Word UP!

Awhile ago in an earlier post, I mentioned I was working on a specific episode of Wordgirl which I was REALLY excited about because of the voice actor involved. If you didn't guess by the subtle hints I gave, it was the voice star of the Pixar studios film "UP", Ed Asner. The episode has aired and its old news, so its okay for me to post this. UNFORTUNATELY, Adobe has still not gotten off their fat, money-grubbing asses and fixed the quicktime problems with Flash CS4 and I'm gonna go ahead and predict that they won't until the next $200 upgrade (maybe), so until then, you'll have to enjoy the stills from my scene. These two shots are taken directly from the two scenes I worked on in this particular episode where The Butcher is robbing a bank, but then halted by Wordgirl and her monkey sidekick, Huggyface! They have a back and forth about a mispronunciation (like they do) and through the front door enters Kid Potato, voiced by the great Ed Asner! Its then established that Kid Potato, a retired villain who shoots potato dishes and products from his hands, is actually The Butcher's father and wishes to team up with him for a father-son crime spree.

I thoroughly enjoyed working on both of these scenes, and the storyboarder should get a lot of the props for his timing and shot planning. So for those who watch Wordgirl (good on ya) watch for this episode and this scene. For those who don't, go watch the show! It's very funny!

Lunch Lab LIVE!

Lunch Lab is live and the shorts I worked so hard on are getting posted. The first episode of 10 is up in the video section called "Food Camp". I did the layout and storyboards for the first 10 episodes (the other 9 are still to be posted). I would've posted the original storyboard Quicktime up on the blog, but I haven't wanted to spend $1000 for After Effects quite yet. This is a quick shot of the intro. Obviously the title card is just a placeholder until the designers had completed it for the actual animation. The premise of the show is basically a cartoon cooking show for kids. It promotes healthy eating habits for young kids. Some of the recipes are really interesting and simple. I'll be stealing a few of these recipes for myself :) Don't be surprised if you are having dinner at my place and you are eating mashed cauliflower.

Thanks to the creators and co-founders of Cloud Kid Studios, Evan Sussman and Dave Schlafman for giving me this opportunity to flex my boarding muscles...I loved every minute of it. And thanks to Alex Berry for putting up with my boarding and doing a great job animating these! Each webisode was written by Evan Sussman, Backgrounds and props by Jen Blicharz, Animation by Alex Berry and Sound Editing by Brian Smith. The voice of Corporal Cup is Megan Goltermann who did a great job bringing this character to life.

THE GODS ARE ANGRY!!!

We bought this cat tower which sits at about 7ft tall and has a little cubby hole. It was mainly for the cat to escape to when we finally got a puppy. Well the puppy adoption has been put on hiatus for now. But our cat, Tuck, still got a nice tall climbing toy to mess around on. Every now and then we'll find him on the top looking down on us as if he is our ruler and God. The Cat Tower is really the Mt. Olympus for kitties with delusions of grandeur.

Side Note: Thanks to Rob and Margaret for pointing me in the right direction for some GREAT deals on a nice tall cat tree. Tuck LOVES it.

Fishy Dreamin'

My cat gets really anxious and irritated if he's not in the same room as us. Its like he doesn't want to be alone. So late at night when I'm working, he sleeps in the office chair next to me and every now and then he'll start chattering (you cat owners probably know what I'm talking about, the clicking noise when cats get excited and want to chase something) and lets out random tiny "Maow"s. Then much like a dreaming dog, he'll start twitching and moving his legs as if he's chasing something in his dreams. I bet Tuck dreams of swimming after fish. But he wouldn't know what fish actually look like since his only interaction with that smell is the pink mush in his food bowl 4x a day which he goes BONKERS for.

Side-note: Misha took him to the vet for his annual check up, he is healthy, except he is slightly over-weight. I think its the excess fur that is weighing him down. But for a big ol' 3 year old Maine Coon...he's at a rather small 15 lbs. Adult Maine Coons can grow up to 18lbs, so technically, he's just under-weight...well...according to my research on Maine Coons. But its hard to tell a Veterinarian that they are wrong when all you have in your corner of information is Wikipedia and various cat related websites.

