Pacifica J. Sauer

Still in the fast lane...

2012-01-18T19:59:00.000-08:00

I really enjoy having the chance to challenge myself, getting the opportunity to really get into a project. I think being trusted with difficulties is the best part. And that's why I keep working so hard.

Busy

2011-12-12T17:16:00.000-08:00

I've been producing a news show KTBU channel 55.4 in Houston. It's a local interest show, focusing on the bilingual populations in Houston. It's a 30 minute news program chopped in 1 - 2 minute segments. The shows are designed for a mobile device, such as a smart phone or Ipad; however, we (I) also composite them for tv to show throughout the day. The graphics and set design are mine, and constantly morphing into what I hope the show will one day be branded. These are some screen shot of my peeps- the on-air talent- Cynthia Leal, Rebecca Sotelo, Roger Palomino, Maritza Willis and Vanessa Palacios (not pictured are Teri Medina Galvan and Roy Vasquez).

Oh my Barnes

2011-10-20T02:48:00.000-07:00

I took this sketch from Jason Barnes and made it my own, stylized and converted it to fit the theme of my short. I am rather concerned about the challenge of Maya hair for this guy's curly locks. I've got experience with ndynamics, but have very little power over hair and fur. The short hairs for the legs and face were sculpted in zbrush. Turns out however, with the use of this brush and particular alpha, I will be able to put fur on my rats without using Maya fur... this is a breakthrough for me.

Still working on a lot of the pieces, but it's coming together.

The Funky Fur

2011-08-25T03:05:00.001-07:00

Some assets I've been working on for my short, The Squeakeasy (working title). It's a mixed media cartoon about an incident that goes down in a bar called Dirty's Funky Fur. This is Maya and After Effects, very basic light effects with some particles. I've got a lot of the set put together, going to get some characters modeled and rigged here shortly. Probably should have thrown a color correction layer on the video, it is a little darker than I thought after the upload- guess you'll have to wait to see it better in the final :).

Get Your Gun

2011-08-10T21:26:00.000-07:00

My own play on an old Broadway musical bill. Probably I should feed my horse ;)

a day out of exile

2011-08-09T22:26:00.000-07:00

Time for something new.

Pole Dancing Rats, y'all

2011-07-20T00:53:00.001-07:00

More sketches to build up the bible for my short, The Squeakeasy. Some will end up as layouts. Looking for a color scheme that is very specific- so far, no luck.

Squeakeasy Shots

2011-07-17T02:11:00.001-07:00

Some pre-vis drawings for my short, in varying stages of disarray.

Wardrobe Malfunction

2011-06-25T20:52:00.000-07:00

Various passes tweaking the attributes for the uniform for my Shoeless Joe character rig. The first playblast shows the nCloth with basic attributes applied to it. The initial uniform mesh was first bound to the skeleton, just like the body skin, and the weights were copied from the original mesh onto the uniform mesh. At least then, you can pose the character however you want, and the uniform mesh moves with the rest of the rig. After binding skin, make the uniform mesh nCloth in the usual way. The belt was skinned the the main hip joint, and set as a passive collider, which in hindsight may be a mistake on my part. I'm thinking later trying skinning just the buckle to the main hip, making it a passive collider, and then making the waist portion of the belt nCloth as well.

The referenced rig in the scene. From here, I referenced a workflow borrowed from a gentleman who is absolutely brilliant, Duncan. If you frequent the Autodesk forum AREA, you can see his blog post regarding nCloth workflow for animation here: http://area.autodesk.com/blogs/duncan/basic_cloth_on_character_setup. Basically, you connect your original mesh to the posed nCloth and make a rest shape, which will pull back the stretched mesh in simulation. After that, you paint weights on the cloth mesh under a couple of different attributes, depending on how you want that part of the mesh to behave. It's trial and error as it goes.

Maybe time to cache everything out and finally inbetween and cleanup this piece- I can't believe I let it stay this way for so long. After the animation is clean, it will be easier here to diagnose problems with the cloth, and key the attributes necessary to make it look a little more natural.

Pimp My Flash

2011-06-24T03:13:00.000-07:00

Some of the newer assets for my portfolio site, www.pacificasauer.com. Still ironing it out, but I've finally figured out enough of the script to make most of it work (thanks to a lot of reading).Wanted to give an interface that incorporated the entire scope of my work- from the classical to the digital, so I included a little bit of everything.The lunchbox and monitor for "Work-in-Progress" video.Wish I had an old broadcast safe monitor like this one, though.Couldn't live without my Wacom and stylus.Haha, my drawing board is next to my bed... one of the only things I would need to take with me if I had an emergency and had to go.

Risky Baseball - Joe's Rig Test

2011-06-19T02:23:00.000-07:00

Joe's rig test. I owe the walk cycle charts and timing to Eric Larson and Milt Kahl, so I wish you'd appreciate it when it comes around. I modified it a little, but basically, it is the same strut of arrogance and overconfidence that Casey, from Casey at the Bat (1947) had walking to the plate. Joe's bat's name is Black Betsy. Video below, rig is absolutely raw at this state, with no corrective blendshapes or PSD's. In case you wonder why he is in his shorts, the uniform is nCloth, and while I have some settings arranged, the model's rig test was to be bare to see weighting problems easier. The tangents are still in linear, and I sped up the end in the interest of time, but it's looking really good for good ol' Joe that he'll get to play baseball again.
Think he's proud enough?

blah blah blah

2011-06-07T15:38:00.000-07:00

Ink and water on paper. My brother shipped me some new pens straight from Nurnberg. Germany makes the finest drawing tools in the world, fyi.

