CGMA week 5 and 6

here is my last assignments for the past two weeks at CGMA. This time the class had to deal with texture blending to render surfaces more realistically. I'm pretty happy of the results but for me it is not that easy to handle such a big amount of details, which makes lights so hard to control. by the way, textures are a great tool to quickly get the feeling of the surface you're looking for, without too many attempts or compromises.

hope you enjoy!

the black sketches on top left are my favourite method to look for the right shapes.

in case you're wondering... no, he's not some kind of navi pirate -.-

CGMA Week 3 and 4

these are my assignments for week 3 and 4 at CGMA, where i  especially focused on material's rendering.
both designs are reworks of things coming from my childhood. i actually had (maybe still i) an old typewriter with which i used to write terrible short adventure stories. owning it, really made me feel a great  writer back then.
at the time i was a real fan of the REAL ghostbusters. i loved the show so much i made myself a couple of handcrafted protopacks using toy parts and scrap. anyhow i rarely played the ghost hunter part since i was the only kid following the show so i often used them to play war.

hurry up smee mouse!

CGMA Week 1 and 2

here some sketches and finished pictures from my first two lessons at cgma. the frist one was about movie composition studies, where composition itself has it's own part in storytelling. the next lesson was about character and enviromental studies using lasso and pen tool in photoshop.

again, the sketch here were so much better!!

yes, i love cars

i had a lot of fun!

i finally managed to come out with something new tonight! i had a frustrating art block right after 3 intense months where i have been tremendously busy illustrating a bunch of books for primary school and pre-scholar. the new job doesn't allow me too much freedom nor enough time to put the effort i would. But on the other side i have chance to illustrate books for child education and psycology (subjects i've always loved) while tight deadlines really makes you learn how to be very fast and the value of compromise all over what you do.

however i hope i can work for the animation industry again soon! meanwhile i'm going to start a digital painting  class at CGMA the next october 22th.

La mostra mostri si è trasferita al Santeria di Milano dal 13 al 22 Settembre.
Qui i dettagli dell'evento, parteciperanno alla mostra nuovi artisti con tante nuove opere =)

night on bald pate

patey pate is defintely one of the most charming cartoon villains of all time. i love him in the episode "night on bald pate"; voice acting and key animation is simply perfect!
you can watch the entire episode here on youtube.

i copied a few frames tonight just for fun. all the poses are so well done and expressive, i think there is a lot to learn...

what makes an arch villain?
can it be uncaring destiny that it sole to blame or is it merely bad luck?

"i have a message for Mighty Mouse"

i am very grateful to bakshi.

orcostro

while looking at my old sketchbooks, with the intent to scan the things i still like, i found a small rough of a ogre/monster thingie.
then i thought it wouldn't have been a bad idea to redo an old drawing and see the changes in style and technique.

renewed version

palette and rough

this is the old sketch

i am happy of the result even if it came out not as fresh as the older version. a reason can be that lately i'm trying to work more on caricature, asymmetry, variety and negative spaces at the point that my drawings might result factitious or too much charged of details...

i know, i'm neglecting my blog too much, but work keeps draining all my time!

the process

i start from a very small and timid sketch which should give an approximate idea of the pose. then, on a new layer, i try to improve it working on shapes, contrasts and harmony. during this process i massively use photoshop's transform tool (CTRL+T, then select "Warp"). it is a big help when it comes to exaggerate proportions or move/scale parts (see step 2 to 3). usually i sketch on 3-5 different layers where each one is a step. i learned this method studying animation, where, instead to erase or add too much confusing lines you simply overlap a new sheet of paper on the previous one.

during the coloring process i desaturated the color of the skin to drive the attention to the character's tie. i dont know if it has been a good idea, i just thought it was better to not let too many colors compete.

coloring a deer

this is what i have been doing this morning following the steps on walter tulp's shapes and textures tutorial.

i am very happy of the result :3

day of the fox

with the last step i was trying to give the material's feel... arrghhh

i used the wonderful brushes by Chris Wahl, you can find 16 different sets of brushes on his pages.

day of the crocodile

some studies of that fat crocodile character from an Aesop tale i was trying to illustrate this evening.

HB

happy waiter!

while i was sick last week, i started drawing these inspired by ed benedict designs for hanna & barbera <3

a preview and an animatic

and here a link to the animatic.

concepts

a few concepts for this lil thing i'm working on... it will be a commercial.

look at me

sto lavorando a un nuovo progettino... prometto news nei prossimi giorni.

i'm working on a new project, i promise updates during the next few days.

più scienza!

a rare depiction of Doktor Von Pickel

nukelear reactor boom boom boom boom

corrj fattory

mio caro fattoryno, niente disco disco e abiti alla moda pour tua =(