Making of El Dodo Freedom - Part 1

Recently completed a short animation for the Annecy Festival 2011 competition:
http://www.youtube.com/user/neongsan#p/u/0/4z-TfoWMShg

Here is the making of.

At first, as usual, a lot of time was spent sketching and doodling around to look for something that might feel right. It can sometimes be a long journey of exploring new ideas and combining with old ones. When presented with the theme referencing the USA, of course the theme of classic western movies came up and out of nowhere cowboy sketches started to pop out.

Cowboy standing out from the crowd

Character taking shape

blueprint for the modelling phase

For a recent project, there were some random dodo doodles flying around but the dodo concept was not used. Then it all kinda merged together: a cowboy who tries to ride a dodo...

Dodo sketches on the fly

Part 2 will show the process of developing the unique visual and animation style for El Dodo Freedom...