Short film: Keloid

Impressive full CG trailer from the people at Big Lazy Robot. Those guys rock!
http://www.k3loid.com/
http://www.biglazyrobot.com/

Misc: Deadlines

Very smart!

Misc: The human brain

Interesting.

http://paperempire.net/2011/10/12/of-human-brains-and-human-governance/

Human beings are born with different physical brains.  Many of the physical attributes of the brain greatly influence our personalities, emotions, abilities and interests.  Within the realm of human society and human governance, the population is divided into three general brain types:   Sociopaths,  Sheep,  and Truth Seekers.

Sociopaths  Within the human population there exist a small subset of individuals whose brains are essentially defective in one important regard: They do not experience emotion as the rest of the population does.  They are driven only by the temporary happiness (or exhilaration) obtained through the gain of power or money.  Once this temporary rush wears off, they exist only to seek their next fix.  Although they do not experience normal emotions, they understand well how to emulate them and how to manipulate them to their advantage.  Sociopaths tend to feel little remorse and do not have a conscience in the normal sense. They do not seek to simply live their lives, and as a result, have tremendous amounts of time to devote to their solitary purpose of obtaining more power and more money. They are naturally suited for climbing social power structures.  The highest levels of banking, finance and politics contain far larger concentrations of sociopaths than the population at large.

Sheep  The great bulk of the population exists neither to control others or to discover truth. They simply want to live their lives.  They attempt to do this through the path of least resistance.  The process of seeking truth involves tremendous amounts of mental work that gets in the way of living their lives. They prefer not to do the heavy lifting required to arrive at a set of beliefs, but rather, to adopt a predefined set.  They find great comfort in seeking the approval of others as it reassures them the belief systems that they have adopted (or have been taught) are correct. Once reassured, they are relieved of the arduous mental work required to discover the truth.  The Sheep tend to follow the voices of the sociopaths, who in turn seek to herd them;  to shear them;  and in some cases – to slaughter them.

Truth Seekers  At this this end of the distribution lay the diametrical opposite of the sociopaths.  These are the individuals whose desire for truth and the ability to live free, is so strong that they will accept a more difficult life in order to accomplish those goals. Unlike the sociopaths, they have no desire to wield power over others.  In fact, they view the control of others as a great burden – a tremendous drain on precious time – time that should be spent discovering the true nature of the world around them.  These people are strong individualists and tend to be scientists, artists, and thinkers.  Because of their inherent nature, they tend to avoid any involvement in politics, the bureaucracy, and institutions of management.  It is only in times of great political strain, and threat to their own freedom, that they are forced to become part of the politic.  They rise up during times of revolution, as necessary, only to fade away once the overthrow of the sociopaths has been accomplished. Power is then gradually yielded back to the sociopaths as the lessons of the past are slowly forgotten by subsequent generations of Sheep.

Photography: National geographic

Beautiful pictures from National Geographic http://www.fubiz.net/2011/11/21/national-geographic-2011/

 

Misc: Timelapse of the earth from the space

Photography: Personal postcards

Lately I have started collecting the panoramic photographies from the different trips that I have done over the last couple of years and put them into kind of a postcard format. I enclose some of them and I will try to upload newer ones regularly.
This ones from New Zealand.

Film: Eva movie credits

Fantastic credits by Dvein for the spanish movie Eva.

Lighting: Rendering Synthetic Objects into Legacy Photographs

Wow!

