Jessica Plummer

ANTICIPATE

2012-01-30T19:36:00.000-05:00

February.

I have been waiting for a kick-start like this for MONTHS.

I don't know if I should be disappointed with myself or not that it takes a month-long, once-a-year little internet get-together to get be back into a drawing groove, but I CAN say that whatever it may be, it is most certainly welcome in my life right now. A little more than a day before the February challenge is on...

Though constraints to a fun thing can sometimes damper a mood and are the first thing broken, I've decided to give my participating self a theme to abide by. And to expand on it a bit: a hard list to follow. Specifically - I will be drawing nothing but fan art. I'm talking about the most unabashed, rolling-in-absolute-stinking-fandom-type fan art. It's something I sort of cast aside in my quest for more life drawings and color studies, and I seem to have cut out all my fun and why I used to draw so often as a teenager.

So there's the question of the hard bit: I am ONLY allowed to draw a piece if it includes an element I avoid drawing, be it because I am particularly annoyed by it, or haven't practiced it much, or shy from for various reasons. These include, but are not limited to:

-cars (ugh)
-guns and other weaponry
-cows
-boobies
-detailed urban architecture

Etc etc. I'm already cringing just typing some of those (I'm looking at you, "cars"), and some I really just don't draw much of at all. I'll be posting my full list of "achievements" in my challenge thread, which you can find here, but of course I will be posting the daily art here as well, in case wading through a labyrinthine forum is not for you.

Also - just gotta dance an excited jig over here - my inspiration for the month HAS ARRIVED EARLIER THAN EXPECTED. Specifically to help me in the "boobies" department:

Februrary is almost here...

2012-01-26T10:55:00.000-05:00

...and it is almost time for the most glorious challenge of them all. One where seasoned warriors bask in the glory of being included in the Valhalla of artisans, the honor of completing an entry a day shining soft, golden light upon their shoulders. And the shame of a thousand failed lifetimes if they do not. It is almost time for...

I will be posting all my entries here as well. Join if you haveth the courage, adventurer.

I am so excite.

SONOOK

2012-01-05T18:07:00.004-05:00

One last one, yea?

Dumb! Sonic! Deus!

2011-12-19T13:30:00.002-05:00

AGAIN.

Dumb! Sonic!

2011-12-12T21:19:00.000-05:00

Dumb sonic runs like an idiot, yea.

Faces

2011-10-21T20:53:00.000-04:00

I haven't been working with enough realistic faces lately anymore so...there you go.

Pewpew!

2011-10-20T12:08:00.001-04:00

I think I drew the chair all wrong but ooooh welllll.

Fun With a (Colored) Pencil

2011-07-15T16:14:00.000-04:00

Here's today's "daily" draw (I LIE...I finished this last night...). Have picked up traditional mediums a bit again and been sketching a lot with pencils and markers. Should have more soon!

Tiger

2011-07-01T12:03:00.000-04:00

Today's "daily" draw; inspired by the ever-talented bird and his gorgeous lines.

Cute Animals

2011-06-16T13:24:00.000-04:00

I could seriously draw these all day. Just some quick work this morning.

Comic Today

2011-06-15T16:19:00.000-04:00

Ugh. Sorry this is turning into something more like "Draw Every-Other Day...When You Feel Like It".

But anyways, some Little Jessica Adventures. Click to expand!

Pink

2011-06-10T15:02:00.001-04:00

So the lovely ladies over at GirlsDrawinGirls have "manga heroines" as their weekly theme going on now. Of course I cannot pass up an inspiring push to draft one of the baddest bad-asses of Japanese femme fatales. Battle Angel was a huge influence on me when I was a teenager, and really still is today. Alas - I am not a member of GDG, but I will post my hawt girl here anyways.

If you've never picked up a book from this series I highly suggest, nay, PLEAD with you that you do - even if you're not a fan of anime or manga.

Moar Old Game Throwback

2011-06-09T16:46:00.001-04:00

Woah. Did I just draw Zoombinis? Woah, man.

Grass Green I Hate that Color...

2011-06-08T18:17:00.002-04:00

Welp, this was supposed to be a daily-draw post for Monday but, well as you can see, I got a little carried away. I ended up having to do more of a collage effect for the sky because I was starting to go a little bonkers.

Reference-getters for this one will be awarded one (1) Internets and a status on my list of Cool People Who Like Old Geeky Games Like Myself.

Summer in the city

2011-06-03T13:17:00.001-04:00

Ha...I wish...it was 65 this morning. WTF.

Silly Doodlez

2011-06-02T17:24:00.002-04:00

Boxer girls and attempts at Bruce Lee.

Green

2011-05-31T14:56:00.001-04:00

Ackthp...I left one of my sketchbooks at home I've been drawing in recently (AND my drive...I feel nekkid)...wanted to scan them for this post but...looks like I'll have to later -_-

Purple

2011-05-26T15:57:00.003-04:00

Ok, so I'm trying to complete a drawing a day again for myself. Not doing so well record-wise, but I have more...

Blue

2011-05-13T16:24:00.001-04:00

Ho boi guess what I'm trying to do again...

Scribbuls

2011-05-11T15:33:00.001-04:00

I made a drawing. I liek orange.

Art Dump, March

2011-03-10T11:09:00.002-05:00

Daily Draw February finished spectacularly! Well, more exhaustingly for me, I barely got finished with it. But I pulled through all 28 days, and was very glad for a break from it and just leave drawing to work right now, which I'm doing a lot of. There were over 100 people that started DDF off, and 33 finished a piece every day before midnight deadlines! That's like, the amount of entire Daily Drawing challenges in the past. Here are some stellar selections from the jam: http://www.satellitesoda.com/phpBB3/viewtopic.php?f=41&t=5064

Been going through some random drawings of mine and wanted to share a few that I liked. Mostly simple stuff, but things I liked that I've done recently at various times for practice or doodling.

Working on this off and on; some materials rendering practice. I referenced related materials but didn't use any eyedropper tool for color. Still working on "beech" and "brushed steel". Each sphere only affects those in its row, no columns, just to keep things simple but still show reflectivity and refraction.

Some composition practice. I have Hans Bacher to thank for all the info on his awesome blog, and his book picking my brain.

Draw a Day still Underway

2011-02-11T00:02:00.002-05:00

Ehhhhh so for the time being, and until I can submerge myself back into HTML editing without getting eyestrain I'm defaulting to a different blog template for now. Thanks to those who offered tips, I just gotta dig around where all the values are for proper layout...

Also BACK TO ANIMATION SOON...I promise. Well I promised myself so I've got to set my time aside wisely, but I'm gonna be switching my catch-up personal stuff around since this month is so short. For now here's some more drawings/paintings (all digital here) for the going-ons over at Satellite Soda this month:

^ I did this one with my opposite hand for shits n giggles and because I am a jerk.

