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Ok, I know I said I was going to be more active this semester so let’s get cracking. First of all I’d like to just give another huge congratulations to Alexsis who is now a AM Alumni and just got hired at Blue Sky Studios! WOW…she is going to be working on ICE Age 3! How cool is that?
Check her out over at http://www.alexissdawn.com/blog/ and wish her well.
For class 2 my current mentor is David Breaux who just finished up working on Speed Racer and is now the Sacred Road TV Series: Animation Supervisor. Here is a link to his website http://www.siliconriot.com
Based on the Q&A from last night, David seems to be a real stickler for making sure you understand the mechanics of the action and nature of force. I’m really looking forward to getting a lot out of his class and seeing how I will improve. He truly enjoys the teaching the Body Mechanics class and wants to prepare us for acting. We’ve been warned in a round about way that towards the middle of the semester he will make us work to get that grade. This is good because having someone constantly pushing you is great!
This week right off the bat I’ve noticed a difference in the vibe in the work for Class 2. My first assignment is pre-planning phase to animate a 180 turn. We are required to film some video reference and start thumb nailing out “key” poses only. Emphasis, on planning as this is a four week assignment. Gotta remember so much like weight shifts, hips, center of gravity, lead and follow etc…thank God for good notes!
Later tonight I’ll try and up load my video reference just to give those interested an idea of what I’m doing…you would not believe the amount of thumbnail poses I’ve done already and I’m only half way through. Hopefully I can use the thumbnails as a jumping off point in Flipbook to see if everything is working. I’ll post the 2D animation too when I get the chance.
Well I’ve been always talking about integrating the 2D workflow into my animation work. Thank you Jason 
The only caveat is at the moment my drawing skills suck on a Wacom. One of the biggest issues I faced was the lack of control with my digital pencil lines. I had the hardest time trying to keep the pen under control and drawing a pleasing curve. Then I discovered how to properly use the Wacom settings after several years because I took a minute to experiment LOL.
Now either todays programs respond more positive to Wacoms or I’m just a dork for not experimenting with the settings more. Oh well…at this point I have the Wacom working how I want and it feels like a natural pencil, at least with Flip book.
I hope you were not expecting to see some amazingly drawn animation. Hell, I’m just happy to have that! Baby steps…Baby steps. If you actually saw what I had been drawing in the past on a Wacom then you would understand the achievement here
Ok, I think I finally found a home for my future videos. First off, I was never happy with my experience over at Veoh and Youtube is just way too crappy. If I had my choice and could go back in time I would have setup my WordPress blog on my own domain. For that reason alone I cannot even use any of the available plugins to host quick time files, etc.
There I was, at the point of switching back to Blogger because the sole purpose of my blog is to host video clips. This has been more drama than I’ve wanted to experience, trust me.
Continuing on…it usually happens though when your at your wits end that an evangelical like event occurs. “And there stood before me in my time of dismal discomfort like a bright white angel….Vimeo.” All I can say right now is wow. Very user friendly and has tons of nice features. Sold!
This video clip was an animation I did a few months ago, modeling, texturing effects yours truly but noting to write home about. I figured why not use it as test…worked out quite nicely.
….and of course I’m thinking about what else can I work on!
Animation Mentor recommends that we take a break and I totally get that. The only problem for me is that I’m a rhythm type guy and I like to keep a constant groove going. So the trick is how do I work on something, make it fun and enjoy my break too!
Well the first thing is that I definitely need to get out and relax and experience the outdoors. Observe life! So I’ll probably go to a park or something by me for sure. While I’m out there…why not film some video reference while I’m having fun.
This weekend I plan on seeing Kung Fu Panda so there are some chilling out plans in the works while on break. Heck it’s only a week and some days so it’s not that long. The only real break that you getting is not having the pressure of the ever looming DEADLINE
Anyway, I figure to keep my brain on track and touch on some of the areas my mentor give me to work on I’ll do one animation before I go back. I’ve decided that I’m going to do an animation of character running up to a soccer ball and head butting it. That would be kinda cool. So through out the course of my break I’ll post my progress on that.
I’ve also decided to step into the 21st century and retire my five year old DELL Dimension 8400 which is a P4 3.2 ghz with 2GB of Ram. This rig has been my workhouse for a long time and has served me well. The only problem is that it cant handle everything I’m throwing at Maya sometimes. Plus, with the applications that I like to have open while working I just need more of a seamless experience by limiting the laggy responses I get between apps. Moreover, I’m hoping to bring down those dreaded awfully long render times into something more realistic.
So I’ve ordered a XPS 420 with an Intel® Core™ 2 Quad Processor Q9450 (12MB Cache,2.66GHz,1333FSB).
Talk about a beast of a machine…I’ve also added a few other goodies and should have this rig online by the end of next week.
The nice thing here is that I’m going from one processor to four and from 2 gigs to 4 gigs. The video card is a major upgrade too so maybe I can finally enjoy turning on some of the features in Maya like real time lighting and texturing while I’m working.
It’s been a rough month and some days. Most of it had to do with trying to find new residency then moving and finally getting settled. In between the day job, family and AM it I haven’t had time to blog like I prefer. But, things are now starting to get back to normal. I’m settling into the new place and even though it doesn’t feel like “home” yet, all I have is time.
AM has been a blast though. It’s tough…real tough when you have so much going on but I’m loving it. The assignments are demanding and you really have to maximize your time. Were on week 11 and next week is it for Class one and I cannot believe it. Pretty soon I’ll actually have my demo reel uploaded for class one. How cool is that? LOL
Starting in class two I’m really hoping to blog a lot more frequently and post more work than I did for class one. Seriously
Ok, I’ve written this post about five times already. Something fishy is going on between Veoh, wordpress and firefox where my post just keeps getting deleted. I’m just too tired to figure out what. So I’m not even going to rewrite all that I wrote…here’s to keeping it short
We have finally started animating and are beginning to focus more heavily on some of the core principals. Funnily enough the bouncing ball assignment is like “Hello World” for programmers. Learn the basics and the structure and you will go far but you gotta say “Hello World” first. I’d love to give one of my patented long winded post’s but I have a couple of revisions and my regular assignment due.
Definitely!
I gotta do this one more time just to burn everything I learned from the first pass right into the long term memory. From the onset my goal was to discover the secret squirrel if you will about some things that had eluded me in the past about Maya. This first go around, I’d have to at least say it was a quasi success at best.
Animation mentor is literally two weeks around the corner for me and I’ll be fully immersed once again. So I’d like take make one more pass at another Mecha before school starts. This way I’ll end up with two cool models, rigged and textured to have for animation during school. Once we get to walk cycles and then class two, body mechanics I’ll really make these characters shine. Hmmm I wonder what else I may have created by then?
Depending on how much time I have left before the end of this month. I might go ahead and clean up this current animation or just do another one with both Mechas together. Although, the likely hood of that happening and it being polished before AM starts is dismal for sure. I’m a realist at heart but the fun is always in the journey.
Oh, before I forget. Hey Tony!…you weren’t lying about the quality of Veoh…..WOW! Thanks again for the tip!
