rolling stones music breakdown

This is pretty fascinating

we've talked a lot about interlocking, overlapping rhythms and how it pertains to pacing. All this and more...

(link from Steve McManus)

The Proposal: the final assignment

I made a blocking of the final assignment. This is that the guy proposes to his girl friend, and she jumps in joy, runs and falls down. I'm wondering how to make the camera angle good poses. I appreciate if you'd give me any comments. :)

Jazz Piece Final

I've made a few more changes to kind of loosen him up a bit and fix the problem areas. Let me know what you think?

CTN Expo diaries

Hi Jeff! First I need to thank you for teaching us a lot of good stuff this semester - many animation demos at CTN told almost the same things we learned in class. Things beyond the survival kit, things that can only be understood through a demo and practice.

CTN was fun! I made the big transition from attendee to exhibitor this year, and it was very encouraging to see people buy the artwork/toys at our desk. Jerry Beck (Cartoon Brew) offered to publish an exclusive review of my short film after I finish it.


At the same time it was a big reality check from some studios when they'd look at my portfolio and say "This is great but it's not what we're looking for" or "Well, try more" or sometimes straight away "We are sorry". I got to know what exactly each studio was looking for (stuff beyond the things they mention on their website) - so hopefully I'll be able to tailor my reel/portfolio by next year.

I got to meet the amazing 'Moebius' (Jean Henri Gaston Giraud) and talked about his method of posing the characters in his art.

Dean DeBlois (Director of How to Train your Dragon) gave a few tips on 'How to be a good director' when I told him I was passionate about direction.


Sergio Pablos shared his contribution to 'Despicable me'
Del Carmen talked about storyboarding on 'Up'.

Andreas Deja gave some really helpful Animation tips like using the eyeblinks and darts to anticipate other body action and the huge importance of hand gestures. A lot of the things we're learning in this class were also mentioned - like when you said toes pointing straight forward and hands like pancakes make the characters look robotic..

The thing Andreas pointed out very well is that when we're drawing, the flow of lines force us to automatically pose the whole body different each time and maintain the flow and rhythm of animation. Even before getting to the point of thumbnailing/blocking the shot - he would just draw the character in different poses and study the anatomy and construction in and out. This way when he's animating he knows exactly how the character would move/behave.

He said that in CG animation, we assume there is no model sheet or no need to practice the character before we get to animation. But in fact, CG characters also need to stay 'on model' not in terms of the consistency of drawing (because 3d is already defined shape-wise) - but in terms of the character and personality. Which is why it helps to just pose the character (still frame) a few times and try to define the attitudes. Though thumbnails could be very rough too, I couldn't stop noticing the beauty of Andreas' thumbnail drawings. It's practice!

Tony DeRosa gave a small animation demo, and he was so fluent I want to steal his hand! Looking at his demo it seemed very easy, but his 30 years of practice and experience made it look so flawless! For some reason, watching someone like him makes me want to quit CG and go back to pencil and paper!

There was more stuff that I couldn't see because of managing the exhibition desk. It was all together very inspiring to see so many talented artists under one roof.

The competition is very tough, every other person had an amazing portfolio/reel to show. But I guess finally who we are matters more than what we do. Staying humble helps!

ctn

hey..how was it?

Something interesting I found on deviant art

Zombie Robot by ~JonathanEdward on deviantART

Which one is better?

I like these two references and I am trying to decide between the two.  One has a bit more acting and the other shows more weight.

Jazz Music piece

I missed last class. Please give me some feedback .
Thanks for watching this.

Feed back plz

I fixed the issues addressed in class and i still think there is room for improvement
so i would like to get feedback from you guys ..
Thank you.

Musical work

I missed last class so I didn't have a chance to get critiques.

Any words please...

Jerry Lewis

This may be a little late, but this is a cool example of action to music.

Musical animation

How does this look?