L_Shoulder_RVS

2011-05-23T02:31:00.000-07:00

Decided I'd tear up my shoulder this weekend. Thinking about gnawing it off, the pain is maddening. That's one way to get a girl to take a break...
More on Joe and his dirty feet. Decided to go with nCloth for baggy uniform and use a nurbs surface for hair instead of both. Started by just using a texture map on the scalp for hair, but he ended up looking too much like Obama, and that was not okay. Still painting it up in Mudbox, and now that I have some down time, I can experiment with cloth.

Blends Need Not Apply

2011-05-13T11:20:00.001-07:00

I guess blogger took a dive and the original post was lost. Here it is again...

After tirelessly painting weights and managing all the driven keys, Shoeless Joe, my cartoon baseball player rig, finally has expression. He's a hybrid rig- a mixture of joint systems, deformers, and technical expressions. There's squash and stretch on the arms and torso. Boolean toggle for the mitt visibility and controls. Double hierarchy for driven/manuals keys on the facial controls. There's not a single blendshape. Not to mention a little help from a Comet Script called Pose Deformer/Pose Reader... and a beta called LipService. And it's a good beta! Lip Service is a product by Joe Alter that "is a powerful multi-resolution subdivision surface sculpting, rigging and animation system built into a Maya plugin. LipService's sculpting tools are comparable to ZBrush** and Mudbox*. Its animation tools extend this multi-resultion editing philosophy through to motion and rigging." So basically, no multiples of a hi-res mesh for blendshapes, and every pose is a golden pose- it will look good, because you can sculpt all of your corrections directly into your animation. Goodbye dozens and dozens of frickin blendshapes.

This is a lipsync rig test for Joe. Phonemes test for sentences in English. Recorded by Michael Hamm on November 3, 2003, with the aid of Mitchell Sommers in the Psychology Department at Washington University

Can a cat man a catamaran?

Merry Christmas! Mary Christmas will marry Christmas day.

Come to calm.com!

It's a long time, and I mean long.

Where's Nancy?

Who's "Nancy"??

I teach Ferdinand the calm cat to fetch cold cups of coffee. Who knows more about tasting things? He's used the book.
The rig has some more work to be done, mainly refining SDK and some other features I would like to include (hair and cloth). It's exciting for me to watch a project take on the fourth dimension. Time is the true test of integrity. More so I think with the things that we relate to as human.

Shoeless Joe

2011-04-15T12:48:00.001-07:00

Ladies and gentlemen, meet Joe. Based on baseball legend Joe Jackson, and a drawing I did waiting for maya files to load about a year ago, I've made it into a personal project.

He's a about 9000 polygons. Thought about taking him into Mudbox, but the uniform (Maya cloth) will cover much of the work, and the anatomy in Maya alone looks fine. I'm a fan of Advanced Skeleton for quick rigging, but I created my own rig for this model. The blendshapes were awkward and didn't work well for the facial shape, especially around the mouth, so I did a little research, and decided to rig facial bones and animate the attributes as blended weights. So limited blendshapes.I used locators for the bones in the face to change the pivots of the facial bones for the driven keys, but still maintained manual control of each joint. The locators for the joints in the mouth in chin were in the middle of the head, and the cheeks and eye joints in the center of the corresponding eye. Other pivots were placed as I needed them.Double hierarchy for the locators of the facial bones for the set driven key. Driven keys first, then manual keys. Undergoing a few animation tests and I'll set the cloth up.

Housekeeping?

2011-04-03T01:48:00.000-07:00

Blood splatter/artery spray for a kill scene in a kitchen. Maya/After Effects. Virtual bleeding at it's finest.

Ghost Rider

2011-03-21T03:57:00.000-07:00

"I don't resent working long hours. I shouldn't - I'm the one who set my life up this way. I love to work. It's the thing that I get the most satisfaction out of- and probably what I do best. Not that I don't enjoy days off. I love vacations and loafing around. But I think much of the world has the wrong idea of working. It's one of the good things in life. The feeling of accomplishment is more real and satisfying than finishing a good meal- "
Jim Henson

Haha, but man, would it feel great to eat a good meal...

Driving Ms. Audi

2011-02-23T11:47:00.000-08:00

This is my Audi sports sedan student car rig from a few years ago. This car is rigged with basic expressions, some set driven key, and standard constraints. Put it on a motion path and key frame your heart out and you can see it animates all right, but I've decided to totally strip it down to the mesh and re-rig it in Craft Director Tools. I haven't smiled continuously for this long in months. Love CDT for Maya.

