Goodbye FDA Animation

That's it... it's done, fda animation is no more for me.
It's been great fun, pulled me out of my fine art slump and opened up a whole new world of illustration styles, techniques etc. etc.

I feel now that I really have the basis to go out and experiment and explore my own style and improve as an artist.

The Star and Shadow exhibition is coming up in the next month, I'm really looking forward to it, although I'm already stressing about it as I'm aiming to do totally new stuff for it, maybe stretch out and experiment abit more and not re-tread old ground. I've been influenced lately by illustrators who do more detailed works, so I'm currently trying some new styles and techniques... I'll see how it goes I guess.

Any way, this may well be the last post I do on this blog as I'm aiming to set up another one in the next week or so.

See yuh.

quick update

So... instead of doing work that I actually need to be doing, I decided to start on a few little drawings for our final show/exhibition.
Started on a Jellyfish thing and a skeleton thing... I'm gunna get 'em scanned, live traced, coloured and printed, I'm doing these not only to have more to show in the exhibition and the final show, but to really brush up on my drawing skills... been at least a few weeks since I last put pen to paper.

I think it would be cool to do these things as prints to sell, maybe, if anyone would actually buy them anyway... I doubt it :'(

Pics to come.

Work module - Toys!

We recieved a work brief from a dude who works at OddCo, a company who create toys, basically the brief was to design a small range of characters that could be made into toys based around a certain theme... as I have been on a scary (but cute) kick at the moment I decided to go with that theme. Needless to say I have been really excited to start designing for this module... so I knuckled down today, when I shoulda been at college, and came up with these guys.

The feet need work still...

I basically made them in Cinema 4D and UV mapped some 2D faces onto them, they were a ton of fun to do. Even if I don't get chosen to make one I will just be happy that I'll have some more stuff to show on the Final Show!

more progress...

I've been enjoying my 3D work of late, so I've been doing quite a bit of work, in the past 2 days I've managed to rig 3 characters and produce walk cycles for all 3 as well as a test scene from the actual animation I will be producing; here they are.

At this rate I should have a 3D animation completed for Final Show, I am really pleased with how these are turning out.

There have been some minor problems with the rigs on two of the characters, but they seem to be trivial as the rig has worked perfectly thus far.

The joints seem to stick through the skin, the only problem I've encountered
so far, and it hasn't effected the movements of the characters at all, there is probably
a very easy fix.

 

updatin'

I had a good easter... I did no work, but it was good.I went to Pictoplasma in the second week, I found it and the city of Berlin both really great, I may upload some photos I took from my phone if I have the chance.

Although I did no work over easter, the past few days I have actually been working quite hard, here is my progress...

Tons of fun designing and making these guys, rigged and
moving.

Another colour guy, he'll be part of my final show
when I get him completed along with the Blue and
Green guy I did a month or so back.

Easter Work

Today I am suppose to get all of my PPD work sorted... I have not brought my memory stick!
So over the easter I will need to get this all sorted and printed for when we get back, this includes:

- Job Research/Skill set/PDFs
- Festival/Competition Research
- CV
- University Research
- UCAS applications
- SWOT analysis

Apart from this I will also be working on:

- Rigging my 3D characters
- Working on another scene from my 2D animation
- Pieces for Final Show/Planning Final Show

WHAT NEEDS TO BE DONE

Next week


Over the next week I aim to get my 3D characters all finished and rigged, the end of said week/the following week will be spent animating 'em.

Once this is done, back to my 2D animation, I'll need to work hard to get it finished, the majority of it seems more illustration back than anything, there won't be that much animation, if I can split the 2D and 3D and have them both finished by the end I will be happy and have some decent stuff for Final Show.

Also had my interview yesterday, it was good... preeettaaaaay preeeetttaaaaay preetttaaaaay good.

3D Progress...

This is just a quick (low quality) jpeg of the characters I've been working on over the past week.
I've kept them as simple as possible, as you can see the bodies are just simple shapes and the features very simple also.
Like I said in the previous post I'm trying to capture that old N64/PSone era low polygon-model look for these characters, they will be finished off with a cell-shaded effect (Zelda Wind Waker style).

