Sunday, November 22, 2009

Extension Mattes

Recently, I got the opportunity to do some extension matte paintings for a drama background done at my church. It's always amazing the things my wife can come up with for me to do to help out people in the church. So, on this endeavor I got to put my very inexperienced matte painting skills to the test.

Matte paintings, in case you don't know, are background paintings done for films or animations. The art of matte paintings is a film making secret that continues to fool audiences into believing that they are seeing far away places or places that don't exist at all. Nowadays most all mattes are done digitally, formally they were hand painted on huge pieces of glass and the live action shots were shot through them. The combination created was the final seamless shot of live action, a few well placed set pieces, and the matte painting.
These two pieces I'm showing here are extension mattes. This is when an original image is extended beyond itself. These were both from Walt Disney's Cinderella.
The images show the process: original plate - full extension - just the painting - full extension

Click on the images to be directed to larger versions.  Thanks for checking these out.
TTYL





Saturday, November 14, 2009

Page on Facebook

Well, my page on Facebook is up and running. Click here to view it or click the link on the sidebar. This page will be my website for the interim while my current site gets a redesign. I'm currently in the process of learning Adobe Flash and ActionScript to get the coding and galleries smooth and user friendly. So, check out the page, become a fan (41 so far . . .), and tell your friends.

Thanks for visiting.
Tom