Saturday Night Render

2011-02-14T01:04:00.000-08:00

The project is fun, but waiting for it to render is not. Motion blur for the propeller was something I had to render in Maya, but I decided to use the Trapcode Particular plug in in After Effects for the airplane exhaust. The camera is a challenge, I need to learn about z-depth and lens shaders, but the pictures right out of Maya with a little color correction and post-work look promising.

A couple of still frames.

The Squeakeasy

2011-02-02T02:35:00.000-08:00

Of late, I've began using my free time on the bus playing with ideas for a short. Thinking about a something going awry in a "Squeakeasy" called "The Funky Fur."

Naval Dentistry

2011-01-29T00:04:00.000-08:00

Decided it was time to see a dentist, since it had been, ummm, since I got out of the Navy. Haha, they said my mouth was in remarkable shape, scraped some stains away and sent me home without incident. It almost never works out that way, so I don't recommend delaying your appointments. I, like many people, dread the dentist. When I was seventeen, this old Navy dentist ripped the wisdom teeth out of my skull using just local anesthetic (Novocaine shots in the roof of my mouth). Anyway, I never forgot it.

Work Smart

2011-01-26T15:37:00.000-08:00

I think this has to be the coolest Maya learning moment ever. I heard about Craft Director Tools for the first time at CTNX 2009, and I wanted to learn about it, but I got busy. The last few weeks, I've been working on an airplane stunt, and have had the opportunity to work with this plug-in, and it's incredible. This is the fastest way to produce physically correct vehicle animation- it's a combination of attribute settings and real-time input from a gamepad or joystick. It's like playing a video game, only more control, more cameras, everything. I rigged my cessna with the basic setup and flew it around Racetown freehand. Just using the basic controls, you can see real possibility here.

Plane Crazy

2011-01-18T15:12:00.000-08:00

I don't do a lot of modeling, so when the budget couldn't pay for an airplane, I had to dig deep into my bag of tricks. This is a Cessna 180. The base mesh without the smooth is 1024 polygons. It's on smooth division 1 for this render. The texture is a headache- it's an mr layered shader with stuff on alpha channels and clamps on bump maps and all kinds of things. It's got a full interior with gauges. I rigged this model to fly in an aerial sequence. Specifically, I'm using Craft Animation Director Tools for Maya to animate this plane. I'm putting the rig on Creative Crash, the textures maybe not. Gotta work for something. It needs some UV/light linking modifications. The hard part is done; we'll see how it flies.

Rats

2010-12-15T01:19:00.001-08:00

I've got a pet rat. She's all spheres and cubes. Easy to find rhythm in a rat, and they have features that make it easy to see how different shapes fit together.

When good cards go bad

2010-12-10T01:25:00.000-08:00

The story is the jacks take the queens away, and this is a moment in the battle when one King loses his Queen, and the other saves his. It's rather oddly shaped, so I cut it in half to see the parts better. I overplayed the curves, but tried to maintain the "playing card" emphasis in shape, design and color. Interaction between all six cards was key, and drove most of my decisions. Just ignore the feet on the King of Spades...

Bored.

2010-11-24T00:02:00.000-08:00

Roughs of what I sit around doing while others are making me wait. Don't get excited about it, the tangents are still in step.
Two guys juggling sounds pretty simple. After all, it's a repeater, right? Well, kinda. It's constantly throwing and catching, mostly everything is in "figure eights." To break up the pattern a little bit, I modified a vibration formula- you make two patterns of action, and then you interleave them together in different combinations. It's an old trick. Tracking the pins was the challenge. I decided to animate them the old fashioned way too. The cheat would be to use a script or expressions for the rotation. Nothing in nature is going to act that perfectly. The thumbnails for the motion of the pins, if you're into how I got them to move with the spin in Maya.

Crap from my sketchbook

2010-11-04T11:53:00.000-07:00

Quick gestures from life (mostly on the bus in Los Angeles) and watching the girls play lacrosse at the school.

Visual FX

2010-10-15T12:44:00.000-07:00

Some of the kind of thing I've been working on lately- blood splatter, artificial props, wire removal, and other VFX stuff. This is After Effects. Red Giant makes some of the best plug-ins for After Effects on the market, and they are reasonable. Check them out. Probably the most essential are Trapcode and Knoll light factory- they'll make working efficiency skyrocket.

Work In Progress

2010-10-02T12:12:00.000-07:00

Back in Maya again, experimenting with some of the devices and charts I've picked up from some very classic early cartoons. Mostly from the work of Friz Freleng and Tex Avery. Most of these curves are still linear or step. I've still got about 130 or so frames to animate, some things to refine (especially facial), and then cleanup. I've actually found a way to use some of the blur frame 2d idea in Maya (see rat animation below), but I'm not going to use it here. I'm thinking about using a motion blur on some of the fastest movements and see what it looks like. This piece is cartoony without all the squash and stretch. And I should tell you, there is a naked lady... I've been exposed to too much Benny Hill lately.

Aerials of Los Angeles

2010-09-12T19:29:00.001-07:00

Pictures I took of LA

Aerials of Los Angeles

2010-09-08T22:07:00.000-07:00

Finally got a guy I know to take me and a couple of friends up in his helicopter. Scary thing is, I work with these crazies...
Edited about an hour and a half into five minutes or so. You'll see some views of Hollywood and LA mostly- the dried up river bed and some mountains. A lot of it was like looking down at a model, about 900 feet up.

