Visual Language Resubmission

Visual Language was probably the most difficult module this year, for me at least. I have trouble keeping up with my sketchbooks and its something I definitely need to work on. That being said, my drawing skills this year have greatly improved due to Visual Language pressing me to put out more work in my sketchbook. I still have to work on blogging as well. What I have decided is that i'm going to keep all of my blogposts as drafts so i'm able to edit them over the course of the module, that way when I post them they're exactly the way I want and need them to look like.
The first assignment for the module wasn't incredibly hard. I just had to come up with sufficient ideas to draw things of. It wasn't until the second brief where things started to get difficult.The backgrounds assignment was probably the one studio brief i struggled most with this entire year. I started out strong but then I took a trip back to America for my birthday and It was difficult for me to change gears. I ended up procrastinating it up until the final few weeks of the module. I didn't even know about the animated sound project until two days before it was due, so I put that off until I wasn't juggling so many things around. I wasn't here for the turnaround studio brief as well so I had to stay up one night and do a turnaround of a stuffed animal on my bed at 1 in the morning.
After all that was done I still had to blog about all of what I did, and by then it was 3 days before the module ended. So I put out as many blogposts as I could, working right up until the end of the module, and only turning in half of a final review blogpost. Overall I felt pretty bad about what I turned in and I felt like I could have planned my projects better. I was glad I got done with all of my physical projects though, I tend to put my actual work at a higher regard than my blogging, but I need to be able to explain myself through the blogposts so I should put more work into them.
After all the modules were done I felt that I probably improved the most with the Visual Language Module. Even though it was incredibly difficult for me to finish, I still ended up finishing all of the physical work for it. I figured out how to properly spread out my work to create a much less stressful work calendar, and I was able to put out work at a rate I've never seen before. The life lessons I learned in this module are some that i'm going to keep using, hopefully into the next year of university if all goes right. I feel like if I made these mistakes in a later part of my life I wouldn't have learned from them nearly as much as I am right now.

Applied Animation Module Evaluation

This Module was probably the most productive one that i've participated in. The first studio brief was a very good introduction to 3-D modelling, something that i've never actually had experience in but I wanted to get better with.  The project itself was making 3-D models of trucks, and then making something small that was simple enough in its design to look nice when we made it. A lot of people ended up going with their phones, but I chose to use my Baymax bracelet.

After we got done with that brief, they assigned us a project where we either had to work on a title sequence of our choosing or go with idents for a set of TV channels.  A few of my classmates decided to go with the idents, but most of them opted to choose a book to make a title sequence of. I was one of them. I wanted mine to give me a good introduction to special effects and green screening, something i've only done once and that was with my father when I was eight. So it wasn't really an introduction as much as him doing most of the work for me. Still, I was determined to figure it out so I chose to put in a small live action sequence and put in special effects. For this I mainly used Trapcode Form and Starglow, which is an effect within Adobe After Effects. I also needed to learn how to key out the green screen and edit in a moving staff into my actors hand. Along with costume design, partial set design (I made a background in Photoshop to use for it.), Directing, Storyboarding, And managing the entire project by myself. I had to outsource some of my work, so I got classmates and Commissioned artists from inside and outside the school to help me. I probably spent around 80+ Pounds on this project altogether, but I think it was worth it. Even though the thing that cost more than half the money I spent never actually got here on time (See My blogpost about the project if you wanna hear more about that). I wasn't able to show my final project to my classmates for Critique because i hadn't rendered it out yet. I assumed since the class day ended at 4pm, that was the time we would all sit down and review it. But instead it surprised me in the morning and I wasn't able to show it. I still had enough time to get it done though, and even fix a few minor tweaks that I didn't see before. I was able to tweak an sfx sound that I was having trouble with too. There was even enough time to put a final edit on all of my blogposts before posting them to my blog. So over all this project was by far the most fun out of this module, and even in some sense this entire year. For me, at least. The module was really interesting too, I learned a lot of skills that i'll probably be using the rest of my life, and improving upon as well.

Title Sequence for book Animation - Development - Part 10

I put all the work together in After effects and got a song off the Dragon Age OST to serve as the background music. I had to motion track the pole movement to be able to get the staff to have the right movement. It was extremely difficult as I had to go frame by frame to achieve the illusion. I made gas clouds and stars in the background by using trapcode form and starglow. I used camera panning shots to give it a sense of 3-d space within the shot and edited cloud sprites to serve as 3-d gas clouds.

