Session 409

It's been a pretty good week. I managed to get thru a 2nd pass of refining on the bodymech and a 1st pass on the facial animation on all the shots. The lipsync and the facial is kinda rough at the moment, but I got two weeks left for polishing :)

I've mentiond the Glen Keane lectures at YouTube before and now all of them are up, 18 in total. It's a huge inspiration to hear how he approach a shot and how he works thru it. Awesome!

Here's my 2nd refiningpass:


And here's this weeks facial poses:

Session 408

Alright, I'm back on track. I was able to get thru all my shots and get them into a 1st pass of refinement. The worst part is over :) Even tho the 2nd refinement pass, the polishing and the facial stuff probably is more time consuming, it's at least less frustrating. I'm actually beginning to think that I'll be able to finish this piece on time, some way or another.

There's no doubt that I've taken on a bit too much on this assignment, but to look at it in a positive way, it will give me an indication about how much I can handle for my short film the next two terms.

Great lecture this week about Entertainment, hosted by Pixar-star Doug Sweetland. How to explore different ways of approaching and thinking about a scene/shot to get it unique, sincere and as entertaining as possible.

Here's my 1st pass of refining for "It's Over":


Here's my facial poses this week:

Session 407

Oooohh. Bad week! It's been a while, so that's okay :) The pros says that the part after stepped blocking is where everything feels hopeless and the shot is at it's crappiest ever. That's sooo true, but even if it's normal, it still sucks.

Anyway, I blocked in a new version of the last shot and converted shot 1, 2 and 3 to splines. Went over all the curves, cleaned them up and started to work on Shot 1. Kept working on shot one....still working on shot 1. Wow, this takes time. We're on a tight schedule so I have to get thru refining all the shots next week, at least a decent first-pass of the overall bodymotion.

I came across a great link to a video of a Pixar tour. Check it out. There's also interviews with John Lassetter and Dan Scanlon. Really nice stuff.

Here's my semi-refining pass:


And here's the facial poses this week:

Session 406

Time for breakdowns this week. Lots of lots of work, but defining arcs and getting in the overall motion is maybe the most fun part.

I have a lot of keys on this one. I guess we should decide if we put our keys on the bodymechanics or on the acting, but I kinda did both, because it's a lot of physical stuff going on at the same time as there's acting, and it looked weird if I skipped either. The result was a lot of keys and therefore a lot of breakdowns :) I threw in one breakdown between each key and then an anticipation inbetween and an overshoot/settle/easing inbetween and ended up mostly on 3s and 4s. Even 2s some places.

Sean wanted me to come up with a new gesture for the guy in the last shot, so I left that untouched this week, but I was able to go thru the first 5 shots and break them down as much as I felt was needed before going to splines.

Most of you are probably aware of this already, but if not, check out Keith Lango's blog. His series of posts about manufactured images in CG productions, is awesome (the link is to the first post, there's a lot more on this topic at Keith's site). Not only does he point out what might be wrong, but there's also a lot of gold in there to learn from.

Here's my 2nd pass of blocking on "It's Over":


And the facial poses of the week:

Session 405

First week of blocking on the multi-character shot. This is fun!! I went thru the videoreference and analyzed the heck out of it and then blocked out all the main actions and the key poses on both characters.

Ever since late in class 1, almost a year ago, I've heard about this fantastic Victor Navone-lecture, a complete walkthru of a shot from start to finish. This week we got to see the first part of it :) as our lecture. And it IS awesome!!

This week we also had a live Cars-Q&A with Victor Navone, Anthony Wong, Carlos Baena and a couple of other Pixar-guys. They answered all the questions we had about the making of Cars and went thru a lot of the stuff that they had to deal with during the production. Seans Q&A's is also awesome! He worked on Over the Hedge and for the last couple of Q&A's he has gone thru several shots he did and talked about how he approached the shots. Great great stuff and super inspirational!

