Sunday, October 30, 2005

Some more Santori

This week I worked on the inbetweens... I adjusted many slow-ins and slow-outs, especially on the head as Randy (Haycock) suggested.
I also put all on 2's and sometimes on 1's, to keep it more alive.
In the end I sketched a rough background: the Santori-studio!

Clip

Saturday, October 29, 2005

Il libro 2

The villain! A summoned shadow...



Thursday, October 27, 2005

Il Libro




Studies for a short film in 3d (that we've never finished), based on a Lovecraft short story.

Wednesday, October 26, 2005

Devastation Pose

Devastation... another one from AM class 1. The "actor" is my brother.

Tuesday, October 25, 2005

sitting sketch

This is my collegue Gabriele, caught in his classic pose...

Monday, October 24, 2005

Tai chi

Tai Chi sketches from AM, class 1. Thanks to my dad for the reference!

Sunday, October 23, 2005

Monday, October 17, 2005

sketchbook

Sketches from some months ago... AM, class 1.




Sunday, October 16, 2005

Make it Santori time...

I finished this week work on my Santori assignment... I refined my blocking, especially I've removed from the animation a lot of stuff, above all some expressions and some extra poses that weren't necessary and that made the animation less clear. All the feedback I've received from the students, from Doug Dooley and Randy Haycock, was about the fact that the more a character is "cool", the less he moves... and so I've tryed to make it more subtle... there's only one pose for the body, one head turn, one gesture and the glass.
The other issue is to keep the model in shape, keep the volumes (grazie Mauro!): for me this is a very difficult part of hand drawn animation, that in 3d doesn't even exist.
Now the character is less similar to Jafar, because he speaks with a lot of squash and stretch and it's awesome but he doesn't fit to my character. So I think that I added some Lee Van Cliff, some System of a Down and maybe some of me (you always appear in your works!).

Santori

Friday, October 14, 2005

Thumbnails: push

Thumbnail drawings for an Animation Mentor assignment from class 2, bodymechanics... I was the "actor" behind these poses :)


Thursday, October 13, 2005

sketch: exhausted

A page of sketches from my first AM class...

LaTigre e la Neve, Alias and Ubik conference

Next week we will give a lecture in Milan on the vfx of La Tigre e La Neve... you're invited!

Wednesday, October 12, 2005

Another quick doodle

Here another one... like yesterday I didn't plan anything...

  • saluti!


  • Tuesday, October 11, 2005

    Calvin and the tentacle

    Here's another one... always done with Js GreasePencil tool.
    It's very straight ahead: I haven't planned anything! There were no tentacles or boxes at the beginning; I've started with a fast run and continued doodling.
    My inspiration is a clip by Jason Ryan I've seen some weeks ago ... I like the way he makes Chicken little slides. There's also some Calvin personality inside.
    Thanks to Josè and Mauro for the instant feedback!

  • Calvin and the tentacle



  • Monday, October 10, 2005

    Doodling with Js_Greasepencil tool

    This evening at work I had 30 empty minutes so I started doodling with Js_greasepencil tool, the script by Jason Schliefer that let you draw and animate directly in Maya...
    The character is just a little inspired by Calvin, from Calvin & Hobbes.

  • Calvin doodle


  • AM students blogs

    Now we have A LOT of blogs... happy reading:


    AM Mentor Blogs

  • Jason Schleifer's Blog

  • Ethan Hurd

  • Justin Barrett

  • Bobby Beck

  • Carlos Baena

  • Victor Navone

  • Mark Behm

  • Mike Walling

  • Mike Thurmeier

  • Cameron Miyasaki


  • AM Class 3 Blogs

  • David Andrade

  • Aja B.

