE Pixar fan, I love all their movies and short films. Up was definitely more serious than their other movies, but entertaining and an excellent story. Everything about Up was awesome. So with that said, congratulations Pixar you've done it again! Another well deserved Oscar to go on your shelf.

Still Chuggin' Along...

2010-02-19T11:14:00.002-07:00

Well, it's been a while since my last post... so I thought I would update it with my job hunting news. So far my first freelance animation job is going good, I'm almost finished with my first shot and ready for more. It's crazy to think I'm actually getting paid to animate, it's a concept that hasn't sunk in yet, but once I get my first check that should all change.

I've been searching and applying everywhere that I can. I sent my first reel over seas today. A studio in London that has worked on some big-time movies. Plus numerous amount of studios all over the US. I've already received two rejection letters from studios that I really wanted to work at. Bummer, but I have to keep moving forward and focus on being the best animator that I can be. There's no point in getting discouraged, finding that first full time job sounds the hardest, but I have a good feeling it's right around the corner. I found out today that there's a local game studio here in Colorado hiring, plus I heard back from another studio in Denver... so keep your fingers crossed!

Having spent so much time working on my demo reel and short film it feels like now that I've finished my reel I can take it easy... but it's just the opposite, my reel is like a constant project, that I need to keep fine tuning and perfecting till I land that full time animation position with an awesome company! I have my next 2 animations figured out when I get a free moment I'm going to start planning and hopefully get 2 more great pieces to add to my reel. Also, (side note) I started a new blog to try and keep track of all the notes that I find online regarding animation. Something that I can refer back to here at work if I get some down time or need to look something up... CLICK HERE.

Till the next post (hopefully, it will be with some good news) take care and keep on animating!

2 Movies of inspiration from 2009.

2010-02-03T15:16:00.002-07:00

If you haven't seen Cloudy with a Chance of Meatballs, I highly recommend it. It's a great story, really funny and the animation is awesome! I really like the animation style of the movie and Steve is one of the best characters of all time!

Up was another Pixar great! I enjoy this movie more and more every time I watch it! Up is the 2nd fully animated feature that is nominated for an Academy Award this year. Unfortunately it's up against Avatar, and I have a feeling that Avatar is going to clean house... I feel that Up totally deserves the Best Picture Award.

There were so many others that came out last year that were also great, but these are my two favorite! If you haven't seen them yet, what are you waiting for?!

Wow... that was quick.

2010-01-20T10:17:00.004-07:00

So after a year and a half of anticipation, graduation was an absolute blast! Meeting the founders and all of the staff at Animation Mentor was amazing! Also, to get together with students/peers that I've known for so long and have been through so much with in person.... priceless. It was very surreal. I'm glad that I kept this blog to look back on, but wish I had updated it more often.

We arrived in San Francisco on Thursday and trekked up to Emeryville (to our hotel). Got unpacked and had some lunch, we walked around Bay St. which is the new, fancy area in Emeryville, we were only a few blocks away from the mecca of animation, Pixar. It was nice to hang out and relax before the festivities. After only getting 2 hours of sleep then traveling from Denver, it was the perfect afternoon to unwind. Had some lunch, did some shopping, sat in the hot tub and went swimming. My friend John was flying into Oakland later that evening... after picking him up we went back to the hotel and had some margaritas.. which turned into meeting a crazy flight attendent (whom was straight) named Rob, which turned into vodkas, that turned into tequila shots, and trying to teach John how to play chess, which ultimately turned into 330 in the morning... time for bed.

The school tour the next morning was amazing. Seeing all these people that you've been in contact with since applying at the school, seeing them each week in the video news just isn't the same. We got to see where they all work, I got to sign the Alumni wall of fame, see Bobby's toy collection and play some ping pong! Such an inspiring place to be, there's no wonder it's the greatest place to learn animation on the planet! I imagine that if I ever get a full time job in a studio someday, that's what it's going to be like. From there we had to run some errands and since we were on San Pablo Ave. (if you remember from the beginning sequence in the Incredibles, they make reference to that road) we were only blocks away from Pixar. We thought that we would make an appearance and try and get a 'pity tour'. No such luck, we did talk to the security guard and it didn't sound like it was going to happen (without getting arrested). So we got some pictures and moved on. Time for the career fair. It was a madhouse of animators! I would guess about 200+ were there. A total of 6 studios showed up: Pixar, DreamWorks, ILM, Sony Imageworks, Blizzard and Reel FX. Because of the mass amounts of people the lines were super long and moving quite slow. Except for Pixar, there was nobody in that line.. sort of like the super hot chick at the bar that everyone's too intimidated to talk to! I was lucky enough to talk with Pixar, DreamWorks and Reel FX before time expired. I met some new people while in line and some 'old' friends too. It was awesome. Shortened version of that evening... Burger King, 2 Buck Chuck, Rubios, Broken Rack, throat punch (ouch), beers, Jager, walking, animators, outdoor toilet, Burger King attempt, Denny's, 330 in the morning.... time for bed.

Saturday was the actual graduation in San Francisco. We headed out in route to Fort Mason. We got to rehersals on time and saw a bunch more students I hadn't seen yet. Out of my entire first class there were only 2 people that weren't there... so it was pretty awesome knowing that back when we all began AM, dreaming of this day, we were all there (once again) to share it with each other. The rehersal was a hoot, photos, screwing around, talking with awesome people. They also put on a live QnA feed for all of the alumni, which I thought was totally rad. The ceremony itself was the best I ever seen. So much energy and entertainment. When we came in our names were in the credits on the big screen, I really like that followed by Carlos dressed up like the Avatar dude and a ninja fight followed by a touching movie about the school and it's conception. Next were the Student Choice Awards. It was great to see some of the students work up on the big screen and to hear their speeches. The guest speaker for this round was an ILM animator named Charles Alleneck. He gave an amazing and inspiring speech. Next was the announcement of names. Afterwards they put on a reception party with sushi, cheese, wine, crackers.... I got to meet Bobby Beck, Shawn Kelly and my favorite Mentor from class 4, Greg Kyle. I felt like a 12 year old girl who was meeting the cast of Twilight, gushing and hopefully not making an ass out of myself! They're such humble and amazing people they make it really easy to talk with.

Afterwards we found this amazing seafood/oyster place (thanks Yelp) in San Fran. The dinner was amazing and the company was great. I went with 2 people that have become great friends over the years. The downside was, my buddy's car got broken into... the SF police called him about 6 times, but he didn't hear his phone till after dinner. What an annoyance it was. Luckily they didn't get the cameras which captured the fore mentioned event.. they only made out with an iPod Nano, and the GPS mount and plug in thingy. Lame.

We headed over to the after-after-after party right near the Bay Bridge. The signs all mentioned 10-12 drinks so we were only planning on staying for a little while. But when we got there, they were typical downtown prices... 5.50 a beer. Excellent, we're staying! A lot more people showed up throughout the night. It was such an awesome experience to meet and talk with so many people that inspire me and whom I look up to! It was such a great night.

Sunday was the day to cruise around San Francisco, we saw the wharf, which honestly I've seen it enough I won't put it on the list when I got back, Chinatown (it was neat to see once, but super lame), I imagine if we were getting some food there, it might be a different story. We ventured over to the SF park, but by the time we got there it was dark (it had been raining all day). We headed back to Emeryville planning on finally seeing Avatar... we did, it was awesome. We were only 3 rows back so there were moments where my eyes felt like they were going to explode! We're going to see it next month and get there early to get some seats right in the middle.

After all the hard work of completing such an amazing school and meeting all the people behind it who make it so special I'm so glad I was lucky enough to be a part of it. I'm so inspired now to work harder and become the best person/animator that I can be. The next graduation is in July along with the AM BBQ.. I'm already starting to save up!!

Exhausted, and ready for action!

2009-12-29T10:09:00.002-07:00

Having thought I was finished with my reel, I posted it and got some (much needed) feedback... so, I had to move some things around and re-work some of the animation on one of the shots. I'm getting close to re-finishing it. January 14th is rapidly approaching and the time for the career fair and graduation is right around the corner! The only thing that I'm waiting on is finishing the animation. Then I have to burn the DVDs and re-upload everything to the various web locations. I'll admit, I've been taking it easy for a few weeks, with the holidays and all... but I feel like it's been ages since I've animated or read one of my animation books. I've been watching plenty animation to keep me "fresh", but I'm going to start planning my next shot (gotta stay sharp!) real soon.

I just found a really cool networking site www.vfx-recruit.com. It's a free website to join, but they do have a possible upgrade that is about 25 dollars a year. They have some good job leads and it almost looks like Linked In.

So with that being said. 2009 was very hectic, but fruitful. I'm looking forward to a lot of changes in 2010 and can't wait to see all the animation that's coming out!! Happy New Year to all!!!!

Demo Reel Completed!

2009-12-03T13:58:00.005-07:00

I completed my demo reel! CLICK HERE to view it.

It feels like a huge weight has been lifted off me! It was a lot of long hours and a lot of late nights/early mornings, but I feel really good in how it turned out! Maybe I'll post some of my older reels just for kicks, they are pretty painful to watch, but entertaining and it's great to see the progress that I've made over the years.

I'm planning on doing some subtle tweaking over the next month before the job fair in San Francisco in January, but the animation is pretty much done!

Enjoy. Till next time.

So close to the light at the end of the tunnel!

2009-11-23T10:53:00.002-07:00

Well, another Saturday spent working on my demo reel and I feel as if I'm gaining significant progress! And, believe it or not, I'm feeling pretty good about my reel! There's a total of 6 shots and I just finished polishing the forth and fifth ones over the weekend! I spent a little over 10 hours on Saturday fine tuning 10 seconds of animation.

As all I have left to do know is print the artwork and cut it to size . Finish the final shot for my reel, get blank DVDs and render out the final product!! The Rhythm and Hues recruiter will be coming next Friday (December 4th) and I'll have a version (not fully rendered) to give to her! Exciting stuff! As soon as I have something I'll post it so you can see it too... I'm planning on having all the animation done by this weekend, then burning one copy for the Rhythm and Hues recruiter, then render all the shots over the next couple of weekends and it's time to start burning DVDs and and putting the entire package together and start sending them out....

Stay tuned! Till next time.

Feedback, feedback ,feedback....

