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Reel

QuickTime Version (26MB)

iPhone Version

Spec board/reel of my work from 2009, including projects currently in production. I consider myself a VFX generalist with a strong focus on animation.

Many of these projects were group efforts, if you would like to know more about my specific involvement on any project feel free to ask. My contact info is available at the end of the reel and on the right column of this site.

Thanks for watching!

2009_____________________________________________________________

The Floating World

The main project that is currently in production is entitled “The Floating World” you can see bits and pieces of it in posts on this site.

Here is a look at the early animatic:

Here is a look at the early animatic:

And some storyboard pages:

Early rig/deformation tests:

Forced Perspective Shot Layout:

Quick demo of one of the forced perspective shot layouts in Maya. One element of CG work that I find very frustrating is the inability to get the brilliant lens distortion that is possible with a practical camera. Well just like you would in other forms of animation, CG isn’t any different, it is always possible to make something work the way you like.

Check back soon for more on this project!

KCAI Department Idents

Project for the Kansas City Art Institute that I became involved in. Creating Idents for different departments of the school.

Mainly developed and completed by Claudia Chagui and I basically came in to help it along (modeling, animation/animation polishing/render setup).

3D Modeling

The above are examples from a freelance modeling project I worked on with Jeremy Casper.

I have a slight fascination with small slightly limited non-existent robots, sometimes I model them, sometimes I make films about them.

2008_____________________________________________________________

The Sandopus Project

Warm up project for Senior Year at KCAI. My first return to backlit sand animation since Sophomore year. There are many things I would like to tidy up, as well as a few more layers I would like to add, but it was a fantastic project. Spent right around 24 hours for this one once I started animating
This version is at 24 frames per second so there are a few oddities, some jittering and things, but I kind of like it, it maybe works a little better at 12fps though as most stop motion does, so I may upload that one as well.

The music is “Snow Tip Cap Mountain” by The Octopus Project, from their album, Hello Avalanche:

[iTunes]

Cut from the Same Cloth

A filmy by a.buritsch, j.casper, and myself, completed my Junior year at KCAI. My main contributions to this little number involve a lot of shot construction and layout, development, dynamics animation (wires, rain, etc), and a motherload of compositing, sound recording and editing. And my crown jewel, the animation, layout, and rendering of the coin at the end, a lot of work went into making that crazy thing fall in a nice way. Another really fun part of this project was getting down and dirty laying out all the sound the day of the deadline.

Once production began, this was completed in about 3 weeks, which didn’t afford much sleep, but the thought of sleep didn’t even cross our minds, once you have a good film in progress all else can be abandoned for a little while right?

Character Design

Quick overview of characters that I developed for various reasons. Some may appear in some form or another in the future, some may not.

François:

Frank Archer:

Old Guy (me?):

The Laughing Man:

Marcel Dufarge:

Lamp Acrobat

Junior Year – character animation project. Lamp + Trampoline + Animate equals what you see here.

Fun project, really started to learn a lot more about CG animation. I see so much now that I would like to improve, but moving forward is the key.

2007_____________________________________________________________

Untitled143/RGB

a little ole film by Patrick Morgan and Myself, shot in an extremely creepy basement. Inspired by an old television and mirrors.

enjoy! and remember, it is a happy video!

Harmonic Narrative – Installation/Crazy

This is bizarre, did I work on this? Oh yeah, this was a group installation/freak out project 1st semester Junior year at KCAI. I put together this little documentation video using this illustration contructed by myself, Jeremy Casper, and Isaiah Powers. This was wierd, fun, and hilarious when we got to see peoples confused yet satisfied reactions. The main idea here is 3 old guys telling war stories, each with their own form of very limited communication.

I designed the TV/Wheelchair guy and helped construct everything else. I also worked on a lot of the hand-drawn animation on the center tree guy. Push ups, machine gunners, fun stuff. We also recorded all of this sound ourselves. The mouth-trumpet/billy holiday/peen trumpet is performed by none other than Jonathan Lyman. He will be famous soon, so if you haven’t heard of him, just give it time. What a bunch of weirdos.

2006_____________________________________________________________

Adapt

Sophomore Group Sand Animation then edit project. KCAI sophomore’s all contributed bits of animation then we all edited into something special. Shot under the camera at KCAI. Trying to keep the amount of themes simple, we had a lot of footage to work with, just something simple and efficient, bringing the beginning and end together, straight forward editing to music, nothing mind blowing.

This is my rendition, using “PIANO BLACK” by Seatbelts.