OZzy - Art & Demo Video

OZzy

Ozzy Color Demo from Mel Miller on Vimeo.

My character Ozzy from Matihao Whenua - the fictional pack of werewolve's heavyweight, capable of transforming into a hulking anthropomorphic Kodiak bear. In human form, he's a towering tank of a fellow - a wise-cracking trucker, at that.

This illustration was colored in Photoshop CS3 in about 4.5 hours using the Polygonal lasso and gradient tools, and textures from Mayang's texture library. Music in the demonstrational video has been graciously provided by Kevin McLeod under Creative Commons Licensing. For more work from Kevin, visit http://www.incompetech.com/

Video shot in CamStudio - my first attempt at using the program and compiling something post-able for 'net viewing, so my apologies if the quality is a little rocky this first go-around!

Cheers,

♥Mel

Caravan Updates as of 06-16-10

My new at-home animation desk set-up :)

After a nice little adjustment and rest/recovery period post-graduation, I'm back to work on Caravan which, of course, means a slew of new Caravan Archive blog entries are to be had! The following is a quick-link list of the latest updates, including a look at my at-home film production set-up (as seen above) and my recent podcast interview with the Stratton Foundation about the film.

• Scene 2 Storyboards and Update

• Working From Home

• ReFueling Inspiration

• Shot 001 Clean-Up & Webcam Conquests

• Stratton Podcast Interview

♥Mel

TKP: Deloco finalized, Raine Doodle & Color Preview

Judah's Sire: Deloco's Therian form.

I've finally been able to get back to musing over one of my longest running and most beloved personal projects over the past few weeks, and will continue to do so verbatim for the foreseeable future... simply because I can, really. It's wonderful to have regained that level of creative freedom back. A little gift, care of graduation.

One of the series' villains is a particularly seedy, deceitful, weasily little bastard by the name of Deloco, oftentimes simply referred to as "Del".

As I'm slowly going through and creating up-to-date reference images of many of the characters from this whole expansive story, I decided (finally!) to do a more definitive image of Deloco in his anthro form. (Seen above.) For referral's sake, below is also a quick BIC doodle of the same seedy sap in his Human form, though the drawing, at this point, is rather old, created in 2007.

Deloco's human form... unsavory as ever!

I've also started to better flesh out the rather mysterious, river-dwelling tribe from the series, including the group's two leaders, Rio and Raine who, up to this point, have been woefully neglected art-wise. Below is a quick (and first!) sketchbook doodle of miss Raine. I'm particularly tickled with the decision that her Therian form is highly reminiscent of a Fennec fox. Cute!

Soft-spoken, sweet natured Raine of the Hayataiga. Leave the boisterousness to her mate, Rio!

And, last but not least, a little preview of the "TKP: Leading Ladies" colors that are still underway. I'm taking my time on this one and thoroughly enjoying it, mostly because it's wonderful to not have a set deadline, for once. Hooray, art for leisure!

Raven in Technicolour

♥Mel

TKP: Leading Ladies (Line Art)

The leading Ladies of the Kemono Prophecy: (L-R) Raven, Remedy and Akinah.

Three characters very near and dear to my heart and 14-year-long creative musing: the leading ladies from my TKP original story concept, Raven, Remedy (Yes, Anathemas Remedy, to my curious DeviantArt watchers) and Akinah. It was an absolute joy to be able to sit down and draw them properly again. I'm equally excited to color this... and do an image of the leading fellas from the series as well, soon!

Cheers, and as always, thanks for viewing!
♥Mel

Bloomies!

My first post-CCS summer has officially begun! I have been, quite graciously, been contacted by a number of perspective freelance clients, this first week or so post-graduation, and am amidst the process of seeing which job pans out first - all are quite exciting, so I'm thrilled with the prospects. Meanwhile, as I am taking a roughly two-week break from Caravan's production to refresh my mind I, for the first time in many, many months, am able to do artwork for FUN! It's exhilarating! I decided to kick off some portfolio-building personal pieces with a request for a friend. My roommate and good buddy Patrick Stannard drew some fantastic caricatures of the two of us and our roommates, and asked if I'd color it for him. I couldn't resist. Below is some of the process, as well as the final piece!