Title Sequence for book Animation - Development - Part 9

I needed to film a live action portion with an elder Merlin so I got Luca to help with it since he can do makeup. I had to put together a costume for him though. So I commissioned a fashion student to make me a cloak, along with ordering a wooden staff from eBay. I never actually got the staff, so I had to use a pole and edit the staff in.

 I used a green screen to key out the background and made one by editing a couple of photos together.

Title Sequence for book Animation - Development - Part 8

I managed to get some help from an artist friend I have from Singapore,  and she gave me a PSD file to learn a technique from. So I got the rest of the subject matter I needed it to transfer into the formula and they all turned out pretty well.

 I got one of my classmates, Matt, to act as Merlin in one of my backgrounds since he has a likeness to the character.

















I also used a photo of a beach in Wales, since at the start of the story Merlin wakes up on a beach, and i figured it could blend out into the movie.

Title Sequence for book Animation - Development - Part 7

I found a fashion student who is willing to help me with creating the costume production. He charged it as around 20-30 pounds, which is well within my budget. Now all I need is an old looking chair for my actor to sit in, as well as a staff for him to knock against the ground. I wont need them to be movie quality since its just a school project, but it would be nice if I could make it look as best as possible, since im really starting to enjoy this project.

Title Sequence for book Animation - Development - Part 6

So far today i've been trying different techniques to create a suitable recreation of a nebula with the content I need put in. I've created a set of dynamic photoshop brushes to help make nebulas look more realistic and unique. Hopefully i'll be able to use this to my advantage, but so far i haven't found an easy to replicate technique to use so I haven't been able to make the backgrounds.

Title Sequence for book Animation - Development - Part 5

I managed to finish some basic storyboarding but I knew exactly how I needed it to look, since the idea was simple enough. Although i'm not sure how i'm going to achieve the particle flow that makes each tiny particle a nebula in of itself, i'm sure i'll be able to. Even if it doesn't work out, the live action portion of it will still be interesting enough to leave in the project. So far i've only been starting out with the basic parts of the project, i've found a few photos that are high res enough to use and they're all uncopyrighted images so i wont have any issues if i use them. I plan to use a classmate who looks similar to the main character as a model for the blind picture i need, and I'm going to ask around for people to help me with costume design, along with the actor who's going to play the older merlin.

Feedback on Applied animation project - Title Sequence for book Animation - Development - Part 4

I plan to open the title sequence with an old merlin sitting in a chair. He strikes his staff on the ground and it produces light particles. I plan to move to and from each light particle, and when zoomed in close it covers some of the major events surrounding the story, Including waking up on a beach, and the fight between the stag god Dagda and the Boar god Rhita Gawr. I also plan to cover the events that lead up to his renouncing of magic and his blindness due to the cause of a fire he caused, along with the realisation of his second sight.

I got Prompted to search up ways on producing the light effects i need to make the title sequence the way I want it to. I was also told to finish my storyboards.

Title Sequence for book Animation - Development - Part 3

I found a creativedojo post about creating trapcode galaxies in after effects.

http://creativedojo.net/tutorial/nebula-galaxy-trapcode-form/

After seeing some of the videos that were made with this technique I realised that this is the exact feel I need for my project. I figured out that I could create pieces that had themes within the story and make them into nebulas for the animation project. Now all I need to do is search up some themes from the book and create a storyboard for it.

Title Sequence for book Animation - Development - Part 2

I've decided to go with a book that I read during the time I was a child, The Lost Years of Merlin. Warner Bros. is actually in the process of making this into a film, but since nothing on it has been released, my instructor said it would be fine to make a Title Sequence for it. I want the title sequence in some way to portray the sense of mysticism I had when first reading the book, so it has to be subtle. Im going to look into ways to produce this effect.

Title Sequence for book Animation - Development - Part 1

Today we were given a brief on making a sequence for some form of entertainment. One was making Idents for Tv shows, one was for making a Title sequence for a book, and the last was making a commercial for a charity campaign. I want to go with the one that has the most creative freedom, the Title Sequence. Since we can choose any book we want (as long as it hasn't been made into a movie) I'm going to take some time to decided one what to do.

Maya Induction Pt.2

After that he assigned us a project to create and render a shape of our choosing. I decided to use my baymax bracelet and create it within a 3-D space. I used the skills he taught us and made a rough rendition of what it looks like. I Created a few primitives and blended them together to create the image of the baymax bracelet. For the face I did the same thing but on a smaller scale.

Overall the class was very informative, especially since I want to start doing 3-D animation. I hope to be able to use this program in a more in depth way in the future.