Sylvain Chomet Animating

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VTlQK0E_4KM&feature=player_embedded#!

Imagine - From Pencils To Pixels

http://www.youtube.com/watch?NR=1&feature=endscreen&v=lnsBLF5cYpg

It is really important to think before creating it. As mentioned by Mr John lasseter,'" You get nothing for free." Everything has be think before putting it on paper. 

11 sec club

Step1:

Step 2:

I wanted to work more on key poses and timing. In this act both characters were having contrast characteristics. Maintaining that in animation was very important. I wanted to achieve an effect of contrast characteristic in very early stage of an animation. I gave details to blocking poses for example character fingers, eye lids,chair animation, paper placements. This helped me in getting a overview of my final output.




Step 3:

In this stage of an animation is on a step mode. I put attention on accurate  actions, clear look at of eyes, more detailed secondary poses. Previous animation clip of my work was a different style. It required almost frame by frame animation. In current animation clip most important thing is to achieve arcs in body gesture. A boss character in this animation has a style and attitude. I want to maintain that throughout my animation. Second character is a poor employee. She has to look underestimated. It is very important to achieve correct feel of a scene.

Step 4:

This is stage where I am more confident about my timing and staging. I clearly gave very dominate poses to a Boss's character. That emphasis on her behavior towards her employees. Other character is detailed by expressions, she don't have much dialogues in this animation clip, yet she is a very important according to a story.  All her serious expressions helps to gain audience sympathy. I added some definite holds where I wanted to dominate the silence of the scene. Because of my tutors guidance, I changed last cut of the scene. Now scene is looking more focused on emotions. Now animation is looking more relax and believable. 

Final Output:

Play blast:

Final Render:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zbBqFKQXYME&feature=youtu.be

I am satisfied with my final output. Now I feel more confident while doing animation. I started to understand small details of human body and timing of it. My sketches were also a reason of my detailed animation. While doing sketches, I noticed many human actions and purpose behind them.I tried to animate some actions which where less seen in 3D animation. As example a simple finger movement of hand while character says ,"time". Because of technical difficulty, final render output was not matching with voice.I managed to match voice again in my rendered output although, if there is any lag please consider my play blast of a Maya.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=z9yW1s0-JwI&feature=youtu.be

This is a better quality renders. Because of lack of time, I could not produced high quality renders. 

All your suggestions and critics are welcome.

Mime Final

High quality render:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9BiCJrpCrnE&feature=youtu.be

Group Work

A Mime Holiday:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0zqElI_MJ7g

Mime on a holiday.

Plan of a mime:

This was a group task. Topic was a audition of a mime.  Audition is like a competition. There are three characters in this short film. Three of them are mime artists. While choosing a location we thought of selecting something different. We selected beach as our location of the act. There was a question what these mime artists are doing on beach and an answer was they were on a holiday.

In our story there is one more character of a beautiful girl. She is lying on a beach to enjoy bright sunny weather.All of them were trying to impress a girl by their mime moves. There has to be a obstacle for every story , we chose are obstacle as a glass.

Story base: Three mime artists want to impress a girl.

Location: Beach

Medium: Mime

Obstacle: Glass

Story of a scene:

Mime artists whose names are Andrew, Jack, Bob. These three guys are on a vacation. They were enjoying their vacation on a beach. They saw a girl, lying on a beach. They try to impress her one by one through their mime moves. Andrew first sees a girl and runs to grab her attention, but he fails. Second character is Jack. Despite of Jack's efforts he also fails to amaze her. Last guy whose name is Bob, he has a personality to impress a girl.

Idea behind choosing this story was a complete concept. This story has a start and proper end. There is a winner also at the end of a story, which makes it different.

Camera:

While setting a camera there were many thoughts in my mind. We wanted it to look like a girls point of view. After all our sincere efforts we set a camera which was a girl's point of view. Girl was playing a role of a camera. Camera is facing towards up to show her eye site. This was very difficult to convince the audience that there is a girl behind a camera. Camera set up and voice of a girl made it look believable.

Background Set up:

We deliberately designed background with less props without losing feel of a beach. My group mate made one art effect for background. Considering that as a reference I created a set according to story requirements.

Style of Animation:

While deciding a plot, we thought of doing something different in an animation also. We decided that we will take inspiration from a Tom and Jerry's cartoon. Audience are familiar as individual but, when that contains certain style in it becomes more interesting. Mime has its own characteristics as example. Every moment has a exaggeration, all the gestures are express without any props of help. It is like playing with imagination. All facial expressions are shown in more prominent way. Adapting all this in animation and portray that in 2D cartoon style is main motive of this short film. 

We collected many references for are short film.

Following are example of it.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nlxYdZJUboU

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=u-W4HULfO4M

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FXLNDV4D_2w

2D animation has it's own style for examples, Gags ,Timing , Fast action, Long holds ect. All this elements are difficult to bring in 3D animation. This clip is a combination of a mime and 2D animation. Achieve that style with mime is a tricky task for me.   

