It's over.... It's finally over!

Well. It's rendering at least!

After many moons, many struggles, many lessons and one mini heart attack. It is done.... And sweet sugar it feels good.

As I watch the render tick down.... I began to remember everything, And i think its fair to do a pretty big blog to recount it :P

Idea
A short animation where a character finds music and reacts to it emotionally.

Software
3Dsmax
Photoshop
Sony Vegas
Adobe Audition

Readings

• Gahan, Andrew. 3ds Max Modeling for Games: insider's Guide to Game Character, Vehicle, and Environment Modeling. Amsterdam: Focal/Elsevier, 2011. Print.
• Jackson, Chris. Flash Cinematic Techniques: Enhancing Animated Shorts and Interactive Storytelling. Oxford: Focal, 2010. Print.
• O'brien, Flora. Walt Disney's Donald Duck: 50 Years of Happy Frustration. Tucson, AZ: HP, 1984. Print.
• Wells, Paul. Understanding Animation. Abingdon: Routledge, 1998. Print.
• Marks, Aaron. The complete guide to Game Audio for composers, musicians, sound designers and game developers. Burlington, MA: Focal/Elsevier, 2009. Print.
• Thomas, Frank, Ollie Johnston and Frank Thomas. The Illusion of Life: Disney Animation. New York: Hyperion, 1995. Print.
• Wells, Paul. The Fundamentals of Animation. Lausanne: AVA, 2006. Print.
• Colborn, Gene L. and David B. Lause. Musculoskeletal Anatomy: A text and guide for Dissection: For students in the Allied Health Sciences. Pearl River, NY: Parthenon Pub. Group, 1993. Print.
• Collett, Peter. The Book of Tells: How to Read People's Minds from Their Actions.London: Bantam, 2004. Print.
• Whitaker, Harold. Timing for Animation. London: Focal, 2009. Print.

What I learned

• Rigging - I taught myself to rig efficiently and effectively.
• Animating by scenes - As I had only previously animated for games I enjoyed making animations to my storyboards designs and I am glad that I took that extra time in pre production to break the scenes up.
• Animating to music - To get the final effect I had to redo plenty of scenes to make sure they fit.
• Animating cameras - As i had never worked with cameras in 3Ds Max before it was a new experience and the overall effect has been carried into my other pieces of work.
• Using cameras to build a scene - Using the cameras to create speed and effects was also a new experience that I feel worked well and created a better final piece.
• Overall I also planned an entire project and set myself deadlines that I had to adhere to.

What went bad?

Although I am generally positive about how the project went down and was created I feel that there were a few small issues I should have looked into more to make the assignment more comfortable for me.

Although I loved this idea and was adamant to create it, Most of the time while working on it I felt disheartened by it and was constantly convincing myself that it was a bad idea to pick this to show animation skills and that I would be better off creating a complex model and doing some animations on it.

Though this was a comment from the start from a tutor I still say that I am glad that I took the plunge and stuck to my guns. Although this idea was a risky move and wasn't advised from day one the feeling of completion I got from it when it was all done was incredible and I am glad that I did decide to stick with it.

I do wish that I did take that extra bit longer looking into research and constantly stayed on top of work rather than the occasional build up (Not that I ever fell behind!)

The piece

EDIT - So it looks like someone doesn't want it to be embedded....

HERE is a link :)
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FydjlCk3kHQ

TA DA!

Enjoy it as much as I enjoyed making it. (No really!)

Hope you all enjoyed reading my blog and my pursuit into animation.

Jack Stalley

The final Post

For more fun follow me on twitter!

@Fuzz7e

Work Work, Dig Dig, Drink Drink.....

A month later the phoenix rises its ashes...... And begins to blog.

Well the time has come where I begin to compile it all together, Oh did i mention? Animation has all been done! I can go back to sleeping!!! Well sleeping more i guess.

The last steps had a small albeit adjustable issue. In the popular dance PSY crosses his arm and pretending to ride a horse by the reigns, This was a pain as the robots arms do not bend all the way in without serious distortion.

To combat this I chose to create a new dance for the robot to perform using a hybrid of the next stage where PSY imitates a rodeo and the original dance. I also chose to make the leg movements more static with this one to create a "Bunny Hop" styled movement.

To ensure that all the movements were equal I created a plane with 20 panels along so that movements could be tracked effortlessly.

The next step now that all of it is render is to edit and work on the sounds as well as add in the additional art assets.

So same time next week? Maybe a bit earlier this time who knows, I have a headache.

Mountains of chocolate.... Sorry. Uni work.

The projects going well, In the simplest of ways. After spending some more time working on him falling over I found some new methods of doing specific things with 3Ds Max.

I also spent some time looking into sound effects for the piece. I realized that this wasnt on my schedule so it was a good time to find it in hindsight.

