Better Off Undead !

Finally! As promised, here is my short film, Better Off Undead! Whew, It's just crazy to see months and months of work fly by in seconds. Seconds!!

Well so, I started Animation Mentor Jan 2007, took classes on and off for about two years, and today I'm off to the Bay Area for the AM graduation. I'm super excited to graduate and meet my class, mentors, and all the other students, from around the world!

I'll write up my thoughts about it in the next posts. But for now I just want to thank everyone who helped me out these past couple of months.
Some of you know that I ended up getting placed in a tough situation and I appreciate everyone who got in touch with me to offer up some help or give an encouraging word. I won't forget it man and I hope to return the favor someday! Godfather style!

Please enjoy, and as always, thanks for watching!

Better Off Undead ! from Bobby Pontillas on Vimeo.

Long walks on the beach

Hey guys! Here's something I did tonight for a birthday gift . I'm not much of a painter (obviously!), but there you go . I had a few guidelines to springboard from, but I just wanted it to put the recipients in a good mood whenever they look at it! Maybe you will too, which is why I wanted to post it.

And I know I keep saying this, but, film comin soon! Promise! Just lower your expectations a little!
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On another note, this Friday is Kevin Dart's Seductive Espionage: The World of Yuki 7 show at Gallery Nucleus! Check out that rockstar lineup! And oh man, recently I was fortunate enough to be invited to have my Yuki sketch included in the show!
Which or course meant, getting it framed, and matted, and stuff. Which I've never done with my own art before. Oh and pricing it, which I'm not used to doing either. I guess when you're a newbie like me you're just thinkin, who on earth is gonna pay for this? Anyway it goes on for about two weeks, It was a little too last minute to get a ticket down, but if you stop by take some pictures!

In the bag!

After a little more than two years (on and off, I started Jan 2007) ,I'm finally done with my courses at Animation Mentor! July is gonna be a busy month. I go down to the bay area for the AM graduation, and then the weekend after after, is the San Diego Comic Con! Time flies when you're busy!

Here's a roll call of my final class, with Keith Sintay as mentor. I had the pleasure of sharing this class with some really , really skilled, hard workin' people. I felt like I was behind the whole time, seriously. But everyone was unbelievably supportive, and humble, and friendly. Same goes for all of my terms at AM though, I gotta say I made some good friends every class, and now half of my facebook are AM people.
I've been spending my waking hours polishing the 3D animation, so unfortunately I have no new drawings worth showing. But I thought I'd post some character sketches I did last year when I was working at Gas Powered Games. Grandpa Caruso and Surfergirl ! Grandpa was alot of fun, and I remember trying design surfergirl after my fiance, Cheryl. Both versions ended up not getting used for the project, actually, nothing ended up getting used, but thats another story altogether =). Still, it was a fun project, a great (albeit short) experience, and I worked with some great dudes.

Check out waaay more awesome work from this project on Raf's blog!

Yesterday I finally finished up some freelance work with Nickelodeon too! It was actually a lot of fun. I didn't know what to expect working with a bigger company like Nick, but I worked with a real cool art manager that "got it" and acted as buffer between myself and the Nick head honchos. I appreciated that.

I'll post up the film as soon as I get it in presentable order! I promise! Along with some tidbits on the things I learned, struggled with, little victories, in making the film. As humble & simple as it is, this term was chaotic! As you might know.

See you soon! In the Bay OR SD!

Yuki 7

Man! The lack of updates means I'm super swamped with my short film. I haven't been able to draw much, outside of freelance, and it's killin me. So tonight I decided to step away from Maya and sketch this little piece of fan art. I'm sure you've done so already, but in case you haven't, check out my friend, Kevin Dart's trailer for his new book coming out soon called , Seductive Espionage: The World of Yuki 7. The trailer was directed by Kev and Stephane Coedel.

The book was written by another friend of mine , Ada Cole, and made with the help of her hubby Dan Cole! Congrats you guys!

Ah, and a couple of good friends and I also went to the Sasquatch Music Festival last weekend which was awesome and I'm totally burnt. I'll upload some pictures to my Flickr soon!

3D blocking!

Finally! Here's a show-able rough blocking pass. It's come a long way but I've got about 6 -7 weeks until the term ends, so I still gonna have to scramble to flesh this out, then polish it up. Which really has been insane, I'm sprinting to get it done. I've also had the good fortune to pick up some freelance character design for Nickelodeon , so between that , my day job, and this film, my schedule has been brutal ! But I can't complain. This is what they call character building right? Alright time to hit the sack. More soon ok?

BTW. Pacquiao for the win! Speaking of Brutal!

Also, big thanks to Danny, Katy, and Rich for all the maya help so far!!

Here we go...

Before the 3D begins, I thought It'd be cool to post what I had so far. Which is the whole film blocked out in key poses, and little bits of animation here and there just to get a feel for how the end product would look. Animating in flash was so much harder than storyboarding in flash, for me. In fact, I'd say that flash is the perfect tool setting up leica reels. But animating straight into flash will still take some time getting used to . The instant playback button was really nice though.

So since I'm now required to animate at least 1/3 of the film in 3D (see two posts down) , the second act will be replaced. From the point where he pops out of the grave, to when he starts to head towards town. Which ironically enough, has the weakest blocking I feel. His poses are stiff and his model is all over the place, amongst other issues!

A buddy of mine at work came to my rescue and is graciously lending his time to modify the classic AM Rig to make it look like Remington. I know it wont look like him exactly, but it'll have to do. Besides, he's a bad- ass and he'll make it look cool anyway. Thanks dude!