Rainbows smell funny

I once heard that Unicorns eat cupcakes and poop rainbows. I'd like to think that's how they fly...propelled by their own colorful feces that populate the skies. Should they go see a doctor if they have such kaleidoscopic excrement? It can't be healthy...maybe its from the cupcakes? Maybe they should stop eating those things. Or at least go to a different store for cupcakes.

Imposter

Just a little addition to the last post. I imagined that same blob creature controlling a Haz-Mat suit to creep up on unsuspecting victims. Also inspired by the 1980's movie "The Blob" when a haz-mat suited individual was filled up with blob-goo and pulled into the sewer.

Blobby

Just some fun with shapes. This character is inspired by an illustration I did as an instructional map for a World of Warcraft boss encounter (Yogg-Saron). The character is also inspired by both Yogg-Saron and The Blob from the horror/scifi movies of the same name.

"Blobby"

Teen angst is sparkly

I saw the first half of the first Twilight movie and I was already groaning at every melodramatic teen angsty scene when finally I had enough the very minute they explained that the vampires don't explode in a ball of dust at the sun light...but instead...they sparkle more than Liberace out on the town on a Saturday night. How is that supposed to be intimidating? I guess it was supposed to be portrayed as 'beautiful'...but if I came up to a REAL girl and started to sparkle, she'd laugh and then immediately question my sexuality.
Now...this character is supposed to be this lonely brooding 'emo' vampire who falls in love with this Washington state native girl who is also 'emo' and angsty and full of melodrama. Where are we supposed to care about these characters? Every step of the way, I wanted to slap everyone around. Maybe its because I went through High School and I know that there is life after it, but it just seems to me, that EVERY teen angst show/movie out there is centered around the idea that High School is it. Nothing happens after that. Your life is over. Let's be miserable and over react to impossible situations that would never happen to an actual teen...or at least MULTIPLE unlikely situations happening to the same teen. Its ridiculous. Did all the writers for these shows just not go to college? Were their prime years centered mainly in High School? Really? Well...I found out after 4 years of college that your life is finally beginning after High School...that's when its fun...so all the stupid, impossible or unlikely situations like "My brooding boyfriend, who can't seem to smile or have fun because he's so emo and thinks life is pain and sadness, is really a vampire." all seem rather pointless in the long run.

Maybe he's sad because he DOES sparkle...hell..I'd be pissed to if my skin sparkled. Should probably see a doctor about it.

Super Liam

Its my blog and I can do what I want with it. Even if its making myself a generic superhero. HEY! When you have your own blog...you can do whatever YOU want!

"Hmmm...I should do something for the blog soon." I thought to myself. "I wanna fly and have an arch-nemesis!" I pondered.

So here is the latest of the series of nonsense that drools randomly from the thrown together mess of noodles and stroganoff I call 'my brain'. First, I just sketched out myself with flying powers...oooo...ahhhh. Then, I needed a nemesis. So I used Tuck my cat, as "Dr. Kitteh Mew Mew". When I drew this, I imagine he is more angry that he has a helmet than anything else. And finally, me rescuing my wife and ace reporter, Misha, from the sharpened claws of Dr. Kitteh Mew Mew!

WILLARD Strikes Back

Back via popular demand...WILLARD THE OBESE DUCK!

Weirdly enough...some people have been asking me how big Willard has gotten. Originally, the character got dropped almost immediately because Misha is against animal cruelty and felt that her weight loss was cruel to the lil' duck who absorbs the lost weight. Growing bigger as my wife gets slimmer. So here he is...much much bigger and not colored (not that fat/obese people are Black and White, but just because I'm lazy about coloring him.) Enjoy, you duck haters! I think his duck-man-boobies are funny.

INVASION!!!!

Yay!! I had a week off from work! And this is what I did with my time. If I choose to work in Flash while vacationing from my job in Flash...that's my business. Don't judge me!

"Cat Invasion" 10/27/09

Zombie Carrots

I have zombies on the brain, probably because its nearing Halloween and/or I want to go see "Zombieland"...thought this would be a funny scenario. For the next one, I want to create a scene where they have to decide whether or not to kill the potato, cause he's turning. Hehe.

ARE YOU NOT ENTERTAINED!?

It started as a quick cartoon self-portrait and lead to me as a Gladiator vs a pretty calm bear.

And before you ask...I am wearing underwear in this image. You never know what a bear might swipe at. Even a timid bear.