2010-08-26T11:35:00.000-07:00

I needed a way for this rat to zip around looking for whatever before he snatches this piece of cheese from the trap. First instinct is to inbetween it the "regular" way- using exaggerated squash and stretch frames and a couple of other tricks. But you run into problems immediately. There is not enough time for anticipation, the turn takes too long, you can't read the accent before the transition, you don't get the zipping around visual... So Tex Avery back in the day was experimenting with a three drawing run with blur frames, and he had a character who zipped from one pose to the next. This idea was later built upon and evolved- Chuck Jones had his distorted version of transitional inbetweens (probably one of the more famous). So I spent a couple of weeks dissecting Tex Avery's formula- 5 frame virtual hold on the accent with a cushion back, using three blurs (combining the anticipation, the inbetweens, and the follow through).

Lacrosse Anyone?

2010-08-25T15:23:00.000-07:00

Look what life drawing did for me...
Was inspired by a friend's drawing (Amanda Dockery) that exists but isn't finished yet (that I know of). I've been playing around with some of Vilppu's composition classes, so it seemed like a viable project. Of course, it started as a sketch and evolved from several references (mostly women's rugby for the interactive poses).

Hollywood Screening of "Sleepy Time Pals"

2010-07-23T22:46:00.001-07:00

Tonight was the premier for our show "Sleepy Time Pals" at Chaplin Theater- a screening theater deep in the bowels of a place called Raleigh Studios on Melrose in Hollywood. From the corner of Bronson and Melrose, you have this view of the Hollywood sign on Mt. Lee. Across the street, you've got legendary Paramount Pictures. You may have never heard Raleigh Studio (Producer's Studio), but if you know anything about Hollywood, this is one of the oldest studios around. This place was here twelve years or so before Paramount. It's changed names a couple of times, but the Clune building is still there. You've seen sets at Raleigh Studios if you've ever seen "The Closer" on TNT or maybe you watch "Private Practice." Parts of "Ironman" were shot here. Way back when: "Gunsmoke", "What Happened to Baby Jane." The place has atmosphere; it's fantastic. There are about a dozen different stages on the lot. A bunch of offices, equipment rooms, a large silver cow, trailers... there is a lot going on at this little place. Some of the pictures are pictures of pictures from my Blackberry (I left the USB cable on the computer at work and I'm too impatient to wait). I invited friend and designer (animation) Micah Lewis.
This is the sign on the corner of Bronson and Melrose. What's neat about this lot is you can see how the place has grown and evolved. The newest buildings on the lot kind of follow this design- with mirrorized windows. The older parts I think are the most interesting- the Bronson gate (below) has a lot of personality. Through it all, this place has made it's money renting stage space to other studios, which is brilliant. The theater is named for Charlie Chaplin, who was himself something of a living cartoon character. It was a classic theater with the projector house, drapery hanging, the lights, the seats, and the place had a pretty good crowd.
The show was about 20 minutes. I worked on this a little less than a year, but I know it was longer than that in the making. Probably about 30 people or so at one point or another had their hands on it. A lot of work and anxiety and frustration and love goes into something like this. It's time away from your home, family, friends, pets, reality. Production consumes your life, and when you finally get to see your work on the big screen, all rendered with the textures and composited, and you can turn to your friend and say "that's mine...that's mine...this scene was ours..." it finally seems to be worth it. Sleepy Time Pals is a live action 3d composite cartoon designed to get kids in a bedtime routine. There were literally all age groups there to include a population of children, and I was impressed with the audience response. People laughed at the jokes and the gags, answered questions to the viewers, and seemed to enjoy the story (The title is "Softbear has a Secret"). It's really a relief from the animator's perspective when you get the response you were hoping for in the theater. Success. When it's over, its nice to see your name in the credits, but the most rewarding experience for me is seeing the characters on the screen, and being convinced. My first Hollywood screening in animation was an incredible experience. Part of me wishes I could sit down and watch it again- or at least relive this experience, I feel super good about my art right now. I had the opportunity to work with some very dedicated people, we threw our talents together for this project, and it came together very nicely. Awesome job, STP Production Crew.

The Academy Exhibit

2010-07-06T21:51:00.000-07:00

If you're in Los Angeles, and you have some free time, hurry to The Academy building on Wilshire and check out these exhibits.
I personally can't get enough Chuck Jones. 'Nuff said.
Ray Harryhausen is inspiring as an animator- made me start looking at some serious stop motion stuff. Anyone remember the Clash of the Titans on TNT or TBS- old Turner network and all those mythical movies with the old school special effects? THIS is the man.

Chuck Jones: An Animator’s Life From A to Z-Z-Z-Z

Through August 22 – An exhibition of the work of Oscar winner and master humorist Chuck Jones, representing his short animated films, features and TV specials, including “What’s Opera, Doc?,” “Elmer’s Candid Camera,” “Beep Prepared,” “Duck Amuck” and many others. More

The Fantastical Worlds of Ray Harryhausen

Through August 22 – An exhibition showcasing the work of stop-motion animation and visual effects pioneer Ray Harryhausen (“It Came from beneath the Sea,” “The 7th Voyage of Sinbad,” “Jason and the Argonauts,” “One Million Years B.C.,” “Clash of the Titans”). More

Rats In Color

2010-06-28T10:28:00.000-07:00

Some color for clarity...