2009-11-09T09:13:00.007-07:00

Hey everyone! So since my completion of Animation Mentor I've been getting my short film complete and working on my demo reel. Also I have volunteered my time at Animation Mentor and became a Peer Buddy.... basically I get assigned 10 students and am responsible for going over the work that they post. It's really time consuming but it's a great thing to help out. One thing that is really tricky about being a Peer Buddy is the amount of feedback you have to leave for each student. What's so hard about that?? Well sometimes when I leave feedback I feel like I'm not really finding anything, or I'm being too critical, or I'm talking down to the student... all of these factors play a key role in feedback. If someone's shot is working and you notice something off, chances are they missed it and need the extra pair of eyes. One of the brilliant animators who graduated from AM, who recently got hired on at Disney, Malcon Peirce . He posted a really helpful blog on leaving feedback. I'm going refer to it often and is the reason I'm posting it....

How to give awesome Critiques!

So Giving feedback will not only help out the person you’re giving feedback to, It will help you learn also. This seems obvious, but when you break down somebody’s animation and really look at it on a micro-analytical level(yes i think i made that word up… and I like it) Your forcing yourself to think about every action and you end up rationalizing every move. for example, You learn why the weight is off, or how the animator got the weight just right. You can see clearly why the animator made certain decisions, maybe to make an idea read clearly, or even to confuse the audience. By doing these things your animation vocabulary will grow. Not talking about words and definitions, but methods, and or tricks that can take your animation to a higher level. So in my opinion, giving really solid feedback involves breaking down the animation and thinking about why the artist made decisions, and how did the artist accomplish ideas. This applies to all animation, Highly polished feature level, or somebody that is just starting out. You’re going to learn from both and I think it’s Vidal if you want to improve. So if somebody needs feedback on their shot I think it is important to consider a few things in order to give the best, and most beneficial advise to help the animator improve upon their shot.

1. How far along in the workflow is the animator.

- Obviously if something isn’t working. It isn’t working. BUT if somebody is in spline, you don’t want to give them feedback that would derail their shot if at all possible. Try and figure out possible solutions to the problem with the least about of backtracking possible. It may be easy to say “instead of having the character land on both feet.. maybe have him land on his hands, do a front flip, and then stand up on his feet” OBVIOUSLY I’m exaggerating. but you get the point. This comes into play big time in the studio. You will have tight deadlines, and no time (usually) to reanimate a shot. By finding a way to fix a problem without having to take 6 steps backwards is a good approach when giving feedback. Of course there will be times where the animator may have to reanimate a section, weather its because the animation just isn’t working and that’s the best solution, or if the director makes changes and needs you to take your shot in a different direction. Both will happen, but problem solving is a huge part of animation, and getting good at problem solving will make you a faster, better animator.

2. Will my ideas Plus the shot or just change it.

- Being artists, we all have great ideas, and approach challenges differently. This a good thing, it keeps out animation unique and keeps animation entertaining. But when giving somebody feedback try an avoid challenging the animators choices purely for sake of change. Really think before you suggest a possible idea that may be different from the one in the shot. Think about what all would need to be adjusted in the shot for this to work. Would the animator need to reanimate only a few frames, or would this cause a train wreck through out the shot. Think “will this idea plus the animation, and make the idea more clear?”, “is this change going to help make this animation more appealing?” Make sure you have solid reasoning for suggesting ideas. Keep in mind that this also plays a great deal in how far along in the workflow the animator is in. Obviously you can suggest as many ideas as you want, when the animator is brainstorming. That’s a fantastic thing to do! I know its helped my animation. Most of my ideas come from other animators adding better ideas upon my original idea. BUT when the animator is splining his shot, you don’t want to change anything unless its vital, or will make a drastic change for the better.

3. Performance VS Preference

- I think this is a big one. When looking at somebody’s work, No matter where they are in the pipeline, be careful not to give feedback one something just because you personally would do it a different way. This sort of feedback is good for brainstorming, early blocking stages, where maybe suggesting ideas is easier because the animator can tackle changes faster and easier. But remember that animation is art, and it is personal. Telling somebody that the idea, or joke isn’t funny just because it isnt what you would do is not helping anybody. Try and see the animators “vision” for the shot. Sure we all have different personalities, but trying to relate your ideas to the ideas of the animator is the best way to ensure a positive and helpful critique. Otherwise it just causes frustration and can confuse the animator.

4. “Just because” feedback is a waste of time.

- Giving feedback just to get your name on a person’s workspace is a waste of time, for yourself and for the person who needed feedback. Alot of times I see feedback on a persons workspace that says “looks good.” when maybe the animation is not at a level that it needs to be. THIS IS NOT HELPING THE ANIMATOR LEARN. Pointing out flaws and mistakes in animation doesn’t make a you a bad person. You will not be unliked if you give somebody feedback that will make a difference in the quality of animation. (a higher quality) I think some people are shy and are afraid of offending people., Well If you check out #’s 1, 2, 3, I can almost guarantee that you will not offend anybody, and they will appreciate the time you put in to critiquing their shot. Try and be personable when giving feedback. For example if somebody you have never met or have never seen work from, just leaves comments like this ” F58-90 fix arm, 25-25 fix weight, f 50 needs better pose, F 70 hand not reading”, that person can come across as arrogant and rude. If it is your first time giving feedback to an animator, Introduce yourself. Point out things that ARE working as well as things that could be more clear. and Follow the ideas I mentioned above. This Way your not going to offend anybody. Imagine if your in a studio, and its your first day.. and somebody comes up that you don’t know and gives you all sorts of notes and just leaves. They don’t introduce themselves, or say anything positive about the work. That would make most people feel pretty bad about themselves. So remember to be personable when critiquing somebody’s animation for the first time. Also Its important to respect higher level animators such as senior animators etc etc ( applies more in a studio environment more than AM) Try to avoid giving notes to somebody that has been working or animating far longer than you, unless they have a shot up for crit, or ask you. You dont want to be that guy that comes in and things he owns the place. This can make you seem aragent , even if your just trying to help.

5. ANIMATION IS FUN

-This is for bother the person giving and receiving feedback. Remember that when its all said and done… your make a cartoon. This is a fun job and should always be enjoyed. Even though there will be times where you hate animating (most likely this will occur on your 75′th hour of your week, when your trying to get a shot INTO spline that is due the next day, or when your going for final notes for your shot, and get reblocking notes) BUT in the end most changes are for the better, and when you see your shot after is gos through lighting and is projected on a 50 foot screen you’ll forget all the late nights of agony and defeat. haha .

So these are a few pointers I find helpful when giving feedback. I think if you think about these ideas, your critiques will be far more helpful to the animator and will be appreciated alot more. Also you will think more about why and how to solve problems, bring it full circle, and learning from the animation your critiquing. Of course animation is a hard thing to give feedback because so much is relative and most things can be done in many many different ways. Most questions i hear asked about animation is usually followed by “Well, It depends on the shot”… and this is very true. So think of this is a guide and not a rule book. thanks for checking this out!

I hope it helps!

-Malcon

Thanks for such a great post Malcon and best wishes at Disney!!

Making progress...

2009-10-30T10:59:00.004-06:00

Well, I finished up the animation for my short film and began re-working the shots for my demo reel. I had set a final deadline for my short or I'd be polishing it for another 10 years. I'm trying to do the same with my reel, setting deadlines, and (trying to) stick to them. My plan is to finish all the animation render out playblasts, so at least I have something to upload and show. Then go back and set up the lighting and render them out over a weekend or two. I rendered a few test renders for my short and using Mental Ray each frame took between 45 minutes to an hour. So I still have some settings to tweak as well as the lights themselves. I'm getting closer with each week and more excited to get it all done!

Other than that we endured a 2 day blizzard and got 2 feet of snow. It's awesome if you don't have to leave the house... the roads are icy and dangerous. I'm curious what it's going to do for our Hallowe'en trick-or-treaters....

Stay tuned.

Student Showcase.

2009-10-13T14:02:00.002-06:00

Here is the latest and greatest student showcase from Animation Mentor. Absolutely amazing work!

They've done it again....

2009-10-13T12:20:00.005-06:00

Now that I've completed Animation Mentor, I'm even more overwhelmed with ALL of the 3D animation surrounding me, on the Internet, TV, commercials, movies and video games. One studio in particular, if you happen to mention 3D Animation, will be the top of everyones' list... The studio, of course, I am referring to is the one and only Pixar Animation Studios. That's right, they have, hands down, produced my favorite movies (not just animations) and short films since their conception. I can watch any Pixar movie at any time and be completely entertained for the duration of the film, then watch the shorts, and all the special features on each DVD... I'm completely blown away from not only their animation, but the style in each of their films, the originality they possess, the overall feel of each film, and how they have hidden Easter Eggs throughout each of their films (like putting in the Pizza Planet truck in every movie).

If you look at Pixar's later films: Wall-E, Up and even Ratatouille, they take on a more serious feel (still fun, don't get me wrong), where if you look at Monster's Inc., Finding Nemo and Cars, they have a more comical/fun tone. Now in said comical movies there is still a serious message in the undertones of the movie, but they aren't as apparent. One thing that Pixar strives for is the story, that's their number one focus no matter what. Originally Toy Story 2 was going to be a 'straight to DVD' movie, and John Lasseter took a step back and said that its not Pixar's style. So they put some more money and time into the story and made it 'theater-worthy'. And look at what a great movie it turned out to be! I'm usually not as concerned when hearing that Pixar is making sequels to their amazing movies, there's Cars 2 and Toy Story 3 on the way(although, parts of me loves when they have an original movie coming out) as I am when say there's another Shrek movie in the making (although, I'm pretty stoked about Shrek 4). Shrek 1 was great, Shrek 2 was sub par, and I still have yet to see the Third, from all the bad reviews I've heard... Without further ado, here is the trailer for the upcoming Toy Story 3, June 18th, 2010.... It looks like such a fun movie and you know the story is going to be great!! I'm planning on seeing Toy Story 1 and 2 in 3D this week, and can't wait to see TS3 in June. Enjoy it.

Toy Story 3 Trailer from d C on Vimeo.

Two New Blogs Added....

2009-10-07T09:37:00.003-06:00

Alright, well since graduation I've been doing a little bit of work on my short film and demo reel. Mainly just artwork and putsy type work, in that process I did create two new blogs: one, my online portfolio site where my reel will reside CLICK HERE to see it. Second, I posted a new blog with my short film 'Fresh Out the Box' the entire process, from pitching the story to my mentor, the animatic, layout, blocking and animation. CLICK HERE to see it, it goes chronological from the latest stage to earliest.

