three heads in perspective

In “Drawing from the Imagination”, we’ve been working on drawing the human form from imagination, using indirect photo reference.  Here’s a recent assignment with the photo ref included. It required that we draw Ron from a 2-pt perspective (from a side angle, level with his head), Sophie from a 2-pt vertical perspective (basically, looking down or looking up at her) & Francis in 3-pt…

street perspective update

Remember that one-point perspective street that took me a million hours earlier in the semester? Well, I spent a little more time on it recently… my instructor is great at giving detailed constructive criticism, so I was happy to make the adjustments. I added in those electric wires (and their shadows) that I’d forgotten before. I fixed the shadows on the front left window frames…

samson & matilda – heavy lifting animation

Meet Samson and his dog, Matilda! I designed them for a three-week assignment for a “heavy lifting” exercise. The focus was first on the thinking that takes place before lifting something heavy; then on portraying weight, then losing a grip on the heavy object. I could have just used a static object instead of a dog, but I really like the idea of a…

3-point perspective (and 2-point vertical)

Here’s another Drawing from the Imagination assignment – three-point perspective (+ two-point vertical). You can tell when something’s in three-point perspective when there are barely any truly vertical lines – all of them slant off to some point in the distance (in this case, out side of the picture to the bottom, right & left). The two-point vertical comes into play if you want…

sneaky goose walk

This assignment took WAY longer than I originally thought it would! We were given 4 key frames (major drawings showing the most important positions) plus a chart for spacing all the drawings, all from Richard William’s “Animator’s Survival Kit” book.  Usually desiging/picking a character & determining those main poses takes me a huge amount of time, so I thought “Awesome! This will be so…

two-point perspective interior

In Drawing for the Imagination, we had another assignment that spanned two weeks: a two-point perspective interior. I was going for a space like the Colby Room at the Museum of Science.  Here’s the final piece, with shadows plotted from the main light source & tone added to the surfaces:  The first week’s component was just laying out the basic shapes (see below, with…

mabel moves

This video is a combo of two assignments for my Traditional Animation 2 class – getting up out of a chair and “easing in” to a walk. In order to smoothly start or stop any action in animation, you have to carefully space the drawings so that the motion doesn’t start awkwardly or end too abruptly. Keep in mind this is just a simple…

getting some perspective

So far, my Drawing from the Imagination class is really shaping up to be an incredible challenge (and we’ve only just started the third week of the semester!).  It’s like perspective boot camp, which is perfect, because that’s what I really need.  I think anyone would squirm when faced with the crazy grids,  plotting and intersections that create a formal perspective drawing… but getting…

meet mabel!

So, it’s happened once again – I missed my weekly posting! Not for a lack of material, though  – my new classes are very challenging and I am already learning so much. In first week of classes, our Traditional Animation 2 assignment was to create a a five-point turnaround model sheet. Last fall I played around with some basic character design but hadn’t done…

beryl & rawrg – animation final project!

Here’s the final project for my first official animation class! I’m pleased with how it turned out – lots of in-between drawings and great feedback from my instructor throughout the process, and I even managed to get it done before the deadline despite a bout of pneumonia at the end of the semester. This was pretty fun to do; I’m looking forward to next…