Restaurant caffe

I quickly sketched these guys when we went out for supper on Friday night. Ah, people are so fun to draw! Endless varieties.....

Beat boards for Action Analysis

Here are my revised beat boards for my Action Analysis project.... aka, my mini individual film we have to do this term. [Along with working on our group film and group meetings and class stuff... pant pant... !!!]

Yeah, this should be fun though!

Once I get the character designs figured out and the style finalized and the storyboard drawn.... is it end of term yet??

This Bird's boots are made for walkin'

So perhaps it's just that this week was insane with deadlines and amount of work, or perhaps it's that this bird has every possible follow-thru element available... [well, almost!]

...but let's just say I am very happy it's FRIDAY!!!!

Ottawa Animation Fest 07!

We just got back tonight from a fun-filled weekend adventure at the Ottawa Internationl Animation Festival! It was my first time there, both for seeing the city and attending the festival. Ottawa was really beautiful and funky, it reminded me of a combo between Toronto, Winnipeg and New York City. Lovely!

And the festival was great!! I really lucked out, this year they were doing a 4-part tribute to the awesomeness of UPA animation, which is my FAV... so I got to screen a lot of Mr. Magoo that I had never seen before! Another major highlight was the Disney workshop where we got to meet and greet with the directors/animators who worked on the new Goofy short. Crazy cool.

In between all the walking and screening, I found some time to do some sketchin'... see above.

Here are a couple pics – good times at the festival!

A super cool chalk artist dude. We gave props.

Alysia and I outside the first venue on Friday night.

Tams in front of some shwanky parliament buildings, it was near one of the major screening venues.

Me being attacked by a giant spider. A typically normal day at the animation festival.

Mo-cap Penguins logo

I did a quick logo for our group film studio; we named it Mo-cap Penguins. As in, motion captured penguins. This would be humorous if a-you are in the animation field, b-sort of loathe the mad amount of motion captured that is done for every animated film lately, and c-realize how many animated films star motion captured penguins.

If not a, b, or c.... it's a penguin logo!

If Tracers reads this - isn't is ironic that it stars a penguin Trace?? I should have suggested we call it Chomper....

Good times! :)

Life drawring... round 3!

It seems so far for me, that a lot of the classes in this third year have a common theme:

Back to basics!

Which, honestly, I can REALLY use! After a while of building up new skills and techniques and styles, when you go back to doing something super simple, it's like, "Wait – what?? I don't know what I'm doing!!"

This term we have Bobby Chiu to lead us in his life drawing wisdom... and so far, I am muchly enjoying his lessons! It has filled in a lot of blanks for me, and I think will help heaps as I continue to grow on this meandering journey of being an artist.

Bobby also created a blog for us third year-ers to post our life drawrings. Good idea!
If you feel so inclined, take a gander: http://lifedrawers.blogspot.com/

Here's some notes I took the first week back, it was really helpful for me on how to simplify profiles, especially when you go to do caffe drawings and such.

The first thing Bobby made us do was 5 1-min poses, back to back – ay, but here's the catch – we could NOT look at our paper the entire time. Believe it or not, it really helped to monitor proportions, and also to JUST concentrate on seeing the model, and drawing what you see. Not what you see on your paper. I attached the end result for fun :) What do you see? Maybe it could be used as one of those Rorschach tests!


First week was about structure. He told us to think of the figure as a tree, how is the trunk positioned, how are the branches... just look at the shapes and try to not think of it as a person. Very helpful! Here's a couple from the first week: [yep, I felt rusty!]



This past week was about how things fit together. Not necessarily in an anatomy form, but how would you construct a person if you didn't know how things were put together? Hence my drawing above. She looks like she got some attitude.

Onward and upward!

Ball a la cloth

Phew, nearing the end of Week 2 almost and already I am exhausted!!
But, a good exhausted :)

Welcome to third year!! [I am welcoming myself. I have already lost it.]

Here's the first animation - DQ is bringing us back to basics, yo.

Chomiak Card Capers

My grand friend Ann, who owns a charming little shop on Kerr Street [here in Oakville] called Art on the Left, told me that I could sell some cards through her shop if I so desired.

And since I love painting, and am always in need of funds to attempt to balance my starving artist status... I said, "Why I'd love to!"

So I spent my last day of non-school work today whipping up some watercolour cards. Tomorrow however, it is Week 2, and all downhill! Free time as I knew it, is officially over.

Good times. And thanks Ann!

Here's what the series will look like; simple graphic in the center, and a smaller graphic on the envelope cover. If these happen to sell, I shall do more, but here's the first batch of my idears.

The Christmas collection. [I use the term 'collection' loosely.]

The Birthday collection. Happy happy! Birthday birthday.