Above is the drawing as I received it - Pat's beautifully gestural under-sketching and all. From left to right: Niles Bontrager, myself Mel Miller, Pat himself, and Kerry Newill.

As gorgeous as the under-sketching was, I needed clear line work to really get the color to work at its best, so, away it went. Here's the lines as they'd appear in the final image, after nixing the Red channel.

Choosing colors was made particularly fun, as I was able to base them all of stuff my roomies and I actually own. It personalized the piece all the more. Above - the flat colors! Somehow, that phase always takes me the longest.

And finally - the final piece! I love the results, and it was incredibly fun and relaxing to work on as a whole. A great way to kick off my post CCS art-life, for sure. Thank you for lending the lines to color, Patar! ♥ Also, major kudos for the resources: Mayang's Texture Library, and DeviantArt's Rawox for the Photoshop brush of the Detroit city skyline. And to Coldplay for ever conceiving of "Life in Technicolour II" as it was on repeat habitually the entire time I was coloring this. Damn, I love that song.

So yes. Four quirky animators living under one suburbanite roof. Personally, I think we'd make an ace animated sitcom ;)

Bless you, roomies. Bloomies.

♥Mel

Caravan Updates as of 05-16-10

Caravan Official Trailer (Updated!) from Mel Miller on Vimeo.

Caravan's first official trailer, (Now with two new shots!) compiled both for the CCS 2010 Senior Show, and for use by the Stratton Foundation, who was recently kind enough to award the film and myself a generous scholarship. A film (Concept, Animation, Backgrounds and Color) by Mel Miller. Compositing by Niles Bontrager. Music by Larry Larson.

Well, it's official - I'm now an alumni to the College for Creative Studies. My graduation was positively wonderful; I'll post an entry on it here soon. While I'm taking a week or two off of Caravan's production for some much needed rest, I'll be diving back into the remaining clean-up, color and final composite soon enough, with the goal of completion set somewhere amidst late September 2010. For the moment, however, below are the links to the latest updates and entries on the film's production, as seen on Caravan's official production blog, including "After the Tale: Roadside Rest," a recently finished concept illustration, as seen below the links.

• Transitions

• Caravan Official Trailer (Updated!)

• "Mel-Style" Caravan

• Roadside Rest (Flat Colors)

• Roadside Rest - Final

"After The Tale: Roadside Rest" 2010

-Mel

CCS 2010 SEO Show Setup

So, tomorrow, I gradate from CCS. I couldn't be more ready, let me tell you. The past week has been spent laboring over getting my space set up for CCS's 2010 Senior Exhibition show. I found out very recently that I'd been granted, quite kindly, the spot of runner-up to Senior Select for the year for the Entertainment Arts department, so I've had a rather large space to fill. I think, in the end, things shaped up rather nicely indeed. Here's a couple of shots of my space for the show, and I'm sure there will be more where that came from soon enough.

The full set-up, along with a ridiculous blinking me, care of my buddy Patrick.

Close up! The table includes Caraan's production book and my portfolio. All prints and original drawn images are either framed or matted, and everything on the wall is available for purchase.

My recently completed piece, "After the Tale: Roadside Rest;" both the original line drawing as well as a color print of the final image.

A couple of drawn frames from Caravan, as a large-scale print of "Polly Want A Soliloquy?"

It's a Mel! Completing show set-up after a good 20 hours of preparatory work makes Mels very happy indeed.... yeeeah, I'll stop talking in third person now. Yick.

Here's to tomorrow's graduation!
-Mel

Demo Reel

Mel Miller Demo Reel from Mel Miller on Vimeo.

My latest demo reel. All animation, layout and color by myself, Mel Miller. Compositing on all color shots by Niles Bontrager. Music provided by Kevin McLeod from http://www.incompetech.com 3D character rig provided by Dale Meyers.

-Mel

Caravan Updates as of 05/03/10

Caravan Official Trailer from Mel Miller on Vimeo.

Caravan's first official trailer, compiled both for the CCS 2010 Senior Show, and for use by the Stratton Foundation, who was recently kind enough to award the film and myself a generous scholarship. Music by Larry Larson.

The semester has finally, blessedly, ended, and I'll be graduating in a week. Caravan's production, however, will likely span through September - I'm looking forward to diving back into it after a brief but much-needed break. For now, below are the links to the latest updates and entries on the film's production, as seen on Caravan's official production blog, including the first version of an official trailer for teh film, seen above.

