FINITO!

We have finished. It's been a little hectic but the Lewmeister and Mr Pinnock did it! We had many many problems. Rendering issues in maya with the 'C++ Errors'. We also found out that some of the renders had become corrupted and so we had to re-render them. We also had problems exporting the film. I also had a problem with one particular shot where I had to composite some 2d animation onto a TV, I did it first but it looked rubbish. Then the godly god Simon Butler showed me how to do it properly! We were originally going to have all of our 2d animations in the film but we had to take all of them out except for one because the film was already 10 seconds over the limit. I'm moderately pleased with the look of the film. It was mainly an animation project for Neil and myself, not a modelling, rigging or compositing. Overall, I think it looks good but there is always room for improvement. I would like to thank everyone that helped the project along the way, Dan, Jared, Spence, Stu, Tom, Daryl and Simon.

PRODUCTION SCHEDULE

Hard at work. I finished all my animations on Friday, so Monday and today has been rendering. Which is now complete. It has been pretty frustrating, I must have seen that damn c++ error over ten times today! Allot of the shot's we've had to render in layers, but not in the traditional sense. We had to separate our layers into different projects as we could not have the animations in the environment as it kept imploding. Anyway it is all done with now, after running backwards and forwards across the college trying to get my renders. We have to do the editing now, put the sound and stuff in. I am going to quote my motto for this project..."Must keep going".

Animation Overview

The Animation in this project has been interesting. Blot is a strange character as he is very theatrical. All his movements have to be very grand and expressive. On the flip side, Durg's animation really is quite undramatic as there is no drama or reason for it. He just does things and that's it. I've had to bee quite calculated about my animation. Because we have so many shots and so many movements to fit into 30 seconds, we have had to keep all the animations quite fast passed. This is difficult as you have to take time for anticipation and things like that. Overall, I think my animation is quite mediocre. It's not great, and we don't have allot of time to tweak it as it is due in on Friday. There are many better animators than me in the class, so I won't be expecting Pixar to knock on my door anytime soon!

Animation Vids 5...ummm, they haven't made any more Die Hard movies!

Neil was finding doing the run cycle and the drool shot quite time consuming. Considering they are now half done, I decided to lighten his load and take a couple of his niggly little shots away from him. The first shot I tool was just a close up of Durg. This is supposed to reveal how idiotic he is, so I decided to have him glaring off into the distance with his eyes blinking at different times. There's not much more to say about this shot...does Durg looks dumb, YES!

The second shot is going to be a panning shot closing in on Durg illustrating how blot is now flying through the air towards him. With this in mind, I thought a normal person would look scared if they saw someone flying at them, so i did the opposite and made Durg smile idiotically...priceless. These Durg shots are pretty simple, but have been the most enjoyable pieces of animation in this project so far.

Animation Vids 4: Live Free or Draw Hard

I've tried soooo hard to make this shot look good but I just can't. I've fiddled with the animation and the graph editor and it just looks terrible. I'm really just hoping that I can edit this into the movie so it looks OK.

This next shot was a tough one. This is after the crash when blot realises that the knifes are coming towards him. For some reasons the arms kept freaking out and all I wanted to do was to get them to shrug down. Oh well it looks decent enough in the end.

Animation Vids 3: Draw Hard with a Vengence

Not a whole lot of difference with this shot, I just fiddled with the graph editor to make the timing a little better. I like this shot and I think it works. Obviously there is more I could do but I do not have the time.

This next shot is simply to show blot slipping. It is really quick and really not that impressive. There's not really more I can say about this one!

Animation Vids 2: Draw Harder

This is the shot where Blot finds the knives that he misplaced. Here we see him rumaging through some junk untill he comes across the knives. This is the shot where we reveal to the audience that the audience is not real, but actually a 2d cartoon on a screen. I will import our 2d animations onto the screen in after effects. I thought that the TV could go on the fritz and blot could punch it as a joke.