Rat v. Trap

2010-06-25T15:58:00.000-07:00

Thinking about some color for this one... now that's it's animated, the motivation for that is almost nil, but some color I think will make the cheese stand out a little better.
To make the action faster, I ended up cutting several drawings from the original (broke my heart after planning the poses) and the timing seems to be about right now.

Rats Are Cool

2010-06-16T23:59:00.000-07:00

Just a quick idea for a rat eyeing a piece of cheese. Six, maybe seven seconds when it's through.
Animation of a rat batting a piece of cheese from a trap. Trap and cheese omitted for clarity. Work in Progress... some parts work, and others are kind of sticky. Rats are fun- they are easy to draw and classically smart. It's understandable why they make good cartoons.
Then there's the video (complete with timing issues)-

Pick Axe Drawings

2010-06-03T14:34:00.000-07:00

Video of the drawings below. 24fps. The timing is off, it needs extremes and some inbetweens, but everything is there and it works. There are some things I would change for a character animation, but the spacing and mechanics for this movement are about where I think they should be, and there is plenty of room for overlap.

Sequential Drawing

2010-06-03T13:02:00.000-07:00

These are lifedrawings with a model using a pick axe. (There are a few things you should never do naked- like exercise, use powertools, swing an axe...) Anyway, start at the back of your drawing pad, and work forward. I scanned mine in and spread them out. Terrific study in weight, and if you have enough control of your drawings, you can find some pretty good arcs too.

Not Just Another Walk Cycle

2010-04-28T00:25:00.000-07:00

Character walk work-in-progress of a rotund man walking toward the camera, adjusting his pants. Right now I'm modifying a chart for a walk on 16's (legs and body) and I'll chart the arms and hands a little differently. Overall, I'm pleased. The silhouettes are easy to read and the arcs support the action.

ToonRex Rig Test

2010-04-24T14:28:00.000-07:00

Maybe this one got away from me... this had some nice camera effects on it. Had to limit what I could up load so it lost a lot, but you get the idea.

Aunt Stephanie

2010-03-19T18:00:00.000-07:00

My family makes calendars every year so we can remember birthdays and stuff like that. Somehow this picture of my aunt circulated around the family, and ended up in this year's calendar. I almost died when I saw it. I'm sure we were never meant to see it. Anyway, decided to caricature it.

Butterfly Flying

2010-03-13T00:36:00.000-08:00

I used the wing flutter plans (posted below somewhere) to animate this butterfly in flight. This is actually a rough from my short (from a different camera, but it's the same animation). Used the alpha for the out placard of my demo reel. It put together nicely, only took a few hours from start to finish, and the best part was I had a good idea how to make it work before I sat down.

Cats and Rabbits

2010-03-12T03:35:00.000-08:00

They aren't that pretty, but it beats watching the scripts in the output window scroll as I wait for my Maya files to load.

Life Drawing Cartoons

2010-02-12T04:06:00.000-08:00

Just Messing around waiting for Maya files to load

New Placards

2010-02-09T11:39:00.000-08:00

Using my butterfly test as part of the placard for my demo reel. The top is with a straight alpha and no motion blur. The bottom has a motion blur of 0.75 (rendered that way before composite).

Butterfly wing test - Rough

2010-02-06T15:25:00.000-08:00

It needs some inbetweens and some tweaking, but so far, so good.

Butterfly Wing Flutter Plans

2010-01-26T03:36:00.000-08:00

Went crazy looking for a good way to animate this butterfly flying. Left plenty of room for overlap, broke a few joints, picked out strong poses and an interesting breakdown. I condensed it down to a classic run on 6's- where drawings 1 and 7 are close. I put the body on a different chart than the wings, just for some variation.

Planning my poses

2010-01-23T14:46:00.000-08:00

Just planning some of my key poses for this little animation I'm putting together. My plans have changed a little bit over the past few days and I'm trying to organize my thoughts.

Eric Goldberg Talks About Ken Harris

2010-01-22T22:25:00.000-08:00

I found this video digging around You Tube. I've ripped off so many charts from Ken Harris- he's my favorite animator of all time. The Animator' s Survival Kit is a Ken Harris/Art Babbitt animation chart goldmine. Animators spread rumors about where to get notes, who has the notes, who wrote stuff down. Because it is valuable information. There are legends of reams of Art Babbitt notes floating around- I'm telling you, read the Animator's Survival Kit. It will save a lot of time, the charts apply to everything, and it's already been proven to work. Memorize some basic charts, draw well, and read all the notes you can. Start with Dick Williams and then go straight to Stanchfield.

Some Ken Harris art- I like looking at this kind of thing. And here is a picture of the master. Pretty intense expression...