• A Cornucopia of Happenings

• Thank You, Stratton Foundation!

• The Traveler's Camp (Soundtrack)

• First Official Trailer (And To Do's!)

• I kill trees for fun.

♥Mel

Caravan Updates as of 04/18/10

Shot 80 of Caravan, completed.

The end of the semester, and the end of my time at the College for Creative Studies, is fast approaching. I'll be graduating on May 13th, and could not be more excited and ready to do so! In the interim, I'm continuing my work on Caravan (A process that will, at this point, span throughout the summer months) which is, blessedly, going quite smoothly. Below are the links to the latest updates and entries on the film's production, as seen on Caravan's official production blog, including the completed version of shot 80, seen above.

• Score Recording Scheduled!

• Shot 80 Completed

• Random Roughs

• Re-Organization and Numbers

Caravan so far. The trees... they weep for their kin.

♥Mel

Gallery Show Photos

As noted in the previous entry I've been given the chance to display my work in my own little gallery show in the Entertainment Arts department hall at the College for Creative Studies for the next couple of weeks. In addition to a couple dozen images (including frame-by frame clean-up animation sequences) there are two reels playing on a digital tv, one for animation, one for illustration and concepts. Here's a couple of photos of the setup.

Prints of various illustrations.

Part of an animated sequence, frame-by-frame.

The majority of the images, including the digital display.

Last and most certainly least, my haggard, sleep-deprived bum, with the entire set-up. Photo snapped by my professor, Chris Carden.

Cheers,
Mel

Gallery Show, and Thanks!

For anyone interested and in the area, I currently have a small gallery show on the third floor of the Walter B Ford building at the College for Creative Studies, which has been receiving very positive feedback so far. I'll post photos of the setup here soon.

Cheers,
Mel

Caravan Updates as of 03-29-10

More New Caravan Shots 3-30 from Mel Miller on Vimeo.

Progress on Caravan is continuing to come right along. Spring break saw to the closure of all of the rough animation on my to-do list, and I'm right back to clean up, color, and final composite. Finished 5 shots this past weekend, and as always, it feels fantastic to see those completed clips. As per usual, here's a quick-link list to the latest progress on Caravan, via entries over at the Caravan Production blog, including the above reel of more completed shots from the film.

• Everybody Likes ol' Charlie

• Quirk's New Cover

• Patrick's HoobleDoodles

• Peaceful Mia (Rough Test)

• Shot 26 Progression

• Pat's Mia and Hoobler

• More New, Completed Shots!

Cheers,
Mel

Poltergeist and Mook

A quickie from my overly-uneventful pre-Spring-Break proctor shift on campus. This here is, along with the previously posted Velocity, another new character I've been considering for my Nexus series' line-up: 12 year old Geist and her little goopy goulie buddy Mook. I keep giggling that it sort of looks like she birthed poor Mook here which was hardly on my mind when I sketched out the poses. Moreover, she's supposed to be creating\manifesting the thing from her hand, as her spiffy comic book powers allow her. We'll pretend it looks like that instead.

Yet another all marker and micron image from a sketchbook named Quirk. The base marker sketch to this was particularly rough because I had no idea what I was going to draw when I began. I am pleased though that I'm getting faster drawing like this. So far so good - the exercise is proving effective! I hope to get speedier through these exercises to help me pick up a bit of pace with Caravan's cleanup in the coming weeks. Here's hoping!

For the record, her hair isn't nearly the intense teal blue you see here - I envision it far lighter - ghost-like. Such is the nature of my hilariously limited marker collection at the moment, however. I make do ;)

I'm on spring break this upcoming week. A large portion of that will be spent completing all remaining rough animation on Caravan and hopping right back into clean-up and final composite. Updates over on the film's production blog will likely come of that. Ill be keeping with Quirk doodles as well, for the sake of sanity (And hopefully skill\portfolio strengthening too!)

More again soon,
Mel

The Young Guru

Another installment from Quirk. This is TKP's resident forest guardian, The Guru, in his much-sprightlier years. Another piece drawn entirely in Prisma markers and Micron pens - no pencil or eraser involved.

-Mel