I’m blogging on all things animation including progress with my class projects, interviews with fellow artists and cool sites I think you’ll find useful.
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My ANI421 Animation Mechanics Class
ANI421 is the first of the new cohort of courses for the Master of Arts in Animation program that was recently split of from the Master of Science in Cinema program. Animation was previously just a concentration of DePaul’s College of Computing and Digital Media‘s cinema curriculum but we now have our own standalone degree program as of this fall 2011 quarter!!!
Our professor for this class is Scott Roberts who heads up the animation program within the School of Cinema and Interactive Media. He’s a renowned digital artist in his own right so we’re getting the benefit of a wealth of experience.
Scott has us focusing on the fundamentals of effective animated motion. We’re digging into the details of many of the 12 Principles of Animation as outlined in The Animator’s Survival Kit. Our other reference is Timing for Animation which is helping us learn how to move different parts of the body at different speeds.
At this point at least we’re focused on using stick figures in Flash to be sure we nail down the principles. Some of my classmates are really accomplished artists so they are beyond stick people. Drawing on a monitor is definitely different than drawing on paper but I plan on getting beyond the stick people too before the end of the term as I get more comfortable with sketching poses in the software. In the meantime I’ll share some of what I’ve made so far.
After four weeks I’m really getting a lot out of this class. I’ll be able to apply this to any of my future 2D and 3D work. Can’t wait to see what’s next.
My ANI460 Animation Graduate Seminar
For the fall quarter of 2011 I will take my third class with one of my favorite professors, Lisa Barcy. Much of it will be an overview of the animation industry and careers. It’s going to cover a lot of aesthetics and cover some international styles. Our first night of class we looked at a Japanese short film and a slightly longer Czech film so she has us hitting the ground right from the start just the way I like it. Lisa is our main stop motion professor. If you’ve never seen her work before this one is my favorite. Check it out.
During our “getting to know you” introductions I learned that we have a couple of working animators in the class as well as a few people with an interest in comics, something that has been recently rekindled in me. Plenty of opportunity for collaboration and to learn how to make the transition from classroom to the animation workforce by people who have done it and are doing it.
Lisa is also making us spread our wings and see more of the local arts community outside our campus walls to events at venues like the Gene Siskel Film Center, Columbia College and the School of the Art Institute of Chicago. We’re also going to have professional animators including some of our own DePaul College of Computing and Digital Media professors as guest speakers in class and off campus. I’ll give a plug to my advisor Alexander Stewart who is curating his second Eyeworks Festival of Experimental Animation (this year’s URL coming soon).
We’ll also have lots of good reading and reaction papers to the reading and to films that we screen in class. Each of us will give informal presentations of subjects that we’d like to explore further and final animated projects because although this isn’t a production class it is ultimately it’s about producing some work. I’m thinking about doing something with a superhero character especially since I’ve been inspired by all the comic artists I’ve met this summer. I’ll keep you posted on that when we get closer to actually planning projects.
Lisa is starting us off with the first couple of chapters of “A Short Guide to Writing About Films” as a compliment to writing our papers more effectively and we’ll be using “Animation in Process” to learn about a variety of aesthetic approaches to the animation craft.
It’s going to be another great term and I’m going to soak it all up in sponge-like fashion. Of course I’ll share some of my papers and projects with you guys over the next ten weeks so leave comments and tell me what you think as we go along.
The 501st Legion Invades Chicago ComiCon 2011
Couldn’t bring yourself to to throw out that old plastic light saber? Neither could these guys. The Midwest Garrison is a branch of The 501st Legion (Vader’s Fist) a non profit costuming group of Star Wars re-enactors who raise funds and donate to causes for children. They also dress in costume to entertain youngsters and bring a little joy to their lives.
Darrell Hargrove made the hyperjump from the Midsouth Garrison in Kentucky to join his fellow Illinois stormtroopers of the Midwest Garrison at Chicago Comic Con 2011 and tells us more in this interview.
These guys and girls have as much fun as the cosplayers only more often. If you want to channel your inner child while doing good, consider joining a 501st Garrison near you.
I Met Real Life Superhero Yorli Huff at Chicago Comic Con 2011
How many people get to tell their life story in heroic illustrated fashion? Yorli Huff is one of the few among us who can make that claim. Yorli is one of many people in the comic industry that I’ve connected with and been networking with on Facebook and I got to meet her in person during Wizard World weekend.
It’s funny how we finally crossed paths on the convention floor. I was walking with my head down taking notes or fidgeting with equipment or some such thing and someone walking the other way down the aisle shoved a couple of cards in my hand. I looked up and it was Yorli and her artist Derrel Spicyy handing out Special Agent Phaedra shields and Veil of victory placards.