Zombie Astronaut

Why not?

The Omega Liam

Sooo...I've been cooped up in my condo for the past 2-3 weeks working double time and I'm finally seeing the light at the end of tunnel. Which is why I haven't posted in some time.

But now I'm just about done with this second job and I feel like a guy coming out to the blinding light of the world again after being locked away in a cave for weeks only to find the population of the Earth infected by radiation poisoning and craving human flesh.

I'll be starting the Certificate Program this Monday. Hopefully the work load from that will be insignificant to the freelance job.

Bloo's Reviews: Death Note

I've decided I'm going to review DVDs every week for fun. And since this blog is mostly about Animation, I might try to review an Animation on DVD each week. Originally I was going to start off by reviewing all types of movies, and I was going to start humorously with "Bloodrayne" by Uwe Bol. But I couldn't finish the movie it was so terrible. So I would keep to animation, since I know the most about that, anyways.

This week's Review is:

DEATH NOTE

Based on a Japanese Manga from Shonen Jump, Death Note centers around a 17 year old called Light Yagime. A bright young man, who has perfect attendance, school marks, and athleticism. The perfect teen who is on track to go to college at the top of his class and become a great detective. Until he stumbles across a notebook which seemed to have fallen from the heavens. This Notebook, known as "The Death Note", has special powers, and soon Light discovers how special these powers really are. If he writes the name of a person and time/mode of death, that person will die in the exact way it was described. If he writes only the name, that person will die within a minute by a heart attack. But by owning this Deathnote, he is followed by a God of Death or "Shimigami" until either the Notebook is filled or the bearer dies. Light begins using the notebook by killing only criminals and vowing to bring about a new World without criminals under the guise of "Kira", a faceless 'god' of justice. Light, soon, finds a nemesis in a young, strange prodigy named, simply, "L". The series explodes in a twirling match of wits between the two trying to find out each others identities. The first to lose this struggle will die.

From the very beginning to the very last episode, "Death Note" is rarely tired and boring. Just watching these two minds sitting in the same room and psycho-anaylizing each other is exciting. This psychological thriller, loves to toy with emotions as we dive deeper and deeper into Light's psyche as he falls steadily into madness with the power of the Death Note. The visuals and animation make up for the long steady stream of dialogue, but even the dialogue is, for the most part, very intriguing and keeps the audience on the edge of their seats. All of the characters are explored into amazing depth and each given some amazing detail which only gives the audience a reason to care about each one and worry about them. the only thing I would fault the series on would be the over explanations and very long dialogue scenes. It seemed to rely purely on the animation and direction to keep things interesting, especially since things were repeated on several occasions to remind the audience, which (for me at least), broke me from suspension of disbelief or just reminded me that I was watching an animation when I was previously right there in the room with each character.

Writing aside, the animation quality is outstanding. With Character Design by Masaru Kitao, Series Director Tetsuro Araki, and animation production by Madhouse. There is very little to fault. The style, direction and use of colors versus black and white flavors the already in-depth characters. Sometimes, things get a little wonky in the animation with missing frames or actions that could have been a little more expanded upon, but these are minor nit-picks since the overall quality on a half hour series, even out of Japan, is one of the better series I have seen.

Since this is my first ever rated DVD, I haven't quite come up with a suitable rating system, but until I do, I'll just go with the 10 point system for now.

This creepy psycho-thriller was well written and dripping with emotion and character along with some amazing visuals, design and excellent animation. It does get a little tedious at times with the repeated explanations, but is only a small grievance to an amazing series.

For "Death Note": 8.5 out of 10

I highly recommend watching, you'll be hooked by the first 10 minutes.

"Death Note" previously aired on Cartoon Network's "Adult Swim" and is for sale on DVD released in English Dub format in the US by Viz Media Production. Rated "Older Teen"

