Gap Jump - Planning and Blocking

Here's my first assignment. This one will span 4 weeks (planning, blocking, blocking plus, polish) and I'll turn each step in for Steve to review and give me feedback. So far he's liked what he's seen but has also given some great critiques such as not doing two things at once. For example, I had Ballie stopping at the edge of the gap on one foot and, as he gained his balance by sticking the other foot out, he shot upwards to help himself out. Steve suggested I have him shoot up and, at his peek, shoot that leg out and move in to a hold. Man, that little difference was huge. But I guess that's why he's the mentor and I'm the student!

So far so good. I'm in the Blocking Plus stage and I've adjusted the timing a bit so the jump is faster, some holds are a touch longer or exaggerated and some other tweaks. I'll be posting the splined animation soon but here's my blocking and planning stages.

Quick sketches, notes and detailed doodles.

Planning out specific poses that I wanted to nail.

Gap jump Blocking

Class 2 - Psychology of Body Mechanics

Just a quick blurb about my next class. I'm pretty stoked about this one (shocking, I know) because I'm taking the basics I learned and applying them to a few different animations that I get to choose over 12 weeks. My mentor is Steve Cady, a great guy who has worked on flicks, like Avatar, Scooby Doo, Watchmen (GAH!!!), and is currently working in games via BlueCastleGames. His Q&A's are really cool because he shows us things he's worked on in the past (drawings, planning, blocking, final renders) and then gives us his tips and tricks. This is the best way to learn for me, seeing it go down! I'm pretty stoked, as I'm sure you've heard!

Stu - Balance

Final pose assignment of Stu balancing. One thing Mark told me throughout the class and made a final suggestion to was to push my poses. Squash them more, accentuate the angles, anyting to really push the idea I'm trying to portray. If I've taken anything from my first class it's that I'm conservative. Yep, you read that right... me... conservative. Hehehe.

Sketches for balance pose.

This is what reading Tony Hawk video game reviews does to me.

Weeeee! Nothin' Like a good manual!

Side Sneak - Final Class 1 Assignment

For whatever reason (probably dissatisfaction), I never uploaded my final assignment from Basic Foundations. Well, here it is. It's not great but I've come to the conclusion that I'm learning, of course it's not going to be perfect. I struggled, I found things I wished I had done differently, etc, but that's the best part - I'm learning.

Anyway, the plan was a side sneak, which went awry for several reasons, but it's a stepping stone, and that's how I look at it.

Not so sneaky-pants.