Obviously the skeleton head needs a body, thinking of giving him a rag doll type body and perhaps a sword or a mace or something. The swamp man needs a little bit more work on his textures, the baghead man too, the mask guy I'm pretty happy with. I also plan on making maybe one or two more, once that's done I will rig and make an animation!
It'll be short probably around 20-30 seconds in length, fingers crossed it looks alright.


When I have spare time I intend to make a 3D model of one of my superheroes/villains, the opposite of these guys, hopefully very sculpted and detailed.

What I've been doing.

No pics atm I'm afraid.

Basically I've taken a small break from my main animation, I've already grown bored of it... not good.

I have however been doing some 3D modelling, I'm going to make a small animation with these characters I'm doing, it'll probably be very short and just be some little guy being chased by monsters.
I'm making the characters have a low polygon count and trying to make them appear as if they've been ripped right from an N64 or PSone game... I've always loved those graphics, it'll be a kind of homage to them.

Scene Progress

So, I've been workin' hard over the last week.

I've got a canny bit done... not as much as I would have hoped, but a decent amount.

Here's some of the villains, I will be adding one or two more in the future.

I'm a little worried about the continuity between scenes with this pencil shading,
I may re shade them later on. Second guy will have an animated cape in the future too.
Thin scientist guy I'm not too happy with.

I also managed to get a rough version of the villain scene done, it's a good indicator of what the final scene will look like, but the animation is quite crude, some of the goons are rough and theres not enough of them and certain things are missing, such as capes and a few other things.

It's pretty crap, it will be improved I promise!
I'm pretty happy with the way the background/foreground worked out though.

SWOT/SMART analysis

this is just fer me.

Strengths

Cinema 4D (2d Animation)
Audacity
Creative approach to Problem Solving
Being Realistic
Prioritizing


Weaknesses

Sometimes lazy
Being a leader
Managing People


I'll edit this later...

Progress and Targets

I have a lot of work to do over the next week... A LOT, I mean for real, I'm not bluffing, a lot.

My time plan is going to be as follows 

Today and Weekend - Finish off all of the villains and colour them up

The first layer being fully shaded, including all of the supervillains,

The second layer including the henchman, this will be just linework and purple shading,

The third will be just silhouettes, perhaps with just the eyes showing.

Next Week - Compiling the characters and background to create the villains scene, this will be about 5 seconds in length, arguably this scene will take the longest to do with regards to the artwork, altogether there will be about 12 coloured up individual villains.

After this I will begin work on the scene wherein the villains fly back off screen, again this will be just still of the villains, the mouth and eyes of the characters will move, this shouldn't take as long as only 2-3 characters will be fully coloured up, the rest will be silhouetted, the framework of the eyes and mouth will only be maybe 2-3 frames, this shouldn't take two long.

I'm concentrating on these two scenes before hand-in simply for the fact that they contain the most artwork... and these two scenes seem like they will be the most fun to make, I'd rather do the fun scenes whilst I have time and be able to do them to a high quality than rushing them right at the end.

Some More Drawings

A few pieces done on MyPaint (love this) I've been working on over the weekend, I tried mixing the cute, cartoony guys I normally do with the more detailed, sketchy style I'm also into, the background colours were just quickly improvised to show the shade. When these are fully finished they will most certainly go in my portfolio/work blog (when I start it)... these were a ton of fun to do.


Pondering little blue man, gunna improve on
him and the background.




Snotty, horrible gremlin thing, again he will be
finsihed, I'll add some ears and gnarly limbs
and the background/shading perhaps improved.

Got a few other ones on the go, some happy and angry characters, it'll just be nice to add some more illustrative work to my portfolio and blog.

Interview day, Sunderland.

So yesterday I had my first of my interviews at Sunderland University. It started with a short presentation about all of the courses included in the design area and a short tour of the facilities followed... I was very impressed with the buildings on campus and all of the staff were very welcoming and friendly.

The interview was short and sweet, the interviewer I had was very complimentary about my portfolio, she said she really liked it, she in particular liked my drawings and the way I had covered a range of different mediums, it was very nice to here.

Overall it went far better than I anticipated, the university itself gave me a really good first impression and I'm really keen on it, of course if I was to go there the travel would be very awkward.

I've also been doing some more drawings, I'll post 'em soon.

Interview...

Sunderland interview tomorrow... I'm apprehensive.


