Pre-Infinity Spaceships

Before we did Disney Infinity, at Avalanche, we were working on a sequel to the Toy Story 3 Toybox that was based in space with the main characters all working for Star Command. During this time I drew a lot of spaceships---not something I'm particularly good at---but I had a lot of fun anyway.

We were trying to come up with a design that felt like a more massive, starship version of Buzz's spaceship box from the  movies.

I don't remember what I was thinking here.

I had the idea of making the "town" or hub be the spaceship itself---the bottom one here and the rounded ship in the picture below were attempts to pitch this idea. That concept didn't gain any traction. 

I think this was the one they went with. But it has been a while so I can't remember.

A few designs for the bridge of the starship: definitely going for a Star Trek vibe.

Some Zurg ships. I think the whole concept of using a larger ship level was abandoned before I finished doing the interior layout.

This was a revision/caricature of an earlier design by Jason Kim that was used in Toy Story 3.

Disney Infinity Hulk

Hulk designs I did back when we were first coming up with the style for Infinity. I think Disney had recently purchased Marvel and we were excited about the possibility of doing some of these characters.

We did this set of designs when we were pitching to Marvel the idea of extending Marvel characters into Infinity. I think we recognized even early on that the Marvel characters needed to have a bit more anatomical detail than the current Infinity lineup, but we didn't have any idea how to do that and keep true to the Infinity style.

We knew that there should be edges because that's a hallmark of the Infinity style. But which direction should those edges go, and how many sharp edges should there be? 

These paint-overs of represent the extreme end of our exploration for anatomical detail. I think we backed off just a tiny bit for the final models, as you can see in the final toy photos below. Most of the design work for Hulk came from Jon Diesta and Irene Matar, and I mostly supplied alternate solutions for how to handle details and edges, like in these paint-overs. I believe Bryan Allen did all the final sculpt work on the toy, I believe (correct me if I'm wrong guys).

Infinity Cars Re-post

Another batch of art I deleted a while back, here again to stay.

Sketch/design of the side view done by Jon Diesta

Sketch by Jon Diesta

Sketch by Jon Diesta

Re-post of Infinity Incredibles Omnidroids

I had to delete these a while ago but I've been cleared to post them again.

I didn't design all the versions in this line-up, I think Jason Kim did the ranged guys but I honestly don't remember who did the revisions on the others.

The left design here is Jason Kim's and so I was trying to figure out the front view.

Infinity Mickey

Redesigning a beloved icon is always a bit terrifying. Redesigning Mickey Mouse was a step above that. I struggled a lot with this one, but luckily we had one Mr. Jason Kim, who seemed to really understand what Mickey was all about, and who pushed his design to the point where I just had to figure out forms and edges. He really deserves most of the credit on this but my guess is that he won't brag about it so I can do it for him.

We went with a different pose in the end, and Jason made some further adjustments to the design along the way, as you can see with the final figure design (this is a marketing image, but pretty close to the figure):

Presenting at Video Games Symposium

If you're in the area this Friday (Feb 13), I'm doing a couple things at the Video Games Studies Symposium held at BYU.

First of all, I'm doing a presentation called "The Mad Science of Visual and Gameplay Design" from 12:30-1:30pm in F201 of the Harris Fine Arts Center. I'll be talking about things I've learned over the years as an artist and gameplay designer at Disney and elsewhere, and how to find a fusion between the two disciplines. I'm going to show some cool stuff that nobody has ever seen before and if there's time, I might even go through some design process thoughts.

Then from 7-8:30pm in the same room, I'm going to be the moderator of a discussion between some industry-leading (not exaggerating) professionals---including Jeff Bunker, the art director of Disney Infinity and the Tak and the Power of Juju series; and Adam Ford and Geremy Mustard, creators of Infinity Blade I-III. Don't miss this one.

More information here!
http://videogames.byu.edu

I think you can follow event updates here also:
https://www.facebook.com/events/359349160915208/?ref_newsfeed_story_type=regular

Early Infinity 2

With our earliest work on the Infinity 2.0 stuff, we were trying to keep the Marvel characters more in the style of the rest of the Infinity characters. Of course, Marvel would have none of that, but I personally still prefer some things about these versions of the characters. Jon Diesta deserves most of the credit with his strong sketch of Iron Man, but I did get to help resolve the forms and details a bit under his art direction. That guy has a pretty amazing sense of design.

Here is where the final character ended up, for comparison.

Infinity Anna

I hear it's okay for me to post Disney Infinity stuff again, so there will at least be something for me to post while I'm buried in other projects.

Here are a couple takes on Frozen's Anna. This was based on some earlier concept art, then we revised her look as we got more information. The far right are my first sketches, then the middle came next, and the one on the left last, with some help getting the pose right from Jason Kim.

Images copyright by Disney.

Workshop in Toronto!

