portraits

Just finished a 6 week portrait class. Never thought I'd be able to do this... but I love drawing portraits! These are a few of the better ones. They were really rough at the start.

These were relatively short poses... they range from 20 to 40 minutes. (to do a complete/finished portrait takes hours)

HD017- Pointbender- Sifting Through Circuits

design for a friend's new album!

5 point perspective!

Ponder

Plan all you want. Just be at peace with the mystery of the next moment.

-Jamie

neato

just a test, for the fun of it, with machine motion.... looks pretty neat rendered in 2d. has a neat feel to it.

fun with pencil

watercolor fun

no cats allowed!

a fun little ditty with my hubby!....and of course, the cat!

lighting and paint :)

painted with a computer...yay for good software

This was my first real attempt at a watercolor painting. The snail is from an drawing I did following an exercise from a book...so it's not my image. Not bad for a first attempt, but I still have soooooooo much to learn. :)

Limaçon ep art

Did this for a Harmonious Discord tech-house release....
Limaçon - Electro Meds

old images of us

I like these...totally forgot about them. :o)

animation technique- my thoughts

the kiko alien

flower

huh?

the rhythm of film

film runs at 24 frames per second. I'm trying to really learn how fast this is.

24 frames = 1 second

12 frames = 1/2 second

6 frames = 1/4 second

3 frames = 1/8 second

1 frame = 1/24 second

1 second (or 24 frames) can be thought of as 60 bpm (beats per minute) because at 60 bpm you get 1 beat per second, or 60 beats in a minute.

In this same way, you could say that every 12 frames hits at 120 bpm because the beat hits twice per second. So if I need 1/2 second accuracy in my planning, I can use a metronome running at 120 bpm.

To get 1/4 second accuracy, I would set the metronome for 240 bpm. At 240, every beat would equal 6 frames worth of time. This is about as fast as I can slap my hand on my leg, so it's a good measure to plan timing with.

In the video above, I tried to express all of this in a muscial way.

Each second can be thought of as a musical 'measure'. I've represented 1 second as a whole note.

Each whole note = 24 frames

The second can be broken in half to get a beat every 1/2 second. I've represented this as a half note.

Each half note = 12 frames

The second can also be broken into quarters with a beat happening 4 times a second. I've represented this as quarter notes.

Each quarter note = 6 frames

I could break the second of time down further, into eights (eighth notes), but this would run at 480 bpm which I can't count out.

Each eighth note would = 3 frames

That's reeeeeally fast!

clips from the archive

animation process test

this was a test of the animation process...

keys, holds, anticipation, breakdown, overshoot, settle on the main object (video 1)

in video 2, I added a ribbon that follows the movement of the main object. this ribbon doesn't 'drive' the action, so it doesn't have the typical keys, breakdowns, etc. what the ribbon does is totally driven by the main object---that's why it's a little tougher to plan for.

I'm trying to find a way to plan overlapping action in my planning process, how to design it. I think it might work to just have a basic idea that there will be overlap in an action, and then animate it straight-ahead once the driving object is animated. I could just make notes about how much overlap, how much time, how much the overlapping object weighs, etc.

feather drop

this is a simple weight test...trying to get the weight right. it's not perfect, but it was educational.
I modeled and rigged the feather as quickly as possible. with animation, this took about 2 hours, proving to myself that simple rigs and animation can be created without a ton of time hair-pulling...and that's a good thing :D

a strange little test!

...that believe it or not, I learned a lot from!

I took a simple movement of the body that I understand, and tried three different types of spacing. each test has the same timing, but different spacing.

1st test- favors the extremes (hips to one side), no ease coming out or going into the extremes.

--9 frames at each side extreme, 4 frames to transition to the other side

2nd test- totally 'smooth' spacing with short eases on the extremes (flat tangents). this one spends as much time in the center of the movement as it does near the extremes.

--constant movement, never stops or pauses, perfect sine waves

3rd test- more time is spent at the extremes, very little in the center of the movement. this test uses long 'drifts' around the extremes. this produces snappy action without being harsh. I would say this is the winner and most natural spacing for this type of movement of the body...except for belly dancers, who would hit the extremes much harder ;o)

--7 frames around each extreme that slowly drift into, then out of the extreme, 5 frames of fast transition in the middle of the movement

the 3rd test gives the best illusion of muscles and weight. it's snappy enough to be appealing and not be swimmy, and smooth enough to show some weight and the stretchiness of muscle.

pocoyo test a

I copied part of the Pocoyo intro to learn the style. I modified the Bishop rig from AM to be a little cute guy...needless to say, I had to break the rig a bit ;o)

...this is minus the lovely camera-move from the original.

