Santa On A Diet

So, finally I got around to finishing a Christmas animation: Santa On A Diet

I'd like to make more animations that are relevant to holidays or current events, if only the process didn't take so long. Perhaps this will be a challenge for the next year, making projects that are mere seconds in length, but responding to world events. Until next year, though, I'll be taking a break to enjoy the holidays and my birthday. See you in 2013!

Christmas Project

My website isn't up yet due to reasons out of my control. So instead, here's a screenshot from an animation I hope to have done in time for the holidays.

I've Made My Decision

Ok, so the Halloween animation isn't going to happen. The idea just wouldn't take off anywhere.
Of course, that doesn't mean I won't be keeping busy. I've been procrastinating far too long on getting my website up and running, so expect to see that soon.

I Need A Halloween Idea...

I came up with an idea for a Halloween animation the other night that I haven't fully developed. So I'm trying to figure out whether to just drop the whole idea, or keep rethinking it until I have something that works and can hopefully be completed by Halloween so it's relevant.

It involves a Flying Rhino that is addicted to candy...

I hope I can come up with something that's actually funny and interesting to watch, because as of right now, I just want to draw a rhinoceros with wings and call it a day. I think the most likely scenario is that I add this character to my long list of future projects from my previous post and hopefully something interesting will come of it later on down the line.

Find out what happens within the month I guess?

Upcoming Projects

These are titles of all the projects I'm planning on doing or have already started, in no particular order:

What Inanimate Objects Are Thinking
Rabies Babies
Jury Duty
How the Dinosaurs Really Died
Animal Walk Cycles
Dream Camera
Wind Powered Killer Robots
The Grim Reaper is a Bunny
The Never Ending Spaghetti
Santa on a Diet
Dr. Robotnik skit #2

I told you there was a lot.

World of Dots

I'm going through a (hopefully) brief period of time where I don't really want to work on any long term projects. I do have a rather extensive list of animations that I want to complete in the future, and I seriously see it taking at least a year to do them all.

Until then, I decided to whip something up real quick for the sake of seeing what it would look like.
That brings us to "World of Dots". Enjoy!

It's Raining Salami

Dr. Robotnik, Salami, and Moving To Salem

I was debating whether or not to post this animation on my blog.

It's very unlike me to make an animation using characters that are not my own. I don't want to be known as a person that is famous online for making animations that parody famous franchises, there are already plenty of people that do that. I want to be known as someone who creates entirely original content.

However, in this case I couldn't resist. The script here was almost entirely written by Dock Howard, and I just took his words and brought them to life in this animation, "A Scheming Session With Dr. Robotnik", based on my favorite video game series, Sonic the Hedgehog.

This animation has quickly become my most viewed video on YouTube, and was featured on a Sonic website so hopefully this will bring in traffic to my other videos as well. However, you can expect some new original animations coming soon; I don't intend to do anymore animations like this one.

Starting with this animation, all of my shorts from here on out will include clickable links at the end, for viewers to check out previous videos. You may also notice this is the first time I've used Adobe After Effects to combine recorded video and flash animation, so it's good to know I got something out of this project other than LOL fan animation.

I am already at work on two new projects, the first one, called "It's Raining Salami", proves that I have spent way too much of my life working in a deli, and the second "What Inanimate Objects Are Thinking", personifies some everyday objects, but not in the same monologue-inducing way as my previous short ,"Raindrop Thoughts". I think these will be enjoyable, random little projects that are fun to watch.
The rate at which I finish these projects will depend on how quickly I get my life in order after I move to Salem. A lot of things are uncertain at the moment, including a job and reliable internet access. I hope I have plenty of time to work on animations after the move.

This may be my last post for quite some time. Enjoy!

This Perfect Place

This is a trailer for a movie I helped work on over the past year and a half during a job and internship at Van Ness Creative. It's good to finally see it finished and finally playing at the Salem cinema.

Business Card

This is what I'm planning for a business card. I'm not sure if I'm going to call this done quite yet.

Artrageous!26 Auction Signage

This was for the annual Montserrat auction, "Artrageous!". I was tasked with making animated signage, meant to loop on screens at the auction to point out each of the different departments. Obviously not all of the departments are represented here. Another student has been working on those.

After doing my senior thesis project, it's good to return to doing more quick projects.
I feel at home again.

My final animation at Montserrat! How sad...

Web Site Progress

Here are some screenshots of the web site I'm building, for when this blog is not enough for all of your Zach related needs.

Future Projects

With my senior show over with, I'm looking forward to going back and fixing The Tortoise and the Hare project less and less. We'll see what happens.

I am currently working on making a business card and a website.
Also, I am making animated signage for the school auction at the end of the year. It's a little more than half done, and I will post everything I did for that at once on this blog and YouTube.

I have a few ideas for future projects rolling around in my brain.
Including making up sci-fi worlds, and The Never Ending Spaghetti.
I'm going to be looking at other video websites where I can post my work. The more places I post my work, the more people that can see it. I have had barely any views on Vimeo since I started that account. My YouTube is fairing slightly better, although my most viewed video isn't even an animation.

Proximity Opening Reception

So this past week was the opening reception for the graphic design senior show that I was a part of Proximity. The reception went well. It was about what I expected.

