A Look Back

    I changed my mind and decided to post on Mondays instead of Saturdays. Maybe. I'm not sure if that's a smarter idea, but for me, it's easier to keep track of things and I know at this time I'm most likely to be less busy on Mondays than Saturdays.

    Anywho, progress is still slow going, but I'm almost done with boarding out Act I of Shift (aside from going back and making some adjustments.) If all goes well, I may even provide a little sneak peak animatic of Act I by my next post! Act II is pretty much all thumbed out and ready to go, Act III on the other hand is still a bit shaky but I have a general idea of where it's headed. It's just ironing out some details, maybe tweaking some designs.

    I don't have a whole lot of new stuff to show at the moment, but I realized I haven't shown my "Beat Boards" for the film yet so....

    These were from earlier this year, around April I believe, so some scenes have since been removed or changed. The opening chase scene is generally the same, but I changed the staging of some scenes and what prompts the wolf to chase Oliver has changed. The mouse scene though, as cute as that mouse was, was taken out as it didn't add much to the story. 

    Originally, I wanted to take a look at Oliver's "human side" and show him living in an old cabin..as humans do...and further emphasize how he's just..starving, the poor thing. No food, little resources..and to top it off a mouse has helped itself to whatever scraps Oliver had left. Angry and hungry, Oliver tries to catch the mouse but fails again, as he did trying to catch the hare earlier. It would've then transitioned into the next scene, Act II. 

    As pointed out by friends, it was already established that Oliver was not the best hunter after the run-in with the wolves, so struggling with that mouse felt redundant and added more time than was necessary. His cabin will stay in the film, but I don't know if you'll see as much of it. 

    On another note, I thought I'd share the original "attempt" at making this film too before continuing on with more progress and development:

    Mmmm-mmmm, look at that 720 x 480. I did this 4 years ago, wayyyy back when I was a wee little sophomore. I definitely took on more than I could handle but I gave it my best. I look back on it from time to time though to reflect on where I was and where I am now and it really boosts my confidence. If I can give one piece of advice to any new and even more seasoned animators and artists, it would be this: You can only move forward. You will only get better. Don't give up! It's simple and it doesn't sound like much, but it really does sink in, trust me.

    As much as I still struggle to believe in my own abilities I am much better at picking myself up now than I was only a few years ago. I am determined and at least confident enough now to work hard and keep my promise I made at the end of my sophomore year to revamp and complete this film.

Puppeting Assignmnet- Sophomore Year

Another assignment for Digital Compositing class. I used Niko again for old time sake =) This was a lot more tedious than I thought! Once again I hand drew the model and scanned it in to be inked and colored in Photoshop. Then I copied and pasted the separate joints into different layers. How many layers? A lot. Her tail has 4 joints in it, body has 2, the neck and head moved separately and her ears had 2 joints. The limbs are pretty obvious. It was a lot more trouble than it's worth to make sure the outline matched up at all times so I just got rid of it and ended up liking the vector look to it. After it was all assembled I imported it into After Effects and began animating, joint by joint. At first I thought it'd move a long faster than the traditional way. But now...let's just say my admiration and respect for claymation artists has doubled. You have to have so much patience for it.

Anyway, enjoy this little animation of Niko =) Next week I'm going on a field trip to Titmouse, where my digital compositing professor work. If I can take pictures I will. If not, I'll still share my experience on it!

Prepare yourselves for a slew of pencil tests coming up as well involving Kit playing tennis and another one of my characters, perhaps Ali, cracking a whip. Also, I have another assignment coming up in 2 weeks of a fully colored lip sync (exciting!) There will be a lot more animations to come this year. Lots.

More Animations!

I really should've put these up a while ago. Woops! Some more animations I did my first year:

A dog walk cycle we FINALLY got to do! I was waiting for this assignment the entire year. I was happy with the outcome. The assignment was only to use 8 drawings (16 frames) but being the perfectionist I am...I added inbetweens as well. =P

This was my segment from our class Anijam. Each of us did a few seconds of animation and the next person had to pick up from there and continue it. I was the third one to go for this.

Letter Reaction Assignment- Freshman Year

One of the last assignments we did for the fall semester and one of the first animations I did with Niko. The assignment was to have our character read a letter and react to it in some way. In this case..Niko isn't happy about having to wait till Christmas to open this giant present.