Happy Easter, I mean Maundy Thursday

Yay, I'm going to eat sooooooo much chocolate, and now that I'm a grown up I don't have to wait until Easter Sunday =D



Last week my friend had a Canadian Party before she emigrated to Canada. We had to dress as a famous canadian, I initially wanted to be Terrence/Phillip but someone had the party had a phobia about masks, so I went as ace ventura instead and had to wear a revolting hawaian shirt! I made some strawberry muffins with Jam filled maple leafs cut into them...some maple leafs were better than others.

Pressies!

My friend Tristan if off pack backing around South East Asia for a few months so I made him this piccie before he flew out to Singapore.



This is the card I gave my girlfriend on Valentines, we had a really great day! We had a super long lye in and then I made heart shaped pancakes (some turned out to be triangles) before giving her this and a book about hot, stud vampires falling in love with a mortal lady. I got the latest Mighty Boosh DVD, simpsons socks and a beautiful card from her =D We went out for some delicous mexican food later and ate Krispy Kreme doughnuts! All in all the best valentines day I've had. You could say it's all a con and made up by card manufacturers and all that stuff, and you're half way right, still doesn't mean you can't enjoy it =)

Moon Pirates

Almost two years ago I was a trainee animator at a company called Cyfle. This is the product of my 3 months spent there, Moon Pirates. As part of the training, myself and five other trainees had to come up with a film idea each and pitch it to an industry panel, one idea was chosen which was mine so I got to play director. It was a great deal of fun because I got to make a fun film with five of the most hard working, talented people I've had the pleasure to work with.

That was the ol' work, here's some new =)

Gorilla

This is a test I did for a recent job application. A gorilla walking, waving, running and so on :)

The circle is complete

This is a documentary made a year ago when I was working in Cardiff. The company "Cyfle" were celebrating their 21 year anniversary and had a documentary made. It goes through two animation course they were running, one which I was on, and an animation day they had with guess speakers including Joanna Quinn (Girls Night Out, Britannia), JaKE (Prodigy, Mighty Boosh), Mike Ploog (Shrek, Ghost Rider) and Richard Williams (The animators survival kit, Who Framed Roger Rabbit). Happy memeories, except for my hair :S worked so hard didn't even have time for a hair cut :P

Cyfle Documentary: Digital Animation Schemes from Cyfle on Vimeo.

And now after a year working in London I'm going back to Cardiff to work on a tv show called "Happy Valley" (Cwm Teg). It's with a company called Dinamo. As much as I'll miss London I am looking forward to going back to a company where most of my friends from uni and past jobs work :D

I find some time

Despite it being a very busy time in work and having freelance jobs on top of that I've managed to find some time over the last few months to do some images for myself, as well as picking up old "skills" (or lack of!).

For about two months I was without any internet, so to fill my time I thought it'd be cool to try building maquettes again, seeing as how I haven't tempted it since my first year of uni just about getting a passing grade! The photos below are off Red and Neville from "Moon Pirates", I made them over two seperate weekends. Red went alot better than Neville! I used way to much plastecine on poor old new who is now cracking and tilting under his own weight.

They're definately better than my last attempt, which isn't saying much, but they were really fun to make, might have a new hobby! In my internet down time I also did a few other drawings, vectors etc, here's a choice. I didn't want to make one long list of images you won't take in ;)

Life Drawing

1-2 Minutes

5 - 10 Minutes
20 Minutes

I've started going back to Life Drawing, these are three sessions worth. I'm starting to feel myself get into the rhythum of drawing neud models again after a long gap of not. Anatomy and theory are slowly creeping back into my mind and so far it's been really enjoyable. I'm pretty much sticking to pencils, and if I'm feeling ambitous, a pen, that hasn't changed since uni. Perhaps one day I'll cut loose and use the markers, pastels, paints, crayons, and inks I bring with me every week, but for now I'm stuck in my ways, which works for me as all I really want to do is improove my construction, sense of weight and proportions (still having a little trouble).

Test, test and more testing

I recently did a number of tests for a flash designer's job. The first was a small cowboy game, but for some reason I can't get it working on blogger but you can have a go here if you like. It took me a day to design, draw animate and program, so excuse the crappy line quality and easiness of the game. One interview later I then had to proove myself further by making some graphics with a "comedy gold" theme.

But competition was fierce and had to do another test around the theme of "Rich Jetsetters". I didn't mind as the company looked a great place to work and I liked the artwork that was being produced.

And I got the job :D Definately worth it. After months of "Great work but we're not hiring" and "we'll contact you if we get some work" I've finally got a stimulating, creative enviroment to go to and get paid for it!

Now what follows is an art dump of stuff I've done recently, enjoy.

Attempt at George

I've been reading John K's blog for a couple of years now, as I'm sure a lot of people have, but this is the first time I've tried drawing one of his characters following his instructions.



