another god damn blogger!!

HAPPY NEW YEAR!! WELCOME 2012

2012-01-13T00:15:00.000-08:00

Wishing everybody a wonderful new year ahead ! It is my heartiest wish that this year is full of happiness and joy and may your every wish come true. 2011 ended with release of some amazing dance and melodious numbers, among the endless list a few are "Move like Jagger" by Maroon 5, "Mr Saxo Beat" by Alexandra Stan, "Why this Kolaveri Di" by Dhanush and Anirudh and so on. Well, what better way to start the new year than a sketch of Lord Ganesha, the god of luck and well being.

Sketch on Flash

Photoshop sketch with Pentool and Brush

Sketch on Flash

Flash Illustration

YEAR END!!

2011-12-03T03:02:00.000-08:00

"FAMOUS DETECTIVE STORIES", by Wilco Publishing House is the book i finished reading this month, as i was on the way to attend a college friend's wedding. Each story in the compilation and their author are exceptional and worth a read, but a few of them have made a permanent place for themselves in my list of favorites. I really enjoyed reading the, "The Gold-Bug" by Edgar Allen Poe, and coincidentally found an omnibus of his work. I am absolutely in love with it, but unfortunately i find very little time for it. 2011 has come to an end. This year has been tough and fabulous, it taught me a lot and strengthened me. Adios 2011!! Well, below is an illustration i have been working on whenever i found some free time, inspired by the spirit of Christmas.

All flash and a bit of Photoshop.

All flash and photoshop

UPDATES

2011-11-09T10:56:00.000-08:00

I am really happy to share that my short film, "RAMATIYA", was nominated in the best professional short film category at ASIF India, and it won. I am really thankful all over again to NID, Ahmedabad and the ASIFA India team. More than acknowledging that i have created something worth recognition, the award has given me encouragement and has inspired me to create something even better. My attempt is not to fail them and myself. Fortunately, i was able to attend the event, which was fabulous. There were people from around the world to present what they have been working on professionally and share their experience. It was in units of astronomy informative and exhilarating.

http://www.asifa.in/iad11/winners.html

Below are some quick artworks/sketches. They were made using flash and some play with Photoshop. These are outcomes of unavoidable and indispensable urge to create and escape from the essential materialistic life. They are also inspired by some very psychedelic tracks by Bjork and Dandy Warhols. Recently i was done reading, Rabbi's Cat by Joan Safar. The book is an enjoyable ride into Algeria's Jewish culture and a cat which speaks it's mind. Let me not talk about it any further and ruin it for you. I am almost done with my detective stories omnibus. I will be writing about he authors and some of the stories in my next post. They are absolutely fantabulous and brilliosome.

BACKLOGS !!

2011-10-06T08:47:00.000-07:00

Just as i was done adding a few illustrations to this post i was down with health. While recovering i was able to see Rio. Thoroughly enjoyed it. The colors and characters were absolutely brilliant. As i was reading about the film i found out, the protagonist was initially a penguin. Wow !! that would have been a very different film. Among the screenplay writers, Don Rhymer is my favorite one. He also wrote Surf's Up. Which i personally consider as the top ten animation films. Ok ! This particular post is dedicated to some of my work i was unable to complete earlier or could not add to the blog.

This is what remains of what was supposed to be an animated promotional film for Chitrakatha Student International Animation Film Festival '2011. Sadly the ambition didn't come to life because of the realities of Mumbai professional life and ambitious plans.

I had earlier posted this illustration. But i wanted ot further work and detail it a bit. All Flash and Photoshop editing. The new Avatar is here!!

It seems as if it has been ages since i have been working on this illustration. The basic idea was to dedicate this illustration to our beautiful planet and it's creatures living under water, on land and conquering the sky. Nature is my biggest inspiration. It's mesmerizing colours and forms triggers my creativity endlessly. All Photoshop.

This was a map postcard that i made a few months back for the store CMYK in Pune. Had great fun doing something fresh.

Collage is my rediscovered love. I love to do things to images. I often feel that a captured image is hiding a lot in itself. Some how i want to bring that out.I tried playing around with a friends Photograph and apparently she liked it a lot. She herself is a brilliant designer. (http://carciofocontento.blogspot.com/).