My portfolio I think is decent, obviously there's a few pages that I would like to scrap, but it's part of the development.

It's cool to see how I've progressed from being a total computer pussy who could only just about use Microsoft Paint to being able to make 3D characters in Cinema 4D.

Here's a few of the sheets from the portfolio itself:

There's about 25 pages in all, cost a fair bit to print, but the prints are very nice quality.

PRESENTATION TOMORROW!

AAAARRRGGHH!



...oh yeah and I may work on that little dude some more if I have the time

SMART targets

The main target for the next week is getting the following finished so I can build the presentation for the friday:
-Storyboards
-Animatic (possibly)
-Full colour concepts of both character and background
-Finalised script

Once these are done I will begin to build up my presentation to present on the Friday.

New module and some more spare time doodles.

Got my marks for the group project module; i passed, which i was surprised at, my last two modules have been god-awful. This new module is carrying on with our main animation and getting together all the pre-production stuff such as the treatment, proposal, animatic etc. Honestly I would be lieing if I said I was looking forward to animating this, the more I think about it, the worse and more uninspired my idea seems and as a result it's a bit daunting.

...Anyway, heres some of the doodles I've been doing in my spare time, I want to take a few of these forward and improve on them possibly for final show.

Few character doodles,  I really like the bottom three.

Although I love doing cartoons, I also love doing this sort of more detailed style,
distorting the faces and exaggerating the wrinkles etc. Inspired by some cool
drawing of Edgar Allan Poe on one of my sisters books.

Actually did this one about a week or two ago, just really to improve on my drawings
and distorting of features, I may colour him further.

Some spare time stuff.

I thought "why not?", I really fancied learning more about 3D modelling in Cinema 4D and decided to knock up some characters. Considering I had only done one 3D character before this, last year, I think these turned out alright. If I can get them rigged and moving I think I might stick them in my show reel at the end of the year.

Honestly, doing these characters was a welcome break from the 2D stuff I've been doing and I was surprised to find I actually enjoyed doing these more than doing the 2D frame by frame stuff. I'm just going to keep at the 3D stuff in my spare time and see where it takes me; whether I end up pursuing primarily 2D, 3D or both.

Ghost thing, took about an hour and a half - two hours

Just messed around with the melt tags, so he was pretty easy to make

Happy Banana thing, took a while, I think by the time I had done this one
I had kind of got my head around the modelling abit more.

Hand In...

Unfortunately we didn't manage to finish our iDents for the hand in, looking back I think we should have stuck to maybe 1 or 2 characters each instead of doing as many as possible, this meant much our time was eaten up doing line tests and designing characters instead of concentrating fully on the compositing aspect of the project.
The iDent that I did myself was more or less finished, however it is very sketchy and rough around the edges, some of the characters a little disappointing and unfortunately it is without sound.
We have talked to our tutor and we have decided upon perhaps continuing this project after the hand in and   making it worthy of putting into our show reels.

First comp attempts

I've never done this before and I think it shows really; I don't necessarily think my comps are bad, they're just okay...
I do like some of the characters I have done, especially the rabbit guy, I will most likely use him again for something, although in this animation he was admittedly rushed, if I had the time I would of liked to have given him both a better jump cycle and more detail; he feels too safe and I'm disappointed with the outcome.
There's obviously problems with these comps and I hope I have enough time to go back and correct some of the mistakes, however that is looking increasingly unlikely as I have ALOT of written work to do.

Am I ever happy with my own work?

MTV iDent Progress

Things are going quite well lately for this project, the characters are quite time consuming but are quite fun and allow me to just go mad with them as far as their designs go, I have still tried to keep them quite simple as we only had a quite short amount of time to do quite a lot of characters. Some of the ones I have designed will be simple pop up characters that will only have 1 or maybe 2 frames.

Over the weekend I have to finish off the rest of my characters, colour them and then render them out.
The rabbit character is more or less complete, he's a bit jumpy and could probably have more frames, but he will do.
I have the jumping character to finish off, pen up the rest of the frames and colour him.
I have a few pop up characters to draw out.
There is a flying character and another walk cycle to finish off...

I also need to ring up a few universities to inquire into a third year and sort out the rest of my UCAS if I decide to do pursue a third year

This will be a fun weekend...