Let me tell you about my tour at Pixar and last day of AnimC.

As I was driving to the gates, my hands were literally shaking from excitement because you know, I was visiting Pixar. The security guy gave me my tag (which I’ll keep forever). I ran to the lobby because I was 30 minutes late, also took a quick picture of the yard with the stones from Brave. As I entered the lobby I saw my class huddled on a small table at the Luxo Cafe. Dan reviewed our portfolios I which went well, Im glad he liked my landscapes and designs. Half the time my eyes were wandering around.

After the review, Dan gave us a tour of the main building, unfortunately I wasn’t able to take pictures of the visual development and drawings for Brave. They had an entire hall dedicated to a gallery for the film. Walking through that gallery was so inspiring, actually seeing the eraser marks and textures of paint got me excited and shaky.

Since there wasn’t much else we could go to in the main building, we headed to another one named Brooklyn where all the visual development and story took place. This one was airy like the main but it wasn’t as lively. It had this huge fireplace and behind it was a super fancy room with fancy wine, fancy furniture, and a bitchin chandelier. Because it was behind the “fireplace” everything in there looked charred and burnt, which was a great touch I thought. The next part of the tour I can’t tell you about because it would get Dan fired. Haha

After walking around the campus we all went back to the Luxo Cafe, had some tea, and asked Dan about his experience before going to Pixar. He talked about all the schools he went to and how hard it was before getting his break at Pixar. He really emphasized staying true to your passion because in the end, that’s what’s going to get you to your goal. All in all, I really enjoyed and learned a lot during my time at AnimC and the tour at Pixar was a cherry on top.

AnimC class is moved to next Thursday and we will be meeting in their legendary lobby

I can’t contain my excitement!!

Animc Day 7: Okay guys this was the second to last class and I felt a little sad because I’ve learned so much and met some talented artists, all that coming to an end next Tuesday. Anyways, our assignment was to take one of our past projects and do it in the style of a given artist, I picked Miroslav Slasek mainly because of his use of color, character design? Not so much. You may remember the 70s contestant and host, I chose these two because they would look great with color. I think the more successful one is the host which everyone seemed to like. They didn’t think it was Slasek-y enough but Dan agreed that I used Slasek as an influence and it worked well in my own style.

Our lesson that day was about portfolios. Dan talked about RED (Research, Experimentation, and Decision). He also showed us some portfolio examples from artists in Disney and Pixar and some very talented Europeans (those guys can draw). For the last example Dan showed us some of his work from two years ago, I saw illustrations of Burn-E and I think he might have designed him!For the time remaining we watched experimental animations that were totally wack and weird but awesome stuff. I didn’t Sesame Street was into that kind of stuff.

Exciting news: Next week will be our last class and the assignment was to put together a portfolio that should include some of the character designs we did for this class. Dan decided to hold the last class at Pixar. Im pumped for next week, I’ll take a butt load of pictures for you guys, especially of that legendary lobby they have and maybe their famous cereal bar!

Last animc class will be held at pixar. Im so happy

AnimC Day 6: Not much happened during this class but that doesn’t mean it was insightful. During the first half, Dan critiqued our assignment which was to design three characters from the poem “The Shooting of Dan McGrew” in a way that hasn’t been done before. I mean, how hard is it to come up with a method that hasn’t been done before? Okay, enough sarcasm, it was pretty difficult, I realized I just need to pick an artist and experiment with their style, I chose Al Hirschfeld. I liked his style; simple, clean, and on point. The poem was challenging to understand so I decided to make the characters look mysterious, leaving just enough information for the viewer to fill in the rest. Overall I think my classmates and I did pretty well, especially this guy from Brazil who demonstrated how he made one of his designs.Im actually learning a lot from all the critiques he’s given to other people.

For the rest of the class, Dan showed us some books and talked about experimentation again. We also did some quick sketches of different pictures which was fun, definitely experimented more than I did last time. Our assignment for next class was to design characters from our past assignments but in the style of either Bill Peet or Sasik.

AnimC Day 5: Our assignment was to design a 70s game show host and contestant with at least 3 to 6 gestures, at least one interacting with each other. I had a lot of fun with this assignment, mainly because I love gesture drawing and so that’s what I focused on, hence the lack of caricature with the contestant.

During critique I got really nervous because like last class, everyone else’ drawings were colored and mostly polished, while mines was still rough. To my surprise, everyone really liked my gestures, especially Dan. He pointed out the fact that these poses were solid and had a lot of action to them, despite the subtlety on some. In fact, he only had to draw over one gesture which is a big deal because if he doesn’t draw over them, it usually means that the drawing is perfect or just doesn’t need any more pushing around. One particular drawing everyone seemed to like is the one with the host snatching the contestant. Definitely tried to keep the last lesson in mind.

