Animation 31/5

Todays progress was working on the speech. I decided to animate the words and the speech bubbles which will take more time. However I think it adds a cool element, and there isnt really that much speech in my cartoon anyway. I really need to buckle down and hammer out a bunch of animation this weekend, thankfully filming is over, except for me finishing my film, so I will have more time than the last couple of weekends.

Film 31/5

I managed to edit 2.5mins of my film so far. That is more than I thought I had but nowhere near what I need. I have the camera booked for this weekend so I can film everything else. Ill be damned if I fail cos of this stupid thing. Things definitely ran smoother when there wasnt the whole crew around, the only unknown will be whether Simba performs or hides like the scared kitty he is. That is my problem for choosing to have him in the film however, so I need to work around that. So far my film is definitely just turning into motorbike porn lol but I am ok with that.

Digital Sculpture 31/5

Progress. I finally found a tool today after much ctrl+zing that will give me the desired look for my bears head. I need to have a long hard think about whether I can actually get a city done on his back with the time I have left. Ill keep working on both the city version and the full version to float, and make a decision next week. Vaughn had a nice idea to use this 3D printed model in my physical sculpture, which could be cool. King of the pile of trash styles lol. Time is the key factor.

Gaming 30/5

Shes broken! Lol, my characters rigging on her hands is a bit wonky, so she has perpetual claw hands when running around. I am having fun creating hidden away flat spots for her to stand on up the mountains, to get the good views. Unfortunately the trees still arent working, so I potentially will have to create a new terrain from scratch. Thankfully making terrain in Unity is fairly painless. I think I might work on a new terrain anyway, sometimes that is the best option.

Digital Painting 28/5

Today I stayed at home due to being contagious, and I didnt want to spread my cold around tech. My paintings are going slowly at the moment, mostly because of how bad I feel, but also because I am at the finicky, details point which naturally takes longer. I just hope that the end result is satisfying.

Film 27/5

What a damn mess today was. Shannon and myself are actually quite sick, and so today was hard for us both having to stick around for so long to get the footage shot. Lajcee was full of bullshit excuses this morning as to why she couldnt come in. Number one being that she was out of town at her boyfriends with no ride in, despite confirming that we needed to be at the park, the last 4 days in a row. The big kicker with that situation is that we only had the location for today, and it cost money to book it. Both Aaron and James had her acting in their movies since she couldnt actually do any filming due to skipping certification class. Because she didnt come in, James has had to cut a whole scene out of his movie, and the rest of us had to wait until Jordyn finished work so that she could take the spot in Aarons film. Need less to say there was a lot of angry people today, which also didnt help the mood on set. Aaron is too easily overwhelmed to be effective at directing, not to mention wanting 10 angles of the same shot for every shot, and we just dont have time for that. Frustrations are very high and I think if we had too many more filming days, there would actually be a fight and walk-outs. Good thing this class is nearly over, I just hope there is enough footage for a film, for the ones that actually deserve it. The lessons I have learned from this whole experience are, dont underestimate just how lazy some people are, and dont help everyone else to the point of screwing yourself over in the long run.

Film 26/5

Well, today I was supposed to get my film shot however it didnt quite work out that way. Aaron was the only one to show up at the agreed time of 10am. The two of us managed to get quite a few outside shots done before james and shannon finally showed up around 11:30. It was at this stage that my sister and her family arrived for their part, so we moved locations to the park and got a few takes in there before it started raining, which ended my shoot for the day. I am going to have to get the camera out myself at some point this week so I can do the shots with the cat and a few other shots that hadn't been done yet due to various reasons. It really feels like as soon as we are filming something other than rockdog, everyone just stops giving a damn and just want to leave as soon as they can. Not that Lajcee bothered to show up because she conveniently had things that needed to be done today. She hasnt showed up to over half of the shoots so far, its a little unfair to the rest of us who are actually doing the work.

Film 25/5

Today we continued on with James interior film scenes, and finished them. So now we only have a couple of outdoor scenes for him and he is finished shooting. My film is definitely far behind the other two in terms of footage, due to my main actors work schedule. I am getting the feeling I will have to do some more shooting next week as well, weather permitting. Its a little frustrating for me being behind schedule, and I really hope that I can get the amount of effort from the others on my film, that the other two are getting. Big day tomorrow, and I am really hoping to smash out my whole film. I took the camera for a ride on my passenger seat while driving around today as an experiment. Sadly it was shaky, as I suspected it would be, but I might be able to use some footage as a POV clip. I need to really go through it and see if there is anything usable.

Animation 24/5

I finally started my actual animating today, however its still a bit interrupted until filming is out of the way and I get my after class time back. I am catching back up though which is good. Thankfully, as planned, the actual animating isnt too hard due to the simple, looping style I am using for my piece. The large background and zooming in idea is working however I need to be more aware of my line thickness, as when I zoom in it becomes a lot chunkier and wont be consistent with the more zoomed out scenes.

