venerdì 31 gennaio 2014

Dark Souls reunion

Drawing i did for my brother in two months. He erased it once and made me lose my marbles...still love him.
Took me ages to try and make the characters similar to the ones of the videogame, Dark Souls by From Software, but luckily enough, my brother wanted them cartonized.
It is not very professional, but oh well...

Never again

Dark Souls reunion


But seriously, i love dark souls...the character design is so obscure, realistic and elaborated at the same time...a real source of inspiration for every character designer

giovedì 30 gennaio 2014

Behind you, ash demon

I was supposed to do a drawing for my brother, but i got so tired and angry for losing all the datas (for his fault) that i had to start something else. This was a pain...seriously...there are so many mistakes in this one that i wasn't sure to put it on my blog. The illumination is wrong and the characters aren't that great, but i really like the concept of the ash demon...couldn't get the background right and that column and rock...ngggg...the beast wasn't even supposed to come from lava...but well...as long as it is done...

As you probably noticed i tend to use often the shot that involves a monster (big or bad one) as the main focus and other characters (the heroes or victims maybe?) as background fillings.

Latest work:
Behind you, Ash Demon...


martedì 28 gennaio 2014

Pirate adventure WITH SOUNDS YAAAAAARH

Remember the storyboard of the Zoo Troop and the Lost treasure? This is the animated version, the animatic: the voices behind it are mine for the captain and of my brother for the first mate. Italian pirates aren't exactly the best rogues ever...but they did the trick. Most of the sounds come from freesound.org while the song is Yo Ho yo Ho the pirate life is for me! and i don't own the rights ALSO i don't own my own soul.my life is spiraling into a pit of despair. I have no hope and i eat chocolate peanuts all day long :)

Wish i added more animations thou

Giacomo Jack Ghigo showreel fall 2013

It all comes to this, my final showreel for Falmouth university Animation and visual effect course.
It includes both 2d and 3d assignments, and i got to say I am quite satisfied with most of them yet as i stated a thousand times already, i feel like i am can still improve a lot.

Music is Spanish Flea by Herb Alpert, i do not own the rights for this song.

Enjoy


Zoo Troop and the Lost treasure storyboard


Oh my god...so many bad memories about this storyboard. Everybody were having a good time, waiting for Christmas and sharing happy memories...i wasn't
My father booked my plane one day before the actual date, so i has two days less than the others, and i had to pull three all nighters in a row. I literally died (metaphorically) on the train for 8 hours:
Ok well it was fun to draw but i wish I had more time to dedicate to the small details, maybe adding more frames...still i had enough to put them in the animatic. 
God i hate drawing ships.



Zoo Troop and the Lost treasure storyboard (done the 5 December 2013)
























Horsing around

This was an experiment. First .GIF ever done on Photoshop.
It is exactly what it looks like.
Pure
Party
Rocking

The power of animation at its finest

Horsing around (uploaded the 7 January 2014)

The goat and the koala

While everyone was working on the "Deep" storyboard i was gazing upon them, filled with that feeling of accomplishment and proudness...what to do while everybody were losing their minds? Animating of course! Luckily for me i had an audio file that involved me and my fellow companion animator Kanye West  Katie Wyman talking about an average night in Falmouth, involving alcohol, beans and crumpets. I animated it, Rob Owen fixed the audio and Katie was harassing some elders. 
Life is good. 
This is a case were it wasn't.

The Goat and the Koala made on flash, quick and easy, not fully animated. Follow your dreams




Beasts black shapes

When Maya and Flash crash, i tend to get a little frustrated. And by little i mean that i turn into a raging volcano...no joke, imagine a woman on her period trying to pick up a coin behind the washing machine during a summer day while the husband is talking about fishing.
Yes.
It is that bad. 
To relax and avoid prison i tend to do quick black shapes exercises that involves animals, mythical animals. It is fun, it is quick and it is useful. You have no excuses for not being creative on these things.

Black shape (uploaded the 20 December 2013) going zig zag from the top left to the top right:
Hambush, buckbark, Limyfish, dirt hermit crab, Cobold, Cockatrice.


Tentacle being

During the winter break i managed to go back to Italy and visit my old "colleagues" of the Imasterart course. We basically just chilled drawing tentacle hooded figures. Characters designers are cool fellas, little to say about that.

Here i did a quick black shape. My teacher liked the idea yet he complained that the figure is too static: should have bent it a little to make it look creepier.