Here are pictures of some of the work from the graphic design students.

Of course you can tell my display apart from the others because of the cartoon characters.

My display consisted of two screens playing recent animations, with focus on my Tortoise and the Hare adaptation that I have working on all year. Screenshots and character printouts are hung on the wall.

I'm glad everyone likes that dog, that stupid thing makes me happy. Without the dog, I would not have wanted to finish that project.

With this huge hurdle behind me. I have a lot of more desire to work on other upcoming projects and I already have animations planned for after I graduate.

My First Demo Reel

Installing Proximity

As a senior at Montserrat I get to share a gallery with 5 other people in Senior Design Seminar for a week. Our exhibition, called Proximity, will be open this week, April 9th - 13th. You can see my completed senior film above. "The Tortoise, Hare, Dog and Sheep" It will be on display at Proximity along with my previous animations "Dance Of The Cloud People", "Super Montserrat Fighter, and "The More You Don't Know" parodies, and it will also be accompanied by giant printed characters from my animation.

Installing an exhibition is not fun when you have no experience doing artwork that doesn't involve a computer. I felt like I wasn't on the same level as the graphic designers that actually knew what they were doing. So that was weird. In the near future, I'll have to make myself focus more on physical artwork. I have a few ideas about that, but I'll discuss them at another time.

The opening for my show is Wednesday the 11th from 5 - 8. Oddly enough, I'm not really nervous about it. Installing was the hardest part. Now I just have to stand in that room for 3 hours on Wednesday and then take everything down on Friday.

As you can see, the animation was rushed in time for the show, so there will be edits somewhere down the road, but right now I know I'm taking a long break from this project after Friday.

These characters were not meant to be blown up on a wall.

It took a while to get a few resources working, such as having access to a second screen for displaying my animations. After that, I found out I needed to go back and burn more DVDs that were standard definition compatible. I almost seem like I know what I'm talking about here. And to think a few days ago I didn't know spray mount adhesive existed.

I'm the third student in Montserrat to have animation in a senior show. I can't wait to see future shows that are all animation students!

The More You Don't Know

Here are links to three new animations that parody "The More You Know" PSAs.

http://vimeo.com/37830446

http://vimeo.com/37830914

http://vimeo.com/37831051

These were refreshing and fun to make.

Senior Film Progress 2/29/12

I'll just keep working and we'll see what happens.
I have no guess as to when this will be completed.

It Will Get Done When It Gets Done

Ok, look.

I haven't worked on any animation in a week and a half thanks to my own stupidity sending me to the hospital. So I feel it's necessary to tell the world right now that there is no way my senior film is going to be done in time for the senior show.
It's just not happening. In fact, it probably won't be done by the time I graduate.

Now that I got that off my chest, I'm feeling slightly relieved, oddly enough.

This may be the first time I've ever been unable to make a deadline, but it's reasonable and completely allowable for me to say that my project will get done whenever it gets done. As an artist, I'm practicing my right to say my work isn't done until I say so.
I'm slightly less stressed out knowing that I now have the freedom to say that.

The only problems now are making sure that what I do have finished of the animation is cohesive and presentable to the audience at my senior show, and figuring out anything else I may need for the show.

Weekly updates of the Tortoise and the Hare will return next week, as well as brand new PSA animations.

Wish me luck!

Senior Film Progress 2/08/12

I'll have this done on time or die trying.

Both outcomes are equally possible at this point.

Apple Sucks

I'm having a bit of trouble with my laptop.
It's been very talkative in the past 24 hours. 
It sounds like the fan on it broke.

So after my fantastic time yesterday, trying to resist my urge to jump from a three story window, talking to someone who doesn't speak English on Apple Support, and completely ignoring my responsibilities due to fear of my laptop exploding, I think I'm finally ready to catch up on work again. I need to catch up on all the hours I missed putting into my projects yesterday.

I'll be venturing to the Apple store tomorrow and hopefully this fan will be fixed relatively quickly and without it costing ridiculous amounts of money. I doubt it. It is Apple we're talking about here.

Animation Topics 2

Now that class is back in full force for me (for the last time), I have work unrelated to my senior film.

One assignment is to create fake PSAs called "The More You Don't Know", in which I animate celebrities giving the audience knowledge that they wish they hadn't heard.

I mentioned previously that I wanted to put my knowledge of strange or disgusting facts to use.
Looks like I'm in luck! So far Mike Tyson and Christopher Walken are slated to make appearances in my PSAs. Their voices have already bee recorded.

It will be nice to show something else off other than the constant Tortoise and the Hare updates.

Senior Film Progress 2/01/12

I will be aiming to have weekly updates from now until this project is finished.

I also have other projects in the works aside from the Tortoise and the Hare. It's a nice change of pace.

Senior Film Progress 1/20/12

Here's all the work I did over the winter break.
The animation is somewhere around half done. Looks like I'm on schedule.

Senior Film Progress 1/8/12

My animation is no longer plagued by black linework.

Senior Film Progress 1/4/12

All distractions, annoyances, and interruptions considered, I guess this is going well. I'm probably going to end up wishing I hadn't saved all the hard stuff for last, but that will make it feel even better when this is finally over.