T'was a dark day in Azeroth

Yeah...I play World of Warcraft. I play a Draenei Shaman. Its part of my "me time" when I'm taking a break from work. For the 12 of you in the world who don't know...World of Warcraft (WoW) is a Massively Multiplayer Online Role Playing Game or MMORPG for short. Meaning, you can interact with thousands of people from all corners of the Earth from within this game. I have a large group of real life friends who I play this game with...so really, its the geek equivalent of going out to a bar and having a drink. Recently, I've been rethinking my involvement in this game. Mostly due to the ass-hats that populate the world. Don't get me wrong, the majority of this games population as a whole are nice genuinely good people. But there is a percentage of players (mostly in the 8-15 age range) that think its cool or adult to spout random obscenities like a Sailor suffering from severe turrets. Some are considered, by law standards, adults (and I use that term loosely to describe these individuals). I recently had a run in with one (usually, I'm good about weeding those people out through a rigorous screening process). It was a dungeon run with 4 other players...3 of which I run with on a regular basis, so i knew them. The other was a stranger, but the others knew him. About half way through our run, he starts to berate one of our group members (as a joke, I think) and then openly call all of us a derogatory term used to describe homosexuals (no, I won't repeat it...especially on my blog). I then stepped up and and told him that that was enough, I'm leaving because I'm not going to take this sort of verbal abuse, joking or not, from a childish individual when I'm supposed to be having fun...and then I promptly left. I come to find out that he was someone from another guild who I have run with before...and who has made comments and statements within runs and he is a part of the same community of people that I thought was a safe place to be from these sort of individuals within the game. I didn't recognize him because he was on an alt character. So now I'm just upset that such people exist, that someone thinks they are being clever or "adult" by randomly spouting obscenities at another person, but they are ok because the repercussions of such acts almost don't exist due to the anonymity shield of the Internet. So, no one can enjoy anything because there is some childish individual out there who will inevitably ruin it for everyone. I just can't even begin to fathom why such people even exist...to ruin things for everyone else...why people lie, or cheat, or are just there to make everyone else miserable for no real reason.

Wow...that was long and rather depressing. I promise I'll draw my cat doing something cute/stupid next time.

What is it? What does it want?

Recently, my wife, Misha and I have agreed to start actively looking to adopt a dog from a shelter or foster home. We're a little worried about the interactions that may come with our 3 year old Maine-Coon cat, Tuck...especially since he doesn't know much about the outside world beyond the walls of our condo except the Cat only Vet hospital we take him to for check ups and boarding. He's only had brief run-ins with dogs but from behind the security of his own cage. So his reaction is going to be interesting to a new animal in the house. This is how I think Tuck will react at first. The good news, he'll finally find out what exactly is making that barking noise across the street every morning at around 9am on a consistent basis. Tuck: "Ah...so THAT'S a dog? Tell it to leave me alone."

"New Friend" 9/09 Flash CS4 B/W

Disnarvel?

Ok...so I lied...I do have some draw in me despite being overloaded with work. Only because this issue makes me sad. Anyone who knows me well enough (and it doesn't take long to know this about me) knows that I despise Disney with a passion. So you can imagine after hearing the news that my favorite Comic company, Marvel Comics, was recently purchased by Disney for $4 Billion, how I felt. So now they own just about everything in the entertainment industry that I love. Studio Ghibli, Pixar Studios, and now Marvel. None of which they had much to do with in creating...but rather they use their girth upon this world to obtain any sort of competition. I'd better stop there before I start ranting...again.

NOTE: I should clarify, that Disney doesn't actually "own" Studio Ghibli, but they purchased the rights to distribute their films in the US....so technically they had NOTHING to do with the making of the films, but they get the right to plaster their castle logo all over Ghibli's fantastic animated masterpieces.

Twice the work, half the sleep

Wow...work has been crazy hardcore lately. So it has been a while since I was able to post anything. Not much to post since work has just consumed me except for the occasional family outing or video game break (I call it, "me time"). On my way to my dad's 60th birthday party, I was working on the ferry. I took a break and took drawing requests from my wife. One was "How do you feel?" This is a cleaned up version of that drawn response. Only because I can't get my head out of work to think of anything better. 3 more weeks and I'll be back to my normal work schedule...then it'll be time for some UW 3D design classes.

"Plaid to the Bone"? Really?