As you can see, I have a copy of the outline of his head, which is on a separate layer, so I can adjust it to where I want it and just copy paste onto the actual linework layer as I go. Im not sure if this is a proper technique but it seems to be working for me so far.

Digital Sculpture 24/5

I worked on my sculpture as two separate items today, it will be interesting to see if splitting them, and joining them after printing will make a difference. I scaled the bear up, which makes the ice berg smaller, helping to convey the melting ice theme. I also am creating an iceberg shape to help with the balance in the water, and looks more believable than just a flat plane. I need to work out the centre of balance so that my final piece will float upright in water. My current mission is working on the bear in mudbox to sculpt it out a bit better than can be achieved in Maya. Maya is great for blocking out shapes, but doesnt have the fine tuning ability of mudbox. I just hope I can get this finished because I am liking the direction it is going so far.

Film 24/5

Unfortunately due to weather, I havent managed to shoot much of my film yet. We were editing in class today, so I only had a few clips to work with but it was good to play around with premiere and familiarise myself with the program a little better. This saturday is the day we are focusing on my film this weekend, and so far we are only going to have a 2hr window approx to film outside. However Sunday is looking fairly clear, so I am hoping we can get all three films finished by the end of that day.

Gaming 23/5

My environment is coming along the way I want, however I have hit a roadblock in that  I cant place any trees. The brush works, but nothing shows up so Im not sure if its a ram thing, or a unity glitch. =( I may have to switch to photoshop for my character concept art piece unless I can make some of this area look like a forest. I have been enjoying unity, you can create some pretty cool looking things fairly easily which is good for me since I am so new to 3D modelling.

Digital Painting 21/5

Today I decided to bail on my hallway image, I just wasnt feeling it the way I do with the wolf series. So, I am now on a mission to refine the images I have, and tweak them to make them fit my proposal better. I am definitely struggling to keep on top of my classwork though. so I hope I can present my final images with the attention they deserve. Mostly today I was fine tuning the cave interior image, adding hues and changes saturation etc to make the lighting match the sky better. I like it, but I need to be careful to not overwork it.

Film 20/5

Shot from todays time on set. We managed to get all of the cafe scenes for Aarons film shot, however it required a lot of organisation and direction from myself to keep things moving. Props werent fully organised, one person had a breakdown, one person shutdown mentally, and only one extra had been confirmed at last minute as the casting call was only put out late last night, amidst a huge misunderstanding with the 2IC of the cafe in Queens park. I played damage control and managed to clear up that situation with her but I still dont think Aaron fully understands just how bad that situation could have been, purely because of the way he approached the conversations.
I am starting to feel like a director, producer, props master and production manager all smashed into one, considering I have organised 80% of the props and locations for all three films so far and I have no doubt that if I take a step back next week, there is going to be major time delays with everything and filming is going to drag out even longer. Which is the last thing I need, as I am struggling to keep up with everything schoolwise as it is. Herding cats is the current analogy that has been running through my head the last couple of days.

Film 19/5

Day one off to a shaky start. To be expected with completely new experiences. There was a blip with the SD card being write protected, but thats fixed now and luckily didnt need the space today. We didnt get nearly as much done as I wanted, but I guess thats usual story anyway and practice will speed things up. Organisation of actors and props has been left a little last minute which is not helping our cause either. Overall for a first time working as a film crew together I think things went ok though, there was no arguments and everyone mostly pitched in to help where they could. Hopefully that mentality last through til we are done.

Digital Sculpture 17/5

Yay! up to 3D test print today. It will be great to get my hands onto the model. Then I can fine tune the shape, and start modifying the top half into the cityscape that I had planned, and the bottom into some shape that will help it to float and stay upright. I really need to remember to stick to 4 sided faces, instead of getting all complicated when trying to move the vertices around. That seems to be a running theme for me lol, trying to make things complicated when I should make them simpler.

Film 17/5

2 days til filming begins, I am hoping we will be able to crank out a good majority of the internal scenes this weekend. Almost all of us are now certified to use the film equipment, except for one person who wasnt present in the class. Unfortunately due to circumstances, fridays filming slot is a no-go, so we will have to be organised on sat and sun. The forecast for next weekend isnt looking too good right now, so fingers crossed it changes so we can get the external shots done next week. I have almost finished filling out the booking form and location release for the park location, I just need to confirm with Aaron what the final choice is.

Animation 17/5

I am a little bit behind this week, I need to kick my own butt and stop letting myself get distracted. I knew this would be an issue for me coming back to study, so now I need to fix it. By drawing my background as an entire image, I can zoom in to different parts of it for each scene, saving me from having to redraw it over and over. Kathryns idea of looping movements will come in handy as well for time saving, I really dont want to run out and have this unfinished, especially when I have all my other projects still to complete.

The bottom left is for the final jump attempt, and I can use the centre for the first jump attempt and discussions, and then maybe the part in between the river fork for the tree jump.

