November 17, 2010

The Conscientious Jogger

For the last month or so I've been working on some animation. The Grove has been a fun adveture, but it's such a long-term project and at the state that it's in right now it doesn't do much for my job situation. After many months of rejections and closed doors I realized that it was time to get out of the Grove and update (and hopefully upgrade) my reel to give myself a better chance at actually getting a job. I decided to just scrap my old reel entirely and create a short film that showcased my animation skills, and hopefully told an amuzing, memorable story; something that would say "Hire me." The result is The Conscientious Jogger.

The Conscientious Jogger from Jacob Cementina on Vimeo.

October 1, 2010

The Window

Yesterday I read a peom that was written by a long time family friend and I was immediately inspired by it visually. Then, for whatever reason, I didn't draw an illustation for it, but instead illustrated it with another poem.
The original poem was written by Tim Blair, and can be found here.


The Window
(For T)

At the country farmhouse of my youth
There was a window nestled in the gable
And to the dusty attic I would climb
To view the tree that grew beside the stable.

The noble oak had always stood for truth;
For when my father’s father bought this land
Its tempered roots had long been steeped in time
And so for age and honor it would stand.

The farm was thus established by the tree,
Foundations laid around the roots and leaves.
The tree would shade the house’s Western face
And greet the window underneath the eaves.

My father’s father often came to see
The view from up among the branch’s reach.
This attic window came to be a place
For him to learn and for the tree to teach.

And as the leaves turned gold, and back to green
Old age and certain wisdom came with time.
And soon he kept a cotton cloth upstairs
to rid his view of country dust and grime.

Throughout the years retreat became routine,
Routine became tradition passed to kin.
The faithful cloth was given to his heir,
Who, soon enough, would pass it down again.

So in this way I learned to love the tree
And grew up gazing through a dingy pane
Because I wiped the window with the cotton
but never questioned why the filth remained.

Then came the day that I began to see
The dirty cloth itself hindered my view.
So with the vision lost but not forgotten
I thanked my father, and his father too
Then slid the window open and crawled through.

September 29, 2010

From verdant murk emerged a smirking turtle




In the Huntington Library's Chinese Garden there is a giant, green pond. Over the pond is a bridge called The Bridge of the Verdant Mist. And in the pond there is a turtle.

Jenette and I visited the Gardens over the weekend. It was really, really hot. My deoderant melted in my backpack. But that's another story.

September 10, 2010

Bla bla bla ART!

I felt bad about all the spewing on the last post so here's some more art. A while back I studied some movies to get ideas for the Grover's eyes. These are from Chicken Little and Finding Nemo. They're really just modeling notes for myself and I wasn't planning on posting them but I guess it's all part of the proccess and that's interesting too, right? So here you go.



My main concern was whether or not I could get enough expression out of the characters without giving them eyebrows. None of the fish in Nemo have actual eyebrows and they all have extrememly expressive faces so I think I'll be able to pull it off.

Late Night Epiphany

I think I mentioned earlier that The Grove has gone through some rewrites, but I'm not sure if I mentioned that my biggest concern right now is that the changes I made in order to better explain things actually made the story a more complicated. It kind of sounds like I'm moving backwards, but let me just say that if I can get this stuff to work then the film will be way cooler than it was before.

That being said, I've come to realize that in order for the film to succeed it needs to be really attractive visually. I've noticed that there are films that LOOK really cool and because they're so interesting to look at you watch the whole thing. And then when the film is over you say "Wow. That was really cool. And really pointless." Kind of like living wallpaper, right?

And there are also films that have really great stories and could be really memorable, except that they looked so bad that you couldn't take them seriously and you gave up after the first however many minutes/seconds/whatever. I'm not saying that The Grove is one of those films, but I can say that it has the potential to be if I don't step it up visually. The problem is that the whole first half is extrememly dependant on plants and pay-offs, that is, a whole bunch of seemingly random things happen and you don't learn what they are until later on and then you say "Oh, THAT'S what that was. I get it!" I love when that happens in movies and it makes me really excited that this film has the potential to do that too. But the only way to keep the audience invested with all this random nonsense going on is by making the things that they're watching look REALLY good. I really want people to say "I have no idea what's going on but it doesn't bother me yet." The "yet" is the key because I don't necessarily want to attract an audience that is into watching wallpaper. Maybe I should say that I want people to think "I hope this is going somwhere because I'm enjoying watching it but I don't want to be disappointed by it when it's over."