I looked up and realized that it was her in the flesh and I said “Hey Yorli, I was coming to see when I can interview you.” We shook hands and she said “Give me ten minutes. I’m going to get an autograph from Pam Grier.” Couldn’t argue with that (LOL) and I caught up with her and Derrell at her at her table a few minutes later.
As you can see from the interview Yorli is a busy lady. She has the comic book and her real life story The Veil of Victory. Also be sure to friend her on Facebook to keep up with her latest public appearances.
Secrets of the Superstars at Chicago Comic Con 2011
The Secrets of the Superstars panel hosted by Glass House Graphics artist agency CEO David Campiti featured two of Marvel Comics finest in a discussion on secrets of the comics business. His international talent company helped launch the careers of panelists Mike Deodato (Secret Avengers) and Will Conrad (X-Men) and all three shared thoughts and answered questions.
Some general tips from the trio included:
- Create a portfolio with the characters of the company you want to work for. They want to see if you can draw their universe.
- Tell the story with as few words as possible because you will be limited by word balloons.
- Omit common American phrases because you are writing for an international audience.
- Learn to draw poses with shadows and practice drawing the folds in clothes.
- Use reference images or personal photographs of things that interest you to practice drawing.
It’s great advice and simple to apply. These guys obviously enjoy what they do and get a lot of pleasure out of being comic artists as you can tell by this video from the Glass House Graphics web site.
As you might expect from top flight professionals both Deodato and Conrad are self taught artists (most comic artists seem to be) but they both continue to study in order to constantly improve at the craft.
Mike emphasized that knowing more can only help you by making you more versatile. One response to a particular question was that a tool is a tool and you should become as comfortable with as many traditional and digital drawing tools as possible.
Will Conrad shared his typical day with us. His day can start with taking the kids to school then getting home to work from 7:00AM to 12:00 noon. He’ll take a break for a little while and get back to it from 2:00PM to 6:00 or 7:00PM. Then he’ll allow a longer break for family time and life and he’ll hit it one more time from 11:00PM to 1:00AM. As a parent and a graduate student I can identify and his answer was very affirming too me.
David gave great tips on how to assemble a sample test plot before submitting a portfolio. His company has a wealth of information on the process so you guys should definitely read up on it if you’re serious about breaking into the industry.
Secrets of the Superstars was a great panel. I can apply much of what I learned and I hope that you can do the same.
What I Learned About Tom Nguyen’s Style of Inking At Chicago ComicCon 2011
One of the best parts of Comic Con is the hourly information presentations you can attend on all sorts of comic related subjects. One particular subject I wanted to learn more about is inking and D.C. Comics inker Tom Nguyen is one of the best in the industry. I got a chance to sit in on his session “Tom Nguyen’s Style of Inking” Friday afternoon at Chicago Comic Con 2011. Don’t know what an inker is? That’s the second person in the creative process of making a comic book or graphic novel. The penciler draws all the panels and then they hand it off to the inker who makes the dark outlines, shadows and backgrounds. The letterer handles the lettering including thought and speech bubbles along with effects lettering and the colorist finishes it off to bring the page to life.
Tom shared a lot including the tools he uses and his daily routine. One of the cool process things he taught us is the fact that comic artists never create at comic size. Everything is done on an 11 X 17 Bristol pad. When each artist has done their part the Brystol is reduced to comic page size for publishing. The Brystol page has a cardstock type of texture. That’s probably because it’s going through so many artist’s hands before reaching the publishing stage.
Some inking tools include Micron pens which come in a few different sizes. He said Sharpies are good to use for concept art but not serious inking because you can encounter bleeding issues and the tips get blunted with use. He also noted that technical pens are good for drawing mechanical objects and borders.
Tom prefers to use brushes (size 1 or 2) with India ink though. Windsor and Newton is his favorite brand but he said it’s not necessary for a beginner to use a top of the line brush like that while learning the craft. He mentioned that some inkers like to use crow quill pens because they give you great control over line variation but they’re not for him as the tips wear out so quickly. He also uses brushes for black fill in. When working digitally he fills in the blacks with the Photoshop fill bucket. White-out pens or thinned white acrylic paint are commonly used to correct errors.
The final tool in the inking process is the prep work to pass it on. That requires a scanner and Tom uses a large format Epson scanner. After this point the pencilers and inkers usually work out personal agreements on how to split the original art. Sometimes they keep it for themselves and other times they sell it. Inks are actually some of the coolest for sale work in artist alley at the convention.
It was also good to learn about his daily routine and personal journey into the profession. He makes it his goal to complete one page a day and while he’s working he likes to listen to music or documentaries. Not watch documentaries, just listen to them (LOL).
Tom got into the field at the age of fifteen by working with D.C. artist Doug Mahnke in Minnesota. A few years of that was enough to get him started full time at the age of nineteen. His answer to the question “what if you don’t know anyone in the industry to get an internship” was to attend conventions and show your work there. You can ask for critiques from the pros on the spot or online. People asked lots of good questions and Tom made lots of other great points during the session.
