Matt Walker: Animator

2010-08-03T10:07:00.000-07:00

Hey Everyone! Sorry I've been away for so long...but, I've got great news! A lot of it!

Earlier this month I got married! The picture below is me and my beautiful new wife! It was a perfect wedding at such an amazing location.

And here is our wedding cake! Yeah, thats right. Its Wall e! My wife told me to design it myself and thats what I came out with. Heres a little side note, my wife is not an animator, she's just that cool.

Then we went on an amazing and beautiful honeymoon in Mendocino, CA where we went kayaking in the ocean and mountain biking and wine tasting!

Then I got back and headed down to LA for Siggraph (first business-ish trip as a married man) and while I was down there I got to go on a tour of DreamWorks! It was so fun! Pictured below are me and a few other AM alumni. The coolest thing about that picture is that I am from America, to the left is Miurika from Venezuela, then Sean from the UK, then Tommi from Germany, and then Kristina from Australia! We had the whole world right there at that lunch table at DreamWorks! It was so fun and all of those people are super nice and incredibly talented!

Then I got back from LA and headed to SF for my AnimationMentor graduation! AMAZING!!! Best graduation I have ever been to. It was so entertaining and so much fun! Our commencement speaker was Lee Unkrich, the director or Toy Story 3!!!

During graduation we had an award ceremony. I won an award!!! I won Most Entertaining Video Reference! Oh man, thats embarrassing... but so awesome!

And last but certainly not least... I got a JOB!!!! This fall my wife and I will be moving to Auckland, New Zealand! I'll be joining the crew at Oktobor Animation! I'll be working on the Nickelodeon/DreamWorks animated TV series "The Penguins of Madagascar"!!! I can't wait to move to NZ and get started!

Thats it for now, but hopefully Ill be able to post more soon!

-Matt

Amazing Trip to LA

2010-04-26T15:31:00.001-07:00

Hey everyone!

Sorry its been so long since the last post. I've been super busy. I finished up AM and took a trip to LA and as always, Ive been animating! While I was down there I got to hang out with some amazing animators and AMers. One of the many people I got to hang out with was Daniel Klug. Awesome guy and super talented animator. If you've never seen his stuff check it out here:

http://www.lesdangereux.com/

So I wanted to share some awesome pictures from my trip and some of the stories of hanging out with some great people. Hopefully they could serve as inspiration to others. I know I'm always inspired by pictures from inside the studios.

This last one is where all of the DW employees get to eat! Crazy!!! And the food is delicious... and free! An awesome friend of mine brought me in for some lunch and showed me around the campus. I got to see the animation floor and I got to meet the rest of the Speaking of Animation guys! Thanks Adam!! I had a blast, and was totally inspired.

I also got to go to Disney Inspire Days. An amazing even put on by Disney where a bunch of students get to get together from different schools and tour the studio and hear from some of the employees.

Here I am with a bunch of other AMers at Disney! Whoo! (From left to right) Justin Rochon, Miurika Valery, Joe Miranda, Wes Storhoff (in the back), Me, Jesse Colucci, Lamont Hunt, and Casey McDermott. Sorry if I misspelled any names :) I had a blast with these guys!

I also got to go in for a personal visit with the help of my good friend Malcon. He brought up me and fellow AMer Leon Gittens. Then the three of us went and hung out with my friend and rock star mentor, Chad Sellers! I hadn't seen him in a while so it was awesome catching up with him. Haning out on the animation floor was cooler than I can explain in words. And I got to see Andreas Deja and Bruce Smith walk by Chads office! Awesome seeing those guys in person, even though I didnt get to speak to them.

I also got to meet one of Disney's fix animators, Michael, and he showed me what kind of things he does. Such an awesome job for those of us who dont have much experience. It looked like a ton of fun and he was a super funny guy.

Lastly to end the trip I got in touch with an animator at R&H and me and him went out to lunch. I didnt get any pictures, although I dont know why. He was by far one of the nicest guys Ive ever met! We had a great lunch talking about life and of course animation! Thanks Phil!

