Geoff Wheeler

Warty Pigs

2012-02-12T23:21:00.000-08:00

I'm a big fan of the 'Warty Pigs' at the L.A. Zoo, each one has their own unique hairstyle, giving them tons of personality.

Playing With Painter

2012-02-09T00:24:00.000-08:00

Lately, I've been playing around with brushes in Corel Painter

Twilight: Breaking Dawn Storyboards

2011-11-27T23:40:00.000-08:00

Over a year ago, I was given the scripts for Twilight: Breaking Dawn Part 1 and 2 and was asked to develop storyboards for some of the sequences involving the wolves.

Some script re-writes took place during the pre-viz stage, that's why there are some differences between this and the film. In the end, I was really happy that through all the different stages, some of my concepts were able to make there way into the final film.

I thought the Wolf sequences played really well in the film. Both the look and the animation of the wolves were fantastic, another kick-ass job from the team at Tippett Studio.

It' Been A Good Month

2011-11-25T14:05:00.001-08:00

Two movies I worked on, out in the same month.

Storyboarding on Twilight: Breaking Dawn was one of the last projects I worked on at Tippett Studio before moving to Sony Pictures to animate on Arthur Christmas.

More Life Drawing

2011-11-25T14:03:00.001-08:00

Life Drawing Practice

2011-10-30T14:02:00.000-07:00

I'm often on the Figure Drawing Practice Tool website. I can only get out to life drawing from a live model every couple of weeks, and this site is a fantastic alternative to fill the gaps.

L.A. Zoo

2011-10-23T22:25:00.000-07:00

Went down to the L.A. zoo this weekend.

Horse Practice

2011-09-09T10:00:00.000-07:00

Lately, I've been practicing drawing horses from memory.

From my sketchbook 3

2011-08-24T16:25:00.000-07:00

Some Recent Caricatures

2011-07-16T16:13:00.000-07:00

Some drawings I've done of a few Arthur Christmas animators...

J.Q. Park

Matt Hasselmann

Tim Watts

Sue Houston

Dan Segarra

Shad Bradbury

Jeff Kim

more life drawin'

2011-06-22T21:17:00.000-07:00

life drawin'

2011-05-25T22:09:00.000-07:00

I took my tablet PC to life drawing this week.

head sketches

2011-05-20T22:16:00.001-07:00

From My Sketchbook 2

2011-05-10T22:30:00.000-07:00

From My Sketchbook 1

2011-05-06T23:51:00.000-07:00

Gesture Class - playin' with markers

2011-03-20T20:40:00.000-07:00

I picked up a set of markers to play around with in gesture class. We had another amazing model this week. Sadly though, it was also the last class.

More Gesture Class

2011-02-27T16:58:00.000-08:00

These are from the last couple of weeks, all 3 minutes in length.

Gesture Class

2011-02-06T23:24:00.000-08:00

I recently started taking a gesture class at the Los Angeles Academy of Figurative Art . Each week there is a model dressed in a themed costume with most of the poses in the 2 to 3 minute range. It's an amazing class instructed by Mark McDonnell . He places a huge emphasis on storytelling and encourages us to stop and think for a quick moment at the start of each pose to imagine who this person is, what are they doing and what are they thinking. Mark is always trying to push us in a way that is tailored to each artist and the passion he has for drawing is completely infectious and makes it a lot of fun.

Drawing for Ronald McDonald House

2010-12-13T23:00:00.000-08:00

This past Saturday, I felt extremely privileged to be a part of a great day for a great cause. For the past number of years, McDonalds and Warner Bros. studios put on a holiday party for the Los Angeles families of the Ronald McDonald House. The Ronald McDonald House is a “Home Away From Home” for families of children undergoing treatment for serious childhood illnesses at nearby hospitals. They provide a caring environment where families receive support services through a wide array of programs designed to assist them during their difficult time.

The party was held at the Warner Bros. Ranch in Burbank, CA where there was all you can eat hamburgers, turkey dogs, cake, cookies and cotton candy, lots of rides and great activities.

