ASIFA Drawing Sesson FALL 2010 #4

Had a good session tonight, so here's a bit larger post than usual.  I continued to sketch mostly with the flat of the pencil, trying to stay as loose as possible.

1-2 minutes:

 

3 minutes:

 

I started something new this session with a little sketchbook I picked up from Muji.  China marker and white charcoal is something I've never really tried outside of foundation studies back in college, but I'm enjoying it so far.  

These are 4-5 minutes:

 

And these are the last two pages of my little watercolor sketchbook.  I think I'm starting to get back into the swing of it.  I'll be looking for a new one with a little bit better paper.  These are 4 minutes each.  

There Has Been a Short Delay

Been a while since the last posting, but it's not for lack of working! Sesame Street has been pretty busy the past few weeks, and our weekends lately have generally been experienced as bright blurry things whizzing past us. I've also been building up a back catalog of sketches in preparation for a new sketchbook I hope to have printed by early next January! I'll be posting a few teasers here and thee in the next couple of months, but there's going to be a lot of stuff I'm keeping exclusive for the book. In the meantime here's stuff from the past two life drawing sketches.

Last week to change things up I tried sketching with just the flat of the pencil. I like how it helped me loosen up and focus on the motion of the figure. There's quite a different feeling between last week's sketches and the ones before. I've also just about finished with the little watercolor sketchbook! I'll be trying something new starting next session.

Poses 1-5 minutes.

ASIFA Drawing Session FALL 2010 #2

iThe model this week had such good gesture poses it's a shame I wasn't able to capture more of them. 1-5 minute poses.

New Space Bear

Had a nice, productive Columbus Day his year. Gouache 5"x7". I might make this a print.

Little Scenes

A guy with a rockin' beard on the subway on the way to the Workshop. Drawn from memory in Flash in between files at work.

Quick brush-pen sketches in a corner cafe. I'm starting to re-train my eyes to look for interesting ways to frame a scene.

ASIFA Drawing Session FALL 2010 #1

ASIFA model drawing class is back for the season.  Tonight was the first session.  I'm really happy to get back into practice.  These are 1-5 minute gestures.  I want to try to really push motion and weight this season.

New Pencils

Pencils for the new version of the space bear. I just need to figure out how to watercolor it without screwing it up.

From the Sketchbook

I just finished the old sketchbook and started a new one. Here's a few doodles from the last few pages!

Brooklyn Aquarium

Broke in my new sketchbook yesterday at the aquarium on Coney Island.

SpaceGlider Studios Tai-Chi Project Boards #2

Updated:

Shots 20-23 from my wife's new short film.

Here they are in sequence from the animatic:

Double-click the art to see the large-scale versions.

More coming soon!

Fire Island

We drove out to the beach yesterday with some friends. Beautiful day, but the riptide was amazingly strong. A wave caught my legs and back-flipped me onto my head. I gave Azure a sunhat for some reason. The little travel sketchbook I have isn't really made for watercolor. I think I need to get myself a better one going forward.

More TaiChi boards coming soon!

The Lake at Central Park

Last Sunday was Azure's birthday so we took a walk out to Central Park and rented a rowboat on the lake. I managed to get this sketched before the wind blew our boat away into the banks on the far side. Then we rowed back and went way uptown for some excellent Indian food.

Work Doodle

Little sketch in Flash while waiting on various file approvals.

ASIFA Drawing Sesson Summer 2010 #4

This may or may not be the last model session of the summer season. I'll try to keep posting life drawing each week regardless since we missed so many of the classes this time around. Gotta try to get to the zoo!

I'm going to be compiling in the next week all the various life-drawings posted on the blog into a single "Life Drawing" page up on the main header.

SpaceGlider Studios Tai-Chi Project Boards

Updated:

Working on boards for a new animation production about Tai-Chi that my wife is currently directing. She's been handling most of the storyboarding work herself but I have a few more shots beside these coming.

We're working fast and loose on the boards for the most part , but since these shots are the first to introduce the character Lily and the technique of Tai_Chi I wanted to make sure that her form was as correct for the animators as I could make it.

Here they are played in sequence from the animatic:

(Click image twice for full viewing)

All boards drawn in Flash. The first and last boards in the sequence are cribbed from my wife's shots for continuity. There's tons more boards from the production over at her blog as well. Check it out!

More coming!

ASIFA Drawing Sesson Summer 2010 #3

Trying to loosen up in the sketches.  It might take a few sessions to get the right kind of feel for it!