I have a feeling the left hand in between 480 t0 500 looks slightly heavy.

final touches music exercise

the changes from what I brought last week might be subtle, i tried to make the motions unfold more, trying to pay close attention to overlapping action. i appreciate any last minute suggestions. thanks for watching.

prop rigs - Final Assignment

2 rigs with prop controls

norman
hogan


Here are 2 rigs for the prop assignment. Just reference them in. I'll try to work up a generic background soon, but for the first week, just get your concept (post for critique), ideally some video reference, pose sketches and whatever you can to get a clear idea across.

Then, basic blocking of your scene with a camera.

To recap the final assignment

• first pass blocking with reference material is due on Friday for the Friday class, and a week from Tuesday on Tuesday's class
• Use reference and present that as part of your blocking. this includes - sketches rough thumbnails, video reference, reference of live action or cartoon animation that provides inspiration or style reference
• I'm opening it up to new characters WITH APPROVAL. Don't just show up with a high res or unfinished rig. The point of this class is to focus on animation - NOT texturing, lighting and rendering. I've let some of it slide in the past but in general, it's not productive to be a generalist in an animation class. Save that energy for polish.
• Fixed camera. No camera cuts - just a static camera. 
• Simple set. Use your judgement....cubes, cylinders, spheres are fine. It's good to ground your character and provide context, bad to blow your time budget on modelling an architectural masterpiece.
• between 5 and 10 seconds.
• topic. somewhere in this animation, hand a box from one character to another. 

Also, 3rd quarter grades are due. bring in for next class your music pieces named the following

shot#_studentName_weekX.mov

playblast with nothing but polygons and nurbs surfaces visible at 800x450, quicktime h.264 compressed

friday class, week 3 rough cut

I was missing a fair number of  files from this class, but here's a rough cut, for your viewing pleasure. Some of the sound was way off from the assignment so I did a lot of cheating to make it work

Proposed Rig

Like so?

I got video to work for a split second.

The blog isn't letting my post any videos right now. YOUTUBE

tuesday class...rough cut

here it is! the rough cut.
For next week I need to look at some of the frame ranges on these..i may have inadvertantly overlapped some of these shots by a few frames and/or some of you may have got the frame count wrong

In any case, pretty cool to see it in sequence.

double bounce walk

http://johnkstuff.blogspot.com/2007/10/10-x-beats-flip-frog-double-bounce-walk.html

Rig problems

Hey Jeff,
So, I got back yesterday from being gone all last week as I mentioned to you and I was able to get the assignment pretty much done but I have one small problem with the rig.
The left shoulder will not key frame for me no matter what I try. The rest of the rig works great but there is some kind of error when I try and Key frame the left shoulder.

The error reads: Warning: Current manipulator and active objects have no keyable attributes, , or animation layers are present and the BaseAnimation bar is not selected or locked.

Ive checked the attributes and nothing looks out of the ordinary and I also checked to make sure there were no animation layers which there aren't so I must be missing something but will bring it to class unless I hear back from you sooner. Thanks

Kung Fu Panda moving hold

I think "the kung fu staring contest" in the new Kung Fu Panda 2 teaser is an awesome example for a moving hold. What do people think?

final assignment

A couple of things in this post...

1. The final assignment.

• 2 Characters.
• Fixed Camera.
• 10 seconds max
• topic: pass a box from one character to another in the scene.

My instinct is to give you a set, 2 characters and a box, but please comment if you feel strongly about using a custom rig. One thing I don't want is a week to go by, and you've modded out your character at the expense of animation. Oh, and no wrap deformers. I'll let you know tomorrow the exact parameters.

2. Playblast your music pieces for tomorrow and friday's class with the following parameters.

• 800x450, quicktime h.264, maximum quality
• show polygons only in the playblast window
• name your shot "Shot#_name" so we can put them together and see how they look.

3. Tips from you guys

I took a look at the teacher reviews, which had some pretty low scores in both sections. As we're in the home stretch, I'm putting it back to you guys as to what you feel would help you get what you feel you need out of this class. The ones that concerned me were

Does the instructor teach the skills and content listed on the syllabus?

Does the instructor clearly explain the main points of each demonstration?