Short film update, I have completed seven shots, only nine more to go!! Then the lighting, rendering, and put it all together and clean up/add some more sound effects.

Stay tuned!

Excited and motivated...

2009-09-28T16:05:00.005-06:00

Well, the fall term at AM started today!! And I am super excited for all of my AM peeps. Starting a new class, meeting their new Mentor and all of the new classmates, re-uniting with old ones.... a new syllabus to peruse, new characters unveiled. It felt kind of weird, and strange to not be a part of it. I was thinking this morning, that a new term is beginning, then the excitement kicked in for a minute, it quickly dissipated when I realized I don't have a new class to start today. Its finally sinking in that I graduated, I'm done, I made it... Still a great feeling, now a little more nervous about being in the 'real animation world'. Being done sure feels nice, I'm really excited to start working on my reel and finishing up my short film... I've been working on little things here and there. Getting a lot of my demo reel artwork done, setting up a new website to view my online portfolio and relaxing with movies and spending time with my family.

So, I guess what I'm getting at is that I'm definitely enjoying being done with AM, relaxing, couching, etc and I realize that I have a lot of work ahead of me... being around all this animation is too motivating to just relax. I'm contemplating taking one more week of 'chillax' time, then start working again.... or get busy tonight! Animation is really hard, and taking time away from it can be exactly what you need. After being away from my short film for a couple weeks, then coming back to it; it's really amazing on how your perception changes, you catch different things, you come up with different/better ideas for the film and you're able to fix the problems that you having before with the animation..... it really is like a breath of fresh air.

We went a saw Cloudy with a Chance of Meatballs last night and it was awesome. The style of the movie was great and original, the animation was awesome, very snappy, yet very 'squiggly' in the limbs, the effects were awesome with all the food falling from the sky, and the characters had tons of appeal. It was by far Sony's best animated feature yet. I recognized a few names in the credits, but I was surprised to see so many names under 'animation' in the credits as well as all the other departments.

One more quick thing. Now that I have access to the Alumni site, it further iterates my feelings on how truly amazing the school is. There's career services that helps you write resumes, cover letters and thank yous. Demo reel help, job boards, chats, forums, your own workspace to post your current reel.

Till then, keep on livin' 24 frames per second.

AM Alumnus Reporting for Duty!!

2009-09-18T14:50:00.004-06:00

Well, it's officially official! I graduated from the greatest animation school on the planet! Lots of: sacrifice, hard work, loooong weekends, late nights/early mornings, lectures, notes, filming, drawing, chatting, forums, coffee, 5 hour energy shots, iTunes, key frames, posing, polishing, struggle, QnAs, feedback and animating!! What a life changing experience. I can't believe it's over, one more chapter done, and another one starting!

It's a great feeling to be done, a major sense of accomplishment and pride... now time to relax for a few weeks! Margaritas and Jager tonight!

Till next time.

It's a final!!

2009-09-16T10:19:00.002-06:00

Whew... that was a the longest/fastest 18 months of my life! But, I persevered and graduated from Animation Mentor (well, not officially till Friday at 1pm). I pretty much completed my short film. I want to go and add a bunch more to it, and could keep adding to it till I am 80 years old. I want to do an intro scene with the opening credits that I still might do, but then I have to build another set, an outdoor set... we'll see how time permits. I still have some final polish and one more once over to make sure that all the splines are smooth and everything is rocking! Then I get to light it, render it and put it together in post with sound effects...

All in all Animation Mentor has changed my life, I'm so glad that I went. I'm looking forward to relaxing for a few weeks, then hitting it hard again! Got to get that demo reel done by January!

My Mentor (Sean Sexton) last night for our last QnA showed us his student work and told us his animation story. It was an interesting one to say the least, but a great one none-the-less. Then he showed us his current reel.. Wow. He's an amazing animator. It really inspired me to work hard to get my reel as finely tuned as I can to get an amazing job doing character animation all day long! I probably wont get to a major studio out of the gates, or even work on motion pictures... but that's my goal for the next 5 years. I mentioned before that I have a connection to a pretty big studio out in California... I'm going to start there and see what happens!!

It's been an amazing journey with Animation Mentor, but this is only the beginning. I'm planning on posting the progress of my short film, once it's all finished to look back at the creation process of it and see the transformation... stay tuned.

Till then.

Whew, one week to go!

2009-09-11T13:02:00.002-06:00

Man oh man... where did the time go!? Well, I have one week left at Animation Mentor and can't believe how fast the time went. Looking back I learned so much, and looking forward, I still have so much more to learn. I guess that's a good thing, it will keep me on my toes, fresh and inspired. Going to AM I have met so many wonderful and inspiring people I will never forget and hope that I never lose contact with! Even though I have accomplished a major goal by completing the program I am far from being ready to begin my quest as an animator. As far as the animation goes for my short film, it's pretty much complete. Now I have add some final touches/polishes. Light, render and then put it all together in post production with the audio. Then I'm going to begin construction on my demo reel. I pretty much have all the artwork done, I just have to get the content. I'm going to put between 5 and 8 shots so I have to go back to some older work and clean up and add some more polish. Then in January for graduation I should be set to go.... Wish me luck.

Moving right along...

2009-08-11T15:28:00.002-06:00

Well, I'm halfway through my final class at AnimationMentor.com, and I can't believe it. How fast it went, how much I learned, how much I don't know about animation, how many great students and Mentors I've been lucky enough to come across. One chapter is closing and another opening I guess. It's still sad to think it's coming to an end so quick. Yet, I don't remember a time I wasn't in school. It's been a rough year and a half, learning/studying animation, learning how to be a dad..... needless to say, I'm completely exhausted.

As far as my short film goes, it's coming along nicely. I'm on pace to finish it up in the next month, being 38 days out I confident that I can finish it. Then the reel work begins... literally, my goal is to have my demo reel, resume, short film and website completed by December so I can start the job hunt come 2010!! Exciting I know. I did find out that a friend of mine here in Denver knows John Hughes (not the late great director/writer from the 80's). The president of Rhythm and Hues Studios.... So what a great contact that is, once I get my reel completed, he's definitely getting one.

I just finished blocking out the entire short film, 3 passes roughly and it's ready to moving on to splining. I've gotten some great feedback/ideas from my Mentor and other students. Very helpful and it's good to know that if I ever get into an Animation Studio that I'll get the same feedback from my director, supervisor and other animators each day. There are so many things that are overlooked when it's your scene, it's so nice to get other eyes on it. It's about a minute long now, with animation, that doesn't include credits. I'm still not sure how much I'm going to do for the intro credits.

I'll post my progress as soon as I can upload it to youTube. Till next time.

Some new movies...

2009-07-29T11:35:00.007-06:00

That are getting me inspired and excited. I went and saw Up and Ice Age 3. Up was truly amazing, I can't wait to see it again! The story, animation, effects, environments, everything was mind numbing! IA3 was their best yet and the fact that 51 students, Mentors and alumni worked on it says a lot for Animation Mentor. Enjoy.

Here are a couple trailers for movies coming out that I can't wait to go and see:
Cloudy with a Chance of Meatballs:

9

Toy Story 3:

Despicable Me:

Slacking on my Blog...

2009-07-29T11:11:00.002-06:00

Okay, so I'm already in week 5 and haven't posted any updates. It's moving right along and I graduate in under 60 days! Wow, I honestly can't believe how fast the time is flying by! I'm sort of sad that I'm not going to be a student at Animation Mentor no longer, but it sounds like you still get access to the site as an Alumni. So that's pretty cool. But, it will be nice to get my life back in order, spending more time with my awesome family and friends.

My mentor is awesome. Sean Sexton is his name and he's been animating at Dreamworks for some time now. He's worked on all the big-time movies they've produced over the past decade: Shrek I, II, and III, Bee Movie, Over the Hedge, Kung Fu Panda (by far their best movie yet), Sharks Tale, and Monster's vs. Aliens. He showed us some shots that he worked on in Over the Hedge and Monsters vs. Aliens. What an amazing animator. I couldn't imagine working at a company like Dreamworks or Pixar and animating these amazing shots everyday, all day!! That would be awesome.

My short film is coming along, I made some great progress and was ahead of the game coming into class 6, so I'm still confident that I'll finish up by week 12. There is still so much to go, but baby steps is the key. I converted it from blocking to linear this past week, trying a method that I've picked up since attending AM. Sean said that I should have more breakdowns before I convert the keyframes to linear. So I'm going to go back this week and go back to blocking, add some more breakdowns, then hopefully next week it will be ready to go to linear and I can start polishing the sucker! Then the plan is to start putting together my demo reel, art work,resume and website by December and start looking for work in 2010. Now that I'm in class 6 and graduation is right around the corner people are asking 'what next?'. I've thought about it and yes, I'd love to work at Pixar, Dreamworks or Blue Sky (any big time studio) but realistically I don't think that I'm ready... I know that I just want to animate, whether it be video games or movies. Spending a couple years in the video game industry would be great to learn more about physics and body mechanics. The thing about that is you don't get much experience in acting shots, and if you want to get into the big studios you have to be a strong actor (well, at least your characters do). So I'll have to keep up on that with the 11 Second Club contest each month. Still trying not to think about the future too much, focusing on the present. Finish up my short film to the best of my abilities, polish up my previous shots for my demo reel, and then I can worry about where I'm going.

It's a long journey, stressful at times, but a fun one none-the-less. I plan on posting my progress for my short film soon.....

Till next time.

On to Short Film Production!! Wooohoo.

2009-06-18T12:21:00.003-06:00

Well, I made it through class 5 doing very well. My Mentor was great and I was glad to have gotten him. His name is Cal Brunker and he's an animator up in Toronto Canada at a studio called Red Rover. They mainly do commercials for TV. He had a lot of great ideas to make my short what it is today! I learned a lot in the class, but I feel like I haven't animated anything in a really long time. I do feel a bit rusty, but hopefully it's still fresh and I'll be fine. I was pleased with my grades this class, and based on those I feel like I really succeeded. I'm really excited to start blocking out my shots. Total of 16 shots, right around 1000 frames, so it's not too bad. The tricky part in actually finishing the animation by graduation in 3 months is the amount of animation that is done. When you're animating full characters in a scene it's going to take more time than if you're just animating the upper body, or just the face, etc. In my shot there's some full body acting/animating, but I'd say 65 percent is just portions of the body. So I think planning it out like that makes it more feasible to actually finish it in the time allotted, but also making it quality animation so that I can submit it to festivals if I want and have some strong pieces for my demo reel.