ASIFA Drawing Sesson Summer 2010 #2

Had a great time at Comic-Con this year.  Saw old friends, met new ones, chatted with some of my heros, and made some significant progress in the field.  Overall it was the most successful convention that I've been to. 

Look for a lot of new work here very soon!  Storyboards, characters, random sketches and more.

And more ASIFA, naturally.

We haven't really had the time or the energy to go the past three weeks, but this week should see the return of the regular life drawing.  I really want to try to loosen up my line and movement in the figure.  And I'm determined to figure out these watercolors!

Storyboards -- The Lady Jane Sc. 01

These I've been meaning to post for a while now. Boards for the first scene of a story I've been working on with my friend Kyle Kershner.

I decided to do them in Sketchbook Pro as an excuse to practice with it. I wanted to keep the drawings pretty loose but the framing solid and atmospheric. Now that I'm a bit more confident with the program I'm looking forward to the next scene. Bring on the action!

ASIFA Drawing Sesson Summer 2010 #1

Life Drawing class is back in session! I missed the first class, but managed to catch a good hour of the second class before running home to catch the Futurama premiere. I'm trying something a bit different with my construction now.

1-2 minutes each:

2-3 minutes each:

Trying to catch gestures with watercolor is really fun but difficult for me. Here's a few from the Spring classes I never got around to posting. I hope to see a big improvement by the end of the summer.

Hobbes, 1990-2010

My brother's cat just passed. She's part of a pair, and we've had her and her brother for nearly 20 years. We got them the year we moved to Virginia, and they've been a part of home for so long it's hard to think of her not there anymore. She went to sleep on the porch today and just never woke up. I'll miss you, Hobbes. You were a great kitty.

Joe Weatherly Animal Drawing Workshop, Day 2

The last day of the workshop spent at the Museum of Natural History. I can't wait to go back for a longer study of the skeletons.

Joe Weatherly Animal Drawing Workshop, Day 1

Today was the first part of Joe Weatherly's workshop at the Bronx Zoo. It was a great time, super informative and just plain fun to focus on drawing moving animals with a critical eye.

To



Tomorrow is skeletons at the Museum of Natural History!

Free-Form Doodling

I haven't really done that much drawing for myself the past few months. With the wedding, working two gigs, and foolishly purchasing the time sink that is Red Dead Redemption I haven't given myself the time to just sit and draw (with a real pencil!) for the hell of it. This weekend I'm going to force myself out of the rut. I'll be taking an animal drawing workshop with Joe Weatherly--I only hope it doesn't rain! I've started just free-form doodling to loosen up. I'm not even thinking, just letting the pencil sort make shapes and then following them to their conclusion, or lack thereof. Here's what the pencil decided to make from two of my sketchbook pages last night. What the hell is that little Gumby-type character?

I might post some more loosen-up exercises tonight.

Commercial Work

New animation! Here is the commercial featuring Dora the Explorer that I directed and animated last month for Nathan Love, Inc. The spot was designed and animated in Flash. Enjoy!



And here is an extended sequence:

Return

The repeated infrequent posting has got to stop, no more good excuses. The wedding in Japan was amazing, everything went off without a hitch and we just got back into New York. I'm in the middle of editing a crazy amount photos which I'll eventually be posting on my photo blog.

The commercial I directed before the trip is on the air now, so I'll be posting that too once I get everything together. More drawings on the way too!

Stay tuned,

Little doodle between files at work. 

I'm animating again.  It's been a while, since I've mainly been doing design work for the past year.  It's bound to eat up the majority of my time the next week weeks so I hope to be able to post at least a few sketches before the wedding.

The blog is in the middle of a bit of a redesign.  There's now a page bar at the top of the blog where you can no go directly to my current demo reel.  I'll be adding new pages as things calm down a bit more.

Scramble Time

Little break from posting lately, with work and the wedding just a month away I've been sitting on a few things I meant to post weeks ago. There's two weeks of ASIFA drawings I haven't compiled yet and even had to skip last week's session, which is a shame since I heard the model had a shaved head with a map of the world tattooed on her skull.

Bit of a preview of things to come:

Two sequences of new storyboards I meant to finish weeks ago that had to take a backseat for the time being. I hope to have the first sequence at least finished before the wedding. About 45 boards all told, thumbnailed and just waiting for me to get on with it. I'm doing them as a Sketchbook Pro exercise and the goal is to keep them fast and loose but atmospheric.

Boards, ASIFA sessions, doodles and a new fancy blog layout coming in the near future.