He capped it off by giving us a demo of inking in Photoshop with a quick Batman sketch. Using his digital tablet and stylus he mentioned that he uses the default brush settings. He doesn’t bother with creating his own. The most interesting technique pointer was that changing line width when you encounter a change in direction on the shape or character makes it look more dynamic (he said to think “thick-thin, thick-thin” while working) . Techniques like that are what makes the inker more than just a tracer of the penciler’s original work.
Another cool part of his Photoshop demo was the way he used the lasso tool to make corrections. Most of us who use the software only think to use the lasso to delete a section of a layer or to move the lassoed section to a new layer. He used it to reposition a couple of sections of the Batman face and edited it back together using the eraser or clone tool (I don’t remember which) and then redrew where he needed to reconnect the shifted parts of the face.
It was a great choice of a first session for me and I walked away with some ideas that I can immediately apply in animation school this fall and going forward in my career.
Tom isn’t a one dimensional artist. Among other things he’s an accomplished photographer as well. Check out his photography site here. Also keep up with Tom’s projects on social media via his tweets at @tomnguyenart.
Behind the Scenes of My Interview With Illustrator, Animator and Logo Designer Russ Cox
The interview you’re about to watch was one of the potential subjects of my final project during the Spring 2011 quarter at DePaul University’s College of Computing and Digital Media (The CDM Baby!). The task assigned by my DC489 “The Big Picture” course professor Dan Pal was to interview someone in the entertainment business. Russ Cox, owner of Smiling Otis Studio was one of two artists I contacted who agreed to a live interview.
I contacted him through LinkedIn. That won’t surprise those of you who know I am huge believer in the power of social media for networking. I don’t exactly recall how I came across Russ’s profile, probably a LinkedIn group, but two things caught my attention. First was his profile picture with one of his characters popping out of the top his hat but also his hilarious bio (read the funny Summary section). His summary is so well written that I rewrote mine in narrative form as he had done. I realized it’s O.K. to use humor in your profile even on a forum as professional as LinkedIn so my Summary isn’t stiff like the original version.
At any rate that was the impetus to formally connect our profiles then I messaged a request for an interview. He was happy to help an emerging fellow artist and we worked out the details. Take a look at the interview and I’ll continue with the backstory on the other side.
The method I arranged for was a recorded Skype interview via the VOD Burner system. VOD Burner is a downloadable program that connects to your Skype video call and records it. You can then save and edit the video conference in a variety of formats. I’m a Skype pro but this was my first time using the recording program and I had a couple of issues that I needed to work around.
Although Russ and I were able to see each other and converse through our computer cameras VOD didn’t record my half of the video portion. It processed my audio just fine but you’ll notice in the two panel layout that the left side is green opposite Russ’s video on the right. My face should be where the green is. Somehow it didn’t work out. Don’t know if I didn’t have the settings correct or if the program flaked out but it called on my sense of creativity to make it work.
I initially imported the VOD Burner files into Adobe Premier Pro, my favorite film editing package. For some reason Premier Pro and VOD were not agreeing with each other (I won’t bore you with the time wasted on figuring out how to process the VOD interview footage into a useful format). For some reason Premier Pro garbled the QuickTime files. Never had that problem before, nothing but a headache this time. Adobe After Effects wound up being the tool for the job.
Since my smiling face was nowhere to be seen I inserted a series of images into the left panel and used the green as border for each of them. In the middle segment you’ll see a transition to a single screen. I simply moved the dual panel to the left centering Russ’s face on the screen and inserted black layer over the green panel. Then it switches back to the dual screen layout for the last part of the interview. This forced technical adjustment helped me to give the interview some additional visual interest. Plus, I now know how to do multiple video layouts within a film intentional for future projects.
The other adjustment that took some time figuring out was how to adjust the VOD default frame rate (30 frames per second OR fps) to the standard 24 fps that I’m used to. Didn’t know how to change it on the VOD side and neither Premier Pro nor After Effects could adjust it after I imported the files. These differing settings resulted in the audio and video being out of sync.
I finally figured out that I had to use two copies of each segment as individual tracks, one track for audio only (by turning off the video) and the other track for video only (by turning off the audio). This allowed my to slide the audio track ahead of the video by a few frames in order for words and mouth to match up again. Five frame seemed to do the trick. With all manner of audio visual trickery I finally got it to where it needed to be. Such is the life of animators and film makers. Obstacles sonstantly present learning opportunities to get the job done.
I hoped you enjoyed the interview and learned a lot from Russ as I did. And if you’re an Adobe software user be sure to save this post for reference in case of future problems of your own. Leave comments, tell me what you learned or tell me what you thought of my aesthetic choices and workarounds.
