The Block, Pass 1

So, following on from my last post I've been working on the actual animation over the last few weeks. I've finished my first pass of the animation now, blocking out the poses for Pandora and the other character rigs in my scene, which you can watch below:

I had originally intended to animate the intro, with her stealing the key, which you can see at the start of the animatic, but as the above block worked out as 1 minute 50 I've decided to leave it as 2D or it'll be too much to do in the time I have. Also it's not really the most important sequence so I think I should focus on the main, defining part of the story.

Since working on the block I've encountered a few problems here and there, mainly with the skinning, which I've been fixing as I go along.

I've also encountered two other problems which have led me to making changes within the animation in order to make the relevant actions work. This has meant deviating slightly from the animatic and adding in some additional actions, which hopefully still work.

The first one of these occurred at the part where the Dark Arm is pulling Pandora into the box. In the animatic the hand pulls her into the box in it's grip. This didn't go quite as smoothly in the 3D version. With Pandora in it's grasp the hand would not fit into the box. If I'd just pulled it through anyway the Dark Arm mesh intersects the box and is visible outside of it which is not something I want in the animation. 

There were two possible solutions to this problem: 

1. resize the box 
2. come up with an alternative action to make this work

I decided on option two. The results of which are shown in the above block video. I decided to have the hand stop at the top of the box and push Pandora down into the box using the thumb/finger. When she's in the box it then straightens and withdraws. I think this action worked quite well despite not being part of the original plan.

The next problem is something I've come across today while working my way through the second pass of the animation. At the start of this pass I added in the box key and linked it to Pandora's hand at the start. Everything was find until I reached the point in the animation where she goes to unlock the box, only to find the key was the wrong way round:

The easy solution would be to just rotate the key the other way (with autokey turned off) in order for this action to work in the animation with the key facing the right way. However by doing this the key would then not be in the right position for the action prior to this when Pandora is holding the key put towards the box comparing the shape at the top of the key to the box lock, which you can see below.

So the only option left was the key would have to be rotated in the animation. This wasn't something I'd planned for. Maybe this is something I should have given more consideration too during the filming stage... If I'd been using a more suitable prop other than a hairbrush maybe it would have O_O

Either way I've not incorporated the rotate into the animation, which hopefully looks ok. I repositioned some of my pose keys to adjust the timing and added in some additional poses and extended others to try and make this new action look believable and fit into the sequence. The results of this will be seen when I upload the second pass. For now I'm just making note of this problem so I can incorporate it into my report.

I've also began blocking out the face in this pass so I've got to make use of my facial rig for the first time. Could be better, but for a first attempt at building one, not bad! Definately something to learn from and build upon in the future!

Let the Animation Begin

The Pandora model is now finished and in use! 

Here's a picture of the final model:

I finished the facial rig, which was quite a fun process. As I've mentioned previously I've never made a proper one before so I had to do a bit of research. I've used Morpher before to create expressions but this time I wanted to control the expression changes without having to go into the modifier panel each time. Also this is the first animatable model I've created with a jaw bone so I wanted to link that up to my control panel too. I had no idea how to do this mind so research had to be done!

I found these tutorials:

http://www.bakaneko.com/howto/computer/3d/rigging/
http://www.3dtotal.com/team/Tutorials_3/video_facecontrol/facecontrol.php

I did also have a read at the book 'Stop Staring' I have on facial animation, but the actual section on setting up the controls for it is for MAYA so didn't make much sense to me. After reading/watching the above links I felt comfortable enough to take what I'd learned and apply it to what I wanted to achieve with my own rig. I created my control panel first, making control panels for all the actions I wanted to be able to control and then set these up with IK and limits so they could be wired up to the relevant expressions later using reaction manager.

In total I ended up having 40 morph targets, quite a variety.

These should be enough there for what I want but if not I can always create more as I go along. I wired all of these up to my control panel then using Reaction Manager, as well as the jaw bone and that all seems to be working just fine. The real test will come when I start animating her facial expressions in the animation, so fingers crossed!

With that done I then decided to test the rig itself by creating a quick walk cycle for Pandora to fix any obvious problems. I didn't want to spend too long on the walk (as tempting as it was) with it only being a test but I tried to give it a bit of character then I rendered it out. Couldn't see any problems with the skinning so I decided it was time to begin the actual animation work. I did see a few things on the model and texture I'd like to have refined but at this stage I don't want to be editing and re-doing stages. I'd rather move forward unless the issues really call for me to go back.

