Week 17, Okej! I start my Monster film

Well, Mike and I had a meeting last friday and Jared also showed up. We talked about the film and so on and decided that the best thing might be to drop it. So, its done. I really liked the idea, I loved Aminata's model of the girl, I liked how the dead world was coming together, I didn't want to do another 3D gag comedy film- use the software and the medium for something different and mix it up more - any way - it didn't work.




No..he doesn't have three heads -its parts that I will animate in AE )


Time to make a ll the cut out body parts to joint in after effects and animate. I don't have time to write now if I am going to make this, so ciao bello, later!

Technical things- how to render out a film from AE so its remains an alpha chanel. Will try the puppet tool in after effect- might be helpful with the animation.




Made some props for the spa and sticked them into the maya file. 2D and 3D is hard to mix nicely, i just want this colorful and wacky so I think i will keep the spa in just a solid color, no tiles or any fancy 3d texturing cos that just wouldn't fit.

Started to animate the horn monster who will just brush his back and put soap on the belly - have problems with his front arm, it doesn't want to joint and i cant put the anchor point where i want so i can't make it move naturally right now. His eyes are also a pain in the ass, want to animate everything but the front arm today so that i easily can do the arm later.

Will meet up with Alex tomorrow and hopefully solve why I can't upload my avi films on planes in Maya, do the films have to be something else den DV pal size? I know he gat some After Effects tricks as well then he can enlight me about. I did everything wrong with my showreel last year cos i refused to do tutorials n started working and learning - and making lots of mistakes- instead..hehehe..i didn't even parent my characters last year, - or use joints hehe..so that surely didn't help the animation haha. Anyway, u live and learn.

AAAAARGHHH! Tuesday today and my scanner just died - very bad timing - gat to go n get a new one! later!

Wednesday : new scanner and a new receptionist that I can't choose between.
My maya file is acting really weird, wanted to stick 2d textures on the spa walls to see if that could be the solution to the 2d and 3d not looking good together- BUT, maya sometimes has its own life, this time when i high light a face and add a texture to it- it adds the texture on everything thats NOT highlighted! haha I love this software, it does have its own life! Anyway, maybe i do it all in 2d.



The Receptionist - two different versions and some color tests.



..and if I get the time I will animate the Teacher down below cos she should be the receiver of the postcard.



I went for the orange hair for Ruth,





I have started to animate the Horn Monster and the Green Smelly Monster in After Effects - BUT - when I think I am done with the green monster, all of a sudden his parts starts floating around - they have anchor points, they are not parented, they are keyed in position and the layers are LOCKED! So how the hell can they move?? Very irritating. Have to find out what the hell it is cosing it cos all my work is for nothing right now as long as that continue to happen.




I think this will do as the massage scenery? I tried to give the massage customer different colors as he shouldn't have the same color as Ruth, but, i liked him the most green..





Working out how the shower room and the waiting room could look - need to add the room itself -

Peace n Luv
asa

Week 16

Josie found new faults on the girl so I sent her back to Giles again and asked him to try and animate her a bit this time and play around with blendshapes so that we hopefully dont find any more faults and can get started - he fixed her really quick, hopefully she works now, i have passed her on to Raphael, Wan and Josie and will start playing around with her, hopefully there are no more faults.

Made some more test for Jess and passed her a folder with them all so that she can get back to me with fedback and hopefully i can wrap it soon, the funny thing is that when i freestyle and do something silly that i think Jess is going to hate- then she actually likes it so she likes the silly ones when he is dramatic and stands up on his toes and wave with his arm and when he poses as in a musical, so I will develop them, find the tweaking hard, hard to get the natural look, very stiff cos its just a few keyframes now so I am playing around with it. Jess asked me if I wanted to animate some other small scenes- would have been fun but I honestly need to focus on mine now eventhough I find it fun to animate - I just wish I knew more about the tweaking cos i think thats what makes the difference, adding those extra keys and tweaking them right- i am trying now but damn, we dont have time to learn to much new things this year- i am busy reading about after effects and trying to figure out how to do with the composoting, need to find out how to export films from final cut as alpha channels if i don't want massive and messy aftereffect files.. Found this site that has some very good tutorials:

