Caoimhe O'Brien Portfolio

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Behind This Project

This is a character that I created for our Dingle Animation 2025 Sting. The theme was "An Phiast's Untold Story" so we decided that our would be "An Phiast, An Spiaire" so An Phiast was an undercover spy that went around to different villages making sure that there is no evil animals.

St Cuan is the villain of the game. I explored different styles and shapes for the character, I knew I wanted him to have a long, looming presence and to be quite angular to contrast An Phiast. I explored different art styles.

These are primary sketches for St Cuan.

This is a moodboard for the character.

These are some ideas for St Cuan's staff. This did not make it into the final design or the game

This is the final character turnaround.

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Behind This Project

This is a character that I created for our Dingle Animation 2025 Sting. The theme was "An Phiast's Untold Story" so we decided that our would be "An Phiast, An Spiaire" so An Phiast was an undercover spy that went around to different villages making sure that there is no evil animals. I explored different styles and shapes for the character, I knew I wanted her to be goofy and quite silly as she is a harmless character. She has an attitude and thinks that she is better than everyone so I juxta positioned her confidence with her hair and exaggerated shapes.

Additionally, I incorporated vibrant colors and dynamic poses to reflect her energetic personality, making her relatable and endearing to the audience. This approach not only enhances her visual appeal but also aligns with the lighthearted theme of the project, inviting viewers to connect with her story.

This is a thumbnail for Cow. She is the funny hench-cow of St. Cuan

This is a moodboard for Cow.

This is a front view of the Cow character.

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Behind This Project

These are some backgrounds that I made for my Dingle Animation Game Sting 2026 I created 2 of the 5 locations for this game.

This background depicts An Phiast's cave - a moody, atmospheric cavern used in the sting. This is where the characters have their "mission board", which holds their progress in the game.

Key choices: light from outside as the primary rim light, cool ambient fill for depth, textured rock surfaces, subtle fog and light shafts to suggest scale as well as waterfall, and small details (stalactites, stalagmites) to add story.

This background depicts Lake Corrailli - the lake where An Phiast confronts St Cuan (spoiler I'm sorry).

Key choices: Lucious green grass and foilage surrounding the gorgeous blue lake.

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Behind This Project

This is Lili Lasourris, a character that I made as concept art for a short film, "Lasourris Très Bizarre", which translates to "Very Strange Lasourris". It is a short film set in Marseilles, France which follows Lili, a young girl who is trying her best to navigate the complexities of her daily life.

Lili is a shy, young girl who does not have any whiskers, unlike the other rodents, this makes it hard for people to understand what she's feeling sometimes, she also finds it hard to read other peoples whiskers. She is the youngest of three, with her siblings having moved to the city, but Lili has committed herself to the quiet life.

She is a curious and determined girl who faces various challenges throughout the film as she is not like the other rodents in her village. This short film would explore these of growing up with a neurodivergency, family, culture and rural life.

Lasourris is a play on the words "La Souris" which means "the mouse" in French.

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Behind This Project

These are the storyboards for a 2D animatic I made for one of my class in university using Adobe Animate. The animatic is about a character's morning routine and the storyboards were created to plan out the different scenes and shots.

Our class was told to create a storyboard for "something" and so I decided to put together my morning routine, to reflect on how I take certain, seemingly mundane, aspects of my day for granted. It was also an early morning class so, my morning routine was still on my mind.

Once I had chosen an idea, I wrote a basic script and colour coded it. Upon finishing the script, I created rough thumbnails for each of the shots. I paid attention to the composition and framing of each panel to ensure that it would be visually appealing and effective in conveying the story.

Using the thumbnails I created an in-depth story board using Adobe Photoshop. I chose not to use colour in my animatic as Ireland most often has dull, foggy mornings. Once I finished the panels I put them together in Adobe Animate and After Effects to add sound and other sound effects that I found on youtube/ recorded myself. All SFX are not copyrighted and are free to use. The vocals were recorded by my classmate; Liam Treacy.

This is the full storyboard

Here is the animatic from this storyboard.

Concept art of the "Amy", the character in the animatic.

Here is the end of the script with my notes highlighted.
Yellow was for setting, purple for props, blue for character action, red for camera action & effects in green.

First panel of the storyboard with the notes from my script.

Amy's Wardrobe - the background of panel 2 without Amy

Panel 2 of the storyboard - with Amy and my notes.