As part of the event, animation legend Art Leonardi organizes a station where 20 to 30 cartoonists take requests from the kids to draw their favourite cartoon characters for them. I got a lot of Bugs Bunny requests, some Batman drawings for the boys and surprisingly a bunch of Superman drawings for the girls. There were some Ariel and Tinkerbell drawings I did as well, the girls weren't all about the super heroes.

My good friend Jason Martinsen (above on the left) was there drawing as well, Art Leonardi (center) cranked out some fantastic Pink Panthers, and that's me on the right.

Easily, the biggest thrill of the day was seeing the smiles on all the kids faces, I had so much fun spending time with them and really hope I get another chance to do something like this again.

While I was there, I also got a chance to visit the most amazing christmas location I could ever think of. On the studio lot, they have the Griswold house from Christmas Vacation. I knew it was the house from the strange smell coming from the storm drain.

Demo Reel

2010-11-02T22:55:00.000-07:00

zoo sketchbook

2010-08-25T17:37:00.001-07:00

Random Heads

2010-08-10T00:51:00.001-07:00

From this past weekend, mostly from waiting at the Oakland airport, which has become my favorite place to draw people.

Actively Pursuing the Objective

2010-08-03T22:20:00.000-07:00

I take acting classes at the Berkeley Reperatory Theater, which are great by the way. I just thought I'd share something that I thought was really interesting from the last class.

Someone asked my instructor, Ryan O'Donell, how they should go about performing a laugh that was in the script. There was no written stage direction, just 'ha ha ha', leaving it wide open to interpretation. The person talked about how they had tried laugh after laugh to see which one felt most appropriate, but never really finding something that felt right for the scene.

Ryan's response was that he was too focused on results. That instead of focusing on the type of laugh, he should pursue the objective of the character, and the laugh will figure itself out when he's playing out the scene.

My take on what Ryan said, was that he was telling him that he was just going through the motions, and that just knowing the objective isn't enough. That an active pursuit of a character's objective will bring results born out of emotion, and not out of analysis.

Everything I learn about acting for the stage, I'm always trying to translate into acting for animation. I thought what Ryan said was a great mindset to have when shooting reference for the pantomime in an animated scene. What can I do to be more in the scene, and in the mindset of the character? Am I just going through the motions? Am I ACTIVELY pursuing my character's objectives? Am I rushing to the results or did they happen naturally? Are my results coming from analysis ? Or did they come out of emotion?

Stephen Silver Character Design Assignment: Jekyll and Hyde

2010-07-28T20:45:00.000-07:00

As part of Stephen Silver's class, we have to come up with our own take on the story of Jekyll and Hyde. My story involves a happy playful otter that gets turned into an evil little beaver.

Which was really just an excuse to be able to type 'beaver' into Google images. No, seriously Honey, I'm researching for my drawing class!

This is a phase where I'm trying to zero in on proportions, shape and overall look of my characters. I did a stack of drawings during this phase, but these were the ones I pulled out that took me in the direction I felt I wanted to go.

Stephen Silver Character Design Assignment: Using The Basic Shapes

2010-07-15T15:23:00.000-07:00

Part of this week's assignment for Stephen Silver's Character Design Class, we had to create a realistic image from a photograph he gave us. I did a digital gouache version of it above.

Once we did the realistic version, we then had to put the image away and use elements from it that we remembered to create characters using a circle, a triangle and a square. This was a great exercise, I found there were times when I would draw a feature of the face and it just didn't feel like it belonged within the main shape of the head, and I'd redraw the feature to something that felt like it belonged with the total shape. I'll definitely keep doing this type of exercise as a practice.

Another Memory Sketch

2010-07-05T16:27:00.000-07:00

This guy got so excited when he saw a car that looked like it was from the '40s park on the side of the road. The car was in pristine condition. He quickly got his camera out and started taking a bunch of snaps. The smile he had on his face looked like the type you get when you think back on great memories.