I dusted off my old Time Warp Trio work from Soup2nuts in 2005 when dinosaurs roamed the Earth. And here is a sample of some of my storyboards. UNFORTUNATELY, Flash CS4 is so buggy and weird, converting the timeline into Quicktimes is impossible without creating these weird ghosting/artifacts throughout the animation. You'll notice it in the first 3rd of the animation...this was the best of all the quicktimes I made till 4am this morning. But the only remedy to this is, I found out, is to create .swf files from Flash CS4 and then buy a $1k program called "After Effects" (thank you, computer program industry for making creative programs impossible to afford for artists/directors who are struggling to make a name for themselves, ya greedy jerks!). So, I'm calling out a conspiracy here, ADOBE Flash CS4 can only export .SWF files cleanly which are NOT condusive for internet and the general industry, so you are forced to purchase ADOBE After Effects to create the Quicktimes...hmmmm. I think this is bigger than Enron.

Ok, enough about my conspiracy theories...back to the Storyboard. A couple of things to mention here. It's more of an animatic, really...that's only because I was a crazy person and tried to do as much of the animation as I could get away with in the short amount of time I had to create these, so I could convey cleanly enough the timing and what EXACTLY I wanted to happen. You'll also notice in the beginning the red timing indicators I posted in the boards for the simple arm movements...I abandoned that pretty quickly since it was creating more work than necessary. I should also mention what this is about, give you the backstory. This show is called "Time Warp Trio" which only had 1 season on Discovery Kids. The show is based on the children's books "Time Warp Trio" which centers around 3 kids who obtain a magical time traveling book from one of the kids' uncle. The show itself expanded on the idea and created 3 more kids, the boy's great granddaughters from 100 years in the future who are named similarly but have opposing personalities. In this scene (actually this is a composite of 3 scenes) we have the leader of the kids, Joe, his sister, Anna, his Great Granddaughter Jodie, and his magician-Uncle Joe (the previous owner of the book) having a victory feast in 1338 Scotland with Lady Agnes Dunbar ("Black Agnus") as they plan on how they need to survive a continuing onslaught by the English. And Jodie unwillingly volunteers to sneak through the enemy camp to go find help. I enjoyed the back and forth quick camera pans between the bickering family members in this scene and the overall dread that Jodie is overcome with as she just steadily grows worse and worse with fear about her daunting task at hand.

Aftertaste

This is from a small stint of one-panel cartoons I drew for a small wine and spirits magazine called WINO Magazine. I started to name the cartoon "Aftertaste" but by that time I couldn't continue drawing for the magazine due to a contract that was a little too loose.

Supernormal

Something a little different. This is a set of scenes from the British show I worked on before Wordgirl, "Supernormal" which was about a boy with no superpowers going to a superhero high school. Think the plot to Disney's "Sky High" but made into a cartoon show. The show is set around 4 friends, Eric (the normal kid who wears his underwear on the outside of his pants), Changerella (A bubbly girl who could change into anything, from a rodent to a submarine), Brass-Butt (in this scene - he is the idiot of the group who has an impenetrable butt - probably best used for prison) and Buzzgirl ( a half girl, half bug...she has 4 arms and bug wings with a long tongue). The show was shown only in the UK and was animated by a company in Canada called "Fatkat Studios" of whom I worked for via Seattle, WA, USA.

In this scene...I have no idea what's going on. I never saw the full episode. In fact, I never saw a full episode of any of the shows. Only from what I worked on. What I can tell you is that the guy with the screaming British accent and the junky robot with the goldfish in the brain jar are the evil janitors of the school. The guy is supposedly an evil genius who poses as a janitor at the school and are constantly causing problems for the 4 kids. In this scene he flashes back to when the Mayor leaves and we see what the city is like without him.

The interesting thing about the way that this studio had me work, was that each scene was determined by most of the camera changes. There are more episodes I have kept, but only a few I could really show as a great piece of work. Timing issues and just the way I animated things with tweens made the scenes not up to my usual standards.

"Supernormal Ep. 151 scenes 17-26"

World of Warcraft - Ulduar Strat Guide

More delays from work keeping me from drawing :(

But good news...I'm working on a side project for my other hobby (the only thing I do when I'm not animating or drawing on a regular basis). World of Warcraft. The guild I'm in are in the latest dungeon called "Ulduar". Within this dungeon are several boss encounters for 25 people at a time. We run this twice a week. I try to make time for it if work isn't pressing or a real life event isn't in the way.

So this is a concept illustration for the boss encounter "XT-002 Deconstructor". Its a work in progress, but that is my character "Blooregard" (level 80 Draenei Elemental Shaman). Technically I'd be putting nine more players in with me...but it was just to get the idea down. Ultimately, the full animation will be seperated into different sections to portray each boss encounter to help the raid better understand the fight...what to watch out for and how to avoid damage.

