"Do what you Like."
I think he meants with projects anyway.
Thursday, 14 January 2010
End of semester 1
My last post on here was back in November, when I was still managing to hold things together. About a week/week-and-a-half later I kind of fell off the reservation for a while -it's been a difficult.. year actually. I wasn't expecting everything to dissolve so dramatically but it did and I suppose there's not much I can do about it now but I don't want to think about that any more.
So, before the marks come in I want think about what I've done this semester. I've managed 2 projects... and, honestly?
1) Scottish book trust sting (Book that changed my life): It's done 50-ish seconds long in total, using the song 'Fireflies' by Owl City (which I found before the single appeared on Radio 1, I'd like to point out). Quicktime STILL wont play it in it's proper proportions, and it's... It's okay. Good, not great, could have done better -well maybe couldn't have under the circumstances but still feel like I SHOULD have done better, somehow. I don't know, it's alright, I don't hate it but... meh. I don't think it's up to scratch.
I enjoyed editing the soundtrack. I'm good at that anyway.
2) LUSAD Christmas card competition: I like this one. It's not amazingly clever, and it's not going in a gallery anytime soon, but I still think it's a nice image. Could have put more snow on it though, doesn't look wintery enough after the weather we've been having -but then how much snow do we usually get anyway? This year was a bit of a fluke.
Next semester?: I don't know. I feel at the moment that I don't really like anything I draw 'properly', only my stupid little scribbles, and that I failed at animation and I don't know what I want. I don't know what I'm good at, I know I have to be good at something. You know what, that's enough of this. I'm not going to be self-pitying on a blog.
The end.
So, before the marks come in I want think about what I've done this semester. I've managed 2 projects... and, honestly?
1) Scottish book trust sting (Book that changed my life): It's done 50-ish seconds long in total, using the song 'Fireflies' by Owl City (which I found before the single appeared on Radio 1, I'd like to point out). Quicktime STILL wont play it in it's proper proportions, and it's... It's okay. Good, not great, could have done better -well maybe couldn't have under the circumstances but still feel like I SHOULD have done better, somehow. I don't know, it's alright, I don't hate it but... meh. I don't think it's up to scratch.
I enjoyed editing the soundtrack. I'm good at that anyway.
2) LUSAD Christmas card competition: I like this one. It's not amazingly clever, and it's not going in a gallery anytime soon, but I still think it's a nice image. Could have put more snow on it though, doesn't look wintery enough after the weather we've been having -but then how much snow do we usually get anyway? This year was a bit of a fluke.
Next semester?: I don't know. I feel at the moment that I don't really like anything I draw 'properly', only my stupid little scribbles, and that I failed at animation and I don't know what I want. I don't know what I'm good at, I know I have to be good at something. You know what, that's enough of this. I'm not going to be self-pitying on a blog.
The end.
Wednesday, 11 November 2009
By the way...
Still slogging away on the mind-numbing combination of dissertation + hand drawn animation. Not getting very far with it, kind of depressing. Need to find some more 1 or 2 day projects now that the B.T.C.M.L project has been extended.
In the meantime, have been watching lots of animations, for purely research purposes you understand, and came across this brilliant film:
It's called Tekkonkinkreet (which apparently is a wordplay if you can read Japanese), and is about two street children, violent and aggressive Black, and his ward White, a metally retarded/psychic eleven year old. Most of it is about the power stuggles in the city they live in between them and the mobsters and the other street gangs, but ends with a weird little exploration of Black's pshyche and how important it is for darkness to be counterbalanced with light (hence Black/White, geddit?) This was made by the same studio who did the Animatrix and, I think, Global Astroliner, and it's a great film. It... how can I put this. It doesn't intially look like our idea of anime, but it watches like anime. Something in the pacing, which is really refreshing to see; no magic sparkly people, no outrageous hair, no giant eyes. Just smart, sensible drawings and a great story.