Thats about it. I hope I didnt bore you, but I had a blast! Im sure you could tell just by the amount of times I said "awesome" in this post. haha

Amazing trip, and I thank everyone I got to hang out with for being so generous with their time.

Talk later :)

Matt

Out Of A Forest

2010-02-17T14:26:00.000-08:00

Hey everyone!

I just watched the stop motion short "Out Of A Forest" and wow! That was amazing! Well done to all of the artists who worked on it. Ive never done any stop motion (other than little clay creatures back in middle school haha) and I imagine it must be super hard, but these guys did incredible. From the story and characters, to the lighting and music, I was totally sucked in. I actually forgot it was stop motion for a second because I was so into the characters. And what a fabulous ending! It really put a twist on it.

If you have not seen it and need a boost of inspiration, go check it out!
http://vimeo.com/9335203

On a personal note, I have started applying to studios! So wish me luck!

Matt

Class 6

2010-01-08T12:08:00.000-08:00

Hey everyone!

Class 6 has started at AM and I am so excited that my new mentor is Mark Oftedal!! This guy is an amazing animator. He is said to be one of the greatest animators who ever worked at Pixar. And hes such a humble guy. I got to meet him for the first time earlier this week. Another awesome thing is that Toy Story is really what inspired me to become an animator and Mark worked on it! Thats so awesome that I now get to learn from him. Hes also the creator of the short "4pm" and it is incredible!

I just wanted to talk for a minute about "4pm". Hands are a very difficult thing in animation, especially 2D work. His short "4pm" stars a main character who is very simplistic in design. Basic shapes for his body, no real facial features, everything is pretty basic... except for his hands! They are super detailed and that is what Mark chose to communicate this characters emotions through. So the whole short the character is thinking and emoting with basically just his hands. Now that is impressive!! Marks timing and posing are so amazing that you always know exactly what the character is thinking, and all your really looking at is a pair of hands. Wow! (And it is all hand drawn!)

Lastly, I started a new shot, and that is what I posted. My goal with this one was to really think outside of the box and take the line and put it in a situation that you would never think it to be in. The shots not very far along, but I think it shows potential. Hopefully I will be able to use Class 6 to finish and polish it up.

Thats all for now!

Finaled Two Char

2009-12-30T12:08:00.000-08:00

Hey Everyone! Sorry its been so long since my last post. Ive been very busy. I made it down to the CTN animation expo in Burbank CA and it was a blast! I got to meet with several AM students and it was great getting to know all of them, and I got to hang out with my mentor Chad! Hes a great guy and a ton of help! It was super inspiring to be able to hang out with him and the others.

I also finished Class 5 at AM and am now on a short break before I start my final class at animation mentor! I cant believe its already almost done! Some friends of mine are already getting amazing jobs, so hopefully I wont be too far behind them. haha

Lastly On my break Ive begun another shot so hopefully I will have something new to post soon!

Hope everything is well with everyone who is reading this... if anybody actually is haha!

Collector IP

2009-11-16T12:37:00.000-08:00

Hey! Here is an IP pass of my new shot. Ive got shot 1 and shot 4 splined, and the performance of the other 3 shots are being refined. I think its in a pretty good spot right now, but I'm really going to have to notch it up this week and get a lot of work done because Im heading down to the CTN Animation Expo in Burbank, CA! If your going maybe Ill see you there!

Blocking

2009-11-09T14:30:00.000-08:00

Heres the blocking of my new shot. Its a more dark and serious shot than my last one, but i really wanted to experiment with this one and test my range. Im learning a ton with it.

Hope you like it!

I See You FINALED

2009-11-04T13:16:00.000-08:00

Here is a Finaled version of my single character dialogue shot. Ive gotten the ok to move on. Right now Im working on the blocking of a 360 frame two character dialogue shot. Its going to be intense!

