2007 Football Commercial

We were asked to make a 30 second commercial for 2007 football season tickets. The client asked for a simple football edit with a 3-2-1 countdown and information at the end. Below is what we came up with.

Brad Sommer made the train animation at the beginning in Maya. Louis Dierkman edited the video, Adam Ruud created the lower 3rd in Maya, and I created the countdown and end information in After Effects. We then took all the elements and composited them together in After Effects and added the grunge and camera shake. I also helped with the overall "look" and created the text for the Highlighted home games.

We were pleased with the final product. Hope you enjoy.

2007 Football Posters

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We were asked this year to create some posters for the Purdue football team. This is one that I worked on today and is in progress. It still needs text and logos applied and I'm still working on the overall look and may possibly change the sky. I took the pictures of the player, stadium and sky and composited them together in Photoshop.

[update]
I was asked by our creative director to add shoulder pads to the player that we originally shot without pads. He put on a pair of shoulder pads and a jersey that we have in the office and we shot a picture of him trying to match the light as best we could. I then took that image and cut out the pads and added them to the original image that I took. I also had to change the numbers on the shoulders to match the number of the player. Above is a link to the updated poster.

Blast from the Past

This is the first piece we've made for the upcoming Purdue football season and I'm excited about the way the whole look turned out. This piece is a 'guess the year' type of thing that will run during football games on the new LED wall Purdue is installing. Scott Horton is the creative director this season and he wanted a 300 look with some steampunk elements and this is what we created. Scott edited the little video in Premiere Pro that plays during the piece highlighting the events that happened that year. Adam Ruud and I created the base frames in Photoshop that surround the elements. Brad Sommer created the title and spinning numbers in Maya. And I assembled the whole piece in After Effects. To do that I edited the frames created by Adam in Photoshop so they would work the way I needed them to for the piece. I created the background in Photoshop. I then took all the elements assembled them in After Effects and put 3D motion to them and added a camera, lights, shadows, and color correction. I then animated all the pieces to create what you see below.



[ note: this is a rough version. the motion blur was turned off to shorten render time and the voice-over is a temporary one until we get the real one recorded. I'll update the video when we have a completed piece ]

Demo Reel Shot Breakdown

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Hey! I just posted a complete breakdown shot-by-shot of my demo reel. Now you can check out each individual clip and read exactly what it was I worked on. Just click the above image or the link to the right to view it. Enjoy!

Past Perfect - Post: 02

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Some more sketches and color studies. Stu drew the O'Malley image and I colored it. I drew some concept art for the Arc machine.

Young Life Golf Outing & Nerf Wars

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I was given the opportunity to make another poster for Young Life. This time for their annual golf outing fundraiser. I wanted to make something that had a little Scottish influence to it since that was the birthplace of the sport. So in Scottish clan tradition, I made a Young Life golf coat of arms. I used Illustrator to modify the shield and golf clubs, then brought it into Photoshop to create the rest of the poster. It's always fun to make stuff for YL.

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On a separate note we recently purchased an arsenal of nerf guns at work and decided to make some action photos. Below is the one I did of me wielding dual Mavericks. I have two images. The first one is the original photo we took and the second is me in the heat of battle. Everything was done with images from google image search and about 1 hour of playing around in Photoshop. It was just a fun exercise... a sort of graphics challenge.

Past Perfect

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Over the past month or so my friends and I have talked about making a comic together. The whole point being a tool to be creative and keep in touch on a regular basis since we live states, and even continents apart.

We all started out much more heavily in the traditional arts and only in college really moved over to the digital arts. After many years of just working on computers we're itching to put some pencil to paper and just draw a bit. Through this desire we came up with the idea to make a comic that we can all work on and then post the pages on the web for others to read as we complete them.

Right now we're sorting through all of our schedules and figuring out what a possible production timeline could be like and pooling all of our ideas into the story, concept art, and technique. We're all really excited about this project and are looking forward to making the first finished page.

Once we get everything fleshed out I'll post more about the story and characters (most likely in another blog dedicated to the comic) and I'll continue to post concept art and images as we create them. Here's the first peek.

JC Trombley drew up some quick concepts of characters and a guy getting pistol whipped and drew the revolver and vacuum tubes.

The colored one is my first attempt at trying to determine how the colors will look. I really haven't done a lot of this and every time I did I just filled the outlines with a solid color and used the dodge and burn tools in photoshop to create the shadows and highlights. This drawing I wanted to try to get away from that and experimented with different brushes. The main brush acted a bit like a marker. I used broad strokes of color and then refined it until I had what you see below. At the end I added his stubble and used a speckled brush in photoshop to create it. This got me thinking of what other great brushes could be created. I feel the next one could be a lot different because of this.

These are the first drawings I've done in a while. It's taking me back to my childhood when all I wanted to do with my friends was draw. It's a great feeling.

Photography

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My wife and I recently purchased a Nikon D200 for our upcoming trip to Africa. We felt that pictures would be better memories and last longer than some expensive trinket we could find while over there. Since then, we've been taking photos around town trying to brush up our photography chops. I'm finding that I'm pretty rusty, but I'm having a lot of fun with it. It got me thinking of what I feel are the last 'art' photos I took. Some black and white film shots that I developed in the darkroom. Back before photoshop ruled my life. Don't get me wrong.. I love photoshop and the creative freedom it gives you, but there's something about actually going through the process of developing your film and trying to produce the best print possible with the proper contrast and exposures. Also, finding the perfect filter to use and the smell the of the development chemicals.. I just sometime miss that creative process. But I digress.. I love this new camera. Now, just to learn it well so not to miss any opportunities while on safari in Africa. I've posted some of my photos I developed through the now archaic methods and one of my dog, because he rocks.

The chair is a light study. I found it in an abysmal abandoned house on the outskirts of town. I truly believe if the blair witch house existed it would be this house. I never felt at ease here, but I really do love this picture.

The woman is a motion study. It was a series of photos that told a story and this is one of the final panels. The whole project was of her running from someone through the woods. I believe I shot this and the chair with a stock Pentax camera and a 50mm lens.

The dog is my dog - Brody. I took it with a point-and-shoot sony digital camera. Enjoy!