ProWeekend

So this weekend I had the incredible opportunity to hear lectures from several amazing former Disney animators/artists Ruben Aquino, Claire Keane, and Tom Bancroft at ProWeekend in Nashville. Their lectures were so inspiring. They hit on so many topics that I've been thinking about over the years and also some that I should have been thinking about. I took away so much from them. 

I also met Chris Oatley (I recently enrolled in one of his online classes which you can check out on his website) and was very fortunate to sit with him for the second half the seminar and listen to him dish out some great words of wisdom and encouragement.

But anyway, art stuff. Part of this seminar was a contest and the prompt was "A girl and her monster, is it a trick or a treat?" 

I pretty much knew immediately that I wanted the little girl to be the tough/scary one between her and the monster. Here are the first sketches I drew as I was thinking through that.

This is probably one of my favorite sketches of her. She just looks so angry. Don't even think about giving her an apple instead of candy.

The monster was a bit harder to work out. I couldn't decide exactly how I wanted to him to look. I thought about more dragon-esque type but it didn't quite have the feel I wanted. I wanted him to be scary and huge, towering over the little girl. But I also wanted him to look extremely excited about trick or treating as a fairy princess.

This is the final product! I did it in water colors and brush pen with a few small touch ups in photoshop. 

I was awarded the funniest picture and my prize was original Mulan storyboards! 

I cannot overstate how incredible the experience was. If you are an artist/creative person then I implore you to look for opportunities like this in your respective disciplines. Hearing from people who have been there makes your dreams and goals seem so much more tangible.