Yesterday I filmed some footage and began the opening animation where Pandora steals the key from the drawer. I figured this would be the best sequence to begin with to give the rig its first proper testing... and encountered problems with the skinning. This was to be expected after have smooth most things have gone so far :P The problem occured with the shoulder and elbow joints with some strange distortion. I played around with envelopes and vertex weights to some extent but this didn't to much. Then I had an idea that maybe its the shape of the rig at these joints so I edited the CAT rig at the elbows and shoulders so when the joints bend theres a curved section. This seems to have worked pretty good :) Here's a screen shot to show what I mean:

I did also test on a copy of the file if adding more edges would have fixed the problem but it didn't which is kind of good really becasue that would have meant re unwrapping the body, whereas altering the rig itself doesn't really affect anything not even the animation on the various parts as long as you're not in animation mode. Another bonus of the CAT system!

All the problems I've encountered and fixed with the rig I've applied to a 'Final' version of my rig so if I need to bring it into a new scene its up to date with all issues corrected. When I begin work on the main sequence I'll need this.

I also opened up the Attic scene file yesterday and added in my main camera to make sure the angle I'd envisioned in my animatic worked with the 3D version. It did. I also added some lights and checked the scale of the models with the scene just to make sure. All good!

Today I plan on filming some footage for this section, ready to begin blocking it out on the weekend. I've also got some DVDs to watch for relevant research for my report. So far I'm on track with my schedule :)

Character Modelling & Rigging

Since my last post I've spent most of my time working Pandora and also looking more into rigging.

One of my friends from class recommended I use MAX's CAT system to rig my main character, which he'd recently been experimenting with for his models. So after spending an hour or so with him one morning checking it out I decided it was the best thing to use. You can build a highly customisable rig, shape the bones to suit your mesh, animate on layers and switch between IK and FK. Beats the hell out of biped and bones. Well done Autodesk!

So I came home, deleted the original bone rig I'd created for my creature and made a new one with the CAT system to experiment. I skinned and tested it too and it seems to work just fine! Should make animating a lot easier too with the layers.

I then moved back onto working on the Pandora model. This is the first time I've modelled a full human character in quite awhile so I didn't get it done as fast as I'd hoped but I think I did a pretty good job in the end.

Got some feedback on it too and was told the topology was sound, especially in the face. Awesome!

After making some slight adjustments to the final model, I've spent the last few days building and shaping the rig, which you can see below:

 

The rig actually looks like the character now after some editing which I think is cooool. I've also found today that this makes the skinning process a lot easier! I've also unwrapped the model, currently I've just applied some simple colours to match my concepts, not too concerned with that at the moment and this evening I've been skinning her. So far so good! I also got told it looks like my drawings :D which means I haven't done a bad job!

I'm attempting something new with project too by making a facial rig. Previously, I've created characters with some facial expressions using morph targets, and I've used other rigs with a facial set up but I've never attempted building my own.I added an extra bone to the head when I was building the rig for the Jaw, and so far I've skinned it to work.

My next plan is to create my morph targets then create a control system for the face with Reaction Manager so I don't have to keep going into Morpher and rotating the jaw bone. Never tried this before so I hope it goes as smoothly as possible.

I also need to texture her eyes... she looks pretty freaky with them being all white!

Animatic & Project Progress

I've done quite a bit of work on the project since my last post so this is likely going to be a long entry. First off I completed and final draft of my storyboard and then further developed it to produce the animatic for my piece which you can watch below.

It's longer than I expected it to be, luckily around 40 seconds of this is made up of narration or sections which don't include animation. I intend to keep the section I have text and illustrations in, and maybe get someone to read the narration for the final version. Aside from that this pretty much shows what I want the animation to look like.

After giving it some consideration, I've also decided to produce the animation in black and white. It seems to suit the piece well in the animatic, and as its got a creepy, dark element to it I think it'll work. 

This is the moodboard I produced at the start of my research, which gathers together stills from my favourite animations, all of them with that dark edge... guess that shows my personal taste :P 

So my short is likely going to resemble Tim Burton's short Vincent, in the fact that it will be done in these tones, hopefully with some good lighting, but I'm also aiming for it to be cute and appealing too, with the style of the characters and set. Think it's well on its way!

Here's the model of my creature, which is now being rigged:

And also some more designs for Pandora:

I'm currently in the process of modelling her, which I'd like to have done asap so I can get her rigged ready to animate

Speaking of Time Burton earlier, I'm also going to look into compositing at a later stage and experiment with some techniques to give the animation a 'stop motion' feel to see how that works. I think it could potentially work quite well so we shall see. I'm also going to need to use After Effects to make the creature's morph into Pandora work. So I'll need to do some research while I'm in the production stage.

I've also set up a basic model for my Dark Arm which I've successfully rigged and tested:

Originally I had intended to have this to be a tentacle of darkness but after doing numerous tests trying to make it work as a tentacle, which proved to be rather complicated, I decided why not make it just a simple giant arm? So that's what I did! I rigged it with IK, set up the controls and Voila! It seems to work just fine for what I require of it and it's a lot easier to control than a tentacle so it was definately a good call!

So this is where I am at the moment. My priority at the moment is to get Pandora modelled and rigged and finish the creature rig then test them both and go from there!