Does the instructor create a class environment that makes you feel he or she is actively engaged in the class?

These were areas that had ratings of 1/5. It is a challenge to teach this many students in a 3hr session, and it seems many of you feel you aren't getting what you need. I actually structured this syllabus so that each exercise fed into the next. cycles to get character movement. the turnaround, to get weight. moving hold to get a sense of characters being alive in space, then onto a music piece to use what we've learned to explore hitting the important beats of a scene, then wrapping up with a pantomime acting piece, using what we've learning about emphasizing key moments, combined with good weight to make for an entertaining final piece.

So, I'm kicking it back to you guys...how can I make the remains of the semester more effective? Which areas of the syllabus do you feel I haven't taught, or could be more effective with. What would make you feel more engaged in the class? Any help you can provide me to be a more effective teacher would be really welcome.

relink from Sonia

great timing/beat ref

JGallant_11secondclub_Feb.2010 from Jamie Gallant on Vimeo.

inspiration for the home stretch

things to come

A couple of quick things.

Friday class...next week you will be moved to Thursday the 11th. If you can't make it, you can come the following tuesday, but let me know. For those of you that missed the class due to lack of info, don't worry about it.

Assignment.
Our final assignment will be a pantomime exercise. Get excited, because this is going to roll all our knowledge gained so far into a bit of acting.

I'll roll it off next week. It will be similar to the last 2 assignments in that I'll set up a set for you, but I'm going to keep some of the interpretation a lot looser. Stay tuned

How to feel miserable as an artist?

Thought of sharing this, thinking it would help us overcome our fears in animation :)

Keri Smith (author of several books on creativity) wrote this a few years ago - and it became a hit with many artists who go through the frustration of 'not getting it perfectly right' or 'good is not good enough'. I'm guilty of quite a few points!

As a closeup

Musical Week 02

notes on music from richard williams..

some great stuff in the williams book...some excerpts...


Ken Harris thought in feet, probably because he was so footage
conscious - having to produce thirty feet of animation a week. He'd
tap his upside-down pencil exactly every two thirds of a second as
we'd act things out.


Chuck Jones said the Roadrunner films had a musical tempo built into them. He'd time the
whole film out, hitting things on a set beat so they had a musical, rhythmic integrity already
built in . Then the musician could hit the beat, ignore it or run the music against it.
Chuck told me that they used to have exposure sheets with a coloured line printed right across
the page for every sixteen frames and another one marking every twelve frames . He called them
'16 sheets' or '12 sheets' I guess '8 sheets' would be the normal sheets .

That kind of tightly synchronized musical timing is rare today. They call it 'Mickey Mousing'
where you accent everything- it's a derogatory term nowadays and considered corny. But it can
be extremely effective.

First Pass Music Excercise

This is where I'm at right now, still have a lot of breakdowns that need to happen in the beginning and I have not animated the face at all yet. I appreciate any feedback, thanks for watching.

link: http://noonecaresaboutwhatyoudo.com/wp-content/uploads/2010/11/w9_sourcefile.qt

what?

amazing facial reference

homework clarification

This assignment will go for
2 more weeks!

Next week I'll announce the final assignment for the term, which will be either 3 or 4 weeks in duration.

Reminder: if you let me know in advance of missing class, I won't penalize your grade provided you hand your assignment in the following day. If you just blow it off and don't hand it in until the following week, that counts as an F for that week.

Pitfalls of the Student Animator (Part 1)

I’ve been thinking a lot lately about the process of learning animation. I know from being a self-taught animator some of the things that both helped and hindered my learning path over the years. Watching some students really flourish has been inspiring to me and made me realize the importance of critical thinking as it applies to learning.

 

Plan.

Every semester, I get several students who hand in really jittery sloppy work. When I ask where their reference material is, either video, sketching or even verbal description. The answer is always, ‘well, my working method is straight ahead’

Let’s look at this for a moment

Straight Ahead Action
Straight ahead action is so called because an animator literally works straight ahead from the first drawing in the scene. This process usually produces drawings and action that have a fresh and slightly zany look, because the whole process is kept very creative.