Additions to DinoRig

2010-01-06T14:15:00.000-08:00

I didn't want the teeth to look very menacing since I consider this little guy to be a baby. The tongue is a little loud, but everything works. Setting up a GUI for the blendshapes and tongue control and it's off to the races.

Animation Time

2009-12-20T21:20:00.000-08:00

Still ironing out problems with the butter fly rig. The MEL script for the wing flutter is giving me headaches. The lizard rig is WIP as well. I'm working out some teeth and tongue issues, and the blendshapes are non-existent. I atleast want some basic emotion to work with. Right now the jaw opens and shuts... and that is about it. The body is okay. Thinking seriously about gutting this rig and starting over. The butterfly is so small, a few issues won't really matter (which is why it lacks a normal map and some of the other things 3d models normally have). But the lizard, my main squeeze for this sequence, needs some personality. I'm already planning my shots for this animation, and I'll likely post some of my planning.

Butterfly screenshots

2009-12-17T01:21:00.000-08:00

Posed the butterfly in some paint effects grass and branches in maya. Still trying to figure out the MEL script. Digging through the outliner, mostly, trying to make syntax jive. What a pain... may give up on it and do it the old fashioned way.

Butterfly rig

2009-12-16T23:54:00.000-08:00

Wanted a flying animal rig and finally broke down and made myself one. Decided on a butterfly over a bird mainly because of billows in the wings and advanced rig things that I'm not prepared to try yet. Modeled a lot of the mesh myself, but got some help on the legs and body tweaks from modeler Heather Berry. The texture I threw on there just for the visual. There is nothing special about it.
The rig is a modified advanced skeleton file. I used the quadruped setup and then added the extra legs, the antennae, the wings (there are four) and joints for the proboscis. The legs are separate pieces, as are the wings. Plan to use this in an animation soon. Looking to check out a MEL script I've found for wing flutter- hope it works out.

Caricature Painted

2009-12-03T14:53:00.001-08:00

Caricatures

2009-11-27T00:48:00.000-08:00

Just some caricatures I'm doing for some surfer pals. They enjoy snowboarding, too, and met in the hospitality business, so that had to be a part of the drawing. It's an gift drawing. I intend to finish it in markers.

The Future of American Animation

2009-11-22T00:14:00.000-08:00

Tooling around at the CTN Animation Expo in Burbank this weekend really inspired me to look again at the way I draw, how I get ideas- everything about the conference was very well put together. Except how small the venue was. There was a lot of interest and it was very crowded. Artists from everywhere- insane. There were a couple of studio unions around the same time, which brought Don Bluth and Gary Goldman into town.
If you don't know who these people are and you are in animation, then shame on you. Criticize, if you feel like it, a few of their projects. The fact is, they learned from brilliant talent in animation, and they themselves are considered in my business to be living legends.
I stood around watching his tutorials and finally got to introduce myself. He's a living caricature- broad forehead and skinny little nose. I mentioned maybe that I adored The Secret of NIMH as a child, and we used to play NIMH all the time. We were the rats and we would hide in the "rose bush." He laughed. He asked if I was working, so I told him. He asked the question:

Do you think there is a future for 2D animation in America?

God, I hope so. But lets face it. American animation is in a crisis. What happened, I don't know. I think what happened mostly is that we all lost the connection with the characters we work with. We (animators) are not emotionally involved with them as we should be. Lately, it seems people remember the writing more than the art. The animation on a certain network seems to be incidental. It relies on clever writing and the animation is more of a visual guide for the audience- so hurry up and get it done. How sad. We threw away decades of discovery. There are a few older guys left, and they are desperately preaching the same things. Maybe it's time to listen: No more s***y animation.
So I got a critique on my 3d animation from a 2d legend, he looked over my life drawings, and I got some good insight on how I should think about my drawing and my acting, and some new inspirations for my new projects. Exciting weekend- glad I got to attend.

Demo Reel

2009-11-19T23:31:00.000-08:00

Not everything is redundant. There is some new material.

Playing with rigs

2009-11-12T02:44:00.000-08:00

Who knows. Maybe sheep do walk on their hands...

I changed a few things about these monsters before I started my scenes. Some eye control issues and strange scalers I couldn't figure out. What I learned, I think, from working with these rigs daily for the last several months is that you have to work with what you got and it is what it is. If you know enough about the rig and know what the limits are, you can get some pretty flexible action from the worst skeletal setup. Of course, it better have principles. The only way to really know what kind of action you're going to be able to get out of a rig is to make it do things you may never have to do in an actual scene. Then when you sit to plan, you know ahead of time what you're up against.

Good animation I think makes up for a bad rig. Really doesn't go the other way around. Bad animation makes the best art bad. That's the hard part about 3d. Got to love that kind of challenge if you're an animator.

Early Rig Tests for STP

2009-11-06T14:51:00.001-08:00

Here are about half of the rigs I've been dealing with the last few months. There is also a pillow (female), a toothbrush (male), a bookmark, a chart, and a stuffed sheep. There is a bear too. This is just a test where I have them move around and stand on a line, kind of like a lineup. I've hidden the visibility of the other characters until I can clean it up a little. Looks like I've got one more scene to do before my contract expires. About 910 frames.