So, I know what you're saying now. You're saying "But Jacob, a bad story will always be a bad story, no matter how cool it looks, and you can't hide your story flaws behind flashy visuals." I couldn't agree more. BUT you can't deny the power of a hook. After all, "The hooooook brings you baaaaaaaaaaaaack" (Blues Traveler, people. Come on.) And in general the hook should be your story. But since my story is so slow to get going, I need another hook to get people to the story. What do you call those things that attract the fish? The little rubber things that flop around in the water and the fish think it's food and they bite it and get the hook along with it and then get pulled out of the water and get their skin peeled back and their heads chopped off? Tackle? No, a lure? I'm not a fisher, obviously. Anyway, I need that. Really, I feel like I need that in all my art, but that's another seemingly endless rant. SHEESH. Anyway...

All that nonsense is to say that last night as I was falling asleep I had an image flash into my mind of Grovers that looked better than any I had come up with in all my color tests and the thing that was different was that they didn't look like Fruit Loops. They had more of an edge. And I think if I could base the overall palette of The Grove more on these sort of colors it would have more of the appeal that I'm looking for.

Bla bla bla, bla BLA bla bla.


So here it is. The top row is the set that I had decided on before, the middle row is the set from my dream, and the bottom row is that same set but with the contrast narrowed down just a bit to bring them closer together.

September 6, 2010

The Grove has birds



One of the changes to the story was the addition of a couple minor characters, and one of those is the Grove Birds. There were always birds in the grove, but one in particular that originally made a small cameo has since been developed, combined with another instance of birdage, and turned into two individuals that pretty much make up the bird population, at least as far as this story goes. They're both the same species so they pretty much look identical, and they don't have names yet, but I've decided that Tweedle-Dum and Tweedle-Dee are not options.

The bird is based on the toco toucan, but I didn't want them to look exactly like a specific species of bird. But in exploring colors I found that the best combination was really the one that the actual bird has already. So, basically, God did it right the first time. That one is bird "Re". My other favorite is bird "A", which might look too much like Zazu from The Lion King. Granted, he doesn't look as much like Zazu as bird "C" does, but I don't know...

Ups, Downs, and All Arounds.

It's been a while. In the last few months I've finished storyboads on The Grove, gone on a few little trips around California, applied for jobs and heard nothing, taken on some freelance work, and rewritten The Grove completely. Well, not completely, but the story has gone through quite a few changes since I finished the storyboards and at this point I'm not sure how many of the changes actually help. The creative proccess is kind of depressing that way. Never the less, the changes ARE exciting as far as I'm concerned, and since being excited about a project beats feeling depressed and defeated about it, my free time has been spent putting energy into developing the fun parts while ignoring the problems and hoping that they'll just work themselves out. That's a healthy attitude, right?

I'll be posting some of the new developements soon, but to start out, howabout some more Grover colors? I think I've narrowed it down. I basically took the Do Re Mi from the last post and cooled down the dark orange and warmed up the yellow. My wife likes the second row, I think I prefer the first. Those two are so close though that it might just depend on the lighting. You really could get away with saying that the top row is just the middle row under an umbrella on a foggy day. (And, actually, the blue one IS the same color.) So I think it's safe to say that the final models will end up looking a lot like those.

July 21, 2010

Grover Colors Cont.

Okay. I'm leaning towards Do Re Mi.