Ironically, I may not be able to raid in Ulduar due to working on this...hehe.

"Ulduar Strat Guide - Concept Art" Flash CS4 7/28/09

Who ya gonna call?

Some kids love Superman or Spider-man. Some kids want to be a firefighter or an astronaut. I loved and wanted to be a Ghostbuster. The Ghostbusters is one of my favorite movies since I was a little kid (like most children of the 80's) and The Real Ghostbusters was my all-time favorite cartoon growing up. Just recently, with the release of the entire cartoon series on dvd and the new video game, The Ghostbusters have rekindled my Ghostbustin' blood and is reheating my creamy geek center.

To give you a better understanding of my immersion into Ghostbusters (my Mom can confirm all of this). I watched the cartoon religiously, I watched the movie several times (even the not as good "Ghostbusters II"), I owned A LOT of the toys including the Firehouse playset, I collected the comic books, sticker books, my grandfather even made a Proton pack out of cardboard for halloween (the trap was made from a shoebox), I understood, even at a young age, the Ghostbuster lingo such as "a Class 5 full-torso Vapor", I tried to get my hair cut like Peter Venkmen in the cartoon but was told that hair just doesn't do that (it was a sad day for my childhood...lol) and most recently, I was researching to become an amateur Ghost Hunter here in Washington State. Unfortunately, that dream died rather quickly because my work schedule is just too busy to be out in some 'haunted' location till 4am.

So here are some sketches that I threw together today after watching the first disc of The Real Ghostbusters. The first is just a BW drawing of the 5 main characters, Egon Spengler, Ray Stantz, Peter Venkmen, Winston Zeddemore, and Slimer. (Winston was voiced by Arsenio Hall in the cartoon...interesting fact.) and the second sketch is just a quick drawing I threw together from a still of Harold Ramis playing Egon Spengler in the live action blockbuster comedy, "The Ghostbusters". Usually, when you remember stuff from your childhood, the memory is better than it actual is...but after re-watching a few episodes of the cartoon, it still looks great.

"The Real Ghostbusters - sketch" Flash CS4 7/17/09
"Egon Spengler/Harold Ramis - sketch" Flash CS4 7/17/09

BUNNY!!

My studio upgraded to Flash CS4...which means I had to as well. The new program is radically different in layout and design. Plus its added a new type of tween.

This is me just fooling around with the new program to get use to it. I just finished a deadline, so I'm in a sort of limbo between quotas. Its a quick animation...took about an hour or so.

Random street person!

Work has taken over my life once again...but its really exciting what I'm working on...or rather who's voice is in the scene I'm working on. But I can't say who until the episode airs...so you'll have to wait to see who it is until I put UP that scene on the blog.

But I haven't drawn anything but Wordgirl related stuff in a while, so here is some sketching I did based on a girl waiting at a bus stop I passed. It was the mohawk that caught my eye. And her basic demeanor (her actual pose is the full sitting sketch) was what spurred these other drawings of her just being a badass. The far right head shot is just a basic cartoon version of her.

Piano cat plays you off

Based on the Youtube sensation, "Charles Schmidt's 'Cool Cat'", this piece is inspired somewhat by that, and the spawns of multiple youtube videos of that particular video mashed together with others as if the cat is playing them off because they are just just terrible. The REAL reason I created this was based on a unofficial contest by Attack of the Show's G4 host, Kevin Pereira, where he made the challenge for artistic types to submit a piece based on this particular video. I haven't decided to actually submit it or not.

I tried to give this more of a Roy Lichtenstein feel to it. Playing with dots to color and trying to give it a hard black shadow and inking style to make it more of a comic frame.

"Piano Cat Plays You Off" Flash, Contest Submission 6/25/09

This is a scene from the 1st season of "Wordgirl" on PBS Kids I had worked on. There is more I did on this episode, but this is my favorite. I especially like Scoops' movements in this, I'll give up props to the storyboarder for some awesome timing on this.

NOTE: This is pre-lipsynching and special effects

Shamus MacBeard

I saw this dude at the video store today...I don't think I did it justice, but his beard was absolutely awesome. His entire face was shaved except his jawline which had a really long red leprchaun-esque beard. The tiny dog in his arms was just gravy on top of awesome wrapped in bacon.