A Wee Delay but Still Tons o' Stuffs

2011-02-03T12:51:00.006-05:00

Ok ok, so I'm a little behind with my personal animation, but that should be gearing up again in a short while. In the meantime I started a Monthly Draw-A-Day Challenge that I haven't taken part in for some years now with a fantastic gang over at SatelliteSoda.com. Here's my first entries so far...the rest of the month to go!

Day 1

Day 2

Day 3

Also, if anyone has any tips on how to reformat a blog so posts and images arn't chopped in half (like you're probably seeing now), any help is appreciated! I'm going a little crazy trying to fix this...

January "Finish Me!" Work and Susano

2011-01-07T16:49:00.012-05:00

So before the weekend starts I'd like to kick off my first batch of resolutions - my "Finish Me!" three month series. I'm starting off nice and easy - a bit of animation I began a couple months ago and had pushed aside until now.

I'm in love with the Japanese film Wanpaku Ôji no Orochi Taiji (sometimes called The Little Prince and the Eight-Headed Dragon, read more here: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wanpaku_Ouji_no_Orochi_Taiji) and draw a lot of visual inspiration from it. It's fairly simple in terms of story, but the execution feels like a very nostalgic fantasy.

Trailers for the film, which was released in 1963 in Japan.

I started the ruffs in Flash, and had just started cleaning up the keys, but want to take it into Toon Boom and clean up the animation from there. I've been working in their Harmony software and am quickly becoming a fan of the program. For the background I've got a couple ideas to work out in After Effects, but we'll see about that later.

A model sheet from the film - I love the simple design of the characters, but they all still exhibit clean action lines and emotion.

So when I set about thinking of a small bit of animation I could start for practice - something that I didn't have to necessarily design from scratch and just focus on straight animation and compositing while sticking to a finished model - Susano, the main character from Little Prince popped into my head. He rides the most adorable little Pegasus, and the action directed for the horse is hilarious and fun, not strict and literal.

Unfortunately it's pretty difficult to find a good copy of the movie - it seems to be one of those films confined to a vault and only available on an obscure DVD copy or two (that's not in my region code, OF COURSE). The only copy I have is a recorded television broadcast, in a fairly obnoxious English dub, but, ah well what can ya do =\.

Happy New Year!

2011-01-03T12:58:00.007-05:00

The start of anything new and fresh is always good mental inspiration for a lot of things. Change, repairs, and clean starts are present in a lot of personal resolutions, and are never short of present in creative fields. That's why I'm bucking up and solidifying goals for myself this year.

My animation has actually grown pretty stale, and I'm making quite a few adjustments alongside projects for artwork. A few things I'd like to post on this blog consist of a handful of monthly animation goals - not on new projects but on pieces I've actually begun and failed to finish as of yet. It's nice to start completely fresh on things, but very discerning to leave perfectly good beginnings to collect dust.

Each month I'll be working on short animation pieces - not necessarily complete shorts, just something to practice on for different reasons. January, February, and March will consist of three clips each that will have progress posts to share, while when April hits I'd like to post an announcement for a much larger project.

As terrible as I am with personal motivation, I hope that pushing myself to publicize these guys will give me a good incentive to keep up the work on them. Some things fall a bit short sometimes this way - I never really continued with my weekday morning drawing exercise that I started here - but trying to plan experiments like this help to see what's blocking progress, and I'd like to continue to correct these kind of shortcomings.

I'll be posting the first update on January's animation work later this week. It's already pretty far along so I can upload what's already done then.

Henry on a Walk

2010-12-21T18:50:00.007-05:00

Haven't made a post in a while! Here's just a ballpoint pen sketch I finished recently and had fun with:

Also, check out this Green Giant spot I completed in a week...been keeping busy for sure!
http://www.facebook.com/#!/video/video.php?v=118689148198872&oid=122520672138&comments

Character Sketch Post

2010-10-07T18:52:00.004-04:00

Some sketches before I take off for the day.

A random raccoon:

Cody...and some chickens!

Henry:

Voltron Love

2010-07-23T13:21:00.003-04:00

Look at these. Look. At. Them. THESE ARE FANTASTIC. HOW HAVE I NEVER SEEN THESE. Who on this planet was so blessed by the hands of fate that they got to make something so obnoxiously fun?

Even the live action is fun. Campaigns need to be more engaging like this again, maybe TV would be a little more appealing to me...

Cub and Cody and ???

2010-06-11T14:18:00.002-04:00

Just a quick sketch journal post before I take off on a trip...

Faber-Castell brush pen in a Moleskine.

Two of our cats.

2010-06-07T18:25:00.004-04:00

Kali is a hoot. And a little demon. Lovable kind!

Starfish is the little angel princess. This is all of her for now:

Quick Sketch Post

2010-05-28T15:30:00.002-04:00

Urk. Must. Do. Some. Sketches!

Dinosaurs!

2010-05-05T11:19:00.011-04:00

Ok, since it's been terribly long since my last post - and I would really like to get back into posting more soon - I'm going to get this over with and share some dinosaurs!

These guys here were designs for a Lucky Charms spot.

And the bust maquette I made for finalizing the look (the dinosaur was CG in the final spot)

And here we have more dinos! This time for a Trix Yogurt spot that was for a stop-motion puppet!

Here's the mock-up maquette for the final puppet...

And the construction for the actual puppet...

...almost done...

...Ta-Daaa!

And in her final glory:

All done here at Calabash Animation!

Some Designs and Sharing Stuff

2009-09-29T19:23:00.009-04:00

So I haven't had much of a chance to share work I've been doing for, ohhhh the past YEAR for my job! Just didn't really get motivated to compile a good little collection. And since most of these spots have aired for quite some time, I'm assuming they've run their course enough for me to share some behind the scenes of a few elements.

My biggest and most enjoyable position so far has been character design and color work. Color used to be my kryptonite funny enough, when I was younger, but I've beaten my weakness to a pulp over the years and now love working with it.

All of this artwork in this post are for just a few General Mills spots I've worked on so far.

I really loved this first design here:

This was the final:

I had to paint a doll concept as quick as I humanly could, and she came out super cute!

I love painting mock-ups for scenes to help set the environment. My painting skills in Photoshop are getting faster and faster:

I even got to paint (a ton!) of backgrounds for a series of Trix web shorts. Though since I was still new at it and doing so on a mass scale, I soon found out I was way in over my head and had to bring in extra help!

Which designs do you recognize? See any on TV recently?

Next post will have...DINOSAURS!

Character Art Post

2009-08-13T11:30:00.003-04:00

A little something for this morning to share, one of my newer characters...for goodness knows what at the moment to be honest. Wanted to post a bit today since I'll be really busy with guests this weekend.

Mellie the mysterious rock princess.