The Thanksgiving collection. 'Tis good to be thankful. And to eat pumpkin pie.

The Thank-you collection. Merci buckets.

The Wedding collection. How loverly.

Oh, and here's a snapshot of my paintings in Ann's store. Crazy haps!

Red Carpet, TIFF-style

So, since I successfully completed my first week of 3rd year, [yahoo!... 13 more to go this term!], Tams and I thought we'd take a jaunt downtown last night to check out the star-gazing haps for the TIFF. [Toronto International Film Fest]

I would be lying if I didn't say the main reason for our visit [if you ask me] was to see if I could catch a glimpse of Ms. Jodie Foster who apparently arrived in town Thursday to promote her new flick The Brave One. Having been a fan since her Freaky Friday days, I would have had a stroke if I saw her!

However, we found out we had just missed her, as she was out-and-about on Thursday evening. Drats. Foiled again!!! Ugh, see pics.



Downtown was all a-buzz, and we happened upon the red carpet being rolled out just outside of MuchMusic, where Hillary Duff was giving an outdoor carpet. So, needless to say, it was madness!! Reminded me of NYC... but we had an interesting front row seat for a red carpet eve [they apparently are having them throughout the entire film fest], and did some shopping along the funky shops on Queen Street.

I came home with some interesting pics, a funky art book and a new sketchbook, so I cannot complain!

Tams outside of Much! Red carpet and Duffgirl's stage being set up.

At the edge of the red carpet where the limos were dropping off the celebs.

Front row to the camera action... that cameradude was so happy!

This is for my momsy - she loves Ben Mulrooney, right Mom??? [He needs a haircut, seriously.]

This dude is soooo familiar. I have seen him on numerous films. His name escapes moi.

Snake! Anyone remember Degrassi Junior High? Oh, classic Canadian TV.

Don't have a clue who these guys are. But they were cuties.

I haven't kept totally up with Cdn Idol, but here's one of the finalists, Brian Melo.

Finalist numero deux, Jaydee Bixby. Is he 12????

Zach, one of the judges... he's a Winnipegger! Look at his face, he's happy about it too.

Chantal Kreviazuk, another Winnipegger! But one who can ACTUALLY sing.

Oh, that's me! I didn't sign any autographs.

Road Trip Findings

So... currently Tams and I are up to our eyelashes in boxes 'n things at the new digs here in the land o' Oakville, but I needed to take a blog break and share with the 5 of you out there who read this on a sorta-regular basis, some interesting findings on our road trip from Winnipeg to Oakville.

First off, just 'cause I love it and it makes me smile, here's a pic of my crazy family taken the day before I left to return to school....

....dontcha love how Mom is the only "sane" looking one?

And now, for some findings during our recent road trip...

Firstly, signs. I welcome any comments on the following!

So, this route is getting rather familiar to us, even though the 23 hour trek never gets shorter! The roads are better since we go through the States, however, this time I kept asking out loud, "WHAT ARE PASTIES??!!!" Throughout the US, [I think we mostly hit Minnesota, Michigan and Wisconsin], we saw signs for them EVERYwhere. Did they forget the "r" or what?????

Ah, Rita. Well, we noticed this sign "Pray for Rita" in Wisconsin during the first time we drove this route. We marked it on the map, and since check that it still stands. And not only does it stand, but every year there is a bigger, more professional sign in its' place!! Who IS Rita, and what should we be praying for??? I am willing, but I would like a tad more info!

Secondly, nature jazz.

Well, the upside to getting up so early that you are on the road by 6 AM – watching the sunrises! I think this was taken around 6:30ish am. Pertty.

Ya know, fog can be kinda scary sometimes! Somehow we ran into majorly thick patches of fog, [this was taken soon after the aforementioned sunrise], and the windshield fogged up so thick we couldn't even see for a few seconds! Ah, lovely when you're going 75 miles an hour on a highway. But the pic turned out cool!

Thirdly in our findings, tunes.

Since it's fun to radio-surf [a new term I just coined, you are free to use it at your leisure] during a cross-country trip, ya never know what will come through the airwaves! Sometimes, interesting polka-rap, or country [hey, I like Rascall Flatts! less twang....], or fidy-cent and his buddies, or elevator classical......

BUT, sometimes there's a gem that pops up and you're like, "Oh! Who's that! I love that!!" That happened when we first heard a new groovy guitar-driven ditty by up-and-comer chickie Colbie Caillat called "Bubbly". Check out that link to her site, you can sample some of her tunes. I love it!!!

I heard it again last night when we were in Oakville, so I blared it in the car, rolled down the windows and let the fresh air help me greet a new school year.

And now, the boxes are calling.