From Sketch To Screen

Scrat from Ice Age: digital still, and character study
by Peter de Sève. ™ & ©Twentieth Century Fox Film Corporation.
All Rights Reserved.

Continuing on yesterday's theme of film development at Blue Sky Studios, one of the elements I contributed to the exhibition we had last year at the Norman Rockwell Museum was a short interview with illustrator Peter de Sève. 

I had originally interviewed the artist back in 2005 for an exhibition we had on the art of The New Yorker--de Sève has created several very well-executed cover illustrations for the venerable publication over the past decade. I traveled out to his studio in Brooklyn, New York, and had a chance to talk with him about his career and even film him doing a couple quick sketches (which was sort of mesmerizing). At that time, he had just started working with Blue Sky Studios on the development of characters for its Ice Age series, and it was interesting to learn how that all came about. Here is the clip that I edited from that footage and is included in the Ice Age to the Digital Age: The 3D Animation Art of Blue Sky Studios exhibition, which is set to open at the Katonah Museum of Art on September 16, 2012:

de Sève is also credited with much of the concept for the strange prehistoric rat creature, Scrat, who has featured in all of the movies. Personally, I have only really seen the first movie all the way through... the others I have only caught bits and pieces of... I mean, how much of Scrat getting beat up chasing after an acorn can you take? Well actually... Sarah's nephews seem rather excited about the new Ice Age: Continental Drift movie opening up on July 13th:

Related Links:


www.peterdeseve.com
www.iceagemovie.com

Turning Over a "New" Leaf

I came across a pretty interesting movie trailer this morning, for one of the upcoming feature films from digital animation giant Blue Sky Studios:



I was impressed by the hint of well-executed CGI and enticing story, and then realized half-way through watching it that this looked mighty familiar! 


Last year I took at trip to Blue Sky's headquarters in Greenwich, Connecticut, for a look at the work environment and to meet its talented staff in advance of our Ice Age to the Digital Age: The 3D Animation Art of Blue Sky Studios exhibition. While there, I saw development sketches and character design for a movie adaptation of the acclaimed children's picture book, The Leaf Men and the Brave Good Bugs by illustrator William Joyce. The designs looked fantastic... great, fantasy-themed artwork, and definitely something I could see Sarah enjoying. 


I remember talking to Blue Sky's founder Chris Wedge about the film, and he seemed excited to be directing the project (I guess Joyce has been a collaborator on several of the studio's films). Since then, it looks like they have changed the title of the film to Epic, and it is due to be released in 2013. One thing I notice is that the "style" of the animation looks a little different than what we have come to expect from the studio (i.e. Ice Age, Robots, Rio). It looks like a less caricatured film at times, although I see they still have the sense to avoid the "uncanny valley" effect: trying to make human characters look realistic, but ending up scaring the bejeezus out of viewers.


Well, I haven't read the book yet, but both it and the movie look very promising indeed. Fun to catch the inside look at the development of a feature film... and I thought some of my projects took forever to complete!

Most High Def-initely

Tech nerds rejoice! Apple announced the release of its latest iPad today: due out March 16, it will feature a new, sharper display screen and 4G service (that's a lot of Gs). I have been really tempted to buy one myself after hearing all the raves (even from my Mom!). I don't have a laptop, so it would be great to have a portable device that was smaller than my iMac and bigger than my smartphone, that I could work on away from home. I was actually checking out the iPad 2 last night at Verizon, and I do love the interface. The only drawback is that Adobe doesn't seem to offer their products for the tablet... and, of course, once you buy the damned thing, they will announce an entirely new, updated version on the way. Love/hate that about you, Apple.  


Anyway, even Norman Rockwell Museum is trying to keep up with the technology boom... bless 'em. We have been talking about various mobile applications, and next week the Museum will once again offer a workshop on digital animation art. A five-week after school offering, it is being taught by cartoonist Scott Lincoln, who had previously taught the course−a mix of traditional drawing and computer work. I created a promotional video for that last workshop, so in the spirit of social networking/viral cross-promotion, blah blah blah, here's another embedded YouTube clip to share with y'all:





For more information on the class, visit Norman Rockwell Museum's website: www.nrm.org

Related Links:

"New iPad neither dud nor 'revolution,'" CNN, March 7, 2012