Wow, it's cold out. And other irrelevant blog titles

It's the last day of term 2, and I'm excited and sad at the same time. I've finished the last assignment and updated my progress reel, which is this:

In retrospect I think the music is a tad obnoxious, but I have changes to make to it anyways like finessing the intro and properly rendering out all my assignments; but I can do that over the break. I also feel that ol' Betsy here is dying on me, it's official, my DVD drive crapped out, and she's approaching the end of her upgradability. She shall be missed when the time comes, tho I may keep her as a render mule. I feel as if my mind has been all over the place lately and slowly lamenting into insanity... of sorts. So many side projects for one, it's hard to stay focused, especially now when I really should. For example, I started messing around with SDKs for the first time, predominantly Half Life 2 Source and my personally beloved Orbiter. The former I've made more progress with writing and creating my own addon, but so much work left to do. In my nostalgic geekiness, I'm trying to create some nuclear-esque rockets from the Buck Rogers universe; being one of the coolest retro concepts ever! This photo shows my first attempt/test of different parameters and model importing.
That pathetic shadow on the landing pad of the Brighton Beach moonbase is telltale of success, believe it or not, because at first I was skeptical if I could even get that much to work. Ideally, come soon, I should be able to have a fully functionary nuclear rocketship that would behave ideally like that of Buck Rogers' Maelstrom Rider; complete with cockpit and animated controls. As far as the Source engine goes, I'm still learning the (sometimes) frustrating inner workings of the tools it comes with, but will hopefully be able to update my progress with that. The Julio project is partially slowed down due to some technical and personal issues, but should be back up at full force come the new year; Evidentally I still have many lessons to learn in rigging.

The latest of assignment nears completion and I'm feeling somewhat comfortable with it's progress. I have learned from many of the mistakes from the last assignment and thoroughly analyzed the process on this one from a new perspective. Here's a more updated version with an incomplete first pass splining; the latter half needs much work and looks extremely floaty, whilst the first half simply needs more polish. With this term almost over, I really look forward to next term.

My other project is progressing the animation blocking phase, this is a recent shader test and roughly blocked run cycle, just to see how things deform and what still needs tweaking, animation aside. As well, here is a vfx shot that I wanted to try to see if it was possible; it wasa great learning experience and generally a lot of fun, if not challenging.

Well the final assignment has been handed in, and work has started on the new one. I still need to polish the last one up a bit more, based on my newest mentor notes, but it's getting there. The whole area with the balance on the first candy cane, I've never been super happy with, and slowly I'm beginning to figure out how to change it. It's not so much a matter of me not being able to decide what I want it to look like, but more a matter of having what I want translate properly with my keys and f-curves into the computer.

Much work has been accomplished on the next assignment as well: Video reference, thumbnails and first pass blocking have been more or less completed, tho many changes yet to come I'm sure. I Desperately need to fix the set, the lighting's been tricky, and I just decided to scrap the secondary character, as he's too misleading with the eye and distracts the audience from the focus of the animation. I may spend more time working with the actual struggle with the sticky door, as that is the crux of the assignment, however it was great fun to throw in some acting choices as well.

My Julio character for a side project progresses very nicely also. fully rigged and skinned now, I've done a lot with set design for this piece and am kind of finalizing the look of the character. Here's a little test of face shapes and facial hair; still using base textures at this point.

Why Can I never think of a Title?

Once again an overdue blog update. School keeps trucking forth and I with it. In the final stages of polishing this latest assignment after countless revisions. This is not the final version but close to it. I had a lot of fun attempting some dynamic simulation in Maya as well, not my forte. Still a fair bit of finessing to do, but it is ever closer to completion.


I've also been heavily involved in a project I took on in good ol' Softimage, so I had to refresh myself in all that joy as well. I have a character under construction and nearly animatable for this project, who has been rigged and UVs layed out for texturing. Here's a screenshot as a teaser. Weighting and base textures should be done by the weekend and proxy animatics done sometime next week. I'll try and keep updates on that as well.