This code allows my followers to get a discounted All-Access Pass to the March workshop in Toronto. The pass is normally $200 and this allows you to get one for $150. The group of speakers for this is pretty amazing, so I think the all-access is definitely the way to go!

Promocode: NIELSON

Link to purchase: http://www.schoolism.com/workshop-toronto/

Soprano

A singer I saw performing today at BYU. I bought Kyle Webster's brush megapack and I've been trying it out. There are a lot of brushes for inking, so if you're into line quality, it's a great brush pack. Not as many great brushes for painting, but there are a few that I really like.

"Helping Hands" Cover

Done for The Friend magazine. The blues printed out a bit darker than this (the rest of the colors were fine), so you can see what I originally intended.

The letter thing in the lower right doesn't make a lot of sense without the graphic elements in place, but this way you get to see what I was seeing while I worked.

"Herb"

That's what he says, it's not his name.

Black and white, no lines

I started up an instagram: you can follow me here. I'll keep posting better quality versions here on my blog, and if I ever find free time again, I'll get back to posting art tips and tutorials (also here).

Vancouver workshop!

I've been so busy with projects recently that I keep forgetting to post this. I'll be teaching a workshop along with some legendary artists, in Vancouver in January. I'll be melding some of the stuff from my Schoolism classes together and adding some new things I've been learning into a workshop on how light can be used to tell story. Of course my demo will be painting, but the ideas will apply to any discipline that fuses value, color, and composition. I can promise that the other artists will make it worth coming, and I'll do my best to add something useful to the mix. My guess is that tickets will sell fast, so don't wait too long to sign up if you plan on coming.

Posted by request

Andrea Femerstrand (who you really should be following because she's amazing) asked what was different between my final version of this and where I ended up at the end of the class demonstration.

After end of lecture

The finished version

I think the earlier version more clearly communicates the feeling I wanted with the lighting, but that required the lighting to feel a little bland and static (perfect as a narrative beat but not as great for a stand-alone image). So I punched some of the contrast and added some soft rim lighting. I tried to look at the image from a distance and up close since once the image is posted I couldn't control the scale people see it at. I also changed some of the colors because I didn't like the color relationships in the original image. Anyway, I hope that is helpful to see.

Sorrowbird again

I decided to paint this up as a demonstration for my second Schoolism lighting class. One of the biggest difficulties of lighting (and painting in general) is deciding when you are done. I think I spent another 6 hours on it after the class demonstration, adjusting the colors and values to make the lighting pop more, and it's still not feeling like I want it to. So I'm not officially calling this one done yet: I may come back and George Lucas it later.

Special self-taught sale

I nearly forgot to mention, my new Schoolism class is having a special self-taught sale. Since it's early in the class there won't be many critiques available to watch yet, but for anyone who wants to dive into the subject right away, go here:
http://www.schoolism.com/school.php?id=29
The sale ends Nov. 19.

Speedy

Done as an example for the female protagonist assignment in my Character Design/Vis Dev class.

Protagonist exercise

Another assignment I did along with the students. I do wish I had more time to spend on the monster even though the focus was the kid. Maybe someday if I paint it up I'll fix his design.

Grandpa's stories

Another assignment example I did for my character design class. I would have liked to work on the grandfather's facial expression a bit, but the time limit is part of the fun of doing these along with the class. These were based on a New Zealand reptile called a Tuatara.

Monstare

I just realized that in my crazy schedule the last month, I never took the time to announce officially my change in jobs. I decided to leave Disney and teach at BYU full-time. This semester they have me teaching digital painting for animation, character design, and gesture drawing. BYU has a great animation program and the students are very talented so I'm excited to see what kinds of things we can do there.

I have no idea if the students are getting anything out of my character design class but at least I've been having fun doing the assignments with them. This assignment was to design a monster that was both scary and had a personality. This idea was based on the criteria we had on an unreleased project I worked on at Disney/Avalanche several years back.

Caricature for character design class

I'm teaching a character design class at BYU now. The first assignment is on caricature, which I think I've talked about on this blog as great exercise for character designers. I don't consider myself a strong caricature artist but I really love it anyway.

Based on this guy, here: http://earthsworld.com/mars/2012/120526_fun_center/120526_fun_center_0028.jpg
I think my guy ended up a bit more squarish than this guy feels but I wanted to communicate how solid his face and neck feel.

In other news, Schoolism is having a sale on Self-taught classes, here's the flyer:

"Lighting for Story and Concept Art" class open for registration

They officially announce the class on Monday, so if you want a guaranteed spot you might want to sign up now rather than later in case it sells out.

Boo Bird

I used to go with some friends to draw at Barnes and Noble once a week. We had a reunion tonight, where I drew this. I started with inking a drawing and added color later. Using real ink is always a scary prospect, because you have to make decisions with the lines and live with them (at least until you scan and fix them later).

Citadel

A demonstration I did for the surface design lesson in my upcoming Schoolism class. This class has been so much fun to prepare!