5DM034:week 4: mailing letter animation and production stage

Taken from the vid reference and the help of the thumbnail sketches shown on a previous post, I have managed to produce a rough overdraft of a mailing letter animation in Maya but using the personality and movement of a male drug dealer.

The vid below shows the finished animation but would need to be edited and maybe changed as I would want to take on filming more footage from the plan and producing more accurate thumbnail sketches/ line of action in terms of movement to get a better sense of the character.

 

In my view, this needs improvements upon the leg work/walk cycle as I feel it's too static and also work on the features around the face as they need to show the emotional backdrop of the scenario to present what sort of character he is like. I also would like to present this off better by testing it in different camera angles.

5DM031: week 3 & 4:(17th Feb- 3rd March) mask production stage

This post shows the first two week of the production stage into the mask making. This includes casting on my face with mod rock which took only around 20 minutes to do and then filling in the vital shapes and monster features with modelling clay.

Once the shape of skull is created for the grim reaper theme, the next stage was to place it with the scrunched up paper underneath it that helped shape the mask earlier, into a cardboard box. Which would then be filled with plaster cast material. But before that, it become useful to use another material of paper to strengthen the mask's hold onto the cast before filling it to the top.

This then dries into a flat surface from a water base to a solid base. This would in turn be re-casted again when the clay shape has imprinted the skull on the other side of the cast and when the cast is completely solid dry.

5AD008: week 4:(23rd Feb) concept art research notes 3

Coming from the research gathered last week, I've decided to look at the cultural art/ art movements that have inspired animation.

Potential questions:

• classical arts that has influenced animation 
• how artwork has survived through animation and other mediums
• How cultural art and art movements have inspired animation? 

(The third question is most likely topic to do as this can be good to get information from and give the readers another side of looking at information as people forget how the unique pieces came to be)

Personal notes to formulate in essay:
-Gaining cultural style in animations can generate a different visual description from the theme.
-Make sure to research known mainstream animation developments aswell as unknown animation developments. This way it gives people information that they didn't know about and is interesting to read.
-make sure to research with dvds as they show behind the scenes footage that might help with what I need for my topic research in their development stages.

Examples/notes of cultural inspirations in animations:

• Mulan (1998)

-Inspiration from simplistic design and watercolour flow of Chinese paintings
-This would give a more spiritual and bright light feeling to the theme

-This style of art gave the character mulan a redesign a more appealing and selfless personality and characteristics

• Hercules (1997)

-Characters' concept style and design was heavily influenced on greek statues and artist Gerald Scarfe's work in Pink Floyd-The Wall
-Gearld Scarfe: English cartoonist and illustrator; his design of caricatures mixed with greek art and culture is what produced the characters like Hades, Megera or Hercules.

• Batman: The animated series

-Style highly influenced by art Deco
-This would deal in taking in the style of geometric shapes, rich colours and bold forms that stand out and using to design the characters' shape and form from the likes of batman, robin and the joker.

• Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs (1937)

-Inspired by the likes of illustrators Arthur Rackham and John Bauer that inspired the developments concept work.
-What they would have taken from Arthur Rackham is his watercolour technique to create an atmosphere and staging when stylizing character base colours aswell as taking bold use of lines through dark drawing outlines.
-From john bauer, the developers would take on his influenced work from the like of Renaissance and Sami cultures, transferred into his style of drawing when it came to painting. They would take his method of basic shapes in small sketches then created bigger drawings, same shape producing to fill in the details which lastly is filled with the right colours.

5AD008: week 3 (16th feb-23rd feb) concept art notes 2

Notes of book and DVD references to look into, approachable questions for topic and concept art related info

potential questions/ arguments include:

• What artist or art movement inspired on screen concept art/ illustration?
• How classical artwork survives through being inspired in media?
• .......

Books: (This list might change over the course of my research)

Animation in process (Andrew Selby)

2D and beyond (Jayne Pilling)

Before the Animation Begins (John CaneMaker)

The art of.....

• ratatouille
• monster vs aliens
• Robots

5DM031: week 2: more monster sketches (grim reaper)

As part of the mask making task, I've decided to change the theme to the monster of a Grim Reaper instead of a Cyclops as I saw the one eye as a flaw when it comes to making it suitable to see through in the performance stage.
Here are designs inspired by artists perceptions from the internet of a grim reaper aswell as an A3 sketch of the skull shape needed for knowing how to create the mask's features. For my design I also wanted to display some decay of skin on the face other than just a skull.

5DM034:week 3: posting letter footage and maya plan

This post shows the planning stage for the 3d animation of representing emotions through the scenario of sending a letter through the mailbox.

• Who are they (sex, age, class etc)

For mine, the character would be male, mid 20s, thief and courier/dealer

• Their intention is to post a letter, what is there obstacle?

For the scenario, the basis is that he is trying to send an envelope filled with drugs in the mailbox without been noticed or seen by anybody as he is watching every direction to make sure he isn't watched whilst discreetly placing the envelope into the mailbox. 

• Where are they coming from, where are they going?