Final Project Story & Design

I mentioned in my previous post that my idea was to create a piece based on the myth of Pandora's box, and do my own take on it. I intend to create a cute yet creepy stylised piece, featuring one main character and one room. It's going to include some 2D illustrated/narrated elements to open as well as the animated section. I'll be producing all my own character models and rigs.

So here's a brief summary of my story:

Pandora is going to be a young child, what wants to know everything. She has a burning curiosity and loves exploring places, seeking out hidden treasure or hidden passageways. One days she discovers an old mysterious looking chest which she tries to open, but she gets caught by her furious father who takes the chest to the attic and forbids her to ever go up there again. He also hides the key.

The short will open with Pandora stealing the key then venturing to the attic to open it.. As she is about to open the chest she starts to have second thoughts because she’s been forbidden to touch it and doesn’t want to get in trouble with her father. Sensing her doubt, the box shakes and curiosity gets the better of her so she unlocks it.

Not sure what to expect after the box moved Pandora is quite scared of what may come out, but is pleasantly surprised when a cute little dark creature swoops out past her. Laughing she attempts to catch it, turning her back on the box.

A large, dark form begins to grow from the box and the room gets darker. Alarmed by the change in light, Pandora turns around, but she is too late. The darkness is already upon her. Swooping down the dark form seizes Pandora and pulls her into the box, slamming it shut behind her.

The room returns to its original light and state, looking as though nothing had ever disturbed it. Frantic tapping sounds come from within the box with an occasional shake and a dark little creature is seen slinking away into the shadows.

After working on my storyboard I have since added an extra twist to the ending with the evil creature becoming Pandora. I really like this addition and I feel it resolves the story much better. There's also room for me to maybe make a 'Part 2' in the future answering the question of 'What happened to Pandora?

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Here are some of the initial sketches of Pandora with the key and creature!

I've also produced modelling templates from my designs for Pandora, the box, the creature and the key. So far I've completed the box and key, may need a bit of tweaking later but not much.

Only thing left is texturing but I intend to tackle that when all the models are complete. I'll post some more design work soon along with my completed storyboard!

Project Pre-Production

Since my last post we have now began work on our Final Projects. This module is Pre-Production and basically includes doing all the work except for the animating for our final piece i.e. story development, concept art, modelling, rigging, research, reference shooting, storyboarding and animatics etc.

After brainstorming some ideas for a possible project idea I've decided to create a piece based on my own original retelling of 'Pandora's Box'. I aim to create a stylised, dark, cute piece around a minute and a half in length featuring one main character, one scene and some simpler creature designs.

I'm going to attempt to build my own rig for this module as there are no female rigs for max, especially not children which is what I'm after. This should be pretty challenging. I've modelled, skinned and rigged before using biped, but it's not really something I've done much of so it should some additional learning, especially building a facial rig. I have some videos on the process so I'll get round to watching them when I've finished the model.

So far I have planned out all aspects of the story and development, wrote a character profile for my protagonist Pandora,created all the concept art for my characters, props and the scene as well as additional sketches of various story aspects to get a feel for the piece. 

I'm now in the process of modelling from the templates I've drawn up of my final designs, writing up an an animation script and drawing the storyboard to see how it reads.

I'll start posting some of my work in following posts.

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This is a ringling thesis short I watched recently. Nice story concept, great character models and animation! If I can get my character models looking as good as this I'll be very pleased, haha!

Task 2: Mime Final

I also finished up the Mime on Friday so I could spend the weekend with my family. This is probably my favourite piece from the module. 

From my last pose, I tweaked the timing further to make some areas a bit more snappier. Then I worked on the curves and made some offsets and added in the pupil movement.

I think some areas could probably be made faster still, but when it reached the stage it was at this point, theres so many keys for the body that it gets difficult to shift them. Also as the face also has a whole load of keys which have been done to suit the body these also have to be moved to match and it's near impossible to do. But all in all the timing is ok. I think the piece could probably do with a bit more polishing, mainly on the last 400 frames but I'm pleased with the start of it. 

I'm looking forward to making a start on something new now, particularly as it will be my own personal project :D wooo! Going to attempt some new things, do some research into lighting and rendering, attempt building some rigs and as this next module is pre-production... this means ideas and concepts sooo I GET TO DRAW!! Hopefully my idea will be approved and I can get started soon!

And just to finish, a cool short I seen last week which I thought was really cool! Must have been fun animating all the different types of animals.

Lab by Esma-Movie

Oh,I went to see Rio this weekend which I really enjoyed. It's a fun movie, with cool music which made me want to get up and dance and it also made me want to go on holiday, haha! It defintely looks like it would have been a fun movie to have been a part of, theres some pretty interesting characters which have been animated well. I also like the character designs, which is something I always look at! I really like the designs for the monkeys and also for all the different birds. Some of the designs for the small birds are so cute!