Ill post it soon! Also just wanted to send a thanks out to my mentor Chad! You rock man! You've helped me a ton!

Final Pass

2009-10-19T10:17:00.000-07:00

Here is a final pass at my shot. Im going to do a revision pass with a few great suggestions from my mentor Chad. So far this term has been awesome!!

Oh and today is my mentor, Chad Sellers, first day at Disney!! So congratulations on that man! Thats super exciting, and I cant wait to hear about it at our Q&A this week!

Facial animation refining

2009-10-12T15:24:00.000-07:00

Here is a refined pass at my facial animation. Ive also toned down a lot of the motion of the body in the beginning, from a suggestion by my new mentor. Chad is an amazing animator and I am privilaged to be learning under him. I think overall im pretty happy where this shot is at right now. I have one more week to finalize it, then on to a two character shot!

First Pass at Facial Animation!

2009-10-05T10:17:00.000-07:00

Hey! Here is my first pass at the facial animation on my shot. This is very exciting for me as this is my first attempt EVER at facial animation. Im happy with it so far, even knowing there is a lot of work to do!

And I just got my new mentor at Animation Mentor and its Chad Sellers!! Im super excited to be in his class and think its going to be great having this guy look at my work and help me out. Hes also starting at Disney this month so i get to see how is first weeks at Disney go!

Im being mentored by a Disney animator!!!!

Robot Stewie

2009-09-25T21:40:00.000-07:00

Hey! I am on break from AM right now and I decided that this is a perfect time to experiment with a new shot. In this shot I am experimenting with two characters, constraints between the two, and FK arms (so far Ive gotten pretty comfortable with IK). And so far I am loving it!! This shot is a ton of fun and I feel like Im learning a lot. And its all action body mechanics which i wanted more practice in anyway. Hope you like it!

I See You final body pass

2009-09-17T11:05:00.000-07:00

Here is my final body pass for this shot. Im still going to try and polish it up a bit during this short break. Then Im going to start AM class 5 Advanced Acting and I will get to add all of the facial acting to this shot (brows, eyes, lipsync). Whoohoo!! Should be fun!

IP pass with new clothes

2009-09-02T17:03:00.000-07:00

Heres another in progress pass, I made some changes according to my mentor. Still much to do, I have to go through the entire piece and loosen and soften everything up, and track all arcs. But I also added a new little costume to Bishop. Its his creepy stalker shirt.

Couple weeks left!

IP pass on I See You

2009-08-29T13:21:00.000-07:00

Here is an IP pass at my dialogue shot. Still much to do on it, but Im having a ton of fun with this! Hope you like it!

I See You

2009-08-21T17:33:00.000-07:00

As promised here is the blocking of my first dialogue shot! Its so fun! And the AM character is super fun to play with. You really can get all kinds of emotion out of him, And i dont even have the full facial rig yet. But here it is, I hope you enjoy it. Ill keep posting IP passes!

Mr Police Officer

2009-08-19T15:47:00.000-07:00

So here is a "finaled" version of my Pantomime Cop. Im not sold on the fact that its done. If I find any free time, Im going to try and go back and fix a few things. Catching of the gun mainly. But I have moved onto my first dialogue shot with the AM character Bishop. So far its super fun! Ill be uploading a blocking pass soon!

Pantomime Shot Blocking

2009-07-17T09:23:00.000-07:00

In class 4 now and the first assignment is to do a pantomime shot that takes a character from one emotion to a contrasting emotion in a matter of about 10 seconds. My idea is the cocky police officer who's not as tough as he thinks he is. This is my final blocking, I think Im about ready to get into splining! Wish me luck!

Animation Mentor Class 3 Work

2009-06-24T10:27:00.000-07:00

Hey everyone!

This is my three-part shot that I completed at AnimationMentor during class 3. The theme is Stewie the construction worker and what a bad day he is having. I tried rendering it out, but im not the best renderer ;) but my focus is on the animation anyway. Hope you enjoy!