Turtles Run Final

Progress on the walk cycle. Added in an extra bounce in between steps to make it more groovy. It is now complete.

Turtles Run Update

Update on the progress of the walk cycle. Got everything moving now, think it is looking good.

Turtles Run - Walk Cycle

I have been asked to do a short walk cycle for Reece Morton's film Turtles Tun. The character has to groove along while playing a beat on his drum. I planned out the timing on a dope sheet with the initial progress is below.

Blocking




Feet Timed Properly

MWI Shot 26

I was asked by Dan and Mike if I was able to do another shot for My Welcome Intruders. The answer was yes!
The final version is below.



It really depends on the shot and characters but for this one I decided to time out the animation on paper first. These were jsut used as a guide. I think the timings changed slightly for the final shot. But the initial dopesheets are below.

D'Ark Shot 23 Final

Final version of this shot. Slightly longer to account for the extra pauses in the action.

D'Ark Shot 23 Update

Pretty much the final animation for this shot.

D'Ark Shot 23

I'm going to be doing a shot for another undergrad film. D'Ark by Jamie Keddie, Forrest Thomson & Callum Simpson. The main character Noah has to plant a small fruit into the ground. Here is what I have so far.

MWI Shot 10 Final

Pretty much the final version of this shot. Really happy with the way High Five is moving in this one. Only change I need to make is to move Wee Two and Dee Tree further back so it matches up better with the next shot.

MWI Shot 10 Update

Update to shot 10. Got Wee Two and Dee Tree doing their thing now.

MWI Shot 10 Blocking and First Pass

Blocking on the last shot for My Welcome Intruders.




First pass on Arche1.

MWI Shot 13 Final

Here is the final version of Shot 13 for My Welcome Intruders. Much happier with the way High Five lands on the door frame.

MWI Shot 13 Update

Got through this shot much quicker than the previous one due to being able to focus fully on it. I'm happy with the way it has turned out but from the feedback I have received there are a couple of areas I need to adjust. These being Wee Two's hand as it comes round the door frame and the way High Five settles on the door frame.

MWI Shot 12 Update Arche1

This is pretty much the final version of this shot. It took longer than I had hoped to get through due to other commitments and the complexity of it but I am quite happy how it has turned out. I may need to do some tweaking to better match the start of the shot to the end of the preceding one.

MWI Shot 12 Update Dee Tree

Update of shot 12. Both Wee Two and High Five are almost all done, so this was just a test to see how they work together and also to start on Dee Tree who currently stops half way through this shot.

MWI Shot 12 Update High Five

Just a quick update on the progress of this shot for My Welcome Intruders. Pretty much done with Wee Two from the last post so I have now moved onto the High Five character.

DCA Ident Animatic 02

I have update the DCA Ident animatic taking into account the ideas and direction Richard Morrions gave at the end of his workshop. I decided to go even further with the idea of giving each person a unique personality and silhouette in that each person entering shot and sitting down is a recognisable character from the history of cinema. Choosing the right characters was important for the ident. Only film characters who have a very distinct silhouette were going to work but I think I found the perfect 5.



The motion graphics for the logos could do with a rework but I am very happy with the idea as a whole, especially the first section.

MWI Shot 12 Update Wee Two

I have started to receive the proper shots from Mike and Dan so I can start work on the animation. I have been assigned 3 shots to do. They are shots 10, 12 and 13. They run in a sequence which is quite good and should help with the flow between shots. I have decided to tackle shot 12 first as I think it will be the most complex to do as it contains all 4 characters moving either walking or moving down a hallway. First test of the character Wee Two is below.

Richard Morrison Workshop

The past few days we have been working with Richard Morrison to individually develop an ident for the DCA that would be shown before every screening in their cinema. The brief was quite brief but fairly open to interpretation. The only constraints were that it had the be about the cinema itself and not DCA as a whole and be between 5 - 30 seconds in length.

After a quick brainstorming session were I wrote down all the words that immediately came into my head when thinking about DCA and the cinema I had a fairly clear idea of what I wanted to do.

My keywords were:

DCA
Cinema
Films
Genres
Art House
Independent
Screen
Projectors
Light - Silhouettes
Cameras
Audience
Seats - Empty - Full
Sound - Audio

From those keywords I came up with the idea of playing with light and silhouettes and the relationship between the audience, the screen and the projector. The final piece would be shot using live action people with motion graphics used for the logos.
The first animatic is presented below.



We had the opportunity to pitch our ideas to Richard at the end of the workshop for feedback and advice on how it could be improved. The main area that he though I could improve is the start section. Mainly that I could and should push the playfulness of the silhouettes in that each person should each have their own personality and unique silhouette even if it doesn't make complete sense for the setting. Having a man with an open umbrella for example. I quite like this idea and will explore it further in a future update.

Animation Development

A big part of this year for me is to leave with a showreel that shows my range in working in different styles of animation. So as part of my own practice and personal animation development I have chosen to work on a couple of undergraduate films as an animator. The first project is 'My Welcome Intruders' by Daniel Borg and Michael Wilbourn. A few days ago I received the first rig from Mike to do an animation test and to get to grips with the character High Five.

It was just a quick test to get accustomed to the rig so it lacks that final polish but I think it turned out quite well.

Animation Fun Times

After a hiatus of over 2 years I was finding it difficult to get back into producing animation. I think the main hurdle putting me off was a severe lack of practice combined with trying to jump in at the deep end thinking I could just pick up were I left off. My skills are rusty so to warm up I have decided to go back to the basics for some practice and also to get comfortable working again in Maya. Just a quick bouncing ball and run cycle. Underwhelming but essential. 

The Bouncing Ball


The Running Man


The Goon Rig was used for the run cycle.