Step 1:

Story board: 

Mime is an art of expressions. When I was planning for mime, two things were very clear about my animation. I wanted to put mime art in a very new way. This was a main purpose behind selecting a style of animation. 2D style of animation requires more precised things like timing and actions. I planned my animation according to those actions. I selected very famous actions of 2D animation. As example, fast run and sudden stop in an action, taking a long antic before run etc. Story is very clear in my story board.

Step 2:

Reference shoot:

Ideas where very clear when I went to do the reference shoot. But when I actually started acting with my group mates, ideas started taking new shapes. There was a total change in my plan. I got really nice suggestion from my tutors and class mates about continuation of the story. I changed some of the plots from my idea which helped me for a better concept. Some ideas were dropped and some were newly carved. It helped me in my animation also. Reference shoot which I planned previously was taking approximately 50 sec for only my animation. This was a group assignment. We were having a time limit of 1min 60 sec for three characters. I was very happy with my reference shoot. One of my class mate helped me by doing my reference as a fat guy. He did a very nice job in his acting. In above reference I can clearly see my key poses. Hopefully I will be able to peruse a same effect which this reference has.  

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CC9eCTHcckA

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qxG9Zpjhmcg

Step 3:

About Camera:

Group work comes with many challenges. Setting a camera according to all mates was one of the challenge I faced. In individual assignment I had a liberty to change my camera angles as many times as I want. In case of group work it was different. Story requires a proper start and end. Camera helps to define story. We decided to take one more unusual step for our assignment. We set a camera as a girl. Girl was lying on beach, as we kept our cameras low in angle. She is scanning a beach, so we gave dome head turns to are cameras. Some corrections added a accurate look to a camera.    

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dPaZybfN-JU

Step 4:

After adding blocking poses I started putting in-betweens. It was a task to achieve what I planned in my story board and reference. Matching 2D actions was almost like working on every frame. That is a most difficult part of this assignment. Even matching a speed of 2D is tough. My character is fat guy and he has his limitations as a human rig. Keep some human anatomy rules, I wanted to modify his actions. All actions should look convincing in 3D animation. His fat hands, huge belly was tricky to handle in a character animation. All actions which I followed was inspired from 2D animation. It was like learning 2D experience for me. For every definite action I used to draw it in rough. How a human weight should shift, what should be a position of a fat character to  do a bend. All small tips I found from, my own hand drawn actions.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZPRhDdtk7iY 

Step 5:

Use of mime performance reference:

To give a feel of a mime actions, I used some mime performances. They were great inspiration. It is very hard to achieve a mime art in live action. All my references were losing a mime touch. I found many references which could helped to understand rules of the mime.

Final output:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9BiCJrpCrnE

I am really happy with my final output of this assignment. Sound effect and many brilliant ideas of voice over actor, added a nice touch.

About group assignment:

I learned many angles of collaboration act. When an idea and concept is hard, need of hard work increases. I worked in an animation studio but, we never got a chance to work as a group. I am extremely happy that I got a chance to work as a group.  All my group mates were not strong in a Maya software, so initially it took time for our group to catch up. Concept was very hard to put as a group.

We did struggled a lot. Eventually, we are very happy to see a final output. All are efforts were paid off.

About Mime

There are so many things to talk about a mime. Mime is not only a performance to entertain people. It is hard to do mime in live performance. Convey all your ideas and emotion without using any visible object. Just by using body gestures a mime artist portray whole story with emotions. Every move of mime artist's action is exaggerated. In real life of in normal acting field actor do not portray this character as mime artist dose. It is hard to do mime, audience has to understand what a artist is doing. Mime is challenging. Artist has to show clear gestures without having any help. Interesting part of mime is over the top expressions and body moments. A simple action has be convey in a more define manner.

Mime is an art of silence. A famous mime artist Marcel Marceau spread this talent to all over the world. Some of this popular performances are still been remembered as a mark of excellence.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YAIAqwmfzN4

Style of mime had keep on changing by the period of time. Many new artist has shown their mime talent in different ways. Use of technology has  also been part of mime.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hgsLit8khzo&feature=player_embedded

In my mime act I am going to try a different style. Compare to live action mime it is slightly easy to achieve illusion of mime in an animation. If a action consider a prop, we can animate the prop and hide it later on which will give us effect of a mime.

Gorillaz - ... Melancholy Hill

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=T_aUF46r5No&feature=share%27%2C%29

Very unique style of animation. Impressive part of this is that this has a combination of 2D and 3D. It is very hard to merge both style. I am collecting some inspiration for my final project and this can become a part of it. If story and concept is right for 2D and 3D mix animation then I would love to work on such a style.  

Blocking file

11 Sec Club

About Cameras:

In this scene, I am deliberately setting cameras which dominates emotions. Miss Devil (a boss) who has high power center, she is a leading character of a scene. Camera changes are made according to sequence requirements. Every dialogue is setting a mood, keeping that in mind I want to emphasize on important words. Like example ungrateful, enthusiasm, professionals, but I, have to go, good day.

