I'd like to start off by urging anyone in the visual effects industry to please visit Stu Maschwitz's blog, Prolost. It's an excellent well-written and thought-out blog by the co-founder of the former much loved VFX studio The Orphanage, and writer of the The DV Rebel's Guide. Everyone has been talking about the sad loss of The Orphanage lately, and I wish everyone who was there the best of luck. You will never find a better employee than a former Orphan.

In fact, I've had the pleasure of meeting a few Orphans within the past year, and they have all been without a doubt the smartest people I have ever had the pleasure to meet. I took Tim Dobbert's Matchmoving class at the Academy of Art University in San Francisco, and the man is a matchmoving genius. In fact, he's the only one that's currently written a book on the subject. I also had the pleasure of watching a small presentation given by two amazing Orphans on the production of the HUD/GUI display used in Ironman that absolutely blew my mind away. I believe one of their names was Kyle, and he is currently teaching a Grad Nuke class at the Academy. Two nights ago I also heard a presentation from a former Orphan at SFMOGRAPH in Adobe about Alpha Premultiplication workflow inside After Effects. In a matter of two minutes, he managed to confuse, astound, and teach me premultiplication in a way that I never thought I would ever need to know, but now realize makes so much sense. I would be lucky to ever have a fraction of the creative genius the brilliant minds at The Orphanage seemed to amass.

I'd like to post my current works in progress here for all to see, critique, and comment as much as they please. Please realize that I can't show you everything without violating NDA and wishes of my directors and supervisors. That said, I will try and post as much as I can, and hopefully I can receive some pretty helpful feedback from my readers.

Here's what's going on in my Adv. Lighting and Texturing class being taught by Derek Flood of Shark Tacos Studios. We were given this model, and week by week, are learning different techniques to bring it closer to completion. I am working on SSS skin right now, and we're starting Maya Hair and Fur next week.