The lecture was all about experimentation. He showed us books and short films that really pushed and experimented with what you can do to design characters. As an exercise, we all drew scenes from movies using ink and a thick paint brush. Let’s just say it didn’t turn out as well as it could have. And so with that, our assignment: Design characters using descriptions from this poem called ‘The Shooting of Dan McGrew’. Here’s the catch, design them in a way that hasn’t been done before. Okay Dan, I’ll make sure to do that in a week.

AnimC Day 4: Sorry about not posting about the 4th day, I was just really pissed and disappointed because that was the second day I failed my driving test, all because of one simple but costly mistake. It was probably one of the lowest days I’ve had in recent years. Plus it was hot as hell.

Anyways, the assignment for our forth class was to design three characters based on the shapes of triangles, squares, and circles. So far this was one of the most frustrating assignments I had, triangles and circles I did fine; but designing characters based on squares was frustrating. I think because squares are such inorganic shapes when it comes to actual living beings. I was really surprised at what my classmates came up with using squares: dogs, matadors, and WW2 airplane pilots. Meanwhile I had that witch lady using squares for her costume. Did I forget to mention mines were the only designs that were sketched? Everyone else’ was polished and colored, just when I thought my day couldn’t get any worse.

It didn’t, actually it got better. I think the lecture for that class was one of the most helpful and informative one I’ve had so far. Dan discussed placement and silhouette with characters. Having a clear silhouette just makes your design that much better, being able to read their actions enhances the design. Gesture was also a very important topic, just because you have great design, it doesn’t mean you can’t push it to do more than just stand still.

Our assignment for our fifth class was to design a 70s game show host and contestant and have them do several gestures, at least one should be interacting with the other.

Animc Day 3: Shape was the main topic for the third class. We spent the majority of class with Dan critiquing our assignments, in which we had to design three robbers that described who they were. My classmates definitely had some interesting designs, guy with glasses continue to amaze us with his designs, its like, what are you doing here? Just kidding he’s cool.

Back to me. The the first three pictures I posted are Dan’s drawings, these were some of the suggestions he had to improve the design. He wanted me emphasize that these guys were wearing masks and define shapes, although he really liked the crazy wild man’s mask which he said not to change.

During the last hour of class Dan showed us some books and videos and pointed out shapes and all that good stuff. After that we did some quick designs based on simple shapes of vases, cars, and faces.

Im sorry this seems dull but I’ve had a long day, the third day wasn’t boring at all, Im just really tired as I write this. Our assignment for next class is to create designs based on the shapes of triangles, circles, and squares. I’ll make sure to show early sketches. Good night all.

AnimC Day 2: The second day was more hands on than the first, but the exercises were helpful none the less. Our homework was to bring reference materials for our passion. I brought several National Geographic books that included interesting landscapes. I’ve also shown the landscapes I’ve posted here which surprisingly everyone liked a lot. It was interesting to see what other people brought in; someone brought actual video game consoles and game controls.

Then we looked at children’s books and talked about the story that goes behind each of the images and designs. In fact, I think the main theme of the class was story. Who is this character? What has she/he been through? Why does he/she look like that? WHAT IS THEIR STORY?! These are just some of the questions we need to ask ourselves when creating characters. Dan emphasized that not only is character design about appeal and looks, but also the story behind why characters look the way they are.

During break, I saw a map of the world and in them were tags of people and where they came from. I couldn’t believe that people were willing to travel from RUSSIA, AUSTRALIA, AND EUROPE to take classes at AnimC, Im so damn lucky to live in California, especially in the Bay Area.

Our activity took the majority of class but it was worth it. We went over pictures from the early 1900s and analyzed them just by their looks. We went through several pictures and we were to draw them by using our own perception of THEIR story. Definitely changed the way Im making my designs.

Our homework was to design three robbers and just by looking at them we should be able to decide who is who. For example: the leader, the getaway driver, and the muscle man, somewhere along those lines.

If you’ve been reading my AnimC journals and doing my homework, I’d be interested to see some of your designs. :)

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Okay, yesterday was the first day of my character design class at AnimC, which was pretty frickin’ amazing. The studio is located literally in front of the Pixar entrance. I was five minutes late into the class but couldn’t resist taking a picture of the Pixar front gate.

Right as I came in, everyone in the class was in the middle of an introduction, it was amazing how different our backgrounds were. Most of us didn’t even have an animation background so that made me feel better. Our teacher, Dan Holland worked on The Incredibles and Wall-E and was a really nice guy. His lecture about character design was really helpful to get me started on doing my own. After the lecture we went through some fun but also insightful activities like using LEGOs and paper cutouts to caricature each other. He said that having limited information or materials helps with keeping things simple and communicate things clearly without having too much detail. One thing that he emphasized was “Less is more.”

After more talks and lectures, we had some time for one person to show their work. Guy with glasses volunteered and his work made me nervous; for myself. This guy whose had experience with character design and concept art, had work that totally blew me away. He definitely set the bar high for the rest of us.

A down side of AnimC: a block away, everything just turns into Oakland madness

I don’t think I covered everything but that’s all for now. Ah, I just remembered our homework was to bring reference materials based on our interest besides art.