progress......

This was the poster for the oringal carwash...just so you can see my progression between a few years....same idea, different pose...and better band! lol..the band Bullets over Broadway became Mary Shaw a little over a year ago...they switched up a few members and have become a much more interesting group....they stick true to their metal heritage...as is essential with Nina, the female lead singer, who screams heavier than most men....but the guitarists, basist and drummer have background in all kinds of music, from punk, hair metal, hip/hop, and folk. these background have allowed the band to introduce jazz...blues, and hip hoppy beats into their seriously sleazy metal guitar wrifs.
be sure to check them out... the next show is at the Modern Exchange in Southgate Mi, on December 27th....it is a benefit show to help them reaise enough money to buy equipment that was stolen from them....it should be an awesome time!

pin up time

Haha...here is a slightly humorous piece that i did over the summer. fun times....fun times....

i miss my pin up girls. i am a pin up enthusiast through and through.....love it!
check out the band@

myspace.com/maryshawmusic

Christian Slade + The Detroit Zoo= Cold

Especially if you decide to go to the zoo in december. It was fun and we really had a good time sketching the animals that were enclosed. The giraffes were amazing and so was the polar bear and seal exhibit. I had a good time overall. I just wish that i hadnt left my lights on and drained my battery...and I wish i had worn boots.

We got to have a quick drawing session with him and a lecture about where he started and where he is at now. It was hilarious to see the stuff he was drawing when he decided he wanted to be an artist, and where he is now as an artist. He seriously is amazing. His studies of people and animals are sooo extensive. He talked about filling up one sketchbook a week while in college. That is perserverance. I mean, I love my sketch book and I think I do a pretty good job of filling them up, but one a week!? Holy Crap. Maybe its a different situation with being an animator. I feel like all my time drawing is put into each seperate page of animation....i feel like its hard to keepo drawing after youve done so many frames in a day. But its good to know that all this drawing will pay off one day.
I really think that I do need to start stretching my legs in the whole basics of characters....Im so stuck on what im animating at the moment. The fact that this is a year long project, is starting to make me depressed. I dont want to just draw one character for the rest of the year!
Im terrified of drawing animals...so i probably need to do that more.....im just not familiar with them...im not around them....i dont have pets...i dont like pets...ugh.
so apparently i should learn how to draw animals....like so i can from memory. it would be good to be able to understand the basic anatomy of some animals....like dogs, cats, that kind of thing...i mean i have some understanding, but its not convincing enough if i dont have a picture of it in font of me.
my teacher is a total hippy. he definetly looks like he is wearing a night gown over his jeans.
Ok well...so hopefully more to come...on the whoel sketching deal...
and check out my rough animation animatic...Its posted on my youtube site....
its still rough! so be kind!

more tidbits

woohoo...im in class right now, getting my demo reel finalizzed and ready to post on my youtube account. later on today Sam Raimey is upposed to be stopping in. Everyone was joking about asking him "why the hell did you make Spiderman 3?" I guess its a legitiamte question. Though i didnt mind the movie so much. The first one was obviously still the best. I think no matter what you do, if you try to change a character so much as Peter Parker did in the third, you are going to be stuck with a confused audience. It was a bit corny, which was the worst part. I think that they could have made the character seem more confident, without making him dance and prance around. It was cute, but it was so far removed from the rest of the films. It didnt fit in at all. On the other hand, I thought that the characters were very cool. I loved the black goo from Venom.It was very well animated and had a very organic feel to it. I think that with this movie genre, you kind of cant help but have these "cheezy" events take place. I know that Van Helsing couldnt escape from them at all...the Dracula character was incredibly silly....not too mention all of the horrible accents. The Xmen get stuck in the cheese factor when Wolverine comments...."you're a dick." when asked to prove that he is not Mystique. The chracter Chas from Constantine, unfortunately was on screen solely as comic relief.....well if you had told me there was going to be a 200 pound mirror.... or something along those lines. i dunno his character was not needed at all...except for the fact that keanu reeves is soooooooo boring.
ok thats my rant about pointless silliness in comic book/super hero movies.

buttt shot.....o so cute.

this is a silly render of a model that i am currently rigging in Maya. I havent done too much with the program lately, been too busy with my traditional animation. But i do really really love this class, its been a whole new experience, now that i understand timing alot better than i did when i first played around with maya.

if i had more time, than i probably would spend a bit more time exploring the program.
anywho, enjoy.
o ya, and dont forget to check out my youtube account.
www.youtube.com/ishbeth
i just uploaded a bunch of quick animaiton with still frame storyboards.

more to come....

