Second Day of Class

First Live Q&A with Bobby Beck (l), Shawn Kelly (r), and Carlos Baena (not visible).

So, you can imagine my surprise when this morning, I go to the AM site where I had posted the 3 poses I did late last night (see last entry) to see some comments made by passerbys - and one was from Bobby Beck!! He had this to say: LOVE THE POSES. THE HAAHAA YOUR FUNNY POSE INTHE FIRST SKETCHBOOK IMAGE IS REALLY REALLY NICE. GREAT WORK.

I was so stoked! Not that I ever want to rest on laurels...

Which reminds me of the first time I was given a stellar critique from an artist I respected. It was the painter/fantasy artist Jim Christensen, who was in his last year of teaching at BYU. He was a lot of the reason I went to that school. Anyhow, I was a freshman and he was one of my foundation art teachers (I think it was the Value Class - teaching the uses of darkness and light in art) and had invited me to sit in on his Advanced Figure Drawing Class for graduate students. Of course I accepted and was soon drawing alongside very accomplished artists for no credit, but I was grateful for the experience.

So one day, later on in the semester, I was in his office - can't remember why I went to chat, but he sat me down and said, "I think you've got what it takes to make it as a professional artist. You will be very successful. Do you think I invite just anybody to my Advanced Figure Class? Do you see any other freshmen there?" I shook my head no. I hadn't realized I had been singled out... "But!" he said, "If you don't give 100% every time, if you think 'Well, I'm better than 90 to 95% of the people in this class' and don't push yourself, you will fail."

It was a huge reality check for me. It was a "Spider-Man moment" (with great ability comes great responsibility kind of thing). And after his class, I promptly failed to apply his advice and kind of coasted with good, but not my best work in the next foundation class with another professor. Live and learn, right? (Even Spidey had his moments of personal floundering...)

So Jim, I'm taking your advice to heart. No more half-jobs.

Getting back to AM, there are still some technical glitches with the site. The screen cap above is from the first Global Live Q&A session with the Founders (the "3 Amigos" I call them). Bobby is the one making the face. The session lasted for about 5 minutes or so before it froze up and everybody freaked out "Where did they go??!! What's happening?? AAAGGHHHH!!!!"

Ah well, modern life (and other inconveniences)...

My First Day of School

Stu in action.

Well, today was the first day of "class". The only assignments I have are to read the first three chapters of The Illusion of Life and get oriented with the site. I have had that book since I was twelve years old, or so, and i read it like it was holy writ. I even underlined key points lightly in pencil. So it's nice to revisit that classic material.

The actual site has had a few technical problems involving a "bunk license" for the software used to create the website. Gradually throughout the day, those problems seemed to be ironed out and everything seems accessible at this point. There are so many nooks and crannies to explore there - easy to get lost, but the orientation video was very clear about the setup and how to circumnavigate the virtual campus.

I had a long chat session with fellow student Kevin in South Carolina. He's in my group (under Charles Alleneck) and we just got to know each other a little better. I kind of feel like a contestant on the TV reality series "Survivor" or "The Apprentice" - busy making alliances and making moves to maximize my success in the program. Not that I'm trying to get anyone voted off - I'm just treating it as though the stakes were that high.

They have already provided us with our first fully rigged model: the lovely and talented "Stu". So I quickly got to work and took Bobby Beck's advice to do some poses. I had so much fun with it! I started with the far left pose, but I decided that interaction is always more interesting than static poses, so I added another Stu to the mix. NOW there's drama. What's going on here? Maybe Stu #1 forgot his pants when he left the apartment this morning...

Then I moved to something purely physical: leapfrog. Trying to convey the character of the movement in one pose, keeping the silhouette clear and the energy high.

And next I decided to tackle some full body contact. Everyone needs at least one hug a day, right? I think they are strong in terms of line of action and strong posing. Silhouette gets a little lost in the hugging image, but I think weight is conveyed nicely here - one really leaning, and one bracing the weight, stroking the other's head, "There, there, now, shhhhhhh... It's gonna be okay..."

I can't wait to start getting into introducing time as an element in all of this. That's the magic ingredient after all -- what happens before and what happens after, and what your mind tells you those relationships mean. Pure magic!!

My First Mentor

Charles Alleneck

So, I have been assigned a mentor for my first class at AnimationMentor.com: Charles Alleneck.

BIO: Charles is a graduate of the CalArts Character Animation Department, with a BFA in Character Animation and several short films under his belt. He worked briefly as a traditional animator on the television show The Simpson’s before coming to ILM to learn CG animation. Charles has worked at ILM for almost five years, with credit on seven feature films including "The Mummy Returns", "Hulk", and "Star Wars: Episodes II and III". He has served as a Directed Study Mentor for the Academy of Art in San Francisco, and has lectured on animation both in the U.S. and abroad.

I found after doing a simple Google search online that he did a traditionally animated short film called "Onion John" that did well at animation festivals. I read one person's review of it, saying that it was the funniest film of the bunch.

I'm in a group with 9 other people (that I know of so far) - most of them in the bay area, one in Phoenix, and one in Tahiti.

The site launched briefly at 10 this morning, but I guess they are experiencing a few technical issues, because now the site is inaccessible. This week will be mostly orientation and getting everything set up so we can get to animating as soon as we can.

My biggest task right now is to get on a schedule that optimizes my time. I will have to be very organized if I am to work full-time, do school, exercise, eat well, and take care of housework and not burn out. That will be an education in and of itself.

