The end is near...

For those of you who don't know, one of my true loves in life is cleaning, as show below:

No new news really, but I felt like posting since I haven't in a bit. My FableVision internship ends on Friday (boooooooo) and I leave Boston on Saturday. I've gotten a nice little attic apartment in Rochester with my boyfriend, and we'll be moving in in two weeks. Then, I start training for my Union Services position at the Center for Campus Life, and I start my Art Education MST in September.

As far as goals go after that, I've got a few options. One is to make it back to Boston to work at one of the great Flash studios up here (fingers crossed for FableVision one day). Or to get my MFA while working, perhaps in Georgia, San Francisco, LA, or Vancouver. Heck, I'd even be open to animating in India, since travel is also something I've always wanted to pursue.

Well, I guess that's enough blather about goals :) Hopefully I can get some clearance to post some of the stuff I've been working on for FableVision once the internship ends. We'll see!

Have a good week, everyone!

Banner!

So if you haven't noticed yet, I've created a banner for my blog. I really like the way the illustration came out:

I'm hoping my drawings continue to get looser and more fun like this one in the future. I'd like to work on more illustrations like this one of my friends, but possibly alter the styles a little bit for each one depending on their different personalities. I feel this one represents me pretty well :)

As a little bit of an update, I haven't been able to find a job yet, so in the fall I'm going to return to RIT for a year to get my MST in Art Education. I'm most nervous about working with kids, because I'm not really sure how I'll fare. But I am really excited about getting into the psychology and how to's of art education, because I think it will help me be a better children's artist and animator.

Also, I got a copy of "Ish" yesterday, and had it signed by Peter H. Reynolds! It was a very exciting book signing, there were cupcakes and lots of kids, and he even offered a few encouraging words. I really hope I get to work with him and FableVision one day, his books and words are so inspiring.

11 Second Club - June '10

This was my 11 Second Club entry for June. I was trying to learn Flash, so I animated in Flash frame by frame. I came in 30th out of 158 with a rating of 5.7 Not too shabby for my first time, although I think it was the character designs that got me there, and not the animation.

I'd like to try entering the competition with a traditionally drawn piece and see how I do then.

Summertime!

Well hello there!

It's been a while. The past month has been insanely busy: finishing my thesis, graduation, moving out of Rochester, a week at home, and then moving to Boston. Anyways, I am now a college graduate with a BFA in Film and Animation! I can't post the film just yet because I'd like to submit it to some festivals, but eventually I will.

I moved to Boston on Friday, and I'm sure I'm going to love it here. As a country girl, the public transit system seemed pretty daunting, but I got my Link Pass and I rode the subway so I've got a handle on that now. I'm close to Harvard Square, so that's really nice. And a good portion of my roommates are international, which is awesome because I get to learn about Europe!

Tomorrow I start my internship at FableVision Studios, which I'm really excited about. By the end of the summer, I hope to gain a solid grasp of Flash as well as knowledge of a professional environment. I've been drawing in Flash to help prepare myself for the internship. It's hard, because I'm used to being very loose with my drawings, using circles and gesture lines as a foundation. But I do like the graphic look of Flash, so I think I should at least enjoy learning how to draw in a new way. Here's two drawings I did over the past two days (there were also a lot of doodles which I chose to scrap):

(They both happen to be love-themed because I'm missing my boyfriend a lot right now :P)

I need to do a lot more exploring of the city. I'm pretty sure I'm going to going to the beach this weekend with my housemates, which should be fun. I also really want to see the aquarium, the Freedom Trail, some museums, and of course experience all the shopping and food Boston has to offer! Hopefully after all the visits from my boyfriend, my mother, and my friends (so excited for the 4th of July!!!) I'll have some really great Boston experiences under my belt.

Life is good! Keep loving it!

Gretchen, you colorful thing.

An environment created for my gorgon, Gretchen. It depicts her bedroom and her great big open door looking out on her bright, fantasy flip-flopped world:

And three characters that could appear alongside Gretchen. First, Cerberus the puppy. Second, Gretchen's best friend Harriet, who is a harpy (and whom I have to fix so she doesn't look so much like a girl in a bird costume). And last, the evil mastermind Sparkles the unicorn. He looks rather dashing, but that's the point. He's a very arrogant villain.

Ok, that's all for now.

Oh and did I mention that I was offered an internship at FableVision? WELL I WAS! AND I'M SO TAKING IT! Their studio is fantastic, both in what it creates and why it creates. I'm so glad I'm getting the opportunity to learn from them over the summer. They use a lot of Flash (which I really want to learn). Browse their website when you get a chance! www.fablevision.com

Ok and now I'm done. :D

Cheers everyone, have a good week!

Tentative Backgrounds

Alrighty, all. I need some feedback. I had originally planned to do watercolor backgrounds for my film, but due to me running completely off schedule, I'm considering going digital because it's easier, faster, and cheaper. The top picture was my first attempt, which is fairly normal and includes bright colors. But I have the problem that the background colors might wash out the character. I tried dulling it down, but then I wasn't happy with that either. Then I started thinking about the Xerox age, when they used a very small color palette and didn't really worry about lines or small objects. I think I like the second better, because it's different for me and can be really expressive in color. But what do you think? Any suggestions?