Seventh panel of the storyboard

Town background in the animatic

Final panel of the storyboard

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Behind This Project

These are the storyboards for a 2D animation I made for one of my class in university using Adobe Animate. We had to create an "unconventional representation of time".

I started by throwing all my ideas into a mindmap using Figma, then from those ideas I took my top 3 and presented them to my lecturer. Based on his advice and insight, I chose my idea which I named "The Celestial Performer". Originally I wanted to depict a dancer moving across the stage but due to time constaints I went with a singer instead as it still conveyed the spirit of the idea.

Full storyboard for Opera Singer with Moon Clock

Brainstorm of ideas for unconventional representation of time

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Enemy Animation

I created this 2D animation as part of a Concept Art for Games module in Semester 1 of Year 2 of my degree.

The animation was created using a pixelated art style to give it a retro feel. I used a limited color palette to create a cohesive look and feel for the animation.

I started by sketching out the basic design for the enemy character. I then created a series of frames for the animation using a software called Aesprite, focusing on the movement and actions of the character.

I used a combination of traditional animation techniques and digital tools to create the animation. I made sure to pay attention to the timing and spacing of the animation to ensure that it was smooth and fluid, especially since it was going ot be used in a game.

Overall, I am very happy with how this animation turned out. It showcases my skills as an animator and my ability to create engaging and visually appealing content.

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CoffeeUtopia

I created this 2D game as part of a UI prototyping module in Semester 1 of Year 2 of my degree. Our prompt was to make a game based on the theme of "Utopia" and I felt that my perfect utopia was a nice cozy coffee shop.

I first created all the assets for this game in Aesprite, using a pixelated art style to give it a retro feel. I used a limited color palette to create a cohesive look and feel for the game as I watned it to have a "cozy" vibe.

I then used HTML, CSS, and JavaScript to create the game. This was the first time I had used the canvas function in HTML so it was really fun to explore this because it was like I was coding in C++ which I hadd done in my first year of university.

I made sure to pay attention to the user experience and interface design to ensure that the game was intuitive; just in case a user got confused there is a list of instructions in the top left corner of the game screen.

Unlike my other projects, this was hosted on codeberg which is an alternative to GitHub, however I prefer GitHub as it is easier to launch pages and more widely used.

Overall, I am very happy with how this game turned out. It showcases my skills as a game designer and my ability to create engaging and visually appealing content.

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Games Assets

I created these game assets for a project last year in my degree. I used Aesprite to create these pixelated assets.

I created a variety of assets including characters, enemies, and backgrounds. We also had to create 2 spalsh screens for the game so I chose the menu screen and the restart screen.

I used a limited color palette to create a cohesive look and feel for the game. I wanted there to a be a contrast between the characters, enemies and the backgrounds so I used brighter colors for the characters and more muted colors for the backgrounds as well as having a completely different plaette for the enemies.

I made sure to pay attention to the details of each asset, ensuring that they were visually appealing and fit within the overall aesthetic of the game. We were going to code this game but were unable ot complete due to time constraints and clashes without projects going on at the time.

Overall, I am very happy with how these assets turned out.

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Optometry Poster

This is a poster that I worked on in my personal time. I worked with an optometrist to create a poster to highlight certain statistics about eye health that they had recently written a paper on. He wanted an aide for his presentation to the Eurpopean Union of Optometry.

In addition to working with the author on the design and typography of the poster for display I also assisted with the data analysis and am named co-author of this academic peer-reviewed publication which was published / displayed at the 2025 European Academy of Optometry & Optics in Ljubljana.

I used Adobe Photoshop to create the poster, focusing on a clean and professional design. I used a combination of images and text to create a visually appealing poster that would catch the attention of potential patients.

I made sure to pay attention to the typography and layout of the poster to ensure that it was easy to read and understand. I used a color scheme that was consistent with the optometrist's branding, using blues and greens to create a calming and professional look as well as ensuring that it could be read by people with a variety of different levels of colour blindess.

Overall, I am very happy with how this poster turned out. It showcases my skills as a graphic designer and my ability to create engaging and visually appealing content. I am also very proud to have co-authored this publication and to have contributed to the field of optometry in this way.

Caoimhe O'Brien's Projects

Concept Art

St Cuan for Dingle Animation

Cow for Dingle Animation

Backgrounds for Dingle Animation

Lili Lasourris

Storyboards

Storyboard for Morning Routine

Storyboard for Opera Singer

Animations

Enemy Animations

Websites

This Portfolio

Sage Academy

Games

"Coffee Utopia" Game

Miscellaneous

Game Assets

Optometry Poster