Effects: Raging Fire

Another one from my effects class – this time, a raging fire. I studied a lot of forest fire videos for this, trying to get an idea of the energy forces that move the overall pattern. However, I got a little distracted by including a brief glimpse of a fire monster in the flames – can you see it? My notes from the planning…

Thesis Update: Animatic Revision

Another reworking of the animatic! This one’s close, I can feel it. Just a few more changes on the slate that haven’t yet been incorporated: – A title/opening scene aerial view of the town, with the camera slowly moving in – Camera move on bandstand scene, continuing the slow zoom from aerial view – Zoom on Gargantua (the biggest monster) as he walks out…

Thesis update: Test scene in Flash

Last Spring I took a digital animation class and got to try out Flash for the first time. I have a few other assignments that I’ll be posting, but here’s a test scene for my thesis that I created as a final project for that course. I really like how Woofie, the dog, turned out. For Hazel, the main character, I think that the…

Thesis update: Storyboards & Animatic

So as you may remember, I’ve been working on a 2D Animation Master of Fine Arts degree through the Academy of Art University’s online program. As a final thesis project, we’re required to complete a short film. “The Search for the Monster of Lake Quannapowitt” will be a 2D, digitally hand-drawn animated short of less than 3 minutes about the candidate search to fill…

“The Smith Family Secret” – fully funded on Kickstarter!

I’m excited to say that the initial launch of my friend Alison’s book, “The Smith Family Secret“, has been fully funded on Kickstarter!  To celebrate, I’ve posted all of the illustrations on my website – you can find them here! The campaign will continue through Wednesday, August 7th, so if you want to get in as one of the early supporters (and get a first-run copy…

caricatures for character design

Caricatures are crazy – how is it that you can exaggerate/minimize features and somehow get a likeness that can – when professionally executed – be more recognizable than a photo?  This guy – Wouter Tulp – is one amazing caricature artist (among his many talents). Hanoch Piven manages to create very abstract caricatures with amazing likenesses, using objects and minimal color. Here are a few…

fabric fold design

Take a look at your elbows – if you’re wearing a long-sleeve shirt, you’ll have a bunch of fabric folds there. Anytime you move, bend or stretch your arm, those folds change. The folds in fabric help describe the action of the figure, but sometimes they’re super complicated and it’s not necessary to include every single fold.  How can we simplify fabric so that…

shape character design

Here’s a fun recent assignment – create a character by starting with a shape outline that utilizes basic design principles (curves vs straights, small/med/large, intuitive lines.) Here’s my little final guy, with the earlier steps below.

smith family secret production boards

Here are the production boards for my final storyboarding assignment.  It’s the first scene from my friend Alison’s excellent series “The Smith Family Secret“,  where Cardiff Smith discovers that he can make his drawings come to life. 

smith family secret presentation boards in color

Here are the colored versions of the Smith Family Secret Presentation Boards from the last post. I also added backgrounds to the interior shots. I’m pretty happy with the first two, but I’d like to rework the color on the last two shots – I was in a bit of a rush and would have liked the colors to complement a bit more in…