As for editing I also had some practice with a side project, Alot of keybinds in vegas are the same as most other programs I am used to so it was a great find for me and it boosted my confidence in the project.

Im on track to finishing on time, The editing is being done as I render so it will speed things up for me. Once my portfolio site is up and running the video will take pride of place on it.

As for now, Well I have work to do!

Signing off!

A sad tale....

As I approached the deadline I looked at the way my little robot walked as Nickleback echoed through his mind. He looked sad, It wasn't nice and I realised  how much I enjoyed seeing his changes after being so nervous to start the project.

Now onto the new song, Gangnam style! Will be fun to see how that fares to the dance.

But till then I can't say more, till next time!

Seeing keyframes......

Hello again! Well its been a week or 2 since i updated and here is why. I recently contracted the Flu which lead to some shall we say technical difficulties.

Whilst I was determined to work I found that in my fevered state I would hallucinate anything that I was doing during the day, Key frames became to real and i would act out each scene I had to animate. The doctors explained to me that it was my brain trying to make up for the work I was meant to do when I was sleeping during the day.

So yeah that happened, It was interesting to say the least but i'm glad I didn't let the bug beat me. I managed to go into uni and get plenty done at the expense of my sleep.

So this week I learnt that the camera could be used as an animation tool. This allowed me to make the UI scenes more visually appealing as if the robot wasn't stood there aimlessly looking into space.

I also learnt a new way of animating the robots face and encountered a rather irritating issue. When the eyebrows are animated a few of the corners attach themselves to a random part of the robot. This had NO explanation but a simple solution was found by moving the vertices when the issue happened and progress wasn't held up by it.

Well time to get back to animating, Till next time!

Click, Move click. What is this an rpg?

As i mentioned in my previous blog its getting hard to describe whats happened in these without mentioning key elements that will ruin the finished piece.

However, This week as well as digitally animating I have also been working on some other stuff non digitally. For example I attended a life drawing lesson where I managed to scribble some weight notes down when the model moved or stood in a rest position which I have begun to look into with max. Also attending the lessons that Mike has been offering on Friday afternoons has helped incredibly with new techniques that I hope to incorporate into the final piece.

So all in all, progress has been good!

the main focus recently has been on group project as well as sorting out numerous issues with a off project. I've learnt so much already from experimenting with animation and 3D this module and its really helped me with the "Staying" power of work.

Until next time loyal subscribers, Tutors and Stalkers!

Progress!

Hit target quote for animation this week. *wipes sweat off brow* Feels good!

Work was hard with gamehack and other stuff taking over my personal life but it has helped me to move on and focus on my work.

This was a rather short blog as if i were to upload video's each time i do a piece of work i would ruin the project by the end of it. However, As requested by my specialist tutor.

Here is my model in full :)

It functions well enough for what i need it to display and in personal preference is fairly cute :D

Till then folks!

Presentation is everything.

Who said a suit isnt "Suitable" (see what i did there?) for uni?

Not me thats for sure, Welcome back to the progress of my progress.

So yesterday I had my progress presentation, For me it was a big deal as it let me show what I'd done in my absence and was a nice look at the evolution of the project.

It went great by the way, I've never been so confident in my life.

A point that got brought up was that I hadn't updated my progress tracker since Christmas so this is it!

01/02/2013

• Create presentation for check.
• Update blog with progress.
• Create new task list.

15/02/2013

• Animate scenes 1 - 9
• Render scenes 1 - 9

01/03/2013

• Animate scenes 10 - 25
• Render scenes 10 - 25

15/03/2013

• Animate scenes 25 - 35
• Render scenes 25 - 35

29/03/2013

• Animate scenes 36 - 45
• Render scenes 36 - 45

12/04/2013

• Animate scenes 45 - 64
• Render scenes 45 - 64

Remainder

• Compile the rendered footage into one piece.
• Edit the sound and music into the final piece.
• Polish the video and render it to high quality and a web safe version for presentation.

Hopefully it should be a bit clearer now and as always shall be blogging my progress at least weekly.

Till then folks, Have a good one and Happy Birthday to Brent Spiner!

(aka data from star trek)

*blows dust off blog*

Well I'm back :D

Had some major PC issues just before christmas and didnt get it fixed till the new year. Its all good now just been working on group project and getting some feedback from a company about my design masterclass project.

So what have I been doing? Well for one my Robots name is Billy now (Smallest sister requested it) and i've been working through my scene storyboards.

This was something that I underestimated until I started animating and I appreciate the amount of work that goes into any animated piece that I see now.

I have also spent some time learning to move cameras and set them on paths as well as arranging them to certain times.

So what progress have I made? Well that would be revealing wouldn't it! I hope you can make the most out of storyboards 1-6 as thats all thats been animated.

Its a big step for me animating facial movement with eyes etc. but its a strong one.

Whats that?