Animation Direction AM50309 - 6: Week 12

This week I plan to make a start on the animation process. Having experimented with key posing in the previous week, I decided to utilise a similar process in my animation. My aim is to key pose all of Fishbone's animation to the 2 minute timeframe.

As I was creating the key poses, I made sure to keep referencing to the original storyboard to avoid conflicting with the time frame. However, problems occurred in that some motions would require longer or shorter durations, so I made sure to accommodate them in the timeline. It was also an opportunity to insert some of the cameras in the scene as well.

Overall, I'm happy so far with this process, and feel that this will allow me to get a balanced animation.

Animation Direction AM50309 - 6: Week 11

This week my aim was to finish the rigging and practice using the rig. I wanted to understand how the rig will work first before I animate, so I felt it was necessary to do poses to test the rigs versatility.

As hands are quite difficult to animate, I decided to create set driven keys for various expressions. I feel that when I start animating, this will be a valuable shortcut for different hand movements. After completing this, I made final checks to ensure that the rig is working properly, and parented joints to the appropriate nurbs curve.

Left Hand

Right Hand

I then started practicing putting him in various poses to check the rigging and to see how Fishbone looks rendered. Overall I'm happy with the results, and look forward to animating him.

Animation Direction AM50309 - 6: Week 10

This week I've commenced with the production of my storyboard animatic and the body rigging of Fishbone. As my main priority was the completion of the storyboard to begin animating, I decided to focus on this first.

I brought my sketchbook into university and scanned every page of the storyboard panels into a computer. I then used StoryboardPro to composite the sequence together. I added some extra panels digitally so as to pad out the story. The next part was adding audio into the storyboard. I'm rather familiar with the software Final Cut Pro, so I used that to edit sound in. A lot of the sounds at the moment are placeholders from Freesound, so I've asked Laura to help me with specific sounds to make them more original. I also plan to include music in my final animation as well, which has been recorded by my good friend Rob Millard.

                

After completing this, I started to make progress on the body rigging. I used a rig that I made for Fishbone last semester to save time, and made slight adjustments to it where appropriate. After skinning him, I started paint weighting the mesh to the correct joints. I haven't ran into any significant problems so far, and hopefully should have it finished by next week.

Here's a photo of the mic I borrowed to record Rob's guitar, will cost me a grand if I break it :/

Animation Direction AM50309 - 6: Week 9

Over this week I've decided that I ned to make final preparations to begin my animation. To do this, I decided to finish the final texturing for my characters and the environments. This week was also an opportunity for me to experiment with rigging for Fishbone, so I decided to focus on the face to create his various expressions.

Importing all of the of the environmental assets was quite tricky, as I had to think about how everything would suit the scene. I also had to think about lighting, and make sure to get the right contrast between the rocks and the sea to avoid it looking too bright. It's currently a work in progress, and I plan to get it finished in the next few weeks.

For the facial rigging, I decided that I wanted to get as many facial expressions as possible. This was so that I could actually have as many varied poses for when I render Fishbone for still frames in my portfolio. I focused on the mouth expressions first, then worked my towards the brow and ears. Here's a few facial expressions to show my work.

Smile

Kissy Face

Sad

Shocked

Clint Eastwood

Laughing

I now commence with week 10, in which I will focus on the final storyboarding and the body rigging.

Animation Direction AM50309 -6: Week 8

So this week I've decided that I need to get more people involved in helping out my project. I already have Laura Emmerman helping me out with some of the foley sounds eg. Ocean and water, but I need more people to help with other parts of the project eg. Poster design and voice acting.

To promote my project, I have decided to post up flyers in various parts of the uni faculties eg. The animation and graphics departments. I have made it so that if people are interested, they can rip off a ticket with my contact details on it.

I have also been working on Fishbone's trident in maya. As my narrative revolves around Fishbone's mistake of bringing a coconut to life, my design process was to make the trident look more superior than the character who welds it. It is also supposed to signify Fishbone's lack of understanding of the weapon, which I think adds to his personality.

I originally envisioned the trident to have dents and bumps to show it's age. However, I tested the texturing using a preset mia_material, and it produced a far better quality. I also wanted the trident to have a unique silhouette, so I added the wing-like metal at the bottom.

Front

Side

Perspective