So watch out! In about 11 weeks, this could possibly be something decent. Or THE most confusing, disjointed film you've ever seen! Either way, I'll be crying!

Heres the little bugger in 3D!

Monkeys!!

To help chase my 2D blues away, tonight I drew some monkeys!!!!!!!
Take note, if you're feeling bummed about anything, google image search baby monkeys.

Here, we'll do it together....

Hahaha! That third one right? WTF?! Argghhh thats hysterical. Effing monkeys.

Whew...

*Tear

Better Off in 3D

Yikes!

Well I just found out from Animation Mentor staff that they wont be able to have me go on with my short film in 2D. Bummer.

I was unaware of this, but AM's decision to go exclusively 3D was made after the school's first year or so. Which is my bad for not knowing. But to be fair, a lot of people didn't, my mentor included. I didn't even give it a thought, because I remembered that there were indeed 2D films that did come out of AM.

They did give me the option of taking a portion of the short, executing it in 3D from here on out, and still have me graduate from the school. Which was very nice of them, to at least extend me that compromise. It's just going to be difficult considering the time I have left. Also impossible considering the severe lack of modeling and rigging skills! Ha!

I don't know, we'll see. I'll have to think fast to figure out what I'm going to end up doing.

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**Edit : Hey everyone! Thanks so much for the encouragement. The resource links in the comments section are all VERY much appreciated.

Also thank you very much to those who have written or messaged me volunteering to help in any way. That is an amazing and beautiful gesture from you all.

I've been in talks with the AM Staff and Bobby Beck ( who was extremely sensitive to my situation) last evening and this morning, but it looks like the decision isn't going to change. I did at least put up a fight.

Sooooo, lets figure out a way to shoehorn some 3D into this thing shall we?

BTW, there was another student in my term, Toby Cochran, who was doing a 2D film that is in the same boat as I am. We're kinda tryin to deal with it together. You can check out what he has to say over at his blog.

Fennec Fox

Here's a picture I made for a friend to help decorate their new apartment. I *think* I remember her mentioning, in passing, that she really loved foxes. Man, I hope it was foxes. I hope foxes don't freak them out.

In other news, I've started my last term at Animation Mentor this week! So animation (or at least most of it ) should be done by this summer. I'm finishing off the program with Keith Sintay! Someone I've never had, but have kept in contact with , since I started. He has both 2d and 3d animation experience, which , for me, is always a good thing!

Tuke

I've been busy with the film of course and some freelance recently, so just a quick random one from me this week, just as an excuse to keep the blog updated!

Newsie

Cheryl: "I dont like this one because you are promoting smoking."

Dually noted, Smoking is bad for your health kids!

Her mom.

Thanks for the all the kind words below. After the last post, I got a request to sketch her mom , Sally Jupiter. So here she is! In all of her ridiculously costumed glory! What's the point of the skirt, really?

And you heard it here first, Bobby Chiu plans to don a black bananahammmock & blue body paint as Dr. Manhanttan this year as SDCC, so be on the look out for that. Thanks for steppin up to the plate Bobby!

Laurie Jupiter

Work on the film continues, in the mean time here's a sketch I did tonight of Jupiter from the Watchmen. Not the greatest movie ever, but entertaining nonetheless. If anything, it makes me want to finally crack open the book I got for Christmas. What was her power again? I'm not even sure she had one. Meh. My prediction though is a TON of watchmen cosplay at the comic con this year. I can't wait to see who has the balls to go as Mr. Manhattan!

Also, I stumbled upon these pretty cool interviews with two guys whose work I admire. The first one with Joe Moshier and James Baxter.

Animated Views- Joe Moshier
Animated Views- James Baxter

I met Joe Moshier last year at the San Diego Comic Con at his Conduct Happiness booth. Suuuuper freaking nice dude, and extremely humble about his work. I mean, this guy is one of the most prolific in the industry, and there was was zero ego. Total fanboy style, I kind of gushed to him about his work. Said embarassing, ridiculous things like "Damn you look young! How old are you?" Instead he preferred to rave about other artists he worked with.

It's cool to read in that interview about how he fell into character design at Disney, basically being asked to design pigeons on the Hunchback of Notre Dame production. Obviously it snowballed from there and he went on to design characters exclusively. There doesnt seem to be many interviews with Joe online so check it out!

Latika

FINALLY saw Slumdog Millionaire w/ a packed house tonight, it's fantastic! But you already knew that. The soundtrack is killer too.

Film Update!

I'm still busy pluggin away slowly on my film, Better off Undead. But I just wanted to put up some frames at various stages of completion. It's a lot of hard work and can get exhausting at times, but it's really exciting to see it start to come together!

That is all for now, more to come soon. Thanks for looking! Now back to work!

**On a side note, I love coming across interviews with certain lumanaries that get you motivated, or inspired. This morning its from Walt Disney:

The answer, according to Disney is: Invent your own job; take such an interest in it that you eat, sleep, dream, walk, talk and live nothing but your work until you succeed. Then you may take on a hobby or two if you feel so inclined.

“All this talk about my making a lot of money is bunk,” declares Disney. “After 10 years of pretty tough sledding, I am now making a moderate profit on my products, but every dime I take in is immediately put back into the business. I’m building for the future. And my goal isn’t millions; it’s better pictures.

“I’m not interested in money, except for what I can do with it to advance my work. The idea of piling up a fortune for the sake of wealth seems silly to me. Work is the real adventure in life. Money is merely a means to make more work possible."

WORD!