Memory Sketch

2010-07-03T19:13:00.000-07:00

Saw this fellow walking out of the Berkeley farmer's market. He might have bought a cantaloupe or two too many.

Memory Sketch Gold

2010-07-02T11:32:00.001-07:00

I was looking for people to do a memory sketch of this morning during my drive into work. Nothing at all until I stopped at the light and I saw this guy...pure memory sketch gold! Don't let the outfit fool you, it was about 75 degrees out and I had the top down.

Stephen Silver Design Class: Assignment #1

2010-06-28T09:42:00.000-07:00

Last Week, I started the Stephen Silver character design course at Schoolism.com. This is the first assignment, creating a used car salesman character called 'Jerry Loomy' off of a detailed written description given to me.

In my spare time over the last 8-10 months, I've been focusing on trying to improve my drawing fundamentals. I found that there were just too many drawing challenges that I was using semi-blind trial and error to try to get past. I've been working my way through the Glenn Vilppu drawing videos and an old copy of the 'Famous Artists' drawing course.

I thought joining Stephen Silver's course would be a good way to learn both drawing and design fundamentals from an artist I have great admiration for. Learning by myself is one thing, but I'm hoping that assignment deadlines and a mentor will help me pull together a lot of the things I've already been learning as well as adding a lot of new things.

Hand Drawn Lip Sync: Work In Progress

2010-06-07T09:44:00.000-07:00

Here's the start of a character piece I'm working on. Just doing this for fun.

View the full sized(2.9 MB) version here: http://www.geoffwheeler.com/media/GobbledygookWIP.mov

Slow-Mo Reference: Siamang Shake

2010-06-05T21:06:00.000-07:00

Slo-Mo Reference: Gibbon walking and leaping

2010-06-05T20:41:00.000-07:00

Talk about shape design...this guy's got it!

Practicing Face Shapes

2010-05-19T19:34:00.000-07:00

Recently there was a post about making faces out of shapes by Octavio Rodriguez on the Art Center Blog . It's a great exercise. I've been doing it as part of my morning warm-up/practice time.

Sketches

2010-05-17T20:04:00.000-07:00

Life Drawing - April 18th

2010-04-18T19:15:00.000-07:00

From the past couple of weeks....

Slow-Mo Reference: Leaping Leemur

2010-03-23T22:34:00.000-07:00

Slow-Mo Reference: Lion's a leaping

2010-03-16T22:45:00.000-07:00

Rhino Beetle

2010-03-16T20:30:00.000-07:00

Slow-Mo Reference: A Duck Cleaning Himself

2010-03-15T00:23:00.000-07:00

I went to the Oakland Zoo recently to shot video of some exotic animals, and this duck in the pond the giraffe's drink out of ends up being one of the most interesting things I shot all day.

This is the first of a bunch of slow motion videos I've shot that I'll be posting here. They're all shot at 300 fps.

Quicksketches: Belly Dancer

2010-02-24T22:43:00.000-08:00

Learning from the Legends

2009-12-06T18:25:00.000-08:00

I love to listen to the great animators of today on animation podcasts, or read what they have to say in their books about what they did to further their education in animation. Many of them talk about how at one time or another they studied the legendary animators of the past by either getting xeroxed copies of the frames taken from films and then studied under a light table, or by being lucky enough to go down into the Disney vaults and looking up original drawings.

Today's technology gives people plenty of options for studying films frame by frame for educational purposes and even drawing over the frames using a tablet on a computer. I'm assuming that people can figure that part out for themselves.

In 'The Animator's Survival Kit', Richard Williams talks again and again about how legendary animators like Milt Kahl incorporated a 'sophisticated use of the basics' into their work. More and more frequently, I've been studying some of the Disney films of the past in an attempt to try breaking down some of the scenes the Nine Old Men did and figure out how they used the basic principles of animation in sophisticated ways.