Vilppu's Class - In Layers

2009-11-03T17:03:00.000-08:00

Some of the early images (like the gesture) may be a little difficult to see. I've been too heavy handed with some of my drawings- so I've lightened it up a little bit.
So I've worked through this drawing in layers so you can see how I think when I build up these drawings. This is an hour pose, begun in graphite, built in marker cool grays, and finished up in photoshop to lighten up some areas and the black is photoshop.
Kind of spooky!

Two More weeks of Vilppu

2009-11-02T19:07:00.000-08:00

Just to recap...

The top drawings are two minute poses completed on the first day of Vilppu's 2009 Life Drawing Class at The Animation Guild Office in Hollywood. People who have drawn with me know I like fast gestures (fifteen seconds and less). Sometimes I lack the patience to sit through the longer poses. The bottom drawings are the fourth class. The center drawing is a ten minute pose and the marker drawings are half hour. The ten minute pose and the two minute drawings aren't all that different- just a tad more built up. The goal is to have the initial gesture completed very loosely, very quickly- in about 10-15 seconds. Then you build using your shapes. You just keep building it like anything else. Then time runs out.

Demo Reel

2009-10-21T15:05:00.000-07:00

Needed a quick revision of my demo reel for the CTN Animation Expo in November. There is a speed recruiting event there, but you have to have your reel in before the 1 November. So, some pieces are in varying states of production. I really want a flying animal rig. Updated the website at the same time.

Flour Sacks- Final

2009-10-19T11:15:00.000-07:00

I might have spent 15-16 hours on this animation. Back in the day, it would have taken forever.
There are a couple of problems, but I may leave them to begin a new project.

More Flour Sacks

2009-10-18T01:47:00.000-07:00

I spent the evening doing this. May spend some time cleaning it up. May throw it away.

Classic flour sac

2009-10-17T11:44:00.000-07:00

I've been wanting to play with this rig for a while. Animated the body and feet, but I'm leaving the ears for last. I've done little hand drawn animations with a flour sac, but nothing in 3d. This rig is by a guy named Bill Ballout. I general, I'm pleased with how the flour sac moved; this is a great rig. However, he had some dynamics on it that drove me crazy. There was a jiggle on the body and a gravity effect on the ears. If you use this rig, just go into the hypergraph (connections) and delete that s***. Expressions and dynamics like that are fine for games, but they just screw up your senses if you're serious.

Vilppu's Drawing Class Week 4

2009-10-12T22:36:00.000-07:00

Vilppu was saying this week that no matter how you put the shapes together to make a form, what gives it realism is tonality. We looked at scores of drawings by Pontormo. He scanned some images into the computer and traced the shapes he used the show how the drawing was built. I like looking at drawings like that. It's like reading someone's thoughts momentarily. So I'm taking my spheres and boxes and learning how to more believably put them together. I got brave and broke out my markers for the figure. And I was pleased even though I had to work so fast it was hard to maintain even flow- and of course they aren't finished.

Vilppu Week 3

2009-10-04T18:59:00.001-07:00

So this is a ten minute drawing from Vilppu's life drawing class. He walks around and comments on our work as we draw (I should have signed up for the head drawing class). Anyway, he says from behind me that I moved the model- then comes out with this dry joke about how he's been watching the model and she hasn't moved. He asks if he can sit down, and then draws the torso from the pose on the corner of the page to show how he thought I moved the model in my drawing. I didn't think it was that extreme, but when I sat back down, I saw he was right.

Vilppu Week 2

2009-10-04T18:50:00.000-07:00

Usually I draw in black, but I've been talked into another method (at least for now). The color isn't showing up as well, but you get the idea. Drawing women is harder (I think) than drawing men. Not sure why. These are from the second week. 5 minute drawings.

Drawings from Vilppu's Class

2009-09-18T13:28:00.000-07:00

These are some of my drawings from Vilppu's life drawing class in Burbank. I haven't drawn from a model since June, but they are still solid drawings. They are 2 minute poses. I'm curious to see how my drawing changes while taking these classes, so these are like the control drawings- just for reference.

Skin Diver and Mermaid

2009-09-18T13:18:00.000-07:00

This apartment has poor lighting, and my webcam is not the best. Sorry. Need to invest in a scanner, but I use 14x17 paper for most things in my flat book, so right now, I'll have to deal with it. These pictures were done with markers.

Drawing With Vilppu

2009-09-15T14:01:00.000-07:00

Got up on Saturday morning and went to the guild office on Hollywood Way to draw with Glenn Vilppu. Hollywood from a distance sounds glamorous, and you mention Burbank on the street and immediately people connect with some mythical place, maybe liking it to Toon Town (Who Framed Roger Rabbit). It's very "brown" in Burbank. The place is rather dusty. It's a landscape combination of warehouses and older buildings set against the foothills. It was cool though, because when I got out of the car at the guild office, I looked down the street and could see the water tower at the classic entrance to the old Warner Bros cartoon studio. And since is was Saturday morning, there wasn't a lot of traffic. The new guild office actually has parking.
The class met and ten in a small drawing room in the back of the building. Vilppu met us at the door and welcomed up in. For the first hour or so, he talked about the method he wanted to teach us, mentioned how his drawing had changed since his trips abroad, and we did some warm up drawings. He draws in pen, and emptied his shirt pockets to showcase his pen collection. Some of the drawings he did for everyone he did on a tablet computer. After he talked for a while, he went around the room and looked at the way people were drawing as the model went through 2-3 minute poses. It was a new experience. I kept quiet and just watched. I guess the experience of getting to learn with the man who I've studied and emulated for the past few years made me a little nervous. I almost tripped over my horse when he hit the side of my arm and asked if he could sit down and show me something. The class time went by very quickly. He's easy to listen to, very well read, and he's very down to earth. Awesome. I can't wait for the next class.

