Pups: Shot 2

Here's the latest shot I animated for Pups.

The Magpie: images so far

Here's a compilation of all the visual material from this blog, from the very beginning. I figure that a definitive visual summary of all that has been posted would come in handy.

Composition Concepts

In between animating for The Magpie, I've been trying to see how the film will look once everything's been composited together. Once I've figured stuff out in this way, it'll provide a more concrete goal for us when everything's animated and it turns to post-production.

Here are the first designs.

Compositing test

For The Magpie, post-production will play an important role in making sure the animation blends believably with the background. For example, shots with a background involving a strong light source will be complimented with effects, applied to the overlaid animation in After Effects, to simulate the same light hitting the subject.

Here is a little compositing experiment using a generic park image from Google as a makeshift background.
I noted the general direction, and colour, of the light and shade, and tried to replicate it over the man. Largely, I would say this has been successful, but the tweaking will continue.

Magpie Development

A slightly overlooked character in terms of design is that of the magpie itself, which is stupid because he's the eponymous main character, linking the other characters together.
Fortunately, with the help of Estelle Sharpe and Gary Davies, a satisfactory design has been finalised.

The picture at the very bottom is the final visualisation, a design that I'd be happy to take straight into the animation process. Special credit must go to Estelle for coming up with the simplified design of the wing tips and the oval eyeballs.

Animation for The Magpie

Here are some early drafts of animation for my short film The Magpie. Extra attention is being paid to the man's walk cycle, as much of his personality is to be established in his walk-in entrance before he performs a little routine with the bird.

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.