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Yep that’s right I’m back and it’s only a few days away until I start Class 3. I’ll all fit and ready to get stuck in. Class 3 will be starting on 31st March so expect me to be posting like mad again. I have volunteered to be a Peer Buddy again as I find it very rewarding and as well as fun and a great way to meet others on the site. Class 3 is all about an introduction to acting so I can;t wait to take my animation to the next level and get a good insight in acting choices and even more animating techniques.

Only a few days to go….can’t wait!

Well as you can probably guess from the title I have decided to take a term out of animation mentor to rest and get a few things sorted. I am hoping to use this time wisely and get as much practise and reading ready for Class 3′ds introduction to Acting. I am really going to miss Animation Mentor and all of my fellow classmates and mentors, but sometimes you have to make the hard decision for your own health. Hopefully when I get back I’ll be all healed and fit from my operation and I’ll be jumping at the chance to get my hands on some new assignments.

The biggest regret of this decision is that I won’t graduate with my original classmates like Chris Schloemp, Eleanor Taylor and Richard Fournier but the good news is that my good friend , who just happens to be German…. Pete!, is also taking the timeout too, so at least we should end up at the same graduation ceremony!

I will try and get this blog up to date as much as possible and make sure that all the work so far is all present and correct. If you get a chance check back on some of the older classes and you should see loads of new content!

Until then I’m going to bed for a week!

Merry Christmas!! and a Happy New Year!

Well here we are again at the end of another class. I really enjoyed Class 2 and boy did I learn alot. Overall I am quite pleased with my work this semester though I can see a lot of polishing is needed on all 3 of my shots. My biggest regret was not being able to finish my airlock ’sticky door’ shot which was by far my favorite and most successful. For some reason even before I started class 2 the pole jumping one was the most daunting, and although I had quite a few problems with the prep and blocking of that shot, it came good in the end. The 180 wasn;t so bad either though I am going to change the end for sure ad make the turn a little less floaty.

Class 2 has been a big leap for in regards of work-flow. At the beginning I fell into my usual trap of getting worried about placing too many keys, but during the 3 months this seems to have just faded. I have started to create my own work-flow which is getting better each time I sit down in front of the computer. Yeah for sure there are areas for improvement, but I am finding that I can control and edit my keys alot easier, despite the vast amount of keyframes. I am also finding that I am working alot quicker and using my time more productively, rather than just sitting there tweaking the same frames back and fourth. I am putting this down to being up against it a few weeks with illness and having to just hit each assignment full on to see how much I can get done. I have alot of confidence ready to go into class 3 and I am hoping to come up with some nice fresh ideas for the assignments and getting some of it in the showcase! well heres wishing!

When I get a chance I am going to do a nice render of all the work I have done to date and get a decent edit together, but in the mean time here is my reel of both Class 1 and 2. Hope you enjoy it!

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Well here it is, the final assignment submit for class 2. Overall I am quite happy with the result, but basically I ran out of time in putting all of my ideas in. Unfortunately I have been in the wars after my operation and have only just felt ok enough to have a look at this shot today, where I basically play-blasted it and submitted. I think the good old saying of ’shot are never finished, they are just surrendered!’ is very fitting in this situation. This shot has been a great learning curve and I have finally stated to find a work flow that I am comfortable with and that I can change quite easily without having to delete every frame. There are still a few things I would like to revise at some point including making the arms flail at bit more on the exit and making the breaking up the shapes of the pulls a bit more but i think the shot has potential.

With the limited time I had this week I mainly concentrated on polishing ( as usual ) and try to sort of the arms which still have this rotation glitch. I ended up going though frame by frame and keying the glitches out. Though not the ideal solution I think i managed to iron out the worst of it. I am happier with the timing of the look around and exit and spent some time playing with frames trying to keep the frame limit down as much as possible. I knew I was going to way over when I came up with the airlock door opening, but I just managed to keep it under 280 frames, though I actually could do with another 2 frames.

I think the main area I would like to revise would have to be the initial pulls at the door. I think I managed to break up the shapes but the timing is almost the same and I think there is more room to have the effort on each pull build and so raise the tension.

Well that’s all I am going to say about this shot, Lets see what Chris has to say about it and see if I can do anymore before the class 2 reel edit.

