Above is the picture of the main cast of my animated project, not sure what to call it yet but for right now I’m calling it “Academia”. From left to right is Ginsberg, Dylan fighting with Winston and Red running out to break them up… Working on this little group shot was not just for completing a single image but also to determine several factors that will come into play later on during production i.e: Color charts for each character, the line weight, and how smooth the lines should be….Although the lines are a little bit cleaner on the image above, I think I’ll go with the roughness of the drawing shown below:
Ginsberg's Color Chart
Notice that the line work on Ginsberg’s color chart is pretty rough and not overly smooth; even though this was drawn directly into the computer via my Cintiq, I didn’t think i needed to go over the drawing again with any kind of line smoothing tool. The rawness and the little nervous ticks i made while drawing him are all in there; and I think it just helps the drawing have more character. If it had perfectly smooth lines due to the computer’s smoothing tools I think that will make it look too clinical and soulless. I guess that’s why I love the animations of people such as Bill Plympton and Patrick Smith– theirs are drawings that ooze character. Although I’m going into full on digital workflow when I start animating ( you trees better thank me!), it is more because I’m hoping it’ll save me time. I lost count on how many hours i spent scanning in dozens upon dozens of drawings when I was working on my senior project. And I felt bad every time i had to crumple up a sheet of paper and toss it into the trash bin because I made a mistake. I should say though, as much as I love working on my Cintiq, nothing beats drawing using pencil and paper.
Now I don’t know how all of this would look when animated…I guess that’s the next test I’ll have to do. We shall see then.
With the continued development of my animated project (which is still untitled) I realized that i need to go back and dust off the rust on the skills I barely used after college (which is about five years now)…I had to get back into the habit of drawing and review the basics of animation; and I have obtained such great resources that I’m really excited to get back into the groove of things…
an excerpt from my sketchbook
I’ve been watching lecture videos on anatomy and figure drawing by the amazing Glenn Vilppu and damn, there’s so much talent in that man you can’t help but be inspired by him… I decided to start a sketchbook thread over at ConceptArt.org which you can find here: MY SKETCHBOOK
You may ask, why learn to draw the human figure or three-point perspective etc. etc when you’ll be drawing cartoons that are heavily caricatured and from imagination? Its because these basic skills are your building blocks from where you’ll extrapolate your wild ideas from—which need to be grounded in some sort of reality in order to be believable.
I’ve also been reading a couple of books regarding animation, slowly sucking in all that i can learn as I work on this project, ranging from Idea and Character Development, Staging Do’s and Don’ts, Proper Use of Silhouette etc. etc. …A couple of books are a definite must have for any animator, namely Richard William’s “Animators Survival Kit” as an example…here’s a photo of the books I currently have sitting on my desk that I try and read a couple of chapters each everyday.
So much to learn...
Notice I have Tony White’s “How To Make Animated Films”….this book is a complete Masterclass in animation and film making…If you are a beginner student of animation, grab this book along with the William’s book, you won’t regret it. Here’s the first exercise in White’s book…everything starts with the bouncing ball exercise.
Whilst digging deeper into concept art and pre-production, I still go and review the main concept behind the project..I look back through my notes and see if the story could use some tweaking..Is there even a core idea I want to convey? Should an episodic format be treated differently than a feature length or self contained short film? Perhaps..
I’m lucky to have come across these videos by Doug TenNapel (Earthworm Jim) talking about storytelling in a lecture he has done in Art Institute Inland Empire…Some very good points within the 52-minute lecture…certainly great watch to those who are interested in storytelling in general..I plan to re-watch it over and over just to have it simmer in my thick skull..Also, bonus video of him talking about his process of making a graphic novel. Enjoy!
Here are a few expression sheets for two of the main characters for the yet untitled animated project I’m working on…Notice that they are both drawn on a legal pad…I have found it more freeing to draw on a cheap legal pad to develop concept art designs, there is less pressure to the artist compared to the amount a blank piece of white paper imposes. It’s just more relaxed and worry free…and i find that it helps to bring about ideas locked inside your head into the surface. However, these drawings do still need to be cleaned up and drawn on blank white paper once the designs have been finalized…until then, I’ll stick to the legal pads..
During the course of brainstorming and developing the initial idea, I stumbled upon the fact that a big part of it bears a resemblance to another online animated series (I didnt know the series existed before hand)…I almost came close to scrapping the project and call it quits..Yet low and behold, while looking through the notes i scribbled down; I came across a subplot I jotted down and realized that it actually had more potential and meaning compared to the initial concept of the show…Some more characters emerged and a few more ideas for story lines popped into my head. So the lesson here is: First, don’t give up, and second, don’t be afraid to scrap your initial story concept if it means developing a stronger idea that has more potential.
I’m using every little free time I have brainstorming for this little animated show idea i have…I can’t give away any specific details yet besides the fact that it’s going to be done in 2D with some 3D elements discreetly used…The above image is a “mindmap” of the ideas i have brewing: regarding plot/gag ideas/character profile….on the other side of that page is actually the mindmap for the first episode…
I plan to produce this all by my lonely self and possibly do the bulk of the voices…I could possibly lure some of my friends to do voices for me if I bribe them with some sweet lovin’…we’ll see. As of right now, the whole concept is still just a bunch of encircled words with arrows pointing at them…I haven’t even done character designs yet, but in due time. The main concern right now is to develop the idea and make sure its interesting enough since I’ll be slaving over this, drawing till my bleeding fingers fall off..
One of the things I’m really excited about is that the show calls for a lot of different character designs…Its always fun coming up with wacky characters, but I’m sure I’ll be kickin myself once it’s time to figure out who’s going to do the voices for them…
Regarding the length of each episode…I plan to keep each of them 3-4 min…MAYBE 5 min max…this is a one man show afterall…and release them online (i.e. YouTube)
Snow poured in starting last night and we are expected to get hit with up to 15 inches of the icy stuff..Being stuck inside for the next 2 days I figured this would be the perfect time to do some online housecleaning…Weakchild.com redesign should be done by early 2010 though i want to have this blog up and running.
I expect this blog to be more of a production kind; keeping track of my projects and other ventures– be it web design, animation or the occasional paintings.