Some Inbetweened Shots

I've decided to upload some inbetweened shots that are sitting on my jump drive. I need to show more of my animation, and not sit on it like a chicken waiting for an egg to hatch. I threw that analogy out there off the top of my head, but I just realized that I really DO treat my work like that.

This one (Shot 6) has actually been updated since I exported this .mov. For instance, the fabric falling down into the basket is now inbetweened, as is the basket being kicked away. My friend, Dave Rappoccio, is coloring the character for me as we speak. I animated this shot completely, no inbetween help. It's kind of my baby, and I'd like to really perfect it after this is all over so I can use it on my demo reel. I've wanted to do this specific movement since the idea birth of this animation.

And this one is actually kind of neat, because Brett Wilson inbetweened the fat cat while Elizabeth Cardella inbetweened the cook and the skinny cat. My only worry here is that there's too much going on, and so you'll either miss the adorableness of that fat cat licking the spoon his master just put down, or the neat eye roll that the skinnier cat does when his master starts to fawn over the fatter cat, or even the general movement of the cook, Rosie. I've also wanted to do this movement since the very beginning, though it's changed a bit and it didn't end up the way I had imagined it would.

And then this last one, which I just kind of threw in for kicks. It's certainly not one of the most elaborate, but it got finished today and it has the cute fat cat in it again. Elizabeth Cardella also inbetweened this one for me.

What to do, what to do...

So the most recent assignment in my Character Illustration class was to put our character into three different cartoon universes. I chose X-Men, Disney, and South Park. The X-Men one is my favorite, Gretchen looks "bad-ass" enough to fit in (which is funny considering her original design). Disney was a little disappointing, as it came out looking a ton like some cheesy fan art piece. At least I learned a little about constructing "princess" faces. And well, I spent too much time on the first two so I just did South Park in the end. Though I might redo it in a different style if I have some extra time.

In other news (and more importantly as well), I found out this past week that I was accepted to the Vancouver Film School as well as the Academy of Art in San Francisco. I declined Vancouver after finding out about the Academy, but now I need to decide whether to go to the Academy or not. Attending the school would give me a reason to go to San Francisco, would better my skills, and would give me an MFA in Animation so I could teach later in life...but it would also be a huge financial set back for me. Especially if I can't get a job. I'm also waiting to hear about an internship that I'm really, really, REALLY hoping to get. And my family is pressuring me to go into Art Education. So I have a lot of paths waiting to be explored at this current moment in time.

Come summer time, I've decided that I'm going to dedicate my spare time to learning Flash and finessing my drawing skills via 11 Second Club. I'm really excited for this option, because it'll be nice to be able to do animation for myself and at my own leisure, and not for a class.

Oh, and the thesis is coming along. My composer sent me some music which I really like. I hope to be done with breakdowns by the middle of the week. I've also recruited a couple of friends to help me color the character frames. So as of right now, it's looking up.

If anyone has any advice on San Francisco or the Art Academy, feel free to post :)

Good luck with the week, everyone.

Character Illustration - The Gorgon

I'm in a Character Illustration class this quarter, and so far it's been a lot of fun. We have to come up with a main character and a story first. So here she is, my Gorgon. She's not your typical gorgon, she's a protagonist. In the world I'm creating, the monsters are the good guys, and the heroes are the bad guys. She's ditzy, excitable, self-confident, and genuinely friendly. Her best friend is a self-conscious, nervous Harpy. The first bad guy they encounter is an evil unicorn, who steals the puppy Cerberus on the grounds that Cerberus is a monstrosity, and must be done away with. I'm having a lot of fun playing with reverses roles and making silly characters. I can't wait to draw up the others.

First Post

And so we have my first post, which I'll use to post a few shots from my senior thesis animation (tentatively titled, Apartment Waltz).

The first shot, I think, goes a little fast and could use more frames (I apologize for the missing background/items, but the animation is what I'm concentrating on right now anyway). The second, where she ducks into the closet, came out pretty well. The secondary motion on her ponytail and the rag in the bucket might be a little off, it's hard to tell when the background is showing through. Sadly, I have to save fixes for very last, since I'm pretty far behind. Luckily, I've had some classmates standing in as inbetweeners. The first two were inbetweened by Elizabeth Cardella.

This last one I'm fairly happy with. I forgot to overlap the old man's arms hitting the chair and his head rising up at the very beginning when he wakes up, and I also would like to extend his getting up from the chair. But I think the animation looks good. Inbetweening thanks to Baylee Richards.

Anyway, this is just a sneak peek. I get really excited when I see something for the first time, and these are the first "close to finished" shots of the film. If all goes well, I'll have a few more shots inbetweened by the end of the weekend, and possibly some color done as well! Feel free to leave comments, I'm open for suggestions. If you have any suggestions on how to make it better with just the change or addition of a few frames, I'm double open!

Huzzah persistence of vision!

Also, this shirt made me chuckle.

http://www.threadless.com/product/2200/Invention_of_Colour

And watch out for April 8th, it's One Day Without Shoes. Check out http://www.onedaywithoutshoes.com/ for more info and join the movement!