the concept behind the madness

Oh yes, there is some (sort of) structure to my insanity, and I thought that it would be interesting to share it, so from now on I will be adding the concept drawings to the posts with softies. Think of it as a little trip inside my head :)So, here's how I started, just a little scribble on the side of my notebook at work (done whilst waiting for a render). I tend to only have two steps before making a softie, a quick sketch like this followed by a pattern made in freehand. The construction issues sometimes are solved during the pattern stage but, most often than not, I fix them while making the actual softies. I very, very, VERY rarely make prototypes as my work tends to consist only of one off versions. Sometimes it goes well, others, like a fish that was left half done and that is still waiting in softie purgatory, are left behind as I seem to have a very short attention span :P

... Well, here's the softie!

something cool

I first used photoshop when I was 15, I wasn't overly impressed by it... At that time it didn't beat my favorite box of crayons, so I stored the experience in the back of my mind and renounced computers as over glamorized type writers... Ironic, isn't it?
I was dragged back into the computer world and the ever present photoshop when I got my first job. I struggled with it, kicked it about, got pummeled by it, and amazingly enough learned to love it. Just look at my drawings and you'll understand what I mean....
So, it was with delight that I found this website in one of the many emails flying around the studio.
Click on the picture and have fun!

P.S: I still prefer my box of crayons...

presenting MiauMau

Hello everyone!
Here's a few drawings from my latest pet project... It is a bit of a "self-portrait", in a certain way it is more of a alter-ego, pretty much like Clark Kent and Superman. Basically if I put a pair of glasses on and change my hairdo, I should look something like these pictures!!
Scary!
Ok, enough silliness. These drawings represent the 6 basic facial expressions: Happiness, Hanger, Disgust, Surprise, Sadness and Fear, they also include the basic phonemes* that are used to do lip sync in 3d.
Hopefully, I will be able to show you the full 3d model pretty soon. Right now, Miaumau is still under construction and with the help of my bear and MacGio (a friend of ours, check out his website), this little kitty will finally see the light of day.

*Here's a little something something for you guys out there who either want to learn a bit more about 3d character animation...
If you have looked through several book about 3d animation you will find that they tend to use more phonetic blendshapes than the ones that I mention in this post. I tend find those unnecessary, they just seem to confuse me even more, and to be honest (in my point of view) don't really help when I'm trying to do lip sync, especially if I have to do it quickly.
It is better to keep it simple!
As Robert Browning used to say, "Less is more"

Lost projects

I was rummaging through my computer and found these drawings that I did awhile ago. They are concept drawing for a project that me and my bearfriend (check out his blog!!!) were concocting together.
It was called "Orson & Steve" and it was about an old obese chess playing Persian cat fighting against his owner brand new birthday present, an annoying and hyperactive chihuahua for Polly's affection. One of the interesting ideas that we had on this project was that each one of us was going to only animate one of the pets (I was meant to animate Orson and Ricardo would animate Steve) allowing our different animation styles to shine in that way.
If you are curious about how we got to these exact names for our short stars, well... We were looking for inspiration everywhere, and we stumble across the notion that Orson Wells towards the end of his life started to look like a fat Persian cat (don't mean to offend, I love the guy, he was a great master) so, we started to look for a chihuahua like real life actor and Lo and behold we got to Steve Buscemi (again I don't mean to offend, he's one of my favorite actors, but he does look like a chihuahua!!)

So, am I right or am I right?
Just click on the image above of Polly and the gang, to take you to a set of pictures.
Enjoy!!