Poképeople

A little while ago, I started drawing people I knew as pokémon. (No YOU'RE a nerd.) The rule was the person's name had to sound like the pokémon in question. For instance:

Dave Rigley + Wiggleytuff = Rigleytuff

Alex + Snorlax = Snorlex

Lisa + Hitmonlee = Hitmonleesa

And here are some unfinished sketches of Snorlex, Rigleytuff, Poliroth (Dan Roth + Poliwrath), and Garyados (Gary + Gyarados)

I enjoyed these; they were just the right combination of terrible wordplay and stupid artwork. I may do more.

-alex

Starving Artist Gifts

One of the classic plights of the artist is to be asked for free artwork; the request is innocent enough, but sometimes born of a misconception that drawing isn't really work. This conundrum is turned on its head on gift-giving occasions, when the drawing that was really work didn't result in an abundance of real money. The fallback gift? Free artwork of course!

This one was for my ladyfriend on her birthday not long ago. Yeah, I know. Unbearable.

These were for my sister; the occasion of the first I forget, the second was for her birthday.

This one was a mother's day gift, for my mother. It's a drawing of my siblings and I. The faces came out a little creepy, but she liked it.

-alex

Rigging, part 2

Here are a few videos outlining the functionality of the Dan and Alex rigs. My internet connection being as feeble as it is, I had to reduce the size of the videos by half to ensure they would upload sometime this year.

First up: Dan. This video also contains an introduction to the subject and some anecdotes about the process. Dan was an interesting undertaking; I wanted to build a rig that could do whatever the students wanted. Naturally, this proved daunting, but ultimately very educational.



Next: Alex. Building on the feedback I had received with the Dan rig, I set about building the Alex character; trying to match the style and essential functionality while eliminating features he wouldn't make use of.



Finally: Boot hat. I wanted to include a snippet about this rig because while he uses elements from the previous two, he was designed for very specific purposes; built to be sturdy and work well in my pipeline.



And with that, I bid you good night.

-alex

Rigging, part 1

One of my big responsibilities at the GAIF was teaching Rigging; a task which involved learning a great deal about rigging, for starters. In the process, I recalled a major qualm I had had with my own education; that all students interested in animation were expected to build and rig their own models, or locate such rigs online. While this was good for building generalist skills, it resulted in talented animators working with inconsistent, unreliable rigs; and generally deciding they didn't want to be animators after all.

Enter these guys: Dan and Alex.

Working from a sketch my co-worker Dan Roth drew (he draws himself in a specific style, which I wanted to re-create.) I constructed the model of Dan. Later, loosely based on that style, I built a model of myself. (Note: the huge muscles aren't just a result of an absurdly high self-esteem; the students needed a character with different bodily proportions, and my scarecrow-physique wouldn't have cut it.)

I'll post more about the specifics of their rigs and a little about how they work later.

-alex

Boot Hat, Continued

And I am back! Here are those renders I promised.

I built him a simple but effective rig, for some nefarious, animation-related plans I have for him. More on that later. Also, here's a closer look at his horrific little stabbing implement.

-alex

Boot Hat

Here's Some of my more recent stuff.

This character, for obvious reasons, is named Boot Hat. (Mostly because he hasn't needed a better name yet.)  At the time I was doing workshops at high schools around the maritimes and needed a character to work with.

The tough part was the character had to be interesting enough to capture the attention of an impossible, inattentive group of high school students; but simple enough to model in an hour. That is, of course, impossible; but I came pretty close.

I started with this sketch, which I cleaned up in photoshop.

I modelled the whole character, saving incrementally after completing each major step or section. I cleaned up the files a little, and did the workshop like a cooking show. I would start in an empty scene, and block the character out as a cube. When I had shown enough of one step, I would open up the completed version from the list. This allowed me to jump ahead to a later point of the class was rowdy and inattentive, or jump to a part that was either more interesting or more informative, depending on the attitude of the class.

Eventually I got the hang of it, and when I found the time I polished the character up a bit, and can be seen here.

The story behind this guy, inasmuch as it exists, is that he`s a three-foot-tall warrior armed with elements from human society. He started one insomniac night when I realized, as you only can at 3 AM, what a fantastic hat a boot would make for a tiny little person. Note his pants; a pair of boxer shorts, his tunic; a torn basketball jersey, and his sword; half a pair of hedge shears (Thanks to my co-worker Dave Rigley for helping me come up with that.)

I am putting the finishing touches on a rig for him, which I`ll have a post about next week. At the moment I`m home for the weekend and have no access to my software, or any computers that can run it. Stay tuned for more interesting renders.

-alex

Sketchbook Junk

Here is some stuff that I drew.

I inked this one by hand, actually, and decided to color it in photoshop. Kinda surreal for me. I don't hate it though. 

I once compared 'motion controls' in games to being on a crashing plane with a sedated orangutan, putting him in the pilot's chair, and shouting instructions at hi from across the room. This needed to be illustrated.

Okay, so there's a long-running joke about zebras with a friend of mine. "If you were a zebra, everything would be fine." How do you become a zebra? Easy; just be a zebra. Then you're already a zebra, and everything is fine. We brought some religious arguments to a grinding halt this way.