I would say he would be coming from a gang of dealers from a secret hideout where they conduct their business without any eyes or suspicions from officials. For the package, I'd say it would be going to another courier or the buyer to conclude the business.

• What are they thinking, what's the back story?

The character would be thinking he needs to get this done straight away before he is noticed and needs to get back as quick but discreetly as possible to get what's owed of him for the trouble he goes through. The backstory would be that he is in debt and needs a quick fix on the situation before it gets worse which could create a sense of desperation and fear in what would happen if this isn't sorted and what will happen when he does these dangerous jobs.

5DM034: character animator (Glen Keane)

For my chosen character developer, my favourite is the work of animator Glen Keane.

Aswell as being an author and illustrator, he is well-known for his artist animation style portrayed through certain characters he has worked on and developed in Disney films from 70s to the present day.

 His famous creations include Tarzan, Rapunzel, Ariel, Aladdin, Pocahontas and the Beast. From his life time contributions and achievements, he has won awards including 'outstanding Individual achievement in the field of animation' (Annie Award, 1992) and a Winsor McCay Award (2008)

What I find fascinating about his work is that he is able to make his animation mark and personal drawing signature in both 2d and 3d elements. What I love the most is how he can take animation styles and create them to be more personal artistic expression. Furthermore, he's the sort of animator and artist that can keep pushing the boundaries to blend and produce a new artistic style within this medium. This would include the harmonious collaboration of hand-drawn and computer animated elements in 2012's 'Paperman', presented in the form of a black and white romantic story which would still be used in his future work; and in his new short 'Duet', he represents the full short's animation with organic drawings without the colour fill-ins but displayed in a negative and organic quality to show a different energy to this type of animated presentation.

What I've learned from an interview, he was more interested in being a painter when he was younger inspired by his father's artwork but he changed his motive over time when he attended the school of film graphics. From then on he started to love animation but wanted to blend his artistic knowledge into this movement by adding shading and textures to objects he was animating. But to achieve this sort of work he imagined, he made sure he knew the fundamental cracks of drawing through studying anatomy. 

Once he started animating, he wanted to keep the classical drawing element in all the work he does. This was by researching and being inspired by historical artists. From the creation of Ariel, he described about being inspired by french artist Francois Boucher through the Rococo art movement which focused on bringing more light hearted, asymmetrical design, curvaceous forms, graceful lines and combining drawing and colour within the paintings. This sort of advantage is what glen touched on and adapted into the creation of Ariel to generate a soft feel to the character. This sort of approach is how he research and developed his characters in other films. In my opinion, combined with the personalities created as well as the soft, simplistic, curvy tone of drawing style, you connect with the characters straight away and figure what sort of person they are from their visual displays.

What's more creative in his character development is when he finds his inspiration is from personal sources like his daughter's free style artistic personality becoming the traits needed to create Rapunzel; researching places like African jungles for the characteristics of Tarzan from the landmarks and environments and even taking drawing references for Pocahontas from her actual descendants.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Glen_Keane
http://www.skwigly.co.uk/glen-keane-interview/
http://theartofglenkeane.blogspot.co.uk/

5DM031: week 2: more monster sketches (cyclops)

this post shows sketches of a Cyclops monster in drawing stages to get a good overdraft of what this character would look like and what scenario would they be placed in.

5AD008: concept art research notes (1)

These are rough notes and a spider diagram of the topic I am approaching in this module. But this might change over time as I look into the fundamental research needed to do the essay.

5DM031: week 1 (3rd-10th feb 2015) circus and monsters themed sketches and ideas

These selection of photos display the ideas and sketches of what I would be bring forward to the table of which monster is best to suit the puppet making and mask making within the group collaborated circus project. But this could change as these aren't definitive monster ideas I would use in the production stage. These initial thoughts include werewolves, witches, grim reapers and aliens.

5DM034: week 2 (11th feb 2015) thumbnail and line of action practice sketches

This post shows the initial thumbnail and line of action sketches I conducted when my classmates were acting out key frames for a scene that involves someone putting a letter through the mailbox but using emotion in the mix that is visually described through movement.

5DM034: week 1 (4th-11th feb) shocked max rig (maya animation)

For the first week of 3D production, our initial practice was to test and familiarize ourselves in animating through 3D software using a rig on Maya.

For mine I wanted to get a shock reaction where you would see a dead body in front of you .The scenario takes place through someone walking casual down a back alley, he sees and jumps to seeing the body on the floor ending with a gasp, hand over mouth motion. Then as the information kicks in that the person is dead, the figure goes into a moving back, vomiting gesture.

This link shows my first draft of the shock scene posted on Vimeo but still might needs tweaking.
 https://vimeo.com/119282106

Most comments I got in terms of improvements included better timing and better walk cycle when he goes for the initial shock then moving backwards.

5AD008: week 2 (9th Feb 2015) class analyse of Rembrandt's 'the Jewish Bride'

As part our learning into research, the whole class worked on observing and analysing a painting called 'The Jewish Bride' By the painter, Rembrandt based on looking at it in a narrative/story perspective, the visual elements that explains the situation and also how the artist uses the lighting within the painting to represent the theme.