"MacBeard and Snickerdoodle" Flash sketch 6/22/09

ACCEPTED!!!

GREAT NEWS! I was accepted into the University of Washington's Certificate Program for 3D Animation for Games and Media. When I told my mom I got accepted, she wanted to know which pieces I sent in as my portfolio...and these are them, minus some other pieces which are having some issues uploading :(

I know I haven't posted much in a while, I only just finished a deadline this week of which I was up for 30+ hours straight working to finish but now its over and I got 12 hours of sleep. So I should be good to post more again. I actually got accepted a few days ago, but didn't have the time to mention it with an illustration on the blog.

Some of these pieces you probably recognize since I already posted the majority of them on this blog already. But they are what I submitted to UW for the application process.

Its been a while since I last posted...sorry...been busy with work and general life things...including the 3rd annual Man Weekend. Which just includes a bunch of dudes doing guy things like drinking and playing cards and eatin' pigs and drawing on passed out guys' faces.

Anyways, the Man Weekend was another reason why I didn't make another Sunday Drawing Session in downtown Seattle. So here are some older ones for your face eyes.

"Standing Woman in Blue #3" White Charcoal pencil on Blue paper 2006. ""Sitting Woman #6" Black and White Charcoal pencil on Grey paper 2006.

I found out that its acceptable to show some of my scenes from the show I work on as long as its aired previous to posting. This is a clip from "Wordgirl" (PBS Kids) about a superhero girl who has super strength, the ability to fly, a monkey sidekick (Captain Huggyface) and a large vocabulary. This clip is a scene I worked on with one of my favorite characters, Beatrice Bixby aka Lady Redundant Woman. She met an unfortunate accident with a copy machine and now has the ability to make copies of herself. I love this scene in particular because of the rather flamboyant Wordgirl fan. The writing of this show is absolutely stellar (Emmy Award winning, in fact) and I advise everyone to see it...even if you think its just for kids...because there are some awesome adult references in this show. I noticed a "Silence of the Lambs" reference in an episode from early in the second season.

NOTE: This is in its raw form before lipsynching and special effects. Both of which is not my job to do. I just make the drawrings move :P

Mice play WoW?!

This is a piece based on a real person. I'm one of the millions who play World of Warcraft and within my raiding group, we have this girl who has the smallest voice I've ever heard. Its so small and squeaky and funny. So it inspired me to create an illustration based on what that person may look like based on her voice.

"Meascii" Flash 6/8/09

Willard is Obese

My wife, Misha, and I got into one of those weird conversations that couples get into now and then about just odd things that make us laugh. This is the result of one. We were talking about her weightloss and how wonderful its going and that I should create a character that represents the lost weight (just for fun). And the result was a duck representing the weight my wife has lost. Each pound lost the duck would grow bigger. At this point, Misha didn't want any part of this project because she felt sorry for the duck...but I was having too much fun drawing a fat duck...so here it is. We named him "Willard the Fat Duck"

"Willard" 6/6/09 Flash

Three Delivery

This is an animation I did for Fatkat Studios back in 2007 as part of a required animation evaulation, to test how good I was and to put me into an appropriate roll on the show "Three Delivery" which was a very action orientated Flash based show. I saw some of the other evaluations and some were much better than this, but I still got in as a rough animator. For those not in the "biz", it means I'm the first line of defense of interpretting the storyboards before the clean-up crew. Basically I animated scenes in a rough fashion, and then another crew of animators came in and cleaned up the action and then colored it. For a visual example...if any of you have been to Disneyland and gone on the studio tour where you see the monkeys in the glass cages animating for your amusement...i'd be the guy flipping the pages back and forth, then drawing a line in non-photo blue pencil and repeating that process over and over.

"FLLLAAAAAAAANNNNN!!!!!!"

Hmm...Sometimes I'm up late and I just sort of go a little nutty with drawing stuff. So I found a reference picture of William Shatner and just sort of did this for no particular reason. :) Guess the movie and the line and you get extra points! Hint: The movie title ryhmes with "Bar Neck: The Bath of Flan" and the line ryhmes with "FLAAAAAANNNNNNN!!!!!"

"KHAN!" Flash 6/6/09