Drawing for Animation 1/2

Character Design

 Here are some character design researches. I have been very inspired by James Wood and Meg Park. After studying their sketches and how they construct their characters, I tried to work from photos of people which I tried to caricature. Very difficult to dare pushing the realism to something that graphic.

Animation Basics

3 weeks ago we had two intensive weeks about animation basics. We learnt the basis of it and had different assignments to practice. We went through different basic principles such as the bouncing ball, the seaweed, the headturn... and we also got used to anticipate movement thanks to the exercice of TV-croquis which consists of sketching from an animation or a movie. Here are some TV-croquis, and two of our main assigments : the attitude ball with a tail and the flour sack. For this last one, we had to follow an imposed storyboard and the flour sack but we were free concerning the acting. Even if my final animation struggles a lot yet, I am very happy to have been able to surpass myself and to finally tell a story in motion :)

Have a look at our weekly teachers' blogs : Jody Ghani and Laura B. Schjødt 

Some life drawings - october 2012

Composition * Design

The week has been completely awesome for me : we have been taught by "the great" Lawrence Marvit who introduced us to design and composition in visual arts. Here are some of the different assignments we had to explore.

* After tasting a really dark chocolate, our mission was to picture our sensations while eating it only using a line. Very difficult task when you do not dare play with the thickness, the form or the texture of it. I managed to get the closest to what was happening in my body.

* Second approach to the visual translation of our senses, we had to listen to the album Kind of Blue by Miles Davis and same exercise : trying to relate the music to something visual only using a line, shapes and three grays. This is so interesting to realize how you can relate everything you feel to a story.

* After a week figuring out how to compose and design a picture properly and with simple shapes, we received an extract from Shakespear’s Hamlet for which we had to create a final picture. We had to considerate all the "rules" composition offers (focal point, pressure, shapes...) to be able to emphasize the mood we wanted the scene to be. The scene takes place on one of the towers of the castle and the dead king ghost is appearing in front of three guards.

This week was very intense and very surprising because I was not expecting how important the composition of a picture could be. Also it has been a pleasure to explore our body and brain to understand that inspiration comes first from our deepest sensations. Now I will think twice before drawing.

Visit Lawrence Marvit's artwork : clic!

Commission "Escale Bio"

While I was working last july as a seller in an organic shop near my hometown my bosses asked me if I could find some ways to "dress" their new shop. I decided to set myself a goal which was to create big wall paintings. I had "carte blanche" concerning the content of them so I just let my hand go through these new volumes and mediums... It has been a real self-transcendence to be able to finish them and be proud of them. Now they exist and live with the place and the people that run it. The pictures are not very good but you get the idea*

Construction * Perspective

Here are our first week assignments. We went through a lot of construction and perspective basis in order to compose and construct our future characters properly.

Check out our teacher’s blog : Magnus Møller