Last week I participated as a judge of the student category of Laguna College of Art and Design’s “Dressed 2 Kill” competition.

http://lagunacollege.edu/dressed2kill/index.html Students and professionals participated in this contest to create 2D and 3D characters in costume.Top entries are currently displayed in the Ettinger Gallery http://www.lagunacollege.edu/news.php?id=26
SOE also loaned some of our best of the costume oriented works from Legends of Norrath TCG. http://legendsofnorrath.station.sony.com/

Hi! I’m Floyd Bishop, a Senior Artist (Animator) on Free Realms. I recently did a UStream Event (http://www.ustream.tv/recorded/3233553) where I went over the steps involved in animating a character for Free Realms. During the session, I animated our TRex pet doing a push up trick. Look for this animation in a future game update.

Applications are now being accepted for the 2010 G.I.R.L. Scholarship to help educate and recruit more women into the field of video game development.

See the link for complete details: http://www.station.sony.com/girl/

I’ve had the opportunity to participate in the judging for the first two scholarships and it’s always a great experience seeing the creativity of the next wave of emerging talent.

If you are eligible get an entry in on or before February 15th!

- Rystall

SOE’s Mike Pavlovich had his next training video for Eat 3D released.  Titled: Zbrush Character Production, it covers new features in ZBrush 3.5 and useful ZPlugins. He then guides users though creation of a detailed character model. Nice job Mike!

On December 18^th Floyd Bishop, Senior Animator on Free Realms, conducted a live demonstration of animation for games. Floyd took the audience step-by-step through the process of animating the new T-Rex pet from Free Realms, infusing it with action and personality. He also addressed technical challenges as well as the thought process behind designing character movement.

SOE has 11 selections in the newly released Exotique 5 from Ballistic Publishing! ( http://www.ballisticpublishing.com/books/exotique_5/ )

SOE’s own Mike Pavlovich has created a ZBrush 3.5 training video for Eat 3D.  The video titled: ZBrush 3.5 – A Comprehensive Introduction covers basic concepts in detail, new features in this version of the software, as well as discussion of some advanced solutions and techniques. Great job on the excellent video Mike!

Shel Dorf http://www.sheldorftribute.com/ founder of Comic-con http://www.comic-con.org/ passed away this week in San Diego.  I had the pleasure of meeting Shel many years ago; he was a frequent guest of TAG (Tuesday Art group) that many game, film, comic and illustration industry vets attended. He was a kind gentleman and always eager to help people starting out in their careers.  He will be missed.

Beckett Massively Online Gamer’s latest issue celebrates the top 10 most influential women developing MMOs.  Rosie Rappaport, Art Director for Free Realms was recognized, along with two others from SOE: Torrie Dorrell and Laralyn McWilliams.

This past Thursday at Mt Saint Antonio College, Marshall Vandruff opened a show of sketchbook art titled “Intimacy on Paper” http://www.mtsac.edu/instruction/arts/gallery/exhibits/2009-10/IntimacyonPaper.pdf . The show features Vandruff’s work and work of former students, including SOE’s Dok Whitson who is senior concept artist for EQ2.  The exhibit will run through October 15^th.