Tonight was the last day of Class 3. Pretty sad, Drew Adams is an amazing mentor. I feel like at AM when you enjoy your mentor you wish they were teaching the next class you were taking, but then you take your next class and end up feeling the same way about that mentor.

My Class 1 mentor was Aaron Hartline from Pixar. Awesome guy and excellent mentor. What I loved most about his class was that class time could also be critique time so if you made changes on sunday from your e-critique by the time class came then you can get and early critique to make your hand in for that week even better.

Class 2 I had Alan Rogers. So I feel like my registration for class 2 needs a back story... I dont exactly remember how I registered for Class 1 but I dont remember there being a chance to plan. With Class 2 there was a lot of talk with eachother on who everyone was going to take. The only way we could plan was by looking at the current mentors and picking one from the ones who were teaching that term and hoping they would be teaching the next term (which you wont find out till registration opens). So when registration came I dont remember any of the names from the registration list as people that I thought of as an option for Class 2. I remember some upper classmen mentioning Alan Rogers (I didnt remember what they said about him though) but classes were quickly filling up so I grabbed him. He was not the popular choice (Jason Martinsen was) and so at first I was bummed thinking "oh no I have no idea how this is going to go". This is where I learned that all mentors at AM are amazing.

Alan was awesome and I'm so glad that registration went the way it did otherwise I would have missed out on this gem of a mentor. What I really liked about him was that he cut to the chase on critiques and didnt hold back punches. Back at SCAD I had the pleasure of being taught by Scott Wright who had a similar teaching method. I think I learn best with this type of teaching (I think it has something to do with my experience in the military) and since then I really appreciate this stance. I think its best to just point out everything thats wrong in order to improve the best you can. They're helping us to succeed not trying to profit from hurt lol. Any type of critique that is just saying "oh good job" and doesn't offer constructive critique is a waste of time and unproductive.

I'm not sure I completely understand what the main purpose of a blog is but this quickly turned into a journal entry. Anyway this is what I submitted for my final for Class 3



I am pretty disappointed in it. I think I screwed in up deciding to do subtle instead of bigger movements in an advanced body mechanics class. I was hoping to come out of this with a nice 3 shot set up for my reel but I don't think I will be putting any of this on my reel. I have a Christmas long shot idea I want to use as a display of my knowledge for body mechanics. I also just recently was lent an amazing rig with which I have an idea for an animation I'm really excited for which could be a decent multi character shot. As for when I do those however has yet to be determined since I'm doubling up on classes next term. I will be taking the Creatures: Fight or Flight class as well as Class 4 Introduction to Acting. I'm ridiculously excited for both of these classes. Next term starts Monday so I'll start posting up ideas for Class 4 on here this week. The creature class will have to wait till Monday since I wont have access to their syllabus till then and I managed to get the class 4 syllabus early from upper classmen.



I couldnt think of a pose idea late last night and took the easy way out drawing a pose from Ronin while watching Epic
(I love Epic by the way, sword fights and people riding flying creatures have a soft place in my heart... HTTYD <3 )