(QT H.264 61.5mb)

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As you will be able to see there is still plenty to do with this shot. With each sitting I am getting happier with the result though I really want to jazz this shot up and introduce more energy into the timing. I have had an idea that as he is being pulled out through the airlock and is trying to hold to have his fingers slowly stretch and then as his grip fails, his arms flail. At the moment they arm quite straight, which does work but next week I am going to give it a go and see if it looks better. This week I have mostly been working on trying to smooth things out in the graph editor and sort of the ‘weird’ rotations that have cropped up. I think I have finally run into the dreaded ‘gimbal lock’ though in asking a few mates, they are not sure, so at this moment it’s anyones guess whats going on. I have also done a few passes on the legs to try and get a good flapping effect with overlap. As usual I found myself doing this straight ahead which worked really well. I discovered placing locators on the screen really helps me trace where limbs and joints are, much like my past stop motion work using ‘gauges’.

As next week is the final submission of this work, I have made a quick to do this of everything I need to tidy up:

• Clean arcs and holds on initial reaction and transition to door
• Pose cleaner hand positions and shapes
• Correct arm scaling and elbow rotations
• Separate head turn with the helmet exit and door opening
• Speed up exit and body rotations on drag
• Add flashy lights! -

Unfortunately I will be very tight on time next week as I have to go into hospital so it is vital that I can get as much of this done by wednesday, wish me luck!

(QT H.264 68.7mb)

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Heh well ok I was a bit shocked to be honest. Just as I was shutting down my computer tonight I got a bing from my email to say I just got a new message. Hmmm ok i thought so I quickly cheked it and was very surprised to see that I had been critiqued! that was quick!

Well the first thing I should mention was that as predicted although Chris didn;t really mention it my marks reflected the fact that I was over the frame limit. Ah well the marks don’t really bother me, but it brought my A average down to an A- meh!

Chris agreed that he thought the initial reaction could still use some punch and suggested to either cut some more frames or to increase the anticipation beforehand. On the second look he also mentioned it could be good to have some head darts just to add a bit more texture to this hold. He read my mind on that one, I was thinking the same thing.

He liked the new speed to the 3 looking pose and also mentioned that the run was still working well. I had mentioned that I dialled down the initial pull despite the fact I had disagreed with this comment last wekk as Stu would be trying hard to get out so his pulls would all be big. Chris said it still needed something else to try and get some difference between the pulls. I think I will need to think about that one some more and try and come up with something. He still thinks the stretch on the arms is a bit too much, but has left it to me to see to make the final decision. At the moment I think I will keep it. I alreay dialled it down about 40% but I agree at one point it does look very stretched.

The end of the shot didn’t really get any crits as he saw it was still WIP and said it was looking like it was heading in the right direction. Chris said this would be the time to really stretch the character out as he is being dragged out and could give some dynamic shapes.

Well not the best results but to be honest, I think I have biten off quite a large chunk with this shot. I’ll just work hard this week and try to catch up!

R.D

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Well heres where I got this week. I seemed to run out of time this week with this shot spent quite a bit of time trying to fix some of the wierd rotations that have started to happen in the elbows, wrists and as you can see, the head! I’m still not sure what is happening but I hope to get this sorted this week. After last weeks Crits I toned down the arm stretch and sped up the initial reaction and movement to look 3. I am quite happy with the way the ending is working, but really need to get those legs and feet moving and try to sort out the head which is going crazy. I think possibly the initial reaction could still have a few frames taken off it as it still seems a tad soft, but I wrote a note to Chris to get his opinion too. I am trying not to worry about the frame limit. For the first time I am well and truly over the limit,but to be honest I would rather have the shot make sense, than just cut it for times sake. I don’t think Chris will agree with that tho

I think the next steps are

• To really get those arms and nailed down to stop the wierd rotations

• Take a look at the hand shapes and try to get that extra overlap in the fingers.

• Fix wierd head rotations

• Blocking in feet and leg overlap

• Animate helmet with correct bounce and roll

• Add the warning light animation

So still plenty to do and I should have much more time this week to crack some work out. Fingers crossed Chris will get the crit done a bit sooner than last week and I can include his suggestions.

(QT H.264 85mb)

For security and copyright reasons I have password protected all my crit videos.

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