The animation for some ofthe birds when they're rapping is sharp and snappy as well as being smooth and fluid for the dancing. I'd like to learn more about animating animals and creatures... it would be good to explore more possibilities and open up more types of characters to animate. Maybe after the course is done this could be something for me to look into.

Task 3: Development to Final

Due to working to get everything finished to a satisfactory level before this weekend I've been animating and not posting any works in progress. Luckily I did manage to get this piece done in time to submit it into the competition yesterday. Also as my family are visiting this weekend I also had to get the Mime finished up as best I could as well.

Anyway, from my previous post where I established my idea, these are my development videos. 

Initial Block 

Camera Tests

I set up two other cameras to look at possible angles to capture the two characters to see which would be best to capture both their attitudes to each other.

I did make a previous block before this one, where the sitting guy reacted slightly differently when he spoke, using a hand gesture when he says 'How's that again?'. I showed this to the class though, and from feedback it was suggested that a more toned down reaction with the character being more dis-interested would suit the piece better.

So i went home filmed some more reference and altered my block.

Developed Block with Camera Cuts

In this block I decided to experiment with the new camera angles and possible cuts in the piece more than anything. I also worked more on the lip sync and facials and developed some of the poses and actions.

Work in Progress 1

Developed the camera a bit in this to reduce the number of angles while still keeping the same amount of cuts. Worked some more on the lip sync and facials and added in some hand animation, focusing my attentions mainly on the sitting guy.

Work in Progress 2

Tightened up the animation some more, added in some breakdowns poses to make the animation smoother.

Work in Progress 3

Developed the facials more. Set up a better lighting system and fixed up some bits of the scene. Added in the rest of the inbetweens and tidied up the hand animation for both characters.

Work in Progress 4

Started working on the animation splines, reduced the camera cuts down after feedback and re-did some areas of lip sync for the guy in red which I wasn't satisfied with.

Final

From feedback I tweaked the cut lengths slightly, toned down the yellow guys head movement and fixed up his eye movement and also adjusted his reaction to the point to start later as he was initially moving a bit too early. I also made some offsets here and there and tweaked his end pose slightly.

Overall Thoughts

All in all I'm pretty pleased with this piece. I particularly like the guy in yellow who I really enjoyed animating. I found his reaction an amusing one to try and capture. I enjoyed animating the two characters actually and I think the overall results captures the right attitudes I wanted for both of them. It could probably do with a few more passes to tighten it up more and get more of a polish on it but I wanted it done in time for the competition deadline and I'd also like to move on to the next module now and focus my attentions on my final piece.

I enjoyed using the Dee rig too. I had much less trouble with it than the Max rig, not one gimbal error occurred in the whole animation! Woo! 

I think an area my work could really improve from, is better rendering! It's not as important as the animation but presentation is definately an important factor in pieces for a showreel. I'm going to look into this during the new module, pre-production so I'll be able to get a much better result when it comes to rendering my animated short. I could always re-render these pieces then at a later stage.

Task 3: Two Character Dialogue Piece

For Task 3, the assignment we were given was to animate a two character dialogue piece to a provided audio.

We received this piece at the start of April and the Task was to produce the piece as part of this months 11 Second Club competition using the audio they provided, as it was an audio for two characters.

You can preview the audio on their site: 

www.11secondclub.com

Even though I only properly began working on the piece today, we did have a filming session in the green room at the start of the month where we filmed some footage in groups after discussing our individual ideas.

My idea for the task was to have my two characters in a bar, with one guy feeling the need to talk about himself decides to strike up a conversation with a guy sitting on his own just trying to have a quiet drink. An alternative idea was to have the guy talking to the barman, but I decided to go with my original plan.

After setting up a basic bar scene yesterday I filmed some extra reference for both characters and then began blocking it out today. 

For this piece I also decided to use a different rig to previous animations just for a change and to see what other rigs have to offer.

The rig I'm using is the Dee rig, produced by Manuel Sierra and modified by my classmate Remi to look like the new version for Maya by Victor Hugo.

So far I really like the rig, probably more than the Max rig. The controls it offers are great, especially for the feet and face... I have yet to try any facial animation with it though. The only thing I do miss from the Max rig is the hands. 

As I haven't my initial block yet, here is a screenshot of my scene:

The picture in the background can be found HERE. 

I'm not sure who produced it in order to provide credit but I have contacted someone to try and find out so we shall see. IF necessary I shall remove it.

Mime In Progress

Now that the fear animation is done and dusted I've been spending more time on the Mime animation.

Since I posted my block I made another pass over the animation adding in the breakdowns and adding the audio:

After getting feedback on this I made another pass over it to refine the timing and make it faster and snappier. Luckily I have the audio broken down into separate sound bytes and added in separately using Max's ProSound which makes adjusting it to suit the animation a lot easier!

