- Hey, everyone.
Welcome to this episode of "Draw with Pixar."
My name's Scott Morse.
I'm a story artist at Pixar where I've had the opportunity
of working on a lot of really fun movies with my friends like
"Ratatouille," "WALL-E," some of the "Cars" projects,
and the upcoming movie "Soul."
Today, I thought we could draw one of my old buddies, Mater.
I've got a soft spot for old trucks.
I even built the one I'm sitting in with my dad.
Now, what I really love about old trucks
are the really cool pieces of geometry
that make them what they are.
Their fenders, their headlights, their tailgates,
all the little bits that we're going
to celebrate about our old buddy Mater
when we make him come alive today.
We're just gonna use a regular number two pencil
and some paper we can probably steal off our printer.
And we're gonna remember all the bits about our old buddy
that we really, really like.
Mater's an existing character, so there's a lot to work with.
Now, we're gonna work rough, OK?
We're gonna work rough because we're
gonna lay another piece of paper over the top of this when we're
done, and find all of our details again,
and subtract out the lines that we don't like from our rough.
So we're just gonna stack shapes.
We're gonna stack boxes, squares,
rectangles, circles, triangles.
And we're gonna to build out Mater's geometry so
that he has a little bit of a sense of depth and volume
as we work.
And remember, working rough allows us to make mistakes.
It allows us to find the lines we like.
And we do this with the satisfaction of knowing we're
gonna do another drawing over the top of this,
and we can lose those lines that we don't like.
Now, remember to really think about all
the details about Mater that we know and love.
Things like his air filter, things
like where his wheel wells land, give us kind of landmarks
on his body to place other things like his windows,
the slant of his cab, where his little lights might go,
kind of finding the center line of where his geometry might be
so that we can land his big goofy smile
and know where to put his buck teeth.
Now, with Mater, it's tricky.
A lot of people only give him two bucked teeth.
But if you really look at him in the movies,
he's got three that typically show up.
There's kind of two bigger ones and that little one
that kind of tucks back behind.
And I don't like to make them just regular old rectangles
that are kind of hard edged.
I like round them out a little bit
and soften them like he's been chewing on metal or something.
And again, just try to find all the little details that we can
remember-- the side-view mirrors, because Mater
likes to drive backwards.
And then that center line helps us place his eyes.
And, again, with these "Cars" characters,
their eye lids are typically like a zig-zag.
They're like two lines-- almost like a lightning bolt.
And that middle kind of hitch in that lightning bolt
kind of gives us a sense of where
the center of the windshield might be
and where those eyes might land.
We want to make those eyes nice and dark
because that's where the life of these characters
really kind of come out.
And we're just gonna continue to kind of refine
and tighten up a lot of those little details,
kind of the shadows inside of his hood,
a little bit of geometry.
I like to think about where a light source might be
in a world when I'm drawing my characters
so that I kind of can understand how shadows might fall on them.
And I don't always draw that light bulb up in the corner.
But I try to think about it.
Now we're gonna to go back.
And we're gonna lay another piece of paper over our rough.
And we're gonna continue to think about all the details
on Mater that make Mater, Mater.
And we're gonna try to refine our drawing.
And this is the step where instead of using an eraser,
what we're gonna do is we're gonna use
our rough drawing as reference.
And you can probably see the light, faint image
of your lines from your rough underneath this new blank piece
of paper.
And now we can do tighter, cleaner, more
deliberate lines over the top.
We can really kind of love on this drawing a little bit more.
I don't like to think about this as tracing.
I like to think about this as a new drawing
that's using the reference of my rough underneath.
That's just kind of like a blueprint.
It's like a guide for me to find a better drawing over the top.
And working this way, you can always go back to that rough
and do a new, tighter drawing over the top
until you find all of the bits of the new drawing
that you really, really do like and appreciate
and want to celebrate and show other people.
So this new drawing, it really is your chance to kind of go
in and play with those details.
You know, think about the headlight
that's missing on Mater.
All these little things help tell
a story about your character.
So now you can really start thinking about all
of those little bits.
How the engine block might actually look,
the curve of how a shadow might fall.
And you can experiment with your pencil
and try to find different ways of shading like cross-hatching,
things like that.
Think about where his tongue might land, kind
of the darkness of his mouth.
And you can kind of get rid of the front end of that box
and really think about, like, where his bumper might land,
you know, and sort of play with the shapes a little bit more.
Soften your edges, soften your curves, soften your corners.
With these "Cars" characters, I know they're made out of metal.
And metal is hard.
It's a substance we know how it works.
But while drawing them, I really like
to try to create a little bit of a sense of squash and stretch
with them.
So I try to around some things out if I can.
I try to create a sense of what we
call straights against curves.
And that's a design aesthetic that kind of helps us add
a little bit of life and a little bit of pliability
to a character, a little bit of charm,
and also a little bit of a sense of motion.
Even if they're kind of sitting still,
it feels like there's life to them, there's some keep-alive.
Remember where that light source might hit.
Again, we're not gonna draw it up in the corner necessarily.
We can.
But what I want you to do is just
try to remember to think about a light source
whenever you're doing a dimensional drawing like this
so that you can kind of understand how the depth
of that world might work.
Now, when you feel like you've hit a stopping point
and you're happy with your drawing,
don't forget to sign it.
We really want to know who did that awesome piece of artwork.
And if you're on social media, definitely jump on board
and tag your drawing.
The hashtag is #DrawWithPixar.
We really hope you've enjoyed this "Draw with Pixar"
tutorial.
And we hope you're staying safe and healthy
and enjoying your time with your family.
Take care.