"Academia" main cast (click for larger version)

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.