课程主任普林尼奥·平托教授作曲等艺术基础知识, value, and core drawing skills to students studying computer animation and game art. 但普利尼奥的课程还有另一个基本要素:教学生通过追随自己的兴趣爱上艺术过程.

“我想让学生们明白的一件事是，艺术就是画你喜欢的东西……只有这样，你才能越来越好，并爱上这项技术。, [is to] fall in love with the subject matter,” he says.

普林尼奥听从自己的建议，走上了艺术之路. 他在林林艺术与设计学院获得插画学士学位, 他在哪里磨练了他喜欢的领域的技术技能:肖像和插图. However, 普林尼奥对油画产生了过敏，不得不找到一种创造性的方法，通过使用水彩来创造他喜欢的油画风格.

“[My method of using watercolors] is a lot more realistic, goes into a little bit more of a tight wrangling of details,” he explains. “这是你可能会在油画插画家如何执行他们的工作中看到的东西. It's a little tighter. 我必须学习如何分层我的颜色，以便有更多的深度, to look a little bit more realistic. So for me, at least, it’s a fun way of working.

“这比你通常在水彩画中看到的颜色清洗更乏味或更极端,” Plinio continues. “但我必须学会如何发展这种风格，而不是在这个过程中感到沮丧……这是作为一名艺术家的另一个重要部分。. 在某些时候，你必须尝试不同的事情，或者以不同的方式拓展(你的技能).”

普林尼奥的水彩肖像画曾在佛罗里达州中部获奖.

Plinio独特的方法和插图技巧帮助他获得了开箱即用的自由职业者工作. He reached out to Upper Deck, 一家交易卡公司，授权知识产权并为电视节目制作卡片, movies, comics, and more. They hired him to create sketch cards, 哪些是画师以个人风格绘制的IP角色的集换卡大小的插图. Plinio worked on cards for properties like The Walking Dead, the Hobbit movies, and Marvel and DC comics.

“(素描卡)真的很有趣，因为你实际上是在较小的规模上作画, you're drawing directly on the card. And that card, it's not reproduced, it's one-of-a-kind. You do many of them. I used to do an order of 30 to 50 of them, 它们被装在小包装里运往世界各地. 所以这是一种很酷的方式，可以发送你的作品并产生一些有价值的东西, market value as well as personal value,” he says.

Plinio’s art has also caught the attention of some big names. In the early days of Twitter, 普林尼奥贴出了一些他为名人创作的肖像，其中一些人主动提出要买他的作品. They included Christina Ricci (“Unfortunately, I had already sold it”), director Diablo Cody (“I did a portrait of her, and she actually owns that now”), and The Walking Dead 明星诺曼·瑞杜斯(“他最后通过共同的朋友得到了我的一件作品”).

最近，Plinio一直在为奥兰多的桑顿公园主街区做公共艺术. He recently completed a larger mural for the area; he also created murals for storm drains as part of the city’s Only Rain Down the Drain program.

“在公众场合创作总是很不错的，人们会停下来拍照并询问, 所以当你在工作室创作作品时，这种互动是不会发生的. Which is, for me, the fun part of it. It is a little bit more taxing physically. You have to endure weather and cars and stuff like that. But it's fun,” he says.

帮助他的学生在艺术中找到和他一样的乐趣是普利尼奥教学理念的关键. 他知道，当学生将常规的实践与艺术基础相结合，形成自己的艺术风格时，他们就会开始享受创作的过程.

“我通常要求我的学生每天拿出一个小速写本, 他们可以随身携带，画出他们周围的任何东西, 无论是环境，还是静物或物体. It creates a direct connection with seeing what's around you. 尤其是对学习电脑动画和游戏艺术的学生, 他们需要更好地了解他们周围的空间.

“With that continuous drawing, they’ll gain that ability of seeing things in space, 但他们也会开始发展一种个人的绘画方式，让他们想要分享自己的作品,” Plinio continues. “我认为，当他们每天或每周都进行这种练习时, they will start falling in love with drawing. And to me, 这将在他们未来的整个职业生涯中产生影响……他们不再对最终结果感到难为情. It's just enjoying the process of drawing.”