Sunday, April 23, 2006

Session 203

With the walkcycle last term fresh in mind, I knew this session was going to be a tough one. Going from blocking to refining is tedious and tremendously timeconsuming.

Workflow-wise, I'm refining in linear mode and next week i'm gonna convert it over to splines, start to put keys on induvidual parts to get more overlap, trace the arcs, fix the pops etc. It's gonna be a tough week as well...but hey, i'm creating life into a ball with stilky legs - can you ask for more? :) It's hard and at times frustrating, but it's amazingly rewarding to watch my shot come to life, little by little.

I'm blessed with some awesome friends from the school that constantly gives me feedback and helps me improve my shot. Feedback is gold - from anyone - at any stage.

Here's the refined version of the 180 degree turn:

Monday, April 17, 2006

Session 202

In addition to body mechanics, this term is a lot about finding a comfortable workflow. Last week I tried a workflow that Rick O' Conner (Star Wars, Narnia, War of the Worlds ) showed us, he uses a pose-to-pose linear approach and this week I've tried a workflow taught to us by Jason Ryan (Chicken Little) which is a linear/stepped approach.

During the week, I got some great feedback on my work from my fellow classmates and some really helpful comments from my campus mentor Clay Kaytis (Pocahontas, Treasure Planet, Chicken Little). He also host, in my mind, one the most inspiring websites for animators -
The Animation Podcast - check it out - it's a great site!

My planning last week was approved by Rob with some minor adjustments, and here's the blocked out version in stepped keys (the main key drawings and breakdowns):

Friday, April 07, 2006

Session 201

Whooohoo!!! New term, new class and new mentor :)
Class 2 - Body Mechanics and my mentor is Robert Russ. He has animated one of my favorite shots from The Incredibles - the shot where Bob comes home after being fired and the little kid on the tricycle says "I don't know, something amazing I guess". The way that the kid looks slightly shy/embarrassed and at the same time hoping to see something really cool, is just awesome! But that's just one of a lot of cool shots Robert have animated. Here's his bio:

Robert Russ joined Pixar Animation Studios in 1996 and has had the opportunity to work on almost all of the Pixar films. He began his work at Pixar as a crowd animator on "A Bug's Life". From there, he moved on to work as an animator on "Toy Story 2," "Monsters, Inc." and "Finding Nemo." While working on "The Incredibles," he was able to expand his role as an animator by assisting the character articulation team to build the basic set of controls that animators use to animate all the characters. He then directed his attention to animating the characters Edna Mode ("E"), Mr. Incredible/Bob Parr and Elastigirl/Helen Parr.

How cool is this?!?! We also had a great first q&a where everybody was introduced and it seems like it's gonna be another awesome term. Great class!

The assignment this week is to shoot reference and plan out a shot that we're gonna work on the next four weeks.