Gouache Work

2009-07-31T12:58:00.004-04:00

Been busy on and off, cutting into time to create pieces for myself or doing any daily drawing. I also lost time to work for July's 11-Second club, so it will unfortunately not be done in time. Will still work on it though for a demo reel pieces since I love the sound effects and idea I came up with. Good news though, I sought out an open drawing session in a gallery close to work, so I'll be working on figure studies once again (slacker me!). Also, here's a random gouache piece for you all:

Daily Workout - Week 7

2009-07-07T11:10:00.006-04:00

Just gonna post random stuff all this week! Keep checking back daily for images added to this post.

A quick color and design sketch, two baby tyrannosaurs are stalked by a mysterious creature after their mother dies:

Shoot...didn't get around to posting yesterday due to finishing up a ton of animation clean up, but I've got this little guy for today! I'd going to try and pull together a piece for this month's 11 Second Club competition, especially since it's a really fun sound FX clip and I immediately got a cute idea for it. This is the design of one of the characters in my clip.

I'm only going to add color if time offers me such a luxury, but for now it's only going to be black and white. I just dropped in this purple for fun.

Henry Color Sketches

2009-07-06T14:32:00.002-04:00

Some work done over the weekend; practice in gouache.

Daily Workout - Week 6

2009-06-29T17:12:00.004-04:00

So I've had a "meh" week and a half not posting. Honestly, haven't been very motivated, but on the other hand was more concentrated on work. Got myself a new journal to jot down stuff while on the train though. I'm such a sucker for wanting a clean, purdy new journal when less than a quarter has been used in the last one.

I also saw Transformers 2 last night, and all I has to says is...when the heck am I gonna be seein' sum DINOBOTS HMMMM????

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Tuesday Morning:

I cheat! I did this last night... =)

Daily Workout - Week 5

2009-06-15T10:08:00.006-04:00

Nothing special happening as of yet, but I did get that disaster of an art room clean this weekend! Hopefully I'll be seeing myself at a desk working at home more often again.

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Monday Morning:

Starting off the morning with a beakey turtle man creature.

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Friday Morning?
ehhhhh I've been really slow on drawing in the mornings this week since I've been so distracted with work and other personal projects. Been doing way too much writing and daydreaming as well, so I've only been able to do some practice sketches on hands.

I've also been painting in gouache in the evenings at home, so I'll have a make up post of all that practice soon.

Daily Workout - Week 4

2009-06-08T11:20:00.007-04:00

What weird weather we've been having here in Chicago...cold rainy to warm then cold again. In June. Thanks, climate change! =P (maybe I'll just move somewhere warm again...)

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Monday Morning:

For good news though, I got a brand new bike and took it for a fun test spin yesterday running errands. Maybe I can actually get into shape again...

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Tuesday Morning:

Once upon a time there was a mysterious girl, and two boys fell in love with her. One was a handsome prince, the other, a lazy scoundrel. All the girl wanted to do, however, was climb trees and play in the dirt!

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Wednesday Morning:

Umm...a dragon???

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Thursday Morning:

I'd love to be on a warm beach with clear water and bright white sand, especially today (rainy....).

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Friday Morning:

TGIF!!

Daily Workout - Week 3

2009-06-01T10:31:00.011-04:00

Happy June everyone! Starting off the day to more Henry this Monday morning.

Also! Check out my big-timey cover art over at Screen Magazine:

There's a great chunk about Calabash Animation inside pages 12 - 13!
The art is all digital (Photoshop) save for the "movie screen", which is cut paper composited on top. There's a total of three layers of various textures of mine to make it look water-color-ish, even.

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Tuesday "Morning":

Well, didn't actually get to do a "morning" warm-up per se, because of tight deadlines on stuff that took up all of my time, but I managed to squeeze this out before I left the studio for fun and study work.

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Wednesday Morning:

I was getting carried away with this one and started coloring it, but thought to just post the linework for now! =)
....
Here's a little work in progress for the color, at the moment:

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Thursday Morning:

I don't draw a lot in the way of machines and vehicles, so this is just a rough attempt at a concept.

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Friday Morning:

TGIF!

Daily Workout - Week 2

2009-05-26T16:01:00.006-04:00

Whoops! Missed a couple of work day warm-ups! Actually, I took last Friday off so I could get some things done at home before I flew out of state for vacation, and of course - studio was closed on Monday. Hope everyone's Memorial Day Weekend was nice! I'm a little late for Tuesday, erm, "morning", but here ya go!

This is Henry the Aardvark! I caught a glimpse of a blurb of two colors, and suddenly wanted to doodle this little guy. I didn't think he was any kind of animal until I thought he looked like an aardvark. Actually had to google an image of one because I've forgotten what they look like! What neat creatures! I want one now...

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Wednesday Morning:

More Henry, I guess!

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Thursday Morning:
(ok ok...so I'm cheating a bit and posting a day late...but my computer had been commandeered for Maya rendering, and...well...ya know....)

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Friday Morning:

One last Henry piece to end the week! I don't draw much underwater environments, so this was nice to doodle up.

Daily Workout - First Go!

2009-05-18T11:16:00.007-04:00

So I'm trying to convince myself to fall into certain habits. Isn't it funny how you can get into bad habits easier than good ones? Haha...ha...no it's not!!!!!!

But here is my attempt at a "morning workout" routine. Boy I WISH it was an athletic workout! Instead, I'm trying to do a morning warm-up drawing when I first sit down at my desk at work...whether it's a digital color piece, or a doodle on a scrap of paper to get my gears turning. I don't do this as often as I like, but maybe posting here will bump up the production.

Here's my first "morning workout"; this Monday morning, to be exact.

"snrk!"

I'll keep adding the morning drawings to each weekly post, so they're easier to follow. This'll also be a fun time to experiment with techniques and styles for myself, since having more design roles calls for that.

Here's to moar art!!

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Tuesday Morning:
Thought about this kind of color study walking home from work and observing buildings; how the difference of where the warm and cool colors are can bring about different effects.

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Wednesday Morning:

haha, spent way too much time on this one!

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Thursday Morning:

I personally feel that, as a designer, you should never be married to one way of doing things, and always enjoy experimenting.

Random Stuffs

2009-03-16T16:53:00.005-04:00

Some recent random pieces I've done in my spare time. All these are digital (Photoshop).

A mama 'Rex from a short idea!

This last one's a work in progress. Utilizing some reference for starters (the moss, main part of the tree trunk, and main clump of needles), but mostly out of my head.

A Piggy!

2008-11-06T14:34:00.002-05:00

They're becoming my default thing to sketch when I'm bored.

Helps getting in some digital painting practice, too.

Supahmah??

2008-09-30T11:15:00.004-04:00

"Look ima supa hero! Can'tcha tell from mai supa hero physique, my robust triangulation, my serious face? MY ANGRY FIST CLENCHING?? Ya??"