http://www.layersmagazine.com/aftereffects-tutorial-draw.html

Honestly, the film idea is good, it's different and could have been something really nice, but I have been drained out of my motivation long time ago and have had meeting with both Jared, Mike and Dan about the film and that I don't know how the hell we are going to pull it through. Different people in the class has popped up and said they would like to help - I sent them info and so on- nothing ever happened. Yes, I was stupid - I should have pitched a film with more elements that I could handle alone and not so much 3D characters as I rather sell my kidneys then get into rigging - but I didn't, cos in this class the majority is 3D people so I thought I do just like the teachers said: pitch something that a lot of people could work on and that required different skills. I did. I worked my ass off the first term and was really really stressed out. This time I have decided that it is not worth it, I am not letting my group down but first of all - I am not letting myself down. My film would have needed a director that is better on 3D and compositing I think, and someone with more patience cos I loose mine all the time and i want to give up. Because the grades don't mean that much to me- but my showreel surely does, will i even have a showreel now? Well well, lets try n do this n stay positive. So..here are some test for the shadow character done in Corel painter, started with crayon, didn't like it, water colour wasn't that nice either- charcoal, the last test is my favorite, will have to edit it in final cut n change the pace.







Now the question is how to make films from final cut alpha chanels?.. I need coffe

new problems with the girl rig AGAIN, i asked please please please try to animate her so that we find all the faults in one go, but first thing that happens when we get her back is that Wan finds new faults.. i am loosing my hope..




AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAARRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRGHHHHHHHHHHHHH!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Giles and Wan are working on it so that good but I am getting really stressed when it never stops and we always find new faults who makes it really hard to start animating, hopefully we will sort it out this week - WE HAVE TO!!



Raphael cleaned up his file, good, went down from 3000 Kb to 1000 and now i cut it down to 780 kb, i didn't clean my hospitalroom up cos i wasn't happy about it n wanted to go back n change more things but fuck it, Wan cleaned it up and i sent him some changes that i had done with some texture settings for bumbpmaps, Eva's trapetzez etc.



This is what happens after 4 years of studying animation fulltime sitting on you ass 24 7 drawing or working with the computer..u develop extra sections of fat and between the different sections u can stash pencils, erasers etc, very handy!
In a couple of more years I might be able to stash my sketchbook some where between them!

Anyway.. :) went home to Jessica's house o friday to do the bus scene together with her so she can get one scene done and render it, I hate to animate - it's fun to try and give an object life and character but I am to impatient to do it and I go crazy with the hypergraph cos I never get it the way I want - anyway, we gat that scene done now, she asked me to do another small scene and thats nice that she asks me as I am a shit animator- I said yes but then when I started thinking about my film situation I told her that I changed my mind cos I am so behind with my own work.


Weekend work:







I don't want cute Monsters - i want silly ugly and funny monsters.. i am happy about 3-4 of them but..hmm.. i am not giving them any shadows now..too much work for quick color tests.



Time to pick the best characters for the film.. I need ten of them.

Quick test to see if maybe the characters would be nicer with water color textures

..here's a ruff sketch of the idea and here is the first camera test of the shower corridor environment, almost 40 sec.



Peace n Luv,
asa

Week 15 - start animating

Monday: Started with a small scene for Jess. I need to go back in time and get into tweaking and blendshapes again that we did in our first year cos I don't remember where to find everything. Have been rendering different kinds of fog and clouds for my film all weekend so now I am going to play around with compositing - have e-mailed my group about the girls textures, Josie came online and received the file but Raphael don't have internet access at home so I will have to wait for him or meet up some where - but he can start animating without them. Made a schedule for this term - very simple one.
Anyway - Jess's scene, have to ask her about if the bus and the owl should bump n shake a bit - if that will be done now or in compositing afterwards and if he is suppose to look straight into the camera or where the bus is going, here's some quick tests:



I wanted to know what jessica wanted with this scene- should he blink, look into the camera or look at the view from the bus, look to where the bus is going and so on - so i did some quick tests and showed Jess, this top one was more a joke but she actually liked the idea of him closing his eyes and enjoying the sun so i will develop that one. I want to upload the other tests but, what is the point when they are so small and is so low quality that u cant really see what happens? anyway..