Hooded figure (uploaded the 20 December 2013)


Deep storyboard

"End of the line" was my first attempt into making a storyboard, but the "Deep" assignment was definitely my first "serious" storyboard. Took me various days and two all nighters, but it was worthy: i enjoyed doing the different types of shots and being able to tell a story. 

The teacher liked it, yet i messed up the size of the frames and some shots were either not necessary or repetitive, yet i enjoyed the design of the characters and the whole development of action.

Deep storyboard by Derek Hayes (uploaded the 15 December 2013) 












lunedì 27 gennaio 2014

Fall background

I have done and (barely) completed a scientific highschool back in the days, so i basically self taught myself everything i know about drawing and i can tell that one of my biggest weaknesses are EVERYTHING erm i mean backgrounds. what i am willing to do between a drawing and another is to copy real landscape and try to reproduce them on canvas. It is not easy, but is is a good exercise for these young hands of mine! Also, since i enjoy making my life more difficult day after day, i applied as background artist for the third year production "Crocodile tears". Only time and my boss Darren can tell if i am going to make it.
Still...pretty red leaves

Fall background: Autumn leaves (uploaded the 12 December 2013): there is still something about my stroke that doesn't convince me, hopefully with time and experience i will figure it out.



Simplified background for production "Crocodile Tears" (not uploaded)
It is really simple.

Witch sisters

My photoshop teacher Marco Natale told me: "Get fast and get good, silly"

And boy, he is right, i am slow at drawing, totally slow. As a challenge or exercise, he told me to make black shape drawing that wouldn't last more than 3 hours and a half. I have done two so far, two sisters, two witches, Frostbite (the blue one) with Bearzerker and Blightblister (red one) with Gangrendel. I managed to finish them both on time, yet i don't think i'd be able to finish a big drawing in that little time, yet i am sure going faster.


Frostbite and Bearzerker
Blightblister and Gangrendel





























Frostbite was uploaded the 11 November 2013 while Blightblister the 20 december 2013



Drawing 2 and 5 are early concepts of the two witches (done around end of 2012)

Hello? Hello? Hello?

A big step in my animation practice: a sound video, fully animated.
The track was given by Mr Wyatt and was at first a little confusing, but i can honestly tell that in less than 5 minutes i had the whole (twisted) story in my mind. For the first time i had to fight with the bad temper of the program "Adobe flash" that kept crashing over and over making the whole thing even more difficult.
This short taught me that animation is really a time consuming activity, but also creative and stimulating. Also this made me do my fist "All nighter" at the library with other students...great times, great breakfast, great fatigue.

Hello? Hello? Hello? sound clip (uploaded the 9 November 2013): Yea i should definitely improve the stroke of my brush on flash and be more precise in the little things.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PoRl8xrwEzk (in HD)


Sea of dreams

I personally love this picture.
As always the mistakes are many...the planes are not really fully correct, the perspective isn't the greatest and the color are maybe too simple. Yet maybe what you see is different from what i see...after hours and hours of work on photoshop i gaze upon my work and i see all the difficulties i have been through, all the little details that drove me crazy or those parts that i really couldn't get right. You see reader, what is for you maybe just a picture, for me is a world, populated by humans and beasts, where dreams and nightmare are palpable, where magic isn't only a word found in the books or in the Copperfield shows. Behind that horizon that you see far away in the picture there isn't only sky for me, there is another drawing ready to be made. I don't want to overkill this, since i bet I sound pompous already, but i strife, i suffer trying to put on the canvas a little bit of life and interest. I really wish you could partake to this, reader, it is my biggest dream and my greatest goal.
Hopefully one day I'll be able to show properly what is behind that subtle line in the horizon.
.
.
.
well, i really liked doing this composition, just for fun

Sea of dreams (uploaded the 3 November 2013)


Cubey reacting

Last exercise on flash involving cubey. In this episode we find our hero startled by a sudden noise, and then reacting in an exaggerate way: I am not particularly proud of this one...i tried and tried yet i couldn't get it right. Maybe i spent too much time in the dance at the beginning, or maybe i was just distracted...should have started from the beginning but...hopefully there is still time for improving.

Cubey reacting (uploaded the 1 November 2013): It is not very clear, especially the sound reacting part (which is the main). Next time i have to follow the rule KISS, keep it simple stupid. Silly me.

Cubeys interacting

This time the cubeys are two and had to interact with each others.
The big one is obviously dominant while the little one is way too active for the grown up.
The result isn't too bad yet I should have had a little more personality to the big one, it is too static in my opinion. Yet it was very nice to work and experience interaction between moving bodies.

