Thursday 22 October 2009

trip to the farm for inspiration

I went to a couple of farms to gather inspiration on the form/shape of hens and roosters and also the way that they move and stand. I found this useful as it gave me a good idea of how I want my character to look and move, it also gave me a good idea of their texture and colour.













I liked this guy as he kept posing to the camera for me which gave me a good idea of their stance and balance




"hey how you doing?"




how he might stand whilst doing his "cockadoodledo"




what they live in....



the brown hens are used for their eggs and these are the eggs that are sold in supermarkets







whilst I was there I made a few quick sketches of the rooster as this will help me on the form of my character.




Thursday 15 October 2009

story board and final animatic- E4 is everything



I have added a few more elements in the storyboard making it more lively and random, I prefer it with the grey background at the beginning as it compliments the peacock, it has one spot colour which is purple the E4 colour. Then the animation leads to colour showing that E4 brings colour and life to everything.







This is the animatic, I think that its better than what it started off as because its more lively and random which is what I wanted. I now need to think about the style of this piece and what it's going to look like, as I am specializing in CG animation a lot of this will be in 3D.

Monday 12 October 2009

animatic for 1st Ident

I may change this yet as I still feel that its lacking something and is sketchy. It isn't quite what I want as I wanted more in here to make it more lively. I was going to do a domino effect Ident but it wouldn't look as lively as I wanted it to.
week 3

Monday- finalize storyboard

Tuesday- first Ident- start experimenting with imagery, how is the piece going to look and what techniques/programs will I use?

Wednesday- experimenting with the imagery

Thursday- second Ident- start to experiment with the imagery

Friday- experimenting and begin on sound track- put to animatic to see if it works

Saturday- sound track

Sunday- reflect over what I have done and my next steps

Week 4

Monday- begin to make first Ident- modelling on Maya
http://minyos.its.rmit.edu.au/aim/a_notes/04_walkcycle_project.html

http://minyos.its.rmit.edu.au/aim/a_notes/anim_cycles.html

Domino effects

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eP-v95g2RU8&feature=fvw

Guinness advertisement, well known, catches people's attention and keeps them engaged by the quick flow.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=H5m6EtN5sbM

Honda advertisement domino style, popular advert and gets people's attention. Gives the piece a motion and direction, i'm thinking of having a similar approach where the background is affected flowing like a domino effect.

Getting inspiration

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=79i84xYelZI

I have looked at Charlie Chaplin because of the way that they make one thing lead to another. Once he gets away from the first problem he then is faced with another.

feedback- rethinking my animation

After having a discussion about my project with a group of friends, I have realized that I have to broaden my target audience; as I have found that more men watch E4 than what I thought. This means that I need to change my Imagery a little making it more unisex. I will scrap the idea of the four seasons and put this into one random Ident with a simular flow to how I was going to have it. I will make another Ident using the E4 logo only and morphing it into random objects but also having a flow to it. At the end of this project I will have two different style's of Idents, one concentrating on form and modelling in Maya, the other one will be looking at mix media and live action. I am not sure yet of the style for these animations as I will think of the content later.

Friday 9 October 2009

http://www.youtube.com/results?search_query=aphex+twin+rubber+johnny&search_type=&aq=5&oq=aph

I have looked at this for the style, I like the way that the imagery is affected by the music. I thought of using this style but after thinking about it I realised that this would be too dark for E4. I will take from this the way that they have used the music that effects the imagery but fitting the music to the imagery after the motion for the imagery has been finalized. I will also have it so that the person has affect on the background in a kind of domino effect motion, giving my animation a flow and direction.

reference- live action and animation

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TPAzk7kHcug

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Op4FgTEfjp8

I am using a simular aproach in my animation where the background/imagery is affected by the people (live action)

Thursday 8 October 2009

animatic




This is just the first 3 seconds of my animatic. I am just looking at the flow of it at the moment, so the style of the animation will not look like this. I am going to use live action mixed with animation. My Ident will be 40 seconds long, and will be split up into 4 seperate idents each reflecting the seasons. I may change my idea yet but i'm just playing around with the motion.

I have just spent tonight with my friend who is a music producer/sound enginerer and he is happily going to help me produce the music track and sounds effects for my E4 Ident :) Listening to the music he is preparing already has got me thinking of styles for my I dent.

Monday 5 October 2009

Thinking about my final projects

I have been thinking about my final year at University and which area of animation I am going to specialize. I love all of the area's of animation that we have been introduced to but I am particularly interested in CGI animation. I have a lot of practicing to do but with the determination and patience I feel I will achieve my goal and ambition of becoming a CGI animator. I am really excited by special effects animation and I think that this is my chosen path in the animation industry. Although I will specialize in CG I will also use other techniques and materials to create drawn backgrounds and imagery.

For my final projects I will look at character design; I will design and develop my character/s looking at my specialist area and chosen module subject. I will draw inspiration from the people who I come across; looking at their body language, their style and how they portray themselves and their moods/personality. I will experiment with different mark making for my backgrounds looking at pattern and texture. As I am thinking of going into the special effects area of CGI I am going to concentrate on the backgrounds of my animation just as much as the character as I need to show of my modeling and texture skills. I will also look at lighting; depending on where my project is based I need to consider the lighting of the area. I want the piece to look elegantly done with a mature and enthusiastic approach.

Having discussed my final project with my tutor I have decided that one of my first options could be to do an Ident animation for E4. This would be a great opportunity for me, if I achieve a good enough animation this could be used on television (complimenting my portfolio) and would open the door for job opportunities. This would be a brilliant start to my career. Another option could be to do an animation for the D&AD student awards, I would have to request a brief from them and see what the project is based on and who the client is, of course this would narrow my choices of what to base my project on but will be the way of working in the animation industry; working to a clients brief and to a strict deadline.

I have done a little research on the previous Idents for E4 and I found that the main qualities that compliment the animations are the lively, continuous flow of energetic imagery. There are little narrative in the animations, no dialog and most of them are full of randomness; which is what makes them attractive and eye catching, they are 10- 30 seconds in length which is the appropriate time scale to attract and keep the audience engaged. I don't want to move too far away from the typical E4 style as it needs to be recognizable as E4; keeping to the correct colour palette, style of imagery and typography is important. I want to make the most of this project, creating a lively animation that is pleasing to the eye.


http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BeJp-KHFP0Q - this one is really good, love how they have done it.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=seDYX7SBL4k&NR=1

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bS8sBa9SOoA&NR=1

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hU9mYm9JrIM

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ccplsbUza9Y&feature=related - inspired by Escher