Misc: The Top Ten Lessons Steve Jobs Taught Us

As you all probably know Steve Jobs passed away last week. He was truly one of a kind that changed the way we interact with computers and will be reminded as one of the most brilliant minds of our century. I found this interesting article about the top ten lessons that he taught us and I thought it was worth to share. 

http://www.forbes.com/sites/ericjackson/2011/10/05/the-top-ten-lessons-steve-jobs-taught-us/2/

1. The most enduring innovations marry art and science

2. To create the future, you can’t do it through focus groups

3. Never fear failure

4. You can’t connect the dots forward – only backward

5. Listen to that voice in the back of your head that tells you if you’re on the right track or not

6. Expect a lot from yourself and others

7. Don’t care about being right.  Care about succeeding

8. Find the most talented people to surround yourself with

9. Stay hungry, stay foolish

10. Anything is possible through hard work, determination, and a sense of vision

A long time ago I started thinking why there was some people that was head and shoulders over the rest of the human beings. There are some people that are unique as Mr. Jobs, elite sportsmen or artists and they seem to be in a different level that the "ordinary" people. At some point I started thinking that we all had an innate talent for something specific but that only a few people was able to find it. A few years later I came across a book from Mr. Ken Robinson titled "The Element" that was precisely talking about this same topic. In the book he talks about dozens of examples of people that had found that inner "element" and that became very successful in what they did. It was really nice to see that there were some "theories" about something that had been intriguing me for years. Though, I have recently started thinking that I am not quite sure that everyone has that hidden gem inside. It seems to be very difficult to find passionate people about what they do and I personally find quite difficult to find people that inspire me with their energy and they attitude. Sometimes I am thinking that maybe not everyone has that inner need of doing what they are meant to do. They probably fulfil their lives with other things and they might not have that voice in the back of their heads that Mr. Jobs talked about or that voice might be too weak to be heard. It seems to me that there is people like Steve Jobs that could not have lived another life. He had something burning inside his guts that was beyond his own control and that was somehow leading him. I have started questioning myself if every human being has that little spark waiting to be ignited or if instead that is something genetic that not everyone has. Probably nature is smart enough and only puts those gens in a few people otherwise, how would it be if the planet earth were flooded with Steve Jobs kind of people?

In any case another big lesson that we have learned from Mr. Jobs passing is that money can not guarantee you health and that we should be able to put money in the right place of important things in life.

Photography: Landscapes

I am speechless!

Photography: Series

Some more theme photos.

 

 

 

Misc:Sand Sculpture

Impressive sand sculpture!
The process:http://www.pondly.com/2011/09/devils-sand-sculpture-by-master-ray-villafane/

Misc: 10 immutable laws of mistakes

http://www.techrepublic.com/blog/10things/10-immutable-laws-of-mistakes/2633?tag=nl.e099

Law #1: Everyone makes mistakes

“Everyone makes mistakes. That’s why there is an eraser on every pencil.” — Japanese proverb

Law #2: Not all mistakes are bad mistakes

“The only man who never makes mistakes is the man who never does anything.” — Theodore Roosevelt

Law #3: Mistakes not seen by others are not mistakes

“When a tree falls in a lonely forest, and no animal is near by to hear it, does it make a sound?” — Charles Riborg Mann and George Ransom Twiss

Law #4: Ignorance does not excuse your mistakes

“Ignorance of the law excuses no man…” — John Selden

Law #5: Mistakes occur at the very worst time

“If there is a worse time for something to go wrong, it will happen then.” – Corollary to Murphy’s Law

Law #6: Mistakes beget mistakes

“Desperate people do desperate things.“ — Anonymous

Law #7: Mistakes made with computers propagate faster and cause more damage

“Computers have enabled people to make more mistakes faster than almost any invention in history, with the possible exception of tequila and hand guns.” — Mitch Ratcliffe

Law #8: Mistakes of inaction are mistakes nonetheless

“I never worry about action, but only about inaction.” - Winston Churchill

Law #9: Failing to own up to your mistakes is a mistake

“You may make mistakes, but you are not a failure until you start blaming someone else.” — Mary Pickford

Law #10: Failing to learn from your mistakes is a mistake

“The only real mistake is the one from which we learn nothing.” — John Powell

Personal: Dimension 2.5 interview

I have recently been interviewed at a spanish site called Dimension 2.5. The interview is in Spanish and you can take a look at it HERE

Photography: Black and White Portraits of the Homeless by Lee Jeffries

Amazing portraits!
http://pic-tures.blogspot.com/2011/08/black-and-white-portraits-of-homeless.html#more

Misc: Pearls of wisdom

Lovely video with very nice photography.
 

