A big massive update

Hello again.

I've been so busy, I've neglected my blog a bit. But at least there's plenty to post! I've been animating, for both Estelle's film and my own film, supervised the slow but accelerating progress of my film's 3D elements, worked on my dissertation and did some paid animation work to keep me stocked up with coffee and biscuits (vital animator fuel).

A shot for Pups. I animated Jenny, and keyed out Pup to make it easier for Patrycja to animate. I'm particularly proud of my mastery of coat toggle physics - it gives so much life to the performance but requires the least concentration to animate.

More Jenny animation. Estelle's set her film tighter deadlines than I set myself, so against my better judgement I've found myself animating substantially more Pups stuff than Magpie stuff. I've been striving to change this though, by adopting the economic methods I've had to develop for Pups and applying them to The Magpie. Work speed has improved as a result.

Magpie stuff! This is one of my favourite shots; I enjoyed animating the subtle transition from the rediscovered child in the man back to the self-centred drone he was at the beginning. The bird poo on his shoulder, the final punchline, is kind of his ultimate punishment for shrugging off his whimsical side so quickly.

After a period of exhaustion, I returned to form and animated this weirdly appropriate shot for Estelle. Working on Pups has really helped me develop a flowing style to my animation; Jenny's hair and her coat toggles are veritable playgrounds for a perfectionist animator with a penchant for physics.

A shot I started recently. I could feel myself channeling earlier work, namely animating Cave Johnson and Basil Fawlty, when I started depicting this simmering fury. I really, really like animating people on the verge of mental breakdowns. Funny that!

Pups: Shot 2

Here's the latest shot I animated for Pups.

Animation for Pups

For Pups, I've mostly been rotoscoping Jake's 3D model of 'ball Pup', animating Pup and Jenny over the top as required. Here are some examples in animated gif form.

After Effects test for Pups

This is a little test I cobbled together in After Effects to see how easy it would be to have a tracking shot that utilised perspective and 3D, both important elements of Estelle's opening shot of Pups. It was remarkably quick and effective - the final version will have animated elements made by us instead of googled photos, of course, but it shows how much of an impact After Effects can make towards creating a real feeling of atmosphere.

Finalised Walk Cycle for Pups

A few animation tests for Pups

This is an experiment with rotoscoping CGI,
to make the volumes of the ball consistent as it rolls.

Here, Estelle provided the keyframes,
and it was my job to make them animate smoothly.

This is more of a personal test, experimenting with extreme movements
so that animating the character of Jenny became more innate and natural to do

'Ball Pup' turnaround

My most recent achievement is successfully imagining the texture of a 3D sphere from all angles. After quite a bit of trial and error, I managed to create a turnaround of 'Ball Pup'.

Pup, whilst in a big ball of clothes, will be animated in Maya as a very basic geometry in order to maintain a visual consistency as he rolls. When creating a texture to place on the geometry, however, we need to have some sort of idea as to what it will look like from all angles.

Pups: Early background concept art, designs for Pup and a walk cycle

As well as Tall Tale (the title of which, due to story alterations, may change sometime in the near future), I'm assisting Estelle Sharpe with her film, Pups. I'm assisting with the animation, and a little artwork and concept designs here and there.

To help pin down the colour scheme and overall layout of a specific shot, I tried to visualise it in Photoshop (left). It's not one hundred percent in-keeping with the look Estelle was looking for, but it served to help imagine more clearly the world in which her characters inhabit.

In addition to that, I've been working on the character of Pup. There is a scene where he becomes wrapped up in a gigantic ball of clothes and blankets, and as it will be my job to animate the ball (with 3D assistance from Jake Longworth), I had to get to grips with the details of the character in this state of multi-layered over-insulation.

An early attempt to visualise 'Ball Pup'.
The number of segments has since been reduced,
and a rope made of knotted blankets was added to look like
the cloth is somehow bound together.

Developed visualisations. The small drawings at the top are by Estelle -
I used them as direct reference to maintain a very close similarity to her style.

When it comes to animation, I'll also be working on the other character, Jenny - whereas the role of Pup animator only falls to me while he's a big ball of clothes, I'm to be much more involved with animating Jenny. The first hurdle is her walk cycle. Jenny is a young girl and has massive boots, so it's a challenge to make her walk in a way that represents both these characteristics. The wobbly, swingy march I've developed (below) is a step in the right direction, but I think I need to tone it down a little to stop Jenny from looking like she has genuine difficulty walking. Also, her arm movements look like she's constantly shooing some small creature from obstructing her path.

Shoo, tiny elephant! Can't you see I'm wading through treacle?