Liz Clements illustration

Liz Clements illustrations are amazing! I think it is simply eye candy, there does not seemed to be any story or deeper meaning to her work but it is so well detailed and pops out that it is amazing to look at. Yet again I love an artist mainly because their inspiration subject is females, but her style seems to be really detailed and the drawings look like they took ages to make, the colors and designs are very contemporary and speaks to the modern artist or fan of art. It is not that sort of art that every age group would love, mainly young people my age, but if I showed this to my mom she wouldn't get it. Maybe that is why I like it so much?

Otto Shcmidt

Otto Schimdts work is insane. He is currently one of my favorite artists. Mainly because his work shows strong, sexual and at times even cruel women. That is usually what try to draw sometimes, I try and look for these raw moments when a woman is at her strongest. Not for feminist reasons or anything political, mainly because I love drawing women, I find it easier and it is sort of a way to take all my insecurities and reverse them into strengths on these characters I draw. In another way I draw what I wish I was like. I guess Shcmidts work hits that particular note with me where I see all my insecurities reversed and turned into strengths. A sexy woman who knows what she is worth and how to get what she wants.

Goro Fujita Art

I came across this guy on Facebook as it was suggested page. The reason I love his work mainly the lighting and the square brush strokes. There is just something about rough brush strokes that makes drawings look raw and unpolished which excites me. Also his work with lighting and coloring is insane, all of the reflections, shadows and colors make sense and add so much to the drawing. This the one thing I struggle learning I guess that is why I look for other peoples work to understand it better. There is a lot of knowledge needed to make lighting realistic, how the light falls on certain textures and colors. Goro's put up some videos of "making of" which really helps learning about it.

The Realist

I came across this artist not so long ago, but I love his work mainly because I think this typo of work would be an achievable goal for me. He also manages to bring this comic book meets GTA art type of style to the table, it is not over realistic and sort of cartooney in a sense, but juts enough to make you fall in love with it. I especially like the illustrations involving himself, like these ones below:

But he also does amazing art work which seems to be quite flexible and portray the story very well.

Randy Bishop

Randy Bishop is a character design whom I've started following this year. I really love his character design work because it seems to be very simple, nothing over complicated yet very charismatic, all of his characters seem to have a certain charm to them, and even his sketches seem to portray a lot of personality

I especially like his work because it is something I would like to go for, it is styled but not too much, rather subtle I'd say but they have these charming Disney like eyes to them which I really want to lear and use.

Gediminas Skyrius

Yet another Lithuanian artist! What can I say, I am staying true to my heritage. But in all respect I love Skyrius work. Mostly because it is really professional, but he also has his own significant style, his work is mostly dark and mystical and at time creepy even disturbing. I like it that it immediately catches your attention I spend at least five minutes analyzing every single drawing. All of them seem to have a dark story behind them and it just involves you into the story once you see it.

Gediminas Pranckevicius

At one point I was looking up who's up in the Lithuanian art scene and I found this guy. So Gediminas is a digital illustrator/artist. First of all I was really surprised that there are amazing and really professional Lithuanian artist. Seems to me that the last two years the Lithuanian artist scenery has improved significantly. When I was a kid all you could find about Lithuanian artist were soviet or post soviet type of art and it was not anything I would find cool or interesting. Now there are amazing shows, animations, illustrations coming our left and right.  Seems like the new generation of bringing a lot to the table. So anyway, this guys work is really good, it is very detailed and has a lot of character. I can recognize some of that Lithuanian humor and irony in his work. Also there was one post about how he mad an illustration and just browsing through it was cool to see-

His other work is really breath taking, its surrealistic and philosophical in a way

Character Design research Andrea Fermerstrand

I discovered Andrea Fermerstrand a.k.a. Noukah on Behance. What fought my eye was her sketches. I like the way they were presented which I thought looked really professional. Her character designs are insane! She manages to exaggerate the most uncommon features of animal or people and it just works so nicely.

This sketch in particular is my favorite because a new passion of mine is sketching foxes, wolves or dogs. Probably it was because it all started with responsive when I was making a character design for Chilli animation. It was so easy and fun to sketch it I thought I would like to develop it further.

 This sketch is funny and she managed to catch character in such a simple sketch which I find fascinating.

