"California Here I Come!"

Stealing a line from Cars, I'm heading out to PIXAR January 8th! Three weeks of training, then an evaluation, and I'll be working on one of their next feature animated films until June 29th. I'm signing a NDA this week so unfortunately I won't be able to tell you anything other than like "man, this thing I'm working on is going to be so sick!" but yeah... rock on.

A very happy Thanksgiving, eh?

I got home (New Jersey) tonight, to find a message on my answering machine from PIXAR- unfortunately no one was home as my parents were picking up Steve and me from NYU. Despite the fact that they didn't say the words "you're in" in their message, they were excited to talk to me, and certainly didn't sound as if they had bad news. I called back and left a message, but since they're off for Thanksgiving, I'll have to wait until Friday or even Monday for the final final word. So folks, it looks like I just might find myself in Emeryville in a few weeks. 'Til I know for sure, have a happy Thanksgiving!

My TD Reel

I've had a few people ask me recently what I sent to PIXAR, so here's the actual TD section of my reel. Other than this I had sent the figure drawings below, and a more completed version of my 2nd year film (which I should upload sometime...). Its hard to read the descriptions in the lower left-hand corner, but you should be able to get the general gist of it anyway... Check it, yo.

Final Countdown

I had my interview with PIXAR on Wednesday evening, 20 solid minutes talking to 5 Supervising Techinical Directors- talk about being nervous! I actually did a series of drawings that night which pretty much encapsulate how I was feeling, but I haven't scanned them in yet... It went really well! They watched everything I sent them, and asked me all kinds of technical questions. I'll hear back from them within the next 12 days if I'll be working on some stuff for their next film from January to June. I'll be sure to keep all of you posted.

Pixar round #2!

Today was absolutely awful- worst Monday I've had in a long time, that is UNTIL I got an e-mail from Pixar saying they wanted me to interview with their Supervising Technical Directors about the TD internship I applied for 2 weeks ago! Crazy... the very last thing I expected to see in my e-mail, but man what a rush. I can't help but be excited, and so I thought I would deliver on my promise and upload those pieces from my portfolio I mentioned earlier. Some of them you may recognize, those are new... everything else is pretty old, even a year old in some cases, but yeah, enjoy- (and though I have no way of stopping anyone from stealing these things, I'd probably consider it a high form of flattery for a second or two, and then hunt you down- no joke).

Much much progress

Update:
All righty- here's a quick comp of where I'm at with the shot at the moment. Just keys (a few missing) and very few inbetweens, but you should get the idea... hair, clothing, all that good stuff blowing in the wind- I'll address that once I get the character polished! Even though I REALLY want to keep working on this, its 7 in the morning and I should use some sleep...

Once in a long while...

...something inside you clicks, and for a few seconds you can do a nice rough... and then you can't draw worth anything for the next couple years to compensate!

The waiting game.

Text, lots of text, and no obligatory pictures (cuz I don't have the files with me) but I'll upload them later!

I applied for a Technical Director Internship with PIXAR this past week, which means I had to transform all of my modeling and rigging and programming stuff over the past year into something presentable. Along the way I rediscovered my previous reel that I'd sent over to Disney including all of my prior lifedrawing studies and stuff, which was pretty neat! I ended up recycling some of it and replacing the rest... I need to bring those files home from the lab though so I can post them for you (who ever you are? Why're you still reading this? ) to see. PIXAR says they'll let me know in a couple of weeks that I didn't get into their program (oops?) but until I hear the final word I've got my fingers crossed.

I also had the fortune to meet with Jeffrey Katzenberg this past Monday and show him my film, toward which he was very receptive. He seemed to enjoy it? Laughed at the right moments and stuff, but its always got to be somewhat unnerving to show him a traditionally executed short. All the same it was a great experience, and we shared some stories/aspirations/so forth. I'll be writing him a follow-up letter.

As for right now... I've begun animating my next project, like literally today, begun. There will most certainly be pencil tests coming in the very very near future, so watch for them!