If you are interested in the world of digital animation and design, consider enrolling in the Gnomon Workshop of Hollywood, Dec 2-3, for a weekend of "Entertainment Design and Visual Effects Techniques." The weekend promises to be a rewarding experience with a "stellar line up of instructors, featuring speakers in and out of the Gnomon Workshop library. These artists will present on subjects including character and concept design, storyboarding, comic book penciling, modeling, game production pipeline, and texturing. In addition, you'll also get a chance to meet some highly accomplished artists who will take you inside their own personal projects and processes."
For more details on how to register, the full schedule, and what to bring (your portfolio is a must!) check here. (In fact, if this is an area of interest for you, check out the whole site. Gnomon offers an amazing array of instructional DVD's for purchase as well as free video tutorials online for those already acquainted with the basics of computer animation and design.)
Among those slated to instruct is long-time Endicott contributor Iain McCaig, who was a principal designer for Star Wars: Episode One, Two, and Three, designing characters, creatures, and costumes in his bustling studio at Skywalker Ranch. His other principal design credits include Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire, Peter Pan, Charlotte's Web (coming out Christmas 06), and Outlander (coming out 2007), as well as Edgar Rice Burrough's John Carter of Mars, which Iain tells me, "film studios have been trying to bring to the screen for almost eighty years, and which I and my team have now designed--twice." Iain also directed an award-winning short film, The Face, currently distributed theough Spiritual Cinema Circle.
Iain currently has four instructional DVD's on Gnomon that explain some of the principle techniques of visual storytelling. His gorgeous fairy drawings from his sketchbooks can be seen in the Journal of Mythic Arts, Summer/Autumn Issue, and you'll find an archived gallery of his illustrations in Telling Stories: the Art of Iain McCaig.
This is great. If you are looking to write more about animation and visual effects, look to AWN.com. They are an amazing little company that has been around for 11 years and have massive databases of articles and content all related to animation and visual effects all free to the community. It's an education.
Posted by: Gina | November 20, 2006 at 10:25 AM
Thanks for this Gina! I am in to collecting free tutorials for flash animation and photoshop technique. One of these days I will be able to devote myself to hours of pleasure learning how to do it all. (I've discovered many of my students who are excellent animators are all self taught...an astonishing feat.)
Posted by: Midori | November 20, 2006 at 01:26 PM