Here's a small update on something I've been working. Like the desert concept painting below, this has to do with the small animated film I'm working on, and this is our main character. We've yet to decide on a name, but the modeling process has begun. It's got a ways to go, but I wanted to share some here.
I've been meaning to post this for a while, but just got around it I suppose. This is a quick fly-through of an environment I modeled in April; I also did the texturing, lighting, camera animation, and render. The concept was basically an abandoned laboratory, where the instruments and objects sprawled across the room hint at a story behind what could have happened there.
So I've begun some concept work on a new short animated film that I'm working on with a small team of friends. The basic idea is about a turtle - or tortoise, more appropriately - crossing a lone road in the desert to stay cool from the hot sun. Here's an environment concept painting I did: I liked the idea of having a gas station along the road, making it kind of like the protagonist has to journey from his natural, animalistic side to the more unfriendly, man-made world on the other side. Hopefully there will be a lot more work like this to come soon.
The following video is the rendered out opening to the short film, "Atlas' Revenge." The final product in the film has some title overlays and some fancy water-drops-on-the-lens effects by Michael Navarro, but I wanted to post this to display the work I've done in it.
I modeled and textured all assets over the span of about two weeks. All work was done in Maya 8.5 and rendered with Maya Software and Mental Ray (split for above/under water lighting differences). The falling flowers were animated by Zach Hansen and the water surface is courtesy of Creighton Ashton. You can click the link to Vimeo to check it out in full resolution.
This afternoon I decided to try something that would help refresh my illustration techniques, which - I have to admit - have gotten a bit rusty of late. I wanted a simple composition, cartoony and character-focused, which is something I haven't really done before.
I chose to use Corel Painter X instead of Photoshop for this one, not only to get even more familiar with the software but to give the piece a more painterly look. After about two hours, I had a goofy looking airborne snail.
I didn't actually create this fine piece of work - the credit completely goes to Khuong Tran - but it features work I've done for our class short film, "Atlas' Revenge."
The film premieres May 5th, 2009 at the Center for Emerging Media in Orlando, FL. Hopefully it'll then make its way around the festival circuit. But for now, here's the trailer:
