Saturday, August 30, 2008

Gearing up for Round 2...

Summer is quickly drawing to a close. Updates online may have been few and far between, but off-line was pretty packed and can only be summed up with one word: awesome. Just couldn't have asked for a better summer. However, time to take off for CalArts and make the absolute best of my second year---I'm already dying to start storyboarding and can't wait to get my animation disc back. ha. I head off tomorrow to conquer 685 miles(Googlemaps FTW!) with the infamous Kiwi by my side. I'll blog once more when I track down the elusive California internet. Until then, enjoy some inspiring animated shorts that I found earlier today inbetween packing up my room:

All the way from Germany, "Stich Probe":
http://www.stichprobe-derfilm.de/movie_medium.php

And from France,"Bric à Brac":
http://www.bricabrac-story.com/index.php?res=large

Saturday, August 16, 2008

County Fair Time

This past week was the annual county fair and craving the addition of farm life to my newly started sketchbook, I headed out into the blistering heat(103. Today it was supposedly 108ish--so I'm glad I went earlier in the week.) and filled 13 pages(front and back)with life at the fairgrounds.




With it being so hot, a lot of the animal life was obviously defining the term, "chillin." Like this Nubian goat:



The following little goat duo was adorable. The little brown one was on the verge of falling asleep so his head was nodding slowly off, yet he'd always manage to wake himself up again right at the last moment. His companion was already out like a light. After drawing these two I remembered the gold mine that is----the chicken coop:


An abundant display of crazy hens, roosters, and pigeons!
And of course after exploring the various animal areas I settled down for some people studies:

This guy's family was less than 10 feet away from him and also on their cellphone. The discussion was pretty entertaining as the old man veered left and right trying to find the family on the cellphone. THEY had seen him long before he finally found them. Despite being a brisk 10 steps away, they just resorted to shouting, "Turn to your RIGHT! YOUR RIGHT! Okay, almost there! Keep coming straight. Good, good. No, go back the other way. Yes we can see you! Come back some more." It was quite the conversation.

SPRAY-FAN SIGHTING! I couldn't leave the fair until I spotted at least one! I was very pleased to spot the necessary fair accessory--though in the time that I sketched, I saw more fanny-packs than misters. She isn't related to the previous cellphone experience. No shouting coming from her end at least.

Some more fair-goers also sweltering in the heat. I did go to the pig barn and after my second sketch, the smell of pig was reaching the point of unbearable so I wrapped things up and as a certain cartoon depiction would say, "That's all folks!"

Tuesday, August 12, 2008

Costco Conveyor Belt

For the longest time I've wanted to actually go to the local Costco and sketch---you see the mall has MANY exits so a lot of people skip the food court where I usually sketch. The local Costco is perfectly designed for drawing---one entrance and one exit. Everybody has to pass by THAT food court on their way out and therefore I've dubbed Costco a conveyor belt of characters. Well yesterday I had my chance to sketch so here we go....



*I saw the shoes before I saw the actual human who was strapped into them.




These last two are memory sketches. I had put my sketchbook away just as I spied these two lovely locals, so I decided to put the ol' memory to the test and "photograph" them. Leopard prints, tube tops, and missing teeth---oh my!

Sunday, August 10, 2008

Record holder for Summer Slacking

An update for the 2 remaining dustbunnies that still actually read my blog:

I've developed the addiction of drawing stills from movies. So since I have a nice little collection of these studies(all roughly 1 minute or less thumbnails of unique actions) here are a few highlights. Can you guess the characters and/or film?


I relied too heavily on my courage to add watercolors to these studies and now the great and powerful Oz bestowed a good dose of regret on me:

And of course I couldn't forget:



20 days and then I'm driving back down to Valencia----wow that date is sneaking up fast. That also means roughly 20 days until I get an actual scanner back and iPhoto shall butcher my drawings no more!