Toon Boom Rigging Tutorials

TB Animate - Older Tutorial -but simple and straight forward

•  Playlist link 

TB Harmony Beginner's Course 

• Playlist Link

Story Artist Notes

  When it comes to finding employment as a storyboard artist:

the portfolio and the work is the most important thing.

• Get your work out there!
• Search for people that can teach the things that you want to learn.
• Look at the people in the story dept. on IMDB and find them on social media, connect, follow, and reach out.
• Draw every day, every waking moment available and improve your eye-hand coordination.
• Dedicate yourself!
• but also pace yourself and don't become complacent

Portfolio Advice

• A professional presence is important. Your work should be clean and easy to read.
• Have a portfolio, resume, and a cover letter tailored to the studio that you are applying to.
• The resume should indicate:
  1. Where you came from...
  2. Position objective: Ex-"I am seeking a position as a storyboard artist on a T.V production."
  3. Training
  4. Software related to the task

Story Exercises

1. Create a list of the types of shots you would like to practice; such as comedy, action, suspense, drama, etc.
2. Grab a script of a show you have never seen before
3. Work to meet your practice goals
4. Try telling a story in a single panel...it can be quite a challenge!

Books and Resources

• "How to Draw" by Scott Peterson. Teaches perspective drawing and the theory of perspective.
• Andrew Loomis art books
• Robert Valley
• Scorcese films for reference
• Marshall Vandruff
• Dean Cornwell
• JC Leyendecker
• Norman Rockwell
• Draw from Disney films: Expressions, poses, hand shapes.

It is possible to be a working artist!

Cal
"I see the recurring question of how clean the thumbnail should be.
Don't be fooled by the art of books. Although we occasionally have to make our boards pretty for an executive presentation or test screening, I must emphasize
storyboards are meant to be a blueprint for the production.

It's about the information, not pretty drawings.

Rendering won't solve a staging problem and coloring definitely won't make a generic camera angle goes away.
 

Focus your drawing on accurate proportion, dynamic pose and appealing shape.
Take a look at this panel by Glen Keane. Everything you need to know is there! He didn't even need to draw the grid and you know what shot and how high the eye level is. Most importantly, you know what are they feeling.

Less is more....always."

Animated Obstacles

Obstacles in getting an animated project made:

• Funding - Finding sources of finance
• Finding the talent to create the project
• Legal documentation clarity
• Distribution strategy

I had the opportunity to speak to an animation producer from Netflix, and he told me that in order to get your ideas in front of a development executive, you will need a lawyer to represent you and/ or an agent. The reason for this is because the studios do not want unsolicited ideas to prevent lawsuits that claim a story or idea was stolen.

Regarding the other bullet points, I will have to do some research to try and alleviate those pain points.

The Not - So - Starving Artist Calculator

A Simple Calculator to Price Your Work

SALARY

Enter your desired annual salary.

EXPENSES (Yearly)

Ex: software licenses, overhead costs, and materials.

DAY RATE

$

$

PROJECT TIMELINE

How many days will the project take to complete?

TIME BUFFER

Projects often take longer than expected to finish. Add a buffer of extra time (usually 25%).

PROJECT COST

%

Daily and Weekly Stock Charts - WMT, ZTS, AMZN, PG

Note: the *WEEKLY page will load blank.  

To fix: click in the address bar and hit "Enter" on the keyboard to load the page correctly.

• WMT Daily
• ZTS Daily
• AMZN Daily
• PG Daily

• WMT Weekly
• ZTS Weekly
• AMZN Weekly
• PG Weekly

Weird Chart I Found

Stocks I'm Looking At

I used widgets from https://www.tradingview.com/widget/advanced-chart/

AAPL Chart by TradingView

Testing image placement

Mickey Mouse Works - TV Series -1999

I remember being excited to finally have some new Mickey content featuring the voice of the late Wayne Allwine as Mickey. The show was "Mickey Mouse Works" and featured a quaint CGI factory introduction showcasing the "animation process" from drawings to ink and paint.

Unfortunately the show aired on Saturday mornings at a very unreasonable hour. It's like they didn't want anyone to watch it!

Setting up a VHS player to record episodes onto blank tapes bought from the dollar store was the solution. I still have some of those tapes! I don't remember much advertising and recently had a hard time finding any promotional material or quality images.
 

Just Sketchin' In...

Colored Wata'

♫ Somewhere Over the . . . Large Wall ♪

I completed a new mural over the course of 1.5 weekends.  I worked hard, long hours, but not necessarily fast (even though I tried).

Empty Wall

 Final Concept

Close Up

Character Designs

Early Concepts

I have some work to do . . .

Meh

I'll get there eventually.

K.I.S.S. - Keep It Simple Silly

After a catastrophic painting session last Sunday, I mustered up enough courage to go outside into the real world and give painting another try.

• There is no "undo" button in the real world, especially with water colors, but it is important to learn how to make definite choices and keep moving forward.
• This is a very gentle painting that is really just practice, and an attempt to learn how to focus and calm the brain.

In Plein Air

Above is an experimental painting done "en plein air" which is a French expression for "in the open air".  I like the lines created by the real architecture it is based on, but ultimately this painting is just "plein".  

Thank you I'll be here all week.

The frustrations caused by the previous painting inspired me to consider trying harder and actually practice.  Go figure.  I felt like trying watercolor, but only had acrylic paint.  Solution:  heavily dilute acrylic paint.  The tree above is NOT meant to be abstract like the previous painting.

Madam, my eyes are up here! # CG Problems

I've been meaning to post this screen capture for a while. It shows one of the many joyous technical anomalies faced in computer animation.

"Animation ARTIST?"

"So tell me, what do you want to do?"

What a confounding and confining question!

I recently had the opportunity to have my portfolio reviewed by half a dozen studio representatives. With every encounter I was asked the question above. It's not every day that you can define your destiny in a single sentence six different ways.

The frustrating truth is that studios need to be able to define me as (insert talent here). I understand why this is important, I just need to figure out how to not lose the Art in Animation.

This video of Glen Keane puts into words my mentality, although my thoughts and skills are only in their infancy.

Glen Keane Animation Industry from Noel on Vimeo.

Sunday Painting

Below is an acrylic painting of a very particular dog. The goal was to apply the paint quickly and loosely while trying to achieve a balanced / representative look with the final image. After painting on huge walls, this 11"x14" canvas was a cinch!

Mural Progression Summer 2013

Over the course of the Summer I worked on five murals for a local church. Check out the video below to see it come to life! Watch in HD for the best viewing experience.

Mural Progression Summer 2013 from Noel on Vimeo.
Music is from "The Piano Guys".
Rough designs below:

Badly Photoshopped composite: Taking pictures of a huge wall presents interesting perspective issues: