Trendy Fun

So It's been about three months since my last post, the first project I was working on has been shipped, it was the final DLC for Dungeon Defenders. Now we're on a different project in the same realm with this game coming out by the end of the year/very early next. I got my own apt, and got a new bed, tv, couch, etc. My friend Ted also got hired at Zynga in SF and he just moved out there, I decided that I'd take one of his cats that's really chill so he has a good place to be. Recently I've played LBP2, Darksiders2, Fall of Cybertron, and rebeat Castlevania LoS. I have Borderlands 2 but haven't opened it yet, soon, when I beat Darksiders 2. That's pretty much it. I've been using my Twitter more, you can follow me @Veloth88.

Until later, when I have my home desk and comp set up!

Crunch time!

     The end of this past week was my first full week at Trendy Entertainment. I've now worked a week and half and happen to come in at crunch time. I'm actually quite glad that I came in at crunch time, to get a feel for how much and how long I'll be working when we're down to the wire. Within this last week and a half I worked on a full characters animation set (one that the players have been waiting to see) and a familiar which is a little pet that helps out. I got to see what my animations look like in game, and the director was very pleased with the work I did for the characters. They normally give the animator a week to make a whole animation set for a character (about 30-40 animations) I had a good 95ish% of it animated by day 3 (which was Fri. Mon and Tue I was fixing up some issues on other characters) So when day 4 (Sat) rolled about, I knocked out the last couple cycles, and made some fixes so it all worked well and nice ingame. This coming week, I get to work on a cutscene! Oh, it'll be funn. My animation goal is to work for movies, but since I still love games so much I want to work at a game studio. So the plan is to make cycles but move to cinematics ASAP since this is a small studio I'll be doing both and getting that experience for both. It's so nice to be able to almost always be thinking about animation now, it really bummed me out when I had to go to Sprint and talk about phone plans, and accessories. It all distracted me from observing, and understanding animation everyday. Now, it can be done, it's just harder when the majority of my time is forced to think about things that aren't relevant. Now that I'm animating all day, I have those glasses on and I'm seeing the world as it moves and I'm making mental notes. Anyway, back to my lazy Sunday off. Huzzah for set schedule jobs and free weekends!!

First Studio Job!!!!

It finally happened, I got a studio job!!! I received a call from Trendy Entertainment on Friday June 1st,  saying that they like my work and wanted me to check out the studio up in Gainesville. So I took the drive up, met with the Director and Producer of the studio weighed it against the other studio job that is up in NJ and chose Trendy! My first day of work is June 20th, and I move up on the 19th. Other amazing things that have happened within the last couple days are that two of my close friends from school also got their first studio positions at DD in LA, and another friend just had a baby! It's a pretty amazing week I'll say.

The Pokemon project chugs along, I still can't do anything till the characters are rigged, and hopefully that'll be soon. We've got some nice concept art and I wrote out a ton for the choreography and even a prequel if we ever get to them. It's a bit tough trying to get a lot of people who are doing this on their free time to stay committed especially when they have day jobs to do and a studio job to find. I see that if something gets posted that contributes to the continuation of the project and it gets everyone pumped then they get a little boost to keep working on their part of the project. So I've been busting out some previs shots for the fight, two so far I've been a bit busy myself which is why I understand where everyone is coming from. I'll get some more done and the riggers will be working on the rigs so the animators can start doing tests. I can't wait to start playing with those rigs.

Now I'm off to my second to last day of work at Sprint, and then more packing when I get home!

Finally some great news!!

So to keep this short a friend of mine recommended me for an amazing job up in New Jersey which I applied for and did an art test which I feel I did quite well on. I received a call yesterday from a different studio that I sent my portfolio to back in March. They like my work and want me to work for them! I'll be checking out the studio sometime this coming week (since I won't be going to E3 sadly.) Now I have a choice, and I'm just stupidly excited that it's between two different studios instead of two different retail jobs.

In other news the Pokemon Project is still chugging along, the Marowak is modeled and waiting to be rigged, the Donphan is waiting to be rigged and we're figuring out the env modeling. I need a little project so I may make a fun cycle for kicks.

4 day weekend!!

No work for the next three days! Today was a great day off, I cleaned my room did all of the laundry and had a nice sleep in after my meeting at work. Once that was all done i knocked out a jump cycle for MWG and the beginnings of the ninth shot for the Sonic film. I need to practice my drawing, mainly the shading since that's what really sells it. Anyway I'm off to bed, night!

Pushing on.

Bad news and good news. Bad news is that I was not hired at Trion, Mechanist, and Skyparlor. Good news is that they all liked my work, Trion was impressed with the work and look of the cycles that I made for them, Skyparlor liked my style, and I was a strong candidate for Mechanist Games. The problems were that Trion was only hiring a senior animator, Skyparlor wanted more experience, and Mechanist went with someone local. Now the fact that they sent me an email back is a good thing, and that they liked the work tha I do is even better! So I thanked them all for their time and said to remember me if they needed anyone with my experience soon.

After that I went on resume sending spree and got a link on reddit about a company looking for people. So now I'm working with Mountain Wheel Games on their fame Stone Rage. Can't say much more than that, I'm under NDA. I'm still with Bluecore on the Sonic film, April is apparently the running month, and I'm working on the chase scene this month. Currently on shot 9 that I've worked on with them. Also, we're currently looking at a June release!

Other random news I got to teach in my friends class, it was pretty fun. I went over the basic principles, told them about what I've done and currently doing to get a job in the industry and what it takes to be an animator. I'll probably go back and teach another lecture, maybe even check out a teaching position there myself. Better pay, and I won't want to punch the people asking me questions cause they won't be as stupid as "How do I make a call on an iPhone?" "Does the phone have to lock when I put it in my purse?" So on and so forth. I'm grateful for my Sprint job but eager to get out of it into an animation job. That's why I'm spending more time working on animation at home than at the given hours at work. It's about 29/30ish hours at Sprint and 35-37 at home. It's the only thing I do at home now. I haven't even touched Mass Effect 3 in a week. Anyway, I'm out for now, I typed this all out at work on my phone if that shows how much free time I have on my hands. I actually spend as much time as I can drawing at work so I can practice. I'll see if I can upload pics of my drawings to this post. Mike fun

2 cycles left to go!

So I pretty much finished the Shotgun cycle which is at the bottom of this post, I got some great feedback from some of my friends on how to improve it. Once I finish that I'll be working on Sonics run and spindash cycles for BlueCore studios, and actually when I finish the run cycle I'll be able to finish shots 7 and 8 easily since it's him running through some trees. After that I'll apply some fixes to my female walk cycle, and then start the sniper cycle today. Having three days off from Sprint was absolutely amazing and seriously helped me crank out these cycles quickly. Today I also have the Skype interview with the company that's based in China, so hopefully that'll go well.

Time to knock shit out.

Deadlines and Cycles

      So I've started setting deadlines for myself to keep moving forward and not get stuck getting distracted. Todays deadline is to have the shotgun cycle finished by the time I go to bed and have started fixing the female walk cycle/adding details to the Pistol cycle. Tomorrow will be to start and hopefully finish the sniper cycle and have enough time to complete the assault rifle cycle by Thursday. Thursday is the main deadline for all the cycles I've been working on since I've gotten back to GDC. Overall the goal was to finish 5 cycles in about a week and a half.

I also need to put these cycles up on the demo reel page/my website and then start planning an adjustment to my demo reel to add these cycles in it. The Poseidon walk cycle, the female walk cycle, the robot run cycle, and one or two of the gun cycles. That should make my Demo Reel now over a minute long, woo hoo!!

This one is self explanitory, start of the cycle behind cover.

 Obviously he's out shooting now, I must say I got the spin to be nice and fluid and remembered to have his different appendages show up where they needed to be at different times so it doesn't look snapped. I do need to turn down his reflections and add a point light to give the muzzle flash off on the surrounding Geo. Should I make the muzzle flash image bigger though...

Well, back to work I've only got about 13 hours before I have to sleep so I'd better make the best of it!

Mike

I'm pretty sure that I put some blogs up on my phone but I guess they didn't make it on here...

Well since the last post in September a lot has happened, instead of droning on I'll list it.

• I'm still at Sprint but not for long. 
• I put my Demo Reel up in it's own tab with work I've recently done.
• I made my business cards that have a QR code that leads to my Demo Reel tab.
• I've been working on the Sonic fanfilm and doing quite well.
• I've completed 6 shots, and I am now on shots 7 and 8.
• I started a side project with some friends from school, it's a short about Pokemon, a fight between a Marowak and a Donphan.
• I haven't heard anything much from David and the Orlando studio.
• DD is hiring and I've put in my resume and demo reel to see if I can get a job in their new studio up in Port Saint Lucie.
• I went to GDC.
• I found 7 companies who expressed interest in hiring me.
• I've got an interview on Tuesday night with a company in China.
• 3 of the studios that needed me are freelance (hence why I won't be at Sprint for long.
• I met a lot of awesome people at the Trion Worlds party at GDC and currently making some cycles to show them what I can do.
• I've been practicing my illustration.
• I've been holding off on playing ME3 till I finish the cycles for Trion.
• I'm single again.
• I met some cute girls at GDC.

So that's what's been going on with me, right now my main goal is to finish these cycles to impress Trion and go to their open house which is soon. I still need to email A LOT of people that I met at GDC and follow up with the companies that need freelance work. Since I'm working on cycles with Goon and the Robot with guns I'll be making some wallpapers and new backgrounds for my blog. If anything interesting happens it'll be up here!