Dragons!

Okay, I take back my Avatar statement for the use of 3D; Dragons blows it out of the water! Man! huge congrats to everyone over at DW!!

Sean Sexton my class mentor, his shots turned out amazing. And it was soooooo cool to see the shots finalized and lit after visiting and seeing everything last year in the rough blocking stages! I'm going to see this movie again!! I wasn't expecting too much from it, but from friends at DW - I was just hearing this could be the best they've done, better than KFP. Congrats to Luke and Tyler as well!!

And I was hugly impressed with the quality all around. What I enjoyed the most was the cinematography, match cuts were brilliant, use of 3D was so nice!! The flying scenes and the underwater scenes in 3D are very cool. Pacing of the film was great, not a moment dragged. The story development of Hiccup and Toothless was nice, had really nice conflict and turning points!!

Hiccup and his father, man! I loved how far they pushed the dad to just being a complete jerk, but they had some wonderful moments with him and then with the end... money baby!

Also pick up the art of book!! Nico is freaking amazing and I loved looking at


Interviews & great links about the movie:
·Kristof Serrand, Supervising Animator --- I learned from Kristof while I attended Gobelins a few years back, that man is amazing!
·Sabrina Riegel, Supervisor of Surfacing
·Gabe Hordos, Supervising Animator
·Cressida Cowell, head of Character Effects Supervision
·April Knobbe, Matte Painting Supervisor



·AWN Article
·LA Times - Conflict

I'm the Exhale of the Night

Man, time flies! And how lame of me not to post until now!! Been a interesting past couple of months! I'm still cranking animations out at NetDevil.

Close to 5 mins of animation in total, and I've been getting faster! Learning to block in spline mode, no time for stepped. (there is sooo much animation between the 4 main animators at ND - close to 3k if not over) And I've learned to work out of the graph editor for most part. My super limited knowledge on rigging has grown by little bounds, which is good as well.

I'm apart of the LUP team, which is all user generated content that is sent in looking to be optimized, setup and rigged then animated by me! So custom creatures, objects you name it, I've been animating it. It's been extremely fun and difficult at times, some of these characters are only 4 pieces of lego brick. And to get that sucker to read like the animal they want can be hard. But at the same time, it's really pushed me to plan better and become even more creative with such tight limitations.

"Greatness is performing under limitation" - nice quote I heard from a friend that I thought couldn't be more fitting.

·Also I've been working on a new blog for my company along with a website. I thought it was about time I started tracking this journey, covering the last few years, current progress, and as it continues allowing a small window into everything the team and I deal with.

·My team and I have also been working tirelessly on the story for the feature. I will elaborate more on this on my new site. But in about 4-5 days we damn near busted out 500 storyboards. Once we really get going, it is are goal to average 100 drawings a day for the team. Only 3-4 of us right now, and once we hit that bar it will increase even more :D

·Us taking a break to power up ha.


Well even though I'm a few months behind on the HAPPY NEW YEAR! I hope everyone's year has treated them well thus far!! And I can't wait for what this year has in store for everyone!

Change always comes bearing gifts. ~Price Pritchett

Merry Chritsmas!!

I just wanted to wish everyone a Merry Christmas and for those that celebrate other holidays HAPPY HOLIDAYS to you!!

This was one hell of a year. A bit of reflection for me.

-09 Started off with a terrible bang, followed by madness with finished up AM.
-Then jumped on a Discovery Channel project in the middle of finishing up my schooling
-Gramps isn't doing so well, finish last week of school or go see him for the last time.. I went and thankfully passed AM!! Working hard with the team trying to keep everyone motivated on the film but as graduation grew closer we all pretty -much took a much needed break.
-Started reenergizing my batteries, meet up with tons of AM school mates to celebrate graduating, had a trip of a life time with some friends
-Came back refreshed and the blinders came off- focused on making my temple strong again doing all sorts of fun things: dance classes, yoga, parkour, kayaking, taking different religion classes, tai chi, exploring CO's awesome mountains, etc etc.
- Quickly teamed up with Michal Finegold for a animboom contest
-Found out NetDevil was looking for another animator and they contacted me!!
-My grandpa passed away - so great full I went to see him
-Started my new gig at NetDevil
-Regrouping the team, for the last big Hoo RA! - learning that my time management went out the window - trying to refocus my time where it is needed then I am trying to get back on the horse for staying active and in shape.
-Lessons in life; Friends are worth fighting for!
-Time to kick ass in '10

Also thank you, to everyone for their support, and all my love and wishes go out to everyone pursing their dream! If it was easy, everyone would do it.

"If you can dream it, YOU CAN DO IT" -by my fav. one and only - Mr. Disney

Avatar

GO SEE!


WHOOA! Slow it down there... the art team at Netdevil all went to go watch the flick and wow. Then I watched it again in 3D!!

Is that how this stuff is suppose to be done or what?! Aside from UP and Coraline the use of 3D was fantastic I felt. Overall, the movie was nothing mind-blowing storytelling wise, but what one hell of a ride!

I think that's all it was meant to be, to entertain, and I believe over the next weeks it will be rolling the cash in from people going back. I was predicting what was going to happen next almost every-time (which sucked) but still felt super glued to the screen. And man! That's what its about when it comes down to it. No need to freak on reinventing the wheel, just tell a story in a new and entertaining way and boom! You have Avatar!

I also think this is a movie experience not to pass up, go see it in the theater!