I firmly believe that good animation, especially at a student level, comes from planning. Even if you plan your shot in detail and execute it straight ahead, you have clear idea for your goals. Ultimately, I don’t believe in straight ahead for CG unless you’re working on a section or are prepared to keep wiping out what you’ve done and keep at it until it works. CG animation lends itself to planting down poses and working the middle and unless you’re a genius and can see 10 steps ahead (like the stop motion animators I admire), it’s hard to get it right. Part of knowing whether your planning is working depends on….

 

Feedback.

There is an art to both giving and receiving feedback. Interestingly, in my classes, the loudmouths seem to improve the most.  One of the secrets of teaching is that by getting up in front of a group of people and being forced to critique their work, is that it forces the teacher to have to clearly articulate both WHAT WORKS, WHAT DOESN’T WORK and WHY. If you let yourself be open to feedback in the planning stages, you’re letting yourself be open to fixing the concept of your animation early on. Whether it’s how your feet plant in a weight shift, the initial key poses, or whether the gag is even funny. Early is better than later, before you commit to your decisions. At the Academy, I’ve heard students say that they don’t feel comfortable critiquing students because the people they help will get amazing reels and land that last remaining spot at Pixar. It really doesn’t work that way. In fact, the opposite is true. If you develop good relationships with your peers and help level each other up, you’ll learn how to collaborate as a team (yes, animation is a team sport) and will help each other out once you’re at a professional level. Having a generous attitude towards critiquing not only makes things more pleasant during late nights at the lab, but it also helps develop your skill in articulating and describing animation. Believe me, trying to explain animation principles to game designers and producers is a skill in itself, let alone talking to other animators.

The dark side to feedback is to learn how to filter it. If you ask 10 animators about your animation and get 10 different answers, the feedback isn’t useful. Maybe your blocking isn’t clear and you need to refine it to even get to that stage. Maybe just show poses and concept. Asking for specific critique is useful, especially as everyone has different working methods. Also, there’s a subjective side to it, so sometimes taste is a factor. If you ask 10 people about your animation and 5 say there’s a weight problem and give you 5 solutions, acknowledge that’s the element that doesn’t work and figure out the best plan of attack for resolving it.

If feedback hurts your feelings, be gracious about it, step back, then process it. A good lesson was a friend of mine who started at Blue Sky. I asked him how it was receiving feedback from guys like Mike Thurmier. The answer was, “..well, brutal, but I look at it this way. These amazing animators are taking the time to tell you how to make your work look great. I just write down everything they say, figure out how to do it, and it’s like a recipe for great animation”

How smart is that? It’s easy to respond to feedback with ‘but…’ – We all tend to do it. Of course we had valid reasons for our decisions, but if those decisions don’t work, it’s time to rethink them and come up with better ones. Or find a way to clarify those decisions so they’re readable.

 

Partial Posing.

This drives me a bit mad. When you look at classic animation, it’s all about these elegant and clear key poses, and then the uber-pose, the Golden Pose that can sum up the entire scene in a single pose.  At a glance, I can look at a Norman animation, with unposed hands (I was going to do those later) and unposed shoulders, neck at default, and it always reads to me as a missed opportunity.  Often, the whole character isn’t posed. This works in animations that are more procedural, like a quadraped walk cycle. The reason it bugs me is because in keying part of the spine here, the fingers here, the bicep here and so on, is that when you change your timing, you break ALL THE SUBSEQUENT POSES IN YOUR SCENE.  I’m not a fan of partial posing, but if you’re going to do it, plant down your important, immutable key poses, otherwise you’re at a severe disadvantage in retiming your scene.

Musical Blocking :)

How does this look? I still have to do some more offsetting. This is the first time I tried to block out in stepped and I really don't know if I did it right or whether I should have decided to animate in stepped for this particular assignment! It is not in stepped in this playblast though.

I wanted to do a Broadway style dance. So I took a reference from the following:




Oh! And the dropbox link, just in case... :)