My favourite films to study are from the 60's and 70's (101 Dalmations, Jungle Book, The Sword in the Stone etc...). They have my favorite films and characters and because of the limited use of clean up artists, it's my understanding that for the most part, you're pretty much seeing the animator's drawings on screen.

So, what do I focus on when I study these scenes?

Below is an example of a study I did of a Madame Mihm scene from 'The Sword in the Stone', that I believe was animated by Milt Kahl. (In the above clip it begins at 0:29) Wart (the bird) has just entered Mihm's house through the chimney and is dusting himself off saying 'Merlin changed me with his magic, he's the worlds most powerful wizard'. This scene is the start of Mihm's response saying 'Merlin?...Ohh-ho, Merlin!'. (I'll just study small sections at a time).

In this case, I'm focusing on the arcs of the head and the hands. I look at where he places the accents along those arcs and what he's doing with the any facial expression or hand gesture at the time of that accent.

Accents in animation happen in one of two places, either during a change of direction or during a change in speed. Richard Williams demonstrates this in 'The Animator's Survival Kit' on page 295, using the example of a person pointing their finger.

When I've got the arcs and accents plotted, I can then work backwards and guess why he planned out his phrasing and choreography that way.

Other things in the scene catch my eye....

the way he uses the concept of 'opposing forces' having the arms rise as the body and head lower.

the way he had the body arrive 4 frames before the accent in the voice so that it could be seen in the face.

the way that he waited until the last moment to squish the cheeks into the eyes and squish the mouth closed...if he had inbetweened everything on the face evenly, it would have ended up looking mushy and wouldn't have as much pop into the big broad facial expression he follows it with.

I learn a lot every single time I do it, it's a great way to take a very humble and tiny glimpse into the mind of a legend.

Tippett Animator: Hans Brekke

2009-12-06T16:28:00.000-08:00

Sketching At the Beach

2009-12-06T16:21:00.000-08:00

Hand Drawn Lip Sync: Getting it Started

2009-12-06T15:48:00.000-08:00

I've been itchin' to do a hand drawn lip sync using a character I've created.

I came up with this guy from a caricature I drew while doing some quick sketching around town. The man is needle nosed, weak chinned and in his 50's...outside of that, I don't know much about him....yet.

Before I can even begin to think about what he's going to say, I want to know what his personality and backstory are first. From that, I'm hoping that the character will then tell me what he is going to say.

Backyard Visitors

2009-12-06T15:34:00.000-08:00

Last Saturday, we ended up having a few surprise visitors in our backyard. A mother and her two fawns. They ended up staying about half an hour just munching on leaves and laying in the grass. They must be used to people, they let my wife and I get to within 6 feet from them. I must have taken about 200 photos.

One of the fawns got up from laying in the tall grass in a really interesting way. If I was forced to animate it without reference, I don't think there is any way in the world I would have come up with having him roll forward on his wrists. Then to prop himself up to get the other front hoof on the ground.
I couldn't quite make out everything that was going on because of the high grass. I did some sketches as an action analysis to try to figure out exactly what was happening.

Even sticking her tongue out at the camera doesn't keep them from being welcomed in my backyard anytime.

Quicksketch 1

2009-12-06T15:27:00.000-08:00

Possessed To Paint a Skate Deck

2009-12-06T11:52:00.000-08:00

At Tippett Studio, every Christmas we have a Secret Santa gift exchange. What makes it great, is that the gift has to be hand made. In '07, my recipient was lighting guru and skateboard fiend, Aharon Bourland.
So, the idea was to custom paint a skateboard deck with a graphic image of a goblin from The Spiderwick Chronicles. I had never done this before, so there was a bit of trial and error involved, but that's the beauty of opaque paint.

Some of the things I found are...

Sand the board down until it's completely smooth and then undercoat it with gesso. The colour of the acrylic paint will be much more vibrant and the paint itself will don't be absorbed into the wood.
Mix a fluid medium (the kind used to mix paint for use in an airbrush) into your acrylic paint to thin it out enough to get a nice clean edge with your brush.
When trying to get hard lines on small details...frisket is your best friend.