Personal progression during economic depression

The assignment was finished, and countless more changes, subtle at this point, made. Yay for me; I'm quite happy with how it turned out, and only a couple minor notes from my mentor on the knees, but all in all, the TLC that went into it really paid off. Here's the final version, with the box overlap added as well:

I aso began to develop a good and new pipeline that made my production a lot more efficient, particularly when coming to splining. That's part of the interesting phase of school, it's a lot of experimenting with different methods to find ones we're comfortable with and able to excel at, some work better for others.
In other exceptionally cool news, the revered Richard Williams, Animation director of Who Framed Roger Rabbit and author of my personal bible "The Animator's Survival Kit" came to town on Monday and gave a small lecture and QnA session. It was amazingly unbelievable, and his humility was something to behold. It was a fantastic pleasure to meet him, have him sign my book and take a quick photo. This man was able to learn from the "Nine Old Men" (the animators from Disney who constructed the rules behind successful animation) and help pass them along to the next generation of people, because noone had done that at that point.
Video reference, thumbnailing and blocking is also underway with the next week's assignment, this one involving a pole jump (ie. jumping from pole to pole with a character with no arms). Below is a sample of my blocking underway, no timing or spacing has been done yet, simply just working on posing; I chose a xmas theme, I don't really know why, hehe.

Well it's been long overdue for me to update this, and the real challenge has been with this last assignment. Essentially 3 weeks to do one 200 frame assignment, I didn't fully understand why but now I do. The learning curve is huge! It's amazing and nearly infathomable how many times I've reworked this shot and made changes; the detriments of learning body mechanics but it's really paying off. So I totally changed the idea, and reshot my video reference at the end of the week, as with this

Keep in mind the point of the assignment is to make the character do a 180 degree turn around. This idea however was well received by my mentor so I trudged forward with this

Which was a little less well recieved by my mentor, and many changes were made. Numerous iterations later, there was this

the shot nears completion and next week I will post the ultimate finished version. In the meantime, there is this shot, which I have excluded the box, but will have overlapping movement and fall off his head when he runs away. As well preconceptions for the next assignment, video reference and thumbnails shall be ready and well thought out.

Twice the terms, twice the challenge...

I've had a week off and Term 2 has begun, the bar is set high and I'm sallying forth full steam ahead. There isn't much to show yet, this is the follies of trying to post a blog mid-week, mid-assignment. I may change this up to provide something with a little more sustenance, I don't usually get to post everything I do all week. Anyways the first assignment of this term involves a turn-around but also the proper thinking and planning of a shot, starting from reference and thumbnailing to final production. Some fantastic tips and tricks, strategems and time-savers have been learned already and the excitement ensues! Here's some walk reference I've come up with already, tho there may be many changes yet ahead and even before the end of the week.


In the past two weeks I've also co-started a local video game developers group, in which we met for the first time last night. It was a great meet up and not so much in the ways of video game development, but it was a great start to get to know some of the other people involved; I very much look forward to the next class. I've as well found my niche to learn Flash, with another pro-bono project that I'm doing for a good cause in which I get to characaturize an aquaintance of mine. I can't give away too much on that yet, but new news to follow I'm sure. Definately exciting and busy times!

The End of the Term is Nigh

I had a minor interruption last week but was able to get all my assignments in on time. This is the last week of the first term at Animation Mentor, and it's an opportunity to do revisions on past assignments with what we have learned. Also, we have to make a progress reel at the end of each term so other students can see it, and so they can get archived. I've been having a fair bit of fun with the progress reel part of it, and now that the template is laid out, all I have to do is make some minor polishes to past work and replace the footage. As well as render out some of my past poses just to add some more aesthetic appeal; I would really like to include ambient occlusion into these shots to give it more of a clay-y look, it does wonders. This is the meat and bones of it, the final version, will be nicer, but I'm quite happy with my progress so far. Bring on the second term! I can't wait to start fun-filled yet devastating weeks of body mechanics.

The LHC has NOT destroyed the world, so the work must continue...