Here is my layout. I still have some minor changes to make based on my final critique from Cal.... and sound FX are still rough too.

It's been a crazy month...

2009-05-28T11:07:00.004-06:00

May has come on gone, now on to June. We had Maddon's first Birthday, then my Brother and Sister-in-law both graduated from college, a BBQ and trip to Vegas..... Now, the year is almost half over.... OH, and I forgot to mention creating my 30 second short in the midst of all that. The good news is that I'm back in the computer. Setting up cameras, texturing my models, blocking out my character. So that's a nice change (not that I don't love drawing, but I don't want to get rusty).

It was a stressful weekend. We traveled to Vegas and brought the baby, which was a lot of work (mostly for my wife). I worked from my laptop, not a good idea trying to keep files straight, texture maps loaded, sound effects, etc... So needless to say I got my assignment done, but now I have to start over. My Maya skills are very novice so I had some referencing issues and because I referenced in my character I was unable to use the GUI picker for him, and having that tool is irreplaceable. So I went back and set everything up right, and for the most part it's a lot better now than it was before. So I guess it was a lesson learned the hard way, and now I'm pretty much back on schedule.

I had to do the layout for the first third of my short last week, I did just over 10 seconds, and am planning on doing to about 22 seconds this week. One thing that I'm noticing is that once it's in the computer the timing has to slow down a bit so everything reads correctly. I am planning on posting my animatic here when I think of it.... and should be better about recording my progress. Stay tuned.....

11 Second goal met... wow!

2009-05-07T00:36:00.003-06:00

I finished another 11 Second Club competition. It was a great and unique competition. If you're not familiar with the 11 Second Club you can check it out at www.11secondclub.com. Basically they host a monthly animation competition that anyone who has the desire to animate can enter in any medium they choose, be it 2D, 3D, stop motion, flash, etc. I mentioned that this month was unique, for a good reason. Typically they post up a movie dialogue shot, some serious, some funny, some with 3 people conversing, 2 people conversing or just one person talking. So each month is different and fun. Well in April they decided to mix it up again and just do sound effects. At first everyone suspected that it was an April's fools day joke.... turns out it wasn't. It was brilliant, there was an amazing turn out 160 entries. Definitely the most amount of great animation I've seen.

I decided that I would go for it and enter, besides it's great practice and I need all the practice I can get. With animation it's easiest to practice if there's a deadline, that way you'll finish it (at least to a point where you could potentially put it on a demo reel). My goal for the month was to finish in the top 50. Typically I finish somewhere around the halfway point, or lower half, so needless to say it was a pretty ambitious goal. After going through the voting I was pretty intimidated. I kept thinking 'if I even get near top 50 I'll be happy, like I said there was some great animation and some fierce competition! How it works is they post a new audio file on the first of the month and you have till the end of the month to turn in the animation. Everyone who's a member to the site is able to vote. They arrange it so you're able to go through each animation, watch, vote and leave a comment if you want. Then after the 5th they tally up the votes based on the average score and then they rate them.....

I ended up coming in (tied with 2 other animations) at 48.... I was relieved that I made it. Anyway, without further delay here's the animation.

Oh, and my short film is coming along. I'm working on the story boards now, and realizing how tricky and complicated it is to be a director.... camera angles are super tricky to pull off!! I'll post my animatic next week once it's completed!

Maddon's first birthday is on Saturday... I can't believe how fast the past year has whizzzed by me... to think a year ago I was animating a simple pendulum.... Maddon and I have grown a lot in the past year...

Till then.

'Fresh out the Box'....

2009-04-14T10:13:00.005-06:00

Well, I received feedback from my three story ideas from my Mentor (Cal Brunker, what a cool name, I know).... I was going between the new computer idea and the bored bus driver idea. My Mentor thought that the computer idea was better, and I have to concur. Thinking about doing to bus driver story would be really funny and fun to do, but technically I wouldn't be able to handle it. So I thought I'd go with the more simple of the two and run with it. I still have some work do in the middle to set up the gag... but I'll do that this week.

Here's the pre-production structure I submitted:
‘Fresh out the Box’ Pre-Pitch Structure:
a. Setting: opening shot is exterior of house, all the rest of the shots are interior in the man’s office.
b. Time of day: afternoon
c. Characters: There’s only one character, a middle aged man

Pitch Structure:
a. We open with an exterior shot of a house, the sky is blue and the sun is shining.
b. Until the door opens and the main (and only character) pops his head out, looks around with curiosity, he looks down and sees the box. He gets a surprised then excited look on his face, steps out, bends down, picks up the box and brings it in the house.
c. And then now we’re in his office showing his empty desk all cleaned and ready to put his new computer on.
d. And then he starts assembling the computer components onto the computer desk (shown with quick 1-2 second cuts).
e. And then he’s ready to turn on the computer. He presses the power button
f. And then nothing happens, he looks surprised, shocked and confused, he presses it again. Still nothing. He looks angry now with some frustration.
g. And then it shows him trying different methods of troubleshooting, looking at the owner’s manual, maybe on the phone with tech support, studying the front of the computer, lifts up the mouse, etc (there are going to be 5 or 6 different things he does, again all shown in quick 1-2 second cuts). Man is getting more and more frustrated with each shot.
h. Until finally he gives up by banging his head and fists on the desk. Meanwhile the camera is trucking back to reveal that the power cord isn’t plugged in, cut to a close up shot so there’s no confusion what to look at.
i. The moral/point of the story is sometimes the simplest explanation to the problem is the most obvious one, there’s no need to get so upset by it.

Here's some reference I'm going to use in the planning (not for the animation, just some the timing of shots used are what I'm looking for with mine):

Short Film ideas.

2009-04-10T11:20:00.003-06:00

So I'm moving along (hopefully in the right direction) in pre-production of my 30 short film animation project, that will consume the next 6 months of my life. I had a slew of ideas that I've been gathering for years and had to trim a lot off the existing ones because of the duration of the film. I originally thought were going to be 1-2 minutes in length. Come to find out it's only supposed to be 30 seconds long. I posted five ideas and think that I have it narrowed down to 2... Because of my Maya abilities and lack of effects experience it's forcing me to get really creative in my story choice. One character, one set and limited effects.

Here are my two ideas that I'm leaning towards, probably going to go with the first one because it's a little more simple of an environment to create and work around.

1. 'Fresh out the Box': Intro credits play with the sounds of outside (mid day)ambient noise and a door bell ring. Fade out from black, exterior shot of a door step, on it is a computer box (Dell, HP, Apple). A middle aged man opens the door and pops his head out, looks around, then down to see the box. He opens the door in excitement and goes to pick up the box to bring into the house. The next shot is an interior shot of the man's desk, empty and shiny of course. He sets down his computer box and starts to assemble it on the desk, close up cuts showing him adjusted the monitor position, setting up the mouse and keyboard, etc. Finally it cuts a medium shot of him going to turn on the computer. He has an excited look on his face, when he pushes the power button, nothing happens... he sits there for a second and then his expression switches to shock. The next cut is him troubleshooting, getting more and more frustrated with each shot, reading the owner's manual, lifting the keyboard, etc... Until he gets so frustrated he bangs his head and fists down on the desk and lies there still, as if he's defeated. The camera is slowly trucking back to reveal that the computer's not plugged in, maybe even cut to a close up shot of the plug lying on the floor underneath the outlet. Cut to credits. Cut back from credits to a quick shot of the character super frustrated holding either the monitor or the keyboard over his head with his teeth gritting and eye twitching. Cut back to credits with the audio of a large crashing sound effect. The end.

2. 'Over Bored'. (still working on the story a bit). First shot mid morning, interior of a bus driver driving a bus. The bus driver has a very bored look on his face and in his every movement. Slow blinking and slow movements in general. Gets to a stop and there's no one there, he still goes through the action of opening the door waiting a second then closing the door to head back on his route. This goes on for a few more seconds to get the point across that he has a really monotonous job that he's really bored at. Finally he appears to get an idea (may even show a light bulb) and springs up. The next shot is him ramming all kinds of vehicles with the bus. (Now what I might do is have him see a bulldozer at one of the stops with the keys in the ignition and that's when he gets the idea and is ramming the cars with the bulldozer instead of the bus). Either way he's ramming the vehicles with something. The next shot is the same as the first shot, except now he look happy in his face and in his whole attitude. He gets to the stop (same as before) and now there a bunch of people waiting to get on the bus with disgruntled looks on their faces. Here I might have the people in casts and crutches and the camera pans back to reveal that it's a handicap bus..... cut to credits.

So there they are, a bit lengthy, but as the story develops in my head I like to get it down on paper....

I'm really excited to start production on this. Stay tuned as I'll be posting my progress as I go.

Till next time.

Class 5.... 6 more months left.

2009-04-01T10:57:00.003-06:00

Wow, so I've officially been a student at Animation Mentor for one year now. I can't believe how much I've learned (and how much more I still have to go). I started my Pre-production to my short film last night and am a little intimidated by the whole thing. The two biggest things is going to be plan plan plan and keeping it simple. I feel like I already have a big head start because I'm always coming up with ideas and have about 25 in my journal. But I want to explore some more and come up with something awesome and original! The duration of the short is only 30 seconds (only, Ha!). Sounds easy right... wrong.

I have an idea using the Azary rig called 'Identity Theft', and one called 'Over Bored' (which has a clever play on words), and then 'Spring Time' is another one... I have to go through each idea I have and fine tune them. What I like and don't like about them...

Till next time.

I'll try and post more progress for my short film pre-production.

On to class 5.... Short Film Pre-production

2009-03-25T00:46:00.005-06:00

Well, that's that, I made it through Advanced Acting with a recommendation to move on from my Mentor. I wasn't anticipating being held back, but you never know. It was a very tough class, but I persevered through it with a bunch of 14 hour homework Saturdays, 2 and a half hour lectures, tougher shots, facial comparisons, and endless critiques for my classmates. It was a really long class, between work, wife and baby. I really feel like my social life is on a timeout, which is fine. It's for a good cause. I know I say this every class, but here goes: I learned a lot, looking back at my older work, I can catch a whole bunch of issues with it and I want to go change it, so that must mean I'm learning. I still need more practice, and want to keep animating. Not sick of it or burnt out of animation. I'm burnt out, but from exhaustion. No thoughts of thinking that I made the wrong decision or am getting sick of animating.

