Base14

Ah, there’s nothing quite like a bit of a makeover when things are beginning to feel stagnant. And thanks for the fine folks over at WordPress, the Base14 Blog got just that sort of new infusion with a fresh installation of WordPress 3.0! (We had been running on 2.6 for some time.) Of course, you folks on the outside won’t notice much of a change just yet, but the tools we use to publish blog posts and manage content just got a lot slicker.

June was a relatively quiet time for Base14, I realize. We were recouping from production on “The Girl and the Fox” and have been preparing for the launch of the Base14 Store later this year. This upgrade to our content management system is just the first step in making a new, full-fledged storefront that will finally make our lovely creative products easily accessible and available to purchase!

Since July, anyone trying to access my online portfolio at www.tylerkupferer.com probably noticed that the URL would redirect them to the Base14 Blog. This is because what was a stunning accomplishment of amateur web design and development when it was launched in 2005 had long outlasted its welcome and needed to be replaced. The site was a pit of stagnation, featuring videos and illustrations way below my current abilities and being far too much trouble to update. What was needed was a complete redesign, and while I had been toying with some fancy flash interfaces since 2008, it was all asking for more trouble than it was worth.

But with my name getting around in the festival circuit and employment opportunities looming, I realized that I needed something that could at the very least show my demo reel and link to my resume. So I went back to the drawing board and designed something that would be clean, neat and super, super simple. Presenting: TJK Homepage 3.0.

While designing the mockup took a few days, coding the site itself only took one evening. The entire site is very simple, but effective. And it was actually pretty fun to make. I may be out of the professional web development industry, but few things make me happier than some sharp, clean and efficient CSS code.

P.S. The first item in my reel is a piece of rough animation from The Girl and the Fox. Be excited!

This is a public service announcement from your friends at Base14. This Thanksgiving, don’t let this happen to you:

Remember: food is eaten through the mouth, often with cranberry sauce this time of year.

Happy Thanksgiving, everyone!

Yesterday marked the three-year anniversary of the debut of the comic strip Rightfield, the most ambitious comic franchise that Base14 has ever undertaken. Featuring the comedic exploits of Sam the Human, Phil the Platypus and Glitch the Robot, Rightfield was designed to follow well-developed characters through a major story arc, giving readers more than just a daily chuckle. On August 21st, 2006, the following three-panel cartoon was published in nearly 20,000 copies of the Purdue Exponent Newspaper.

This was at best a crude beginning, and as a comic artist, I was still feeling my way into the art form. But working to publish five hand-drawn strips a week meant that I would rack up experience quickly, and the quality of the strip steadily improved. By the end of the Fall Semester, the strip was consistently demonstrating solid craftsmanship and concepts.

The story continues after the break. Continue Reading »

Nearly every post here on Base14 is in response to projects we’re working on or events we’re involved with — but today I’d like to make a post merely as a service to all you other digital artist out there. It’s a reminder to consider entering your most recent work in the 2009 Adobe Design Achievement Awards: an annual contest sponsored by Adobe Systems.

The contest aims to highlight the most outstanding work done by students around the world using Adobe tools. This includes graphic design, photography, film, animation, interactive content, mobile content and more! They claim the work should be 50% or more created with Adobe tools, but just between you and me, I think they blend that rule a bit. Best of all: it’s free!

Entries are due this Friday, June 5th! So don’t doddle! Submit today!

Myself and many of my peers around here are obsessed with two major things: Movies and the Internet. So wherever those two intersect, we completely geek out. Case in point: The Internet Movie Database.

That’s why I’m majorly geeking out today, because Duck ♥ Teslacoil has carved out its own page on IMDb for all to see! Not only that, but credits for all the key players in the movie are also listed! Woah, wait a minute… that means I have my own IMDb profile now. It’s a dream come true!

Naturally we won’t let all this Internet “celebrity” go to our heads; the movie still has yet to prove itself in multiple festivals. (Which we’re still waiting to hear back from.) But it’s a big step for Base14 as a company with significant cinematic work. Check it out!

Happy May Day folks! I thought I’d take a moment to pause from whatever one is supposed to do on May Day to dish out some leftovers from the past two weeks. It’s all the news that’s fit to print when bunched together in one big super-post!

First off, Duck ♥ Teslacoil got some press this past week after its world premiere at the Digital Cinema Contest Award Ceremony. The site LafayetteOnline featured the results of the contest and not only mentioned DHT, but also provided a direct link to our blog! Update: We were also mentioned in a Purdue News press release which basically said the same thing. Actually to be fair, I think it came first.

Secondly, there’s been a bit of new animation I’ve been pumping out for my 2D Character Animation I class here at SCAD. In Character Animation I, emphasis is put on designing strong character key positions, mapping breakdown positions and interpolating character inbetweens quickly and on model. There’s a head turn we did based on Mushu from Mulan, a take with some generic dude no one’s heard of, and then most exciting of all is the weighted object assignment where we could chose who to animate. Of course, I went with my favorite, Donald Duck. Donald was not an easy character to draw or position, believe me, but I think it turned out good enough for a first try. And it was kinda cool to be animating my childhood idol. Thanks, Don!