I'm Not Dead I swear

I realize it's been a while since my last post. This is largely due to the Class 5/6 phenomenom I've noticed, that most students choose not to publish short film works in progress in a public domain and I'm adhering to that as well. It may come back to haunt me in terms of film festivals if it actually does become a festival piece who knows. With that said, it's been an amazing learning experience, that is absolutely no lie. As of now there is only 2 1/2 weeks left of class 7, then I will be ready for the almighty and scary class 7! (Class 7 being a colourful euphemism for the real world industry). Exciting and a bit scary at the same time, but mostly exciting.

Against my original plan but not against my better judgement, I will not complete my short film this term. At the start of class I made a verbal contract with my mentor that I would only tackle 30 seconds of my short film, so I can make those 30 seconds as best as I possibly can, instead of 1 minute 17 seconds of less-than-awesomeness. At most CG film studios where 3 seconds / week is expected, that's about right on par, plus I'm still a student learning and more than polishing out my animation also polishing out my workflow mistakes. That has been the real power of this class so far, I've really developed my workflow into something very functional through experimentation and trial and error. On top of that, I've also increasingly developed my eye into seeing finessing on an even more detailed level as well as a series of "aha!" moments, which are so gratifying.

Sooo much more to learn I feel incredibly humbled by how much there is yet to know, but that's also the very exciting part of the whole industry as well, I will keep growing and learning and pushing myself, and I freakin' love that! With the end of AM so nigh, I will gratefully look forward to my xmas downtime, but much work to be done before the actual graduation in mid January; namely polishing up other shots and compiling a new and improved demo reel. I don't want to jinx anything too much but many new extracurricular projects coming up as well; namely Mass Animation 2, 11 Seconds Club and some Crysis game modding so much to stay busy with.

Also, this week marks the 26th issue of Andy-Mated, my webcomic I'm doing for www.vancouveranimation.ca. In other words, that's 6 months of drawing a web comic and everything that entails. Not only has it been a great commitment but a great way to keep my creativity flowing and improve my artistic and photochopping abilities. Each week it grows slightly stronger so I hope to keep this up.

Musings From Within the Time Cube

First day of Class 6! I just found out my mentor is the wonderfully inspirational Kenny Roy and I'm quite pleased. He's got a great enthusiasm about him and seems quite knowledgable of cartoony style as well, which will be unbelievably helpful for me this term in particular. Woo! Pre-production and layout of my short film is complete, and you can see the more final version below:


In other updates, PAX was great, although I caught the infamous PAX flu, and at least was able to poke fun of it with my webcomic. There is a very real possibility that it was H1N1, but I was advised not to get tested and stay away from public unless it starts to affect my respiratory system in a serious way. Regardless, it surely knocked me down on the floor and recovery was slow. Well over it now, so that's great and now I can go forward out into the world with my super-human immunity.

I finally was able to get my Art page on my website pseudo-functional, tho the proportions are still funky and I apoligize for that. At Siggraph, I had the privelage of having Disney review my reel and they're predominant suggestion was that I plaster my website with drawings of all sorts. And thusly I've been trying to draw with a passion, including weekly life drawing classes. One of the most amazing things is that life drawing has become substantially more enjoyable than before. Anyways, examples can now be seen under my art section, and I hope to categorize them soon appropriately (ie. Quick Sketches, Creative, Longer Studies, etc). Nonetheless, content should be progressively added. Right now though, it's all about getting into the grind, Class 6 goes by fast I'm told, the first day's not over but it's going fast already!

Gimme Sum PAX Plox

Another week and another update. Short film pre-production continues smoothly and relatively unabated so far. I've progressed from the 2D animatic to the 3D layout and am just beginning some first pass blocking. Ahead of schedule but my film's a bit ambitious, so I want to try to get what I can done early to give me more time for polish in Class 6 when it starts. Here's my 2nd revision of my 3D Layout for your viewing enjoyment; poses are rough and I combined some of the shots, but it tells the story, more to come soon. It's missing the AM logo, but the rigs are property of AnimationMentor.com so I'm not taking credit for that. Possibly unnecessary but just in case.



Also, the Penny Arcade Expo is this weekend and I've had the good fortune of attaining tickets for Saturday and Sunday before they sold out. With 50,000 expected people in attendance, it should be a gamer/geeker's paradise. I'm not 100% sure what to expect, but I'm very excited and it should be a fantastic amount of fun. I should be meeting up with other AMers on the Sunday, so hopefully I'll have pictures to update with shortly thereafter. PAX ho!!