TOMORROW NEVER COMES !!

2011-09-15T11:10:00.000-07:00

Good god !! For a while i was convinced, i will never be able to get back to my blog and peacefully write a few lines. Past few months have been demanding and i had to be more than myself . A list of songs were my companions through the highs and lows. In fact most of the numbers are soundtracks of the popular Television series, "SCRUBS". I am hooked, not only to the songs but the series as well. I am currently watching the eighth season.The unmissable songs among them are, " Dreaming of you", this song is from a brilliant band called the "The Coral", formed in the mid 90's. "Superman", by Lazlo Bane. "Good Time", by Leory and "Overkill" by Colin Hay. Pomplamoose, numbers without failure, were always on the playlist.

Apart from this for months, i am stuck with a book which is a compilation of detective stories. I simply am unable to get through the last few stories. But in the mean while a friend from work, who is a brilliant Illustrator ( http://jsmarur.blogspot.com) lent me this graphic novel. The Rabbi's Cat, which i am thoroughly enjoying. Below are images of some of the projects i was working on a few months back which did not materialize.

The above two frames are from the packaging project which fizzled. I used Flash and Photoshop for this project. I basically had to package their show reel They had different programs under the same company.

Another project which fizzled out. I had to create a fake identity and create design layout for graphic animation.

These are among the promo concepts for a holi promo. Sadly they didn't materialize. Would have been enormous fun.

BUSY SUMMER TIME!!

2011-04-11T09:56:00.000-07:00

HEELLLOOO "Mumbai Summer" !!!! The heat and my stress are competing with each other. The plummeting rickshaw rides. Noisy, honky, fumy, nauseating and perpetually under construction roads. The jittery and suffocating trains. Amidst this madness a number of songs teleport me to a music heaven. A few among them are: "Bin Tere (Reprise)" from the movie, I Hate Love Stories. Shekar's voice in the song is amazing and it's lyrics and composition by Vishal is right on the money. "Stop Me" a cover of a 80's British band, "The Smiths", by Mark Ronson. This song features one my favorite recent singer Daniel Merriweather. "Beggin" cover by the Norwegian hip-hop band Madcon. The song was originally sung by the 60's American band, "Four Seasons", and apparently they were the most popular band before the Beatles. Well, so much for the songs. Below are some of the illustrations i made when i had some spare time. I will soon be writing about my on going projects.

This sketch is dedicated to my all time favorite movie, "Ratatouille". Pentool is my recent love in Photoshop. I get sharp and crisp forms and selections.

Say hello to MOONALISA!! Another one with pentool in photoshop.

A quick e- card i made for my little sister. All Flash!!!

A quick illustration with Photoshop.

Some experiments with Flash and Photoshop.

FLASH ! FLASH ! FLASH !

2011-02-01T04:51:00.000-08:00

Wow, finally i am being able to spend sometime on my blog and upload some work i like. Last few months have been hectic. After long Eminem made it to my playlist with his number " I love th way you lie", but i don't really give him all the credit for it. Rihanna sounds fresh and soothing, and i wished to hear more of her in the song. Another song i liked lately is, Animal by Neon Trees. Well, below are some Idents. All flash and some post work. Really enjoyed detailing the characters and animating them, though the deadlines were backbreaking.

The Initial design still

The images below are of the spots i worked on a few months back. The characters were made and animated in flash. The background images were cutouts from images made on Photoshop.

YAHOOOOO !!! ANIFEST TASI 2010

2010-10-28T09:15:00.000-07:00

This is my fourth month, in Mumbai. I am slightly settled in the city. A number of projects, are on. My stereo short "RAMATIYA", was a winner at ANIFEST 2010 and a still of it luckily made it to the cover of the Animation Reporter Magazine.

Last two, months have been a marathon of POMPLAMOOSE music. These guys do brilliant covers and originals. Recently, i had access to television and i was glued to Vh1 and HBO. Got to have a look, at some brilliant shows and saw some old movies again. This was a brilliant, Diwali treat.

Finalist for The Art of the Comic !!

