More gesture studies, did this at the mall today and the street market was done over the weekends.










Jap Cuisine Waiter



So I went for a drink with my high school friends last Friday and it was a crazy night .. everybody was dancing around going wild and I'm sitting at one dark corner sketching the performers.Somehow I joined the fun later on...





These were done a while ago








Oh and btw ~ I'm 22 ~~~ !! Yesterday was my birthday and it was really awesome ~ Thanks everyone for the wishes,kicks and gifts , they're awesome and I love them all !! Ok , back to work - :)

More studies ~ they are a lot of fun to work on !!!







Charcoal Pencils - (gesture studies)







Pastels

Something I'm workin on - In the toilet ..ready for FIXATIVE !!


Some 30mins study

Experimenting a lot with pastels recently I just couldn't stop. Trying some really quick and loose experiment to get the feeling , you know .. the UMPHHH!! feeling which breathes life into them ..


An hour plus


25mins


20mins+

Was really fun ..I'll do a 100 of them in a day if only I could.

Did a quick painting over the sketch , It was a lot of fun !

Marletti

So I was supposed to get this updated last Wednesday , but I was extremely tired and I didn't get full access to the internet on the following days due to the poor internet signal.Anyway , this post will make up for it.

Continuing from the 1st day of the Pixar Seminar , on the 2nd day of the Seminar , The 4 speakers who spoke were Paul Topolos(Matte Painter),Amy Allen(Set Modeler/Dresser TD),Martin Nguyen(Simulation/FX TD) and Min Hyung Lee(Lighting TD). Needless to say , they were very awesome of course.Except that Tim Evatt and the other 5 speakers who were there on the 1st day didn't come since they had some other event to attend to :(

Oh and btw, Paul's an extremely great story teller ! He told us bout his childhood days and how he got interested into making films and so on.Well the coolest was that he had all the audiences to greet "Hi, Paul's Mom" waving to his iPhone on a video record mode.That was fun.Again I had the opportunity to talk and get a picture with them but through the ending of the Seminar, I had this sad..poignant feeling inside of me. Strange but yes and I never questioned why it evoked.I wanted more :( .. who would get enough of Pixar .. Anyway ~ all in all it was a good one.Like what I said , much better than what I ever asked for. Go PIXAR ! You guys rock !

So here are some photos of the seminar, including some sketches I did on both days of the seminar.Some of the photos were taken by Hafiz and Hoe Yi.Thanks guys :)

Can't wait for the big event to start !!


The Pixar Crew (Girl in blond's Beth Albright , she's really really nice)


Mike Krummhoefener (The guy with the quote I'll never forget)


I notice how dorky I look in all these pics taken with them but these r actually priceless !!!

Woon Bing,Me,Tim Evatt,Hafiz,Amy Allen


Amy Allen


Martin Nguyen


TOA Tutor,Min Hyung Lee,Me


Some quick sketches I did.



That's Mike Krummhoefner in the middle


Gave myself a theme like what Tim Evatt suggested and ideas never seem to stop flowing in.


Something Random


By The Way ~ Last Tuesday was the completion of my first year anniversary in my company ~ Congratulationsss to meeeeeee ~~~~~~ :)

OHKAYYY !!!!! You guys probably already know what I wanna talk about !!! Soooo -
The 1st day of the PIXAR TOY STORY 3 LECTURE SERIES was STUNNING !!! I even felt like I absorbed some of their super-positive vibes after the 1st day of the seminar !

Out of 9 speakers , 5 did the speaking today and 4 tomorrow.All I can say is that they were all amazingly friendly people and they even talked about their student life and dreams and how they ended up in Pixar. So the whole thing was inspiring inspIRING INSPIRING.I'm not over saying this because they're Pixarians, but because they DO know exactly what they are doing and what they wanna do.They're good at what they're doing.

Also , I had the opportunity to speak to Tim Evatt, the concept artist for Toy Story 3, and he's a super amazing guy.I even showed him my sketchbook and asked If he could comment on it.It was a really awkward moment cuz Tim's work are super Duper amazing and my sketches are unprofessional at all but I just knew that I had to show him my sketches and I wanna hear from him and I'm glad I took my 1st step.Tim gave positive comments of my sketchbook and of course I felt good with that but he didn't have time to flip over the whole book as time didn't allow him to, but he said he would really like to see my sketches again and I'm planning to show it to him tomorrow !

