Good Bye Class 1, and bring on Class 2!

Hey Good People! I am really excited because I have completed the first of six classes that are required to graduate from Animation Mentor. It was an AWESOME first term and I already can't wait until class two. It doesn't start until July 2nd, so in the meantime I will relax a little and hopefully spend some time with friends, instead of only my computer. :)

For this last week we were required to take all of our assignments from the entire term and make a progress reel. It begins with my latest work and ends with my earliest.



For those of you that didn't see my post before this. Did you catch the gum on the bottom of Ballie's foot in the first animation? :)

Thank you to everyone for all your interest, support, and encouragement. :)

Ballie with a little extra bounce in his step.

Hey Everyone!

Sorry I got a week behind on my blog. Things got a little busy here lately so I will combine two weeks of work in one post. It makes sense since they do sort of go together.

Our assignment was to have "Ballie" doing a walk but with some personality this time...sad, happy, tired, weak, etc... you get the idea. So first I started off by recording myself doing a whole bunch of different walks. I ended up narrowing it down to these nine. Then I showed this video to my fellow AM classmates and had them tell me which one was their favorite. For some reason...a lot of people picked #8. ;)




Everyone had their favorite out of those nine walks, but I went my instincts and decided on #5. From there, I then planned out my main poses on paper for the walk I had chose.




Then I took those main poses and blocked out the walk with "Ballie" in the computer.




Then finally the fun part!...and most difficult part. I got to smooth it all out and make sure it had good arcs, overlapping action, timing, weight, squash & stretch, exaggeration, spacing, etc... All those great principles that we have been learning and I have been telling you about for the last 3 months. We were allowed to add in the 3rd perspective this time which was great. I ended up creating a whole little environment for my walk because I had a little extra time. Here is the finished product. :)



Did you catch the gum on the bottom of Ballie's foot when he paused??? I added that in for just for fun. :)


We also had to do a couple poses during the last couple weeks. Heres my pose conveying "exhaustion."




Heres my pose conveying "balance."




Well that was a lot of work I just posted. I hope you enjoyed my explanation of it all...even my goofy reference video of me walking...and our family dog Jade. Using video of yourself acting out what ever you plan to animate is a must to be an animator. Maybe I will post more reference video of myself in the future...but I should warn you now...it might get pretty goofy as you can imagine. Maybe a little embarrassing for me, but thats ok :) because its a part of doing what I love.

Thank you!

Smooooooth Walking

Well...another Friday night spent animating. My weekly schedule goes like this:

Animate from Sunday evening (when I get the new assignment) until Saturday afternoon about 10-14 hours a day. Its sure a good thing I enjoy it, eh?!

I take Saturday nights to see my friends, if of course I feel good about my work. Which I have been every time. I gave up so much to do this program so I am making sure I give it everything I got. I appreciate everyones support!

So up above there you can see "Ballie" doing some smooooooth walking. In my post before this you may have seen the same walk but in its blocked out form. I'm sure you'll agree it looks a little smoother now. :) Its all apart of the animation process.

This week I am blocking out another walk but with more personality to it. I think its coming together quite nicely, and lets hope my mentor thinks so too. :) I will post the blocking on here for you next week.

Below here you can see Stu in another pose looking all "concerned". Thats the feeling we were supposed to convey. As usual, I appreciate everyone stopping by to check out my progress.

Thank you!

Concerned

I introduce to you "Tailor" starring in "The Squirrel Chase"

Alright, I'm finally getting a chance to post some more work up for you again. The assignment was to bounce "Tailor" a minimum of 3 times, and as you can see I got really carried away. I could have done the minimum, and theres nothing wrong with that, but I just can't help the urge to be a little creative. I am thankful to have the time to do it too. For this assignment we were learning about arcs which is another fundamental of animation. If you just simply reach for something right now, you will notice your hand will move in a little arc. Its not something we think about at all, but pretty much everything we do moves in arcs. With the computer its so easy to move things around in a linear fashion, but that gives it a very mechanical unnatural feel. So its very important to always be thinking about arcs while animating. My mentor, gave me a cool little idea to have the camera shake when the big squirrel hits the tree. It helps emphasize the impact just a little bit and gives the piece a little more "flavor" as he put it.

I love relearning all these fundamentals again because its really forcing me to think about them with every move I make. Its getting to the point where I don't even have to try to remember to think about them. If that makes any sense. :)

Many people told me my animation reminds them of a scene from Disneys "The Sword in the Stone" when theres 2 little squirrels running on some tree limbs. I hope you like it.



Since I missed a week I will upload another weeks worth of work.

Planning



Blocking



This is just my blocking pass of a vanilla walk. A blocking pass is just the main poses needed to create the scene ,as you can see in my planning. That why its feels choppy. A vanilla walk is just a "normal" walk with no personality....in other words, just ordinary. So as you can see its not too exciting. We are getting into walks with more personality this week which are more fun to watch.

We also had to do a another pose with Stu showing strength. So I caged up a huge Tailor and got Stu to pull it.

Strength



I will post another weeks work in another day or two, but I think that enough for now. :)

As always, I love hearing your comments or even just a simple hello.

Thank you!

Just been walking around....all week.

Hello again good people. My little eleven month old nephew and I have a new thing in common. We are both learning how to walk. Yes, thats right...walk...and it involves way more then just left foot, right foot, left foot, right foot. Its said to be one of the toughest things to animate. I've done walk cycles before on my own, but they weren't any good. Its sooooo tough! But they are really breaking it down for us about the little things that makes a walk successful. So thats my excuse for not posting on my blog this past week with some more work. I am designating this Sunday as my blog day though. I have to get caught up with it. So please feel free to check back for it. :)

Tonight though was awesome! We had a question and answer webcam session with animator & mentor Mark Behm. He was talking about working on Shrek 3. He had so many good things and tips to share with us. He showed us some of the work in progress from some of the scenes he did in the movie. Its these little extra opportunities that I have to take advantage of so I can learn more, and hopefully get someone to remember my face, name, and work...so when I am all grown up someday...I will have job. :)

Alright so Sunday....is BLOG day.

Thank you!