Grover Colors

Things on the Grove front have been going well. I finished storyboards last week and I'm excited to go back to visual developement. The storyboard animatic isn't quite ready to go public quite yet, as there are some issues that need to be addressed. For starters, I had always imagined that the Grovers all looked the same. In my mind, there were three characters doing three seperate things who come together in the end. But after showing the animatic to a few trusted critics, I discovered that the seperateness of the three characters isn't so apparent to someone who hasn't been knee-deep in Groverness for the last six months. I realized that, as far as my story goes, the three Grovers could just as easily be the same Grover doing three things at different times. So it looks like the guys are going technicolor.
I'm hesitant to vary the colors too much since I don't want them to end up looking like Fruit Loops or something, plus there's the problem of keeping them all in line with the palate that I create for the Grove itself. But at the same time, the easier it is to immediatly differentiate between the three of them, the better. And with all three being exactly the same shape and size and lacking any kind of identifiable clothing, it's pretty much a done deal with the color. So I don't know. Blue Sky did a really good job of mixing up the colors of the characters in Horton Hears a Who, so I know it can be done. But it's still kind of intimidating. My initial thought was to just vary the shades of one color, like a medium orange, a lighter, yellower orange, and a darker, redder orange. My fear with that is that it could be taken as a race thing and then all of the sudden it's a "lighter skinned folks and darker skinned folks CAN be friends" thing, which limits it, I think. But, whatever. Moving on...

Here's the art. My vote for right now is "1, 2, & 3" or "1, Mi, and a darker, redder version of C". We'll see.

June 10, 2010

Working on my Hummer



Here are a few developement sketches of Hummer. I gave him a little more of a neck and took away the hangy, bulldog jowls. I'm pretty happy with how he's turning out. Through sketching I discovered how creepy he looks without pupils and I thought it would be an appropriate touch- kind of takes the soul out of him, which is exactly what I want. The one in the lower left reminds me of the Terror Dogs in Ghostbusters and that makes me a little warm and fuzzy inside. Because I love that movie, not because evil things make me happy.

May 22, 2010

Meet the Grovers!

The happiest guys in The Grove. Or are they?...


May 18, 2010

The Grove

I'm calling my new film The Grove. Here is a rough promo card.

And here is a semi-rough idea of what the inhabitants of the Grove look like. I'm not sure about the color. I think it kind of makes him look like a giant Goldfish cracker...

May 4, 2010

An official announcement


I'm starting a new film.

April 5, 2010

What the duck?

So about a week ago I noticed a duck laying dead on the side of the freeway. Unusual roadkill I thought, since whenever I see ducks they're either flying way above car level, or when they're on the ground it's next to, if not reasonably close to some sort of water source. But this was on the 91 freeway, about ten miles east of the 5. And unlike a crow or a turkey vulture or something, it's not like a duck would wander onto the road to get at a piece of food or something. So it struck me as being strange, but I didn't think much about it.
That is, not until early Sunday morning as I'm driving down the road and the car in front of me brakes suddenly and comes almost to a stop before finally veering to the left to reveal a male mallard. Yes, the same kind of duck I saw taking a nap on the shoulder of the 91 a few days earlier. So I took my turn passing the duck, making sure I was clear of him, but couldn't help cutting it really close, just to try to scare him out of the road. But the bird seemed completely oblivious to the cars speeding by it. Either oblivious or indifferent. But either way, that's weird, right?

March 23, 2010

Breakfast Machine

Unemployment Activites To Do List~
Electronic cover of Danny Elfman's "Breakfast Machine" from the Pee Wee's Big Adventure Soundtrack: Check.

Breakfast Machine by Wheres Boo?

March 16, 2010

Angel On My Shoulder


One of the great things that has happened in the last few months of unemployment is that I have not only had time to do art, but also follow up on a promise that I made a really long time ago. A few years ago my grandpa wrote a little memoir about his childhood and he asked me to design a cover for it "whenever I get around to it." Well, thanks to this whole jobless bum thing I finally got around to it and I'm so glad that I did. My grandpa has done so much for me throughout the years, not to mention all the things that he did for my dad and his other three kids, and I'm so glad that I finally got the chance to do something for him.

