Anyone else love browsing through production art?

T

The Racing Sniper

New member
Lately I've taken an immense interest in browsing through production art of various animated programs, usually via the websites of the ones who do it. It just fascinates me seeing how they went about bringing the characters to life, and all the little nuances and changes they went through before they came up with the final designs.

Anyone else share my enjoyment?
 
I enjoy looking at production art, sketches, story boards, etc. I've even found some posted on DeviantArt ... it's pretty cool when you stumble upon this kind of thing in unexpected places. :)
 
Are you talking about animated stuff or live-action films? Cause to be quite honest, not really. I'll glance at it, but not really go obsessive over it cause it's kind of boring just looking at production art.
 
I have books upon books of Warner Bros. production art, and it serves a twofold interest for me - not only do I gain some valuable insight into the production of the Looney Tunes, but it also teaches me how to draw the characters.
 
I typically wait for a DVD release of a show, since many DVD's have production art galleries (well, I know Disney's Platinum series has them, I don't know about others). However, I do look at some production blogs (when I find them) for production art.

What's also fun is side-by-side comparison of the design changes fo the main characters over the series' lifetime.
 
Most of the stuff i've seen has been for live action works, like Star Wars ( i remember distinctly some early Darth Vader sketches at the 2002/03 Star wars exhibition at the poerhouse Museum). But certainly the main points remain the same in both categories, that one can trace the origins of characters and gain an insight into imagination, the process of character creation, and possibilities that could have been but weren't. I haven't seen that much, most of this i have read of but not seen. But certainly it is interesting.
 
I defintely like seeing production sketches and abandoned early concepts. Random example- There are some fun early designs for the Star Wars battle droids which show how parts of the design would transform into armour when the droids were fighting.
In terms of animation, I love character sheets that show things like a range of headshots (how the character looks when happy, angry, sleepy, etc), especially when framed around the final character model. A really good character model really hits you with the personality. I wish I could be better at drawing such things.
 
I love looking at production art from various cartoons & animated movies. Most of the blogs I go to are art blogs that feature production art. ;)
 
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