First Zbrush Attempt! LEAFS! SO MANY LEAFS!!

For my last project in my last computer animation class eeeeeeeeeeveeeeeeeer, we were allowed to do anything we wanted. After changing my idea three times I went with trying to recreate a 2D character into a 3D model. Betsy Bauer is a very close friend from Ringling and I've always admired her character design skills and her Tree Lady was one of my favorites that always stuck in my head. Instead of making her in Maya, I thought I would give Zbrush a try. Zbrush is a monster of a program that I have to figure out on my own but hey, with today's internet, 3D forums, other art peers and friends, and lots and loooots of tutorials, you could learn any program.

Zbrush just bugs me cause the stupid move hot keys are different than Maya's. After pushing the same three buttons for 5 years, it's hard for my brain to reteach itself to put the OTHER three buttons when I'm in a different program. This was my first time in Zbrush (duh) and I feel like my girl came out too smooth. She's missing the angles and "feel' of the bark skin of Betsy's. Oh well. With practice comes perfection! Til next time!

White Out

A little something I drew up in a night. Funny, I have another painting I'm fighting with currently and I have been for about two months now, but I drew this in a few hours and I like it a lot better. I feel like I need to step away from the other one for a while to refocus where I want to go with it. Hmm...

Anyway, I was talking to my mom over the phone (who lives in Russia and takes care of her mother) and I've noticed whenever I ask about grandma she always says the same thing. She says she's not doing well and she's always forgetting things. At first my mom was kinda joking about it saying how funny it was that she made two cups of tea one morning, and forgot that she already drank one. She said she was doing this because she's old (about to hit 96 if I recall) and I laughed along with her. "Oh Grandma. She's so silly."

But then my mom kept saying it over and over again and when I seriously asked her what was wrong she said she doesn't know, but Grandma can't stop crying when she tries to recall things. My mom knows she must be developing Alzheimer's and she has no idea what to do. I don't know what to do either which breaks my heart. I feel sorrow for my grandmother who used to be a teacher and always supported my mom in her art, but I also feel great sorrow and pity for my mom who is stuck watching this happen to her own mother.

My older brother who will go to Russia some time soon to visit will hopeful make the situation better. That's what he does, he swoops in to save the rest of the family as he has always done. I'm thankful that he's going to try, but I don't think there is anything he can do either besides make it easier for our mom. So here's to hoping and praying things will go smoothly for everyone. All my love to my grandmother, mama and brother.

Snow keeps falling down and before you know it everything falls into a blissful white out.

Come In My Friend! Come In!

A simple value study painting that was born from paint chipping away from a wood wall and a scribble. It was amazing fun. I did maybe 100 different scribbles to find 100s of different characters and 100s more in photos. These two made it to the final painting. I love saving progress to show how far one has really come from. =)

And here are are the chips and doodles in from it came from.

Update!

Hey there! Hi there! Ho there! Here are some things I've been up to in the past year!

It's me! Goodness I'm gorgeous! This is a characterture of myself for the upcoming lip-sync project. Mine's about how I have a horrible time mishearing things. That's what I get for turning my headphones up to 11.

Here's a turn around drawn out and the final result in Maya.
And a close up of mah' pretty little face. =)


Here's my Push Pull! And the Exaggerated. I dislike rigging and all the little problems it kept giving me and ONLY me.





The exaggerated one was much more fun to work on due to being able to pull off the Warner Brothers' Loony Tunes style of animation





And here's the little guys' model! I named him Jester cause nothing else seemed to fit. Maybe Robert...maybe.
Close up of his big nosed face. Honk honk.


Oh, and my Sit Stand from 09? My General Triton. Very French. Very goofy looking.




And here's his little turn around of his snooty fancy pants too.

That's all for now! Until next post with some of my paintings and drawings from Drawing for Animators class! Cheers!

Is That What I Think It Is?

If you were thinking of the Lnyx Penguin and that toy from the 80's, Robie The Robot Banker, then you are correct sir!

Some modeling projects to get the year going. I hated the penguin the first time around, I hated it even more the second time. Robie not so bad the second time around. But I found out this year that I want to model for a career. 

In Russia penguin model you! 

  

Watch the penguin go round and round.

Give him quarters and he'll eat you out of house and home. Well, out of laundry money, that's for sure. 

 

I thought I would be edgy and put the camera off to the thirds instead of the center. Turns out that was a ten point deduction. Oops.

Until next project!

I Told The Witch Doctor I Was In Love With You!

And the witch doctor he told me what to do! He said Go animate a walk, jump, and a turn, walla walla bing bang!

...That, um, that didn't rhyme as well as I thought it would. Well it's a good thing I'm not a song writer. Anyway, here is the last project we had to do for the first semester. Design a simple biped polygon  character. I was inspired by African masks that I saw and deiced to make my little guy just that; an African mask with legs! I love him  very much and I named him Kuluha. Thanks much to my gal pal Brittany who helped me come up with the design of the mask and colors. I had all these ideas in my head, and they just didn't LOOK right when I actually saw it on him. She helped me simplify it. Which is funny cause the project is a SIMPLE poly. Hmm...

                                            

                                            

And as always, here's the concept sketch of what I wanted him to look like. He lost the grass skirt cause I wanted to show off his butt. =) 

                                                  

Until next project!

Primitive Theater Update!

Well now! It's winter break and that means free time. So I'll be updating a bit more with things and jazz. Woo.

Here's the second project we did this semester- Primitive Theater. Where we had to design and come up with simple characters and simple story in less than 15 seconds or so. Took about...two months or so with the set staging and lighting and animation.

My idea was a little shrimp sushi fighting for his life against a pair of chop sticks. I love to see how different the story board first starts out and then going through the different changes. I think I had to change my story ten of fifteen times. So here's the final product:

And here was the initial storyboard: What a difference!  I do not envy storyboarders...