Haha, I drew this real quick like to illustrate to someone how frustrating it is to see every freakin' superhero drawn this way, "stylized" up the wazoo. As irony likes to have it's way, t actually ended up looking pretty funny and I liked it, so I finished it.

That is all!

But on an extra note, I was at the OIAF this year - had a blast - and got a staff position at Calabash Animation. Horray! I'm not too good at covering news very frequently, as you can tell.

Artwork: Some May Stuff

2008-05-16T10:30:00.005-04:00

And some icky traditional medium use. =(

Oh well; I've been a little tired of digital coloring lately, so I've been breaking out the paints and whatnot. It's fun painting and working like this again - mixing my own colors and what not - but it's been difficult getting used to them all over again and getting the results I want. Trying to apply what I've learned color-wise digitally to these.

I never really draw anything with cats, but since I happen to live with three of them, and Greg has been working so hard, I did this number up for him:

Our girlies, left to right: Kali, Starfish, and Maya. Did this with no initial sketching (only on the surface), and just jumped right in to make a finished piece. Photo of it sucks like always, but I tried to adjust it as close to the original colors as I could. Gouache on matte board - scraps from Greg matting a commission piece he recently did. Guess which ones are the attention hogs!!

.....

A development piece for a yearlong personal/collaboration project that began about a month ago. Didn't mean to go in and render it so much, but a simple color sketch turned into me trying to fix it turned into layers of paint and pencil and really making it a little flat and overdone - not my initial intention. I really should have connected the wing to the back leg, but ehhhh...still figuring it all out. The project is still in early development stages, so not much to post on it here now, but will be filling all you in about it later =).

Watercolor, gouache, and colored pencil on watercolor paper.

.....

OH! Edit: And Tony Stark hearts yoo!!! Go give him yo monies!

Art Dump: Think in Line

2008-04-22T01:00:00.005-04:00

Long overdue post of this time. Have been hogging my stuff to myself. Here's mostly random doodles and sketches. Some concrete, some just because:

A dinosaur for good measure.

A goat horse I guess...

Figure drawing at SORA. Didn't get to finish this one.

More of a finished piece from SORA.

"Doc, ya gotta believe me!"

Some memory sketching waitin' for the train.

Film in Spotlight - 2001: A Space Odyssey

2008-03-30T16:57:00.003-04:00

This is how a REAL space film starts, kids!

Every now and then I enjoy branching back off to live action film to avoid getting stuck in that cartoon film rut. Animated film is, after all, just another way of visual storytelling; why should it be much different from ideas used in live action film every time? Now, there's plenty of animation out there directed to adult or more mature audiences, but rarely are they hosted in a spotlight. It's understandable though - far too many people assume animation is of a more innocent nature (and accidentally take their children to movies like South Park-which I hope they've learned their lesson!).

So back to my topic of film, when's the last time any of you really watched 2001: A Space Odyssey? Getting the "holy shit I think my brain just imploded" feeling out of the way, how do you truly appreciate film making like this amongst the cookie-cutter bonanza of movies in the industry today? You hear all the praise people give Kubrick films, but do you really understand why they are so great? I could go on all day about the good film making lessons one can learn from 2001 alone, but there were two very remarkable things that stood out: simplistic, symmetrical composition, and the most easy pacing you've ever felt.

Far too many movies today rely on the "reassurance" that the fast-paced, get-as-much-material-you-can-pack-in, more bang-for-your-buck entertainment is the reliable way to become an excitement and a success. But while there is a market for that kind of entertainment (and I'm certainly not against it, we've got to admit that we all enjoy that kind of stuff every now and then), there's no denying that this kind of approach can and do ruin some films. There's a reason why certain films become timeless and legendary.

The pacing in 2001 would send the entertainment industry in a frenzy. You can't go this slow! You can't take that long on that shot! There's just no way all of this can work…people will hate it! But it DOES work, and it's funny hearing people talk about classic films like 2001 with admiration, when they probably don't even know what to appreciate about it. The idea behind 2001 isn't to entertain people into a fever, excitedly fist-pumping for more action. It's the idea of the alien feeling of time and space. Kubrick understood what the story was about, and filmed it accordingly - filmed it in a direction that the story fit into, which many films miss that mark entirely and get swept into cliches.

Man it sure does take a long time to land on the moon…

Why in the world would you want to hurry through this film? I tend to think people don't really want to watch movies anymore; they act pressed for time and want to be fed as much information as possible in as short amount for time. Standing in line to use the convenient ATM takes too long! My fast food at the drive through is taking too long! Writing this text message is taking too long! This two hour movie is taking too long! There was a time when patience was enjoyable and relaxing; that a two hour experience in another world or person's life actually drew people in and never wanted it to end. Even some animation suffers from the lack of good pacing as well today.

But probably the most outstanding feature of 2001 is the actual visual storytelling, which all these screen shots I've included illustrate. It was the repeated use of symmetrical composition that was the most outstanding of all.

Hi, I'm HAL. Right here. IN YOUR FACE. You cannot ignore me. I pull you into my world.

The use of such linear, striking, yet simple visuals is what really draws you into the story. It's as if they suck you into that vacuum of space the characters are in themselves. You become more engaged in their reality, which is the basis of escapism. It's eerie and frightening and yet you can't look away.

DOOOOM!

Of course, these compositions also help play with the story themes of the monolith, the computer mind, and travel. Imagine that! The visuals react to the actual story!

Definitely on a spaceship.

The fact that so many shots are so simplistic help the story to remain incredibly complex and abstract. It's not a visual migraine that leaves you grumbling and frustrated by too much action on screen (*cough*StarWars123*cough*).

Say, that computer watching us through the window is kinda creepy…I wonder why.

Less is more sometimes. If I gave you one of those small, artisan dishes with the tiny fillet in the middle sprinkled with a little bit of something, you might look at me like I'm insane, and hop over to Denny's for that mountain of steamy, greasy food (it's cheaper, too!). But some of us gag at the sight of that hospital trip on a platter, and know that that little fillet is absolutely amazing, and is just enough, and will be such a rich experience that even if you don't get to eat there again, you'll still remember how great it was.

Another great sci-fi classic like this that gets praised, and yet no one seems to actually follow it's example, is Alien. Again, it's pacing and it's "less is more" idea makes the frightening aspects more real. We don't have to see the monster to know it's there…God, we KNOW it's there! Give us our night lights already!

Arrg, OK, here goes 2008

2008-03-22T20:33:00.006-04:00

Yeah, three months late in starting off blogging in this year of new, but better late than never. I have lots to start posting again up here, and need to just get a jump on an entry.