2010-10-12T04:58:00.000-07:00

Got some great news from ART & THE CITY, online art journal. I was one of the finalist, for a COMIC STRIP competition. They, publish my work on their site and commission me for more five strips, which will follow up on their site. The theme, was city life. I enjoyed, working on them and am looking forward to the other strips coming online. Below is the link to the site.

http://www.goethe.de/ins/in/lp/prj/kus/bil/en6557638.htm

RAMATIYA

2010-06-08T14:15:00.000-07:00

The unbelievable has happened!! Though i am still to finalize the sound, but the FILM IS OVER!! It was screened in the Design Vision Centre (NID), with fancy LCD 3D Glasses. I can't find words how to thank Mr. Pradyumna Vyas for sanctioning this research project. Sekhar Mukherjee and Praveen Nahar for their patience, guidance,support and bearing the delays. Naeem Sheikh for always being updated with his stereo equipments and getting the projector for the final screening, which made the colors more beautiful then i had imagined. Raval Chandresh and Franklin Kristi, for their ever readiness to help me with software and equipment.Paresh Soni for the DVC keys. Kaushik Chakravarty, Atul Bhai, Sanjeev Bhai for their encouragement. My friends at NID, Pradeep Patil, Nitin Patel, Anuj Sharma, Peter Alwyn, Dawa Imchen, Sanjay Jangir,Abhijit, Chiranjeet, Mochu, Navleen, Shweta, Avinash, Aishwarya, Charles, Manish, Gautam, Amber, Gagan, Rohit, Smit, Longbir, Ranveer,Hemant,Yash and many more who pulled me up when i thought it was an impossible task.

RAMATIYA from pradeep soni on Vimeo.

RAMATIYA 3D from PRADEEP SONI on Vimeo.

RAMATIYA * end stage

2010-04-04T03:37:00.000-07:00

It's a holiday evening and i am listening to my all time favorite song, "All Star" by Smash Mouth. I was in love with it all over again when heard it as the OST for SHREK. It is an apt song to go with Shrek's character. Another one of my favorite song in the movie is "I 'm believer", originally by the Monkees in the mid 60's, later a cover my Smash Mouth. What a treat! Well, the main chunk of the animated film has finally been sent for sound. Here are some designs for the FLASH animated dream sequence and translation of the 3D characters to "Rivetted Puppets". Doing this was a good break from the never ending work in MAYA. Can't wait to texture them and be done with their animation. Looking forward to being done with the film by the coming week (fingres crossed).

RAMATIYA * work in progress

2010-01-19T07:34:00.001-08:00

Ramatiya is a short Stereo 3D Animation Film i am currently working on. It is a love triangle drama of wind up toys.I have worked for years to materialize this project. I was fascinated with what i could achieve with MAYA and over a dedicated period of time learned the technicalities of Modelling, Texturing, Rigging, Lighting, Animation etc. It has been a mammoth size task to learn these techniques and complete this project all by my self. The film is also being rendered for stereo viewing so i have learnt immensely about the language of stereo during this project.

This is a film still from the dream sequence of the movie.

The expressions of one of the characters of the pet.

These are some mock posters i made for my film.

Still shots and characters of the movie.

These are the initial sketches and designs for the movie. I took photographs of my home town which is in Rajasthan to derive the esthetics for the film. I studied Rajasthan's paintings, motifs textiles, and architecture. Simplified them to adopt for my designs.

BACK TO AHMEDABAD!!!

2010-01-13T06:31:00.000-08:00

As a part of certain commitment with the National Institute of Design. I had to be back to Ahmadabad. Here are certain illustrations and short films which i worked upon during that period.

Illustrations and Cover Designs done for Ability Magazine.

Illustrations done for Read India Project. Pratham NGO Organisation

This was an illustration i made for a magazine. Pencil sketch and Photoshop

An illustration i made for my friends marriage. Pencil, sketch and Photoshop.

This one was for his Anniversary. Pencil sketch and Photoshop.

Pencil sketch and Photoshop

Pencil Sketch and Photoshop. The illustration on right was made for the National Institute of Design Facebook Group.

CHITRAKATHA 07 from PRADEEP SONI on Vimeo.