Before starting AM and watching the testimonies of the students and how they always talked about the AM community and the awesome Mentors. That's not even the half on how truly amazing Animation Mentor is. Not to mention the endless amount of animation talent. I learned so much from my mentor, but I learned tons from the students and alumni stopping by giving feedback. Another thing that I found that was really helpful is leaving feedback for others. Maybe it's cause I'm finally getting the hang of animation, and know more what to look for and am thinking more like an animator, remember all the principles and mechanics of how the body moves.

Since there was only a two day break between classes, we decided to take a trip away from Maddon. No computer, no work, no packing lunches every night, no animation (just some animation books on the beach), no dog, no baby, no responsiblities, no rush hour, no waking up in the morning, no agenda. We're off to San Pancho Mexico. A small town just north of Puerto Vallarta. So I'm really excited to get away from it all.

Class five is starting on Monday when we get back. It's going to be a tough rebound, getting back in the swing of things, that I'm trying not to think about and live in the now. Getting back is going to be hitting the ground running, laundry, work, and school in full speed when the plane lands back in Denver. I have a lot of ideas brainstormed and I'm going to go through them and hopefully come up with some new ideas on the beach.... Here is my final shot for class 4. It's from the movie School of Rock (if you didn't recognize it). It still has some minor adjusting and some tweaks.

Class four coming to an end....

2009-03-18T12:57:00.002-06:00

Holy moses, time sure is flying. Four classes down and two to go. I can't believe that I've been in school for a year now. Thinking back at how excited I was to start, getting ready for AM.... And now it's almost over. What a great class this was, really awesome kids in my class and my Mentor was truly amazing. So chill and real with an awesome eye for animation. I really feel like I made some good progress this class.

My next two classes are pre-production and production of making my very own short. I'm really excited. I have a bunch of ideas in the hopper and need to figure out which one is going to be the best story and realistic for me to do. I would definitely say that my Maya abilities are limited so that's going to hold me back a bit, but as long as I come up with a good story and the animation rocks, nobody will notice that I suck in Maya. We don't get much of a break between classes... they're over on Friday and start back up on Monday... 2 days!! Wow! I'm planning on turning in everything early cause my wife and I are going to Mexico. We're leaving the little guy at home and am really looking forward to relaxing on the beach, spending time with my lover-muffin.

Till next time,

Oh yeah... Animation Mentor....

2009-03-06T15:01:00.003-07:00

Sometimes I forget that this blog is for my time spent at Animation Mentor.... the last few posts have dealt with animation and other nonsense. School is going good... and absolutely zooooming by right in front of my eyes. It's a crazy schedule I'm on. Usually my wife works nights from Weds to Sat, so that means I get Maddon all to myself, it's great but crazy. So on said days I go to work till 5 drive home get Maddon, feed him and play with him till about 7:15, then feed him again, give him a bath and put him to bed... luckily he's such a good little baby, no fussing and always fun to hang out with and play. He's really good at playing catching and he seems like he's always willing to share his toys with you. I don't know if that's something common in babies or unique to him. Either way it's adorable. Okay... Animation Mentor, stay focused... so what I was getting at is that once I put him to bed, make and eat dinner, make lunch for the next day and clean up after myself it's dang near 9 o'clock... I usually sit for an episode of Seinfeld or 30 minutes of animation to get motivation and then begins the homework. Last night I started about 830 and worked till about 130 in the morning. Usually with iTunes or some animated movie on in the background, then get up for work the next day and repeat... It's been really hectic and I feel like I have no life other than this... usually Saturday consist of juggling Maddon and homework, the homework portion is roughly 14 hours, but have gone as long as 16 hours (with various breaks).

I guess my whole point to this post is TIME MANAGEMENT. I knew going into Animation Mentor is was going to be a big sacrifice and a huge commitment on my part. Parts of me is completely fried, from learning animation, then applying what I learned and struggling with, the gaining some knowledge and climbing up the mountain. Reading a lot of posts (mostly on 11secondclub.com) so many people are worried about starting AM and having it just flow along with their life (whatever their current situation is). For them I just say, it's a lot of work. Especially with a full time job, baby, wife and house. Adding school to the mix, there really isn't time for much else. Yes, I still see friends, but not nearly as often as I'd like to. I haven't had a 'boy's night' in over a year, a vacation in over a year and half. I'm not complaining one bit... I'm just saying that it's been a big commitment and wouldn't trade it for the world!

I'm currently in week 9 of class four and can't believe it. I'm starting my short next class already! I'm really excited for that, but I know how I am and I'm a little nervous (I tend to go overboard on these projects). For instance when I attended the Art Institute for one class we had a final project for a character animation class that was supposed to be 30 seconds in duration... I ended up doing a 4:30 music video with like 6 sets, lighting, textures and multiple characters. It was a great experience but it was a bit much. I'm going to keep the short to about 90 seconds, no longer than 2 minutes.... that's pretty reasonable. I already have a bunch of ideas brainstormed that could be really good. I'm trying to make something original and entertaining... the goal of any animator!!

But, that's the future.. now for the present. I'm in the middle of a 2 person dialogue shot and it's challenging being responsible for bringing 2 characters to life (plus 2 background characters). I chose a line from School of Rock and it's turning out good. My workflow has definitely improved in clarity and speed. I've learned so much this class thanks to the awesome lectures and my awesome Mentor! I'll try and post progress on the shot when I get a free minute.

Till next time.... party like its 2099!!

2009 Can you smell the animation in the air?

2009-02-26T11:16:00.012-07:00

Wooooowser! 2009 and it's an exciting time to be an animator! There are some really good lookin' movies coming out this year! I'm getting more and more excited about starting production on my short when I see this. I finally feel like I'm ready and confident enough to attempt it (as far as my animation skills are concerned)! I know it's going to be a massive challenge and a major struggle at some points, but that's how you learn and become better. I'm making good progress on my two person shot and feel like I'm going to have time to really polish it and put on my new demo reel.

Now, let's talk about some movies coming out this year that I'm getting excited for:
Pixar's new movie Up... the animators are saying that it's their best one yet... I know they always say that, but they seem to excel and get better and more defined each movie they make. Dreamworks has some fresh original animation coming out this year in Monsters Vs. Aliens, I'm really excited, I was starting to lose faith in their animation with all the Shrek sequels that weren't very entertaining, and then they totally redeemed themselves with Kung Fu Panda...
9 looks amazing, a unique world with an interesting style out of the ordinary! Another one I'm really excited for is Ice Age 3. The first one was great, the second one was nowhere close. I think I'm really excited to see this one because I actually know a bunch of people that worked on it. Students from Animation Mentor mostly, they took off from school to go and work on it. Lost and Found comes out this year... it's from a smaller studio called Studio AKA, a girl in my class from Brazil told me about it. It's a children's book, and like 9 the style is so magical and original, it looks like it really captures the essence of what you can do with 3D. I wish Maddon was older, because I would totally be going with him.

And last but not least is Planet 51. This one just looks like a fun movie, crazy interaction between aliens and humans on their planet! So overall it looks like a great year for animated movies! One that I don't know anything about and is an old children's book is Cloudy with Chance of Meatballs by Sony Animation. I'm looking forward to seeing some trailers on that one.

Till next time... keep on truckin'.

Finally.... the long wait is over.

2009-02-22T04:10:00.013-07:00

I can watch movies they way they are intended! This has been years in the making. We finally got a new HDTV! We ended up going with the 50" plasma TV 720p. I didn't need or want the fancy 1080p TV so I went the less resolution and bigger picture, and it was a fantastic decision!So far I've watched: Toy Story, Finding Nemo, Wall-E, Cars, Bug's Life, Monster's Inc., The Incredibles and Horton Hears a Who! It's amazing how great the picture is! I did do some research and found out that plasma TVs are better if you watch a lot of movies. We definitely watch our share of movies, since we don't really go to movies anymore (because of the little guy)this was a wise purchase. I'm officially addicted to watching movies at home again!

Animazing.....

2009-02-16T09:52:00.009-07:00

So in the past year I've been completely enthralled in animation, learning it, doing it, watching it and studying it. I just have to say, lately it's completely blown my mind. I referring mostly to the movies that I've seen in the past year. The list is as follows: Bolt, Wall-E, Kung Fu Panda, Horton Hears a Who, Igor and now Coraline. All the movies were totally entertaining and the stories in each movie was great and compelling. And of course the animation was completely awesome in every way. It really does inspire me to keep on learning and practicing more animation. First, let's talk about the one movie of the year that didn't impress me.

Recently, I saw Madagascar 2, although there were some really funny lines and a couple of cool scenes (like the plane crash), the story and concepts are completely played out and it was almost like they didn't take the extra time and focus on the story. Granted they did their research and went on a giant safari in Africa, that showed in the movie, but they should have spent a lot more time on story development. I think one of the major things that Pixar excels in over any other studio (especially Dreamworks) is their environments. Especially the Madagascar franchise. Their environments are too realistic. I'm not sure exactly how Pixar does it, but if you look at Cars for instance, they do such a great job in making a photo-realistic environment that is exaggerated just enough to make it cartoony and magical. The environment in Madagascar 2 was too realistic, in the special features they were showing comparison images, from what they captured from the safari and the 3D scene from the movie, it looked exactly the same. Where's the magic in that, recreating a completely realistic environment that's in a 3D movie... what's the point? My opinion in 3D is this: you have the ability to do whatever you want and make things look whatever way you want them to, total control. So why not make the trees have a little more exaggerated personality, or the rocks... enough about Madagascar. One last thing, the animation was awesome again! I love the style of the quick and snappiness of it, really cool looking and fun to watch... moving on.

Trying to list these in order from my best to worse is pretty hard, they all had such great qualities and in my opinion were awesome in their own way... but here goes: Bolt, Wall-E, Kung Fu Panda, Horton, Coraline and finally Igor. Igor was decent, it was a good story and overall the style was cool, but it was lacking something, I'm not sure if it's empathy for the characters or the lack of compassion you feel for the situations throughout the movie. The first four listed are truly amazing movies; I will own them all when they become available and watch them over and over.
If you haven't seen any of the ones listed above, go and check them out....