This last week's assignment incorporated a stylized walk. I went through many ideas from a moonwalk (an astronaut on the moon) to a classic Charlie Chaplin. I also contemplated a war of the worlds three legged walk, but it was suggested I stick with bipedals. So after much deliberation, I decided that I wanted to do something I hadn't seen before, so I chose to do a ballerina, not quite knowing what I was getting into. This turned out to be quite a challenge and long, intense study of reference, plus multiple changes throughout the blocking stage. So far not so bad, my review went better than expected. I lost perspective on it, that's fair enough to be said.


Also, with last nite's failed destruction of Earth due to CERN's LHC working in accordance to scientific postulations, it seems as I will have to continue polishing this walk and do the current week's assignment. :) The other part of the assignment was to research and do a pose that represents exhaustion well. This was the weaker part of my work, it was hard for me, but it worked satisfactorily, I received some fantastic feedback as how to really push it and add appeal. Thus it will be tweaked for revision.

The ponderings of a kidult

This last assignment was to polish up the vanilla walk and find some pose that really captured the feeling of "concerned". As far as the walk goes, I was fairly happy with it, learning the hardway how subtle tweaks and fixes here can grossly affect another control in the body there. But I finally got something decent, my critique went well, although I will have some definate changes to submit this week and get looking good, the feedback was incredible and hard for me to see; tho there was some varying in opinions, which is something I'm also learning. There isn't always such a thing as solidly right or not right; it can be wrong, but if it works, then wrong is right. Pretty cathartic lol.



As for my concerned pose I drew out many ideas and found one that just spoke to me. It worked well as far as composition and portraying a mood went, so I'm quite exceptionally happy with it. It was hard to avoid crashing in places, especially with the characters' gargantuinely huge heads, but it did work out in the end. Again some minor changes to boost the look even more.

The Ministry of Vanilla Walks

This last week we delved into the wondrous world of walks, and all the heartaches that go along with it. It's become more than evident time and time again that walk cycles are one, if not the, trickiest things to do in animation, as every part of the body moves in conjunction with everything else, stemming from the hips. So that's why I'm glad that this assignment has become a two parter, the first for timing and posing, and the second for splining and finessing. It really helps a lot to be given the time to study a walk in thorough detail and understand the mechanics of it all, or at least begin to lol. This was my blocking stage for last week of a standard walk cycle, the crit went well.

As well there was the pose assignment to show physical strength. I took many interpretations on this at first and that more than anything frustrated me, as I was ideally trying to show this without the aid of a prop. Other than flex poses nothing was really working well for me, so I sucked it up and began using props, although minimally. Many different variations, but I was happy with my final product. I also got a bit confused with strength as opposed to effort, and there should be a balance of both. Some minor tweaks to come.

Siggraphitti Vidi Vici

Returning from Siggraph, I can't begin to say enough great and amazing things about it. Not only did I learn an ample amount about the current industry and the future of where it will go but also it was great for career networking, as I got to meet many people in the flesh. Animation Mentor in particular, it was fantastic to be able to shake someone's hand and vocalize that was otherwise done through text. I also got an opportunity to meet the infamous Bobby Beck, Carlos Baena and Shawn Kelly; the founders of the school and essential and inspiring celebrities as far as I'm concerned. There is so much to say about last week, the experience was incredibly profound and useful.

Last week's assignment was relatively light in comparison, which worked well with my gallivant down south. I wasn't able to complete it while in LA but managed to get it done yesterday. My only regret is that it is the sole assignment using the "Tailor" rig which was an extraordinarily fun rig to work with. Needless to say I didn't have much of an opportunity to be creative with this assignment, but I think I faired well on it, crit is yet to come.

Overlapping Fantasipaction

This week's in depth struggle revolves around overlapping action and the different ways to approach it. I had a lot of fun with this assignment, and tried to put in a little liveliness as well. I spose the most important lesson I learned, or had reiterated and drilled solidly into my head is the entire importance and necessity to "offset the keys as the LAST step." I was able to try different methods to prepare for overlap, some I liked more than others, but all ended with a very similar and likeable result. I finally think I am not so overwhelmed with how to apply overlap, use it effectively and be able to do it far more expediently than I have in the past. Truly amazing the things I'm learning, feel free to check it out.