For some reason the laptop, does not like the scene where blot throws the knives so I'll have to fiddle with that one at college. Instead here is an unimpressive animation of some knifes flying through the air. This will be used in the scene where blot runs past them. It doesn't seem like much now but it will look better with a background and some motion blurring in after effects!

New animation vids!

This is the first shot of Blot from our film. I have now fiddled with the graph editor and make the flick in his wrist more dynamic and fluid.

The Second shot is the shot where Blot walks onstage and remembers he does not actually have the knifes. I wanted there to be a stark difference between his confident showmanship as he walks on to the frustrated realisation that he feels afterwards.

Title Card

I thought it would be a good idea to create a title card for our short. I was inspired by the title Cards to the old Hanna-Barbera cartoons, which seems fitting considering the style of our original designs. In my title card you can see what colour Blot will be in the film, which shall make him visually different from Durg. I originally had him far more darker, but I decided to lighten him up so that he will stand out of the shadows a little more, also it will make him look less threatening. I also chose a circus style font as they are putting on a show, after all.

The last two weeks have been pretty hectic. PPd presentations, nightmares with making a DVD, the mammoth Rave on Air, a contextual studies presentation and an essay. With that all in mind, the progress on the project has been slow, however, since that stuff is all over I have been busting my gonads trying to get this work done. So by the end of Friday I have pretty much finished all of my animations...yay! I've been tweaking them today. Neil's got two more shots to do and I have faith that we will finish this movie...scratch that we WILL finish this movie. I'm getting ready to render the shots on Monday. On Thursday I rented out a sound effects hard drive from the store with my buddy Sam. I've found most of the sound effects. We still have to keep pushing.

Playblasts!

Here are two playblasts from some animations that I did over the weekend. The first animation is a shot of blot running and realising his is going to slip on the drool . This was quite a tricky shot to do, because at first it was too fast, and then it was too slow. I think the overall movement looks okay but it could do with being a little faster to make it snappier. The playblast is the beginning of the shot where blot realises that he doesn't have the knives. This shot was especially tricky as, for some reason, the computer kept mucking up. Anyway this shot needs allot of work, the walking needs to be improved, and for some reason some of the inbetweens are missing. Anyway, must keep trudging!

New Update!

Hey, this is an update of the schedule. All seems to be going OK, but we need to get the animations done pretty soon. I've been animating all today, but I know that there's more to do. Just got to keep going! Overall, I think we are on track, but we could do with picking up the pase a bit. I know this is difficult what with the DVD that we have to make, and the contextual studies essay as well!

TV Party!!!

Today I modeled a TV for the audience shot. I made it from a cube (my favourite), a sphere and some cylinders. I thought if I went for a modern looking TV it would not be as comical of obvious to the audience. New TVs look too sleek and computer like, so I decided to go for an old tube like one, just like the 25year old TV I used to have in my bedroom until 2001! I decided to give it some wonky antennas to complete the look. It looks a bit like the TV from the Simpsons.

New Lights.

We had a lecture with Sultan Efe today on the subject of lighting. Sultan advised against using area lights, and instead said to opt for spot light's with a high radius and high drop off. Sultan himself, used a stage as an example. After the lecture I immediately tried lighting the scene. I had one main yellow spotlight in front of the stage. I then had a blue spotlight on the back wall to act as a bounce light, as well as two big red lights either side of the stage to also act as bounce light's. overall I think the scene looks pretty good. The bounce lights have really given thew whole stage more character, with the subtle reflections of the red curtains bouncing onto the walls. To add to this, I actually think the stage looks more theatrical now. Overall, I found the Sultan lecture very helpful!

Slip n' Slide

Here's another shot. The one is a big one. It's of the motion when blot slips on durg's drool. This shot has loads animations in it, every part of his body is moving. The actual slipping still needs lots of work but I think the expression is pretty funny. I was inspired by Jim Carey in Ace Ventura, the bit where he screams with the shark, anyway, no time to dilly dally!

1st shot!