This is getting way too long, my intention was to talk about the movies I fancied (I guess I'll save that for a later time)... so I'm going to leave you with a trailer from Coraline, which is the first 3D movie with 3D glasses I've seen in over 20 years. I forgot how fun it is.... and soo cool! Oh, plus this is the studio my current mentor is working at.....

Finally completed....

2009-02-13T09:10:00.005-07:00

Or at least as much completed as it's going to be, for now.... By that I mean there's always something that I see, or someone else sees and points out that can be tweaked. It's true what they say, an artists work is never done. This definitely holds true in animation. This is the monologue shot that I've been working on since November 08. I was looking back at some of the early stages of the shot and didn't realize how many changes are made to these shots. From my planning/video reference to the early blocking of animation. This piece really transformed and I like the direction that it took. I think the big thing was the feedback that I got. With animation I'm always trying to be original and entertaining with the shots that make, all while trying to learn. It's a tricky situation, but challenging none-the-less. I got tons of feedback from my peers and from 2 different mentors that have different background and styles. That really made a difference in the shot. I was noticing (as well as other) that the shot looked like it was stop-motion as soon as I added the lip sync. My mentor (Greg Kyle) was saying that I need to go through and smooth out those tangents. I was really struggling with that so I asked him if I could send him my Maya file for him to look 'under the hood' and term used in animation to see what's going on in the graph editor. He did, looked at it and gave some good feedback and then fixed a small portion of it to show me what he was talking about, and holy crap just the 12 frames that he fixed made the world of difference to the shot. He then sent me back the Maya file that he worked so I could see what he did to it. I think that has been my biggest break through thus far. So I'm going to post my first blocking pass and the final so you can see what I'm talking about. It's amazing how much you learn with these assignments and how the school really does work.

First pass.

Final pass (at least for now).

Holy moly... slacker head!

2009-01-28T13:40:00.002-07:00

Break is over... mixed in with a mini-break... Right now I'm between assignments... sort of. My first dialogue was a success, I think (I've gotten great feedback and responses to it). I feel I learned sooooo much from that assignment and want to keep going. My new Mentor is absolutely an amazing person! He's a Canuck through and through, and so real! He had mentioned that parts of my assignment looked 'choppy' almost like it was stop motion (so did Sean...) so I asked him for a bit of help. I sent him over my Maya file and he worked on about 22 frames and smoothed it out. I think that my problem was that I'm over animating, adding too many in-between/breakdowns. Like Mr. Williams says K.I.S.S... (keep it simple stupid), I need to make a giant poster that says that and hang it right behind my monitors at home! Soooo, back to my next assignment: it's doing a two person dialogue shot up to 15 seconds.... more characters and more time then before, I'm a little nervous, but I'm excited about what challenges I'm going to face (hopefully overcome)and persevere. So this week, I just have to polish up my monologue shot, and pick three possible dialogs for my next assignment, and one face pose.... pretty chill. So I'm taking full advantage of the calm before the storm (advice from my awesome Mentor).

Maddon's doing great, always smiling, laughing and babbling! It's so fricken cute!

Christmas Break.....

2008-12-23T09:00:00.002-07:00

It's Christmas time, which doesn't seem possible. I can't believe where 2008 went, it completely flew right by! I'm on break right now from Animation Mentor and I sure am enjoying it. Seeing my wife, relaxing with her, and not feeling preoccupied with thinking about my assignment. It's hard to imagine a time before AM. I'm looking forward to the next class, and have already started working on an introduction piece for my demo reel.

I just bought a new computer, long overdue. I've had my last machine for 5 years. It's been a great machine with no problems what-so-ever but it's time for an upgrade. I found a local company here to put it together and they seem very competent. It's a beefed up machine so I'll be excited to use Maya to it's fullest capacity. 3 gigs of RAM (compared to 1) a new 250 hard drive and EVGA motherboard, with an Intel dual quad core proc, and a 1 gig EVGA super duper graphics card!! That baby's going to cook. I'm really excited to set it up and see what it can do!

Other than just going to relax for Christmas, my in-laws got a hot tub this year and live out in the mountains, so I'm really stoked to freeze my butt off then jump in the nice hot water.... then freeze again! Maddon's getting bigger, and I felt his first tooth coming in, up top. It hasn't broke through the gums yet, but it's close... OUCH!! I'm glad I don't remember that.

I'm the only one (in the graphics department) here at work so it's sort of nice, but quiet. We just got new 24inch wide screen monitors.... totally rad!

Outro to acting... time to move on!

2008-12-18T15:28:00.002-07:00

Well, I officially made it through yet another class at Animation Mentor, my Mentor recommended me to move on.... so I'm off to class 4, Advanced Acting! Getting super excited to continue on my journey. The next class will consist of 2 assignments again, one is being carried over from class 3 and then the final is a two person dialogue shot. The only difference is they're giving us a full Bishop rig, with mouth and facial controllers. Yay!

I finally plunged and bought a new computer... money is definitely tight right now, but I figured after next class I'm starting on my short film production and need all the power and resources I can get my hands on. I got a new case, power supply, 250 gig hard drive, 3 gigs of RAM, and a 1 gig graphics card. It's going to be super rad, and like 5 times faster and better than my current machine.

Here's the last nine months of work at Animation Mentor.

3 down, 3 to go....

2008-12-15T02:33:00.003-07:00

Well, class three is coming to an end... that means that I'm halfway there! I feel like I learned so much this class, and am feeling a lot more confident in my animation and my animation abilities. The one hard thing, that I kind of mentioned before is the fine line in animation. By that I mean 'avoiding the cliche' is something said in pretty much every lecture, being original, coming up with new ideas, jokes and animation. They also say to challenge yourself when learning animation, don't bite off more than you can chew, but have enough so you get full. Another contradiction is keeping it simple (KISS), and not over posing your animation and yet keeping your animation entertaining. The further along I get I realize that the fine line is something that comes with practice and perseverance.

At the end of each class you have to make a progress reel of all the work that you've done at AM from newest to oldest. So I went back to clean up a couple things in assignments from class 2.... I wanted to start them over. I went through and cleaned up the splines and not even knowing it, my 'style' has completely transformed in the past 12 weeks. It wasn't as if I were resplining the whole thing, but there were a lot of spots that needed some major attention. So going through that was good, and bad. Good because I'm learning and making my own style to animate, and bad because like I said I want to go back and redo them all.... starting from the very first assignment. But, I keep telling myself 'look ahead and take what you learned and apply it to new animations. My new goal is have a new demo reel by February. I already started designing the artwork and am working on getting pieces to put into it.

Another dilemma was solved today, something that is a lot more stressful than I ever remember. Buying a new computer. Talk about stress. With a budget this is not an easy feat. I was looking to spend around 600 on basically an upgrade to hardware. Seeing is my computer is about 5 years old now, it's completely obsolete, I isn't performing as well as I would like.... so it's time. I found it on tigerdirect.com for about 100 bucks cheaper than my budget, so that's a first for me. It will be about 5 times better/faster than my current machine. It's not that I'm not happy with my machine, I've never had any issues what so ever with it, it's just too old and slow.

I'm looking forward to class 4, and definitely not as nervous as I've been when starting a new class up till now.

Animation all around me....

2008-12-09T12:23:00.003-07:00

So, it's official, I've become obsessed with animation! Not to a scary point, but I definitely know that this is my career choice forever!

Class 3 is flying by, I'm already in week 11! I've learned so much this class and want to keep trekking ahead, practicing and learning more and more!! My dialogue shot is getting closer to completion, at least till I'm able to add facial animation next class. I attempted to enter the 11 second club November competition, but unfortunately I only got to the blocking stage. I got too busy with school, and since that's my priority I had to put 11SC on the back burner. I think I'm going to attempt it again this month, I'm just going to keep it simple. I feel like the more practice the better, practice makes perfect!

We saw Bolt opening weekend and if you are into animation, or animated movie it's a must see! Definitely top ten animated films of all times for me! Action, funny, sad and the characters where awesome!

Next post I'll upload my assignment, till then.

Just when you think....

2008-11-18T15:08:00.003-07:00

you're getting the hang of animating... Blammo-whammo! I received a very in depth, detailed eCritique this week for my dialogue assignment (that is posted below). Very insightful, and some what discouraging (okay, not really, just being dramatic) on how my acting choices were too similar, even though I thought that I was breaking it up and avoiding symmetry... looking at it now, he's totally right on. I'm going to regroup and redeploy my animation troops all over that assignment this week, so check back for an update.

I think the hardest part about learning animation is the back and forth. You're trying to learn something, that is ridiculously hard to begin with, then you have to be original and creative based on your limitations and animation abilities that are holding you back. It's frustrating and can be down right discouraging at times. But I guess that's all part of the learning process of the coolest art forms around. I do feel that with every assignment I'm gaining some sort of knowledge and becoming a better animator. I definitely feel more confident when coming up with ideas, so that's a plus.

That's it for now.....

Week 8 already... Only 4 more to go in class 3.

2008-11-16T20:31:00.002-07:00

I can't believe how fast my time is going at Animation Mentor, it's week 8 today, that means I'm done with first acting class. Overall I'm learning so much this class it's insane. The entire 12 week class consists of 2 assignments, the Pantomime assignment and then a dialogue assignment. The character they give you for the dialogue assignment is the Bishop rig, which is super rad. However, it's a limited rig, with now facial controllers, so you're not able to do facial expressions, that comes next class.

I feel like I'm getting the hang of this whole animation world, now I want to go back and redo all of my assignments, I guess that means that I'm learning something. More and more with each assignment. For some extra practice I'm entering in the 11 Second Club monthly animation competition. Lately it seems like I want to do more and more animations for practice, because I learn so much from each animation that I do, and they get easier and easier. So it's true what they say 'practice makes perfect'.

Maddon's doing good, he's six months now, and has gained over 10 pounds. I can't believe how small he was when he was born, looking back at pictures is creepy. He's getting big and has a really big melon. I started call him 'Bobblehead'.... He laughs when I call him that. Other than, it's fall now and it was 70 degrees today. The basement's coming along slowly, I hung the cabinet bases today so we have tons of storage down here, it's so nice to start getting organized again!

Wall-E comes out on DVD and I'm super excited to buy the special edition. That movie was amazing, and I loved the sound effects all the robots make... Super cool, if you haven't seen it I highly recommend it.

