Ancient Ruins in 3D

Welcome, new watchers! Thank you for taking the time to check out my blog. I just wanted to drop by and give you guys a glimpse of what I'm doing for my current freelance gig - 2D to 3D stereoscopic conversion. The above was an exercise I did during some down time, converting Marie's commission into Anaglyph 3D -  requiring red-blue 3D glasses. If you happen to have a pair at your disposal, check it out! The above image, all said and done, required the creation of 62 rotos and a rather fun learning experience ;)

I keep joking with my other half, Niles (Who, consequently, is working the same job with me at the moment) that our lives have become a Don Hertzfeldt short... making a great gig with awesome people even more fun. Had to share:

-Mel

Commission Status Change

Hi all! Just so everyone's aware, I may be a bit slow to post over the next many weeks (though certainly still active.) This past week I was fortunate enough to be hired on as a feature film compositor, (Learning Nuke - it's a phenomenal program, I absolutely love it) to be added to my re-existing freelance gig as a concept artist (as well as, of course, our much-loved ARMSmasters Project) All combined, my work weeks come out to something like 80 hours - it's fun, but completely insane. I will have work to post inevitably - Davina's commissioned head-shot and a new ARMSmasters character sheet for Riot, as soon as they're completed, for example, but beyond that, I'm swamped.

That said, apart from the one commission I have left to create for *Psamophis I'm going to have to put my availability for taking on new commissions on hold for the next couple of months - likely through June. As soon as I am able to take on more work again, I will be certain to announce so here. Those on my current waiting list (as well as folks who have emailed me their interest in obtaining commission slots recently) will be contacted immediately on a first-serve basis at that time. Thanks for your patience and understanding, all!

That aside, on a very different note, I'm sure many of you, like myself, are completely shocked by the recent devastation caused by the earthquake and tsunami in Japan. For anyone wanting to help, Text "redcross" to 90999 to make a $10 donation or go to redcross.org for more options. Lord knows these folks are going to need every bit of aid they can get. My prayers (and donations) are with them.

Cheers everyone,

Mel

Aeslyn Model Sheet

Cross-posted from http://armsmastersproject.com/

 

Capturing Aeslyn was not an easy task - something Mike and I found out readily in creating her reference sheet. There's bound to be a challenge with a character carrying her level of complexity: She's bold, confident, yet reserved and sophisticated. She's sexy and highly feminine, while absolutely commanding respect from herself and those around her. (Defying many action-fantasy female tropes.) Even her color modeling came down to a tremendous amount of thought - what tones could Aeslyn embody that no other female member of the ARMSmasters line-up pull off? Through all of our effort, and the total blast we had exploring the character, I'm really pleased with the results.

 

Posing this gal was one of the greater tricks to creating her reference sheet. Screaming "Sophisticated Sexy Confident Intelligent Noble-woman!" all in one go is a mouth-full for any one pose to maintain, to be certain. Above are among the many quick sketches of Mike and I's that lead up to the final full-body pose.

 

Last but not lease - Color exploration with Aeslyn. In the end, purple, feminine colors seemed to call out to the character the strongest. She, without a doubt, is the only female in the cast thus far who could, or would even want to based on personality alone, pull off such graceful "pretty" tones - they're inherently Aeslyn, and manage, I feel, to accentuate her beauty and roots as nobility all the more.

Cheers,
Mel