An Flash Animated Promo for Chitrakatha Animation Film Festival 2007

FIT TOGETHER from PRADEEP SONI on Vimeo.

An experimental animation short film. This film was made in Maya. It was finalist for the "Ability Film festival".

CHITRAKATHA 09 from PRADEEP SONI on Vimeo.

Another Promo for Chitrakatha 2009. I made this promo with the help of some NID animation students. I gave life to a little girls drawings.

FREELANCER IN MUMBAI!!!

2010-01-13T04:55:00.000-08:00

I finally had enough of being at "JOBS" for a while. I became a freelancer and started working from home. I got projects from Television Channels, Publishing houses, Advertising agencies and sometimes collaborated with friends on their ongoing projects. Working as freelancer can be tricky. Once you have taken the responsibility to deliver a finished project, you have to live up to that commitment no matter what. Excuses like, hardware malfunction, unexpected creative challenges, health issues go to deaf ears.I learnt this by burning my fingers a few times. But once it rolls it rolls well.

These two are amongst the few fillers i worked on for VH1.

Francois VH1 from PRADEEP SONI on Vimeo.

This was one of the short i made for a certain client. All in FLASH and

certain compositing on After Effects

DON from PRADEEP SONI on Vimeo.

These were some illustrations i worked on as a freelance illustrator.

THE TIMES OF INDIA

2010-01-10T23:12:00.001-08:00

For awhile i worked at "THE TIMES OF INDIA" as an "Illustrator". I got to meet some passionate journalists and we often touched upon a variety of subjects. I was dealing with the student section and i got some intriguing stories to illustrate. The job was a little stress full, as it was far from where i was putting up. I had to commute for two hours every day. But that had it's own perks. I would often get a comfortable seat in the crowded Mumbai locals and dedicated the time to do some live sketching and reading. Well that was not the only thing i had to deal with. I was given sixty minutes, ninety to the upper limit for each illustration. In that time frame i had to conceptualize, get approval, sketch, ink, scan, color and deliver. But soon i became comfortable with this routine. Apart from this, everyday i tried to experiment within the areas of my constraints. I was trying different illustration styles, formats, mediums. I cherish the memories of working at that place. It helped me discover my idiosyncratic way of visual expression.

STAR NEWS

2010-01-10T22:39:00.001-08:00

It's a Monday, and yes, a very much "MANIC" one. Lunch break is on and i am listening to, "coming back to life". The song still does not stop giving me goose bumps. Amongst all the other work i did for s here, the two video clips are from my first job at "STAR NEWS". There i was working as an Animation Designer.

This particular clip was a quick job in which i used paper texture and animated on flash.

This was a mix media "PROMO" using Flash, Live Action and Sketches. I worked on this promo along with a friend.

trip nostaligia continued.....

2010-01-10T04:03:00.000-08:00

It's a Sunday today, anything but a lazy one. After animating a few shots, i am back on the blog. The "trip nostalgia is still on" and i am still listening to Norah Jones. The song is called, "Sinkin Soon". The video is an exciting one, "experimental stop motion". Getting back to the illustraiton. It was made when i was working on my Diploma Project. Diploma Project is supposed to be a client project, which has to meet certain strict academic criteria. Not the easiest one to get through. A perfect example of Murphy's law. Anyway, for this illustration i made a pencil sketch on news print and played around with "Photoshop". From here on i have started using Photoshop extensively.

These are the two render from "The Rose and the Gold Fish", 3D Project which couldn't really materialize. Though, i learnt immensely from this one.

This video is of one of the characters i made for Diploma. It is called MG 2000. Short for Mahagyani 2000. After the approval of the character design. Taking it from sketch to an 3D animate able character was one hell of a journey. I was severely guided by my seniors on this project.

Another hell of a task was making this character entirely on Maya. Modelling it, texturing it adding fur to it was one difficult task. Just thinking about the desperate hours i had put into this one scares me. But i lived through it and i am glad i did it. I was working on Maya extensively at this point of time and since then i always keep coming back to it.

