A BRAND NEW "HOW TO" GOOFY CARTOON!

Disney is reinvigorating it's legacy! What a time to live! It better be funny. Click here for a clip.

WALL-E POSTER

I can't wait for this film! Andrew Stanton seems like the coolest and I am pissed that I wasn't at Comic-Con this year to hear him speak. Looks like this film will have a lot of heart. Click here to watch the trailer.

WALK CYCLES

One of the early trials of any character animator is animating a convincing walk. Here's a great diagram I found to get started on blocking it out. Notice the CONTACT pose is the extreme key. If this is off, good luck with the rest of your animation. Even though this shows a traditional 2D walk, the same principles apply in 3D. I like to get my poses locked down and check them by rendering them in the side viewport in Maya and turning on the Alpha in the Render View. This is the best way to make sure the silhouette is reading and the character is balanced.

I'M BACK!

*UPDATE* I've recently had a few students ask if they could see some of my previous animations from when I worked at IGT. So in an effort to meet the demands of the people I chose to post them here... right at the time when I left IGT to teach at the Art Institute of California- San Diego.

This is an animation from Top Secret Spins. The freakin' awesome character designs and models were created by Marc Mierau. He's the coolest! Lots of laughs shared coming up with these gags.

This here is another animation from Top Secret Spins. There were so many complications with like the rig, and of course, some plug-in for Lightwave. Duhhh, NewTek! Anyway, I liked the way it turned out.

About a year earlier I worked on this game called Jackpot Hunter. Apparently the idea is: A bunch of lil' Aussie animals have stolen and hidden the jackpot and it's your job to hunt these endangered little critters down and reclaim what's rightfully yours! (End annoying obnoxious Australian accent here). I animated all the characters for this game. There was this platypus, a crocodile, a koala, a kangaroo, and a shark. Crikey!!! Anyway, this is an Intro for one of the bonuses.

And this is the Outro. Way to go mate! You really got'em that time!!!

There are plenty more, but this is the last one I decided to post. This was one of the very first animations I did at IGT, all the way back in November 2004, and I was fortunate enough to work with Megan Schlegel. She was so much fun to work with and boy did she love to run for fun! One of the best of the best. This was an intro to the Sixth Bonus Level on the Mystery Progressive Party Time.

It's been a while. I recently moved from Reno, NV to San Diego, CA to take a Full Time position as a Character Animation Instructor at the Art Institute of California- San Diego. It's been a crazy summer and it's hard for me to believe it's almost Thanksgiving already.
Anyway, I'm back with a new look, and an renewed excitement for character animation. Hopefully I will be posting more and more.