Here's my 1st blocking-pass of "It's over":


And here's this weeks facial poses:

Session 404

It's been a busy week. Luckily my last shot was approved by Sean with only tiny adjustments, but for our next assignment we had to find an audioclip with two characters, plan it, shoot videoreference, thumbnail and do the basic layout and editing.

The previous shot (Zeus) was picked mainly because of the physical action, so this time I'm going to try something more subtle and emotional. I still feel that I need practice on body mechanics, so I think this audioclip is a good clip for both physical animation and emotional acting. The scene is about 400+ frames, 6 shots with two characters and we got 7 weeks left to do it! It's gonna be tough, but a fun challenge :)

Keith Lango has a great new tutorial up at his site about eases and favoring. Also, check out his breakdown-tutorial. Great stuff!

Here's my layout for "It's Over!":


And here's my planning:

Session 403

It's always very exciting when a new package arrive in my mailbox. This time it was Justin Barrett's "Animate a Face" and Cristin McKee's "Animate!". Great great stuff. It's totally worth checking out!

The lectures keeps getting better and better. Mark Oftedal hosted the lecture this week about how design applies to animation. Not character design, but how to use design elements to lead the eye and stage the shot. The Q&A's with Sean is also fantastic. There's sooo much golden info in them. Seans mentor at Dreamworks/PDI was the one and only James Baxter so we're learning from one of the very best sources on the planet :)

This is the final week with the Zeus-shot. I've been working on it since Session 305 or 306. That's almost 2 1/2 months! I'm sooo tired of the shot and it looks really bad to me right now. Hopefully it will look better when I get some distance in a couple of weeks :). Next week we're starting our 2-character shot. That's gonna be fun!

Also, somebody at school put up an awesome link about storytelling. It takes about an hour to watch, but its worth it. :)

Here's the final of the Zeus-shot:


Here's my facial poses this week:

Session 402

It's been an interesting week. The lecture was really cool. It was about editing and as a former editor I found it particular interesting to learn the Hollywood-structured way of thinking about storytelling thru editing. Very cool stuff. It was hosted by Patrick Kriwanek from Berkeley Digital Film Institute. Awesome!

When it comes to my assignment, its been ups and downs. Going from blocking to refining on the facial animation has been tough. With a gazillion controls that has to work together to make it believable, its easy to get a bit lost. Since this is the first time I ever touched a facial rig, I felt that I didn't had a clue of what I was doing at times. But towards the end of the week, it came together in an okay way I guess. Still one week left to polish it. Practice makes perfect. :)

We also had to make a couple of facial poses this week. It was pretty fun trying to find a cool expression and then exaggerate/simplify it on the Bishop rig.

Here's some very interesting links I came across. The first one is a shot breakdown from Everyone's Hero by from Justin Barrett and the other one is a new tutorial that's up at Victor Navone's blog about facial takes. Awesome stuff!

Here's my facial refinement-pass of the Zeus-shot:


Here's my facial poses:

Session 401

Class 4! Wow! Now we got a full character rig, complete with facial controls. Thats a lot of controls :)

My new class is pretty much my old one. I know most of them from previous classes and the new guys seems really cool. Its going to be another super quarter. We had a great q&a this week where everybody where introduced and we met our new mentor.

My mentor is Sean Sexton from Dreamworks Feature Animation. Supernice guy! Here's his bio:

Sean Sexton is currently an animator at Dreamworks Feature Animation. Sean graduated from the traditional animation program at the Joe Kubert School of Cartoon and Graphic Art in Dover, N.J. then started his career as a Character Layout Artist/Animator on Matt Groening's Futurama. After four years on Futurama he left to work on Dreamworks' "Sinbad Legend of the Seven Seas". He then made the switch to computer animation for "Sharktale", Aardman's "Flushed Away", "Over the Hedge", and is now currently working on Jerry Seinfeld's "Bee Movie". Sean's favorite movie is "Jaws" and feels that it is still not safe to go back in the water.

This quarter is going to be awesome. For our assignment, we had to thumbnail and block in the facial animation on the shot we did last term.