In case you hadn't noticed, I'm plugging this now :)
In the meantime, have been watching lots of animations, for purely research purposes you understand, and came across this brilliant film:
It's called Tekkonkinkreet (which apparently is a wordplay if you can read Japanese), and is about two street children, violent and aggressive Black, and his ward White, a metally retarded/psychic eleven year old. Most of it is about the power stuggles in the city they live in between them and the mobsters and the other street gangs, but ends with a weird little exploration of Black's pshyche and how important it is for darkness to be counterbalanced with light (hence Black/White, geddit?) This was made by the same studio who did the Animatrix and, I think, Global Astroliner, and it's a great film. It... how can I put this. It doesn't intially look like our idea of anime, but it watches like anime. Something in the pacing, which is really refreshing to see; no magic sparkly people, no outrageous hair, no giant eyes. Just smart, sensible drawings and a great story.
In case you hadn't noticed, I'm plugging this now :)
Sunday, 1 November 2009
The Book that changed my life - animatic
After de-constructing and then reconstructing the storyboard I already had (basically cutting it in half, taking the first half and expanding on it. It just didn't flow before, it felt too cramped for its 45 seconds and very disjointed) I now finally have something to work with. So I dismantled it and re-did it in time for crit. It's just a shame it took so long for me to work out what was wrong with the first version; I feel like I've wasted a lot of time.
I ran it through Photoshop and turned the post-it storyboard into an animatic, with the kind of soundtrack I'd like it to have. I might even keep this one, it fits so well, although it might be a little slow.
I quite like it like this, the pacing seems a lot better. I booked a dictaphone from Fairburn to do the narration on but the person I was meant to get it from didnt bring it back. I'll try again tomorrow.
I ran it through Photoshop and turned the post-it storyboard into an animatic, with the kind of soundtrack I'd like it to have. I might even keep this one, it fits so well, although it might be a little slow.
I quite like it like this, the pacing seems a lot better. I booked a dictaphone from Fairburn to do the narration on but the person I was meant to get it from didnt bring it back. I'll try again tomorrow.
Friday, 30 October 2009
LUSAD Christmas card competition
I've been having storyboard trouble, so I took a day off from the evil EVIL storyboard and did this instead.
Didn't have to be anything complicated, but needed to say 'Loughborough' (since it's mainly sent out by the department and associates from the university) and 'Christmas' (but no religious imagery to represent this religious festival! How odd the world is). I was walking past Queens Park and saw the tower and it makes a much prettier Icon Of Lougborough and the uni than towers hall does :) Also,I seem to be on a bit of a fox kick at the moment, there are foxes EVERYWHERE!!! So I put one in the picture to add a bit of life to this otherwise frosty scene. I did try snow, but the only problem with snow is that it's a looooot of white. But I'm pretty happy with this for a 1 day image.
Didn't have to be anything complicated, but needed to say 'Loughborough' (since it's mainly sent out by the department and associates from the university) and 'Christmas' (but no religious imagery to represent this religious festival! How odd the world is). I was walking past Queens Park and saw the tower and it makes a much prettier Icon Of Lougborough and the uni than towers hall does :) Also,I seem to be on a bit of a fox kick at the moment, there are foxes EVERYWHERE!!! So I put one in the picture to add a bit of life to this otherwise frosty scene. I did try snow, but the only problem with snow is that it's a looooot of white. But I'm pretty happy with this for a 1 day image.
Wednesday, 21 October 2009
Book that changed my life
Trailer using detailed drawings but with only a few moving parts for each animated section. I think I could do something that moves like this and is still effective. Also
Again, really simple shapes, no complex movement. I LOVE this guy, he is my Illustrator Of The Week. He has such a great sense of economy, colour and drama, messes around loads with different picture planes and lengths of images, while still keeping it looking really clean and readable.
Monday, 12 October 2009
Book the changed my life
This is fast becoming a space-based video dump. But then, that was the idea, and I can't leave this little gem out.