I have spent today animating the first shot of the film, where a spotlight shines on blot and he gestures towards the knife board. I wanted people to get a sense that blot loves the theatre so I had him take a big breath in and look around the stage adoringly before making his grand gesture. I wanted to create a sense of grandness to his gesture so I had the wrist flick a little and the fingers roll at one frame after the other. To accent his moves I tilted his head slightly. I thought his legs were a little static so I decided to dip his knees a little to really give the motion more pop. There's still a little more work that needs to be done to this shot, a couple of awkward inbetweens, a bit more secondary animation. I haven't even touched the graph editor yet. Anyway the basics are here.

Storyboard Redraft

Neil and I had a chat with Jared, who said we needed to incorparate the 2d in with the 3d more. He said that it won't sit right with a viewer if the audience is 2d and everything else is 3d, so we need to play around with the ideas more. He said we could exploit the fact that the audience is 2d. I came up with two ideas, the first was that Blot throws one of the knives into the audience, it slices one of them i half and they flutter apart like ripped paper. Neil didn't really like this idea. SO, I came up with another one, which is what we both agreed on, so I decided to storyboard it.

Blot is about to reveal the knives, he then pats down his sides and realises, he doesn't have them. We cut to the audience looking slightly confused, the camera then pans back to reveal that the whole audience are being shown on a TV screen and are all pre recorded. WE see Blot, rummaging around behind the TVs before finding the knives. He the walks happily back on stage, and dusts himself off. The camera then zooms in dramatically as he produces the three knives from one hand behind his back.

Both Neil and myself rather like this idea. It's almost poking fun at the fact that the audience are not real, and do not exist within the 3d world.

The New and Imporved Knifeeeey!!!

After the previously mentioned USB disaster, I had to remodel knifey. NOOOOOO! Fortunately, much like the Wise Jared once said, the second time you model something it will be allot easier and allot better. This was the case, I completed the model in half an hour, and I personally think it looks better than the previous one. I based it on the knife on the far right of this reference image...the big one. I was going to model a specialist throwing knife, but I thought a kitchen knife is far more instantly recognisable for the audience.

Textured Environment

Hey Guys, after a horrible accident involving my USB, a few files went missing, including the production schedule, the knife and the environment. After a a full blown hissy fit, I started re modelling the environment. Then I remembered, I sneaked a copy onto Neil's USB last week as a back up. When I got the environment Back off of Neil, it was un-lit and un textured...so I had to do it again. Anyway, here it is. I used a regular Lambert style texture for the back wall, a blin for our velvety curtains (snazy!) and a blin for our varnished floor (all the more to slip on someones spit with). I chose to light the scene with two lights, a regular area light at the front, and a warmer toned peach light at the back, to give the scene more personality. Overall I think the environment has turned out pretty OK. Neil and I aren't the greatest modeller's and textures in the world. Hopefully the focus will be on the animated performance...then again it is nice to have a swanky environment!

line test

line test

line test

Line Tests

I've been power housing the hand drawn animation for The Prof movie, because Daryl needs 'em all finished within the next few days. Here's are some line tests that I did the other day. I finished the rest of the animations today. These line tests turned out OK, Daryl thinks they'll work.

SHANK!

Now that we will be animating in 3d, I decided to quickly model a knife, (after spending hours scaling the environment up to match Max). I made the knife the same way I make everything in Maya...CUBE! Adding vertexes, extruding and all that stuff. Anyway, it's pretty basic, but Max is pretty Basic too so I think it will fit nicely!

Flash Update!!!

Whilst having a chat with Dan, he made a suggestion...why not animate the duck scenes with a pre-made rig. He said how there's nothing wrong with combining 2d and 3d in the film. This stuck in my mind so I discussed it with Neil and we both agreed it would be the most logical decision to use a pre-made rig. It's partly due to time constraints and, also, we want to work on our 3d muscles as well (they are puny and pathetic after all). We'd rather have a well done piece of 3d animation than a crappy rushed 2d, or worse, a poorly rigged 3d. We squared it with Jared who said it was OK. I am happy with this decision as we will be using Max for Maya, and he is a rally cool rig.