Tim shared some sketching tips that really got me interested in and I couldn't start experimenting on them.Tim suggests that It would be interesting to come up with a theme when you're sketching , and try approaching it in several different ways.Say the theme is Elephant , then try to work out varieties of design from the same theme.
Also,Tim mentioned " Figure why things look the way they do , and how do they translate to the audience".And I have to totally agree on that.
All these are pretty basic things that a lot of people already know , but they tend to slip away from it unnoticed,including me, but the masters got it right in their hands and they know how to play & bend around with it!They're just so darn good at it.Another useful tips from Tim, "Be PROACTIVE".

I also approached Beth Albright, a Shading & Grooming TD from Pixar , knowing that she comes from a 2D background and was involved in projects such as Space Jam,101 Dalmations 2 , Fox & The Hound 2 and recently the shading & grooming for the background toys in TS3.She's one of the magic behind the life of the background toys.I asked Beth what would be the best choice for a 2D animation college , one that she would recommend.I included Ringling , AAU (That's where TIM went!!), and CalArts in the list. Beth personally thinks that CalArts is the one that brings up your artistic side and most of the people she'd met before who graduated from CalArts has good portfolios.

Also there are many other great speakers who inspired me greatly to never give up on my dreams.I'll never EVER EVER in my life forget what Mike Krummhoefener said about your love for what you do. Mike said "Keep the passion and love going for something you love and you'll succeed" and "You succeed because you love what you do".

Mahyar Abousaeedi , the Layout Director shared some really great tips to enhance the camera movement throughout the whole film , and how that would enhance the feeling of the whole film.

Allisson Rutland , an animation TD , bedazzled us with her amazing animation tips and tricks and scenes she did for TS3.

Overall , we had a whole lot of fun during the Seminar , and it's worth the 9 hours of my life, more than I can ever ask for.We watched several clips of the making of the film , and it looks darn good even at the raw stage.I can't wait for the DVD release and I know I'm gonna watch it 24/7 till my DVD player cries for help.

Finally , on my way home , I drove to MPH to get the TS3 artbook so I could get their autographs tomorrow.I found the book but unfortunately there was a little fold at the edge of the outer layer cover so I didn't want it.Then I drove allll the way to Tropicana City Mall to get a better copy of it.I just can't wait for tomorrow!!!

Being at the seminar here today was one of the greatest gift in my life and it made my will stronger to work my ass off all the way to my dream life as an animator/story teller.I'll always remember art as part of me. My passion and love will always go on and on for it forever.

I'm really excited over this new character , "Mrs.Tattenburgh".
A Jolly-Ollie retired mom who's ready to go to school to live a life she never once had back at her childhood days.





I had her carrying with her an adult bag to tell her taste of maturity instead of a normal school bag.She's a fun character to design. I absolutely loved how she turned out!





Another interesting character I designed weeks ago.'Garcia', a hunter, but he doesn't bite.







'Javiere' , a character I designed weeks before Fontane. Look at the previous entry I posted of Fontane , there's one which you can she her dancing with Javiere.(Yes , they have this romance thingy going on within them and I'm still all over it!)



'Judge Dread', literally yes ! Trying out some loose experiment on him to bring out a more prominent side of him (Evil)





Some random sketches I decided to share.






Wow ! Am I not frigging happy to see the gray shades almost done covering all the whites !? It's like watching my own baby grow day by day.It's a pity I didn't get a snap shot of it every day or every week , but I just might start doing it in the next sketchbook.I've been focusing a lot on gestures and body language in my sketches recently , knowing that it's so darn important to breathe a life into your character.

Picked up a book recently called "Force: Character Design from Life Drawing" by Michael D. Mattesi and it teaches really good , like what to look out for in your drawings ,what to observe from your daily life and transcribing them into your own drawings , it's a really cool book ! The other book of the same artist which I didn't have yet is "Force: Dynamic Life Drawing for Animators" .If you really want to be good at gesture drawing I recommend these 2 books. The 1st book improved my drawings exponentially and I really wanna thank Michael D. Mattesi for it and of course many other AMAZING AMAZING AMAZING artists out there!

And for now , many more to draw and I can't wait to get my hands on the the other book!

P.S.: I'll get a scanner as soon as I can so I could share better scans of my works rather than dull camera snaps.