Illustration Friday: Tales and Legends

I guess this is more "Tails and Legends"...ha! Sorry. Dog pirates! Done on real paper...with real paint.

Sketchcrawl!

I was finally able to attend a Sketchcrawl out here in San Francisco. I had a blast. Not only did I get to draw all day, I got to meet a ton of cool new people. And then there were a whole bunch of "Oh wait...I read your blog!" moments. Enjoy these pics from the Chinatown:

Brittney and Dave sketching...photoshop color.

There was a lot of gambling going on!

That is Daniela Strijleva up there.

Those ladies noticed I was drawing them and then they got shifty.

That's the most drawings I've done in a long time. There's still a slew of paintings from Christmas that I've been meaning to post.

Just found this on the forums...thanks for posting this!! (From left to right: Me, Dave, Brittney, Enrico Casarosa!)

FIgure Drawing

Trying to get back into the figure drawing groove. I've been reading Mike Mattesi's "Force" book on figure drawing for animators. So far it's pretty awesome. These drawings were done at the Saturday morning life drawing group at UC Berkeley. It's a great group of very talented people all working in a variety of styles and mediums. If you are in the area you should check it out.

My favorite Wiimote Hacks

Johnny Chung Lee, of Carnegie Mellon University, is doing some amazing things with the wii remote! Here is one where he figured out how to use it for head tracking for desktop VR displays:



And here is another where he uses the wii remote to create a low-cost multi-touch display/whiteboard!



If you go to his website he's got another video where he tracks finger movement with the wii remote...just like in Minority Report. This guy is a genius.

Merry Christmas!

Hope everyone out there is having a great Christmas or other holiday fun. I have uploaded a Golden Book full of awesome illustrations. Enjoy.

Happy Birthday Mr. Disney

Happy Birthday to the most important man in the history of animation!

Illustration Friday: The Zoo

I wanted to draw a panda. And it came out sad.

Where'd the Cheese Go?

I made this random little cut-out film my freshman year of college. Actual paper on an actual animation stand! I should do this again some day.

Boo-o-wulf

ASIFA-Hollywood held a free screening of Beowulf tonight in San Francisco. We sat in the theater for 25 minutes while the projectionist attempted to focus the projector and get the 3D print to work. We then sat through the first 20 minutes of the film in broken 3D, where everything was misaligned and quickly gave me a headache. Eventually everyone in the audience got fed up and walked out and they shut the film off because they couldn't figure out the problem. I wonder how many other theaters around the country this is going to happen at. Funny how they seemed to have a handle on this technology back in the 1950's, but now it's much more difficult to get working! What I saw of Beowulf was ugly, raunchy, and extremely boring. Facial expressions were lifeless and the CG animation made the movie a joke...had it been real actors, I may have taken it more seriously. I will admit I saw a small portion of the film, but there's no way I'm paying to see it in the theater.

RIP Jeff Jones

Sad news today. One of the best (and most down to Earth) professors at RIT has died of lung cancer. I had Jeff Jones for Scriptwriting for Animation and had a great time in his class. There was a whole lot more to him than I realized. He will be sorely missed at RIT, I'm sure.

A Very OOO Halloween

Three Rings had a late Halloween party. (You may have seen the invitation I drew a few posts ago. Check out my Mario costume!

Illustration Friday: Scale

I really have no idea what's going on here...but one is big and one is small.

Illustration Friday: Hat

It's a Spanish "No" hat! (The little balls jingle when you shake your head.) Does anyone know what it's really called?

Illustration Friday: Trick or Treat Pt. 2

Did this illustration for a party invitation for work. (Turned off the text, tho.)

Illustration Friday: Trick or Treat

Sexy wizard! Wooo!! Finally had time to do something for fun. :D

John K Lesson - Constructing Bugs

John K just posted an awesome lesson on constructing Bugs Bunny. Here's the original image:



And my attempt:


The test:

Wow! I thought I was doing so much better! And the one you see above is after I enlarged/moved the dogs head so I could compare it better. Things I did wrong:

1. Proportions - Bugs' neck and body are too long. Dog's head was drawn way too small.

2. Angles/Direction - Bugs's ears and neck are pointing the wrong way. Dog's cheeks are funny.

There's probably a lot more wrong with it...what a great exercise! I gotta do this every day.

Adventures of Mark Twain Clip

As I was surfing through Digg today, I came across this clip from The Adventures of Mark Twain...a Will Vinton claymation film from the 80's. One of my professors from RIT, Tom Gasek, worked on this film back in the day. This particular clip always freaked me out and is definitely worth a watch.



Definitely not for little kids! You would never see something this interesting and frightening in an animated film today. Thanks for doing something different, Will Vinton! The surprising part is that this clip has over 655,000 hits, 5,000 comments, and has been favorited almost 10,000 times. Who knew this film was so popular?

More Cats

Here are the other two paintings I did for the Berkeley Humane Society auction.

Wanna buy one?? The important info:

2nd Annual
Purr-casso Art Sale and Gala

When: Sunday, November 4, 2007
12:00pm - 4:00pm

Where: Hollis Street Project - Grand Hallway 5900 Hollis Street, Emeryville

All proceeds from this event will benefit the Berkeley-East Bay Humane Society. For more information call (510) 845-7735, ext.13.

Illustration Friday: Momentum

Dancing cats! This is a piece for an upcoming benefit auction in Berkeley this November. (For an animal shelter.) I am working on two more (smaller) pieces that will also be for sale. More info on the auction to come soon. Acrylic on paper, 11x11".

Illustration Friday: Captain

Seeing as how I work at Three Rings, with people like this, 'Captain' was a very fitting theme. (I know the perspective is wonky, but I'm too tired to fix it!) I'm busy busy busy, sorry lack of posts.