This illustration is amazing because the character seemed to breaking stereotype- instead of being a clever fox, the fox is presnted so funny and whimsical, where as the tiger is usually a serious character, masculine and even scary sometimes but she made it friendly and cute. I love it when the artist break the stereotypes especially when it comes to character design.

Visiting lecturer Barry Purves

Recently we had a visiting lecturer Barry Purves. He is an English animator, director and screenwriter of puppet animation television and cinema and theatre designer and director, primarily for the Altrincham Garrick Playhouse in Manchester. It was a very beneficial lecture as we went through his work and he explained in detail how the scenes were made and what he wanted to say with it. The first one we analysed was Plume. He talked about how the during the production stages they had to be as efficient as possible, as well as about the doll itself, that it was very expensive and that they used actual swan wings. We also look through Tchaikovsky. 

 I was already aware about who Tchaikovsky was and what work he has produced as I used to have Russian classes. It was very interesting to hear about how it was made he also showed us a bit behind the scenes, the set and he also told us that a group of students got to help out with project. Which made me think it would be cool to help out on this kind of project myself as you get to see how everything is done properly in a professional studio. Another thing we learned was that Barry is a fanatic! It was amazing to see someone so passionate about stop motion animation, he said that if it were up to him, he would animate 50 frames per second, which seemed mad to me (in a good way).

All in all the lecture was very cool, I learned a lot about how professional stop motion animation is made which would be useful if I ever made a stop motion animation myself. 

PPP presentation: Cartoon Network Studios

Recently we were asked to prepare a presentation about a studio we would like to work in. I chose Cartoon Network studios for a few reasons:

•  The direction that the new CN generation is taking with their animated series is really breath taking for me. All these creative minds like Rebecca Sugar, Pen Ward, JG Quintel working under one roof, makes me wish I could rub shoulders with such people one day. 

• CN studios allows this creative freedom which really comes through in the artists work. As a result Cartoon Network studios now manages to attract attention from a wider range of audience.

• Quite a few animated series are made on Flash and animating on Flash would be one of my strenghts now.

 
So Here is Some Research Ive done about the studio and its history:

-The studio began on October 21, 1994 at 7:00am as a division of Hanna-Barbera Cartoons, Inc., which was then focused on producing Cartoons for Cartoon Network: Dexter's Laboratory, Johnny Bravo, Cow and Chicken, I Am Weasel, and The Powerpuff Girls.

-In 1997, the division's productions credited them as their parent studio Hanna-Barbera.

-In 1999, Cartoon Network Studios acquired its own facility located at 300 N 3rd St in Burbank, California. The site was the location of a telephone communications equipment building.

 

This photograph is the last all-studio portrait taken at Hanna-Barbera Cartoons. Time Warner had bought Turner Broadcasting (owner of HB) and folded the studio into Warner Bros. Animation. WBA chief Jean MacCurdy made the decision to fold HB.  Cartoon Network Studios was then revived as a separate entity from Hanna-Barbera, growing out of the animation studio.

 

Cartoon Network Studios has continued to steadily grow with productions such as Samurai Jack and newer productions such as Adventure Time, Regular Show, and Uncle Grandpa. Some of Cartoon Network Studios' former programming now rerun on Cartoon Network's sister channel, Boomerang.

 

Cartoon Network Development Studio Europe is a British animation studio based in London.  It is the European equivalent to Cartoon Network Studios,

It was founded in early 2007 and is owned by Turner Broadcasting System Europe.

 

 

During the presentation I also talked abou Matt Forsythe (Lead designer for Adventure Time)  and his talk in Creative Networks, and how he talked about the producers in Cartoon Network being really hands off with the creative processes.
I also mentioned that I stalk and worship all these CN creatives on social media (people like JQ Quintel, Pen Ward, Mike Roth, Rebecca Sugar) and my tutor adviced me to try an contact them. I intend to do that in the near future!

Who am I now?