Oh yes, it's the Clangers! I used to love this show so much when I was a kid, I went round the house whistling in Clanger-talk. Their idea of space is much more local than some of these big movies. There aren't too many nearby planets, but there's always a nearby SOMETHING. Stuff is always floating around, interesting shapes and objects, things land on the planet often, and they can make short day trips if they want to. This seems more like the environment the prince lives in, with objects and things passing him from time to time so he's not bored, but not many other people about unless you go looking for them
Again thinking about pacing, the intro shocked me when I timed it. The first shot lasts for 22 seconds, that's half of what my outcome has to be!! And he just talks! The camera pans left to right, and the narrator just narrates, and nothing else happens. And then the second shot is just the planet itself, nothing else happens, and that lasts a further 18 seconds! I guess it just shows what you can do with a few simple camera motions, and a minimal amount of movement. In that respect it reminds me of a lot of opening and end credits for anime (non-sci fi/fantasy). The newer ones (last 5 years) are pretty fast-paced too, but ny older than that tend to put the credits at the beginning, and will fill the time up with a few shots of the different characters, often not moving too much. The camera may pan so that the character moves in relation to the background, and maybe their hair will blow, or they will change facial expression, but that's it. Yet this is still effective at holding attention.
Oh yes, it's the Clangers! I used to love this show so much when I was a kid, I went round the house whistling in Clanger-talk. Their idea of space is much more local than some of these big movies. There aren't too many nearby planets, but there's always a nearby SOMETHING. Stuff is always floating around, interesting shapes and objects, things land on the planet often, and they can make short day trips if they want to. This seems more like the environment the prince lives in, with objects and things passing him from time to time so he's not bored, but not many other people about unless you go looking for them
Again thinking about pacing, the intro shocked me when I timed it. The first shot lasts for 22 seconds, that's half of what my outcome has to be!! And he just talks! The camera pans left to right, and the narrator just narrates, and nothing else happens. And then the second shot is just the planet itself, nothing else happens, and that lasts a further 18 seconds! I guess it just shows what you can do with a few simple camera motions, and a minimal amount of movement. In that respect it reminds me of a lot of opening and end credits for anime (non-sci fi/fantasy). The newer ones (last 5 years) are pretty fast-paced too, but ny older than that tend to put the credits at the beginning, and will fill the time up with a few shots of the different characters, often not moving too much. The camera may pan so that the character moves in relation to the background, and maybe their hair will blow, or they will change facial expression, but that's it. Yet this is still effective at holding attention.
Book that changed my life
I look at all the foxes I keep drawing (the fox is one of my favourite parts of the book) and I realised they all look very similar... and then I realised why.
I used to watch this show when my younger brothers and sisters came home from school Pablo the little red fox
I actually saw a fox last night, crossing the RNIB car park when I walked home from Flix, the student cinema, so I'm now trying to think about that instead.
I used to watch this show when my younger brothers and sisters came home from school Pablo the little red fox
I actually saw a fox last night, crossing the RNIB car park when I walked home from Flix, the student cinema, so I'm now trying to think about that instead.
Book that changed my life
Haha! I found it! God bless people stealing things and putting them on Youtube
I saw this a while back on C4's 'Animate TV' and dug out the notes I made at the time. This fits with what I'm looking at now in terms of pacing. Most of the slower paced British or American short films I'm coming across tend to have shots of about 4 secs when something's happening, setting a mood etc, with the odd shot being made even longer, usually to match a narrative.
This animation, however, doesn't actually have any shot changes at all. It was done in one long shot, taking out any changes of viewpoint, angle etc. It was made by Mr Aubtin making all the elements out of paper and sticking them to a wall - the flower field, the mountain, everything- so for every 'frame' of the animation he would cut out a new figure from paper, or move a previous cutout, and photographed it. By moving the camera up and down a little on each shot he could give the illusion of panning up and down, and also having the female character climb 'on the spot' and having rhe clouds move down faster.
Because this is all cutouts, and taken at at least 12/fps, if not more, it would be impossible for me to do within the time limit, and so also to achieve that single shot effect (at least the way he has) which is fine, I think in 30 secs I want to communicate more about the book than you could in one shot anyway. But it's a great effect, very sombre and slow to watch, and creates the illusion of more time than there actually is because the camera isnt shooting around angles every two seconds. When I'm storyboarding my animation I would love to try a pan shot in some form, maybe showing the prince travelling through space, past all the other planets.
