iPad 2 and other stuff

So I finally got a hold of an ipad 2 after my 5th attempt. I know, I know... Why didn't I just buy it online? Well, studying at iAnimate, making rigs, and Skype time with my girlfriend who is 12 thousand miles away keeps me indoors. Going to the apple store to line up with a hundred other people makes for a good opportunity to socialize with others face to face. There was one thing I noticed: Being hidden from the suns reach pushes me realize how interesting outside really is and that I need more of it. When you take something out of your daily habit, you start to look with fresh eyes and a clear unbiased mind (just like animation). You'll notice how the person next to you on the bus presents himself even if he's just glancing about. A person with a commuting daily routine might look at that person just as another commuter clouding the mind of whats really there.


The iA site opened up today and everyone is pumped and ready to animate. I'm really starting to rush things. I haven't worked on my unfinished workshop 4 assignments and I need to get this Jackal rig finished and uploaded ASAP. I need to find a dialog piece to use for workshop 5. ahhh...

BTW.. the drawing up there was made with the artStudio app for ipad.. Its tough drawing with an ipad but i reckon i'll get use to it sooner or later...

Jackal Hands Rigging WIP

So this is what has been keeping me busy these past few days.. I've found that a lot of rigs out there have hands where the knuckles would round out and look like pipes when they would bend.. They fingers would loose their volume and disregard the bone structure beneath the skin. Here's jackals hand system. The deformations took about a day to do.. There are a couple more things to do and iAnimate is starting soon... I've got to get this done and start planning on what I want to animate for workshop 5.

Execution Flipbook Doodle

This one is a bit messy but I've been awake a good 18 hours and I'm ready to sleep so I'll leave it at this.. this is about 2 hours work.

Lucy Internship

So I was just notified by Ben Rush (dreamworks animator, director, film maker) that I've been qualified to intern for the lucy film. I'm happy to have been picked despite being parred with tons of talented animation students at iAnimate.

Check the site production blog out guys! http://anatomyofanightmare.blogspot.com/

Drink to Death Flipbook Doodle

I was lining up at the San Francisco apple store the other day to buy an iPad2 when I noticed this guy blindly crossing the street as he drank his morning cup of coffee. I imagined him getting hit by a car (yea I know... how mean of me, but face it, he was walking across a downtown street with his eyes focused on his drink instead of the surrounding cars). I sketched it and realized it would be a cool little thing to mess with in Flipbook. So here it is... I originally planned to draw it with some volume but I realized it would take more time then I have. This little doodle took about 3 hours to do. There are a couple of issues with it but try not to mind it.

Jackal Animation Test

As promised, I'd post my little jackal animation test when I finished it.. This took in all 3 days to animate..There are a few bits here and there that need to be addressed but I'll leave it at that for the mean time. I hadn't intended on actually finishing it or even make something nice but when i slapped in the golden poses, they seemed to work pretty well. There are a couple of things I need to fix but they're pretty minor. I'm proud to be rigging for iAnimate because, not only do we get more rigs to animate with, I feel I've started to really expand my understanding of character from a rigging stand point. During the course of iAnimate, students including myself find out things we wished were in rigs. It's a great way to get ideas for making characters because as a rigger, I think its most important that the characters are really easy to animate (aside from the aesthetics and appeal of characters). I had planned to finish my workshop 4 assignments this workshop break but I'm realizing that finishing Jackal is a much bigger task. I told Jason I'd get it done by the start of the next block so I'm going to have to hurry up with this. My assignments will have to wait until I get more free time.

hurtMe - Jackal Animation Test from Angelo Sta. Catalina on Vimeo.

So last workshop 4, I had Jamaal Bradley as my instructor. Even though we started the workshop off a little shake-y (due to technical issues and just getting use to one another), it was such a learning experience; especially nearing the end of the 14 week class. Jamaal took one of my shots and made my polish look like splining. He is pretty amazing especially when it comes to appeal and polish. After going through his class, I've come to realize how insanely hard feature quality animation is to achieve.

I'm psyched to start the next workshop. I've heard the 2 workshop instructors will be mike walling and ben rush. They're both passionate about animation and teaching so I'll be good where ever I land.

Broken Branch Animation Doodle

I'm finding it pretty relaxing just coming up with simple animation scenes and flipbook-ing them really roughly. Doing them in CG takes days and I'd be hesitant to try something without tons of planning. I think doing these doodles is starting to help me refine my short hand skills. Time and practice will tell if it really does.. I'll try to post one of these little things at least once a week.

This next little doodle took about 1 hour 30 minutes to do.



I kinda decided I should probably just keep them a little messy and not tied down.. More fun that way!..

Freedom animation doodle

I've been testing out the new iAnimate rig I'm making and I gotta say, its looking pretty appealing... I'll probably go finish it later on when I wake up. I'll post it up once its finished. So to end my day off, I doodled up this. It's kinda rushed.




about 45 minutes of work..

Give me your Shoe

So heres another little doodle. I've realized how much more drawing and anatomy i have to learn..

done in about 3 hours..

The Confused Man

I just pulled up flipbook and started drawing without a plan... This is what came out of it..

about an hour and a half of work...

Doomed Escape Animation Doodle #01

So a friend of mine showed me a blog of this one guy doing quick flipbook type animation tests. I thought it'd be interesting to try to do something of that type more often just to loosen my hands up and practice some animation.. So here's my first little animation doodle.. You guys need to excuse my lame draftsmanship..i need to practice... this took about 2.5 hours

iAnimate Promo is out!

iAnimate.net Promotional video from iAnimate on Vimeo.

This Isn't the student reel though it has work from students. Currently, iA has students up to workshop4 (out of 6 workshops). The 6th workshop is meant for shot polishing so the work you see will probably improve polish-wise. Thought I'd give a share.

Im happy to have one of my shots put up from last workshop. Jason was asking for my current shot for this workshop but unfortunately, its still about 3 weeks from being finished..

Btw, I'm also making the Jackal character there. Jason gave me the initial designs that were a bit cartoony. The intent was for the character to fit in skyscrapers (iAniamte's first character) world. I redesigned him, modeled him, and am currently rigging him. I was able to attach a couple controls to the face for the promo but it still has lots missing..