ASIFA Screening of Surf's Up

Hey ASIFA members! You're invited to the screening of Surf's Up as part of Sony Pictures Animation's 10th Anniversary celebration. I'll be part of Q and A after the screening. Click here to go to ASIFA webpage.

Vertical Set Up

A village structured vertically. I tried to mimic the values if I could have done it in pencil.

Website Update

My updated website is now online and mobile friendly :)

www.armandserrano.com

Tigobo's "Meet Ze Artists"

I'll be speaking at this event on 03 August, Friday. I will present some visual development process on Hotel Transylvania. Hope you could come.

Evolution of Hotel Transylvania Teaser Poster

Poster design for an animated film in a big studio is a bit tricky. We collaborate with the marketing department and they have the creative control. My task for the Hotel Transylvania poster is to lay down the ground work based from the idea/images (below) provided by marketing. Above are the designs I came up with.

My images were accepted by marketing and had their own artists do some final changes and add the necessary details. Here's the final version.

All images ©Sony Pictures Animation/Columbia Pictures

Hotel Transylvania's Newest Trailer

Click to see the newest trailer.

"Meet Ze Artists" Event

I'll be speaking at the Tigobo Animation's MEET ZE ARTIST event at the Titmouse Cartoon studio in Hollywood on August 3rd. For more info, click here.

iPad Paintings: ProcreateHD and ArtRage Apps

First two artworks were done using my new favorite art app, Procreate HD. It has the easiest-to-use interface among painting apps out there. Plus amazing brushes and paint tools. It's hi res capability is perfect for the new iPad retina display. The third painting was done with ArtRage app. Artrage carried over its strong oil texture and behavior to this mobile app version. Fun.

All images ©Armand Serrano.

"Hotel Transylvania" Teaser!

A couple of "teaser" artworks for you from Sony's upcoming animated feature Hotel Transylvania coming out September 23. Have a glimpse of the Invisible Man at the concierge on the first image. Click here for trailer.

All images ©Sony Pictures Animation / Columbia Pictures.

Ron Lukas' Blog

My good friend Ron Lukas has a blog now! Ron is an amazing painter and art directed several animated feature films both for Sony and Dreamworks. Check his blog out and enjoy.

http://www.ronlukas.blogspot.com/

Late Nights...

©Armand Serrano.

Backyard

Compared to the epic, fantastic and fictional grand vistas, the simple and ordinary locations become more challenging to design. The battle is taking the ordinary and common and transform them into something fresh and interesting. Its a balance of shapes, composition, amount of stylization, and lighting. In laying out the location shot, its very crucial to do it and solve all the issues in values to establish the foundation for proper lighting and color. Here's an exercise I did and I want to share including the step by step. Both were done using only two preset brushes in PS - a hard brush for the sketch and my favorite no. 19 brush for wash. Enjoy. 

Backyard-1

Backyard-2

All images ©Armand Serrano.