Here's my first pass for my dialogue shot:

Finally feeling comfortable....

2008-10-13T16:34:00.003-06:00

Well it's week 3 of class 3... weird eh? Anyway, I spent a lot more time planning out my pantomime assignment than I have will all other previous assignments. And holy crap, what a difference it makes. I started by brainstorming 5 different ideas, once I narrowed them down to one idea I started thinking about what and how I want to show it. Acting and thumbnailing out ideas and poses. After I felt comfortable with my movements I filmed the video reference. After that I thumbnailed the video reference to get a better sense of the timing. Thennnnn, I cleaned up the thumbnails as best I could in Photoshop and brought them into a program called Monkey Jam, which basically helps you with the timing of your shot, bringing in the rough poses and using only the main key frames I timed out the shot, which was a little more work, but made blocking so much easier. After getting my first critique from my mentor Jay Jackson (who's been in the animation industry for 25+ years now, and worked on some of my favorite movies) I made some changes, added and took away from it.

My point is this, after living, breathing and learning animation over the past six months, I still have a long journey ahead of me, but I'm finally feeling comfortable and confident when doing animation. The school is great, everyone is so supportive and helpful, between that and my eCritiques it's a wonderful learning environment!

Tah tah for now...
Oh, I finally saw Ironman... very cool movie, I recommend it.

Week 2, class 3....

2008-10-09T10:36:00.003-06:00

Man oh man, how time flies... I started working on my pantomime shot and am really excited. I feel like I'm learning a lot about animating and that I still have so much to go. Looking back to the beginning of class 2, I've learned so much since. I feel a lot more confident that I'm able to animate more and have it be successful and entertaining. For this assignment we're supposed to show two contrasting emotions in with no dialog what so ever. I had five options and went with the one where my character Stewie has a pet 'Tailor' in a crate that he adores. He picks it up and holds/hug it, and then hears something behind him and puts Tailor back in the crate, as he's turned away Tailor makes a run for it and hops out of the crate and runs away. When Stewie turns back around he notices that Tailor is gone, he panics, looks in all direction, see him and runs after it. It sounds simple, and that's the point, pretty much since the first week AM has been saying keep it simple, and that's what I'm doing, with a lot more planning. I took my sketches into Monkey Jam and timed everything out, to get a good sense of timing, to make sure that everything reads and is entertaining. It worked, they were right, the more planning that you do the easier it is once you get into the computer. Definitely a milestone for me and my animation world.

So that's about it for now. Busy as heck, I think Maddon's getting some teeth coming in... he's drooling everywhere. But overall he's a pretty happy little dude and a lot of fun to be around. He's rolling over, so we had to get him a 'baby-wedge' for when he's sleeping.

Till next time.

On break yo.

2008-09-25T21:01:00.003-06:00

I finished class two, and my mentor recommended that I move onto class 3, Introduction to Acting.... so right on! I'm trying not to do any animation (other than work) on my time off. I know that I have soooo much that I need to learn and need to practice as much as I can to get better, but I also don't want to get burned out. I said when I started Animation Mentor that I wasn't going to compare myself to the other students, which is hard because there are so many great animators there. I guess that it's become my motivation to get better. I just have to keep working at it and getting better. It will take time and it's all about patience. I'm getting excited for the next class to start and like going to class 2 I'm a bit nervous. I've been animating at work for the past week or so, and it made me realize that this is it for me, it's what I want to do for money for the rest of my life! I guess I sort of knew that when I started the Art Institute back in 2001, but didn't realize how much fun it is. The case that I'm working involves a man being reckless and losing both feet, I'm animating what he did based on his injuries and what not. Working with a Bio Mechanical Engineer, two attorneys and an expert. So needless to say it's interesting.

I just ordered Eric Goldberg's new book Character Animation Crash Course, my buddy at work bought in and brought it in.... I looked at it for 2 minutes and went on Amazon and ordered one for myself. If you're thinking about getting into animation, or wanted to learn animation the 3 must haves are: the Animator's Survival Kit, The Illusion of Life and Crash Course.... there are a lot other out there that are great too, but those are the trifecta of learning books. So like I said, if you want to learn how to animate get those and read, read and reread them! I'm not saying that Animation Mentor isn't great because it, I've learned so much. But in getting started reading those books is a great first start.

Maddon's doing great, getting bigger. He's smiling now, it's such a cool feeling when I go into his room in the morning and as soon as he sees me he gets a giant smile on his face (unless he's hungry, then there massive screaming), but for the most part he's a happy little baby and I can pretty much always make him smile!

That's about it for now, I'm posting my progress reel, newest work to oldest work at Animation Mentor, so check it out, and please leave me any feedback that you want!

Later.

Inspiring Animations...

2008-09-11T14:52:00.008-06:00

Here is some work that keeps me inspired when I start running out of steam.

This animation called Oktipodi won best student work at Siggraph this year, so it now has the potential of winning an Academy Award for Best Animated Short.... When you see it you'll think to yourself 'Wow! There's no way this is student work'. But I assure you, it is....

This piece is called Sigg Jones, it reminds me why I love animation so much, there really are no rules or limitations with reality, just creative genius.....

Enjoy, I hope they will inspire you too.

Class 2 coming to an end!

2008-09-10T11:57:00.007-06:00

Well, summer's officially over and my 2nd class at Animation Mentor is coming to an end (coincidence? I think not). I've learned a lot about body mechanics and realized how hard it is to convince your audience what you want to show with your animation. For my final assignment I chose the baseball pitch option, to tie into my first turn around assignment with the Yankee outfielder turning around to watch the ball go over the fence for a homerun. I have a new found appreciation for all animation now, I was pretty naive before not realizing how much work actually went into it. I feel like I'm grasping the concepts that I'm learning this quarter, the lectures are very intense and insightful and there's a lot to digest in each one. In the past I would watch the lecture twice in the week, one of the times taking notes on it and the 2nd time was just to pick up what I missed from watching it the first time. My new technique is to watch the lecture early in the week and take notes on it, then go back and watch the lecture from the prior week as well as review the notes. That seems to help not ingest soooo much in one week and make for a nice review after applying the lecture to the current assignment. I feel like as all I want to do is practice, practice practice animation. The lack of patience that I have makes it really hard to want to become a great animator right NOW! I know that it's going to take a lot of time, and it's something that I'm never going to master (back to my whole golf comparison). Every great animator till the day they die always talk about how they're always learning something new, or how they always struggle with their shots. It's kind of intimidating and exciting to know that I picked a career that will always challenge me and will always have new obstacles to overcome. Anyway, this post is all over the place, I'm not a very good writer, I'm just sort of writing as thoughts enter my mind. My pitch animation final is due on Sunday this week and then next week is a short one, basically making a progress reel of my body mechanics animations. So I'm going to have to go back in and adjust/revise my animations that I've already turned in, but with more of the knowledge that I've gained this class, hopefully it's not going to be too bad.... who knows though. Then light 'em and render 'em off..... sounds like a nice final week... Let's hope it is!!

I've been slacking on my online journal.

2008-08-22T09:38:00.003-06:00

So it's been a crazy last few months, with a new baby and learning animation. I absolutely love Animation Mentor. It's so true what Bobby 'Boom' was saying in all of the orientation videos about how you'll get out of whatever you put into the school. If anyone is considering learning animation this is the way/place to do so. The forums are great, but it's the community that makes it what it is. Their motto is 'crit 5'... which means you should go to at least 5 students workspaces each week and leave feedback on their assignment. It's amazing how by doing this not only do they benefit from stuff overlooked when created their assignment, but it helps you by analyzing the animation and looking for the principles and other factors that the school has taught. Not only is the student body completely helpful, energetic, motivating and nice, they do a series of online QnAs each week. So if you're having problems with a character rig in Maya or trouble with the assignment, any of the student body can attend these sessions and participate and ask questions, or just sit back and learn some things. They're great to attend and so insightful. Not only do they have technical support QnAs, there are also professional animator QnAs where a profession animator talks about what they do in the industry, show some of their work and answer any questions that the students have. The last one was a Mentor who was one of the lead Animators on Iron Man.

Anyway, to make a long story longer. Not only is just the bare essential of the school so great, it's the extra curricular activities that really excel your learning process for animation. It's weird how one day you just look at work you're doing for the assignment and you think 'holy shit, I'm animating!'. My eye is so much more trained to really study how things move, and why they move that way. My latest assignment is animating a baseball pitch. It's coming along really nice and it's due in a couple of weeks. The spacing is really nice for class 2. There are only 3 assignments for the 12 week class, so you really learn how create animation. I compare the process to sculpting out of clay, you start with a big lump of clay (your ideas) and fine tune it, getting more and more detail the further along you go. The wallah!

Mommy went back to work (kind of) and so I get the little dude all to myself for 3 nights a week. It's a lot fun hanging out with him. He's more alert and started smiling. He's definitely more used to Mommy, because she's been with him everyday, all day for the past 3 1/2 months. He's getting more used to me and I can finally bathe him myself, which is a challenge in itself....

I probably won't post another till this second class has come to end.... till then.

Why did the 3D character throw the 3D clock out the window?

2008-08-06T16:16:00.006-06:00

I'm halfway through the 2nd class at Animation Mentor and I can't believe it. I'm learning about body mechanics, which consists of, external/internal force, weight, timing, spacing, acting and strong poses. It's very intense, but oh so much fun. The lectures are about 3 times as long as the first class, but they fly by. The lectures now consist of individual animators going through how they would complete a shot, from shooting video reference, studying it and thumbnailing, to get the juicy poses and the timing down. They really help to break it down, but they make it look so easy, that part is a little frustrating. I feel like I want to learn as much about animation as possible as fast as I can and become an awesome animator. I don't know why that is. Maybe it's because I'm in my 30s now and feel as I've missed out on this wonderful art form for so long. Or maybe it's because I see so many great animators all around and I want to be good like them. I know that I need to just stand back, take a deep breath and enjoy the journey as all of these amazing animators have done. I have to keep thinking that they were all where I am now when they were learning animation.... One good thing is that I can look back at my work and see how I can improve it.