As some of you know, I went away for the winter holidays visiting my boyfriend's family in Eastern Europe, specifically Kavadarci, Macedonia, and other locales. Didn't know where the heck Macedonia was? Well, now you do. =D

So, before any arty posts, I'd like to showcase a little retrospective of that month-long trip. It was a great visit, but - if you ever go, be prepared to be fed a lot. And smoke a lot (or sit in smoke a lot). You. Have. No. Choice.

Sitting around, eating food. I wasn't kidding about the lots of food thing.

Photo-ing of photos.

Car trip Makedonski style.

All these next pictures are from Greece. This is on a tomb outside a museum.

Stay tuned for some art posts yaaay!

Dead Animals

2007-08-30T22:03:00.000-04:00

some pieces from some sessions at the museum earlier this summer.

August Wrap-Up

2007-08-30T21:16:00.000-04:00

Just wanted to get in a post about...well...something. Finished up my trip to beautiful San Diego and the comic con in July with a trip to Chicago, then back to NYC two weeks later. Been working away on animation for a live-action feature film, designs by Bill Plympton. Lotsa work and lotsa late nights. Never thought I could do that kind of work again since senior year burned me out, but now it just makes it all seem quite easy. Posted a drawing over at my deviantArt page...just one lonesome drawing, but it's one more than I've done in a while.

a purdy ship in the harbor in san diego.

i love old planes. i really do. i went aboard the uss midway while i had some free time to myself in san diego. the midway was decommissioned in 1994 and turned into a museum. it's not just a place where grannies and vets flock to...it's really worth going to walk around an actual aircraft carrier - below deck and up on the top deck - and a perfect place if any artists need good reference like this. worth all $10 i paid, and took away a load of sweet pictures of all the jets up top. if you ever go, don't pass up the opportunity to chat with the workers there. most of them are war vets and have great stories.

buncha the ncn guys at the con in san diego.

got to run into a lot of artists in sd too, like steve here.

and david colman (aka davidsdoodles - deviantArt). lucky bastard works designing for disney now.

marlo and kali...lol.

uuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuurrrrrk!

Festivities

2007-07-05T11:04:00.000-04:00

Being freed from the confines of school, I've found myself quickly feeding an addiction of traveling. Might as well get it out of my system before "settled down" hits my agenda. Last week I attended a smash-hit of the debut Platform International Animation Festival in the lovely green city of Portland, Oregon. LOL WTF Portland!?, I hear all you internets kids say...but yes, Portland! Home of heavyweight contender Laika (formerly Will Vinton studios, of whom I actually got to see at the festival in person), Bent, and other mid-sized animation studios that play more of a major role in the industry than some of you are aware. It's also quite the lovely city and easy to get around, plus uber kindly bus drivers that one so used to NYC like me are not accustomed to.

Platform was the best...and the very first international animation fest stateside (the big one in North America being in Ottawa, Canada every year), and I encourage all you festival attenders and animators alike to add Platform to your calendar of "must do"s for next year's show.

Funny enough, Platform was a last minute gee-golly I think I WILL go decision on my part, and I'm very thankful I decided to do so. Much like what I'm doing now, planning a trip BACK out to the west coast for the San Diego Comic con. I've told myself for 3 years now I'd go, and I almost didn't plan for it this year...what with all the traveling I AM planning...but getting paychecks has been a sweet sweet gift this summer, and even after paying rent and groceries I find myself aching to splurge a bit on footing it out of town. So San Diego will be graced by the blue raptor later this month.

After SDCC, Chicago will see quite a bit of me, especially at the Chicago Comic con once again...though this time just as an attendee, and not to make dough on raptor goods only to barely break even on expenses....ha. So hopefully I'll get to hang out with more fine and dandy artists in Chicago for the month of August. Plus, the BF's in Chicago...so looks like I'm stayin' a while there!

Boy oh boy...here's my lineup!

:::June - Platform....CHECK!
:::July - SDCC....GOING!
:::August - Chicago Comic Con....GOING!
:::September - Ottawa International Animation Festival....PENDING...
:::Sept/October - National Caricaturist Network Convention....GOING!

Let me know who's gonna be where...I'd like to run into lots'a'ya'll.

Some pics from the glorious mystical land of Portland and Platform:

A rad picnic requires deep thoughts...

...and some baseball throwin'.

Drinking and animating is apparently a huge hit.

Capture Master Javan Ivey muscling the "film" around.

Car trip!!

lol band photo.

A night of free arcade games, cheap beer, and Voodoo donuts.

Everyone loves award ceremony time!

Don't give anything to Don...he likes breaking things.

But congrats to Lee and Dan, who took home an award for their producing and collaborating in The Secret Life of Robots!

=)

Alright, Role Call

2007-06-08T23:34:00.000-04:00

-Senior shows were a blast.
-School's done.
-Visited home in Orlando for a week.
-Moved into my new place in Brooklyn.
-Workin' freelance animation and havin' a great time.

-And just finished the Preacher series that one of my room mates had on him. Had to beg him to buy the last one's when I started! Just 'bout cried my heart out at the end. I don't read many series, or loads of comics in general, but this was one of those good choices with a great story.

Also, I'm drawing more for FUN again. Imagine THAT.

SHOW!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

2007-04-21T20:52:00.000-04:00

just continuing to spread the word everywhurrr.

my film, "The Packrat", will be shown black and white since the animation itself won't be colored.

i suggest you check out the postings over at our campus' animation blog to get a sneak peak at the other students work and such.

break from thesis

2007-04-18T18:37:00.000-04:00

...actually, not really. breaks don't exist. but i do get really annoyed now and then animating the same two characters day in and day out, so i ruffed this out in about an hour last night just to loosen up and have a little fun:

it's animated in plastic animation paper, which i highly suggest all you animators check out. right now they're still working on the mac version tho, sowwie. it's a great little program right now, and i can work so fast in it that half of my thesis film is being done with its aid.

in past events, i also went to go see Meet the Robinsons on the 9th this month. i was going to write a long review on it but i've realized i've been wasting too much energy doing so. i'll just leave all of you to determine for yourselves whether it's good or not, and i'm sure many of you are familiar as to my opinion of it, but for record i gave it a rating of 6 out of 10.

i think i found the problem...

2007-04-07T21:08:00.000-04:00

heheh. been meaning to draw this.

Run Gary Run

2007-04-04T18:46:00.001-04:00

Some more movement for your eyes.

Because photos are phun

2007-04-02T04:22:00.000-04:00

...and internet spelling is phunnier. i am very tired.

A night working in the studio at Pratt with yours truly and the other animation bandits, sans one (Manny) who commutes to campus.

lucky bastards at calarts with their own little cubicles have nothin' against our little room and it's wall of skulls! (note kindergarten-like colored cut-outs on walls)

my little crooked desk I obtain the use of at times.

a defaced Meet the Robinsons poster, percentage done bars (ie. guilt trip), and lists of things to do make for a grand time.

deep thinking for my tush.

scissor fight!

