sculpting with clay is my new favorite thing!!

I had a fantastic time with master Andrea Blasich at his sculpting workshop in LA.
My initial design became quite different from the sculpt. While wanting to keep a very graphic overall shape, I decided to add more structure and work on the details taking advantage of the medium and bringing the original design further. Sculpting in the real world has been a precious moment in the design process to bring my original concept to another level. Here are some images







ther.

Great times at Kilkenny Animated, hosted by Cartoon Saloon

Thanks to Cartoon Saloon for inviting me to this great event in their Irish hometown! It was fantastic meeting all the amazing talent there and exhibiting together with such incredible artists. I've been also a long time admirer of Carter Goodrich's art and the opportunity to sit in a panel with him chatting about character design together with all the other panelists (Jenn Ely, Kat Good, Betsy Bauer, Marie Thouraghe) has been a real gift. Thank you!


experimenting with gouache and digital

good old school illustration techniques mixed with some digital. I started  using gouache again a few months ago for the first time after many years, it feels very relaxing:)




Excited to be at CTN this year!



Thanks to Tina Price for inviting me this year as a panelist to this convention that I've been attending as a member of the audience for quite a few years. It's an honor to be among such an incredible list of panelists.
I'll be also part of RovioAnimation's AngryBirdsMovie panel.


Friday November 18

01:00 PM -- 01:45 PM Conversations with Creators Conversation with Creators with Francesca Natale 
1) Francesca Natale, Character Designer  
Parlor 129 Conversations Creators

03:00 PM -- 04:30 PM Booksigning Francesca Natale 
1) Francesca Natale 
Booksigning Area Table 03 (Hotel Lobby) 

Saturday November 19

06:30 PM -- 07:15 PM Presentation A Character Design Conversation 1) Bobby Chiu  MODERATOR
2) Boris Bakliza  
3) Daniel Arriaga  
4) Florian Satzinger  
5) Francesca Natale  
6) David Pimentel  
Talent-opolis Center Stage 


Sunday November 20

12:00 PM -- 01:30 PM Booksigning "Angry Birds: The Art of the Angry Birds Movie" Booksigning Area Table 01 

05:00 PM -- 05:45 PM Panel THE ANGRY BIRDS MOVIE - CREATIVITY AND OPPORTUNITY 
1) Jerry Beck MODERATOR
2) Johnny Rice 
3) Francesca Natale  
4) Pete Oswald 
5) Pete Nash 


You can find CTN's overall schedule is here


ROBIN HOOD project

I've worked on a personal take on the Robin Hood characters for a Kickstarter book project (Masters of Anatomy).
Here are a selection of concepts created before getting to the final designs for the book. They show a bit of my process when trying to nail the character for the story I have to tell. When I started I was looking for an interesting twist to it within the given limitations. Not an easy thing to achieve as it has been seen so many times. The moment I found my angle I worked out character personalities and ultimately the style I thought was appropriate for the tone. It has been a fun exercise considering the small scale of the project,  and I like some of the characters that came out of it.









My "rockstar experience" at the italian Premiere of THE ANGRY BIRDS MOVIE in ROME!:D

Thanks so much to the terrific Italian team at Warner Bros , Sony and Cristiana Caimmi Press for having me helping out promoting our movie in Italy! I had a blast! The opportunity to be on TV with Vincenzo Mollica at the news on our national channel in primetime and the chance to be part of a radio show live for an hour have been a dream come true for me:)

Thanks also to all the journalists  for being so kind and interested in my professional experience too as an italian artist working abroad.

Here are a few moments from the press conference at Warner Bros in Rome just before the premiere. 

In Italy our movie is still # 1 at the box office!










The Hatchlings! The mascottes of our movie

Below there is a brand new short that will be in theaters screening just before the Angry Birds Movie.
I had lots of fun designing these little characters and I'm amazed by how much love they are getting from the audience:) Enjoy!








and here is also another pig from early deleopment:




An army of pigs and a flock of birds are landing in Italy!! Angry Birds Il Film arriva in Italia il 15 Giugno. Showing more artwork here:)


Some drawings to show how I transformed the Angry Birds  from the mobile game design to the characters that we see in the movie. I started exploring different visual grammars before defining the final one with the producers. I was a very exciting challenge to create a vision and translating the game character designs for the silver screen. More coming!!

























 The image above is the final look of film released as first marketing image for the public. I finalized the characters in all their definitive details (from a look point of view) in this image.
BG design is by our production designer.


The development of Red as a final design and CG look took a lot of work and time. I'll describe the process  in a separate post:)








HAL: character design evolution from the mobile game to the movie screen




This is a progression of drawings that shows how I transformed the character HAL in THE ANGRY BIRDS MOVIE from the one the mobile game to a character that could perform and entertain an audience in the theater for two hours. 

Below is a 2d short that came out last month. and in wich Hal (Anthony Padilla) and Bubbles (Ian Hecox) have an existential crisis. ahha love these guys, enjoy!




More characters coming!

More ANGRY BIRDS MOVIE artwork

These are designs created for the Mighty Eagle 2d sequence. It was refreshing for me to work on a character that was going to be animated in 2d rather than translated in CG. For this sequence I pitched  to Directors and producers an Art Deco spin on the look of the character to amplify the sense of strength and dynamism of the caricatured Mighty Eagle that we need to visualize.
Luckily everybody liked it and got into production.
Here are some poses developed from the boards and some early character exploration of the 2d Mighty Eagle (background by Pete Oswald). Pete's background paintings were very inspiring to work with.
The illustration in the previous post is the image sold the Art Deco spin concept.








The Angry Birds Movie. Designs and art of book sneak peek

Such exciting times!Our movie is #1 in America so far and we are at the second week of release the upcoming weekend. Here are a few designs I did while Art Directing the Characters on the film. I'll start posting more regularly now that there is more time available.
Enjoy!













And here is a Vimeo Link to a sneak peek of The art of The Angry Birds Movie book.

 

Panel and signing book event happening Gallery Nucleus in Los Angeles on Saturday June 4th 2016. See you there!