Meeting Recap, 4/26

Hey everyone!

Announcements:

1) This Monday at 11 AM in the Canzani Auditorium Mark Hentemann and Dominic Bianchi from Family Guy will be speaking to the school about their experiences. It's definitely a talk that shouldn't be missed and a great opportunity for hearing more about the industry.

2) Just a reminder, the deadline for submitting pieces to the end of the year show is April 29th, meaning this Monday! 3D pieces can be submitted to Patrick Kenney and 2D pieces to Thomas Richner; image submissions must be 300 dpi and can vary in size, video submissions should be high quality.

This week we had a group Skype call with the one and only Nick Burkard!

He informed us of the state of the industry, how much he enjoys his work with Disney, his past experiences in other companies, and the importance of networking and making quality work. If you would like the notes from this meeting feel free to message one of the leaders!

See you all next week for the last meeting of the semester!

Link of the Week

Today's link of the week is actually two links, both being pencil test blogs!

 

Pencil Test Depot

Walk Cycle Depot

These blogs are both treasure troves of 2D animation pencil tests from various

movies, tv shows, short films, and other animations! Be inspired!

- Jinny

Meeting Recap, 4/19

Hey everyone!

Announcements:

1) The End of the Year show is getting closer which means the deadline of April 29th for submitting pieces is as well! 3D pieces can be submitted to Patrick Kenney and 2D pieces to Thomas Richner; image submissions must be 300 dpi and can vary in size, video submissions should be high quality.

2) This weeks meeting has special guest Nick Burkard who has worked on such films as Puss in Boots and The Mummy: Tomb of the Dragon Emperor. He will be speaking with us over webcam about his work, Dreamworks, and the industry. We hope to see you all there ready to ask questions!

This week the lovely Jamie Yuhasz and Andrea Rawson informed us all on shape and color theory as well as how to not go blind!

Everyone learned to identify shapes and the emotions they can evoke in an audience through seven basic components for images, how storyboard layouts in films are given contrast and affinity to keep a viewers attention with the plot, and tips for not harming your sight while working on the computer for extensive hours.

We'll see you all next week!

Link of the Week

Hey all, this week i've got a game-centric "Links of the Week" for you.

First is the Game Design Forum, a place filled with research, discussions, and articles on various topics about game design, from the art to the mechanics


http://www.thegamedesignforum.com/


Next, I'd like to showcase a game studio in Toronto, DrinkBox Studios

DrinkBox has completed 3 critically acclaimed games for the Playstation Network download store, recently releasing their 3rd game, "Guacamelee".

http://drinkboxstudios.com/blog/projects/

Check 'em out!

-Tyler

Meeting Recap, 4/12

Hey everyone!

Announcements:

1) There will be a Computer Animation I workshop Saturday, April 20th from 1-3 pm. Faculty will be there to assist students with their class work if needed. This is a good time to get caught up on work, so make sure to take advantage of it!

2) This week's meeting will be The Secrets and Mysteries of Shape with Jamie Yuhasz which will teach us how to utilize certain shapes in characters as well as other aspects of our artwork. There will also be a section dedicated to taking care of your eye's so you don't strain then while working which will be lead by Andrew Rawson. Both are definitely great to listen to and learn from, so we hope to see you all there for those this Friday!

This week everyone in the collective participated in Animation Jeopardy with our very own Tyler Crowley as the host!

The teams were Team MnM's, Team DDD, and Team Bear. Each team played well and the competition was intense, but in the end their could only be one victorious team... and that was Team Bear! Congratulations!

We'll see you all next week!

Link of the Week!

Hey all! Its my turn for the link of the week and I thought I would mention one of my favorite artist blogs.

  

PAUL BRIGGS!!!

Paul Briggs is one of my favorite artist in the industry right now. He is currently a story supervisor at Walt Disney Animation! He has worked on various films for Disney such as the current film in the works entitled Frozen! Paul Briggs has a very unique style. His line work is rough but also confident.

So yeah................Awesome right?!?! Hope you all enjoy!

-Don

Meeting Recap, 4/5

Hey all!

 Announcements:

1) This Friday is Jeopardy hosted by our very own Tyler Crowley! So expect many surprises, musical numbers, interactive questions, and merriment! We're all definitely stoked about the meeting.

 2) As you all know the final week of this semester is coming up fast which means the end of the year show is as well! If you have some work you want in it now is the time to start thinking about what pieces you'd like to submit or touch up! We hope to see a lot of pieces from you all.

 This week we had a networking tutorial lead by our wonderful president and founder of the ASC, Rico Jackson!

We learned about various sites one can use to network, some of the ways to approach making connections throughout the business, and how to make your site and resume alluring for others so they come back to see your work! Afterwards there was a short party in celebration of Rico for finishing his last networking meeting, founding the ASC, and inspiring so many of us!

If you would like the notes from this meeting feel free to contact a leader and we'll get them to you!

See you next week for Jeopardy!

Link of the Week!

This week I wanted to share a site that honestly is a great resource for people interested in idea-sparking as well as those with a competitive nature: a site called No Entry Fee Fests!

 http://noentryfeefestivals.com

The website was created and is maintained by Animation faculty member Tracy Robbins. I am in Experimental Animation class this semester - for our final project, we are required to try and enter one of the festivals. I chose this link this week because honestly - the entire time we were going over a handful of these current competitions, all I could think was: "These contests are totally do-able if not win-able" for lots of us here in the ASC. I also couldn't stop thinking: "Why haven't we?" and then, finally: "Maybe we don't know about it".

Two of what I thought looked like worthwhile contests are the LoopdeLoop (http://www.loopdeloop.org) and the Animation Sequence Project (http://animationsequence.com) (check it out, here's a screenshot of directions):

Also, here's a fun animation I was reminded of the other day... it's pretty abstract, and a fun way to think of animating to music:

And.... here's a video of a CG, not-dead Audrey Hepburn.This is the future? Or is this the past? Or is this just a fancy chocolate commercial?

Have a great week everybody!

-Sarah