Revisiting an old friend (DeviantArt)

21st Aug 2016

Old Logo VS New Logo

I can’t remember after how long I actually opened DeviantArt. It had been years. They've even changed their logo! DeviantArt is that great community of artists, novices, beginners, enthusiasts, professionals all sorts of people who come together to broadly share, discuss and learn art. I don’t know how I forgot about it. I had eve forgotten my password! When I remembered it and logged in, I noticed the 1999 notifications.

It gives me such a warm fuzzy feeling to go through that site today.

With all the instant platforms like Facebook and Instagram, people don’t maintain their blogs or Deviantart profiles anymore. But here’s the thing – Deviantart, CG Society, ConceptArt.org and Vimeo is where the real art community lies. Where you get love, critique and help from people within that community. I remember using Sketchaholic too, I wonder if that still functions.
These platforms were exciting and inspirational! Besides professionals, it’s where I found people who were on the same level as I was. Some grew faster, some slower, and it was so motivating to know and see that there are artists like me out there. I’m going to try making it a point to keep my Deviantart updated. I hope to see you guys there too! 

It's good to move with the times, but it's important to not forget the roots. I’m glad it still exists!

P.S: Sketchaholic is alive too!! :D

More inspiration, news, and updates!

30th August 2013

Soooo! All you fellow bloggers, artists and film makers! Here's another dose of crazy inspiration!! <3 p="">



Cory Loftis
Visual Dev. artist at Walt Disney - his work is SO JUICY!! So much humor, personality, and life! Beautiful handwork, coloring and compositions! A major inspiration to suffice for another 3 weeks!

Rachel Saunders/Barukurri
Illustrator and painter. Although she's British, her work looks very eastern, and makes me want to watch all the Miyazaki movies (including the ones I've already drooled over) again and again!
Her drawing is so beautiful and soft, and her characters are lovable at the least! Beautiful colors and inspiring characters!

 

After seeing this, I think you guys should be interested in participating and giving this a shot! It's a mind-blowing opportunity to go for an all-expense-paid-trip to Burbank CA for CTNXpo!!!!!
Hells yeah! The deadline is Oct. 1st. Here are the DETAILS.

Lastly some updates. I have been trying to make a living out of freelancing to fund my own film. I've been working with Doodle Monkey, a company started by some close friends, and I'm using a great site called PeoplePerHour which is for freelancers and people who want to avail their services. Unfortunately it's one of those projects that is confidential and that I can't put up here. :'( Check it out. It's been taxing, fun, and interesting.That's all for now. Film is almost done, sound is left, and my awesome new laptop is finally here to help me finish it! Things are finally looking up!

Cheers and love!! <3 br="">  

Your weekly inspiration - Stephen McCranie

http://doodlealley.com/

This will suffice your whole week's inspiration needs.

Stephen McCranie's work is full of momentum, simplicity, interest, advice, imagination, curiosity, inspiration, hope, life and art! Enjoy every panel of it. I can't stress on how much you'll be missing out on if you don't see and absorb this.

Cheers and love!

Hyojin Bae

Went through some awesome work today from Hyojin Bae. She's a korean student studying at Calarts (one of the best animation universities in the states). Her work is as good as any professionals. I went through pages of it, and it wasn't enough. 2 hours on her wonderful tumblr blog, and I kept thinking - how does one get so good? What Alok said was so right. Her work had some great understanding of anatomy, gesture and expression, but what was standing out was the pure emotion in it - the imagination, the craziness, and the beauty in the world perceived from her eyes.

I can only hope to stay true to myself, and work on my skills just so that I can draw my mind instead of speaking it. I don't think good work will ever stop existing as long as there are wonderful people. Cheers to Hyojin Bae!

Here's some of her wonderful work:

© Hyojin Bae


"In the past, I have made no secret of my disdain for Chef Gusteau’s famous motto: Anyone can cook. But I realize that only now do I truly understand what he meant. Not everyone can become a great artist, but a great artist can come from anywhere." - Anton Ego, Ratatouille.

Lissa Treiman's blog and Bill Pressing's painting process

6th Dec 2012

Whenever I find a story blog, I am always overexcited to see the artists work. So I was browsing cartoonbrew > saw the annie award nominations for story > found Lissa Treiman's uber cool blog!! She's a story artist at Disney.
I have spent the entire morning archiving her wonderful work. So funny and so simple! Drool. I wish I did so much work fr myself as she does, besides her boards for pixar/disney. I also don't get how she manages to maintain her own style while working in disney, where most people have a consistent way of drawing characters.

Anyway, do check out her blog. Besides her awesome work, >>

©Lissa Treiman

Here's Bill Pressing's painting process she mentioned and followed in one of her blog posts. So so helpful!
Hope you guys like it.

The Secret World of Arietty (I'm mindblown)

22nd Nov 2012

I am overwhelmed. If I could ask an elder to bless me when I touch their feet, I would ask for them to bless me to get a job offer from Studio Ghibli. I can't believe I hadn't seen it earlier. The first thing that came to my mind when it started: Thumbelina. Later, I find a classic story about being brave, and fighting for the things you believe in; although truly, a love story. Maybe it's a Japanese thing, but their romance seems so beautiful and meaningful. Most of them end with the characters being separated in the end because one has to go away. But the feelings told and expressed in Ghibli movies are so true to life, and genuine, you can hear them in the voices of the characters and feel for them so deeply. The boys are so nerdy and emotionally deep. Poetic, almost. And the girls are adventurous, brave, something quite opposite of what we see in western films like all the princess stories.