As far as the home front's concerned, we got moved into our basement, and I have my computer set up, with my inspirational toys all around me! We still have some work left on the basement, trim, doors and the cabinets, at least we're able to enjoy it now, we got it carpeted and tiled also. It's very cozy and I love being down there, definitely worth all of the hard work. In Denver we just went through a record 22 days of temperatures reaching in the 90s.... too damn hot for me. I recently got an iPhone and one of it's features is a weather button. You're able to put in whatever city you want to around the world and when you hit the weather button you can scroll through the cities you've entered.... anyway, I have Vancouver in there as one of my cities and their temperature seems lovely this time of year, typically right around the high 70s low 80s.... perfect!

That's all for now... till next time.

Class one is ovah!

2008-06-19T15:36:00.002-06:00

Man oh man, what a crazy few months I've endured... talk about insanity! I made it through Class one at Animation Mentor and I feel really lucky to have met the people that I have! First off, my mentor Paul Allen was absolutely amazing, his insights and critiques were so helpful and inspiring. He really took time and studied the animations/poses that I handed in, he didn't just say something to say it. I learned a lot, and definitely realized how much work goes into learning animation, I never thought it was going to be an easy feat, but damn I feel naive.... I know that I learned something, because for the final assignment (which is posted below) was to put together a progress reel of all your work for the class so the school can keep on file. Anyway, looking back at my past assignments I know I could start the assignment over and make something twice as good in half the amount of time.

I couldn't have been luckier with my classmates either, they spent so much of their busy time helping me, leaving constructive feedback to better my animations. They were all so helpful, and like I said, I made some really good friends in the process. Last night and my QnA session, it was really kind of sad, Paul went around pulling everyone up on their web cams and said his farewells, as did the class back. I know that everyone will stay in contact, but it's sad not having them in the same class as me.

On another note, Maddon's got so fricken big, he's at 6.5 lbs, that means he gained 9 ounces in a week! He's been eating tons and is much more alert now, not just eating, pooping, and sleeping. After he eats he'll stay awake. Looking around, studying everything around him. I think that his eyes are much more developed and he's able to see a lot farther than before. The expressions of curiosity that he makes is so adorable, you can tell that he's really trying to figure out where he is and what the heck is going on. The cutest thing is when he sleeps, and waddled or not, he'll always manage to get his arms up and over his head like he's riding a roller coaster. It's so fricken cute.

Another major milestone occurred over the past week. We finally got our basement sheet rocked! It looks so cool and we're going to paint it this weekend and hopefully have it finished up, at least be able to move our stuff down there temporarily by July-ish.

I'm getting nervous and excited for class two to begin. It's going to be a lot of work, but I'm up for the challenge. Now that we've had Maddon and the basement won't consume so much of my time, I'll really be able to focus on AM and make some sweet animations, and grow as an animator.

Till next time....

Walk cycles are upon me!

2008-05-22T10:59:00.004-06:00

This post as far as I'm concerned will catch me up to current status at school.... or at least be a new starting point to have more consistent posts.

Anyway, this weeks assignment we're doing 'vanilla' walk cycles. It's just your basic every day run of the mill walk cycle (2 cycles actually). I really like how much thought Bobby, Carlos and Shawn put into the curriculum for teaching animation. My Mentor made a great point last night at QnA about how we're all on this very gradual ramp learning animation, getting the basics down and really how important they are to know, and also how much they're used throughout your animation career. Back to the curriculum, the thought process that they put into it is amazing to me. They start you off so basic with a bouncing ball and then they just wooosh you through and next thing you know you're doing walk cycles, not realizing how you use what you learned the prior week and apply and then what you also learned the current week and apply that. Almost like building blocks. It's so cool. We also have to do a STU pose portraying strength. My sketches sucked that I attempted, which was at 130 in the morning, so I was probably just exhausted, so I'll re-attempt it tonight. I'll try and post something for the blog later this week.... till then.

... already it's week eight.

2008-05-21T15:50:00.004-06:00

Man, I can't believe it's already week eight, the first session of Animation Mentor is flying by. I'm learning lots and realizing how little I know about animation, and secondly how much goes into animation. I guess you could say I have a new found respect and love for the art, which I was anticipating when I started.

The last couple of assignments have been difficult for me, mainly because I'm trying to break my old animation habits and unlearn what I've learned (to do it the right way basically). They've consisted of using overlapping action, path of action and arcs. Arcs I'm okay with, it's the overlapping action that's killing me. I understand the concept of it, I just don't know exactly when to apply it. On my assignment I applied to probably only 25% of where it needed to be. After watching my eCritique (where my Mentor goes through my assignment and tell me what's wrong with it) it totally made it clear and explaining when, where and why to use it. I guess that's why they call it learning animation. Needless to say I'm a bit more intimidated now then when I started.

The lectures still intrigue me and are super insightful and inspirational. They go around and discuss the current week's topic with animators who have been in the animation industry for some time, and there was one animator that really put things into perspective, as far as what you have to go through to learn animation. He said (I'm paraphrasing) 'I would've put as much work as if had I gone to law school, but this is way more fun'. It really made me think how much work this is really going to be, a much bigger commitment on my part. I'm not afraid of more work by any means, it just makes me realize how naive I still am in my old age.....

I'm going to start posting my assignment that I'm talking about so you can see what the heck I'm talking about.

Till next time....

Tired and sleep depped...

2008-05-18T04:08:00.003-06:00

Well, I'm as week seven of Animation Mentor comes to a conclusion. Our son has blessed our home. It's true what they tell you about when you have a baby, you instantly fall in love. Maddon Clifford Smith was born on May 9th, 2008. Birth weight was a whopping 3 lbs 15 oz and 17 inches long. He came early and we initially heard that it was the placenta that wasn't working properly and Maddon wasn't getting the nutrients that he needed to grow in the womb. Come to find out that it wasn't the placenta at all, it was the umbilical cord that was too short, our Doctor said that it was only 10 inches long. Their length varies from pregnancy to pregnancy, but 10 inches was the shortest our Doctor and all the colleagues she told had ever seen.

Here's how the story goes: we moved out Dr. appointment up from Friday to Wednesday because we feared preclampsia/toxemia when we were there the Doctor measured the uterus and it had shrunk from the previous visit. Typically the uterus grows about 1 cm each week, so being that we were 36 weeks, the uterus in turn should've been 36 cm... oh no, it was 31 cm, definitely a cause for concern. She scheduled an ultrasound for later that afternoon and requested that we get some bloodwork done for the toxemia. We went in for the ultrasound and they found out that the baby wasn't getting the proper nutrients and we needed to deliver.

They admitted us in the labor and delivery where they started to try and induce labor. First was trying to soften up the cervix, the whole first night every four hours was done using suppositories, when that didn't work that whole first night they tried using a stronger drug and started the oxytocin, which is used to get the uterus to start the contractions. Basically everything they tried failed and had to perform a C-section. Which if you've ever experienced birth, isn't the optimal situation. Having the Doctor give the disclaimer that if we kill you during this whole ordeal it's not our fault and you can't sue us.

We went into the OR around 0635 and had little Maddon at 0705. That was a Friday morning and we were in the hospital till Tuesday, which was great for us. The nurses were so helpful and anytime you needed something you just called the nurse in and they brought whatever we needed. Maddon stayed in the ICN (intensive care nursery) until Mother's Day. They wanted to make sure that he could maintain his temperature. He's doing great, we had our first Doctor visit with the pediatrician, who is great. He's gaining weight and is strong as ever.

As far as juggling Animation Mentor goes. I was able to take off from work to help with the little guy, so school has been manageable. I've been getting my assignments done and still learning lots. I'm still loving animation and am glad that I committed to AM.com.....

Week 5 is upon me...

2008-05-02T16:08:00.003-06:00

This week's assignment: to animate a ball through an obstacle course... it sounds a lot easier than it is. Man oh man, I spent the entire week planning the path of the ball. The object is use anticipation and squash/stretch, which is this week's lesson. Anyway, I got the first stage in Maya done, and came up with some good ideas. I think that I bite off more than I can chew on these assignments... not sure why I do that. Bobby 'Boom' Beck says to 'keep it simple'... I should just listen to him. Maybe I feel that I'll become a better animator if I push myself a little on each assignment. We'll see how that works out for me.

In other news, we got the basement all framed up. 120 2x4s and about 17 hours of labor (give or take). It was a big job, but man, was it rewarding. We still have our work ahead of us, but it was a huge step. Also the baby's room is almost ready, we got it painted and the crib all assembled (which was a bitch of 3 hours)... It's all coming together.

Till next time.

Team Fortress 2 taunting animations.

2008-04-25T14:27:00.002-06:00

Some great in game animations from Team Fortress 2. If you haven't watched all the intros to the different characters, check them out on youTube.

Eviction...

2008-04-25T14:17:00.002-06:00

With the new arrival that's going to bless the Smith clan comes rearranging of our home. We're currently in the process of finishing our basement. This is to also act as a catalyst of chain reactions to accommodate our baby. It goes like this: we need a room for the little one (crib, changing table, etc.), right now we don't have one. Soooo, we're rotating rooms around. The, what's now, guest room will become the little one's room. What's now my office will become the new guest room.... so where am I going to animate you ask. That's where finishing the basement comes in. Once the basement is finished we'll have a giant family room which will contain my office. Until said time though I will be tearing down my office, all my toys, pictures, files, computer, movies and CDs will be in boxes so we can rotate rooms. Once my computer and office is down I'll be working from the living room, or where ever my laptop can be plugged in. One thing that's freaking me out is that I have all my school stuff, music, side jobs, etc. on my desktop, so I have to make sure that I have EVERYTHING off it and transferred to my laptop or I'll be screwed.... talk about careful planning. Anyway, that's what lies ahead of me tonight, so I thought that I would share it.

It's already week four...

2008-04-24T16:28:00.002-06:00

It's true what they say: 'Time flies when you're having fun'.... man. I'm already in week 4 of my journey through Animation Mentor. So far I've learned basics; the 12 principles, timing, and planning. The lectures are so wonderful and inspiring. To hear all sorts of animators from the biggest studios talking so passionately about what they do, animation. Carlos Baena, Bobby 'Boom' Beck and Shawn Kelly are the founders of the school, and in my opinion are considered the '3 Young Men', these guys are truly amazing animators of our time.

The school itself is the epitome of 21st century school. It's very technical, web cams, forums, uploading, downloading, chat rooms, eCritiques, software/hardware support... amazing. You can check it out at www.animationmentor.com. Anyway, that's enough for today, I'll go more into my life and about the school next time..... 'til then.