*ponder*ponder*

More Animation for teh Blawg

2007-03-31T14:30:00.000-04:00

a slightly update ruff version of the first third of my thesis film, "The Packrat". Sorry there's no sound yet.

More Dinosaurs

2007-03-29T17:17:00.000-04:00

I like to take advantage of moments where I can just sit and get a drawing out of my system...something that doesn't exhaust me and is not part of a project that requires me to think a lot. This is usually when I get to drawing dinosaurs again =).

Here's a Cryolophosaurus that I was particularly proud of how sketchy and fun it turned out.

And an unfinished sketch of a T-rex...with someone...maybe me. Is he gonna make a meal of me or am I gonna show him who's boss??

Pratt Gets Starstruck this Semester...

2007-03-27T16:52:00.000-04:00

So we've been having an amazing array of visitors grace our campus in Brooklyn with their presence. First it was Marv Newland giving us a little retrospective of his and his company's work, then we were really blessed to have long-time artist and animator from Disney and more Dan Haskett visit through the CG department. Dan gave us an amazing (and amazingly long but much appreciated) Q and A panel and a very inspiring display of work and advice. My friend and fellow animation bandit Lee Rubenstein got a great chunk of that night audio recorded before his ipod finally died. You can check that audio out here: Dan Haskett at Pratt. The audio gets a little funky at some points but bear with it...it's quite long too...I think my question I asked about his history at working in the studios at Disney is in there somewhere too... =)

Now today we had Michael Eringis from Blue Sky Studios. He showed a very well put together presentation of not only the studio's work and specialized tech styles, but a very "geared-toward-college-animation-film-makers" pipeline example that paralleled what their studio looks for in work but also relating to our work as well. Sorry I'm not much of a picture-taker or audio recorder, or I would have more stuff to show about all these visitors!

So tomorrow (that's right, TOMORROW. Sheesh!), Disney is coming back to the campus! This time it's a different group than what we've had before visit (thank goodness), and there's supposed to be bringing some goodies...
...Oh, and reviewing portfolios. I might give it a shot and see what they think of my stuff...

A couple of the CG guys want me to design a robot for them so they can model and rig it, maybe that'll give three of us something cool to show them!

Just a Dinosaur

2007-03-07T12:22:00.000-05:00

...that I drew the other day whilst procrastinating. That is all!

Marv Newland visits Pratt

2007-03-01T22:09:00.000-05:00

Our campus was lucky enough to get a screening and visit from animator Marv Newland, probably most known by those who didn't know any better (me) for "Bambi Meets Godzilla". He's a wonderful guy and I continue to wish him the best of luck with his films.

I don't normally enjoy films like these, or the more subtly strange and humorous, but Marv's stuff really found a niche in my heart!

Marv has a show tomorrow here in NYC at the Two Boots Pioneer theatre (www.twooboots.com/pioneer), and I encourage everyone to go check it out if you can (and if you're reading this blog obsessively enough to find out this late, which is a little creepy and a little flattering...). It's a great little theatre too, and actually where my fellow seniors and I will be having our premiere senior show.

Also, I further expand my growing knowledge in the vast world of HTML, and add myself a background image for the bloggidy blog. =D

Birthday Shindig and another Dino Sketch

2007-02-23T00:45:00.000-05:00

So Wednesday night I finally had an actual birthday...thing. And since Saturday was my birthday and Sunday was Pat's, we all met up together and had an animator's birthday...of...animation goodness!!

my room mate attacking me in her usual fashion.

shots for everyone!

and more dinosaurs. lamest one i've done so far but there will be more.

Show and Tell

2007-02-19T18:21:00.000-05:00

Think Samurai Jack is creative? Thought Disney animation was advanced during the 9 old men? How about a little something from the 60's...from Japan...that just might rival everything you thought you knew about animation...

Now, I love Samurai Jack...and I study the 9 old men's work day and night...but I think I wet myself a little when I watched it. And the poster on YouTube was also gracious enough to showcase the whole film as well.

Horraaaaayyy

2007-02-18T11:09:00.000-05:00

Horray, I'm 22. 11 x 2. What a great number. Here's a girl and some dragons!

and a go at a sad little trex ala Heinrich Kley (sort of...), just for warm-up this morning before i get started animating.

More moving stuffs

2007-02-14T04:44:00.000-05:00

Here's a clip from the work I had to show progress on for my film in class Monday. All the animation on Gary was done during the week leading up to class at 930 am. It's probably the most work I've gotten done in 7 days, animation-wise, even being sick half the time which made me want to sleep all the time.

I was too lazy to put the sound in for now.

Even after all of this, I'm still behind.

Pat: "That animation is so beautiful.....but it's not enough. Can't you, like, work MORE?"
*cue CRYING JESSICA ZOMG!!!1!11*

More to come next week on this.

a things

2007-02-07T00:12:00.000-05:00

weeeeooooouuuuu i did a new drawing of meh self.

i have beautiful friends-

mooo

2007-01-30T03:26:00.000-05:00

i'm in that weird crazy state where it's 330 am and i can't go to sleep and i hardly slept last night but then slept after class for 5 hours so my internal clock is all thrown off and i want to sleep but i don't at the same time but i have class in 6 hours and i'm not sure what to do so here's a horsey butt -

i also drank lots of red bull.

zomg...it moves!

2007-01-26T23:41:00.000-05:00

just a little bit. i've been animating nearly every day since i got back to pratt. and i had promised that i'd be showing progress more often on here. until i get some more animation up, for now, here's a bit of a run i have the monster doing.

it's the progress of tests i've done so far on it. any critique would be wonderful, but i have been told several times about the problem of weight already and that'll be fixed in the next tests i'll show.

i'd also like to take this opportunity to share with everyone what my film is about, since i've realized i've been kinda vague to many (that kind happens i guess when you're so involved with something and know it so well...you forget that others don't).

for our senior project as an animation student at pratt, we have to independently make our own film (though we actually had a pair of twins work on one together last semester). I started with a vague idea fall of 2005 when i needed to create characters for animation exercises in class, and the idea of two of them interacting with each other somehow budded from there.

i'm quite a sucker for monsters and large creatures (and dinosaurs), and wanted to use one i had recently designed for fun in the simplest story i could think of. i didn't want to bother with sweating over some complex story and just stick to having fun animating characters. so i turned my monster essentially in to a kleptomaniac, who ends up stealing a beloved teddy from a small child determined to retrieve it. i thought it would be very straightforward and i could achieve a plot with relative ease.

whoops - i was wrong. never take even the simplest story lightly.

i began thumbnailing the entire film over the summer last year. i was quite proud when i had all that complete for the first day of class and critique. i left that class quite exhausted.

i had so many kinks i had to work out. fine-tuning the characters so they made sense; helping the story flow and weeding out all the questionable struggles and random decisions made. it was a nightmare all last semester. i think i worked on my story more than i did animation.

after mulling over and meditating on everything over winter break, i came back to work really refreshed and re-set up key points in the story. but getting a story just right, even with a buttload of animation still to go (and consequently running out of time), makes me feel oh-so much better about the film and more confident about it's success. i can sit at my light table in peace for hours knowing i don't have to spend extra time afterwards and continue tweaking the story.

the premise and outline are basically the same from the original idea.

