Vancouver

Vancouver is amazing. This is a very international city, with influences of USA, Aisa, India, Brazil, There is a strong creative force here it is literally creating Canada in real time each step you take down the street. I feel like I am walking thru the set of Bladerunner. Grainville St. is a lit up promenade full of shopping resturaunts, and clubs. There is old school neon signage mixed with wirless technology. The people on the streets are not afraid to dress up/dress down or kiss in public. I feel a bit like I am walking thru a Robert Burns comic book at times. I have mainly been confined to the city itself, but you can see mountain ranges direcly across from the convention center. Nature is very close to this urban space, the element of water is particularly strong in the climate.

A single picture does not do justice to how lively the city is day or night. There is even radical cuisine, we ate some sushi with ketchup on it. There was a huge fireworks event Saturday night, the streets were packed with everyone that was out to see the event. There were skateboarding contests during the day.

There is art everywhere here. Artisans and Street artists setup and selling.
This is a manhole cover. With a Northwest Pacific Style frog and tadpole theme.

On Friday I was lucky enough to see the Bill Reid Gallery of North West Coast Art. 639 Hornby St. Mayari is pretty well behaved in Museums. I could spend more time looking, but she needs to move on. The gallery had the cast gold version of "a depiction of the Haida creation story, where Raven opens an oyster shell on the beach to find the first Humans."


http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bill_Reid

Bill Reid's art work is outstanding. I have always wanted to see his work in person. He created amazing sculpture and jewelery. I was introduced to his work thru my father who is also a sculptor,metal smith.

http://theravenscall.ca/en/art

There are still four days left here for us. Tomorrow Mayari and I are going whale watching. Then a conference party at night with Momma.

Painting

These are two ink and white out paintings. I created these this weekend.

Mt Auburn Night will be published in Hellbound 2 The Boston Comics Roundtable Horror Anthology

http://www.bostoncomicsroundtable.com/

http://hellbound.riverbirdcomics.com/p/submissions.html

I am excited to post that my Mt Auburn Night will be published in Hellbound 2, from Boston Comics Roundtable. I have been posting updates to Mt Auburn Night on this blog since I started it in March. I am really excited to work with Boston Comics Roundtable. Their comics are solid good work, and they are in comic shops throughout the metro Boston area and New England. Check them out, read the comics.

http://riverbirdcomics.com/

Teaching Maya at Harvard Extension School in the Fall 2011 Term.

This fall I will be the instructor for Intro to Maya at Harvard Extension School.
http://www.extension.harvard.edu/courses/12982

Course Description:

This course is an introduction to Maya 2011. Maya is an industry standard 3-dimensional (3-D) software used to create animated films, video games, medical visualizations, and special effects for films. The objective of the course is to familiarize students with the fundamentals of a 3-D working environment using Maya 2011. The course develops skills in four elementary 3-D software topics: interface, objects, hierarchy, and animation. These four topics translate into most 3-D software packages and provide a foundation for using 3-D software. Topics include Maya interface, modeling, 3-D animation, textures, lighting, and rendering. Prerequisite: familiarity with Adobe Photoshop, Mac OS X. (4 credits)

Wednesdays beginning Aug. 31, 5:30-7:30 pm.

I am thrilled and honored to be the instructor for this course. Working on the course plan is getting me excited to teach. My goal is to have all the students comfortable with core concepts for Maya. I want beginner students to feel like they will get an enhanced first course for Maya with an experienced instructor. Also I have worked with students who have previous experience in a 3d Package and they are great to work with. The past three years I was the Teaching Assistant for Tereza Flaxman when she taught this course. The students in this course are motivated and fun to work with.

I may use this blog to post some maya tutorials.

G is for Guitar

Coloring Book page # G

This is modeled from a Guitar that Mayari and I bought in LA last year when we attended SIGGRAPH 2010.

This photo was taken at La Plaza park across the street from Union Station in Los Angeles CA. Mayari saw the guitars and had to have it. The guitars for sale all had cool hand painted designs on them.

Where? Here:

http://maps.google.com/maps?q=la+train+union+station&oe=utf-8&rls=org.mozilla:en-US:official&client=firefox-a&um=1&ie=UTF-8&sa=N&hl=en&tab=wl

T is for Truck

The modern day workhorse,wagon,toy. For the coloring book series.

Thanks to DiggerFanJSB for posting the vid on youtube.

P is for Penguin

P is for penguin. Penguins are Iconic.

They have been around for millions of years. Imagine a 5-foot tall 36 million year old penguin. They are examples of elegant design and evolutionary efficiency.

http://www.wired.com/wiredscience/2010/09/inkayacu-perus-giant-fossil-penguin-and-the-stories-its-feathers-tell/


Making this coloring book page led me to wondering why penguins are so mainstream in animation. They always seem to have a presence in entertainment. I started to think that it is because of their shape may be easier to animate. Their shape and contour is one step more complex than the basic flower sack animators use for practice. Their black and white contrast makes them easier to color. Google could not answer my question.

For example:

Penguins of Madagascar(My personal favorite in terms of style and character attitude)
Happy feet(CG Musical mo-cap of an outcast dancing penguin)
March of the Penguins(Documentary)
321 Penguins (CG space penguins on Qubo cable channel)
The Penguin (Batman Villain)
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Penguin_%28comics%29
Surf's Up (CG surfing penguins)
Mr Popper's Penguins Starring Jim Carry
The Linux Icon is a Penguin
NHL Hockey team Mascot
There is a penguin meme
http://knowyourmeme.com/memes/socially-awkward-penguin#.TcY9WbKTgbQ

Chilly Willy himself is a Penguin




Bugs bunny gets owned by the skating penguin by bringing him to Antarctica mistakenly in an effort to bring him home only to realize he is from Hoboken NJ.


Full Version(with a cameo of Humphrey Bogart)



Mary Poppins seems to get it right. She gets the penguins to serve her lunch.


http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Penguin

Thanks to the you tube users who posted these
dotHackNETSLUM,AlexValve,mromro,heliomrdias,GrahamCracker22