It would be nice to be able to create a bones applied symbol that would allow animators to go back in and add ink outlines, add colours and so on. The characters cape was originally two tone with an ink outline. I really needed to change the ink to fill, and then when applying the bones, it only attached to one of the two colour tones used. So I had to drop that approach, and just go with a single fill colour. The buildings worked well, except some of the windows look odd, their corners distorted in ways I would have preferred they didn’t. Still, it’s a tool with great potential, and one I’ll certainly explore more.

My commercial to date work includes two Flash animated series for RTE, movies for film festivals, lots of short movies for various clients, tons of illustrations for both print and digital format, and some audio mixing. Currently seeking work as an animator/creative with an animation, educational, or games company. Give me a shout if you think I can be of assistance with your projects, EMAIL ME.

Song – had a lot of fun with this one, really liked the Earth elements and it ends nice.

I like this final piece and am pleased that my visuals have aided in helping troubled children understand that they are not alone and there are brighter days ahead!

Email me if you need an animator.

The winners are decided by the peers of the nominees, which makes coming out on top an even greater privilege. Games are a big part of many people’s lives, whether they are fans of Unchartered 3: Drake’s Deception, La Noire, or Partypoker. The talented people who make games like this possible definitely deserve to have their efforts recognised, as this effort is sometimes not easy. The managing director of Havok, David Coughlan, has talked about how honoured he feels to have the company win the Game Developer Front Line Award yet again. He has praised the talented engineers that work at the company to create and polish their products and thanked everyone for their support, including some of the best teams in the games industry.

Havok has been growing since it was started in 1999 in Ireland. They now have offices in San Francisco, Montreal and Tokyo, which just shows how well they have been doing for themselves and how much success they have seen. The games which it has contributed to include Assassin’s Creed: Revelations, La Noire and Unchartered 3: Drake’s Deception. They typically create technology for animations, AI and physics engines and have featured in hundreds of other games as well.

Below, a sketched style sheet for a little self-representation character that I’ll animate for the showreel.

The next image was more a trial run for a children’s book I’m writing and illustrating. I wanted to get a feel for how I’m going to illustrate the book, and was toying with using digital painting. Still have not decided, will make some attempts in acrylic on board or canvas and experiment with styles more. This picture turned out to be a bit serious, and I added the title ‘Expectant’ after the sketch was finished. The book I’m working will be funny (well that’s the plan). Guess it was late when I did this image, and my energy was a bit low-key, after another day of souless link building, and SEO…sigh.