I'm now working on the Facial animation, focusing on 500 frames at a time and going over each bit continuously for the mouth, eyebrows and eyes until I'm happy before moving onto the next set. As the animation is now at 1500 frames, I'm around 2/3 of the way through.

The only part I haven't worked on yet is the pupils aka where his eyes are focusing. I intend to do a separate pass of this when I'm done with the body animation as if i alter the head then I'll only have to make to alter it again anyway.

So here's where I'm at after the last pass:

I plan to finish the rest of the face off tomorrow before work and then Friday I'll be moving onto the spline animation for the body.

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I've also noticed that it's been awhile since I posted an animated short on here, so here's one I watched recently:

I really enjoyed this, it has a really attractive visual style. I loved the tree!! Actually I generally like trees.... I find them interesting O_o The character designs are great too. I also watched some additional videos on the making of this film looking at how they composited the shots, so many different passes for the various lighting aspects. Makes me want to learn so much more! I'm also intrigued about animating animals...

Fear Final & Thoughts

As I'm calling this animation done now I though I'd make a post of the final version for this module and also talk a bit about what I learnt while making it.

After finishing the last module, I made a list of things I'd like to learn more about in order to develop my skills further, which can be seen in this post here. The main issue I really wanted to get to grips with was the curve editor in order to understand more about 'splining' so I could really enhance my animation further.

I decided to while doing this animation that I was going to play around with the curve editor more in order to get a much better understanding of exactly how it works and how I could really exploit it to make my animation look a lot better.

Whereas I really haven't reached the peak of where I want to be with my animating I can definately say that through the process of this task I have definately achieved my goal of understanding how the curve editor and splining works and I no longer feel wary and overwhelmed when opening up the graph editor and seeing loads of curves for all the body parts. I actually found it really enjoyable and got engrossed when i started playing around with the curves for each part of the body and watching the effects it had on the animation.

I also played around with it by experimenting with simple animation on a basic box shape which really emphasised much more clearly what altering the various curves has on the animation eg. eases in from point a to b etc. 

I still think more experimentation is needed and if I had more time I would like to have made a few more passes over this piece to polish some parts of it further, but as there's now only around 2 weeks left for the other 2 tasks then I don't think it would be wise.

While looking at this list, I can also say I understand more about FK and IK and prefer animating with IK after my experiences with the Dance animation. I've found that I don't seem to have problems with gimbal errors when using IK.

So yes, I'm definately pleased with this piece. I reckon it's one of, in not my best piece of work so far! I'm hoping the next two animations for this module with be just as good or even better!

Fear Development

During last week, I focused on this piece to bring it up to a pretty finished state. I went through a few passes tightening up and inbetweens and adding any extras, putting in the needed sound effects, adding some eye animation and fixing up my curves in the curve editor and adding in any needed overlapping/follow through actions.

I took the latest version into class yesterday to get some feedback, which I'm pleased to say was all positive! The only comments were to remove one sound and maybe speed up the run across the landing to the door. Taking the comments on board I've sped up the run as much as I can and removed the unnecessary sound from the last version. I'm currently rendering this version to see what I think. I may attempt tweaking the curves for more speed too if it's still not looking as I'd like.

Anyway, here are the various stages of the piece's progress up to this point.

Fixed up the run and creep, still blocked,no audio yet.

Added audio, sped up the run, focused in on the first half of the animation to improved it.

Focused in on the end of the animation and worked on the curves for all sections of the body. (Still haven't finished the eye animation in this version).

Next post I make for this one will likely be the final version! Most of my attention is now being directed at getting Task 2 done so I can move onto Task 3.

Task 2: Mime Block

Finally finished blocking out the Mime over the last few days. Took me quite awhile to do due to experimenting with two rigs, the length of the sequence and also the various actions he progresses through.

I did initially start blocking it out using the Joe rig, but I had some problems with his arms due to twists occurring at the wrists :S not sure why this was happening... so I decided to change back to the Max rig just in case I had any more problems later on as I feel I still have a lot to learn in general without having to deal with any additional complications which could make more work for myself and also result in added stress.

This time with the Max rig, I remembered from the offset to set the arms to IK which made things considerably easier for me. I spent some time making him look 'Mime' like and then set about posing him using my video footage for reference.

The finished block did come to around two minutes, but I managed to decrease that considerably when I fixed the timing in certain areas. I don't think I'm going to be able to reduce it by much more though... but there are a few sections I think I could speed up a bit further which will probably make them more effective, like when he's being hung.

This is how its looking:

There's no audio yet. I need to edit the sound file to fit the animation so I've had to install Adobe Premier because I couldn't do it in After Effects. I'm in the process of adding in my breakdowns now and trying to tweak the timing further. When that's done I'll try and get some audio with my next render so it makes more sense.

Task 1: Fear WIP

Developed my stairs piece further since my last post. I've now added in the inbetweens and also made various alterations to the animation and also the camera based on feedback from my class and also the feedback I got from Ed.

