Not yet

First of all, sorry to all of you who have been coming for a few days allready and have seen no update. Im having a few days of crunch time at work. But Im still sketching on my way there. Heres a little something I did just now before I head home to sleep.

Thanks to all of you who have been leaving comment these days.

And oh boy , tomorrow Ill comment on so many blogs! Have been trying to restrain myself since I hadnt even answer comments here.

Well, hold on. Real post when Im done with work!!

Hold on

Off to Anifest

Its been a long time since last post. I had friends visiting, a deadline, was sick a few days. Well, excuses.

Theres a few things I wanted to post before I left to Anifest. Its going to be great. Films during the day and concert and party in the night. Friends, Becherovka, Salmiaki, Jameson, guitars and animation. Cant wait.

I´ve kept on drawing in the metro, bus etc. Theres something about sketching that I just dont get from anything else. Its relaxing and thrilling at the same time. And that feeling when the wheels are allready turning and you just dont stop finding apealing things to draw. Its so good.

I was just thinking the other day that all this drawing around might have actually made me get better at it. I didnt realize until I rememebred the days when the only thing about drawing people was that they just moved too quickly. It would really anoy me. No one would hold a pose long enough! And all poses were so static. Now I cant stop seeing figures in contraposto, tilted waists, squashes and stretches. Not that Im able to put it on paper all the time, but it just feels good to remember those times. Now Im struggling with other problems, think I will always be.

These are all quick sketches done while commuting . In some I tried to use a broken line, trying to get rid of my tendency of laying it all down with as few lines as possible, which sometimes leads to a very flat drawing. I remember how I told one of my friends once (hola peibol) "Why your using 24 lines when you can just draw one??" We where just 14 or something like that and maybe I just didnt know what I was talking about.

I was wondering wether I should write this or not, but I guess I just will. Theres some sort thing going around in the "blogger community", at least to me, that I really dont like. Its like this thing ..Well, I dont know how to explain. It just looks like your commenting on peoples blogs so they go check your blog out. And of course you really want that to happen but it is not your goal when you post. So its like your expecting something when you praise someone´s work. So I was thinking about not writing this but I will:

I´ve been really impressed/influenced by Nick Sung´s and James Robertson´s artwork lately. They really are the kind of guys that you look up to, learn from and make you want to improve. They have been blowing up my mind post after post. and it just gets better and better.This sound like cheap ass-licking, but its just the way I feel it. Thank you for the inspiration.

Ive been wanting to post for so long, and now that I see these I dont really like them. Next time, itll be better, I promise. Now I have a MOLESKINE :)

Amsterdam

Its my fourth day in Amsterdam. Im here with Pablo visiting my sister. Having a great time. This city is just great. I should come live here for a few years sometime. Too bad, I havent been able to draw as much as I would have liked.

We went to a few museums (de gratis, gracias ,banana), Rembrandt, Van der Weiden, Van Gogh but I couldnt help it. I had been there before a year ago. I checked my favourite paintings and then I couldnt resist. I was drawing people instead of looking at the paintings! It was like sketching glory that museum!Lots of people, not moving much, interesting body languaje.wow...

Heres some drawings from prague and one from the museum. No scaner here in Amsterdam, so you'll be getting some more digitalcamera/mousecoloring glory.

Lets see if I can make some drawings of these great city's streets today

I´m happy + Sun shined today

Wow, time just goes so fast. Weeks keep flying and I never find the day to do some personal animation. You can take the sketchbook with you wherever you go and just sketch, but I dont want to start any portfolio animation without puting the right planing into it. I know it pays off in the end.

In this bunch I used a chipsel pen I bought last week, I like the feel a lot. But thinking about shadows and line thickness leaves very little brain for other stuff like pose, expresion etc. Like its not hard enough to try to get them right usually. But the change of materials was a nice blow of fresh air.

Here are some ef last weeks sketches. Of course I couldnt resist PSing them a bit (No wacom, mouse and lasso) Its just like when you would colour stuff as a kid, now worries, just having fun fooling around.

Hope you like them.

Ups and Downs

This weeks rumblings

1. Sometimes I just can´t work.
2.I´m addicted to Band of Brothers



...Guess point one and two can be easily related.

Here´s a few more from the sketchbook after being PSed.







Still trying to "capture the pose/essence". The guy with the newspaper, however, looks completely like I was not working enough on shifting "mental gears". By the way, gonna get the book printed soon, the mental gears one, not that I´m going to print any of my stuff. mmm This is getting confusing...

Sketches

So I finally dared drawing in my brand new sketchbook. Hardcover, good binding, good paper. I thought I was over the days in which I wouldnt dare to draw on good paper. But no.

I havent been very inspired this last week. But I decided I had to get over it. I went through some of Stanchfield´s notes again, man is he inspiring, and a new sketching day begun today.

I really tried to concentrate in capturing the pose, forgeting about folds and details. Just the esence. Well, not that Im there allready, but I kinda feel today was a small step. And that feels good.

