The New Doktah

I like Matt Smith as the new Doctor Who, but I'm really not a fan of the new intro music.

Also, above is an animation background I did recently as part of an art test for Spark-Flow

Epic Music

Anyone who knows me knows how obsessed I am with soundtracks. When it comes to music, the more theatrical the better for me. When I listen to that kinda stuff, I tend to get really inspired and my brain goes crazy thinking about movies, movie-making, shots, stories, images, and it feels like I'm on a creative high. I think the treatment of a soundtrack (or lack thereof) can EASILY make or break a movie and it's something that's overlooked by a lot of us visual types. I mean how much impact would that "married life" montage from Up have if that song wasn't there? How much identity did the soundtrack give to the original Star Wars? Anyway below are links to a few of my favorites, check them out.


Moving Mountains by Two Steps from Hell - It's pretty much as epic as it sounds, it's been used in a few shitty trailers -
LINK

Freedom Fighters by Two Steps from Hell - used in one of the Star Trek trailer song -
LINK

Hollywood and Vines by Michael Giacchino - It's the song they used in Lost when people walked around. This is the song they WALK AROUND to. (I recommend you fast forward to 1:00.) The version I'm linking to is one where someone combined the different versions of the song used in the show-
LINK

Baidir Trailer - And awesome trailer made in france as part of a pitch for a new animation project. It's pretty amazing -
LINK

Barbarian Horde by Hans Zimmer - It's from Gladiator. The whole reason I listen to this song starts at around 5:35 -
LINK

Character Studies

These are some loose sketches of the protagonist starring in my next set of storyboards.

messin around

trying to focus and failing utterly.

Roger Ebert's rant

Let me start by saying that I don't agree with what Roger Ebert said about video games not being art. First of all, the debate over what makes art "art" is a long, endless assault of opinions and the lack of unity on that point makes the entire argument moot. Having said that, I personally define art as the act of creation with intent. Within that, there is obviously good art and bad art. I think good art is measured by how successful the artist was in communicating what the intent WAS, and then achieving it.

Now let's talk about what Ebert MEANS to say, which I think can be summarized by one of his own quotes;

" 'No one in or out of the field has ever been able to cite a game worthy of comparison with the great poets, filmmakers, novelists and poets.' To which I could have added painters, composers, and so on, but my point is clear."

Now on this point, I ALMOST agree, but not quite and my disagreement is three-fold

1) There's this wonderful romanticized notion that older=better, and it's just not true. Well at least it's not automatically true. This notion exists EVERYWHERE though, and it's an idea that has woven itself in the minds of appreciators of movies, video games, t.v. shows, books, comics, animation etc. Now I think a lot of the time, people say this because older material sets the precedence for techniques and ideas that will influence the later generations. They do this because they're the first, and they have the opportunity to set the standard for how the medium will be used from then on. Progression is usually slow and gradual after the initial birth of a new medium. Limitation also usually forces creativity and it also usually forces things (like movies) to center their techniques and methods on the basic essential principles of their craft. Video games are no exception to this.

2) Not all video games are meant to be storytelling, a lot are meant to be more about the interactivity and experience of actually PLAYING the game (tetris? katamari?). This is a principle of video game creation and it's something Roger Ebert doesn't seem to understand. It looks to me like he's comparing video games to movies as though games are a slight alternative, and like I said, this isn't always the case. I personally enjoy the cinematic, story-oriented games more, but I know that's not what all games are about.

3) There ARE some games that compare, even on the narrative side. Half Life is a big, fat juicy example of amazing storytelling, amazing immersion, amazing character development, amazing EVERYTHING. There are very few other examples but I don't even need to go beyond this one.

I think Roger Ebert may be right when he says "no video gamer now living will survive long enough to experience the medium as an art form." but it's only probably because nobody will want to give the medium the respect it deserves until it's old enough to automatically deserve it.

If you're looking for inspiration..

It's amazing.

John Nevarez's blog

Studies and a doodle