Some Color and Texture Magic

Well... as we continue on with our project, we have been tirelessly working on the rigging and weight painting issues while our friend David Rutan has been working on the color and textures for the film. So here are some preliminary color and texture samples of our arena, bull and matador. More soon to come.

Pancho & Villa

The next 2 characters that were in our story were the 2 bull hands named Pancho and Villa. Unfortunately late in the game they found themselves on the cutting room floor. After a lot of effort was spent to develop, model, rig, weight paint and start the facial blendshapes, they ended up getting cut from the story. The story itself was still to long and in an attempt to shorten the film to a more realistic time frame their scenes had to go. With the help of Jeff Jackson and Dave Perry, the storyboarding and 2D animation teachers, we were able to trim the story down to its essential elements. Unfortunately that meant letting go of 2 lovable characters who shared some of our favorite parts of the original story. Our friend Cassia Harries modeled Villa for us with my help in the touch up department, and my co-director Stuart Hallock worked tirelessly modeling Pancho, and we cant forget my good friend Joe Giambrone who also did some final touch up modeling on all our charecters too. It was hard after the time we spent on them but hopefully they will return in a story of their own some day! So here are some preliminary designs and our models. Now a moment of silence for our lost heroes....

Diablo & Belmonte Models

Well here we are back again. The next stage of the film makeing process after the script, character designs and the storyboards are done is to have the modelers take the designs and model the characters in 3D. Here are our finished models of our 2 main characters. First is our fearless matador Ceasar Belmonte which was modeled by our friend Jillian LeNoble. She did a fantastic job. I did a bit of touch up modeling on him to get it just the way I wanted and we love how he came out!

Next is our big Dumb Bull, Diablo Loco. He was modeled by Mike Roberts who is actually the schools modeling teacher! He thought it would be fun to model our funny looking bull so he gladly took on the challenge which we totally apreciated. He also came out great. Thanks Mike!

Diablo Loco Concepts

Our animated short film stars 4 characters so, our fearless matador would be nothing without a fearsome adversary, and it would make for a really short film. So designing our crazy bull was a fun challenge. With a name like Diablo Loco, we had to come up with a bull that could fit the name through his actions but not be obvious from his appearance. He went through many fazes and we had a lot of fun comeing up with the designs. Here is some of the ideas we came up with as we searched for the right design.

"Diablo Loco" The Begining

Well its been a while so I figured it was time post something new. The big project Ive been working on for the last year and a half, is my senior project which is a 3D animated short film called "Diablo Loco". The story revolves around a bull fight with a world famous matador named Caeser Belmonte, and an unpredictable bull named Diablo Loco. This is my big project that will make me and my fellow workhorses rich and famous! Well maybe not rich and famouse but hopefully lead to our first animation jobs. Ive had the idea for a long time, but needed a fellow student with promising talent to help me along the way. My good friend Stuart Hallock came on board with lots of enthusiasm for the project. We started with the over all story concept and began working out the story and script. During this process we also were coming up with concept designs for the 4 charecters. By the end of the Spring semester last year we had our working first draft of a script and rough charecter designs. Stuart has been a great asset to the project as he and I have worked on every aspect of the film-making process. As co-directors, Stuart and I supervised other talents that have lended their help and we will also be the primary animators on the film. So first off Ill show some of the concept drawing I did. These are some of the preliminary roughs which led to our finished design of the matador. Ill continue to post more showing the progression of the film along with other artists contributions. Enjoy.

Christmas Posters

Well hi everyone. I dont have much drawing right now to post so I thought I would show yall what I did for Christmas last year. We were broke as usual and were thinking of some inexpensive gifts for the families. So Melanie thought up movie posters with thier faces on them. I thought that was pretty brilliant and practically free (except for the frames we put them in and the photo paper prints). So this was some of the posters I made for some of my brothers and thier wives and Mels siter and husband. Some arent as good as others but oh well. I hope ya like em.

More From the Old Doodlpad

Well here I am again searching for something to add to this sketchblog that might prove encouraging and inspirational on some kind of level to someone... or... maybe just a moment of personal feel goodness and self assurance that they are just way better than me at drawing. Or maybe it was just that my teacher Jeff said it was time for something new. Either way, these are just some pages from my sketchbook that I thought were kind of fun. Enjoy... or not.

Cogswell Sketchbook part 4

So here we are again, continuing on our journey through what will become the Cogswell Sketchbook. The next phase of this story (based on the Brothers Grimm tale "The Moon"), has our pirate siblings flying away in their air ship, having just kidnapped the royal brat from her extravagant tree house! They then dock in a pirate port were havoc, druken brawls and pleasurable company are the sought after pursuits of true happiness! Now entering center stage- The Royal Navy!!! In the original tale, after the dead arise from the influence of the Moon, they run around, drink and party which in turn freak out the living residents of the land, causing mass histeria. Meanwhile, high up in the land of heavenly company, St. Peter looks down upon the Earth to see this unfolding mayhem. He then gathers THE HOST OF HEAVEN (which was previously gathered to cast out Satan and his followers) and descends down upon the world commanding the dead back into their graves. Peter then takes the moon and hangs it in the heavens. Wow! what a mouth full, Im already tired. If you are already confused read the previous posts to get the rest of the story. Anyways so the last drawings I have to post are my designs for Peter and the Royal Navy who represent Peter and the Host of Heaven. When they catch up with the pirates, they are more than happy to surrender the girl to Peter because of her spoiled, bratty, naggy, anoying attitude. As the Navy leaves with the girl on the journey home, they come to realize the true monster this child is and decide to leave her on a deserted little island to be rid of the cause of so much frustration. The two ships leave in opposite directions as the little girl sitts there ticked off arguing with a sand crab for intruding in her circle of space. Thus ending our little tale. These Navy guys were pretty fun to draw, I hope yall like em.

Cogswell Sketchbook Part 3

Well here we go again. The next aspect I worked on for the Brothers Grimm fairytale "The Moon", was the underworlders. As the story continues, after the moon is stolen from the oak tree, the brothers/travelers, take it back to their land to give light to the night. The people were greatful and for the rest of their lives, the brothers maintane it. When they eack start to die they demand that a quarter of the moon be buried with them representing the phases of the moon. When the 4 quarters of the moon are united under ground it gives light, awakening the dead. The underworlders celebrate and come up out of the ground to party, and have fun. In my rendition of the tale the underworlders are the drunken sots of a pirate port that the brothers dock in. These are the designs I came up with for them. So what happens next in the story you ask... stay tuned.

Cogswell Sketchbook Part 2

In the Brothers Grimm tale "The Moon", the moon is stolen by 4 travelers out of the top of a giant oak tree and taken back to their land. They do this in order to give light to the night. So the next aspect of the story that I designed was the moon and the oak tree. In my rendition of the tale, Moon is the name of a spoiled little rich child who likes to play in her royal tree house and is kidnapped for ransom by the 4 pirates.




Exploring many ideas and not settling for the first one is an essential part of concept design. These sketches show a few of the different paths I pursued until I found the ones that seemed to fit my version of the tale