What have I learned so far
Throughout the first academic year I have learned a lot! The highlight of the year was making a show reel of my work, this allowed me to go through everything I made during the year and realize how much I have improved. I've managed to learn and achieve more than I've set out to, looking back on my first blog post in PPP. I have managed to grasp the basics of 3d modelling and animating (which I did not think I could do), I have improved my drawing skills a lot and feel even more confident with 2d animation and digital drawing. Also, in the beginning of first year I have struggled with creativity and generating ideas, however I do not have a problem with that now (which is a big win for me), along side that I have learned how important it is to research what ever you are doing, document the creative process so you can reflect on it later, these things helped me improve immensely as a practitioner. Another thing I have learned is how to do presentations and speak out. All the crit sessions and presentations we had to do made me a lot more confident in interacting with people and just speaking my mind, I don't feel that the language barrier is holding me down as much now.
What do I want to learn more about
So far I would like to learn more about 3d animation. I don't particularly enjoy it, but I know I need it as there is a growing need for 3d animators in the industry. The way I think about it is 2d and 3d animation is different in the way that 2d is drawing and 3d is sculpting, both of them demand different logic when it come to problem solving. Another thing I would love to learn more about is character design. During our recent lecture about character and short story design I realized how little I really know about it. I do not feel like we had a chance to create a character during the first year as we do now with the Character and Narrative module. Along side that I would like to learn more about storytelling and how translate a story to the screen. The recent Cop lectures got me interested in the theoretical side of animation practice as well, so I would love to learn more about how to research, reflect and evaluate as I have been way too focused on the practical side of everything so far. And the other thing I want to learn more about is how to start positioning myself within the industry, like how to get my work out there, branding myself and just start getting experience out side of the college.
What are my strengths
My strengths have not changed that much since the first year, which I think is good, because I don't like jumping from direction to another. I feel like 2d animation is still one of my strong-suits, I love analyzing movement and translating it to animation. Working with computers is another thing I enjoy and I am fairly good at. However drawing by hand is one of the things that I feel most confident about and I would like to improve it even further. I also feel like I am really good in time management and organizing my work. Throughout the first year I have managed to successfully balance between college and a part time job, I am really proud that I became so independent both financially and mentally, I might have less time to do my homework but I have learned how to do it without leaving everything to the last second which comes in really handy when meeting deadlines and working within certain time tables.
What I need to Improve
I really feel like I should take my strengths and improve them further. Draw more and quicker, more sketches, more design ideas, more animating, more working with computers and more pressure to meet deadlines, so I learn how to be more efficient with my time and work. As the lecturer said during the research and epistemology lecture- fail harder and fail quicker, so there is more time to improve. I want to get used to working under pressure and how to meet higher expectations, because I know that so far I can crack easily when it comes to those things.
Practitioners that demonstrate my interest in animation
Andrea Femerstrand also knows as Noukah, character designer, illustrator and concept artist. I love how every character she draws has so much life and personality in it. Her work is really bright and dynamic. She also does drawing tutorials and they are really benefitial-
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6JU6CWUnll4

 http://noukah.blogspot.co.uk/

Robertas Nevecka Lithuanian illustrator and animator. Even though he is from the same small town as I am (Klaipeda) where everyone knows everyone, I have never met him personally but it is really inspirational to me that I share a similar background to such an artist. In an ideal world I would actually love to collaborate with him. But for now here is some of his work-

http://robertasnevecka.com/

Tadas Vidmantas another Lithuanian practitioner whose work I follow. He is mainly based in London now but quite a lot of his work is still for Lithuanian television and media. Animation wise his work field is quite narrow and the animations them salves aren't anything special, but the reason I love his short films is often times they are funny in an ironic way and the characters are easy to relate.

http://tadasvidmantas.com/

Chris Sasaki, I have started following his work since his visit in uni. I like how he talked about research being 90% percent of any project, and I think I could use that more in my practice. His website provides a lot of insight into his projects, for instance his character design work for Inside Out. 

http://www.csasaki.com/film/

James Roper artist from Manchester. "My work explores a variety of subjects from the heightened realities depicted in Baroque art and modern media to the restraint and release of energy found within complex structures such as the human body. I work in various mediums including painting, drawing, sculpture and film."I love his work because it heightens your senses, it is pleasurable to look at and there is also this weir aesthetic in the chaos he creates. 

http://jroper.co.uk/film/outside/index.html

 Websites and online resources that demonstrate my interest within the industry

Behance

Tumblr

11Second Club

Animation Physics

Cartoo Brew

Motionographer