A trip down memory lane and a Nativity Scene in a Moleskine update

On my way to work on the train this morning, there were 3 guys sitting across from me. They all had laptops and skateboards. One of them was also sketching on a pad of paper. I noticed that the sketcher had what looked like a preview mode of a 3D animation.

I know that all too well. It brought back memories of when I was in school studying 3D computer animation. Back then, in 1994, oh how awful the 3D computer animation software was. The 486 DX2-66MHz computer was the top of the line and we were using 3D Studio version 3. What a pain it was to use that program. It wasn't until 2 or 3 years later I got to work on a real program. It was Maya. Or was it Alias? I forget*. I abandoned 3D a long time ago. What a pain. You needed at least an SGI machine and there was no way I could afford it.

What luck students today have with cheaper laptops, much larger harddrives, a lot faster RAM, BETTER software. I am thankful for that. They can concentrate on the art and not on the technology or workaround.

Oh, I'm having flashbacks... And the rendering time... Make them stop! Make them stop!

Anyhoo, I uploaded my first sketch in the Nativity Scene in the Moleskine Project I am doing for Christmas. You'll see the image there.

For this blog, I'll upload a sketch of Spud's guardian angel who I finally, finally, FINALLY settled upon a character design for him! FINALLY! I just need to refine him a bit. He's the little guy on the left.


* edit: I just remembered. It was Houdini. It was also the first time I used a UNIX machine. I am so glad Mac OS X is based on UNIX!