Misc: Dalai Lama quote

I am kind of transcendental lately...:P

The Dalai Lama, when asked what surprised him most about humanity:

“Man. Because he sacrifices his health in order to make money. Then he sacrifices money to recuperate his health. And then he is so anxious about the future that he does not enjoy the present; the result being that he does not live in the present or the future; he lives as if he is never going to die, and then dies having never really lived.”

Misc: Why success always starts with failure

http://the99percent.com/tips/7072/Why-Success-Always-Starts-With-Failure?utm_source=Triggermail&utm_medium=email&utm_term=ALL&utm_campaign=MIH%20September%20%2711

Misc: Steve Jobs quote

From  the Stanford graduation speech in June 2005.


Remembering that I'll be dead soon is the most important tool I've ever encountered to help me make the big choices in life. Because almost everything -- all external expectations, all pride, all fear of embarrassment or failure -- these things just fall away in the face of death, leaving only what is truly important. Remembering that you are going to die is the best way I know to avoid the trap of thinking you have something to lose. You are already naked. There is no reason not to follow your heart.

Misc: 2011 Wage survey

http://animationguild.org/wp-content/uploads/2011/08/2011-Wage-Survey_Locked.pdf

Photography: Series

Lately I have been putting photographs that were sharing a common theme together in kind of a triptic. I will try to upload some of them every now and then.

 

Personal: 15th Aniversary reel

15 years ago, on September 1996 I got my first 3D gig. I have always been a bit freak about keeping my demo reel updated and that helped me to keep images from pretty much all the projects that I have been involved in. I felt like gathering the most representative works and put them all into a kind of conmmemorative demo reel.

To be honest I had never realized the amount of time and effort that I  put on personal projects throughout all this years until I started editing this reel. I could say that almost 50% of the images belong to personal projects done on my spare time, among them two short films and a tv animated series project.

Needless to say that nobody should ever apply to a job position with a reel like this one as you want to put just your better works and keep it under 3 minutes.

On the other hand I have the feeling that I am getting to the end of a stage of my life so I thought it was nice to wrap it up putting all that journey together into a video. I don´t really know where I am heading but that´s also kind of exciting and my life has been always like that anyway.

Cheers

Short film: On Assignment

Incredible video about climbers at Yosemite.
Not only the images are beautiful but this guys are crazy!

On Assignment from Camp 4 Collective on Vimeo.

Photography: Reflections

Beautiful pictures where reflections play a very important role.
Nice lighting and atmosphere in some of them too!
http://acrisdesign.com/2011/08/50-gorgeous-reflection-photography/

Misc: 9 reasons why failure is not fatal

Last month I was invited to give a talk at a Computer Graphics Festival in Galicia called Mundos Digitales. In my speech I talked about my career and how some failures helped me learning some important things that became very handy later on my career. I just bumped into this site that talks further about the same topic.

http://the99percent.com/articles/7057/9-Reasons-Why-Failure-Is-Not-Fatal?utm_source=Triggermail&utm_medium=email&utm_term=ALL&utm_campaign=MIH%20August%20%2711

Photography: Kristian Dowling

Fantastic photos taken with a Noctilux 0.95 mounted on a full frame Leica body. The defocus are beautiful and so are the pictures

http://www.flickr.com/photos/52028515@N05/sets/72157627144348652/show/

And some more pictures from the same guy
http://www.kristiandowling.com/

Short film: Prey 2 cinematic

Very impressive!

Photography: amazing iPhone photographers

Koci Hernandes:
http://www.keepsy.com/gallery/koci

Christina Noerdam Anderson:
http://www.keepsy.com/gallery/cirkeline

Lydia Davison:
http://www.keepsy.com/gallery/lydiadavison

Eros Sana:

http://www.keepsy.com/gallery/eros_sana

Photography: Surreal scenics

http://www.pdnphotooftheday.com/2011/07/10368

Misc: 29 ways to stay creative

29 WAYS TO STAY CREATIVE from TO-FU on Vimeo.

Short film: Defective detective

Sweet!

