Tommy - "The Batman"

Cycle Test (WIP)

I've been trying my hand at creating cycles using the "Something" rig, courteously provided by the multi-talented Rodney Brett. Seriously, that's it's name. The "Something." Whatever it is, the only thing that's certain is that it is a huge derp. 

If this creature were in an RPG, it would be one of those laughably weak monsters that are inexplicably fun to beat to a pulp. I really wanted to incorporate this into my animations for this character. Everything it does looks stupid from the lagging tongue to his floppy eyes that can't keep up with his head.

What we have here are four animation cycles (idle, idle action, walk and run) combined and blended together using Maya's Trax Editor. The run is not complete, but the other three are pretty much done. I may create some transitional animations as well for certain connections. Each cycle took about a day, though I'm confident I could do all four of them again in one.

Cycle Test from Michael DiNocco on Vimeo.

Sañ the Saguaro Cactoid

It has been a while since my last post, but I assure you new things are in the works. I've been putting more time into developing my Cactoid story and the main character, Sañ. The name is based off the O’odham word for saguaro cactus (O'odham is the Uto-Aztecan language of southern Arizona and northern Sonora).

I'll release more details on the story in the future, but for now I'll leave you with some quick character design sketches and a turnaround for Sañ, which is being used to create a 3D model which I plan on having rigged for animation.

Tommy - Crying Wolf

Onami Dialogue Test [WIP]

Here's a piece I started working on about two months ago. It is a dialogue test using audio from Karate Kid 2. I ended up taking a break for a while to focus on applying for jobs before starting up on it again about 2 1/2 weeks ago. I ended up redoing a large portion of it from what might as well have been from scratch, but I'm happy to say that the quality has really grown exponentially because of that. I'm just about done with it sans lip-sync, which still needs a fair bit of work. I'd like to have this done and on my reel by tomorrow, so be looking for an updated demo reel (finally) very soon.

I'm exited to try a new workflow used by Michael Makarewicz, a Pixar animator who recently came to Ex'pression to give a lecture/demo on animating. His workflow really seems in tune with the way I'd like to work, but I was never sure how to go about efficiently. I'm hoping that will help really overhaul the speed at which I work. My goal is to be able to finish something like this within a week of 8-10 hour work days and this new workflow might be just the ticket I need to meet that goal.

Da'mu

Da'mu is a character I created and modeled for the "Creative Pre-Production" class at Ex'pression. The class entailed creating armatures for our models, sculpting them with super sculpy clay, baking them, and finally painting them. Additionally, we had to create a short animatic that told a story about the character, which I will post later once it's uploaded to Vimeo.

"Olympic Whispers"

I worked alongside over a dozen fellow students at Ex'pression College for Digital Art to create this short film from scratch in 2 weeks for presentation in the Cinemagic International Film Festival for Young People.

The project is part 2 of 3 in a series of films, where each segment was required to begin with the last frame of the one that preceeded it. Instructors were not allowed to offer any help beyond introducing us to the project. 

My roles on the project included animation, painting skin weights on rigs, and providing troubleshooting help.

A part of "Olympic Whispers" from Cinemagic's International Film Festival for Young People from Michael DiNocco on Vimeo.