I LOVE this style... so crisp and punchy! I learned a ton from this test!! ...ahh the joys of creative spacing and keying every frame!

Here's the original:

SHOULD CARTOONS END WITH A MESSAGE?

Some very good thoughts in this one:

http://uncleeddiestheorycorner.blogspot.com/2009/05/should-cartoons-end-with-message.html

baseball- finesse pass

not done yet... more to come

character rig courtesy of Animation Mentor

accent- hammer swing

Richard Williams' keys.... just wanted to try it. the fulcrum of the hammer swing is a shortcut....I wanted to focus on the accent/spacing of the hammer swing using the motion blur (speed lines).

accents- points

a test of a point accent using Richard Williams keys and timing charts. this doesn't seem to read as well to me with a 3d puppet as it would probably read with hand drawn animation.

a RW soft point... this one reads a little better in CG. 

clay guy

he, he, I'm not sure what exactly this little guy is....cat, rat, dog??
who knows.
he is clay though.
:o)

double bounce cycle

not quite done yet, but almost...not quite sure where to go from here. this is a two step cycle, so it repeats, no variation. mickey mouse watch out, he's strutin'. :o)

character rig courtesy of Animation Mentor

baby bishop- just for fun!

lighting is terrible.  just for fun! :o)

technical test- hand drag on console

I had a lot of trouble with this situation in a shot I did for school....I found a wonderful solution, and what gave me fits for weeks and weeks, took 45 minutes to setup and animate. This is still rough, but look what I got in 45 minutes! A miracle I tell ya.

head turn A- improvement

Added an antic and arc in the eyes, offset the blinks, and slowed down and simplified the vibration in the head at the end. Better I think. ??

vibration- head placement

This is a weird one... but interesting to try. This one is from Richard Williams' Animator's Survival Kit. I guess this could happen if hit in the head with a frying pan ??

vibration tests- diving board

2 tests in this video...

-the 1st is a straight vibration test

-the 2nd is a vibration test with overlap

chewing A

Another test of the head/face...this time chewey-chewing! :o)

head turn A

Another test today. A simple head-turn with lots of drag and squash and stretch. I followed the example out of Eric Goldberg's book Character Animation Crash Course (tried to emulate his keys with this rig). I'm becoming a lot more confident with my polishing and blocking skills, and getting a better feel for how to use the graph editor to get what I want on each frame- it's a good thing!

Also added a bit of nervous vibration at the end...have to do something with all of that energy!

sketchbook pro 2010 test

Oooooooo, fun symmetry tool in the new sketchbook. mee likes. very fun! =)

oh my goodness...I can paint....

Just a study. I didn't know I could paint like this! Wow, I'm getting a lot out of studying color relativity!!! Whooooohoooooo!

(ahhh, and the stand-by-I need to finish this-shadow on the apple--- bad, bad, bad. Goes to show that referencing reality usually returns more interesting results than relying on habits and formulas. it kills the whole illusion of realness.)

2 drawing run + antic + new ending!

Just added an better ending on this this...that last one was pretty weak, but I had to try it just for fun. It was really fun working with 'cartoon' physics on this one, but still trying to transfer and change the momentum in a believable way. Fun Stuff!!!

just for fun! ... a new ending!

2 drawing run + finished antic

Here's the 2 drawing (frame) run. It's a bit of an optical illusion... curtesy of guys at Warner Bros. and Richard Williams. I've finished the antic at the beginning... it's no longer in blocking. This was very fun and very informative! =)

3 frame run + antic

Another test.... this time the run is made with 3 frames per leg or 6 frames for a complete cycle. I added a bit more travel to this run so there's more of it on screen to see. The antic is still in blocking, but the run is final, on the 1s.

4 drawing run + antic

I'm currently exploring the extremes of timing and speed. I've found that I tend to give my keys too much time when roughing out my timing, so I'm learning how much you can do with as few frames as possible. Richard Williams is, of course, my guide (big thanks!).

This is a run done with 4 frames for each leg in the cycle- 8 frames total for the cycle. Next up.... the 3 frame and 2 frame runs!!! =)

Leaf

done on my ipod touch, believe it or not! in a wonderful app called 'Brushes' ...just a color and value study.

1st quick painting in Brushes app

Oh I love this app for my Touch!!!! It makes painting so fun and painless! =)

ballerina... work in progress

Long way to go.
She's very graceful...fun to animate.
:o)

new drawings

Studies of Preston Blair's style & technique. (not traced)

comic...Nikko in action

My first photo comic using Comic Life!
Fun stuff!!!

bio-suit

for daily sketch group...biosuit enhances the wearer's abilities...

quicksketch, 15 minutes, alias sketchbook, very rough

he he he :o)

i'm getting back to animation and drawing and i couldn't be happier...the break was very nice though.