I've been animating my life away. I've done a little of my own animation, but not enough to post yet. Some of the other stuff is protected right now and can't be released. Sorry. I would love to show you some of the animation I'm doing for ZOO FX, but you'll have to wait a little while. I have some drawings... may post those later.

STP Prod at The Zoo

2009-08-06T15:05:00.000-07:00

Met my new producers and post production supervisor at The Zoo FX this morning to check out their new project.
Any studio you go to will bring you a new experience (especially coming from Turner), but I think this one is going to be good for me, even if it is temporary.
This new project is a children's show, a mixture of live action and 3d cartoon. Green screen work, voice overs, modeling and rigging is already complete. Some of the test animation has been completed as well. I have some experience with compositing of this kind, so I feel confident that I'll be able to handle some of the more difficult scenes. The rigs look half-way decent. I'm pretty sure at this point I won't have to stop halfway through a scene and gut a rig. My first mission of course will be to tear open the script and search for all the business I'll need to plan my shots. The storyboard is kind of rough...oh well. Sometimes it's better that way. Gives you more room to make your own decisions.
And the best part... the people I'm working for are cool and easy going.
Got to get busy. My big computer is on the way, so I'll finally be ble to convert this blog back to the original format - less of my blah blah blah and more pictures/video. Cheers.

My newest adventure

2009-07-22T10:59:00.001-07:00

This is generally a video blog, but today I thought I would write a little bit about what I've been doing the past few weeks. 5 July, I quit my job (I was a bartender in a sloooooow restaurant) and the next morning, I left for Los Angeles with just my clothes, my computer, and my portfolio stuff to chase after these animator dreams. Sound cliche? This is one of the most difficult tasks I have ever undertaken. Seriously, it is not for the faint of heart. Leaving behind the comforts of my family and friends (not to mention the confidence of being a big fish at school) has been a challenge for me. The competition is insane, and it is very difficult to get your hand on the what's going on in this industry because it is very dynamic and continuously changing right now. So I've been doing lots of research, studying whenever I'm not researching, and drawing myself to sleep since I got here.

But the opportunities are there, and I'm starting to uncover them. And I'm excited because I'm taking life drawing classes from Glenn Vilppu (AWESOME!) in September. And I figured I'd join ASIFA and play with those people too (not as fun as drawing, but I'll deal with it).

I've got some things to post and some other animations in the planning stages. When I get my real computer setup and running, I'll bust it out and post it for yall. Until then, have a good one.

2009-05-21T18:57:00.000-07:00

Horse animation

2009-05-21T18:50:00.001-07:00

ninja attack

2009-04-28T17:48:00.000-07:00

Updated Demo Reel

2009-04-13T19:25:00.000-07:00

Dog Animation - "Tradigital"

2009-04-13T19:21:00.000-07:00

2009-03-23T05:52:00.000-07:00

Pitch

2009-02-28T18:42:00.000-08:00

jumpstart

2009-02-23T18:55:00.000-08:00

Yawn Final

2009-02-17T10:32:00.000-08:00

better yawn

2009-02-07T18:26:00.000-08:00

yawn-version1

2009-02-06T11:41:00.000-08:00

Demo reel in progress

2009-01-24T05:50:00.000-08:00

If you're looking for the rest of the dancing Trex,

you'll find it here.

Gross drink2 (WIP)

2009-01-24T05:45:00.000-08:00

Andrew's idea: Do another with the character knowing it is gross.

Still working on this one

2009-01-23T21:06:00.000-08:00

2009-01-22T13:58:00.000-08:00

Sneak

2008-12-16T17:38:00.000-08:00

Work In Progress

2008-12-16T17:26:00.000-08:00

2008-12-16T16:52:00.000-08:00

First short ever. Learned about a contest 3 weeks before the deadline and decided to enter anyway with two friends. We wrote the story, created the set design, textures, character design, modeled the props, unwrapped, rigged our character model, lit, rendered, and composited everything in time to turn it in the morning it was due. All of this while doing final animations for school. It's embarrassing now, but I think it's a laugh.

2008-12-16T16:50:00.000-08:00

Marker drawing FA08

bags

2008-12-16T16:38:00.000-08:00

Marker Drawing SP 2007

The Dump

2008-12-16T16:30:00.000-08:00

Summer 2008

Life drawings

2008-12-16T16:02:00.000-08:00

Some of my life drawings

Demo Reel

2008-12-16T15:36:00.000-08:00

Demo Reel Fall 2008