Next semester I will hopefully be able to work on my pitch for the cartoon series called "Mammies Closet" or "Mammies Attic". I hope to be able to pitch the series by the end of next semester.
As soon as I can figure out how to upload video onto this thing, I will ahve a few pencil tests available for critique.

Update: the life of Liz

Ok so i had my 10 week review on wendesday. It went pretty well. I had a bit of trouble with the computer, but finally got a grasp of the situation and pummeled forward. I got a great suggestion that tied up the loose endings with the end of my film. My friend Mike had some great ideas, that I think really improve the overall film. It finaly feels like a finished and complete piece. I cant wait to see it colored and on the big screen. I should be dont with my rough animation pretty soon, and i hope to start tying down my shots by Christmas. The film right now is about 1 minute and 30 seconds, which I think is a pretty good length, it might get a bit longer, once everyhting is timed correctly, but I really feel like Im on the right track.
I found out that my school CCS, is offering an advanced environments and characters class next semester, whcihc will help me fill my last sutdio class requirement. I also tallked with the teacher Ben, who has apporved of me using the class to develop my pitch, so I can have it ready for Heather at Cartoon Network.
Im really excited about it, and acutally I think that I will probably write my thesis paper about my pitch for cartoon network, rather than about my senior film. Both are very character driven pieces, but I feel it will help me out more to explore the thhree main characters in the Mammies Closet piece, rather than exploring Lilly, in Beware of Wolves..(which by the way is the new title)
Alrighty, welp. today I am attend the Southgate Players Club, rendition of "The Sound of Music" It should be interesting to say the least.

tiki. and stuff.....

tiki quick character model sheet.
i like him....ooolalala.
i also love this characterrs hips.
love it.

so class is going good. im staying super busy, and am almost at my 10th week review.
terrifying.
the problem is tha i have been spending sooo much time on our collaborative short film, that i feel as though ive neglected my senior film. hopefully the work im putting into the first one will just help me to know that i can get my final senior film done.

penedlton ward.

he is hte creator of adventure time check it out. he came to our school today and talked to everybody about pitching short films to studios and other nifty things. he had good stuff to say.

i recommend him.
much.

fun with modeling.

this is my first attempt at character modeling. i dont plan on animating her....but here you go.

silly stuff.....

so yup.

classes are going good. im in the middle of my semester and a bit behind, but i feel like i am getting quite a bit done.
currently i am working on animating a baby, some point of view hand shots, a few different walk cycles, some tha are in perspective....and im actually trying to tie down the environments for my senior film.
i finished a longer shot of the aztec priest ripping off the head of a stuffed rabbit last week....its really nice, and i cant wait to get started on the special effects shots for that.
the team for that short film is definetely feeling the pressure of having so much work to do. one of the girls is rnning a bit behind, because she spent some much of the first few weeks tying down her senior film sotryboards. right now we are trying to help her catch up, and hopefully we will get the shots finished in the next week or so. the character is all over hte place a the moment, and staying on the character model with 4 different people drawing him, might end up being a bigger issues in the end than we thought. we were hoping that kali could tie down the shots for everyone, but i dont think she is going to have the time to do it anymore. she is very stressed out.
in other news. i am staying busy getting ready for halloween, along with all of my projects. my nana showed me how to knit and we have one scarf done already. i am also embroidering hogwarts patches for our sweater....all we really need now, is to find some glasses for kimo to wear to the parties and show.
my birthday is coming up on the 1st of november.....and it should be fun, my 22nd birthday! considering i didnt do too much of anything for my 21st.....hopefuly this year will be better.
ok welp. thats all for now.

the beginning....

this is a rough draft of one of the sets I am making for my senior film. The other projects are all coming along nicely as well. I am very excited to see how my demo reel will look after Ive made further progress with these projects.

today i am heading out to Lapeer Mi to watch my sister renew her vows in a church. There should be plenty of family drama, for more updates, chekc out my myspace, which is a more personal page.

classes.

ok...here we go.