Through a plot, my own scenario was that this was a royalty or nobility marriage which in most cases back in the 17th century was arranged marriages. In this case, the story behind the two people is that she is not happy for this arrangement, but he is happy and doesn't care how she feels about the situation. Others thought that the father is giving the daughter away for a number of reasons including the gain of alliances and expanding the family empire or in a religious aspect, gaining respect or power for marrying into a highly religious family.

Within the visuals, there are a number of things that could explain the plot elements above. Firstly, they're both wearing rich, expensive clothing from the contrast of gold and vibrant red colours and the amount of jewellery the female figure is wearing which also shows they were probably expensive. Secondly, the emotional status displays she isn't happy for the arrangement as we thought she looks more sad and depressed but the expressions situated display that she has no choice in the matter as women didn't have a voice in society back then as they do now in the 21st century. This would be the same with the way her eyes are looking down as to show she's not comfortable with this, as in a normal aspect, newlyweds would look at each other with displays of happy emotions. Thirdly, what most of the class got from the groom is that from his facial expressions, eye contact and hand gestures, it clearly showed the bride is his property. Furthermore, when he is touching her inappropriately around the breasts with a smiling gesture, it displays his uncaring, self-adsorbed personality that he is only in it for himself  and thinks he can do whatever he likes.

From the lighting, the artist concentrates more on the aspects of producing a dark, eerie and early modern presentation. What we all thought aswell is that the dark setting around the couple shows that these two are the centre of attention in the narrative side of the painting. Also the lighting around the clothing colours brings out the shine of displaying their nobility background and rich lifestyle to the observers.

5AD008: Week 1 (2nd- 9th feb 2015) eadweard murbridge

Eadweard Muybridge
This man from late 19th century instigated the creation of motion picture, inspiring future film industries through his creative technique of moving picture formed into an animation using a zoopraxiscope he invented. What this device basically does is rapidly project images of stop motion movements after their individual motions are imprinted photographically onto a glass disk then coloured by hand.

The link below shows how he would used this method for creating the horse in motion.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QLnxy_5Bpnc

What the reason was for this creative method started through having a different perspective in how motion should be viewed to get a big understanding of the subject matter. This would be better than seeing one form of movement in a still.

A great example of birthing this technique came when he was placed into a bet by racehorse owner Leland Stanford where people speculated and constantly opinionated whether a single horse movement should be shown from one point of view and show how to prove that all legs of a horse can leave the ground from a scientific perspective. This likely happened when he observed portraits showing all four hooves of horses leaving the ground, presented in one galloping still motion and believing this is not how people should see horses.

But his method wasn't approached at first liking as the person who placed him within this argument thought the moving images of a horse running was too fast for the eye to take a full understanding of this animation. But over time his method was perfected through his experimentation with a range of cameras until inventing his own process and even studying movement in a professional way in both humans and animals. His experimentation concluded with years worth of image sequences, most in different angles to get new perspective on the action taking place. In one way people viewed these pieces as scientific experimentation in movie making but other people viewed them as artwork because they looked more like he created a new artistic movement.

 Even after his death, his professional practice and fundamental approach has been used in films to this day. One popular example of this came from John Gaeta using the principles of murbridge's zoopraxiscope to film the famous bullet time visual effect to film sequences in the first matrix film including the roof scene.Click here for the see scene.
The web link below this line shows how those scenes in matrix are produced through the fundamental stages, then the final cut. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uPNBdDNZbYk
This sort of example that is approached to film making can be greatly executed with the use of equipment that wasn't available for eadweard. This also shows that this technique can be improved to suit the formula in each film's theme and further inspire other film corporations and directors to do the same approach in their own media besides just films like tv shows or animations.
Click here to see how other industries stylized bullet time through their own approach.


Another example of zoopraxiscope influencing diverse people is Harold Eugene edgerton as muybridge's idealism greatly inspired his work through high speed photography to film slow motion or fast sequences. The fundamentals of zoopraxiscope pioneered him to be known as the man who can freeze time in his film making. This can be shown from his use of a stroboscope which is a camera that captures film in the form of multiple images placed onto a single photo plate. This means the plate is capturing individual exposure shots in motion whilst on top of the stroboscope's lens just like the zooprxiscope. From the help of eadweard Muybridge's method, Harold furthered the process through using each motion shot to appear in slow motion using a electronic flash, allowing slow motion to be captured in place to how he want the film direction to go.

• http://www.biography.com/people/eadweard-muybridge-9419513#photographic-discovery
• http://americanhistory.si.edu/muybridge/
• http://blog.europeana.eu/2012/04/the-science-of-movement-eadweard-muybridge/ 
• http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Zoopraxiscope
• http://edgerton-digital-collections.org/videos/hee-fv-038
• http://www.bbc.com/future/story/20140722-the-man-who-froze-the-world 
• http://makezine.com/projects/make-24/stroboscope/ 

5DM031 brief

5AD008 brief

5DM034 brief