I used Flash to ink the lines on seperate layers trying to pay attention to where the line needed to be thicker/thinner as depicted by the rough and also trying to pay attention to the construction. Below I've coloured the lines to show their different layers, like Katie Rice did with her image. But when I'm animating in Flash I like to put the head in it's own symbol to try minimise the features moving around the face, so I also broke the head up into it's own system of layers. Also the feet weren't drawn on the rough, so I gave him some socks :)


I also found a coloured version of George in the same get up on John's blog so I coloured him for fun.

For a first go I don't think I did too bad. But when I compared it to the one Katie Rice did I did see some errors :S If anyone wants to give feedback, please do!

Moon Pirates Trailer

Yep, it's almost done!

Red and Nev

I've been animating almost non stop to keep on schedule! But I needed a break from it as I have succesfully found a new flat with my girlfriend and two friends to move down to London, so that means finding a new job which means updating my portfolio. Plus by doing artwork related to my current projects I don't feel guilty about neglecting them ;)

Moon Pirates poster

A poster I made with two other artist's on my course, James and Sarah. I did the background and layout. The poster is going to be displayed at Cannes Film Festival in the Short Film's Tent. Take a look at the Moon Pirates blog for more info.

Colour keys

So Moon Pirates is well into production, we seem to be on schedule but at the same time there's still so much work to trawl through! Like colour keys! I've been continuously looking at animation backgrounds and photographs trying to come up with a palette and technique that will work well with the film. So far I've put in this effort, but more can be seen at the Moon Pirates production blog. Don't be frightened by the picture of me and the other scurvy pirates!







© Allyn Thomas and Cyfle 2008

Moon Pirates - the next film

So it was decided by a panel that out of six fresh great ideas from six different artists, that mine would be the one taken forward and made into a short animated film. Weeeeeee, so the stressful journey is undertaken to get it all completed. The other four guys and one gal working on it have already hit the ground running and have improved on my ideas and artwork considerably.
These are images I put together to pitch the idea. Don't think I'll post anything else about it until after it's finished in about 10 weeks.

My first PAID Animation job!

Finally after sending out portfolio after portfolio I've finally got a job!!! I can finally quit the drudgery of my current minimum wage job and get on the right track with where I want to be heading :D It's with Cyfle making a short film with five other artists over 3 months! Can't wait to get started!

Weedy so Speedy

Inspiration is a funny ol' thing. I don't watch American Football, and don't really have no interest in any sports. But in the last three weeks I've been using just about all my spare time making a short animation about it! The story is about a scrawny american football player called Weedy, who takes on the big boys in the Super Bowl. I'm really happy with the way it turned out, especially for the time I made it in. Let me know what you think :D

The future is bright...ish

Hey my film Jungle Janet is going to Animated Exeter! My first real film festival and the third time Jungle Janet will be on the big screen! Perhaps someone will give me a job now. Speaking of which, went for an interview for a producers training course. Couldn't have gone worse :S I was so nervous I made the panel nervous! Really doesn't look like I'm getting it but you never know, perhaps the other canditates were worse than me hehe.

The pretty and ugly side of life

Some more recent artwork...

I was going to stick these on some t-shirts this week. But Instead I spent my money on tickets to see the Smashing pumpkins :D Finally I'll get to see my favourite band! Everytime something's ogt in my way, but hopfully, this time, there's going to be no hick up...keep your fingers crossed for me x

I drew a pretty angel cos life isn't always ugly :)

I used my girlfriend's graphics tablet because mine is a hunk of junk that doesn't even have pen pressure on it...ggrrr. But my girlfriend also being amazingly wonderful has bought me a super slim, lightweight, large graphics tablet for xmas :D

I finished reading "The Watchmen", and because of some text in the book I drew this clown. If you don't know what I'm talking about, then read it, becuase it's amazing. I'm quite new to this digial painting stuff so as a first attempt I'm quite happy with how it turned out. Can only get better!

Art dump

I'm really really bored, so I'm going to just dump a bunch of drawings

ANOTHER FILM!

Well, you my good friends should all know that I've got a film in a competition. Famecast's talent seach. Well I made it through to the top 25!!

This is fantastic news for me and I'm so thankful to everyone who has voted for me and my film. Now I need you help getting through to the top 10!

LINK

That link takes you to "the centre stage" where the top 25 are, and you'll have to scroll along for my film. If you haven't already voted then you'll have to register. Anyone who's already voted can now vote again as all votes are reset at the beginning of a new round.

BUT I ALSO HAVE TO DO SOMETHING ELSE!!!

If I do get into the top 10, i've got to make another 15 to 90 second film for the sponsers of the competiont.

1. AT&T
2. Volkswagen
3. Starbucks
4. Pepsi
5. Heineken
6. Apple

Crazy in it! I'm going to have to spent the next 2 weeks making a film for a chosen company, in case I get into the next round! So don't let my hard work go to waste. Vote for my film, lets keep it in the top 10!!!

I love you all!!!!!!!