Found some old work I did long ago (G. I. Joe)

I found an old CD with these images saved onto it.

This one was for a freelance gig for a G.I Joe commercial. I don't know if it was ever actually used in the end. It was the body for the character The Baroness.

Here is what she looked like in the cartoon:

I was tasked with building her in 3D in Maya. If you're wondering why she has such big guns, well, I was asked to make her guns bigger, over and over again. I would go to a size I thought was ridiculously too big, and then I was told "BIGGER!". I was about to start on the head and face, but they ended up giving that to someone else who was going to incorporate hair, which I was not up to speed on.

(Click image for larger version)

If I had to do her all over again I would do it completely different. I've learned so much since back then about anatomy, workflow and modeling techniques. But it's fun to look at what I did when I was a newbie.

On a different assignment I was asked to come up with an elderly robot. This was my quick Previs mock-up. I don't know if it was ever used for anything.

It's fun to look at old work, especially if you're embarrassed by it.  ;)

Home Art Project - Wood/Jar/Plant

Recently Jane and I started on a little project for the house. Since moving in we haven't really decorated a ton and decided we needed to get off our butts and do it. Jane was inspired and so she went out and did all the hard work, searching the internet for the right supplies and ordering them. One box of old blue Ball jars and three live-edge planks of wood. We then picked up some hardware, put them together and fastened our new planters on the wall in our living room.

Jane is sanding the planks...

And then oiled them all purdy.

This is the bare wall we wanted to put them on.

Some close ups of the old Ball jars. These would be the containers for the plants.

We used these rings to secure the jars to the planks. I drilled a hole in the ring and then used a screw to secure it in place on the boards. A small piece of rubber was placed between the jar and the ring towards the back to give it better traction and a bit of cushion when tightened around the glass jar. (of course I didn't take pictures of any of that stuff)

To measure out where we wanted them on the wall we cut templates of each board and taped them onto the wall, ensuring proper placement. The pups were very helpful as supervisors.

Here we see the rings and some of the jars in place. One of the boards had a section of it's core missing which we liked the look of. To keep the jars at the same height across we just dropped the rings on those jars lower on the board.

And here they are up.

And the first board gets it's new tenants. :)

Cape Cod Fishing 06/12

A few weeks ago I went on a fishing trip to Cape Cod for a few days and I have just returned. We, being Steve G, Mark E and myself, stayed in a cabin in Chatham, MA.The trip was tiring as hell, but it was a great time.

We fished right around this little light house most of the time we were there. I've been thinking about moving in, whether they want me to or not.

This dude is a complete bad ass.

Steve = pooped.

I was gettin' jiggy with it.

As we headed back to land we hit some waves and Mark almost went overboard. He definitely was airborne a few times there.

My bed. We fished so much I barely used it.

Painting again

I've finally started painting again. In February, during "No TV, No Video Games, No Distractions" month I spent a bunch of time designing the paintings I wanted to work on. I'm starting with my Flying Babies series, this will be the first in that series. I found the perfect place in our house for it and picked a canvas that would support the intent and space well. But, having never done a painting anywhere near this big was quite a surprise. At 5ft tall it's a beast. You can tell from my face how excited I was to be sitting on the floor for three and a half hours and to only have gotten this much done. Probably the most frustrating part was realizing the paint I was using was so thin that I'm going to have to go over what I already did with a second coat to get it to look right. Anyway, here is the start of it all.

Our old friend.

I took this pic with my iPhone this weekend. It's of a toy truck my brother and I used to play with when we were kids. This past summer I visited the woods we used to play in and found it almost completely buried in the dirt under a tree. I brought it home and now our old imaginary friend does his construction work in my front yard.