So I told a friend I would post up my current animation on this guy. I spoke with Kevin Chesnos last night about this and he gave me a great critique on how to polish the puppy and make it sing. I learned a lot. So here she is with color and more polish but not quite finished. Dorthy Mantooth is a saint!

Before total polish

Ok, so here is a more recent version where i changed the major notes that Kevin gave me. I changed up the beats a lil and played with timing. I am feeling much happier about this one. It has come a long way since last revision. Now when Kevin gives the approval I will go in and polish everything. Oh and yes I have polished up the knees already! blah!

Polish Started

Well, so I decided to take out the wrapper part and now this is not in stepped. I have broken it down past blocking. Some of the notes I received were that he needs to be more frantic at the beginning. More energetic. Then I need to really work on the lick. There were more but so I am going to work on all that then post it. I am having a great time on this shot.

New Gear CHange Test

So, This is my blocking and general ideas for a new test I am doing. Its called a "gear change." Its a test that Pixar does with all of its classes. Its a test to show a change of emotion in a character. Something else that I wanted to do with this test was try to animate a kid-like behavior. It has been a challenge but I think my poses are portraying my story. Im excited to get some break downs in here and really time it out right.

As Far As I Got

Sadly enough kids.... this is as far as I got before I had to move onto another test for Dream Giver. But I learned a lot on this test. The end is still not totally decided. I wanted to get this one working more solid and polish it up, but I didn't have time. Maybe laterssssss!

Blocking DG Test Object Interaction

This week for the Dream Giver project Kevin Chesnos asked us to do a test with our character interacting with an object. I figured it would be challenging do a type of scramble but moreso of him bumbling an object and having to save it from breaking... this is my blocking

I dodged a bullet

So I had some recent acquaintances that I have always wanted to caricature. The woman character is always yelling at her husband and saying how crazy he is. She is like the toad princess that will punch a hole in the wall if she cant watch her tv program. Then the man is a blue collar worker that just shells out money like an ATM. He just gets yanked around by his choke collar and dances like a circus boy. Such inspiring people for great stories and character!

Redo

So Kevin critiqued my first go and I decided to simplify it. Here is what it looks like. I didn't get to spend as much polish time as I would have liked. There are obvious hiccups. Oh well. It was a fun test anyway.

DG blocking for Kevin Chesnos

Ok, so I have had an amazing opportunity fall into my lap! I have been working on Ty Carters short film called "Dream Giver." Then Ty went and did an internship at Pixar where he met Kevin Chesnos! (character animator). Kevin has agreed to mentor us on this short film! Im stoked because I can get great critiques from a pixar animator, and hopefully we can get the film in front of a lot of people. On top of that I hope to get some nice demoreel pieces out of the film. Thanks Ty!!! you are the man!
So this is a simple test that Kevin is having us do to show some of our character by having him hop around and land. This is just my ideas in a rough blocking state. I have already received a critique from Kevin and I will take this a step further by making him act more like Golam. Cheers!

Teton Dance!

So I had to put this on. We just had taken a lift up to the top of the mountain in Jackson Hole Wyoming and we had such a great view of the Tetons. I had to do a lil dance! Just shakin it like its nobodys business!

Blocking for new shot

So I have been trying to juggle three different animations right now. I am doing some freelance stuff, this clip for fun, and working on Dream Giver for Ty Carter. Anyway, I had an epiphany while doing animation this last week. It was really interesting when I figured out how keeping it in stepped can really help me organize my shot much better. Anyway, This is a fun clip. I hope to finish it soon.

Policeman Scene

Hey So I wanted to do this clip because it was on the 11 second club website and I didn't finish it in time for the contest. I loved the rich voice and I thought it would be fun to get some uncomfortable acting choices. Anyway, this is the first camera pass.... its just a start but I have half more to go. It has been a lot of fun. I haven't been smoothing this much. Next time I do a dialogue shot I will do it much differently. LOL

Deliah Ghost Flying test

This is a test that I decided to do to create a model for our character Deliah, when she becomes a ghost on our new film at Brigham Young University. I got my inspiration from pigbelly.com I think his stuff is amazing. I particularly wanted to try to mimic the bee commercials that he did and somehow apply that timing to our character when she is a ghost. This was a quick and rough idea but I think it is fun

Termite on a bench

This is just a fun animation I decided to do in my spare time to learn more. I learned soooooo much on this test its nuts. Overall I am happy about it but I know it isn't the best I can do now hahaha its still fun to do these test

1hr Laugh Test

Well I saw a chuckle that Seth Hippen did on our Bolt Cinematics here at Avalanche and I decided to just do a laugh test myself. I am going to start doing test each day after work is over. THis is simple and not perfect. I will get it critiqued and then improve it

Dream Giver Rig Test

30 min. rig test for Dream Giver

Ty Carter asked me to animate on his short called the Dream Giver. It is gonna be so fun to animate this character. Essentially on this test I wanted to just have fun and test out Levi's rig. As you can see it is very fast but I just had to do something snappy for this character!!!!