Coke "Quest" (Paranoid US)

Buck bring paint swatches to life for Sherwin-Williams

American studio Buck bring a great concept for paint manufacturer Serwin-Williams. Colour swatches are animated representing a range of environments and the creatures, houses and vehicles within. This ispart of a larger campaign, so we can look forward to a few more of these.

**UPDATE!**

Nice breakdown & interview on Motionographer.

I Love Dust: Featured Website

Great illustration, design, typography and of course animation from this London/South Coast based dual studio outfit.

Pixels (Patrick Jean)

PIXELS by PATRICK JEAN.
Uploaded by onemoreprod. - Independent web videos.

This appeals to both my nostalgic side and a newly resurrected interest in pixel derived art, sprite animation and all things Commodore & arcade! Beautifully done...

1st Personal animation up here for C&C!

I'm setting up another blog for my own work, maybe somewhere we can all stick sideline projects, reels etc for c&c, encouragement and feedback? What d'you think?

I'll move this there once that's set up. For now here's something I've been tinkering with for a few evenings and would like to improve. It's a clip I've wanted to animate in a more cartoony way on a character for a while, so I started by setting up a rotoscoped step pass of the reference which is blocked out here:



The roto version looks very slow and lacks any snap when played back by itself and the poses look stiff and lack fluidity; I've since adjusted the timing and key positions but would like some feedback on how it looks, as well as whether any of the poses could be pushed further etc. The jump-through at the end is only very roughly blocked, so ignore that part for now. All C&C welcome, it's a few days from being complete!



Below is an update based on the C&C you guys gave me. I've tried to hold some poses, really push the c shapes in the left/right switches for contrast and vary the timing. It's now a lot different to the straight roto but could use another crit at this stage. You can still ignore the end, I've not done much with that!

New version:


And the side-by-side changes, last week to this week.

Skateboard Animation

Stop motion animation made from random magazine and web photo cut-outs, cheers for the link Ricky.

List of Inspiring Animators....

http://www.jimjagger.com/JPages/JLinks/Links_Inspiration.htm

Thanks Almudena for this list; links to reels, websites and blogs. Looks like it's going to be well worth going through this one by one!

The Daily Zoo (Chris Ayers)

"This is an inspiring collection of illustrations from top concept artist Chris Ayers created during his first year of recovery from leukaemia. In the spring of 2005, Chris Ayers was busy working as a concept artist in the Hollywood film industry. That all came crashing to a halt when he was diagnosed with leukaemia. After a year-long period of treatment and recovery, he started a sketchbook called "The Daily Zoo" on the anniversary of his diagnosis. Over the next 365 days he would draw one animal character each day, challenging not only his self-discipline but also his imagination. Most importantly, it allowed him the opportunity to celebrate the gift of each healthy day. Chock-full of wonderful creatures, ranging from curious pandas to sinister hyenas, athletic aardvarks to zealous zebra's, as well as Ayers touching commentary about his experience with cancer, this volume will leave you inspired as well as amused."

Website here.

Animation ABC - How it Works (Cirkus Animation)

There've been a lot of comical prods at the client/artist relationship lately. This is more of an instruction video for the unenlightened client - must've been born of some frustrating encounters though! Nicely done in a 50's 'infomercial' stylee. : )

Bad Day in Gesture Drawing Class

Entertaining little play on a comic strip, for anyone who's been on the wrong end of an unflattering pose in a life-drawing class. Click the image for the full story!