The Packrat

Gary, a little boy, has his precious teddy stolen from his backyard after dropping it by accident one day. A creature that inhabits the woods behind Gary's house swipes the teddy away deep into the forest. Stunned, Gary makes his way into the woods in search of teddy. Gary stumbles upon his abducted friend, but the monster as well. Frightened away, Gary is lost in the woods, still without teddy. The monster subsequently tries to rid Gary's disruptive presence and noise from his woods, but will they both get what they want?

Some production stuff...

2007-01-15T15:41:00.000-05:00

So...some people like to cry when they haven't updated their blogs in a while, and usually a page-long apology follows suit. Frankly, I don't think that many people read my poor little blog for me to apologize to...besides, when Jessica isn't on the internet she's probably getting things done. Lots of things. Like these background paintings for my film. Mmmmmm...paaaaintings.

Enjoy. =)

Production Updates - November 28

2006-11-28T16:54:00.000-05:00

So even though we had thesis this Monday, I didn't bring in a thing to show. Doesn't mean I didn't have new stuff though. I was just really tired and got two hours of sleep and felt a little rebellious. Ha.

Backgrounds for The Packrat have been coming along now, and I've slowly accepted that they will all be hand-painted instead of digital. Also been tweaking out some of the story kinks I kept getting stopped for and re-laid out scenes.

Lookit all the storyboard craziness!

Good thing about all this tweaking is I believe it's making the film a tad bit shorter. Which means more room for padding and any extra animation that sneaks it.

I'm using so much paper. Thank God it's free. I grab printer paper from one of the offices on campus that gives it out since it's apparently "unusable" because of four butt-end text characters left at the top of the page when they're done printing out audits or some such nonsense. They don't get in the way at all though and I'll take a huge chunk of the freebies and get them acme punched in our equiptment office. At least it's sort of like my school is funding my film in a roundabout way!

Mmmmm dead trees.

Here's a little background I'm working on:

k thnks bai! =)

Mmmm tryptophan...

2006-11-23T12:39:00.000-05:00

it's the TURKEY OF WONDAH!

have a great thanksgiving everyone! =)

Still here...busy as always

2006-11-18T13:02:00.000-05:00

Not much in the updates department. The Packrat is going along a little slow and going through a few story revisions and changes, and some bigger changes like me dropping out all use of dialogue. I'm trying to get a whole scene mostly finished by Monday but I somehow doubt I'll get that far done.

Working a bit too on some freelance for Asterisk, Inc. inbetweening on a feature they got a few minutes or so of to work on. That's going well but it's suuuuch a detailed character. Thank God I'm only inbetweening.

I'm excited for New Years this year. I'll most likely be going to the grandest New Years party ever. Check it out at

www.scythianmusic.com

. Scythian is perhaps one of the grandest bands out there kids. I can't say it enough. Though some of my friends hate that. =D

Feeling Crappy

2006-10-30T11:58:00.000-05:00

For about a week now. Good remedy: search "puppies" on YouTube...

Coloring Scare

2006-10-27T00:55:00.000-04:00

So I hit a big roadblock recently when I was asked to put together a color test using a shot in my thesis film this past week.

Wow, a lot harder than I thought.

Now I can spend hours or days musing over colors in an illustration, but I have well over 100 shots to layout and make bg's for...though some I'll be reusing, and some will be very simple and quick. So I don't have days to spend on each bg, and barely a few hours each really to meet a deadline next semester.

My first color test looked like this:

Bleh. It's nice and clean and professional looking, yeah. But pretty bland I was told. And I really started to see it afterwards. It only took me around 45 min to complete this one...but it shows. I was proud of getting it done fast, because I want to breeze through color without much of a thought and have a fully colored film. That's a big mistake though. I hate the way this is colored now. It's pretty flat, and the colors are really typical. My thesis professor pointed out how it looked too nice, too predictable, and others commented on how it was just looking like "another student film". I didn't want to think about color because I didn't want to make a statement in revolutionary looks or anything, but now I realize that if I don't pay attention to it at all, my whole film can suffer.

So I've been musing over color all evening, and practically at the point of pulling all my hair out. I'm without a tablet at the moment so I'm doing everything by hand. It was a real struggle at first, dabbling in watercolor again and getting it to look just right. I didn't know what kind of colors to use really, to make a scene...a mood...a good environment.

Then I finally came up with this one:

A ton better I feel. More texture too (at least for the bg), which I want to show in the film. Maybe not exactly what the final look will be, but a much nicer mix of color (not to mention an actual style now that might work a ton nicer with my animated characters). It's kinda Calvin and Hobbes - ish, but I like it. It was a lot easier to mix colors you wouldn't normally use for areas right on paper. We'll see how this goes more this week later...

By the way...John K happens to be ranting and raving about color uses in cartoons over at his blog...which I highly reccommend everyone check out. It's quite a nice coincidence that he happens to be talking about color right at this point and time. =)

Doodles and Such

2006-10-20T01:36:00.000-04:00

As such things go...=) Some doodles of Peridot (that's her name sillies):

and my thesis movie poster! everyone loves posters!

this means my film is pretty much moving up from pre-production to production. exciting!

I suck so bad...

2006-10-18T16:03:00.000-04:00

I hate art history. Really. Very very sick of it. I just can't seem to get the hang of taking it for, oh, 3+ YEARS OF SCHOOL here. And that's not including how many times I'm retaking a few of them. =(

I had a midterm for it today. I studied pretty last minute but was doing ok on the ID's. It's the essays that were killing me. Strange thing is they usually don't. I just totally went blank though a little more than halfway through. This is what I did for maybe 40% of the time spent on the test:

horray for spaceships and dragons! sorry...but they're just way cooler than Neoclassicism. Take THAT David!

I also kept doodling myself on the exam booklet doing things like stabbing myself in the head with a pencil and hanging myself at the end of it. They were kinda funny actually...I hope my professor doesn't have me call some help hotline.

Hrm...well at least I'm going to go see Bill Plympton's Hair High tonight and hang out with some cool peeps. Maybe that'll cheer me up. Maybe.

Website Blues

2006-10-15T20:57:00.000-04:00

So, sorry if you guys ran smack dead into this but the website is down for a bit until I pay for more bandwidth. Aye be a poor college student and hafta scrape me together a few dubloons to get it back up for this month. Hopefully this will be soon. Peace.

Agony and Torture!