Do you feel good because you draw or do you draw because you feel good? I still dont know.

So here are the ones I like the most.

This time, instead of puting the sketchbook back in the bag while transfering buses/metros, I kept it in my hand ALL the time. And did it pay-off. I felt like a sniper scouting for my next victim.

I hadnt though of the psycological value of the size of the sketchbook. This one is way bigger than the last one and it shows, its obvious you are drawing, I couldnt hide it behind the backpack anymore. Now it feels like "HEY, look at me! Im sketching!"

Hope you like them. And comments are really apreciated.

Life Drawing...

So finally, I went to do some life drawing. Theres no teacher or anything, just a bunch of people who like to draw.

Man am I rusty. In fact, its just that I have to get better, not that I ever was really good at it. They started with some 1 min poses, but sadly they only did a few of them. Didnt feel like asking for more since it was my first day and I dont really know the people. Hope I can get to draw more of those poses in the future. I think its what I need.

So, theres nothing from that session that I dont feel really embarassed about, but since I said Id post some pics next time, here are some really old sketches.




And check this website out. Its when I see these kind of things when I get amazed and frustrated at the same time. How am I ever gonna be able to do hand drawn animation if I cant get to draw a single pose?

I´d ordered some books last month and a bunch of them arrived today, all at the same time. Great

I got the Jack Jack Attack children book, with drawings from Tony Fucile. It´s only a few pages, but the drawings are 100% Mr. Fucile with great poses and effortless looking drawings.

I also got Unlikely by Jeffrey Brown. First time I saw any of his books was in a comic store in Germany. "Clumsy" was the one I saw. I flipped through a few pages and I had to buy it. His stuff is so sincere and gets you so hooked that you just can´t the book down. I really liked Unlikely.

There was another package, this one not from Amazon but from Sam Hiti. I got the books through his web. He was really cool and send in an extra comic and did sketches on the first pages on the comics. The comic I liked the most was "El Largo Tren Oscuro", really inspiriong stuff.

There´s something special in buying the stuff from the artist itself that I really like. We even exchanged a few e-mails and he was kind enough to add me to the links in his blog. Thanks again from here.

I really like Sam Hiti´s style. I was inspired after reading the comics and did a couple of ink and brush doodles, I hadnt picked up the brush in a long time.


So that´s it for today. Animation/drawings next time.

Doodles

Hello hello everybody!! Im about to finish my scene and theres a party in school later! Good things are happening. Now that I have a host, Ill start building up my portfolio. Its going to be tough to decide what things to leave out, I have so many sketches and doodles. Its been some days without any updates, so i thought it would be nice to post.

When I dont know what to draw I tend to do the same kind of face and I ALWAYS start it the same way: eyebrow first, then the eye, etc. Its quite easy to fall in the trap of drawing the same thing everytime, and I think its happening to me lately. When I draw this faces I always draw them in the same way, I dont think in terms of mass or volume. But I kinda like the end result, so its pleasing, but theres no "learning" in the process. Well, dont know if Im making sense.

I think most of us have this kind of doodle we are obssesed with, this head, animal or whatever that we keep on doing. Here's a video of me drawing some of those faces I was talking about. You can see theres not much thinking, just the same thing over and over with some slight changes. I noticed how much I doubt when I start drawing the neck are on the third guy. I knew I had to do my homework on head connecting neck and torso, but seeing the video again, just makes it more evident. Oh, and of course I don't draw that fast. :)

I dont know how many people actually read this, I mean, I know how many times this page is loaded but not how many people actually follow the blog. I know theres some really talented people coming here. Id love to see/know what it is that you constantly draw, and it would be amazing to see a video of you in action!

Yuhuuuuuuuu!!

I now have a host! Im so happy about that.

So the after effects sketch is here and if you feel like it you can check out how things looked like before putting them together, here, and a view of the after effects workspace, here.

First time that I do this, so hope there´s nothing wrong.

I have a host!

After Effects doodling

I could finally take some reference with my camera and download the pics and videos that were on the card. There was this house or cottage I saw one night after getting out of a pub that really striked me. It was so...I dont know, it was begging to be turned into something, an animation, an illustration. So I started playing around with it in PS, one thing led to the other and there I was again fooling around with After Effects until pretty late. Id calle this an "aftereffects sketch". It gives me some design ideas to try out in the future. And of course next time things will be much faster, I just need to plan things beforehand.

So here are some frames from the short thing. I wont post the video until I have a host, it really bugs me to put up lowres versions of the videos.

technorati tags: after effects animation

in the meantime...

Tryed to buy the cable for my camera today. They don´t have it. I really want to start working on the AE Workshop thing. I have some ideas, but I certainly need reference . I´d go sketching but it´s cold.

