Röyksopp

Make me happy.

How cool is this?!

Awesome. :D

A much more personal blog...

A close relative of mine has just had a baby! Yay! The entire family are delighted and everything is funkydory!
I decided to make a hanging mobile for the baby. Textiles is one of my big areas within art & design; hand sewing, embroidery, screen printing, knitting, I absolutely adore it. I'd bough an enourmous pack of felt on an impulse buy at Trago Mills, I'd been pottering around with it, making things like this:

 Vintage Rose brooch.

I told you I like the new My Little Pony...

I made Rarity, Rainbow Dash and Pinkie Pie brooches.

All hand designed and embroidered by me.

I figured felt would be the easiest material to use, having already experiemented with it. Considering it's light, durable, simple to cut and stitches beautifully. Plus it's soft and has a massive appeal to children because of it's range of bright colours. Not forgetting the popular toy Fuzzy Felt.

I had already decided I would hand stitch it all, I felt my sewing machine would probably eat the fabric. Additionally it also gave the mobile a very quaint 'handmade' feel. I chose animals as my theme, something simple which I could be creative with.

I made Alfie the Lion first...

Then Billy the Elephant, Toby the Parrot and Fred the Tiger

By this point, I'd turned the dining room into a mini studio:

 

Dad helped me make a frame out of MDF wood, which I painted a bright green. I also decided to attach the animals by ribbon to the mobile. 

Using Bondaweb, I glued on pieces of fabric to the back of each animal. This hid the exterior stitching plus the eye catching fabrics hopefully will keep the baby amused, especially the pink sparkly one.

Here's the card I made too:

I know it's not especially exciting, but I'm not a fan of big flouncy cards with masses of text and twee illustrations. I thought something simple and modern with a handmade touch would look nice. I added a crayon string from the balloon as well.

Rarity, Rainbow Dash & Pinkie Pie (c) Lauren Faust & Hasbro

My Little Pony, Drawings and Lauren Faust.

Over the holidays I've been keeping some sketchbooks. I've picked out my favourite drawings as a lot were scribbly messes. Most of them are doodles I've done which I like. I also bought some ProMarkers, so I've been experimenting with them too.

 This is a character I named Martina. The brown haired boy who I've set to be her boyfriend originated from the show; Gregg with 3 G's. Based on the character design of the Nickelodeon show As Told By Ginger. I'd been a big fan of this show since it's release in 2000 and continues to make me smile.

A lot more scribbles and doodles. I'd been watching a few episodes of As Told By Ginger, my favourite character is Dodie. Ginger's shy, dorky friend who I began drawing on the side. I also drew Gregg with 3 G's again. Nigel Thornberry also makes an appaearance too. I began playing with the ProMarkers on here, mixing tones for skin and using the blend pen too. I completly ruined Pocahontas's face though, I was testing whilst the ink was dry, only to realise it leaves a nasty smudgy outline.

Crazy lion thing.

I've begun drawing people out and about, carrying my sketchbook where I go to practice. 

I also started some tutorials on drawing hands...

They aren't great but I'm going to continue practicing.

I also started a visual diary. I didn't keep this up very long, however here are a few of the pages I drew:

So yeah. 

I've also been watching a lot of cartoons on YouTube which have provided me with inspiration for character designs;

Lauren Faust, character design and animator of hit shows such as Foster's Home for Imaginary Friends has re-designed the My Little Pony franchise completly. Her designs are modern with a cutting twist making them original and appealing to all ages. They've become an internet phonomenon with viewers ranging from 4 - 40. I've become a big fan of the new My Little Pony, the characters have incredibly emotive faces along with beautiful animation. The characters have been designed uniquely with interesting (if not slightly) stereotypical personalities. Rainbow Dash being the 'tomboy' Pegasus pony of the group, whilst Fluttershy the quiet, polite animal lover. Lauren Faust has removed the sickly pastel colours of the elder My Little Ponies to create bright and vibrant characters. I'm taken by My Little Pony. It's got witty humour, compelling storylines and incredible characters.

I've also gotten back into The PowerPuff Girls, which I used to love as a child.

I love the simple character design of the PowerPuff Girls, alone with the strange creativity behind all the bad guys. Especially Mojojojo.

Gregg with 3 G's, Dodie, Ginger, Nigel Thornberry and As Told By Ginger all belong to Nickelodeon.  (c) Nickelodeon.

Simba & Pocahontas (c) Disney.
My Little Pony (c) Hasbro and Lauren Faust
The PowerPuff Girls (c) Craig McCracken and Cartoon Network.

Old

But I still love it.

Bad Apple!!

My friend Harley sent me this pretty sweet animation. It's called Bad Apple!! By Touhou.

Modelling and aniamtion in Maya

This is a round up of what I've been doing. We've got officially 9 days left until our hand-in. So it's all hand on deck at the moment.
After a critique on Friday, I was assigned Creative Director of the project, which I'm really enjoying at the moment.
I finished the texturing, got that sorted. Phoebe added her creative magic and made some fantastic scenes. Maggie has completed the stop-motion intro and is now working more detail into it. Kylie's been working within Flash adding in all the characters now, so far I'm really pleased with what everyone has done.

I've also animated Brian flying, which I've exported as TIFF files for Phoebe to import into Flash to work with on the backgrounds.

These are all quick playblasts on Maya. These have changed a bit, only general messing about to make them look better. We'll also adjust them needs be in Flash too.









With the Copic Marker, I've added a green tip on the end of the pen to make it look like the cap. On the back I've added a quick little texture;

 I thought adding this to the end of the pen to make it look a bit more realistic to the style. I also added the copic logo to the pen too;

I made the pen longer as well for it to look much more realistic. So far things are working well.


Copic Markers are (c) of Copic, Japan.  No copywrite infringement intended.