school is getting intese. some storyboards we did have changed, and one of my collaborative parters just keye out all those shots according to the original boards. things are frustrating and everyone wants to move on already.....and we havent even really gotten into inbetweens yet. i understand completely why she is annoyed. its hard to stay organized with 4 different schedules involved.
i need to get a move on iwht my individual project though, i feel overwhelmed right now...im not sure where to beigin, i am really aprehensive aabout ebginning animation for fear that i dont have the story completed yet. and also becuz i tedn to get so bored so easily with a character. im trying to keep busy. ive been working on layouts, and have developed a look and style for the background. so thats good, but i need to start animating like now inoreder to not fall behinid.
im also very apprehensive about the wolf character. i am not confident in my animal drawing at all. and i ccant seem to fins a character that i am happy with. i want it to be a cartoon, bbut the plot is based heavily on fear and chase sequences, which means that the wolf must also appear intimidating.

ugh. help.

random thought of the day.

i really like hummus.

thank you middle eastern culture.

life drawing!

here we go... a few more posts from anatomy class....oooo, like them?

ok well...lets talk about something a bit more interesting...
im in my 3d class....i love modeling, but i cant seem to grasp the idea of animating with 3d characters, i feel like i have no patience, i dont like the idea of not being in control of my characcter, complete control, every line, movement, shape, mass...u know. im hoping that this class will open me up to more opportunities with maya. i feel like i need to know as much as possible, but i cant seem to get over this whole 3d thing!

i hate maya....mostly becuz i suck at it.

this is my original design for red riding hood. she has problems.

we are animating......

some more anatomy work...i hope to get at least one thing posted each day.

very busy right now......
i am in animation projects class taught by Gary Schwartz...who actually isnt doing too much teaching, its just kind of us doing what we need to do to get the job done.
we wanted to animate some special effects, in a traditional animation movie. any help???
we've narrowed down the story, and we just finished up the animatic. it basically involves a young boy who is trying to perform a human sacrifice with his baby brother.
its cute, more to come later.

take anatomy....it rules

this is some of my anatomy work.....hence the spine-

Recap of the Ottawa Animation Festival

So we left on Thursday night for a 10 hour trip from Detroit to Ottawa. W arrived early on friday morning and were completely worn out already. After some confusion, we managed to purchase our festival weekend passes and the passes for the Cartoon Network Picnic. It was a great time at the picnic. We managed to finish a few pumpkins for the pumpkin carving contest, and though none of ours won, we really enjoyed carving them. We met some great people and also reconnected with a few we had met at the Kalamazoo Animation Festival. A few of the underaged (19+) people took full advantage of the free ber and wine; and im sure they wished they hadnt. But all in all...i dont think anyone made a bad impression, and we seemed to be one of the fairly larger groups of people. The industry folked seemed very interested in what kind of ideas we were coming up with in detroit.... after all it is a far way from l.a. or new york.
From there we got to watch a few different screenings of the films that made it into the festival, and they even provided screenings of films which they loved, but unfortunately did not make it into the festival. A few of the really great ones (in my opinion) were, Teet Beat, T.O.M., i love Pandas, Sleeping Betty, Madame Tutli Putli, and Doxology. They represent a wide variety of the types of films which were shown. By far my favorite was, t.o.m. which i believe can be seen at the website,
www.tdotodotm.com
thats how i feel darnet.
i got to listen in on some great workshops, (though they were jam packed, and i didnt get to actually "see" too much) i still feel like they were well worth the time and effort. I actually also got to sit in on a "Blogging and animation" workshop, which was very insightful as to the many ways that i can approach my blog, the things that i may like to talk about, and what people may actually be interested in reading. it gave me quite a few tips, and i apprecaited them for sharing with us greatly.
ok well.....these are the many things to come..........

-a pitch of my story concept, "Red", which is a variation on the red riding hood tale
-a few reviews of some of my favorite movies, and the short films which i saw recently.....
-also an overview of my projects that i am working on, such as
-tattoo designs,
-advertising for my small caricature business,
-a small film i am doing in after effects about a boy who is afraid of water
-and much much more to come.

i also will have some pictures from ottawa posted, and more artwork to come.

This is my blog.

Ok so these are soem of my character sketches...designs and such...ill try not to over do it today...but i am excited to get on here and post some of my work. I am currently working on my senior film. Its only the 3rd week of class...but my story is pretty well fleshed out and Im really excited to start animating. This weekend I am attending the Ottawa animation festival with my school. Im really geeked about everything except the ride there. Wish us luck!