I´ll try to post some animation soon. Here are some recent doodles. I still struggle with giving life to my characters, they´re so...well, yeah, lifeless. I´m a bit afraid of doing full figures, I´m so bad at it. But I think I should start to do more story oriented drawings, not just faces. Oh, by the way, this month I should get my "In Your Face" and "Flight 2" books! Really want to have them.

And check the new links, the last ones, some amazing stuff there to see.

Pojd´te Pane Budeme Si Hrát

This is one of my favourite animations. Directed by B. Pojar and created in the "golden ages" of Czech animation, it has excellent character design, amazing animation, charming characters and well, I could go on for ages. I simply love these cartoons. They combine puppets, paper and cell cutout animation, sand animation, everything. Many of the things in these films,if not all , hold up today. Here are some screen grabs. I think these cartoon should be more known. For all of you who like 50´s animation, I think theres some really inspiring stuff here. You just cannot appreciate the thing in its full glory if you dont see the thing moving, but here are the screengrabs.

Speed paint

Quick update.

I started doodling around while taking a break from animating and this came out. I wanted to have a guy on a horse waving at the camera, like he was telling his friends " hey, we finally found the lost city" or something. Well, I ended up doing a cow/some animal. Should have worked on the silhouette to make it readable. No reference. Oh, and check the Monkey Island/Fate of Atlantis/Beneath a Steel Sky version here. I´ve been doing this to my stuff lately, it gives it such a old school games feeling.

higher res

Lots of lemons

This week has been a bit frustrating. A walk I wanted a character to do made me crawl on my hand and knees. Just a walk! I couldn't move forward in days. Eventually I had to give up and move on. That and the fact that the rig went crazy sometimes and made me start over from scratch has made for a lot of lemons. I could do lots of lemonade this week. (If you don't get the whole lemon thing go to the great site Seward Street and check out Dave Pimentel´s great article. Or click here )

So looks like I should forget about acting which is what I really really want to get into and start working on walks. Ken Harris said that was the way to go. Guess I should first get that right.

And from now on I´ll post here every little thing that I learn and makes me go "ah HA!!".I didn´t have a solid animation education so I had to learn almost everything myself. Books, tutorials, internet. So I´ll just share the things I find out on the way, maybe someone actually learns something!

So: I found out today that you can get rid of the strobo effect of a character walking on twos over a background moving on ones if you move the character every frame. Just move the pose/drawing, displace it. Even if the pose is the same, as long as it is moves on ones, it will work. Maybe someone didn´t know.

And some doodles. Mouse colored! Hope I can post something more juicy next time.

New links!

check them out. sooo good (cant help remembering Syndrome saying it when he finds the whole family)

Walt, Mayaa nd no sleep

Every week is like a new adventure. I've learned more in a few days than what I've learned in a lot of time. So many times I said “ I'm sure you learn so much faster if you have a job, it'll not be like making a few sketches here and there, or doing some animation test every now and then, you really have to get things done ”. Well, it's so true.


Only this week I came to realize how true the book is to it's title. It really was my “survival kit”. Man, that book is good. I ordered “The Illusion of Life” a few days ago. I'm so looking forward to getting it.


I've been trying to sketch quite a lot lately. I downloaded Walt Stanchfield's notes. I've been going through them. I knew they were around, but I really didn't know how good they were. James Robertson pointed me to them. I really admire his drawings, so straight away I went check them out. It has been a real eye opener for me. Really changed the way in which I approach a drawing. I'm still working on it. I'm trying to develop that cartooning sense that I admire so much from the artists that I like. I also want to tell something with what I draw, have a story in them. But, boy, is that hard. It's going to be a long way, but it just feels good knowing where I want to go. I dont really think you can feel any difference in my drawings. yet.

Rigs, sketches and frustration.

Hello everybody!

This week has been quite strange. I had to do 40 seconds of animation in 5 days. To me thats a lot. I was working for the whole night yesterday, didnt sleep and went to work. The thing is, the rig was doing strange things, I didnt really know at the time it started to happen, but it seems it goes a bit crazy if you switch from FK to IK and viceversa. So after keying all my keyposes, Maya would go completely crazy and my poses looked liked shit.

After too many hours without sleeping, I had nothing. But I have a super cool boss, he fixed the problem and gave me some more time.

While I was waiting for the program to render or when I got completely frustrated, I tryed to relaxe, looked at some pics/drawings/paintings from the artists that I like and sketched. This are the ones that I like most. As u can see, I really need to start drawing poses, not only heads. And yeah, I tend to draw them always the same. Have to keep on practicing!

It also looks like Ill be giving an After Effects workshop in the animation studio. Im really looking forward to it, and its also pushing me to do some little animations. Hope I can show something soon.

And I still cant believe Im feeling so bad, Its hardly been 30 hours with no sleep. The days where I could spend days without sleeping are gone...Am I getting old?...

ais....

oh!

I forgot! and this guy I drew while the AE thing was rendering. Now I have a bunch of blank papers on my desk, so I can draw while the computer is "thinking". For some reason I like this one.