Oh dear, that's probably going to mean using motion again. I could do with going to a tutorial on that. I last used it properly for the Part B big animation project, and I didn't really like it very much then either. Or alternatively, it might work just as well with Flash. I'm a lot more familiar with Flash now anyway, although it doesn't have the same range of filters and effects (which I probably wont need) or so useful a timeline for clips (which would be handy, since Flash works on a frame-by-frame basis. You can't just drag and drop sequences like you can in Motion.
I saw this a while back on C4's 'Animate TV' and dug out the notes I made at the time. This fits with what I'm looking at now in terms of pacing. Most of the slower paced British or American short films I'm coming across tend to have shots of about 4 secs when something's happening, setting a mood etc, with the odd shot being made even longer, usually to match a narrative.
This animation, however, doesn't actually have any shot changes at all. It was done in one long shot, taking out any changes of viewpoint, angle etc. It was made by Mr Aubtin making all the elements out of paper and sticking them to a wall - the flower field, the mountain, everything- so for every 'frame' of the animation he would cut out a new figure from paper, or move a previous cutout, and photographed it. By moving the camera up and down a little on each shot he could give the illusion of panning up and down, and also having the female character climb 'on the spot' and having rhe clouds move down faster.
Because this is all cutouts, and taken at at least 12/fps, if not more, it would be impossible for me to do within the time limit, and so also to achieve that single shot effect (at least the way he has) which is fine, I think in 30 secs I want to communicate more about the book than you could in one shot anyway. But it's a great effect, very sombre and slow to watch, and creates the illusion of more time than there actually is because the camera isnt shooting around angles every two seconds. When I'm storyboarding my animation I would love to try a pan shot in some form, maybe showing the prince travelling through space, past all the other planets.
Oh dear, that's probably going to mean using motion again. I could do with going to a tutorial on that. I last used it properly for the Part B big animation project, and I didn't really like it very much then either. Or alternatively, it might work just as well with Flash. I'm a lot more familiar with Flash now anyway, although it doesn't have the same range of filters and effects (which I probably wont need) or so useful a timeline for clips (which would be handy, since Flash works on a frame-by-frame basis. You can't just drag and drop sequences like you can in Motion.
Book that changed my life
Eagle Nebula
Currently researching the little prince's journey through space and what that might look like for him. What is that really like to travel through space? So I'm having my mind blown over and over every ten minutes with photos of nebulae and weird diagrams of the solar system. I was reading something about a series called 'Cosmos', with Carl Sagan, and somehow ended up seeing this.
Just the ideas he's talking about amaze me.
I also thought of some Disney (rather inevitably *rolls eyes*)
My favourite scene in the whole film, because of the way the images and music combine. They depict this vast emptiness of space but at the same time it's really beautiful, and also very playful (the solar-charging panels!) Same musical pattern, basic underscoring chords and a 'tinkly' bit when he enters space, nice and simple. I love Thomas Newman's music, he does manages to put this amazing bitter-sweet edge onto things. Like 'It's a shame this can't last, but in the meantime, isn't it lovely?"
Also, Disney's 'Treasure Planet', but I don't think you need to see that one too :) I liked the idea of combining space travel with nautical navigation, and everything becoming a little bit JulesVerne-esque, with charts and sextants and things but that's not quite right for the Little Prince either. Nice imagery though. (Great film though, more what they should be making, rather than crummy sequals for flippin' 'Brother Bear'. Was NOT impressed when I heard about that)
I was actually thinking when I was watching all this, and what I was thinking was that I don't think this is space as it is for the little prince. I think his version of outer space is a lot more local, no more than a day's travel between planets. Because he talks about listening to stars laughing and being good friends with the sun on his planet, which gives the impressions that things are more like they are in the kids show Tiny Planets- if you have a mind to travel (and a large trebuchet) you can.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)