New Rough Cut

I composited together a more up to date rough cut. It has everything i aim to have in the finalised film in it- at least in rough form, and sometimes in complete-animation-but-no-colour form. This rough cut should be close to, or bang on the final timing for the film i hope to hand in in a few weeks time- which will be helpful when preparing sound for it. It's also a good indicator of exactly where i am in production for everyone to have a nosy at :) A few people are helping me inbetween the clean keyed scenes and i have yet to start farming out scenes to colour....

Animation update!!

Ok, i've been withholding work again but here it goes:

Scene 6:

Rough roto

Rough keys

Clean Keys with charting

Scene 8:

Blocks & roto

rough Keys-pup

Scene 10:

Rough keys

Clean keys

Scene 12:

I've decided to split scene 12 into parts: the final pull back will be a part on it's own and the animation required here is Anna standing with her back turned to the camera with some wind movement through her clothes. This can then be placed in the 3D tracked shot. The beginning of the scene i will animate Anna turning on the spot the way i act out in the reference footage. she will then be placed in an empty shot which will be 3D tracked to place her. I've been having some trouble with this process because the empty shot doesn't match the reference shot, which can only be expected with a hand held camera... all i have to show atm is some rough roto to help me get my head around the beginning of the shot.

Rough roto

Scene 13:

Rough keys

Clean keys

I am preeetty behind on my personal schedule- thankfully though, Wendy has agreed to help me inbetween/ clean and colour which is great news!

Rough-cut Composition

I put together some of my final footage (pre- colour correction and grading) with some finalised line animation and tried out some 2D tracking and masking:

The only thing apart from workload that worries me atm is the length this rough cut is coming out at... almost double my animatic- probably due to over generous time allowance when filming. I'm hoping this time will go down as i fully animate sections and have to cut the footage to match the animation.

I've been keeping some secrets....

I've withheld work i've done from public view for the past couple of weeks for... normal artistic reasons (fear of criticism both on quality and quantity).

But, a greater fear is starting to take hold: what if people think i actually haven't done any work? Well, first of all, i really shouldn't care what people think, but also...

Here's some animation I done did already, ENJOY.

Scene 4!

Rough blocks

cleaned up keys

finished line animation

This scene still needs to be coloured

Scene 5!

Rough blocks

finished line animation

This scene still needs to be coloured

Scene 9!

clean keys

finished line animation

This scene still needs to be coloured

There is a rough cut comp coming soon aswell including all the tid-bits you see above so hold on to your hats!!

Research: Existing Animation- Watership Down

Deceptively charming and innocent: Watership Down is pretty brutal,  and attracted my attention in my search for good reference for one of the hardest scenes i will have to animate... my pup becoming trapped by it's paw in a rabbit snare.

I made a sketch of this scene to help me understand the poses and line of action better, and breakdown the things about it that make it disturbing and nail biting...

The pulling away from the snare seems counter- productive but immediately indicates panic and also the animal instinct to flee from danger. This is something i can use for my animation, however, i noticed Bigwig's design changed dramatically while he was trapped- it helped emphasize the danger he was in because he suddenly appeared bloated and withered, unlike his normal strong, sturdy and lean style. I don't think i like the idea of applying this idea too heavily to my own animation, i think the scene will be stressful enough for the audience, and i plan to convey the fear and severity in the situation through the pup's expressions and dramatically changed body language- compared to the beginning of the film.

I plan to also use my reference footage of actors portraying wolves to help convey the wolf's fear and panic, there is a scene in the play where a wolf becomes trapped by it's paw in a hunter's trap:

 "The Last Wolf of Scotland" also has representations of protection, defiance, and fear- similar to Watership Down which will be useful when animating both human and wolf characters in my film. Hopefully all of these visual aids will help me create identifiable character performance.

Defiance and protection...

WD:

LWS:

 FOTW:

 Fear...

WD:

LWS:

FOTW:

New animatic

I finally made that better timed animatic with sound that i've been chatting about for ages -_- All the sound is free or just me...It's all meant to help tell the story, and help me understand the timing really!

Animatic Complete!

The 1st draft of my animatic that i put together from my (new) storyboard and some recce footage and photographs. There’s no sound at this stage which is a shame as a lot of the audio that happens off screen explains the story. The timing is also very rough but what is encouraging at this stage is that i am sure it’s too long in places- and yet the whole thing is only 2mins 30 secs… so it can only get shorter with refinement :). I’ll be working towards a 2nd draft of this with audio and improved timing.

Model sheet WIP

I've been putting together a model sheet for ANNA as i go along. This is part of my pre-production process and also in partial fulfillment of my 2D masters brief, heres where i am with it so far. If i have time i will tidy up the lines and such digitally and put it together neatly. I will also use some poses i gathered from observational drawing at pre-natal yoga and life drawing with our pregnant model, Megan. When complete, the model sheet will act as a reference for animators on the form and personality of Anna.

I made a 3D model of Anna!

This was a requirement of my brief, to model a character designed in 2D in 3D... so here is Anna, modelled in Maya with some simple shaders dropped onto her...

I may decide to use the model to test lighting and what not in her live action background or even as reference when animating a complicated camera move- for example to make sure she is accurate in a 180 degree turn. But just to clarify- i am still hoping to animate my short in 2D with live action environments.

If you'd like a better idea of my process for modelling her take a look at my  MSc Blog where there are lots of screen shot WIPs .

Turnaround & Character Design: ANNA

 Finally finished with Anna's turnaround! the "T" pose is mainly for the purposes of modelling her in maya- however she will be animated in 2D (digitally) so i included a relaxed 3/4 turn.

Anna is a russian peasant girl, she lives in a small village community near a forest where she and her neighbours gather food and hunt. She is 19 years old, recently married and 6-8 months pregnant with her first child.

While drawing my friend Megan, i asked her to wear a long skirt of mine around her rib cage so that i could observe the folds of the material around her bump, i really liked the look and changed Anna's design at the last minute. I was also persuaded to change it after drawing my storyboard and realising that conveying lots of movements would be difficult underneath a shoulder-covering shawl.

 Some costume decisions...

 In the end i dropped the front-tied scarf idea because i thought it made Anna look too old, i found out a head scarf would be essential as Fall of the Wolf is set outside; and after reading parts of "The Empire's New Clothes" i found out that headscarves were a sign of modesty and mainly all country girls and women in 19 Century Russia wore them. They became less common in the cities as other European fashions were absorbed into the culture there.

 I was inspired to design a shawl-type shoulder cover for Anna by one of the characters in "Zelda"- But also liked the idea of an empire-line dress cut like Chicha's (The Emperor's New Groove). Chicha is the only pregnant animated character i can think of. (I do not own the 2 images above)

Researching clothes worn by russian peasants ("The Empire's New Clothes") and sketching some basic outfits for girls...

Some very early google image drawing of pregnant bellies...

Storyboards FINALLY

Pre-Natal Yoga: Observational Drawing

Following on from drawing my friend Megan in some poses of my own choice this week, i arranged to draw in a pre-natal yoga class at the Olympia centre in Dundee city centre this morning. 

This was very interesting as i had no control or knowledge of the type of poses that would be involved here, it helped build an understanding of balance, weight and flexibility in a pregnant body. 

I will use the reference and knowledge gathered here to inform my character drawings and actual animation.