Doda Doodles: California! + Sketches

From what I can tell, it appears that the last time I updated my blog was almost three months ago (yikes)! This lack of updates is no excuse--I really do feel bad, since I had planned on using this blog as a way of tracking my progress. But bettter late than never to post a few things--and while they aren't projects (...yet), I thought I'd update with what I've been up to as of late.

The first semester of my sophomore year ended quite well! I have a lot of good memories, and I hope that I'll have just as many in the semester to come. Of course, I did end the semester with a bang; from December 9th to the 15th, I went to Disneyland in California...DISNEYLAND, KIDS!!!

But Disneyland wasn't my only highlight! I also went and visited two studios while I was in good Ol' Cali--Dreamworks Animation Studios in Glendale, and Walt Disney Animation Studios in Burbank.

The first studio that I went to was Dreamworks; this one in particular was special, since the person who gave me a tour was Liron Topaz, a Ringling alum who graduated in 2009. I contacted him for information on a project for History of Animation in April, and I've kept in contact with him since. I had only talked to him through email, so the tour at Dreamworks was the first time I met him in person. It was really great being able to talk to him about his work and Ringling (the guy really knows his stuff!); he's a really cool, inspiring individual!

He also recommended me this really cool newsletter, Frame By Frame Animation (FBFA). Originally, it was a newsletter that was posted only in Israeli, but lately Liron and a few other of its contributors have been coming out with articles in English, too. FBFA will be posting quite a few cool things on animation--everything from layout, design, etc. They've already posted this great interview with Joe Bowers and an article on favoring in animation. Definitely take the time to check it out!

The second studio I visited was Disney; this one was special, too, since I was visiting my friend Matt Sullivan, a Ringling alum who graduated last year (he was a Layout Trainee when I visited the studio, but recently he passed his final review!). He was kind enough to show me and my mom around the Disney complex, and even introduced us to another awesome Ringling alum, Mike Klim (one of the two Michaels' who worked on the Ringling short, Dilla). All in all, the tour was amazing, and Matt is definitely one of the coolest guys I know. I wish him the best of of luck in his future endeavors.

Now while I am inclined to discuss more about the studio tours themselves (what I saw, my thoughts on the facilities, etc.), I'd rather talk about those experiences in future posts. Why? Well, if I talked about them now, then this blog post would go on forever, because I could talk about it for ages...ages! In order to keep these blog posts manageable to read, I'll save that info for later.

But for now, here's some sketches!

Abstract Doodle