2006-10-13T14:11:00.000-04:00

i finally get in the mood to start animating...with all my new gear...and i can't find my pegbar. anywhere.

=(

Theatre Jessica presents....

2006-10-13T11:04:00.000-04:00

...some youtube favorites. On friday the 13th waaauuughhhdsljfkdifoda! =D

and of course, footage of a 99 year old master. he'll kick all yer arses.

Too tired right now...

2006-10-12T11:13:00.000-04:00

...so....really I've just been too tired/busy/lazy to really keep up with updates on here, what I've been drawing, etc. But I did get to build my desk finally last night to put on the most beautiful hand-crafted animation table made for me:

haha drawing in progress up there ^

Keep in mind, I did NOT make the piece on top. Mister Lee Rubenstein's dad was wonderful enough to make one for me (with payment of course...though I feel like I robbed him for such awesome handiwork). I just build the shoddy-looking table underneath. But I'm so happy though...my very first animation disk and desk. The lightbox has now officially retired. =D

Also, Ottawa and Orlando were a blast this past month of roaming around the country. I put more accurate updates on those two trips on my portfolio website, which I finally got up and running: www.jessica-plummer.com. There's pictures too, yaaaay. Everyone likes pictures!

I've been drawing a bit...started memory sketching. I'm just...yeah, too lazy to put them up yet. Want to color them actually. Been coloring a bit.

Yay.

Convention Updates

2006-09-19T17:26:00.000-04:00

Some of you may already know that I'm heading up to Ottawa tomorrow for the International Animation Festival. Fellow Pratt students and I attended last year, and we obviously had a spectacular experience last year, since we're setting aside the time and money to go once again. Hope to run into some fabulous animators and such up there. Not to mention running into the parties that happen to be going on....

I also have a scheduled trip to head back to Orlando first week of October. I've just recently applied to become a member of the NCN, because their annual convention will be held that week for their organization. I originally wanted to go backto Orlando in the first place to take advantage of the resources around home for voice recording, but hey...when there's a caricature convention conveniently going on at the same time down there, who wouldn't pass that up!? Heheheh.

Sharing some Classics

2006-09-11T21:47:00.000-04:00

I was oogling over some old Disney cartoons with Dan recently on good ol' YouTube, and just wanted to share one of my favorites. Disney had such a spark back then making shorts like these. Their studios really had balls. And yeah, not like today at all.

This is one of those awesome examples for most creative use of animated cycles. Haha. I die laughing at the end every time. Lol whale.

The New Beast

2006-09-10T13:38:00.000-04:00

Bwahaha, the Monster has arrived. Well it actually came Friday, but I'm just now getting around to showing it off. This was my back-to-school present for the year, and probably my early Christmas present...for a good couple Christmases to follow. Hahaha. Nice new slick PC notebook, with a gig of ram and 80 gigs of diskspace. More than enough for senior year's work. Next to it is the good old Millenium Falcon (so dubbed by me in numerous jokes about the old thing). My friends joked that they wanted to hold a fundraiser for me to get me a new computer when I brought that thing into class one day. Another friend wanted me to take a bat to it. It nearly died last year. I'll admit, it pulled off some amazing feats of usage, and I'm still pretty suprised I was able to do so much digital work on it for two years. See that white paint can behind the screen? Yeah....holding it up.

So yeah, I'm friggin flying on the new one. Pure bliss. =D

Yay Pratt!

2006-09-06T13:44:00.000-04:00

So now school's begun, the last trek before the big leap into the wide world of work. Well, not like we don't work our butts off here at school. Some strange feeling I get tells me that real work will be full of a lot less BS work than there is here...

I started the year off quite shakey. Lost my wallet first day of class (and now, funny thing, I seem to have lost it in my room), and then my wildlife hero Steve Irwin passes away. I loved that man very much. It was one of my life goals to meet him.

That aside though, my senior class animators and I are really digging into our thesis films, and for some of us...reality is hitting hard. I'm having a bit of trouble wondering where I am going to get voices for a little boy character. Then again, some of my friends here do frighteningly good little boy voices...

More production updates later, but for now, here's Gary. Gary looses his teddy. Gary's in my film ^-^.

Also, I finally got an email back from the artist's alley staff for the NYC comic con, with an application and everything. Let's hope that goes well.

Wizard World Chicago, 2006

2006-09-06T13:41:00.000-04:00

So in an attempt to look like I update here more than I really do, I'll make a few posts individually covering what I've been doing for the past month. Heh.

Attending the Wizard World comic convention this year was a blast, and I had a lot of fun being introduced into the convention scene (as well as being introduced to two of the fine young Sketch Tavern members). It was a great experience, selling prints and sketchbooks for the first time (and I was suprised how well the books sold). I helped work the booth for The Sketch Tavern, and work with two of their artists, Dan Schoening and Tim Kelley, as well as Tim's friend Ian Seniff. All three were great guys, and we all felt like old friends after only a couple days. Much comic antic-ing and Denny's eatery-ing followed suit, of course.

I even got to churn up some commission sketches, my favorite ones being for a very friendly member of The Disney Club, who was commissioning several artists at the convention to draw their own versions of Disney characters that he would pick for them. I found it quite neat that he prefered all this original art collecting rather than his peers, who all just drone into the mass-reproduced cel art in their homes. My favorite one I drew was a Tinkerbell.

So since Chicago was such a great convention experience, I'm attempting to get a booth at the second annual NYC Comic Con at the Jacob Javits Center in February. Apparently it was a super hot venue last year in its debut, so I'm definitally crossing my fingers that I get a table!

Summer so far....

2006-07-01T00:14:00.000-04:00

So...trying to get myself up and running with websites and publications...hopefully soon will have some of my work in print to really be able to sell myself, even still being in school. Never hurts to start now!

Right after classes ended I was up and out in LA attending the coveted E3 convention, as a reward for my hard work illustrating in a contest. Had a blast hanging with all the artist out there in the most suped-up gaming environment ever (even though the most advanced thing I own personally is an original 1989 Nintento Gameboy...that I've even been recently playing...). After that, going home and crashing was on the agenda. I've been pretty non-existant to most of the world.

But I've got some projects in my scope. Some are underway (a bit of design work and flash animation for an up-and-coming virtual pet site), as well as some publication offers I've just gotten. Yes, I'm still an animator, but it's a ton of fun getting into illustration and comics. Plus, it's paying me right now!

Also, August 3-5 is the Wizard World Comic Convention in Chicago, where I got a generously offered spot at an artist's table, so I'm gearing up to sell work there for the first time ever. Should be exciting, and I'm making sure I come super prepared.

Under Construction

2006-01-30T10:36:00.000-05:00

I have just added this site to my list of many ones involved with portfolio sharing, but at the moment it will be unavaliable for regular art until I get this gorram thing lookin cool.

-=jess=-