The feedback I got from Ed from the last video was:

"Nice work, Lauren. My only note is that you be very specific in your own mind about what it is that your character thinks he hears. You have him jerking around at one point on the stairs, and it seems to me that if I heard a ...suspicious noise upstairs, I would freeze, trying not to even breathe. Maybe he thinks the noise came from downstairs? Also, after he has made it to the top landing, I am not sure what he is doing when he flattens himself against the wall. Is he afraid there is a person in the house and that the person might see him?"

I'd already got feedback from my class about the ending where he slides along the wall recommending I alter it... I also thought it would be better to change it but part of me was kind of attached to it just because of how it looks visually... I loved the poses and movement! Sadly they just don't make sense in the context of the animation so I took them out :( I also made some other alterations here and there to the timing e.g sped up the slamming of the door at the end and started adding in my breakdowns/inbetweens. The plus side of making these tweaks is my animation is now 30 seconds long rather than over 40, which is great due to the time we have on the task.

We had a lecture focusing on camera work last week too, so based on what I learnt in that session I've also totally changed the cameras, which was a definite improvement! I took them all out and the animation now has only one camera which follows the character throughout the piece which was an instant improvement.

This was what I had initially based on everything I mentioned:

In the last few days I've developed it further. I further tweaked the camera to capture the character better as he climbs the stairs, as the angle in the video above didn't really show the poses at their best as he's climbing the stairs. They weren't reading well to the camera. I also adjusted it so it doesn't pull back then zoom in after he climbs the stairs which works much better. Another thing I tweaked was having the camera to stop moving when he glances behind his as well as when he's scared to give the impression that the camera is 'something' creeping behind him/watching him as he moves which works well with the mood I'm attempting to create.

I finished adding in my breakdowns too and altered the start of the animation to more of a sneak rather than just steps.

I made a proper render this time round to get a better idea of how the whole piece is looking with the lighting:

Overall I'm pleased with how it's developing.There's a few areas which I'm still not happy with... mainly the run from the top of the stairs to his room, it's not working for me yet. Not sure how to approach it.. may need to re-block it and go from there. Going to post this one up for feedback now and then delve into it some more.

I really need to block in some actions for his eyes and add in some sound effects too for the next pass.

Blocking and Recording

After feedback from yesterdays class I added cameras to my initial block scene and set them up to resemble my animatic. This is something I should have done anyway in order to test out how the animation looked with the cameras in place and to test if the set-up worked. I made a few attempts at it and this is what I've got at the moment:

I also need to make some tweaks to the speed of the character's movement after he's been scared on the stairs. It needs to be sped up as he's meant to be running. I also need to add in a sound for the part where he jumps just so it reads better ready for it to be sent onto Ed. I should have all of this in place by the end of this afternoon.

I also had a session with a professional voice actor yesterday who narrated the voice over for my mime script. I took the script to draft 4, making a few more cuts in the length and took this version in with me to the recording studio. We did three takes of it and they were all great! He did a really good job of it and even added some improvised bits. I liked the voice and tempo, though it's probably going to need a bit of editing as its currently coming out at around 58 seconds which is way too long! However this is including some pauses so when I put it all together it should come out a bit shorter, but it'll still need a bit or editing I think but hopefully not too much. I plan to film some video reference for it over this weekend so I can make a start on the blocking for next weeks classes.

Oh I watched a really beautiful short yesterday. The combination of the music and style of the piece really work great together. I love the character designs in it!

Task Developments

Task 2: Mime

Last week I shared my 'Charade' idea for the Mime task with my tutor and class. Surprisingly my idea was well received... I wasn't quite sure it would be seen as I thought I may need a second character to make it work, but after some discussion my tutor suggested I have a voice over for the piece, kind of like they do in the Children's show 'Pocoyo' and also in 'Pib and Pog' from Aardmans darkside which is aimed at an older audience and is more along the lines of what I'd like to achieve. 

You can watch it here:

Pib and Pog - X Factor

We also had a lecture on Mime last week which was really interesting. Looking at different examples of Mime artists. There were some pretty weird ones... We also watched quite a few 'How to...' videos explaining how to do various actions as a Mime artist, which will probably be pretty useful when putting together my video reference for it over the next week.

So I've been putting together a script for my piece. It's currently on Draft 3. There's a voice actor in this Thursday so he's going to be the narrator for it. I'm going to time the piece today (as best I can) and then take it into our class later to run it by a few people, see if anything can be omitted and get some feedback. Hopefully by the end of the week then I'll be able to move onto filming some video reference for it all. I'll also get to use the 'Joe' rig, which is now up and running!

