We recently connected with Alex Relloso and have shared our conversation below.
Great, appreciate you sharing that with us. Before we ask you to share more of your insights, can you take a moment to introduce yourself and how you got to where you are today to our readers.
My name is Alex Relloso, I’m a storyboard and character design artist working in Animation. I have worked for studios such as Netflix, Dreamworks, Skydance, Ilion and The SPA Studios. I’m currently freelancing for Dreamworks doing storyboards for an upcoming movie and character designs for Sony Animation for another feature that is being developed there!
When Im doing storyboards my work basically consists in translating the written script into visual panels (storyboards) that help build a “blueprint” of the movie. It’s a great way to test if the story is working, and change things around, experiment with it and iterate until the director thinks its working or the deadline strikes! I love it because it combines two of my favorite things, drawing and movies. You choose and define the camera angles, acting on the characters, sometimes you can even suggest lighting, and even change/add parts of the script. I love the impact that these role can have on a movie, and how collaborative and spontaneous it is sometimes.
When Im doing character designs my role is to give the director drawing proposals of how the characters in the movie might look like. In my head I sometimes picture it as being a like a combo of a casting director + fashion stylist. There are so many cool aspects to it, the shape language, the silouette, proportions… It’s so much fun, and I love the fact that the inspiration can come from everywhere! Includind daily life situations, like the guy that is waiting to catch the bus next to me suddenly fits the face of the wizard i was trying to design! and stuff like that.
I always carry around a sketchbook, I love to go to cafes and draw people there, also life drawing, and tortilla de patatas (had to say it now that im opening my heart to you guys)
I’m truly happy to be able to use drawing in my job and as a tool to communicate and express my ideas, and my dream without a doubt is to eventually be able to write and direct my own projects, not only animated shorts, or movies, but also illustrations and comics :)
What’s a lesson you had to unlearn and what’s the backstory?
When i was in the first year of university I broke my right wrist really bad playing basketball (And Im righthanded, so not the best for drawing). It was terrible timing and I got super sad thinking i was gonna stay behind and miss on a big moment for my learning. At that first year of university I was obsessed with trying to improve and level up and I thought that i would do it by i by working all the time. But one of my teachers, Juampa Lopez who taught us Anatomy shifted my perspective. During the next life drawing classes with him, he made me walk around the class with him so I could see/hear the feedback that he was giving to all the other students. I started then to understand there the inmense value of pause and observation in order to learn, the importance of observation and understanding the process. I guess in drawing we often think that the amount of hours we put into it will make us better, but is not only about the quantity of hourse you invest, but the quality and purpose behind them. I had always thought that If I worked hard non stop I would get better and better, but after this episode it became obvious that pause, observing from other people and how the progress is the perfect combo in order to level up.
For you, what’s the most rewarding aspect of being a creative?
I feel truly fullfilled when drawing, truly makes me happy to draw and create stuff in general. I also love some of the “collateral impacts” that happen because of working in animated projects. There’s often a lot of research to do when you start on a movie ,really specific things that have to do with the context of the story. For example Ember, the 2D animated movie we were working on at The SPA Studios we we were doing a TON of research on Prehistoric times, the fauna and vegetation of that period of time…. we even had talks with antropologists, we went on a research trip, learned how to make fire, and we shared thousands of clips from documentaries, and It was so fascinating and educating. Any project is a great excuse to do a deep dive in a really unique and specific topic, time of history, etc, and its super rewarding to then be able to use some of that data and find a way to plug it onto the story you’re helping to build. And of course my favorite aspect of being in this field is the amazing people you get to meet and work with along the way. Crazy but true, some of my favorite artist happen to be some of my best friends, I feel that creates a ripple effect that makes us want to create even more, and share with them the stuff that we do, what we learn, and then gooo cafelito sketching to a bar! best plan
Contact Info:
- Website: alexrelloso.com
- Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/alexrelloso_art/
- Linkedin: https://www.linkedin.com/in/alexrelloso/