  • Rick Blankenship

  • Brad Bradbury

  • Robert Casumbal

  • Irene Chung

  • Philippe Duvin

  • Ernesto Esteo

  • Lee Fieldhouse

  • Landis R. Fields IV

  • Carlos Fins

  • Hugo Garcia

  • Matt Gaward

  • Daniel Gerhardt

  • Gianmichele Mariani

  • J Gibson IV

  • Jeremy Hopkins

  • Stu Jones aka Vyntax

  • Anthea Kerou

  • Jeff Kim

  • Adam Levin

  • Jimmy Lyons

  • David Martinez

  • Matt Moriss

  • Adrian Ng

  • Brian Nicolucci

  • Michael Plaisance

  • Eric Scheur

  • Kenny R

  • Rebecca

  • JP Roberts

  • Phil Rogan

  • Ryan Scott

  • David Sloss

  • Barry T. Smith

  • Mike Stern

  • Phelan Sykes

  • Ali Tezel

  • Jazz Tigan

  • Thomas Vanlicht

  • Sara Wade

  • Dieter Wagner

  • Nathan Walpole

  • Doodlesquad

  • Derek

  • David Leighton

  • Peter Starostin

  • James Schneider

  • Dan Segarra

  • Matt Kelly

  • Kenshi

  • Emanuele Pavarotti

  • Makomako


  • AM Class 2 Blogs

  • Mel Milton

  • Dylan Forman

  • Christophe DeGregory

  • Jamie-Lee Bury

  • Paul Sinclair

  • Jason Campbell

  • Jeff Rapess

  • Otto Schnurr

  • Eric Stratte

  • Adam Strick

  • Keith Patterson

  • Sean MacNeil

  • Nenad Mitrovic

  • Will Kistler

  • Tomislav Tesla

  • Traci Plagmann


  • AM Class 1 Blogs

  • Aaron Schultz

  • Alex Lehmann

  • Aaron Scott

  • Derek Bledsoe

  • Ryan Summers

  • Justin Weg

  • Megan Hobby

  • Chad Moore

  • Sean Dicken

  • Jocelyn Cofer

  • Mike Feil

  • Chris Zurbrigg

  • Freddy Burgos

  • Kate Forrest

  • Pamela Miles

  • Max Perelman

  • John Sung
  • Sunday, October 09, 2005

    Santori Reblocking

    whew... what a busy sunday! I always finish my AM assignment ten minutes before the deadline!
    Now my eyes aren't fresh so I can't judge in a clear way what I've done, but I'm quiet satisfied considering that I have still 3 weeks to work on this.
    From last week I changed some body postures and the gesture: now there's less movement because as my mentor Randy Haycock told me (and my fellow student Sternio gave me the same suggestion), cool characters don't move much, and he's cool!
    For the face I used Jafar from Aladdin as a reference, without the arabian style. I love the cartoon villains!

    Santori reblock

    Thursday, October 06, 2005

    Vegetables Sketches

    Thumbnails drawings for my Animation Mentor Miss Stewie animation.

    The first idea was a bit different: she was drinking a cup of tea... very english. Then I changed my mind on the run... a nouvelle cuisine "misterious" plate could be better for that fussy reaction!



    Wednesday, October 05, 2005

    carletto

    It's out! It's the last commercial on which I've worked, for Italian market only. That funny character is named Carletto and it has been created by the Jim Henson guys! Yes... the muppets! In fact the previous commercials with Carletto have been done with a real puppet animated by 6 animators at the same time. In this commercials there was some shots that couldn't be done with a puppet and so we have worked on it in 3d! So two shots are live action and all the others are in 3d.

    The director is Dario Piana, and Ubik vfx worked at the CGI: I've worked on the animation part and the model and shaders are by my collegue Roberto Clochiatti with. The compositor is Josè Sala and on the set in Romania there was Nicola Scarpinato.

    The shots are really fast but we've worked hard on them and we're happy for the result, also considering the difficulties provided by the fact that we had to create a performance believable and similar to the puppet appearence and behaviour.

    Watch Carletto














    Tuesday, October 04, 2005

    Vegetables


    It is the last assignment for the second class of Animation Mentor: Bodymechanics (now I'm in the "Introduction to acting" class).
    We had to illustrate a single idea with some contrast in it. I chose this haughty and aristocratic character that is a caricature of someone I know...
    I did it this summer, in Sardegna with my tablet pc. Eh... good times!

    Vegetables

    Tigreneve poster


    The poster...

    La Tigre e La Neve

    The trailer of "La Tigre e la Neve", the Roberto Benigni movie I've been working on all over this year is out... however in the trailer ther's nothing I've done... you have to go to theater!

    La Tigre e la Neve

    Sunday, October 02, 2005

    Santori, body blocking_rough

    Here is the first rough for the body.
    It's not easy because Bill Murray isn't very "cartooney", but I love the movie and this line is funny and subtle...

    suntori_time

    Saturday, October 01, 2005

    For relaxing times, make it Santori time...




    Body blocking for Animation Mentor class 3 first assignment: to animate a line of dialogue. Mine is from Lost in Translation...