I want to finish that scene for Jess this week and start with my scene for my film, I noticed a faulty with the girls neck and found t hard to control her arms so Giles was changing the rig last nite and I will get a new version of her today so that I can get started. Wan noticed a faulty with his blendshapes - I told him to talk straight to Giles about it and then I said that we will find away around it as there's no time to re- rig or re-do blendshapes, we just have to get started now. I also want to make that sky for the first and the last scene - maybe I should sit down and learn shake, the sun is alright in maya put the clouds looks to much like computer games clouds for my liking but maybe thats just because I haven't found the right setting for them yet?




Been sending the girl rig back n forth with Giles this week as I find new faults here and there, i have asked everyone in the group to let me know if they found any as well but no one has which makes me worried cos then maybe they haven't even touched their scenes yet? Anyway.. Giles is on the case and works very fast so that is very good!

CHECKLIST:

* animate scene for Jess
* get train from Josie and the traintracks from Raphael and put the deadworld for the last scene together and pass to the rest of the group
* new girl and rig from Giles - pass to the rest of the group
* start animating my scene for my film
* render out mist and sky for the first scene
* would be very nice to 2D animate the shadow with crayons, but I will have to see if there's any time for that

I want to have some butterflies in this world so I made 2 simple ones that I will animate on planes in Maya,





and just mess around with watercolor n make a quick texture. Made some simple creatures that could be transparent silhouettes in the deadworld. Work i will do if i have time in the end - gat problems with the compositing and it is driving me Maaaaaaaaaaaaad.

Week 14 - back to college

Monday: Applied for a workplacement in Stockholm, illustration place. Online meeting on skype, Raph couldn't be online but i texted him n he gat all the info in a mail. We looked at the blockout again, cut it down more so its down to 4:02 now, passed the new version to Emmet and Wan and Joise. I played around with the dead world, still don't know AE so well but i am slowly learning. Rendered out tests, still think its looks SHIIIIT. I am loosing hope in the mixed media idea cos the 2D clouds does not look good in the deadworld, anyway, I am rendering out mist and clouds etc from maya so i am trying different things, hope i can upload the tests now! Trying to make mist and clouds in After effects as well, the kind of test i wanted and thought that Patrick was dojng for us the first term, i like after effects though but it doesnt feel as if there's time to sit and watch tutorials and look for tutorials, well.. lets see how many hours it takes before i can upload some tests..



not the film but a still, the deadworld all in AE - mist looks shit in 2D though so i will try to make AE mist and watercolor 2D mist again but with texture so its less flat



playing with layers in AE and learning effects, not there yet, just playing around trying to figure out HOW to do it :)

Not happy with the tree trainstation, will add more branches and ask Alex why the mesh doesn't go together eventhough all vertices are merged, weird. Might look better with a bump map, will do a quick test.

I always have problems with uploading films, anyway- low quality as hell but thats the only way i can get films up. I prefer 3D mist and clouds - look spoky in the end, don't want it to look like a ghost film so i will work on the background there and render animated light.



I built more branches to the tree and moved them around to see where i could add them- they looked weird where ever I put them..we dont have time, Wan loves the tree and Jessica likes it to, Mike hates it but, we don't have time - and i kind of like it to - and its my film moahahahaha, ( evil laugh) but he is right, how will people know its a tree? i will add a bump map n play around with textures.