Incredibles DVD, Sutdent ID, and Bobby "Boom" Beck live chat

Well, it's a been a big animation day for me. I got my AM Student ID in an email today, so I'm officially logged into the system. Cant' access the website til the 28th though (classes got pushed back a week).

At work I've been listening to the director/producer and animators' commentaries on The Incredibles DVD. Lots of great information there. I was encouraged by something Brad Bird said; that it's been one of his "causes" to give inexperienced but talented animators challenging scenes. I think Cameron Miyasaki's scene of Helen and Voilet outside of the cave is what triggered the comment, which reminded me of the Finding Nemo DVD extras where Dylan Brown said how Cameron, one of the new guys, did great animation on the anemone. Quite a leap, going from animating tentacles to a key acting scene with poignant mother-daughter exchanges. Now, I know he did more on Nemo than that (some really great shots, actually), but Brad's point was that he likes to throw the new guys into the deep end and not cut them short by assuming they are not up to the task.

I think it would be daunting, for sure, but such an honor at the same time. It's like someone handing you their newborn baby and saying, "Take good care of her. I'll be back when she starts to speak." Aacck!! The responsibility!!

A lot of the guys on CGTalk (an online forum for CG animator types) that are AnimationMentor students have been busy, busy, busy - recreating and animating primitive models they have seen on the website... A LOT of bouncing ball tests, trying to get personality and entertaining movement in simple objects. I haven't jumped on the bandwagon yet.

Why? I guess there are a few reasons. I am going to dive in quickly and deeply when all this starts, and know that will take most of my time, so I want to get other things done before that happens (like paint the house, spend time with friends). I see it like I'm going off to boot camp (a fun boot camp, but still a lot of work). In the past, I would be animating bouncing balls with the rest of them, trying to get ahead, worrying that I would be left behind if I didn't maniacally eat, sleep, and drink animation. But I've turned over a new leaf. I trust them to teach me how to do this stuff RIGHT. I don't think I need to practice blindly. When they teach, I will take and apply the information. I'm encouraged that the tools will be already set-up. I don't want to waste my time figuring out what controls I'll need to get the results I want. That's not what I'm paying $2,000 a class to learn.

So I've taken a chill pill and am just getting ready mentally. I already know Maya, the program we will be using, so I don't have to worry about that.

What I have been doing is going through Richard Williams' book, The Animator's Survival Kit - I'm on page 145. I'm no longer thinking in terms of software, but trying to get the principles and mechanics of animation, of movement, down in my head. I drive to and from work acting lines of dialogue out in my head; observing the gestures I make with my hands, how my face and head and neck emphasize what I'm saying, trying the same lines other ways, whatever resonates and seems to fit the best; I notice where I put weight when I walk, or where my center of gravity is; I pull out my sketchbook at the gym lobby and quickly sketch out the unique qualities of the people around me.

That's the kind of homework I'm doing.

Tonight there was a live chat with Bobby "Boom" Beck, one of the founders of AnimationMentor and something that stood out to me was the importance of planning, planning, planning. He even quoted The Illusion of Life: Spend half your time planning and half your time animating. Bobby said you're ready to animate when you've worked everything out already on PAPER. Paper, not the computer.

I love that the "new" guys are emphasizing the "old" guys from the Golden Age of Animation (earlier Disney classics). It's very heartening. Walt's dream hasn't died with Disney, Co. thank goodness.

I'll post my personal critique of Robots from Blue Sky Studios soon (I saw it in Vegas over the weekend)...

Flying logos are not beneath me (yet)...

All work done in Maya 6.0 by kenshi.

So I just finished my first animation for a film. No character animation involved, but it was a good chance to put my modeling, lighting, shading, rendering, and animating skills to use. It's for my friends' newly formed film company and they needed it tonight because they are showing their documentary film "Pariahs" tonight at a fundraiser and wanted a slick intro for their film. Take a look at the finished product.

So the whole thing took 8 hours to do, start to finish, which includes 2 hours of rendering 150 frames. Last night from 8 pm to 4am this morning. Amazing how fast you work when sleep is on the line. I had already designed the logo in Photoshop and Illustrator, but I had to recreate it all in Maya in order to do the movement I wanted to incorporate.

There are some timing and shadow issues I still need to address (slow some things down, etc.) but I have time now that this pre-final draft is done to tweak it to my heart's content.

It was actually pretty fun, seeing how fast I could do this, working backwards so the final product would be finished first in case I ran into any technical problems. (That way they would have something at least to slap onto their trailer.) But things basically went without a hitch and I'm not that worse for wear (considering I usually need at least 8 hours of sleep to not feel like a walking zombie).

I'm supposed to be getting my Student ID# for AnimationMentor today, so I've been checking my email every few minutes like a jonesing crack whore. Word on the street is that the big studios are going to be keeping a careful eye on the work the students put out. Kinda feels like a reality internet show: "Who will be fired this week?" or rather, "Who will be hired?"

I'm going to work hard and do the absolute best I can. I am going to push myself like I've never pushed myself before. Only a week and a half til the ball starts rolling, but once it does, I'm hoping that it can't be stopped.

I've been accepted!

AnimationMentor.com's newest student.

I just found out late Friday night that I have been accepted into AnimationMentor.com 's program for Spring 2005. I can hardly remember the last time I felt so nervous and excited about something. Kind of odd to be feeling those emotions. I guess I've been coasting a little too long in my comfort zone.

Anyhow, classes start Monday, March 21st and go for a year and a half, so I'll graduate in September of 2006.

This blog will serve as a journal of sorts as I document my experiences, mainly so I can look back and (hopefully) see how far I've come. Who knows what the future will bring, but whatever happens, I'll keep dreaming big...