Short film: Loom

Very impressive short film on this year's Siggraph animated shorts.

Misc: The color of...

Pretty savvy application allowing to to find flickr images of whatever based on its color.

http://www.thecolorof.com/#find

Photography: Defocusing photos as a post process

Interesting technology.
http://www.cnn.com/2011/TECH/gaming.gadgets/06/22/auto.focus.camera/index.html?eref=mrss_igoogle_cnn

http://www.lytro.com/picture_gallery

Film: Nikotxan

My friend Niko, the creator of Calico electronico has started a new site with a new project based on the calico character called Los Telepis. He is an incredible talented artist doing 2D flash animation, make sure you check the site out. The first episode of the Telepis is only available in spanish though.

http://www.nikotxan.com/

Photography: Richard Koci Hernandez

Amazing iPhone photos with Instagram.

http://lens.blogs.nytimes.com/2011/06/09/a-distinctive-voice-on-instagram/
http://www.flickr.com/photos/koci/

Film: Assasins creed E3 trailer

Photography: SLR camera simulator

http://camerasim.com/camera-simulator.html

Short film: Verne on vacation

TV pilot for a TV series created in 2009 by Sylvain Marc.
Sweet!

Misc: The most expensive words in production

How true this can be XDXD

http://www.migrantfilmworker.com/johnvanvliet.html

Misc: Rethink

Very inspiring promotional video for Langara College.

Photography: "Alive" photos

How cool and smart this is!

http://fromme-toyou.tumblr.com/tagged/gif

Film: I am a monster Art

My friends from Headless have uploaded some concept art from the project I am a monster. Did I ever tell you that this guys rock?

Misc: Pursuing passion

Today I came across a quite interesting topic about being your job in the animation industry your passion or just being your job. I found it in Dave Pimentel's blog  and he talks about storyboarding but I think it applies to any discipline and I couldn't agree more with him.

http://drawingsfromamexican.blogspot.com/2011/04/artist-in-animation-vs-animation-artist.html

As an artist you should always want to get better.  We are on a constant road of evolution with our art.  I believe that true artists aren't satisfied with where they are on that road of evolution.  They are always searching for inspiring visuals, books, films, paintings, drawings, or anything to help them learn and get better.    It's a double edged sword for artists who feel this way because you want to feel good about your current work and yet you should be self aware as to how you want to improve it.  The day we stop striving to be better artists is the day we become stagnant and stop growing.
Psychologically believing that you are an artist who works in animation will benefit your animation career.  Reason being you will not just be completing a trade on a daily basis but you will see the artistic facet of your trade whether it be animating, storyboarding, modeling, character design,,,etc.  Realizing that artistic facet will help defeat mediocrity.
The opposite mind set is solely being an animation artist.  this is someone who will not create outside the realm of their job description and will not create any art after they have left the building of employment.  I respect everyone no matter how they feel, but that way of thinking means that that artist is a tradesman.  Someone who is crafting a particular skill and that skill only.  These artists or tradesman if you will do not create any art at home. 
The psychological effect can turn into an animation artist who does not grow or doesn't care to grow in their career because they don't see themselves as artists first.  Thus the career dictates the amount of art done and the hunger to improve is suppressed.  Some may be totally fine with that or some may say they don't have time to create art outside of work.  I've even heard many say that they draw enough all day and the last thing they want to do when they get home is draw.  Sad.

If you are reading this blog you can probably consider yourself as from the second group as it seems that you have some interest in other people's work or in other people's inspirations or in keeping learning beyond your regular job.
When I was reading Dave's blog I came to think of another interesting post in John Hagel's blog about passion in life that I totally subscribe and which I felt completely identified. A little long but worth the read :)

Pursuing passion

Misc: Classic pin-up before and after

http://www.buzzfeed.com/daves4/20-classic-pin-up-girls-before-photoshop