Here's my assignment:


And here's the thumbnails:

Session 312

Sooo, this is it for Class 3. It's been a fantastic quarter. Great class and a great mentor. I've never done any acting before AM, and making a complete fool of myself thru video reference was a bit scary, but I did it and I'm proud of it :)

My respect for actors has grown enormously during this quarter. The amount of work that goes into an acting part is a lot more than what we eventually see on the screen. I feel that I've scratched the surface of what acting is, but it will probably take a lifetime to master it, which is cool - always something new to learn :)

The first assignment this quarter, the letter-shot, was a tough experience. It was a 4-week struggle from start to end. A lot of frustration, trial and errors (mostly errors) and I was on the edge of giving up a few times. But, ironically, when looking back, it was probably during that time I learned the most and even if that shot still doesn't work as well as I wish, it made the next assignment a lot easier to do. I was able to avoid all the pitfalls from the previous assignment when I started the Zues-shot. I went back to my old workflow and was able to refine it further. I felt that I had much more control over the shot. It was still frustrating at times and a bit of a struggle, but much much more fun! So all in all, this has been the toughest quarter so far, but then again, equally rewarding in the end :)

Michelle was a perfect mentor for this term. She's tough (in a good way), honest and went straight to the point, always respectful, kind and supercool. The q&a's was well prepared with tons of awesome tips and tricks related to the specific lecture and lots of cool stories about her experience in the industry that ranges from high-footage environments like The Sims to high-quality work like Gollum and Princess Fiona.

Next term is Advanced Acting. Class 4 is the last quarter before we begin our short film in Class 5 and then finish it in Class 6. It's scary to think about that it's only three months away, but at the same time I feel a lot more "ready" now, than I did three months ago.

A huge thanks to Michelle and to all my fellow classmates! It's been awesome!!

Here's my rendered assignments from Class 3:



And the revision of the Zues-Shot:

Session 311

Phew!! The final assignment in class 3 is turned in. It's been superduper hard, many many long hours, but most of all FUN!! We're about to finish up the 9th month at Animation Mentor. It's really unbelivable, 9 months ago we struggeled for a week with a bouncing ball and now we're animating a fully rigged character to dialogue. This school rocks big time!!

Disney-animator Mark Henn (supervising animator: Jasmine, Mulan, Belle, Pocahontas, Young Simba and more) hosted this weeks lecture about sincerity. How to get the audience to believe in the character. It's soooo cool to get his thoughts about this concept, that I believe is the core of what creates the magic of Disney, from one the most experienced animators in the industry.

Here's the final of my "Zeus"-shot:

Session 310

I've continued to refine my "Zeus"-shot. I re-did the hands after watching the awesome lecture about hands this week. I also tried to umph it up a little bit more by tweaking the timing/spacing here and there.

Here's the 2nd refining-pass:

Session 309

I went from blocking to refining this week. Except from some workflow problems in the beginning of the week, its been a pretty good week. Again I have to make a reference to Mentor Schleifers blog :). He has a very very good post about going past blocking, The fear of moving past blocking.

In the last couple of weeks, some awesome videos/documentarys about Richard Williams has popped up at YouTube. This is simply awesome inspirational stuff. Check out 'I drew Roger Rabbit' (4 parts) and 'The thief who never gave up' (6 parts). There's also lots of pencil test uploaded. Take a look at this Beaty and the Beast test. More pencil tests from this user. Great stuff.

Here's my refining pass of the "Zeus's"-shot:

Session 308

It's been a really good week. I'm back working with my old workflow on this assignment (blocking in linear - playblast in stepped) and I feel a lot more comfortable and in more control by doing that instead of the copied pairs method. I get a sense of the timing right away and I can keep the shot fairly open to changes pretty far along. I'm sure the Copied Pairs method have its pros, but I tried it on my previous assignment and it didn't quite worked out that well for me.

What else....the lecture this week was about eyes/lids and blinks and it was hosted by Disney's Jason Ryan. Eyes truly are the window to the soul :) Great lecture. I also read a post over at Jason Schleifers blog about receiving critique. Check it out. Very interesting thoughts and I totally agree.