Cubeys interacting (uploaded the 26 October 2013)


Cubey jumping

Quick exercise done in flash consisting of our little simple protagonist, cubey, jumping from one spot to another.

They said keep it simple, so i kept it simple

Jumping cubey (never uploaded on the other blog)



Johnny the dealer

Inspiration really comes from everywhere. People you walk by...strangers...other American fellow animators...
Quick exercise done with black shape technique on photoshop: used one layer only and i remember being terribly nervous while doing anything.

Johnny the dealer (uploaded the 26 October 2013): he looks kind of chubby in the drawing, yet maybe he is just wearing a lot of clothes. Like a lot, really a lot...or maybe just too many cheeseburgers. Remember to eat plenty of vegetables
and don't do drugs


By the way Joe, the model, was ok with this. We had a good laugh and that's it.
This is his blog, go check it out
http://josephstout13.blogspot.co.uk/

Barbed Wurm

After bouncing balls, creepy puppets and people running what i needed was a little relax:
Videogames? Nope
A nice run? Naaah
Dating? I said "relaxation"
Drinking? Implying i am a social person...
DRAWING? OH BOY YESSSSSSSS

jokes apart i drew something on photoshop more complicated and fun than a guy drooling. A worm, or better, an armored worm, hunting a mythical Alcyone. Mistakes are many, yet i just wanted to have fun, not caring too much about the deer's back or the background itself.
It was all about a huge worm trying to kill something else.
Groovy

Barbed wurm (uploaded 21 October 2013): As said before, the deer isn't exactly splendid and the background looks made by a 12 years old holding the pencil upside down. But the worm is cool...right? I like the sunset environments.



Storyboard "End of the line": two people meeting

 Two people meeting was the main theme: one is moving faster than the other. The main difficulty consisted in having a continuity in the movement of the characters, even thou we had to change camera angles and cut between the two of them.


Early sketches on paper of the two main characters, Carver and Muriel, plus a quick graphic of how things were supposed to go.





First sketch on photoshop of the development of the story: everybody were like "it is ok, it is supposed to look rough!" but i was like "Over my dead body, I am gonna do this again"


Final sketch of the storyboard "End of the line" by me (uploaded the 18 October 2013): took me ages despite the simple backgrounds and the simple coloration, yet i still managed to make mistakes like in the 11-12th panels, where the woman face is supposed to be on the other side of the frame. Oh well...My only concern is that it is clear enough.


Lip-syncing a banana

Exercise done in flash for the 11 seconds club.
It is a banana talking shaking its fist.
Don't give me that look, it was a good idea, back then.
The exercise consisted mainly in lip-syncing and it wasn't easy at all. I heard the guy talking at least 40 times, yet i still don't understand what is he talking about. Jee...


Banana president (uploaded the 10 October 2013): Well there is not a lot to say about this one. It is supposed to talk, and it is talking.
I'd add some more details, like photo flashes, but i am quite satisfied.





2d Balls

We are talking about the basics here. Both Mr Wyatt and Mr Finch told us that in 2d and 3d you can be a God in what you do, but "bouncing balls" will always be the basis, the elements from which you can tell you know what you are doing.
The following projects are my first "serious" animations for Falmouth university: two different balls, two different movements.
Both animations were uploaded the 10 October 2013.

Football (soccer ball for the rest of the world): Yea, i am not fully satisfied with this one. It was the first approach with something serious and physics on flash, yet i'd re do it if i had to (and i probably will)



Bowling ball: Better. In my opinion is more realistic than the other, plus i had fun doing the background.


ANIMATIONS first encounter

Here we are.
It was October, back then in 2013
They gave me the power to animate things. 
Sounds pretty boring, but it isn't. 
Watching your creation coming to life might sound stupid, but it isn't...it was (and it is) mind blowing. Those ideas that first were in your brain now are right there, in front of you, and are moving.
The concept is simple, an illusion, yet we can consider this a miracle. A time consuming miracle. Really consuming...am i exaggerating? Definitely. But I just animated myself, what the hell did you expected me to say?

Giacomo Ghigo drooling (uploaded 10 october 2013)



Another quick exercise with objects. Still me, a little creepier. (uploaded 10 October 2013)

Anthrax viper

Done the 1st October 2013

Anthrax Viper is a creation of mine: I spent way too many hours on this work, if i'd do this again, i'd probably finish it much quicker and add some details. Oh, cmon, i am not saying i am good, i'm saying i'm better! Oh no please don't leave, maybe you are misunderstanding, can we talk about it? Ok go fine
fine
I'll call you
can i?
...


Anthrax viper, 2 versions light and dark