Siggraph was a Fulfillment of my Nerdlinging Wishes

Well as I've suggestively indicated, Siggraph was amazing! Got to see the amazing town of N'Awlins to begin with but on top of that, the conference itself was simply mind blowing. I think one of the most prominent events that transpired for me was the Gamejam! competition, a 24 hour video game asset creation challenge, and challenging was an understatement. This was the first year running of this event, so it had it's bumps in the road, but I'm grateful to have been a part of it, completed it and have a Siggraph themed video game to show for it. Specifically, the challenger was to design, model, texture, rig and animate a character with an idle, walk, jump and Special cycle. I created whom I have dubbed Zorgath, a Pikachu-esque slug creature with unknown backstory (little time to develop one) that uses his clawes and "slugness" to crawl up walls. If I do this challenge again next year, I'll be sure to avoid a special power that involves interaction with the environment, this proved to be an extra added difficulty on top of an already packed and complex itinerary. Anyways, there were some drastic rule changes throughout the contest, but as I said, basically bugs being ironed out. If you, the reader, has any inkling to waste endless hours playing this groundbreaking sidescrolling machinima you can download it at this link http://www.megaftp.com/92122 (PC only, sry).

Recently, AM came out with these wonderful badges to show our school pride. I am in full endorsement of this, as I've made obvious numerous times this school's one of the most exciting and amazing communities I've been fortunate to be involved with, and the learning is unparalleled. I'll figure out how to properly append this onto my website shortly but in the meantime it's here for all to see. A bit behind the ball on this one, they came out with the badges about a day after my last post.

And speaking of school, shortfilm preproduction is well under way. 2D storyboard finalized and 3D layout beginning as we speak. I'm trying to get ahead of the curve here, as my story is getting longer than I intended, but necessary to be sure. I think I'm running at about 43 seconds right now and it will be a wee longer, tho most of that is just to let the acting breathe. Very exciting stuff, I forgot how nerve wracking working on a short film could be, as it's all form the inner depths of my mind. And with that, I decided to go bizarre and hopefully not offensive in the religious context. A light hearted story of God babysitting Satan's child. I've heard someone say that I am not held responsible for what my mind comes up with; at a glance that seems totally false, but I'm inclined to believe it :D With that said, here's the 2D animatic in all it's embarassing glory (no sound yet).

Birds of a Feather Flock in Relative Proximity of Each Other

Another quick update. I attended CG Con this weekend and it was simply fantastic! The animation masterclasses were full of gold nuggets that I am looking very forward to implementing. I was also able to have my reel professionally reviewed by Matthew Russel of Valve and Charles Alleneck of ILM. Both experiences were humbling but positive; some definite tweaks to make, so much more to learn but overall they thought it was rather strong, which is a good sign as I certainly can't judge my own worth. One thing they both mentioned was that I could use a full body, body mechanics shot and so I have started one. It's only in the blocking phase and a short test, but hopefully I can get it polished up by Siggraph.



I've essentially finished the subtle acting piece I've been working on, and decided to cut off the ending, I felt it drag on a bit too long for the purpose it was trying to serve, which was to demonstrate a context between text and subtext. It was understood at the reel review so that's a good sign to be sure. I've compiled it all together in what is now my current reel, but only for a couple more weeks, as I have to go back and tweak other shots. But here it is for the time being:



CG Con is planning on coming to Vancouver in the next few months for a smaller road show, they've asked for my assistance so I'm seeing what I can do to make that a reality, not much mind you. It will be great if they come, a lot of local talent and interest to be sure. So yea, it's largely just the mad rush to get ready for Siggraph, GameJam, and mostly just finish tweaking my reel as many studios this year it seems requires a pre-submission to be talked to; rather smart but kind of annoying hehe. A test of endurance, can't stop now! :D

Et Tu Bay?

Just a quick update, it's been a week off between terms but I still managed to keep busy. I started a new monologue shot that still needs a lot of finess but it's well on it's way. I decided to go with an clip from the original Frost/Nixon interviews as the authenticity of the piece really sung out to me and presents an interesting challenge in what's being said and what the subtext actually is.


My new mentor for Class 5 is Jason Taylor and I feel very lucky to have him. This term is all about story and I'm very excited, also nervous to come up with a short film idea that I will be happy with as I will be spending the next 6 months on this. I've had a few good brainstorming sessions already, but I'm not letting the cat out of the bag yet, too early.

CGCon is only 2 weeks away holy schnikey! Part of my reason to do a new animation was just to bulk up my reel for this event as there will be an impressive job fair there, to which I will get an opportunity to hand out some reels and more importantly receive feedback to make them stronger for Siggraph, the theory seems sound anyways. Also there will be some excellent animation master classes and a chance to meet some AM mentors, alum and mentees, it's going to be a busy week.

I saw Transformers 2, I shall refrain from comment on that one as I want this to be a short blog post. Also saw Ice Age 3, and that was excellent stuff. Great for kids, but the animation in that was supersolid, I feel really inspired right now and I gotta keep that feeling. Also with any luck there is a new twitter widget on my blog as I recently found out I can combine the two, feel free to follow me if you wish.

