Cave Lighting Keys

In preparation for submitting my portfolio to Disney, I did up some quick tonal paintings of my cavern layout, showing a different lighting scheme in each one. The idea came from Will--he mentioned that a student of his did this for 4 different layouts, with 4 different lighting schemes for each, and that it got him an internship at Pixar. I think the idea is to show that you can light a composition from any which way you choose...demonstrate versatility, etc.

I like how, using only light and shadow, you can communicate three completely different ideas, or moods, through the same layout.

Full painting to come later...

Cavern Rough Lighting Keys

Will says there's only 6 possible combinations for landscapes with a clear foreground, middleground, and background. You're gonna have light, medium, and dark tones, so there you go.

I'm working on some lighting keys for the cave layout, so I whipped this up quickly to give myself a basic schematic of what the different possibilities are (not accounting for unnatural or unusual lighting situations--lanterns, fairy dust, etc.)

Mostly for me but also for you to see how one layout can look so different...tone really matters!
FYI if you really want to see the difference, I'd suggest opening the image in a new tab, zooming in, and then focusing on each different layout. Looking at them all together boggles the mind...

Final Cavern Layout!!!

At long last, it's here! The Cavern layout is finished! YAY!
Anyways, I finished this a little earlier than I had to because I need to get cracking on the digital painting. I want to have a semi-painted layout to show Will on Friday.

Why the giant squid/octopus tentacles? Glad you asked...somehow or another Will started making fun of me for not liking squid, and then drew a giant squid tentacle in the middle of my rough composition on his tracing paper when he was critiquing it. I decided that it would be funny to keep the tentacle in, but place it surreptitiously in the foreground.
That I did, and then after showing it to Will again, I decided to go big or go home! Tentacles galore! (That staircase just WASN'T working, you know? So why not replace it with another tentacle?)

The end story, which I made up to justify the excess of tentacles, is that this underground (underwater?) city is plagued by killer squids...so they hang lanterns filled with squid repellant outside their doors and windows...lol!

Here's the blue-pencil version:

And here it is desaturated:

Click on it for a LARGE view!!!

First Lantern Designs

I took a look at ref and did some quick lantern designs in sharpie and Prismacolor markers.
The one on the left is one of my favorites. I think I can push the shapes a little more, though...

Rough Cavern Layout

I gotta think of a better name than "Cavern" for this project :D

Here is the rough layout I did based on the 2nd thumb from the last post. I enjoyed myself a lot on this one, adding lanterns here and there to make it feel busy, and wireframing the heck out of everything to give some depth and form to the rocks and stalactites.

Will took his pen and tracing paper and pointed out all sorts of things that I've got to change, but that's great, and I'm super excited to turn this into a working layout...hopefully painted? (Cross your fingers!)

Cavern City Thumbnails

I went in and did some extra thumbnails just to make sure there wasn't a composition I liked better than the original one...heehee. I didn't find one :D

Enjoy!

Goodbye Star Wars, Hello Hanging Cave City!

So after doing some thinking (and drawing) to the Star Wars effect, I didn't really feel like the layout was working. I LOVE Star Wars, and still get a kick out of the idea, but I haven't been able to do any original design, since I'm basically drawing things that have already been invented and designed. Meh.

So I decided to ditch the idea, but I liked the composition so I chose to keep the same thumbnail. Then last night I was seized with inspiration! I'm going to create a hidden city with strange buildings hanging from the cave ceiling! (These will handily replace the bottom of the Star Destroyer in the original thumbnail...do you know how hard it is to convey "Star Destroyer" by simply drawing the bottom corner of one? No one's gonna recognize that...)

I traced over my thumbnail and replaced the ship with dwellings, and then did some designing. What do the dwellings look like? I did some doorways carved into stalactites and stalagmites, some rickety stairwells that will look like spun sugar clinging to the cave ceiling, and then designed some hanging lanterns to light the ancient city. Enjoy! Definitely more to come!

PS Please click on the image for a full view!

Star Wars Cave!

Hahaha...our next assignment is to create a layout where "USC Students get trapped underground and then discover the remains of an ancient civilization".
I was like, hmm...what's an ancient civilization that I know of? STAR WARS! (A long time ago...remember?) Anyways, I decided, why don't I have them enter a cave and stumble upon Darth Vader's helmet lying among the rocks? Or how about finding an X-wing or Tie fighter encased in a column of ice?

My favorite is the first one. In this one, they're walking into the cave and seeing the bottom of a giant Star Destroyer encased in rocks. In the foreground I'll probably put Darth Vader's helmet and some of the remains of his Tie fighter on the rocky ground. Heehee.