The Plan (don't even think about it Neil!) }:(

Not much to say about this post...the only thing is that Neil and I have not put the percentages in it yet!

ANother Flash Test

I have a graphics tablet now ( a very sexy Wacom Intuos 4). With this in mind I decided to do a little test in flash. It's only a super quick, three frame animation, but I think it turned out quite well...considering I'm so new to flash!

I would show it to you all but stupid blogger is being a little butt hole and it won't upload. URGGGGH! I HATE COMPUTERS!

Flash reference!

Here are some examples of how Flash can look awesome. One clip his from the hit Cartoon Network show Fosters Home For Imaginary Friends. The one with the devil is from the new Cartoon network show, Jimmy Two Shoes, which is about a kid in hell (I think the character designs resemble that of our film). The last two clips are from a fantastic Internet animator called Harry Partridge, who is most famous for his 'Saturday Morning Watchmen' parody. His Metal Gear Solid Parody is fantastic as it lasts pretty much 30 seconds, so it gives an idea of how quick our film has to be.

Enivironment!

In Daryl's film, he is using 3d rendered Maya backgrounds. To keep with continuity with the audience shots I decided to model a stage for our Duck film. I took the audience seats, cameras, directors chair and lights from Daryl's environment (modelled by Harry and Elisha) and created my own stage. It's really basic but I had to keep in mind that it must fit with our character designs as well. It's certainly not the worlds greatest environment but I think it'll do.

Just an Update!

Just to let you all know, all the pencil animations with the bean have been completed. It's no Glen Keane but Daryl says it looks fine. Must. Keep. Going.

New Boards!

Hey all here are the new boards. After a long chat Neil and I decided that my boards were too long, way over 30 seconds, so we decided to rethink the story. The new story begins with a spotlight on Blot. The lights go up revealing Durg the assistant and the knife board. Blot produces two knives from behind his back, and then one from his tongue. We close up on Durg presenting the board, then we see Blot throw the knives. He then speeds past them. We then see a close up of Durg's tongue as a piece of drool drops from it onto the floor. Blot is horrified as he slips on the dribble and goes careering into Durg. Then two get up rubbing their heads as the knives are still flying through the air. Blot looks on in terror of the impeding knives, as Durg is completely unaware.

I like this new story a lot, I think its quite short and sweet.

Line Tests

Here's a two line test for Daryl's audience. I decided to start the ball rolling with my crazy baked bean character (he's so crazy). Here we have him clapping, and ooohing! It needs a little work, Simon pointed out that his foot inflates and deflates. Anyway, Daryl seemed to like it.

A Test in Flash

Neil and I are worried about getting the animation done in time. With this in mind we decided to try Flash to see if it would be easier to animate and save time. The original idea that we had was to line test taditionally but not only line test, ink over it, take to illustrator, live trace then take it to flash to colour. However since we only have 5 weeks, that process would take too long so we decided to do everything on flash. I've uploaded a video to do a test, we're just messing about with the basics. However if we get to good grips with this, then we will use that to get the animation done. Neil is doing a test himself so I'll see how that gets on.

A Message from The Big Man!

Hi, I hear there is some confusion over the audience animation. For the wide shot of the audience I just need a single 3/4 view of the characters facing left. For the shot from the back of the audience I just need of the characters from the back. The close up shot of the audience is the one you need to animate to.

Their are six different emotions.

