Happy Holidays!!

Hope you've had a great Christmas!
This is a color key I did for the Shrek Christmas special.

Jungle Waterfall

Jungle waterfalls are the most fun to paint! Here's a waterfall color study I did for the animated movie Rio 2. 

Out the Office Window

These are studies of the view out of my office window from DreamWorks back in our traditional painting days. I did something like 70 of these over the course of a year, they're painted in acrylics.

I've posted some of these before and now here are all the ones I have handy in one group.

Spirit, Stallion of the Cimarron Scene

Here's a scene and preliminary sketch for the Animated film Spirit, Stallion of the Cimarron. They're both painted in acrylics on Crescent 100 illustration board.

The comp was based on a potential long camera pan but the final shot is condensed.

Puss in Boots Lighting Design Sequence

Here's a lighting design sequence I did for Puss and Boots and the Tres Diablos:

 Rough lighting keys.

 Scene illustration.

  Scene illustration.

 Final production matte painting.

 Scene illustration.

 Final scene form the show using my lighting design and matte painting.



Here's a close up of the final matte painting.

Fun with Paint!

Puss in Boots Environment

An environment I did for Puss in Boots. The background is a matte painting and the foreground is a place holder for geometry that will be created and lit.

CTNX!

Great time at CTNX, thanks to all of you who stopped to say hi!
Here's our panel of superstars (plus me): James Paick, Bruce Zick, me, Laurel Austin and Fernando Olmedo. We spoke on the topic of Concept.

Online Portrait Drawing Course Begins January 17!

My online portrait drawing class is coming up in January check it out here.

Dubai Report!

Our latest Schoolism live event was Dubai, an extraordinary city. Our crack team of artists were Bobby Chiu, Chris Pern, David Levy, Justin Fields, Stanley Lau and myself. Here are some highlight photos:

CTN Animation Expo!

I have 2 workshops at the CTN Animation Expo in Burbank Ca. this Month:
Color Script Design for Storytelling. Friday, November 20, 3:45 PM.
Lighting Design for Storytelling. Saturday, November 21, 3:15 PM.

Happy Halloween!

This is a color key painting from the DreamWorks Halloween special.

Color Explorations in Acrylic.

Practice practice!

Drawing!

Working on my portrait drawing book a little every day. Should be out next summer.

Master Studies

Back in the mid nineties I was out of school and starting to work professionally but painfully aware of how much improvement was still needed. I put myself on a routine of daily master studies which included one of my favorite landscape painters: Edgar Payne. Here's a page of my studies:

Barcelona!

Back from Barcelona!
Special thanks to King Studio! Good stuff brewing over there, and they were excellent hosts, an amazing company to work for.

Online Portrait Class in January!

My online portrait drawing class has opened for enrollments! More info here.
Begins January 17, 2016. Limited spots!

This was practice rendering grass for a project with 6 inch tall characters.

Create Change Design Forum in China!

Here are the photos from the event if you'd like to take a look, (Yeah OK, it's totally a bragging wall.)
Special thanks to our hosts and forum creators Art Center College of Design (host, Dr Mark Breitenberg) and the Art Center Institute of Design in China (Miss Yu Lan), they were awesome!
Info on the extraordinary speakers here.