I like drawing this big-chin guy, you'll see him pop up a lot.

Puppets

A friend of mine once approached me to make a simple, but promising puppet game for the iPhone with him. He asked me to design some puppets for him, so I sent him the some drawings:

When the drawing checked out, I started work on some models. The dummy and the marionette I never completed, as we both became busy with other things and never revisited the project. The sock-dragon and the angry muppet were coming along pretty nicely though.

This guy was sort of the unholy offspring of Grover and Oscar the Grouch. I called him Curmudgeonly Stan.

Some might ask "Is this the most fun you've had working on a character?" The answer is no; this is the most fun ANYONE has had working on a character. I love those floppy felt teeth.

This is one of those projects I'd like to revisit later.

-alex

Sub-Zero

Bight did a pitch for the mobile version of Mortal Kombat a while ago; the project ended up going to Other Ocean, so sadly I did not work on it. I did get to build a quick model of Sub-Zero for the pitch though. It was an interesting couple of days.

30 day drawing challenge

Back at Bight we did a 30-day drawing challenge; every day our art director picked a topic and we drew something on the subject. You should check out the results here.

I picked a few of my favorite submissions to post here:

Draw a 3-panel comic: (Little gruesome, sorry. It was a long day.)

Draw a body part:

Draw something from a fairy tale: This is Rumpelstiltskin, flying out the window on a soup ladle. Other variations depict him tearing himself in half. I tried drawing that one, but it was a bit too morbid and confusing. Even for me.

Design a tattoo: A tattoo reading "Tattoo" always struck me as a funny concept.

Draw an animal: Just your typical zebra, doing typical zebra stuff.

Create a pattern: Don't look too hard, you'll hurt yourself. The white space is zebras, the black space is dragons. An interesting undertaking, though both of their shapes were pretty compromised by the end of it.

 Draw something you hate: This merits some explanation. At the time, I was living in a seedy little apartment above a Greco/Robin's donuts in downtown Charlottetown. Downtown Charlottetown, at certain times of the year, is riddled with bums and buskers. Apart from begging for change, the principal forms of recreation are to a) Get very, very drunk, b) Weigh 700 lbs, sit on park benches, and stare at people; or c) Drive motorcycles up and down the street at all hours of the day and night.

Long story short; this is a drawing of downtown Charlottetown; depicting a combination of it's four most favorite passtimes, and also an Anne-of-Green-Gables hat.

Draw something from a video game: Henry Hatsworth, from his eponymous title, engaged in "Tea Time."

Draw something with your eyes closed: Heheheh. Yeah, I know. Sorry.

Draw an optical illusion: O could not think of an optical illusion, so I drew a number of things that kind of sounded like "optical illusion."

Illustrate how you think the world will end: This is me, hurling the planet into the sun. Don't worry, I don't actually plan on it. Yet.

Draw a plant: This is a rabbit-eating tree. And no, I have no idea.

Draw a friend: My trusty crowbar, Brunhilda.

Draw something from your favorite cartoon: Samurai Jack, of course.

Draw something you miss: Lego! I still have lots of it, just not much time to use it.

Draw your favorite food: Live bison, apparently.

Draw a monster: Off to work.

Draw your dream home: Behold, the underwater volcano moon fortress. I bought crayola crayons just for the occasion.




-alex

Dino Bandito

While working at Bight, I was commissioned by a friend to do a series of tutorials on introductory character modelling, texturing, and rigging. He had to be pretty simple, and made without any overly complicated tools. Stripping the process down to it's bare bones and and working around anything that couldn't be explained in simple terms was a challenge, and paved the way for the teaching work I would go on to do. He was a fun little side project.

-alex

And we're back!

Hello Blog! I'm sorry I have neglected you; but three years of steady employment has a way of distracting a guy. It wasn't you, Blog; it was me. But, I have accumulated some shiny new portfolio pieces, and over the next few days I'll be sending it all your way. You and me, Blog. Just like the old days.

So, the news. It seems I haven't updated you since... 2009. Wow. Okay, I got the job at Bight games, and worked there, quite happily, for about a year and eight months. I learned on the job more than I ever did at school, and met some truly inspiring people. Shortly before they were bought by EA, I was offered a position as 3D Department head at a school called the Gaming Animation Institute of Fredericton. 

Having had something of a lackluster educational experience, I was excited to help others not end up in the same boat; and the GAIF's policy of focused courses with industry input and realistic expectations appealed to me. I worked there for roughly a year and a half, handling an assortment of administrative, teaching, recruitment, course development, and general problem-solving duties. It was challenging, but I learned a lot, both about leadership roles and my field of expertise; teaching has this way of forcing you to understand your trade on a deeper level. It always amazed me that half a dozen students could find half a dozen new ways to break the same piece of software.

My days at the GAIF were very full, and often extended well into the night. While it is satisfying to go home at the end of the day having averted a list of disasters as long as your arm; I missed the studio environment, and the crazy studio people, and having time to work on my artwork. I submitted my resignation back in January, and that just about brings you up to date.

So goes the tale of the wandering art-monkey. Stay tuned Blog, I'll keep you posted.

-alex