Second year - New term, new project

2013 has begin, and new term has started. I'm actually surprised how times goes pass so quick.

This term we are looking into 'our future', as in what kind of job would we want to get in future.
I will start off by researching 2D pre-production pipeline and both UK and Japanese companies.

Although I am still confused with what kind of job I would like to get, so I think this project will be a good opportunity to clear my mind and hopefully find out what exactly I want to be.

So far, I know that I am into 2D more than 3D. I like story boarding, character design and making animatics. I especially enjoy story boarding every time we make animations, so I will be looking into that in depth.

As for the company I have always been interested in Studio Ghibli, the great director Hayao Miyazaki makes amazing 2D based work. I will be looking into his performance, branding and the skills that Studip Ghibli would require to the new worker.

So... I hope I can achieve these tasks this week.

Second year - Finished

I have finished this project - Norman animation.

Music - From Hell Sound track - Whitechapel Murders
Sound effect - soundbible.com

This project was very challenging since I always find Maya difficult (last year I struggled A LOT) and also it was very first time to animate rigged character Norman and it took me a while to get used to with using controls WITH re-capping all the Maya tutorials I had last year. There were a lot of new things to try this term and I can definitely tell second year is much harder than first year.
But on the positive side I did enjoy animating Norman and working on Maya which helped me to improve my skills, finding out my own ways to model an object and making layout with using polygon etc. The best part of this project was that I actually started to enjoy working with Maya, also learning new skills was fun every time. Animating Norman was definitely a fun task to do, it was funny how we could do pretty much anything on Norman, moving arms, Legs, face... there were so many controls on Norman and I was amazed how much you can do to him. His face control was amusing because moving his eye browse changes his expression instantly, but it was hard to get the right expression since there were so many controls.
Hardest part of this project was definitely the Norman's joints, joints as in Knee, Elbow etc... they tends to bend in the wrong way and sometimes it ruined the entire animation because of it.
Another hard moment was actually not from the project, my health issues did interrupt so many times and I often had to miss the lecture because of it. So I've decided to organise the working time so that I can rest fully while I am sick. Since my health issues kicks in a pattern I have decided to work as much as I could on the sick-free week. Also since I have busy plans during Christmas I have decided to finish all my work before Christmas so that I won't need to worry about working over Christmas. I think I have managed to successfully organise the working time since I have managed to finish my work before the original deadline.
Lastly I have enjoyed this project and I feel that I have actually 'worked' reasonably hard. In future I will probably play around on Maya and use Norman to mess around...just for fun :)

Second year - Music

For the background music I was thinking about using dark, but not too loud music such as Orchestra music.

Some Ideas I have is :

• Saint-Saens - Requiem : Agnus

• Saint-Saens - Samson et Dalila : Introduction

• Grieg - Peer Gynt suite : Abduction & Ingrid's Lament - Aase's Death

• From Hell - Compass and the Ruler 

I will need to do more research this week.

Second year - FINISHED RENDERING

I have managed to finish animating last weekend, and I have also finished rendering and ALSO putting everything into After Effects. I am really happy how I have actually managed to follow the schedule of "finishing before Christmas" since I am off to Japan this Christmas.

All I need to do is to find a good music for the background and also some sound effects, I will be concentrating on that for the rest of this week.

Second year - Sound project (take 2)

Sound project take 2. I didn't like the first one so I've edit some of the sounds and volume.

Second year - Sound project

My new sound project.

Second year - FINISHED ANIMATING

I have managed to achieve my target of 'finish animating this weekend'!!
All of the big animation is done (out of my way!) so I am going to spend the next 2 weeks editing, improving and rendering.

Also I need to work out which sounds I will be using. I will start looking into that from tomorrow.

At least the main big part is done... phew.




I am actually happy with my achievement despite the fact I was having a lot of health issues, there was a time where I thought "... no, I don't think I can finish it" I was actually really worried that I may not be able to finish it on time because of the illness, but I did forced myself to work a lot when I was feeling fine. I am actually glad that I scheduled my work time.