The original drawing was done in conte crayon and charcoal, then I brought it into photoshop for some light tweakage. I've always been inspired by Chris Van Allsburg's soft, tonal drawings and I thought that something like that would be appropriate for this project. Now that it's done I'm even more impressed by Van Allsburg's detail, as my stubby fingers and lack of practice left me miles from his level of finish. But at the same time, I'm pleased enough with the final product, and my grandparents both seem to love it, which is really what matters anyway.

March 4, 2010

Red Panda Valentine



This is a drawing that I made my wife for Valentine's Day. The original was done in Prismacolor, but before I colored it in I scanned it so I could use it to practice my digital painting. Looking at it now I see some things that could be fixed but over all I'm pretty happy with how it turned out, especially since it's really the first painting I've done in Photoshop. Or, should I say, the first painting that I haven't given up on after a half an hour. Hopefully it will only get better from here.

March 2, 2010

SLOIFF Update

The schedule for the San Luis Obispo International Film Festival is officially up.
Furtissimo's schedule looks like this:

Sunday, March 14, 7:00pm Joe Momma's Cafe, Avila Beach
Wednesday, March 17, 7:00pm Palm Theatre,SLO
Thursday, March 18, 7:00pm Pavilion on the Lake, Atascadero

And the whole schedule looks like this:
http://www.slofilmfest.org/2010/films.shtml

I'm excited for the lineup, particularly Furtissimo's screen buddy on the 17th - John Carney's "Once". What, you say, you mean the Once that won the Academy Award for best original song? Yeah, that one! Nice.

February 9, 2010

Coming to a Central Coast near you



Fluffy is having a good year. After showing in Chicago last fall, Furtissimo has been picked up by film festivals in New York and Taiwan, and has been requested to audition for spots in Seattle and Australia. I think it's going to be an exciting year for my little diva.

In related news, I'm pleased to announce that Fluffy and the gang will be headed to good old SLO town for the San Luis Obispo International Film Festival in March. Apparently the dates aren't solid until Feb 15th, but I've been told that it will be playing on the 14th, 17th and 18th. So if any of the seven people that read this blog are going to be in San Luis on those days (doubtful) you should check it out. And let me know how it goes. Just kidding, I'll be there. Hopefully.

January 13, 2010

And now, for the first time in four years...

Finished animation!!! Just a simple test done with a clip I found online from the (incredibly awesome) movie Everything is Illuminated, which is strangely different from the lines in the actual movie. Maybe it was taken from the trailer? Anyway, I hope you like it.

January 11, 2010

Since Facebook limits the length of Wall posts...

An open letter to Ducksworth-

Hey, remember that time we were rescuing those children from that overtunrned schoolbus and all of the sudden a gang of drunken bank robbers came tearing around the corner in their H2 and clipped me in the thigh as I jumped out to push that old lady of the way, and although I was hurt pretty badly I kept on catching those children as you lowered them out of the bus's rooftop emergency hatch. And then later, after the fire department had put out the flames (since the bus exploded just after you jumped out the emergency hatch with the last remaining child) and after the police had found the drunken bank robbers due to Jenette's quick wits and keen eye (good thing she was there to catch the liscence plate on their getaway vehicle) and after all the adrenaline subsided (nothing like the natural high that comes from saving lives), I realized how badly I had been hurt and then all of the sudden felt kind of woozy, and I was like "Woah, I think I'm going to faint." And then I did, so you held my feet up until I regained conciousness, and then got me some Sprite after I blew Spaghetti chunks? That was crazy, man. I'm glad you were there.

Love,
Steakob

January 4, 2010

Yay, Nature!!!

While at home for the holidays I was able to borrow my sister's camera and shoot some pictures of the local wildlife. It had been a few years since I had used anything other than a little point and shoot camera and knew that it would have been a good idea to go over some of the "one step above letting the camera do everything for you" functions like the light meter and stuff like that, but I decided instead to just take a bunch of pictures and see what happened. The results were mixed. I'm posting the best of the bunch, which have almost all been tweaked in photoshop to varying degrees, and are still all pretty hit and miss. But I had a lot of fun taking the pictures, and a few of them are decent, I think, so I thought I'd share them with you. So here you go.