Task 1: Fear

As well as putting together my script, I've also been continuing my work on the stairs task. We had a few filming sessions and also quite a few discussions about the 'believability'' of various aspects of my idea. First was the creeping, which I dealt with altering the piece to include a some faster action at the end with a run. I also did the whole write up of my idea then altering his age and developing the concept further. Lastly, the latest point brought up was with the lamp... and whether it worked. I didn't see the problem with it, but it was questioned as to why there wasn't a main light so that left me a bit unsure. 

Personally I didn't want a main light because to me it would destroy the whole mood of the piece due to the bright lighting. I don't think it would work to communicate the character's feeling convincingly which is what I'm trying to go for with this one. Besides that at my family home we have a table lamp which we use instead of the main light at times because it makes softer lighting.

Anyway, I decided to keep the lamp but made a few tweaks to the start of the animation to communicate the character's fear of the dark more, which I think works well and still ties in with my animatic. My only concern now is the length of the piece... 

Oh, my idea development document was also sent to Ed Hooks for his feedback on my idea, which was much to my surprise all good! (I was a bit worried at the time and was starting to think I may have to change it altogether). Here's what he said:

"Love it, Lauren! Good work.  The emotion you are after is “fear”.  If you make the boy merely “nervous”, it won’t read as well.  It is more difficult to achieve an objective (going to bed, right?) if afraid than anxious.  You will also be able to do some interesting things with lighting.  Nice stuff."

I finished the first pass of my block yesterday, just with a main poses, no breakdowns or inbetweens yet. 

Only problem is it's too long...  Surprise Surprise! I've yet to make something that's too short. I'm thinking I'm probably going to have to cut out some of the start. I want it to be at the most 35 seconds. Will get some feedback on it Thursday and go from there!

Task 2: Idea & Research

For the second task of this module aka 'The Mime'. The first idea I had was to have my character playing the party game 'Charades'. For anyone who isn't familiar with this game, one person selects a card which will have something written on it eg. the title of a book or a name of a film and they then have to act out the word for the others playing to guess.

For this to work, I guess I'm going to have to include two characters or at least implement people shouting guesses for what the mime is preforming.

This is just a possible option for this task which I'll need to get some feedback on first before I develop it any further.

Anyway I just typed 'Charades' into Youtube and found some interesting videos, one of which is from Monsters Inc. I don't remember this scene from the movie (it's been awhile since I was watched it though) but it's fun to watch.

In terms of style this is the approach I'd be going for. Stylised, fun and exaggerated actions.

I also found one from Monty Python:

Another from ABC's Modern family:

And lastly, something a bit different, a clip of a comedian performing what they've called 'Kareoke Characdes' to a song, haha!

Hopefully I will get to do something with this idea... it could be pretty entertaining if done right!

Task 1: Idea Development

After getting some feedback from my class last week I decided to take another look at my idea and develop it some more to get a better understanding of my character and what I wanted to portray in my scene.

Using the sheets we received last week in our lecture I made a document and wrote up a character profile, an animation plan and looked at how I wanted my character to develop in the scene in terms of mood and body language.

Initially I had planned to have my character as a young child, but after talking through my idea with my classmates and tutors it became apparent that a young child would not behave the way I wanted them to in my animation as they would not yet be thinking the way I perceived my character would. As a result I realised my character would need to be older, more in the range of pre-teens - early teens where their thought process would be more developed which would influence their reactions more. 

The character would need to be nearer the age of the kids in the movie Monster House which I recently watched again as part of my research.

I also watched a short movie recommended by my tutor called 'The Sandman'. You can watch it here:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UjgHbRrnjhU&feature=feedf

The boy in this short is a bit younger than my character will be but the overall mood and feel of the piece is definitely along the lines of what I would like to achieve as it shows the development of fear and builds suspense very well!

I'm currently awaiting feedback on my developed idea from my tutor and also from Ed Hooks, who's working with our class on this assignment. So hopefully by the weekend, I'll know whether I can proceed or if I need to make any further adjustments.

Either way I did some more filming yesterday with my housemate to get some more footage implementing the changes I've made, which involve the character running the last bit of the animation. I also filmed footage for the landing section of my animation which I'd only storyboarded previously.

I've also more or less finished my scene for the time being. I did some more work on the stairs, adding the banisters in and also putting in some additional items for the hallway. I also made some adjustments to the lighting.

Scene with light:

Scene without light:

When the scene gos darker in the animation after the character has turned off the lamp, I plan on including some additional lights to only light the character so he remains clear to the audience. I'll be experimenting with that when I've begun on the animation. Any other needed adjustments can also be made at this stage.

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Here are two shorts I watched recently.

The Backwater Gospel:

This ones pretty creepy, but it has a really interesting style to it, dark and twisty! I also like crows...

The Saga of Bjorn:

I liked this one too! I like the stylised characters and its pretty funny in comparison to the first one.

Task 1: Storyboard and Animatic

So the last few days I've done yet more filming, wrote out a plan of what I want to happen in the animation, sketched a storyboard, done up the storyboard to make it more readable and created an animatic to establish a rough idea for the timing and possible camera shots.