1. Clapping the prof.
2. Laughing at the prof goof
3. Nervous at the prof selecting a member of the audience.
4. OOOOing and Ahhing at the Prof
5. Shocked at the prof
6. Worried at the prof

Animations need to be no more than a second long each, filmed on twos so that's twelve drawings. Also the animations should be repeating, i.e. they end where they start. Hope that helps. All the best. Daryl

Rough Storyboard Ideas

Hello there! Here are some rough story board ideas for our short...emphasis on the ROUGH part. It starts off with blot sliding onto stage. He approaches the turning dial and begins to spin it. Blot then zooms to the other end of the stage and pulls out three knives. Blot throws the knives, He the proceeds to speed past them and jump on the board and miss all of the oncoming knives. Blot then leaps off the board and poses for the crowd. Blot the shows a box, and then pulls out a saw (which I am thinking of changing to an axe). He hops into the box and cuts himself in half. When he leaps out of the box, he has been split into two halves. Blot is shocked and then squeezes out another set of legs. Blot then glances over to his old set of legs which begin to grow a top half, thus giving life to Durg, Blot's idiotic counterpart. Blot is shock as a exclamation point appears over his head. Durg steps forward and falls flat on his face which causes the audience to laugh. Blot is filled with jealousy that Durg is stealing the show. Blot grabs the exclamation point over his head,and clubs Durg with it.

Yeah the endings a bit week so I have to figure out what should happen instead.

A llittle tweaking!

Hey all, here's a little design for the story that Neil and I are coming up with. Here we have my design for the main character, who I have kept relatively close to the hillbilly duck design except now he is a little more classy. Gone are his buck teeth and dungarees, hello to handsome smile and showman's bow tie. I also decided to dabble with Neil's design for the ugly duck. I have kept in mind that we will have to hand animate this. Knowing this I simplified Neil's design as I thought it was a little too complicated to draw (we will have to draw these guys like 900 times). I also decided to test out some names, Blot is the showman and Durg is the ugly duck. Let me know what you think of the names. We need to go full steam ahead with storyboards soon!

Last of the audience.

Hello, this is the last leg of my audience designs. Daryl told Neil and I to design ten and then pick five or six from them. The first character that I designed was a red headed creature that I imagine would be of some relation to the professor, which is why I coloured him yellow. The second character was a pigeon, however I didn't want to colour him grey because I thought it would be too dull so I decided to colour him peach. I also decided to make him a professor fan boy, hence the t-shirt...I like the pigeon. For the next design I decided that the audience needed a bit of ethnicity so I decided to draw a dude with a fro. I didn't want to colour him in a human like skin tone so I decided to take a 'skeeter' approach and colour him green. Finally for my last character I chose to create some sort of turtle. I had already coloured my Afro dude green, so I decided to go against traditional turtle colours and went with a blue. Overall I quite like most of the designs, some are weaker than others, so I'll doubt they'll make the cut. Now I have to think about the Lewis/Neil movie.

URGENT MESSAGE FOR NEIL!

Neil, we only have six weeks to do this, so we need to have all the character designs done by Tuesday, so we can start animating the audience on Wednesday. We need to get the audience done as soon as possible, so we can give it time to learn toon boom and give it to Daryl. Then we need to get started on animating our Duck Movie!!!!!!

The Plot

For our film, Neil and I have decided to have the audience observing a one man show, starring the cousin of my duck character. The duck will be trying to do tricks that take two people to do, by himself. After sawing himself in half he splits into two ducks, one is a dopey version of himself.

I don't know if Neil is cool with this, but I thought it would be funny if the dopey duck starts ruining the acts and stealing the show, so the other duck tries to do away with him. Let me know what you think!

HuuuH?

I don't know why that happened but one of my pictures uploaded as a negative. URGGGGH! :(

Wacky Audience Characters Ahoy!

I'MMMM BAAACK! For this project I will be helping out with the animated short "Insane Science Seeking With The Professor", alongside my partner in crime Neil (he is my Robin). For this animated short, Neil and I will be designing and animating audience members, who will gasp, applaud, and do many others things. However, this is not all. The audience that we will be animating will also be featured in mine and Neil's new short...which has no name yet. Anyway here are some designs for the audience. Daryl told me to be wacky and that these characters do not have to resemble any sort of creature at all. With that in mind I drew a boy with a fedora for a head, a blue slob, an old bogey man, a hillbilly duck, a stuck up eel and a new yorker baked bean. I don't like the old man so I don't think I'll use him in the audience. There's more to come...