This is the pilot for a short show called, "Akkar Bakkar Bambe Bhow". This was a part of my training, which along with a lot of work was hell of an adventure in Mumbai. This "Plilot Episode" was materialized using FLASH 5, Photoshop and sketch on paper. Me and two of my Animation batch mates were working on it.

trip nostalgia continued.....

2010-01-09T04:16:00.000-08:00

The pencil color trip continued and i used the medium to illustrate my "Story Book"exercise, for an illustration course. By now i had acquired Derewent 72 Studio, which still is amongst my cherished possession. To add to that i was on an exchange in Paris, in the renowned school ENSAD. I was living in a student residence called Rollin Residence of Rue Rollin, Central Paris. We had a common kitchen on each floor and it was generally vacant on the weekend afternoons. On some of the weekends when it was raining out side, or exceptionally cold, or when i would have had enough of French, i would sit there and illustrate my story. On rare occasions , when someone would come to make a coffee or tea for themselves would make a spare cup for me. The story i was illustrating was written by me and it was meant for children. It was about a Rose and a Goldfish and how they become friends. A friend finally helped me make a book out if it.

Since i was in Paris for a couple of months i made it a point to see the entire of Louvre. I was really fascinated by the renaissance sculptures. They were made of all sorts of materials. Some times i would look at the marble sculptures, and wonder how the artists achieved the softness of the organic body in stone. These are the sketches of some of those sculptures.

For my final project i wanted to make a short film out of my Rose and The Goldfish story, using the Digital 3D but unfortunately it couldn't completely materialize. But , i haven't completely given up hope on this project. Maybe sometime in future. This sketch was done using Dry Pastels. After the tedious pencil strokes, dry pastels were a bliss. Till date i love using this medium, not that i hate pencil colors now.

trip nostalgia !

2010-01-09T01:45:00.000-08:00

The renders of my current film, i mentioned about in my last post will soon be upstream. My blog "ENTHUSIASM", has carried on from last night, and i was thinking of uploading some of my work.As i was scrolling down the window on my computer screen, displaying thumbnails of my illustrations, some took me down the memory lane. So i have decided to upload some "College day" stuff.

As i am doing this, i am listening to, "those sweet words" by Norah Jones. I never really went out of my way to listen to her, but just yesterday i saw an advertisement of her recent album, "THE FALL", and decided to listen a few numbers from it. I didn't really enjoy the first few songs from this album, so i just gave up. But she does have this great voice. So,today i thought lets give it one more shot and now i seem to be liking, "those sweet words", which is from one of her earlier albums. I think i will stick to her for a while. Also, i am totally hooked to, "The Graveyard Book". Apparently he was working on the idea of this book since 1985 and one of his inspiration is Rudyard Kipling's, "Jungle Book".

These are NID batch mates, with whom i have had some crazy times. These were made using the much popular EE Stadler . Most of them were made in my final year for their PREDIPLOMA DISPLAYS.

These are some sketches of my friends from NID who were working on their final projects along with me. I was on an extensive pencil colors trip then.

More live sketches,more batch mates and a play with different mediums.

here it is!!!

2010-01-08T07:06:00.000-08:00

Here it is!! Another one, amongst the ocean of blogs. Not that i have anything against blogs, but it's just that i never saw myself having one, but "HERE I AM".

Well, presently i am working on a short 3D ANIMATED STEREO FILM, which has been on for more than a year and a half. It's called "RAMATIYA" (Which means toys in Rajasthani). It's a Love Triangle of wind up toys. I am really excited about it. As i have been willing to work on a SHORT for a LONG time. Also, because i have been experimenting with Narrative, Visual Treatment and Language of Stereo.

My frustration levels are rising as this is the longest i have worked, on a single project. My stress takes a toll on my health on and off, as i am trying to set unrealistic deadlines for a kind of project i have never dealt with before. On the other hand i am beginning to relax a little as i am nearing its end, and looking forward to packing it up for it's Sound Design (can't wait for that day to be here).

So, i am off for dinner at the moment and can't wait to get my hands on, "The Graveyard Book", by Neil Gaiman. Soon i will be uploading some of the "RENDERS" of my project, and will try to keep up this "ENTHUSIASM" to blog regularly...often...time to time.