Here's the Photoshop storyboard:

You can't see the text but it basically outlines the camera shot and whats happening, which should be clear in the animatic.

And... from that my animatic:

It needs some sound effects still, which I've been gathering and possibly some sort of creepy audio track. I need to look into the background audio...

Going to get some feedback on my work so far and go from there.

Task 1: Establishing the Scene

Since establishing my idea for task one and getting it approved I've been doing some pose drawings to represent fear and also done some thumbnails of possible scenes to get an idea of how I want the piece to look. 

These are the my thumbnails showing a few variations of the 'stairs' scene.

 I picked the one I liked best took it into Photoshop and turned it into a colour key thumbnail by painting on it. I already had an idea in my head of how I wanted to stage the piece in terms of lighting and colour so I applied this to the drawing and this is how it turned out:

I like it. I think the colours work well together but I figured they would being contrasting. It should create a nice moody look for the scene.

Using this design I then started to build the scene in 3D and put in a few lights to experiment. It's not finished yet, but I think for the time being all the important elements are there. Here's how it looks so far:

The stairs rails need more work, some additional items could be added to make areas less empty and some areas need more detailing so I'll probably work on that some more before the weekends over so most of it is established before I start the actual animation. I'll probably experiment a bit more with the lighting as well.

I've decided to use Andreas' 'Woody' rig, which I used previously for my lift animation. I made a few adjustments to it, after talking to Andreas, so I'd be able to do more with the characters eyes as the rig has no other animatable facial elements to it. I set up two controllers so I'll now be able to increase the size of the eyes to become very large (widen) and also shut which I think will help express the character's feelings along with it's body language without relying too much on facial expressions.

I also did some filming yesterday using my stairs at home. I made multiple attempts and tried a few different things for various to get some reference footage ready start on blocking. I'm considering making a storyboard first though or maybe assemble the bits of my reference that I like so I can establish an idea for the timing and general outline of the animation before I start.

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I read an interesting article the other day on best and worst animated characters, which you can read here:

http://www.salon.com/entertainment/movies/film_salon/2011/02/09/gnomeo_and_juliet_character_design

It features an interview with character designer, Shannon Tindle (who's work I really like) and focuses mainly on Gnomeo and Juliet, a 3D animated movie which recently hit the cinemas.

I also watched a pretty creepy but enjoyable short yesterday while drinking my afternoon cup of tea, which I must share here! 

Be warned it may make you think twice about visiting an ice cream van and if you have children yourselves you may be inclined to tell them to avoid ice cream vans at all costs! hehe!

Task 1: Character, Obstacle, Objective

For the first task of the module the brief is to animate a character going up some stairs, taking into account what the task is all about, which is clearly stated in the title.

- Need to know who they are (must be clear!)

- What mood the character is in

- What is their objective; why are they climbing the stairs?

- What is the obstacle?

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 Idea Summary

My idea for the task is to have a person with a deep fear of the dark who has to make their way from downstairs (after turning off the last lamp), up the stairs in the dark to reach the safety of their well lit bedroom.

Character: The character is likely going to be a child, as a fear of the dark is a common problem for kids as they imagine all sorts of monsters are lurking in it.

Obstacle: Fear of the dark.

Objective: To reach the safety of their bedroom which is filled with light.

At the start of the animation they are downstairs and they're about to turn off the last light at the bottom before making their way upstairs to their room, which they will have to do in the dark with only the limited light from the windows. The door of their bedroom on the landing is open and the light from the room is streaming out. It is a place of safety which they desperately want to reach. However, in order to get there they will first need to climb the stairs in the darkness and deal with their fear.

Mood/ Key Elements / Feelings: Atmospheric, Eerie, Suspense, Fearful, Scared, Intense, Nervous, Dark, Moody, Creepy

Other factors: No dialogue, focused on creating mood and feeling through expressing the character using body language and limited facial expression.

 

I'd like to create more emotional moody piece for this one as it's something I haven't attempted yet and I think it would be challenging and fun to do this using just the characters body language alone without relying on any facial expressions to convey the characters mood and feelings to the audience.

I'm also considering that there could be an additional obstacle to further hinder the character's journey to their bedroom. I'm only planning on implementing their if the fear obstacle isn't enough to achieve the effect I want. I plan to have the character creeping to their room quietly, in fear that any hasty or loud movement will draw attention to them  (from whatever lurks in the darkness) before they reach their bedroom where they will be safe. I don't want to have them running, I want creeping!

So if necessary I may implement a door with a 'DO NOT DISTURB' sign on it to give the character a reason to creep and try and remain as quiet as possible. I don't really think it will be needed. I think both of these could work well as separate obstacles... but we'll see! I shall await feedback and until then finish my sketches and thumbnails for the character and scene and set out my idea for the mime piece.