Instant Coffee Offers a Different Sort of Caffeine Sweats

This is the last week of class 4 and just wrapping up one of the most challenging assignments of my journey. There are still minor fixes, but my two person dialogue shot is practically complete and what a learning experience has this been. It's amazing how much I really started learning this last month, hard to quantify but certain elements really started to click into place; namely the amalgamation of body mechanics and acting choices. To some this may seem trivial, to others non-sensical, but having the marriage of both work with each other rather than against was a big breakthough in the annals of my mind. Term break next week, but I'm already beginning work on a new monologue/acting piece so I can have something to pad my reel a bit more, no rest for the wicked or socially dis-inclined it seems.


In other news, my Andy-mated Webcomic strip has finally gone live on VancouverAnimation.ca and so far response has been positive. It proves an interesting challenge to come up with content as it's weekly and industry related, but it's one I am happy to go about as it will definitely help keep the creative juices flowing. You can view it at this incredibly loooong link: http://www.vancouveranimation.ca/index.php?option=com_content&view=category&layout=blog&id=52&Itemid=127 Partially related, as an incentive for my efforts in swinging this together I was honored to receive a ticket to Rob McKee's 3 Day "Story" seminar which was a fantastically amazing, yet thoroughly exhausting experience. Not a single regret from the 35 hours of his lecture, as I really look forward to apply his concepts to make a powerful piece in term 5 for the development of my short film. This is the same man who taught Pixar how to do it and his book has become the staple of screenwriting in Hollywood as well has led to numerous academy award winning movies, it was truly an honor.

Also, Siggraph is ramping up, and I cannot wait to attend it in New Orleans this August. I have already made time to accomadate my Gabriel Knight photo tour, simply as it was one of my favorite all time games growing up, and still for that matter. I made it tho, I am an official contestant in the GameJam! competition which is a 24 hour collaborative experiment to make a theme based game. Although I have no clue about scripting and game engines, it should prove to be ample fun and my 3D skills should come into play very well. I also just recently found out about CG Con in LA, which is a new event, but having a great job fair and Animation master classes, so I'm looking into the rationality of being able to attend.

April Anuerisms bring May Dopamines

Well a fair bit to update on this one. First and most notably, Pixar is opening up a studio in Vancouver! Asides being exciting in general, the launch of their studio sort of coincides well with myu completion of the core program at AM. I know realistically, my odds of getting hired there are small, but I also know that they don't always go for the best quality, they like to see a certain... panache I guess. Anyways, long shot, but exciting.

My charitable project is now very much complete, and reception has already been quite promising. For those who wish to view it you can here. It was an amazing plethora of technical challenges and creative design; occasionally drove me nuts, but I think that's the nature of the work. I feel much accomplished for having done it and am glad it's serving a good purpose. If you're reading this and live in the lower BC mainland, I highly encourage you to donate as well; the cause is quite just.


Also, through networking at a rather unique CG/Steampunk event a couple weeks back, I have an opportunity to start a webcomic for a local animation related website. This is very exciting and nerve wracking at the same time. A weekly publication that would run for about a year, but now that I've ironed about a bunch of the lumps, I think it's quite achievable and am really grateful for this opportunity. I had to be proactive and pitch my idea, which was liked, so hopefully next week on www.vancouveranimation.ca my work should be published weekly! Also a great way to gain some recognition and just generally be creative. Here's the first prototype issue; rather relevant to current local media:









New assignment has been going on for school the past couple weeks as well, the all encompassing 2 person dialogue shot. After sifting through near half of every movie ever produced, I narrowed down my choices of audio clips and after a long deliberation of determining what I wanted to achieve with this shot, I ended up choosing a clip from The Wedding Crashers. It's highly emotional and shows good anger and fear; plus I was able to throw it way out of context and do (what I think) is a rather original take on it. Still in it's base blocking stage, I am definitely hoping I'm not getting too far over my head, or that I inadvertantly offend someone or come off as a masochist or pervert :P but I think I'll be fine and this is just how the story evolved.

Once again long overdue for a blog post. The monologue shot has essentially been finished up, here's the final version posted. Working on the facial details took more time than I would have imagined, but was a very exciting and promising learning experience; amazing how the slightest of changes can really affect the emotional state of the character.