Also, I head down to LA for the almighty Siggraph tomorrow, and I can't begin to explain how thoroughly excited I am. A small part of me wishes I was further along in Animation Mentor so I could show even stronger work, but I realized that at next year's Siggraph, the timing will be poetically perfect. Plus, it's also entirely possible an incredible job offer or internship with one of the many prestigious studios may arise with the countless character animation reels I have comprised for distribution. Wish me luck; and stop asking me for swag! :D

Ball-Worthy

More balls! And this time a ball through an obstacle course. Trying to think of something different and creative, I managed to be fairly successful. The pain of this assignment, or my creativity, was putting a fast spin on the ball such that it would land a certain way and continue to roll in that fasion. Coupled with the ideals of squash and stretch it became quite challenging, but ended up working out in my favour. It was a fun challenge, and they do seem to be getting more fun, which is thoroughly exciting. It's astonishing what I'm learning this time around, the things I never picked up on before, being able to feel the weight and appropriateness of a movement or action for example... simply stunning.
The other part of my assignment was to portray devastation in a pose; to show how a body itself can give the impression of this emotion. Also a challenge, particularly to avoid anything that might be overdone or cliche. This is the other real power of this school; it does a good job of forcing originality; well not so much force but strongly enourage. This also makes it that much more difficult hehe, but it works. All these of course start with sketching real life examples and then working towards replicating and exagerating that with a 3D rig as seen below.









Also next week is the beginning of Siggraph, which I do have the good grace and fortune to attend. Also very exciting, I'm busy throwing together reels for handout, so it shall progress to be a busy week in preparation. I can't wait to attend, my nerves are shot already hehe. A most exciting event indeed! The things I shall learn are unfathomable as of yet; well I have sort of an idea.

On going Jedi Training

Another week another not quite a dollar. Our last assignment required to bounce two balls of various weights to contrast (ie. one heavy one light) so I thought I'd see what I could do to push the envelope on it by adding a symmetrical cantilevering device commonly known as a teeter-totter. This was a fun one but more challenging that I would have originally have imagined. There still needs to be a tiny bit of polishing on it but by and large for the most part, I'm happy with it. This was a really good lesson in timing and how important it is in the overall product; if not THE most important attribute. It will make or break a shot, acting wise or more generally making the shot read unclearly; this is also one of the continuing strengths of the school. The receival of continuous feedback if I put my work out there really helps as it is really difficult for me to know sometimes if my idea in my head is being understood by someone who's never seen it before in the way I want it to.

Also another fascinating things I'm learning and more importantly finally understanding are how there are rules of animation, but at the same time there are no rules. What rules need to be applied, what rules can be bent and even more crucibly when these rules can be broken. I very much didn't understand this concept in the past, it seemed so incredibly contradictory, but it's finally beginning to sink in. I think this comes from an intuitive understanding of the rules and foundations, because without that there is no way to know when to have the flexibilty of creative design within a shot and style of shot.

In other news, Siggraph is two weeks away! And I have to compile a new demo reel because I might as well. If I was to land a possibility of of an internship or the like with a big name company, Siggraph would be an excellent stepping stone for such an opportunity. Plus public awareness and social networking is key; and it's been about a year since I made my last demo reel anyways, a lot more new stuff to add; let's hope I can impress!

The first post of a new blog! I figured it would be a great idea to start a real blog as opposed to the one I have on my website www.franticrabbit.com; as I'm forever redesigning the layout of that. This way it'll be great to stay on top of how my week/work progresses as Animation Mentor, and this is the onset of my new and revamped Character Animator career. The 3D generalist angle was fun, but I know what I really want to do deep down inside; animation is such a wonderful industry, always changing and constantly fun! I'll post my first animation assignment of a regular bouncing ball which went over better than expected; it's just a bouncing ball, but even that can take quite a while to finesse. That was my real learning experience with this simplistic but perfectionist assignment; to help develop that eye and make those micro-changes that add appeal and believability to a shot. Likewise with the pose assignments which I will also post. A very exciting and appealing school, hands down, one of the best decisions I've made in the past couple years. I luv it when dreams are coming true!