Here's my 2nd pass of blocking of "Zeus":


And another revision-pass on the Letter-shot:

Session 307

First week of blocking with Bishop, our new character. I got a go from Michelle on the "Zeus's" clip, so everything is set for this one to be a really fun shot to do.

During the past months, Animation Mentor has collected students work and put together a showcase that first was presented at Comi-Con and later at Siggraph. That showcase is awesome! Take a look!

Here's my first pass of blocking of "Zeus's":

Session 306

Busy week. I did another revision-pass on the Letter-shot and for our next assignment we had to find three lines of dialogue, which basically means watching tons of movies and television shows in order to find interesting audio-clips. In addition to that, we had to shoot videoreference and thumbnail all three of them. Phew!

For this assignment we have a new skinned character, Bishop. We will work on this assignment for the rest of this quarter and for the first weeks of Class 4, by then, with a full facial rig. Things are getting tougher, thats for sure :)

I read a very interesting post over at Keith Lango's blog - his thoughts about why some movies succeed and others don't. Very interesting, worth a checkout!

Here's my audio-clips for this assignment:


And here's the thumbnails:




And here is my revision pass of the Letter-shot:

Session 305

It's been the final week with the Letter-shot and it's been tough and exhausting, but totally fun and I've learned a lot about acting (which I knew almost nothing about beforehand) doing this shot. Hopefully I will be able to take that further on the next assignment when we're animating with a completely new character to a dialogue piece. That's gonna be tons of fun :)

I bought an awesome book last week, "A Practical Handbook for the Actor", that teaches a great acting technique. Check it out! While you're at it, check out Ed Hooks' books too. Awesome stuff.

Another very cool thing I came over was a thread at CG Talk called "The Unoffical Truth about the Industry". It's a great post about everything from wages and how to best put together a demoreel.

Here's my final of the Letter-shot:

Session 304

Yooohoooo! Things has been a lot better this week. Michelle liked my blocking and i've taken it into refining/blocking plus. It's awesome how great the good days feels after a couple of really bad weeks. In fact, I think that having a bad day or two actually is very useful and maybe also necessary to be able to appreciate when the real fun kicks in :)

Fantastic lecture this week about Secondary Action by Jason Schleifer. Stuff that helps enhancing who the character is and what emotional state he is in. Great stuff. Jason also has a great blog. Check it out!

Here's my assignment this week, the blocking plus of the letter-shot:

Session 303

Week of despair. Nothing has worked out for me this week. Three re-blocks and none of them is as solid as I would like it to be. Feels like I hit a brick wall or something...ahhh well, that happens once in a while. Just has to get over it and move on :)

Anyway, the assignment has to be turned in, no excuses, so I kept going and tried to find some inspiration. It's been a while since I read the transcript of the Stanford 2005 Commencment Speech by Steve Jobs, but this week, while I was searching for something to keep me going, I stumbled over the video of the speech at YouTube. I also went back to the Animation Podcast, awesome stuff. Especially the Glen Keane casts.

Sooooo...bottom line, my week of despair is over!! Lots of stuff out there to pull me back up and continue towards becoming a character animator. Still happy, still looove animation :)

Here's my new blocking of the Letter-shot. Back to my old workflow this time, copied pairs didn't seem to work that well. At least not for now:

Session 302

Alright...off to a tough start this term. The thief-idea I submitted last week went out the window in exchange for another idea with better potential for showing emotional change. So I came up with an idea of a guy opening a letter, read it and then reacts to it. Basically I started over with new videoreference and new thumbnails.

I'm testing out a new workflow this time - blocking in copied pairs. I was pretty happy with my current workflow, but it's a good habit to stay open to new and better ways of working...and no regrets so far. In an acting shot with few key poses, I think copied pairs is a great way to block out the shot, 'cause you can get a better sense of the timing a lot sooner and it's easier for the director/mentor to get a feeling of the shot at an earlier stage. So that's cool :)

Here's my new idea thumbnailed and the first pass of blocking in copied pairs with only the key poses and one breakdown inbetween each pose.