The worlds they create are so real and fantastic, like heaven (but real). The Secret world of Arietty has backgrounds mostly in a bug's perspective of a country house and it's surrounding garden and forest. I was resisting from pausing the movie to oggle at the water colored backgrounds. I found the story very similar to Whisper of the heart; they have  similar characters. There was even the cat - the guide that connected the protagonists. But they're both set in completely different worlds. I can't wait to see the rest of the Ghibli films. Somehow I save the ones I haven't seen for special days - because I know they come out after years. It totally makes my day.

If you spot me giving a flying kiss to my laptop screen during the credit roll, it means it was something really special, and that the film makers are the few people in my life I aspire to meet and congratulate on sharing such a beautiful story with the world. The Secret World of Arietty was one of them.

Here's some of the artwork from the films that I could find available online:

If you're satisfied with this, you'll be in another world if you watch the film!!

Willie Real's inspiringly beautiful art!

29th Feb 2012

My fellow animator friend Rhutu told me about Will Real. I'm so grateful for finding his work today! This is the most wonderful discovery!! His work has beautiful clean raw lines, depth, character, personality, color, shape, variation, composition, all the good stuff stuffed into one piece! Absolutely mindblowing, speechless and fantastic work, that I had to share with u guys.

Also, if you like his work and are very inspired by it (like I am) you can read his interview HERE.

Here are some of my favorite pieces just to entice you into scanning his ENTIRE blog. Gaah!! <3 p="p">

©Willie Real

I tried to be brief.
Now drool!!

OMG! Mr. Drawing Animator!

22nd Oct 2012

Omg! I just saw this amazing feature called Mr. Drawing Animator by Oscar Medina! Heads up guys! This is shocking for me! Enjoy and swallow! ;)

Mr. Drawing Animator is coming... from Oscar Medina on-animation on Vimeo.

Pinched - short film by David Vandervoort

This is ridiculous!! Watch this mind-boggling film by David Vandervoort! brilliant colors, angles and absolutely crazy animation!!! :D :D Congrats to him, and enjoy this kickass film guys, u don't wanna miss a SECOND!

Pinched from David Vandervoort on Vimeo.

One Day - Gobelins

This film has left me speechless. I absolutely loved the concept and it's absolutely wonderful execution. The animation was so beautiful and I'm glad I got to read so much about Laurent Rossi's 'making of' in this film! I'm making my short film right now as well and I had a lot of questions regarding this film. The compositor must be really good because the camera, the 3D, the water and the reflections all looks so gorgeous and real, and yet they fit in the movie so well. The bgs and the light is stunning!

Enjoy!



Also here is his making of post! :)

Congrats to the whole team on the film! It has been in suspense for so long and I'm so stunned by the amount of work that must have gone into it. It's absolutely beautiful and I would say it's the best of this year's gobelins films.


If you want to see all of this year's gobelins films, here's the lineup on flooby nooby.

Help StoryCorps!

If I was rich or even moderately well-off, the first project I would fund would be StoryCorps. I have been watching their animations from the very first and they are so beautiful and so moving in their style and narration that they totally deserve the money from us. We're ready to pay so much money for funny entertainment like Dick Figures, but StoryCorps has just collected over 2K of funds. It's really sad. If you can afford it, please contribute atleast $1 to their amazing 1/2 hour production.

Here's their channel on youtube, you can watch all their films HERE (for free).

Alina chau's commencement speech

Hi guys,

I read Alina Chau's commencement speech today and I was very inspired. I think every animation film maker or art student should read this before graduating. If you're ever down and you get lost in your work, and what you did once for fun now becomes work, this is what you need to be reminded; to keep both separate and always do art for yourself as well.

Happy reading!

Inspiration findings

My best bud Alok posted some of the most inspirational videos on his blog today. For anyone who's feeling like giving up on art or their not gonna make it, you have got to listen to these wonderful artists. :)
Here's his post.

Artist Inspiration!

Re-discovered these two great blogs/artist today!
http://www.simplestroke.com/wp/ Dice Tsutsumi
http://ronyhotin.blogspot.in/ Roni Hotin

If you haven't seen their work yet, you gotta! What an amazing inspiration! Roni Hotin is a Gobelins alumni and Dice has worked with Pixar as a visual development artist. I am drooling over their work right now!

Goro Fujita's Speed Painting Gyaan!

TREASURE! TREASURE!!!

Well I'm a big fan of Goro Fujita's work. I've been having a lot of trouble painting my backgrounds and coming to terms with myself regarding the look of the film. Anywho, I was about to request Goro to put up a digital painting tutorial, and then I stumbled upon this! I can't tell you guys how useful this was. It makes everything clear - and as long as you practice it, you'll keep getting better. One major mistake I made was I always kept the bg color white - which doesn't allow me to set the mood or play with the values!
Enjoy!!

http://chapter-56.blogspot.in/2006/11/speedpainting.html

And here's another one on the making of 'the hunt' another one of his works - stepwise.
http://www.cgsociety.org/index.php/CGSFeatures/CGSFeatureSpecial/the_making_of_the_hunt

Pascal Campion's Interview

So I've been trying to learn lighting and color for my film's color script. I didn't want anything complex, but the deeper I get into it the more difficult it gets!!! There are amazing artists who I
've been learning these things from, some of them are Chris Appelhans - who designed some of the art of one of my fav. films - 'Fantastic Mr. Fox', and there's Lou Romano who makes color scripts for pixar movies - here's his BLOG.

BUT! I'm sure you've heard of Pascal Campion as well! His work is so inspiring. It creates a beautful mood and they all tell an emotional story. Here's his BLOG, and along with that, a special interview on vimeo! Here it is.