Marty and Marcie Are Going to Wizard World Chicago Comic Con 2011
Marcie Hill and I will be nerding out on the floor of the Donald E. Stephens Convention Center at Chicago Comic Con 2011 this weekend, August 11th through 14th in Rosemont. The doors officially open Thursday for a few hours but the big fun is actually Friday through Sunday. There will be some local comic artists, writers and even a character model there that I know and we’re hoping to see them along with many others.
Lots of stars like Louis Gossett Jr., Christopher Lloyd and Patrick Stewart will be there at different points during the weekend, along with panelists covering a variety of specialties. I’m going to hang out in the artsy meetings (comic book inkers, cartoon artists and the like) and Marcie is going to check some of the more literary and other cool sessions.
We’re looking to take pictures and video and share an interview or two with you. Marcie is going to be doing live blogging and tweeting so Follow her Marcie_Hill Twitter name. I’ll likely tweet from my MartyBLOGs name and I’ll have more full length posts in the days and weeks after this weekend. We’ll cross link and share those with you in the coming days.
Of course you can always come out to Rosemont and join in the fun yourselves as well. If not, we’ll keep you posted on what you missed.
Behind the Scenes of My Interview With Keisha Jordan
Our final project assignment for my DC489 “The Big Picture” class was to interview a person in the field of entertainment. I organized my project by prospecting my LinkedIn connections list for potential interview candidates. I specifically researched some of the artists that I have reached out to via social media and found a couple of candidates with interesting profiles whose careers I wanted to know more about. Senior Art director Keisha Jordan of Common Ground Marketing was one of those who responded.
A couple of things stood out about Keisha. First, her artsy profile picture caught my attention. Instead of a head shot she uses a hand sketch of her face as her profile picture on LinkedIn. That instantly made her stand out from pretty much everyone else on my list (See why you should never leave your profile picture space blank?). It was proof enough to me that she was a serious artist so she was an immediate candidate. The other factor was that we could talk shop about the digital tools we use for our different artistic pursuits. Here’s the interview. Take a look and I’ll continue on the other side.
I mention the effectiveness of a good profile picture for a particular reason. In the case of scheduling Keisha for filming we agreed to meet at the Harold Washington Library. If you’ll take a close look at her sketch, it looks just like the lady in video. I knew exactly who she was as she stepped off the escalator and we headed to our meeting room. If you have any artistic leanings I recommend you use her idea as inspiration if you want to try something a little different for your profile.
As far as project logistics flowed, we rearranged chairs in the meeting room to stage her against one of the walls. I asked more questions than included in the final cut because I had a fifteen minute time limit for the class presentation so you’re hearing about 1/3 to 1/2 of them here. I used my SONY Handycam for filming and had Keisha reposition her chair so I could include a couple of different perspective views of her in the final cut of the film.
For post production I imported three clips of film into Adobe Premier Pro. I typically use After Effects just because I’m used to it but it’s not really a complete film editing program. It’s specifically designed for effects and animation and happens to have some good basic film making features. Premier Pro though is Adobe’s full fledged editing package (all the cutting, audio, color correction and other features of Final Cut Pro for you Mac people) so I made the choice to jump in and use it full tilt for the first time.
After filming, Keisha provide me a few PDF’s of some of her digital ad work and some personal paintings which I faded into the film at different points to demonstrate her skills. The white walls of the meeting room made for a lot of glare in the film so I was able to use color correction to ramp it down. In my first rough cut of the film I created a QuickTime and imported it into After Effects to create opening and closing credits on either end of it (again, because I was used to doing that in After Effects). Fortunately I got bumped to another class day on the presentation rotation and my copy of Adobe Premier Pro CS4, Classroom In a Book arrived in the mail so I learned how to use the title feature within the package to create the credits. So this is my first fully contained Premier Pro production.
I enjoyed this project because I was able to expand my technical skill which as always the objective but also I had the opportunity to network with another professional in the field which was our professor Dan Pal‘s objective. So what do you think of one of Chicago’s art directors on the rise?
Dream Studio Still Life
This is my final project for my 3D Texturing and Lighting course taken Winter Quarter of 2011. I downloaded the geometry of this scene and imported it into Maya. I created textures found from online images and applied them to shaders. The shaders were assigned to each object in the scene and digital lighting was added for realism.
I really enjoyed this assignment. I picked this model in particular as it reminded me of the dream studio I have pictured in my head. It looks like the old loft/factory buildings that many traditional artists use for studio space. I wouldn’t necessarily need a brand new or even a used modern building. I like old places and one properly refurbished would do just the trick for me.
About The Artist
Martin Lindsey is a Master of Arts animation student at DePaul University in Chicago, Illinois and an engineer turned blogger here on The Animated World of Martin Lindsey. I’m blogging with the press corps at the 2012 C2E2 April 13-15.
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