Updated Timeline
 24/5-30/5 - Scene 1, 2 & 3
31/5-6/6 - Scene 4, 5 & 6
7/6-13/6 - Scene 7, Title screen & Credits

Gaming 16/5

Today was spent working on my terrain again. Im quite enjoying this part of it, but I need to be careful and not get caught up in doing lots of little details at the expense of the rest of the environment.

Digital Painting 14/5

Completed a series of 4 images that I started when we were doing the class intro to photoshop and corel. I need to get my focus back onto my actual images now, and get them finished asap.

  

Animation 10/5

Pressure is now on. I have to finish once scene a week if I want to spend a decent amount of time on each one. However, Kathryn is getting the info for setting up toon boom at home which means I will have more access to work on it. Im still torn between the whole work at home or work at tech thing, but in the holidays I achieved about the same amount of work at home, as the time I spent going in to tech so I figure its better to be comfortable. I did get my storyboard finished though which is great.

Digital Sculpture 10/5

More work on the bear today, I almost have it ready to test print, that is my goal for the week ahead. I need to adjust the mesh so that when my objects are smoothed out, it doesnt look odd. I need to create little divets for the feet as well so we can connect the bear to the ice platform next week too.

The legs and face are the current issues that I need to focus on, but shouldnt take me too long to sort out once I put my mind to it.

Digital painting 7/5

The beginning of the first image. Ive decided to head towards my childhood fears for this image, specifically the nightly run down the dark hallway if I needed to use the bathroom after everyone was in bed. Im hoping this inspiration merged with the supernatural side of gs will give me some decent paintings for my assignment.

Film 10/5

I am having serious reservations about some of the classes participation in the coming weeks. There is definitely going to be arguments, I can feel it. I guess its a taste of a proper production, having to deal with scheduling conflicts and personality conflicts. We are officially into the self guided part of this class now, for the rest of the semester. Ill be damned if I am failing due to other people not doing their share, I will film my own story on my own if I have to. Extreme measures, but its always good to have a backup plan right? lol. Got my script sorted this week, now I have a better idea of what is actually required so next time I wont go over the top like I did for my first one. Touch wood. I need to spend more time hands on with the camera, as I still am a little unsure where some buttons are due to lack of practice. Todays class was a good chance to do that for next weeks certification, all going well. We are still waiting for shannon and jordyns work schedule to finalise the times but I have a rough table done so far.

Gaming 9/5

Superhero pose woo! The Unity update doesnt seem to have affected my previous terrain at all, so I can carry on modifying that to create my forest paradise for my character. I cant wait to have her running around in it. The mesh is a bit warped when she is kneeling down like this, but thats where the creative camera angles come into play. I am pleased with how everything is progressing in this class so far.

Animation 3/5

Well, it was proposal day and I am unsure how I went. It always feels like not quite enough during the actual presentation so I am just going to have to focus on making the journaling and body of work damn good. I dont think any of us realised that we were supposed to present a storyboard as part of the proposal which is why its our homework, I have a feeling we all lost marks for that. As a nice way to end the class however, we were taken to a sculpture exhibition next door, Michelle Beavors: Anatomy Lessons. Completely knitted skeletons of various animals at the point of their extinction. Almost every sculpture had human artifacts included, quite a stark reminder of the damage we are inflicting on the natural world.

Digital Sculpture 3/5

Modelling this bear is trickier than anticipated. Mostly because I was trying to do it in a complicated way. I am going to try the method I was shown and hopefully get the rough model done by class next week. Having the reference photo in the background is definitely improving the accuracy of my model. I need to find a front on and rear end shot too so I can get the other perspectives.

Digital Painting 30/4

Today was presenting our proposal to class, I felt a little more confident with the public speaking side of it this time, hopefully this will help with my final presentation for animation. I got some good feedback and artist suggestions from Peter, I did choose quite a broad subject so I need to refine it a bit for my series i think. First step is research research research. Now that I have a tablet and corel at home, I can spend more time playing around with composition ideas.

Proposal notes.

 
 
 

Gaming 2/5

Its a bit rough coming back after 2 weeks away and trying to remember controls.. I need to get off my butt and actually play around more with Maya at home. I am pleased with how my character is coming along though, the wings have worked out way better than I anticipated. Being able to take an image and use it as the texture is great for detail. I am still a little unsure about the UV shell side of things but with practice I will retain that info. Looking forward to getting back into Unity in the next few weeks.

Film 3/5

Term two! The study break consisted of finishing off my script after the proposal. I found it easy enough to write what I did, however I need to look more into how to write a script properly. I used far too much detail, and sort of merged the breakdown into the script itself, which is not what I am supposed to do. This is the first proper script I have attempted though so at least I am on the right track. Its gonna be interesting to film the 3 scripts that we are, they are all so very different but I think we can manage it as a group. Trying to work out filming days is going to be awkward, especially due to work schedules but Im sure we will get it. Getting some ppl to give up their free time is going to be the biggest source of conflict I believe.