The Norman Rockwell Museum (www.nrm.org – my linker is on the fritz apparently) in Stockbridge, MA will be hosting an exhibit entitled “Ice Age to the Digital Age: The 3D Animation Art of Blue Sky Studios,” opening June 11. Visitors to the museum will get a behind-the-scenes look at how the artists at Blue Sky Studios create the lovable characters from the Ice Age series.
The exhibit will run from June 11 to October 31, 2011. I hope I’m in town at some point before then to check it out!
Sergio Pablos has added a handful of original designs for the earliest pitches of Despicable Me, which appears to have been first titled Evil Me.
The drawings are drastically different from what appears in the final film. Check them out here.
Congrats to my buddy Malcon Pierce on being a featured artist on Flooby Nooby!
Malcon and I were at Blue Sky at the same time; he was working as a temp animator on Ice Age: Dawn of the Dinosaurs while I was a lowly production assistant intern. He was almost ready to graduate from Animation Mentor at the time, and generously took me under his wing whenever I asked what he was working on or how he was planning on approaching his next shot.
I love his drawing and painting style, highlighted here. According to Malcon, he does most of these drawings while waiting on Maya to load, recover, playblast, etc. Incredible! He has a few prints for sale, so hop on over to his site to check ‘em out! While you’re there, watch his Tangled reel. Be prepared to drool on your keyboard.
Malcon is currently working at Disney Animation Studios in Burbank, CA.
I recently stumbled upon the most inspiring sketch blog: Chromasketch, the blog of artist Brian Wong. It looks like he updates about once a week with photos of his sketchbook.
As someone who strives to sketch as often as possible – and fails – it’s inspiring to see someone who clearly sets aside time to sketch despite a busy and demanding schedule.
Also inspiring is the confidence of Wong’s lines. His blog also includes a link to his YouTube channel, which features videos of him sketching. It’s amazing to watch someone draft a gesture drawing with clean, confident lines – and in ink! I’m floored.
Wong’s drawings make me want to grab my sketchbook and run to the nearest public place to draw!
Blue Hero Poses by Sergio Pablos
Jewel Hero Poses by Sergio Pablos
Sergio Pablos Animation (The SPA Studios) have published a selection of character designs from Blue Sky’s Rio. I was fortunate enough to intern as a production assistant during pre-production on Rio and witnessed first-hand how all of the talented folks at Blue Sky worked tirelessly to bring Pablos’ drawings to life.
It is quite often the case that characters vary widely from initial design to what you see in the film, but these beautiful drawings show how faithful the characters on screen are to the original designs. I was often tasked with printing these beautiful pose drawings for various departments during the pre-production testing of feathers, wings, and brows along with the search for the perfect voice cast. There are even a few pages of characters that were eventually cut from the story (though Clyde the cat does make an appearance in one shot of Rio!)
The SPA Studios website still has a lot of “Coming Soon” pages, but I’ll definitely be checking back to see Pablos’ contributions to Despicable Me. As you can see from the Rio gallery and the Character Design page, Pablos has a strong eye for appeal and a great balance of caricature that lends his designs so readily to animated films.