Character Design for Animation with Nate Wragg

In this workshop, we will be exploring the many different ways one can go about designing a character for animation. We will focus on how a characters personality affects his shape, and how shape says something about who a character is. We will also be discussing the importance of designing a functional character for both 2-D and 3-D animation mediums.

Digital Painting Workshop with Erik D. Martin

This workshop will focus on digital painting and designing for animation (with an emphasis on storytelling). This includes designing practical backgrounds, characters and props using Photoshop. Erik will also cover some basic color theory, perspective and use of textures.

Fantasy Illustration Workshop with Kekai Kotaki

KeKai Kotaki is a renowned illustrator and lead concept artist at Arenanet, working on Guild Wars 2. In this workshop KeKai will demonstrate his process for creating beautiful digital fantasy art using various techniques. This will consist of everything from gesture, composition, and mood, to lighting, shading, and character design. KeKai will also talk about his experience as an illustrator and concept artist.

Character Illustration Workshop with Nicolas Marlet

Nicolas Marlet was trained in France and started his career as an animator. He's worked as a character designer on nine feature films, and because of his work on Kung Fu Panda and How to Train Your Dragon, the world finally got to see his designs really make it to the screen. Nicolas Marlet's format is different from all other workshops, he just creates an illustration. It is an observation of a master character artist at work. No dialog, no commentary, no distractions. Just Nico doing what he does best; creating beautiful works of art.

Environment Design Workshop with James Paick

James Paick a concept artist and owner of Scribble Pad Studios will illustrate the process in how he goes about designing environments for blockbuster games and films. This workshop will teach the fundamentals required to create world class environment concept art which will include thumbnails, perspective, and compsotion, lighting, and color theory. James will also talk about into the individual components required to stage a successful environment design and architectural ideas and concepts used to create compelling structures.

Intro to Background Design and Perspective

Imagine a beautiful castle with enormous spires, an underground super villain's lair, or dark and grimy factory filled with ludicrous machinery. How do you take an idea for an environment and turn it into a drawing? This workshop will give the beginning designer the foundation needed to design environments and backgrounds. Additionally, this workshop will be an introduction to background design techniques that will take you from the basics of perspective, sketching, composition to more advanced techniques using software such as Google Sketchup and Photoshop.

Creature & Character Design for Games

Eric's workshop will take you step by step through the creation of amazing yet believable creatures and characters.

Storyboarding for Animation

This workshop will focus on the Feature Film storyboarding process, and various storytelling philosophies. Louie will outline concepts about the script analysis and planning process, while also sharing insight into aspects of feature animation film making, and why it differs from TV story boarding.

Visual Development for Film

This workshop will focus on the creation of production illustrations used for pitches and visual development in the film industry. The process involves designing and illustrating environments, principles of dramatic lighting, composition, atmospheric perspective and applying textures. Having a design background in the car industry Patrick works as a concept designer for the film industry. His recent projects include "Gatchaman", "Priest" and "Jack the Giant Killer".

Traditional Animal Anatomy

This workshop is an introduction to animal drawing covering topics such as rhythm, design, form, gesture, proportion and basic anatomy. Joe's workshop will teach participants the fundamentals of animal anatomy. The content within this survey will also serve as a starting point for drawing the live model, drawing from imagination, and offer a basic approach that can be built upon with more advanced studies. With emphasis placed on proper distribution of mass via line weighting and placement, along with instruction on how to create dynamic poses and composition, Joe's workshop will give the beginning artist the foundation they need to create not only great art, but functional organic design as well ..

Figure Drawing

Good knowledge of the structure of the human form is invaluable for any artist. Michael Hampton - the author of the book: “Figure Drawing: Design and Invention” -will be sharing his insights about the subject, during this workshop. During his demonstration, Michael will exploit the use of gesture to construct the human figure, while taking into consideration anatomy as the main focus of the studies.

Character Design for Games

Good character design is critical to financial success in most action and adventure games. Designing a compelling character for games require the ability to create characters with strong personality and visual interests. This process encompasses a multitude of techniques and principals from defining visual design themes, refining shapes and silhouettes, posses, facial expression, and most importantly communicating the way the character will move and behave. Carlo’s experiences ranges from working at studios such as Blizzard, Insomniac, and ILM, and projects such as God of War, World of Warcraft, and Resistance: Fall of Man to name a few.

Character Design - Female Cyborg

Good character design is critical to financial success in most action and adventure games. Designing a compelling character for games require the ability to create characters with strong personality and visual interests. Carlo's workshop will demonstrate the creative process and techniques for making a female cyborg character for a game series. Human form mixed with robotic technology etc. This will integrate organic forms with technology.

Vehicle/Mech Design

This workshop will focus on the creation of vehicle and Sci-Fi mech/robot design used for visual development in the toy, game, and film industries. The process involves designing and illustrating various vehicle and mech/robots using research, digital and traditional sketching, and dynamic perspective.

Dynamic Sketching

Sketching is one of the key tools concept artists utilize to visually create, communicate, and express their creative ideas (both dynamically, and via stories and experiences). As such, concept design sketches should feel quick, accurate and very dynamic. In this workshop Peter Han will show you how to break down objects to their most basic geometric shapes and forms. Such skills can be applied to creatures, characters, props, weapons, and environment sketches, and are the foundations for a successful designer. Peter will also talk about how he utilizes these techniques day-to-day as a professional artists working in the game industry.

Creature Design

Anthony Francisco is a Concept Artist/Art Director who has worked on many projects- for both the film and gaming industry. He has created concepts for numerous movies, such as: Men in Black 2, Alien Vs. Predator, Species3, Spiderman, and Chronicles of Riddick (just to name a few). He has also taught character design at Gnomon, and the Los Angeles Academy of Figurative Arts. In this workshop Anthony will demonstrate how to bring about true bloodcurdling creature designs. He will outline everything from: initial sketches, preliminary design, and initial final rendering process using Photoshop, to the integration of a concept design for prosthetics used in practical effects. Anthony will also talk about his experience as a creature designer, his work, and what it takes to stand out in this industry.

Environment Design: Sci-Fi World

This workshop will focus on Sci-Fi environments for games. Darren will teach the fundamentals required to create world class environments, and answer questions such as: What individual components are required to stage a successful environment design? Or what architectural ideas and concepts should be used to create compelling structures? Layout, perspective, and composition; lighting, and color theory; and various other tips, tricks, and techniques to finalize your piece will be featured.

Creature Design: Dissecting a Minotaur

In this workshop Anthony will demonstrate how to create a very intimidating minotaur creature. He will outline everything from: initial sketches and preliminary design, to the final layout and rendering process in Photoshop. This will involve his thorough process for creating the minotaur, along with the different references he used and what it was like for him to create such a compelling character from scratch.

More info:

_http://www.cgmwonline.com/workshops.html