Week 13 - back from Sweden

Yes! Gat my lap top now and maya is running on it!! Puuh, been awful not being able to work at home!!
Not a word from Caspar about the train, Giles about the girl, nothing about Wan's Bobo or Raph's creatures since last week when we had a meeting. I need to edit the block out and put it up and have a last look at it- Emmet has e-mailed me some suggestions for sound that I have to listen to, i need to get the train from Caspar so I can size and texture the tree station and i need to hunt people and nag and ask where their work is and then I need to do some more tests for the dead world and then I need to rig the Dr and animate a scene for jessica and after that I will shape up my CV and my portfolio...yeaaah..not long time left now.



I changed the textures on the Dr that Josie textured, the eyes and the coat and the trousers and put a phong on the shoes so that they shine. I think I need to change the tie as well cos in a distance it looks weird as I think the UV's are wrong. Now I am going to rig him...think i should add color under his eyes first so he looks more tired...don't know how to manage and do everything. The Dr's eyes are way to far apart, I don't like it at all, but there is just no time to fix it, I already asked Jess to put them closer once so it might be a bit tiring if I ask again and again just cos my concept was to 2D and baaaaad.




I don't have photoshop on my pc so i cant do print screen and my camera is shit but, this is the train station as it looks right now. Want to try a more brown yellow texture as well before I decide which one it should be. Put the texture tests up on the group blog - need to get photoshop cos u hardly see anything with these pics, anyway..




played around with the credits n subtitles n so on..looks shit when its so small.. but it has to be to be able to upload. I want to animate the cloud background and the frame aroun it, the frame will be easy, just turn and change in AE, but the clouds will be another ball game.



received more sound examples from emmet but we still haven't nailed it so I asked him if he will be in on Monday or Tuesday so that maybe we can sit down together and look at the blockout and listen to sounds and try to nail it and get it done. The group work thing about asking everyone to report their work on the blog every friday didn't work either, Josie is the only one who did it, I didn't do it last friday when i was in Sweden so shame on me but otherwise I have been doing it.

Today, friday I gat the train from Caspar and he says he hasn't have tome to finish it and apologies, I would love to texture it, but i don't have time so I just put up a request on the group Blog to see if Raphael or Joise can do it. I'm missing one small changed sequence from Josie to be able to finsih the blockout, but Josie is always fast and reliable ( i love u joise!!) so I will get it soon, and then we'll have a last look at it and hopefully its done. I asked Wan and Raphael to look at it and leave feedback.

About rigging the Dr..I have started, gat a tutorial from Jared which is like a bible from hell, i think i am dyslectic, i cant read that much text i need images!! So i found my old rigging tutorial which is very basic but it doesn't explain how to do everything, it just says " go to IK handles and connect the..bla bla" but..where the fuck is IK tools? And what am I suppose to connect? So..I am stuck there and will need to find another tutorial or commit suicide, cos thats how much i hate rigging.



and editing the blocout scenes and sound effects to it



I just gat a mail from Giles and something was wrong with the file he gat from Wan + he said there was problems with the model but he still did it in just one week, but its a shame that it was so much hassle with getting her finished and sent to him, he waited like 3 weeks. Anyway, the vains in my brain are hurting, i think they might burst cos Giles also told me that Ben G had called him and asked to rig another character for our film, WHAT?? I have mailed him and told him that we are thankful for him trying to create a new bobo but that we are sticking to the old design as Ben never changed the characteristics that we didnt like and made him less cartoonish and maleish as we wanted and also from the start made promises of texturing the character and then later told me that he doesn't want to texture and doesn't like texturing - and now he have asked Giles to rig and weight him? I wrote to Giles and said sorry but i dont know what Ben is doing, maybe he is using the character for another film? But not in mine.


Anyway, I am glad to work with Wan and Josie and I am glad that Raphael came back, we might be a slow group but people are nice to eachother and everyone is trying and is also trying to stay positive although we had so much tiring shit happening and so much disappointments with other members and people promising to help us with things that they never do. Now there's only few weeks left so now everyone has to get into hardcore work mode.

Jessica sent me this one, nice to see how they looked in frames in the end and which ones Jessica choose




piiiiiiiiiiiiias