And then there were many post-less days. And there was much crying and gnashing of teeth.

I sometimes like to make up bible-ish quotes in an attempt to deflect attention from the fact that I have failed.

My excuse is: it's finals time, which is messing up the schedule on this blog a bit. I will try to be more diligent in the future.

Okay, so blogger is not letting me post my reel in it's current incarnation. I probably need to make a smaller file, which I'm not going to do right at this moment. What I will post, however, are a few of the images in my current reel.

This was the hairstyle target I was going for in my grooms below, found (obviously) at hairstyledesign.com.

I still need to paint the previous character's scalp so that her bald spots aren't quite so obvious. I would also like to work on her sideburns and stray hairs a little more too. Actually, there's still a lot of work I'd like to put into this groom, but I'm going to have to put it off at least until finals are over.

I wish I could show you a full turn-around, but I've been having difficulty getting my batch renders to work in the lab, and I'm not going to spend another 2-5 hours figuring out why the crap this won't batch render just for this blog. I suspect it has something to do with shave and a haircut acting weird with the way we have the lab computers set up.

Also, I would like to note that the head model on which I groomed the hair is not mine. I just downloaded it for free off the internets.

Concept.

Diffuse.

Bump.

Final Image.

So tired....

So it is sleepy time now, but before I go, here is my offering to you:

http://vimeo.com/22050843

I'll try to actually put the video on here, along with my old sophomore reel, tomorrow or friday.

Nighty night.

I Love New Wacom Tablets

We have new Wacom tablets in the lab! W00t! In tribute, I am going to share one of my many doodles from the new Wacom tablets. I should really learn to focus better. On the other hand, 40 completely sleepless hours can excuse pretty much anything, I think.

Holy Crap Microsoft!

So, Microsoft has been here for most of the day and I haven't gotten a chance to scan in any figure drawings or render out any other awesome things, but I will probably be doing that tonight. Keep an eye out for upcoming late-night posts!

More Old Figure Drawings

These are actually a few of the figure drawings that helped me get into the animation program at BYU. I haven't done any longer poses (as opposed to just gestures that were 20 minutes or less) in a year or so, but I worked for at least 2 hours on almost every figure drawing (minus the gesture here and maybe one other) I turned in when I was applying. Seriously, though. Gesture drawing is ridiculously fun and really helps improve any drawing skills you might be cultivating. Everyone should do it, even if they aren't an artist.

One More Post, And Then I'll Stop Talking

So, I really feel like I should mention my current love of Dragon Age 2 at this point.

I make an effort, every semester, to cut myself off from video games entirely. I spend too much time on them when I really should be working and/or doing something useful; and that's just not a good idea during the schoolyear, when my grades and my scholarships depend on me focusing.

I'm one of those people who can't play a game (or do anything, really) for just an hour. Once I get started, I don't come up for air again for hours. Every once in awhile, I awake from my game-induced hypnosis to realize I have have not slept or eaten in the last 24 hours, that the overwhelming desire to finish the ever present next quest was the sole reason for my feeling of boundless energy. Cut off from that source of power, the exhaustion from the past few days rises up and threatens to destroy me with its entirely justified wrath.

I figure that's probably not healthy.

The danger with Dragon Age in general and Dragon Age 2 specifically is that it's epic-ness calls to me constantly, even when I'm not playing it, even before I've bought it. It cajoles me and sings its siren songs until at last I finally give in.

So I bought DA2 two Saturdays ago and I've beaten the game twice and am even now midway through my third playthrough. Sometimes I don't sleep so that I have time to play Dragon Age at night and actually do schoolwork during the daytime.

When I said I was addicted, I really meant it.