Paying attention...?

Classes have started anew and so far it hasn't been too bad. I have 3D Animation II (digital cinematography), Intro to Web Design, Drawing, and Intro to programming. Right now it's a lot of explaining the basics stuff, nothing too hard. I usually catch on pretty quick to the basics. In web design, I already know the basics from high school. Not to say I wasn't paying attention...

...okay...maybe I wasn't so much. I've gotten into a really bad habit of doodling in my notebook, but my notes for Web Design are by far the worst. I know I won't be able to get away with this for too long. With two studio classes and two computer courses I know my homework load is going to be massive. I tried to set my availability schedule for work accordingly, yet somehow they still manage to schedule 21 hours per week for me. One one hand, money and some apparent job security if they need me that much; on the other, I'd really rather be doing homework.

Why would I rather be doing homework? Well simple. When you're completing classes for your chosen field of study, homework can be fun. It can also be a nightmare, but one you get to tell horror stories about later with co-workers who know what you're talking about. In Animation I had to relearn how to use Maya, the modeling program we use. It all came back pretty fast, but I still had to do a little tinkering. What comes out of my brain the minute I start playing with an animation program? An animal. What animal? Uh....

This is piggerton. He doesn't look exactly like this in Maya (he's missing his feet) but I hope to end up with something similar to this eventually.

So that's the random wanderings of my brain this past week. Enjoy.

Super Bunny Lives!

A few months ago I posted a sketch for a bunny with a baby blanket cape. Well, the cape is going to be a bib instead, but I finally made the bunny. I ditched my initial idea of green and blue and went with different colors, but how it ended up is cute as a button. Of course, the rabbit itself doesn't have any buttons. The eyes, nose, and mouth are all embroidery thread to make it safer for the baby it will eventually go to.

Faster than a race horse! Cuter than a koala! Able to leap tall cabbages in a single bound! It's Super Bunny!

Kenlilians

I've had a lot of free time lately, and I haven't been as productive as I should be, but at least I have gotten something done. I've been meaning to design some outfits for some of my extraterrestrial characters, the Kenlilians. Their clothing presents some challenges because their legs are built for jumping and running, and therefore pants become a bit of a mobility issue. They get around this by wearing shorts or leaving the knees out. The rest of their clothing is determined by personal preferences and occupation.

Zorkedian is a soldier stationed on an intergalactic war ship. His uniform is pretty basic with the knees and elbows left open for mobility. The gold patch on the shoulder displays his rank of foot soldier (in Kenlilian culture, gold is a pretty average color, like blue for us). He carries a blaster with him at all times. His boots are steel-toed and divided like most kenlilian footwear.

Gen is a mechanic on a cargo ship. He's usually seen wearing a vest that acts as armor against mechanical accidents and has lots of pockets for stashing tools in. His shirt is made of a simple coarse fabric and has a few stains here and there, but it fits well and has more pockets. Arm guards protect his fore-arms while digging around in the interiors of ships and machinery. His pants have an extra flexible patch on the knees that doubles as a knee pad. His boots don't have two lobes (it's difficult for him to find good kenlilian boots) but they're steel-toed and well worn.

Dige is Gen's son. He's small and round in comparison to the adults. He's his father's shadow, always helping him in the shop. He has his own vest like his dad, but everything else on him is a size too big. Sometimes his clothes don't match because he's blind, he just grabs the first shirt and shorts he lays hands on and calls it good. He wears kneepads to protect his knees while crawling inside ships and machinery, and can sometimes be convinced to wear arm guards, but he absolutely refuses to wear shoes. Being able to feel the floor is essential for navigating the corridors of the ship.

Anke is Zorkedian's older brother. He's a cook in the war ship's galley. Over his shirt he wears a smock that is slightly big for him. The smock has pockets for kitchen ware and an extra fold of fabric at the color, used to wipe food splatters off the face. The green name tag and trim labels him as the head chef (kenlilian blood is green, so green is used to denote high rank, much like red for us). His pants have the knees left out and his shoes only cover his toes, held on by straps that wrap around his foot and ankle.

Tough as Nails

I love using goofy quirky characters in my stories. Then again, who doesn't. The other night I was fleshing out my Ninja Order of Animalburg and ended up with the character Nails. Nails got his name because he can seemingly live through anything. He's a master at taking a hit so that it generates the least amount of damage. This skill didn't come naturally or easily though. Nails is missing a finger, about 40% of his tail, a piece of his ear, six teeth, and his appendix (though that had nothing to do with ninja work). All the same, Nails comes off as a happy-go-lucky sort of fellow who at once accepts that he has bits of himself missing and seems to have no notion that it should affect him in any way.

In Animalburg, the ninja all strive to be as tough as Nails.

The Monster of Rudard Pond

Lately I've been trying to flesh out the imaginary world of my ninja characters. In the biggest park in the city, there's a lake called Rudard Pond (they call it pond, but I'm pretty sure if it has an inlet and an outlet, it's a lake). Lurking in the "pond" is a lake monster known as Rudy. The civilians of Animalburg don't really know what the monster looks like, so they make cute little salamander and sea dragon-like figurines of him for souvenirs. The people never get a good look at their monster because Rudy only hunts at night. Turns out Rudy's nocturnal and reclusive nature is for everyone's own good.

The ninja of the city are perfectly aware of what the monster looks like. Their unnofficial list of rules has "don't feed the lake monster" as #12 on the list. In reality, Rudy is a ten foot tall cross between a salamander, a sea monster, and a mutated experiment. It has no teeth, and it's completely blind from injuries and cataracts on its eyes, but anything that floats in the waters of Rudard Pond after dark has a good chance of being eaten. The monster brings along a trail of pondweed stuck to useless extra limbs caused by pollution. The end of its tail is missing from when it tried to eat a ninja that strayed too close to shore.

I had way too much fun inventing this thing. Can you tell?

Animation is a Pain

I already mentioned something about singing puffballs in my last post. Meet Rodger, Omar, Yolanda, Gary, Celia, and Benny (listed from right to left). They are to be my first characters capable of vocalization. In their case singing. This is mostly a practice in lip-sync and reading waveforms, but also in patience. As of now, I have only the first 8 seconds done. That is only after sitting in front of a computer for approximately ten hours total with a graphics tablet in hand. Sure I haven't been animating all at once, but it's a lot of work. Especially for one person.

Animation takes tons of imagination. The ability to hear a character talk and see them move, even when all you're doing is drawing one frame after another, after another, after another....

Free Time

Two weeks vacation and my imagination's already running wild. I'm launching back into my favorite things: cartoons, animation, and hopefully some movies. But I also love creating bizarre photo collages. The one above is made from three photos. I think it needs something though. Hmm....

I also figured out how to make an animation using Pencil, iMovie, and Garage Band. It involves lip-synced characers and a 6 part sound track of Twinkle Twinkle Little Star on comb kazoo. Hope it flies. If I does, I'm posting it.

Enjoy the two weeks vacation fellow Parkland people!

Onward and Upward

Last week of summer class. I can't even tell you the relief. Fall class starts on the 24th, and with it a whole new set of worries, but for two weeks I'll have my freedom. What do I plan to do? Maybe catch up with friends, see a movie or two, sew a bunny rabbit for my co-worker's baby, and write, and draw, and write some more. I think that's all I have time for actually.

So as for this blog... well it just so happens blogging is fun, even if no one is reading. But for the sake of those who are, I think I'll keep posting here, though I am so changing the title. How does "EY Productions" sound? Or, oh! I know! "Penguins With Jet Packs"!

Anywho. Onward and upward...