Manga Studio 4 is AWESOME (also Shannon's been here)

My girlfriend Shannon and I have been spending the last month or so together. We've had a really great time; taking drives, going out to eat, even spending a week in Disney World! It's been a blast!

During that time, we've also been drawing together. We've done a few jam comics and a couple little doodles back and forth. The other day, she asked me to draw a picture of my dodo, Randy, that she can use as a desktop background on her laptop. So I started roughing out a picture for her:

Earlier this month, she gave me her copy of Manga Studio 4. I've been fiddling around with it for the last few weeks and it's really grown on me. It's a REALLY fun program to draw and ink in. The brushes are really versatile. I'll be doing my comic with that program.

Then I moved on to inks:

I have to say, I usually don't like the inking process. But in Manga Studio, it's a lot of fun. I don't think I've ever had as much fun inking as I did with this. The uke and tree are a little wonky, but otherwise I'm really happy with how this came out.

Finally I sent it off to Shannon (all the way on the other side of the room) and she started coloring it in her program of choice: PaintTool SAI. I've heard nothing but good things from my friends and colleagues about that program. In fact, while I was at SVA, a lot of the underclassmen were using it to ink their films. And I don't blame 'em! The brushes in that program are godly-amazing. Sadly, it's a PC-only program, so I won't be able to use it anytime soon. Oh well, I'm content with Manga Studio.

Anyway, Shannon put in color, highlights and shading, cropped it a bit and the final product looks like this:

I really think Shannon and I make a good team. I can't color for jack, so I definitely need her help when it comes to coloring. She'll be coloring my comic, which HOPEFULLY will be starting up soon. I would've started sooner, but Shannon and I have been busy with other things.

Sadly, she's leaving in a few days to go back home to Washington. But I'm not too sad, because we'll definitely be seeing each other again real soon! Besides, we'll be talking and collaborating on stuff all the time, so we won't really be too far apart.

See you real soon!

Patching things together...

Some time ago, I commissioned a friend, Kevin McKenna, to make a 3D sculpture of my rotund dodo, Randy. I gave him this to use as a guide:

A few months later (he was busy with schoolwork, so I told him to take his time), he sends me this:

FREAKING. AWESOME. Especially when it's spinning around in a circle like this:

Kevin is an amazing 3D modeler, and a damn good traditional artist to boot! Go ahead, see for yourself: http://cc-5052.deviantart.com/.

At first glance, some people that I showed it to thought it was a real vinyl figure. That got me seriously thinking about the idea of having him made into a toy. Jeff Pidgeon did it with his neat Happy Beaver toy, so why couldn't I? Unfortunately, getting a figure sculpted, casted and mass-produced costs some pretty serious bucks, and as a college student the last thing I want to think about is spending money (especially hefty amounts of it). Luckily, there's another option.

PatchTogether.com is a website where you submit a toy/shirt design and if it gets enough votes, they'll actually make the toy, which they will sell in their store and the designer gets a percentage of the money it makes! A capital idea (especially for one with little capital). So I did a little write up and submitted a few images to PatchTogether a few days ago, and last night it was finally put up on their site.

Like I said, the only way they'll make the toy is if I get enough votes, so that's where I need your help! Help me out by going to Randy's page (HERE) and vote on him! You gotta sign up on the site to vote, but that literally takes a teensy-2 minutes to do, and it's FREE!

Thanks in advance, blog-visitors!

Clipboards make good makeshift flipbooks...

While working behind the counter at the SVA animation studio, boredom started to creep in. So I picked up a ballpoint pen and started doodling on the Cintiq sign-out sheets. After 20 minutes, and 16 pages, I ended up with this.

The best animations stem from sheer boredom.

New Blog Banner

I never really thought my old banner was too good. I just put it up there as a temp. banner, and it ended up staying there for over a year. So I finally got around to making a new one.

I sketched this doodle of Randy kicking a pine cone...

...scanned it into the computer, cleaned it up in Sketchbook Pro...

... sent it over to Shannon to color (who did a fantastic job as always)...

Put it into a banner template, added text and VOILA! I liked the rough a lot, so I thought it would look keen to put it in the background too.

I really like how this drawing came out. I think there's some good flow in it. It feels more natural. Plus it's actually cleaned up, which I rarely have the patience to do usually.

And for those who miss the old banner, here it is, in all it's rushed, Flashy glory.

The Dodo and the Darling

Here's the colored version, done by Shannon.

I can imagine hugging Randy would be like hugging an overstuffed pillow, or a bean bag chair filled with memory foam.

Dodo Turnaround

Here's a turnaround I did of the dodo for somebody who's making a 3D model. Tried to make things a little easier for him.

Since he's also gonna be in my thesis film, I could use this when I hand my designs/concept work to the thesis committee later this year. I'll make turnarounds for the other 2 birds sometime soon.

Music is For the Birds

I finally figured out what my thesis is gonna be about, & it's gonna star this ragtag group of friends of the feathered kind.

I hope you all had a nice Christmas.

Now for something completely different:

I Animated Something...

There's 4 hours I'll never get back.

Compression sucks.

Lonely Night

Just another one of those nights.... ho hum...

Sculpey Fun

For my Toy Design class, we have to sculpt a "collectible figure" of an original character out of Sculpey modeling clay. Since I have no concept of how to think up something new, I chose a character from my cast of ol' reliables, Randy (whom I've been focusing on a bit too much lately).

Using some tin foil & a poorly-constructed metal armature as a base, I began to sculpt him. Here's what I got after about an hour:

& here's after about another hour's worth of work:

While I have used Sculpey in the past (during my few years of learning at Hofstra University's saturday cartoon classes), I never sculpted anything of this magnitude before. I have to admit, it's difficult, but lots of fun!

The hardest part for me is smoothing out all the rough edges & bumpy areas. It takes plenty of Sculpey, & even more patience. Still, it's really cool seeing your character(s) in 3D like this.

I based it roughly off a picture I posted not too long ago. I definitely took a few liberties when translating it to 3D, but it still kinda has that charm. In fact, there's some things I like more about the figure than the original drawing.

I'll probably be working on it a bit more tomorrow night before my class on Monday. Sadly, I have no place to bake it at the moment, so he'll stay soft & colorless until I can find a suitable place to bake him.

Try Odosketch

I was looking through Keith Lango's blog & I found a link to this online drawing page called Odosketch. It's sorta limited, but still really neat. Try it out!

Ohmmmmm.....

MORE Inking Practice

Here's a little something I inked up today while 'TAing' for Doug Crane's 1st Year Animation class. I think I'm getting a little more confident with ink. I think I'll give brushes a try soon.

Randy's Valentine

A brief cartoon I threw together for Valentines Day. Click on the link below to watch.

Randy's Valentine by ~FantasiaMan on deviantART

Belated Xmas Thingy

While looking through the pictures on my computer, I found this image I forgot to post back during the holiday season.

For a long time, I promised my aunt that I'd make her something nice to hang on her wall, but I've been so busy with school that I never had the time to make something for her. Then Christmas was right around the corner, so I thought I'd finally make a nice drawing for her as a gift. 

Using what I learned in Howard Beckerman's storyboarding class, I colored a nice Christmasy picture on blue construction-like paper with some colored pencils & white charcoal pencil. Then I put it in a nice, shiny black frame. 

She liked it.

Merry Christmas.