Modern Day Society.

I've been struggling to maintain my interest in this series of environmental pieces for ART401, and thankfully the project is nearing its end. Here's the modern setting for the previous piece, hundreds if not thousands of years later...

At least there's someone still holding a candle out there for him.

Here's the design I'm setting down for my DVD Demo Reel case. I'll probably be putting my Demo Reel, my Website, and my Resume at least, and maybe even other things as they come along.

The Ancient Past

Finally finished a solid concept drawing of an environment piece for my ART 401 class. I've never really had the sheer patience for environmental drawing, and I'm not exuberantly happy about this, but I'm glad I got it done and have something to begin making 'modern' for the next phase of the assignment.

Past, Present, Future

Ancient civilizations always need more kangaroos. Gonna be developing this piece into a fully finished work over the next few days. Then, we'll see how this civilization progresses to modern day and then the distant future.

Animation Planning!

Got a bit of homework done today, I've started planning out the animation for our 3D animatic for That Sinking Feeling, and managed to get some decent poses and sketches done. I have a total of 12 shots that I plan to give this sort of treatment and have animated by the end of next semester.

We're still hopeful to have a finished product by the end of the year, something we can all be proud of and begin our careers with. I'm still hoping to be in a position to do animation for a game, either Flash or 3D.

Cute, Cuddly, Catastrophic.

One of my main passions in life has got to be Giant Monsters. We've all seen them in movies that range from the Commentary of Nuclear Proliferation in Godzilla 1954 to the rubbery one-off villains in Mighty Morphin' Power Rangers. There's something about the sheer power that these villains (or heros, as Godzilla and Gamera have proven on occasion) wield that sticks around in the psyche long after the final frames have rolled off the spool. Most of my art and animation will likely have giant monsters as a theme running somewhere through it, and my sketchbooks are no exception.

The bigger they are, the more fun they can be drawn. I like to draw the "Three C's"; cute, cuddly, and catastrophic. Azrael the Kitraxian (sort of a hybrid between a fruit bat, lion, and falcon) happens to match all three of those criteria for me, and she's been something of an inspiration for me. I aspire to animate her in 3D someday, once I've accrued enough experience and free time to continue.

I maded you a castle...

...but I brokeded it.

Did some repolishing work on the Castle done last week, and tried to give it some 'before-after' treatment here... the Prince has returned home, but something has gone entirely wrong! He's been flung far into the future, in a world where he never returned in time to save his Kingdom... and now he must seek the answers locked in the past so he can save his own future.

Digital Paintover Shenanigans

For our ART 401 class, we were assigned to locate an untextured render of a place or general location, and paint over it to what we would like to see as the 'finished' version of the untextured work in progress. I came across a few candidates for some interesting scenes, but I settled on this one:

This was created by a chap that goes by the name of Ryu-Gi on Deviant Art, a student in California, if you're interested. I decided to take this untextured and interesting city and... spruce it up a bit:

I am not really an environment designer, and would much much much rather be animating characters than creating environmental pieces like this. I don't think our ART 401 teacher is quite in step with the rest of the faculty with their agenda, but it's hard to say no to the guy who designed Master Chief for Halo 2 and 3...

Yossarian Lives!

Just a few color sketches I'm working on for my ART 401 class. The project involves drawing three works from a literary source. I chose to draw three pivotal scenes from Catch-22. Definitely one of the more bizarre tales I've read, but shockingly accurate in its depiction of WWII bureaucracy and military incompetence in the face of capitalism and self preservation.

Bonus points if you can guess which major work of art I borrowed from to create these.

Nightcap Productions Logo

Just completed what I hope will be a perfect logo for our production team at school. Nightcap Productions!

Lars Attacks!

For my (Acting for Animation) ANI 300's first assignment, we were told to spend an hour doing observational sketching, 'emotion' sketching, and 'balance' sketching. Once we had done a few pages of thumbnails, we make the ones we liked best presentable, and then take a pre-rigged model of 'Lars' and pose him in our favorite sketch. It's a great little way to get ready for really acting out a scene and seeing how far you can push things in a sketch.

For my observational drawing, I was lucky enough to witness a little child throw a temper tantrum at the local grocery store. His defiance and desire to yell at Mommy for not getting a candy bar struck a solid pose, and I decided to see how Lars looked when he didn't get his way.

Observational thumbnails

Lars Want Chocolaaaaaate!

 For the 'Balance' sketches, I managed to come out with a decent smattering of interesting sketches of figures posing on precarious perches, but the package predicament persuaded me to pursue the power of posing Lars in perilous poise. Perfect.

Balance is crucial for telling a story and making it believable

You'd better hope that's not an egg, Lars.

I really think the 'Strength' poses were easiest. There's plenty of reference in a lot of video game characters and designs, but I wanted to vary things up with some sports and other ideas. I eventually settled on the 'Iron Cross' pose that's apparently quite popular in gymnastics... now just how long can poor Lars hold out in that pose?

Strength is pretty common in video games. Can you spot Ryu, Link, and Ganon?

Yeah. I got this... urgh... saywhenIcanleggoplease...

It might be a minor nightmare to actually rig up a model with the same mechanical precision that Lars has been. There's a lot of confusing code hidden under that marshmallow exterior, but perhaps one day I'll be able to puzzle it all out.

A Unified Look

Just experimenting with the customization capabilities of Blogger and Weebly. What do you think of the look?

I've completed the first draft of the animatic for our production, and I believe I've come up with an appropriate name as well. I would like to present:

"That Sinking Feeling..."

A new and interesting world...

Hello, and welcome to what promises to be a wild and wonderfully long journey. I have never attempted to comprehend this foreign and wonderful world of 'Blogging'. Now that I am creating one to further my impending career as an artist and animator, I am going to try and post my musings, sketchings, and interesting things that may (or may not) have occured to me as they happen. Bear with me as I learn how to use this interesting new outlet, and any suggestions would be welcomed! Thanks!

-Ryan Gates