Also, due to a faulty windows update on a macintosh computer, I have switched over fully to OSX as getting Windows to work again work require a full reinstallation through bootcamp. It will happen, but it is not a viable option for the next couple weeks at least. With that said, I'm getting quite comfortable on the mac side of things, but definitely a huge stretch of the imagination to call myself a fanboy. A lot of it is in part related to the final touches to put on my video for VWSAC, which is essentially complete; just some minor revisions.
The new assignment is a 2 person dialogue shot and I'm quickly narrowing down my choices for audio clips and creative scenarios. Much more to consider than I would have originally thought, it's a matter of what I think I can reasonably finish and polish, what challenge I want to take on and ultimately what I hope to accomplish with it. Will update soon with what I end to choose and base blocking; in some senses this is the most challenging part, the commitment :D

Pantomimes, Monologues and Voice Replacements, oh my!

About time for another update. The pantomime assignment went well; I definitely learned a ton from it and I was amazed as to how much time I spent fixing mistakes in blocking when transitioning to splining. It helped me greatly with my workflow and I'm adapting it all to the next assignment to something that I feel is a better fit for me (eg. building in offsets in key poses rather than doing it after the fact, personal preference but it seems to vibe.) Here's the final version, tho a revision is still in the works.

Things are really beginning to click. After obsessing the past 3 weeks over the last assignment and the new one, I'm beginning to have a series of "Ah ha!" moments which is boosting my sense of self confidence but I'm still remaining very humble about it all. I've definitely reached a new echelon in my personal development for which I am grateful, but there's so much more to learn. It also just occured to me why at AM we spend so much time on so few assignments; spending 5 weeks on an 11 second clip seems absurd at a glance, but in retrospect it's brilliant. It forces me to push my work and see what's wrong with it at the finest levels of animation and subtleties, instead of producing a massive repetoire of so-so shots, as I'm particularly used to.

In terms of the new assignment, it's our first dialogue piece, a monologue rather, so one character, a new rig and the challenge of real acting. After sifting through many many carefully picked clips, I chose one and shot more video reference than I ever have previously to test out different ideas. I decided to go with a serious, emotional clip as most people tend to go with something humourous, but I figured I could get more out of it with a solidly conveyed piece. With that said, it has it's risks and rewards as I'm learning; far less forgiving over a funny shot, but I believe in myself I can make it shine. Here's my first pass blocking attempt at it, halfway through the second pass, but I won't post it yet.

Further development on my charitable project, have many rendered shots and the base of it is complete, a lot of fine tuning still yet to do. The script has undergone some serious changes to increase the length and overall power of it, so a lot of things are being reworked and reshot. Also an amazing learning experience and one I'm not soon to forget. As an additional test and personal curiousity, I did a little experiment with multi-channel sound editing. Largely because I haven't tried before and I wanted to see if I could. By and large it seemed to work and proved to be more challenging than I had previously thought; no copyright infringment intended this is simply a test but I successfully removed Robert Downey Jr's voice and replaced it with my own. Victory!

Here's the near polished version of my first acting (pantomime) assignment, it's been quite an evolution. I rendered this out to test the lighting and occlusion, all in all worked pretty well. It's down to the last 10% of polish to put that often imperceptible oomf into it; if you ask me, also the trickiest part.

In lieu of Ironman and my seemingly undying interest in visual effects as well, I messed around with making a HUD much like the one featured with Tony Stark. Much of it was done through the aid of a tutorial, but the experience was all together new and I learned some invaluable tricks and techniques. Here's basically what I got. I want to reshoot the footage and splice myself into Ironman, but after rewatching that sequence, I'd have to be really crafty with the audio... if I can get the music on it's own track then I'd say it's possible and totally worthwhile.


Coraline comes out this weekend, very exciting, and new Monsters vs. Aliens posters are released. If you have no intention on watching that film then shame on you! It should prove to be thoroughly enjoyable for all ages. Dreamworks has finally learned from past mistakes, all the power to them. March 27th, mark it down.

Many other things in the works, but I don't feel obliged to talk about them right now; they're not in any real state of public displayability, so I'll hold off until my next post.

Actimating

Long overdue for a post, but Term 3 has started and it's just great so far. I've switched over to a new computer as my old one was on it's last legs and this has helped endlessly. In terms of Animation Mentor, we've delved into learning about acting and pantomime. This assignment is incredibly challenging and I'm already a bit surprised the amount of time I've put towards it (technical complications with constraints not-withstanding). It's criteria involves an emotional change, leaving the playing field very open. I decided to try and go unique and, during it's evolution, it actually progressed into something that made more sense.
From the original video reference and thumbnails, all I can say is that so much has changed, and by next week, so much more will also.

I've also started reconstructing a new logo for myself and rebuilding the Julio model I was creating in Maya, well rerigging and reskinning mostly. A timely prospect, but my progress has been good and I decided to spend a little more time now to save time later. This is largely to save me from some insane compositing that I would have had to resort to in a couple weeks time. I did this screenshot as a test to see how it might unfold, the environment still needs a lot of work but it answers a lot of questions for me.