Camera 1: Idea behind having a down to up camera is to show an importance of Miss Devil, where she looks bigger than Mrs Crawley ( an employee). This is a introduction camera. It consists impression of a character. That is a reason behind keeping a strong angle.

Camera 2: In this chunk major dialogues are for Miss Devil, so a camera is facing towards her.

Camera 3: This is a part where Mrs Crawley has a single dialogue but, still an importance goes to Miss Devil's character. I wanted to catch both characters expressions that is why I am choosing an angle where both characters are visible.

Camera 4: This is a story telling camera for me. I want to convey that, Miss Devil is pleased by hurting Mrs Crawley's feeling. She has a mischievous and cruel smile, when she says," Good Bye." At the same time Mrs Crawley is very upset about a failure.

Camera set up 1:

Camera set up 2:

All above cameras are kept for elaborating a story and features of both characters. I was confused about a last camera angle. I tried putting it in two different directions for the same sequence. According to my classmates suggestion, I am going to use my 1'st camera set up.

Sketchy Duel

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Qi2kaDzGh9A&feature=player_embedded

This animation clip is an example of simple and effective animation. This story is about two guys who are fighting for their pride. Clip contains four characters. Two guys are fighters and rest two are supporters. Execution of the scene is very successful. This animation has very less scope of detail but, still we can see use of animation principles. Every action has reaction. None of the character has room for expression but body questions are so strong that it clears all the elements of a story. Lovely style of animation. Only sticks are used for body language. Humor plays huge role in this clip. Comic sequences are successful to achieve audience attention till the end of the scene. Funny sound effects are helpful to raise the tempo. Good color scheme and layout is adding extra weight to over all look of the scene.

Sketch Book

11 Sec Club

Voice One: "Please don't think we're ungrateful for your enthusiasm, Mrs. Crawley, but there comes a time when things are best left to the professionals."

Voice Two: "But I...."

Voice One: "And now I really, I really must go. Good day."

In this story leading character is a boss whose name is Mrs Devil. Mrs Devil is a fashion designer by profession, who owns her own brand. She likes to dominate on her employs. This character has a high power center. She is bold,arrogant and self obsessed. At the same time she is a very elegant lady, who has power to make others bow in front of her. She herself is a talented woman who won many awards . And now she don't want her super talented employ to overtake her.

Inspiration behind this character is a famous character Cruella from the movie 101 DALMATIANS. When first I heart this sound, I could not think any other character than Cruella for this kind of attitude. A person who wants to dominate with all her power, a character like Cruella.

Second character in this scene is, Mrs Crawley. This lady is a upcoming talented fashion designer. She is enthusiastic and focused on her work. She achieves best out her work. Mrs Crawley is contained held back from whom she meant to be.

While planning for this scene I particularly had one scene in my mind. From the movie 101 Dalmatians, introduction short of a character Cruella. The body postures , attitude and mood swings are perfectly matching with this sound.

Situation of the scene-

Scene starts in an office. Both the character are sitting on chairs. Mrs. Crawley is very excited to show her new design to her boss Mrs Devil. She is hoping for a positive reply from her boss. Mrs Devil sees a beautiful design of Mrs Crawley. She gives an cruel expression and says, "Please don't think we're ungrateful for your enthusiasm, Mrs. Crawley,(through a design and turn towards Mrs Crawley) but there comes a time when things are best left to the professionals."

Mrs Crawley gets upset and try an offer her a new design by saying,"But I...."

Mrs Devil refuses to listen any further and interrupt her by saying,"And now I really, I really must go.(Walks towards a door, turn back to see Mrs Crawley's reaction. She is happy to see Mrs Crawley depress) Good day."

Mime character First look

Sketch Book

Mime

About a character:

Andrew is a fat and short guy. His age is 32 years. As a person he is romantic and sensitive. Andrew always wants to impress girls but, because of his personality he fails to impress them. He like to eat and drink with his friends. Important feature of his character is, he is a MIME artist. Even if he is off stage he always like to attract people through his mime moves. He has some puppy characteristic in him as example he gets excited very soon.

Script:

Andrew : Notices a girl and runs towards her to grab her attention. Suddenly find a imaginative glass between him and a girl character. Bangs on a glass. Gets pissed off and starts scratching on a glass, like a puppy. Thinks about overcoming that imaginative glass. Finds an idea ( bulb lights as a symbol of an idea ). Andrew turns off a bulb. (Idea is to walk downstairs and pass a imaginative glass.) Start stepping down until he cross a glass.

Camera(Girl) : Shows no interest in him.(Still)

Andrew : Jumps in front of a girl.

Camera(Girl) : Shocked (little shake of a camera).

Andrew : Took out a flower and smells it. With all his feelings, Andrew offer that flower to a girl.

Camera(Girl) : Refuses his flower. (Slight shack of a camera, saying no).

Andrew : Breaks his heart. Sad expression. Walks out of a frame.

Tips fro voice-over

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QWsY3aTnyaM&feature=related

Sketch Book

Dance

Presenter

This is a final output of presenter's clip. I really learned lot of things while animating. How should an acting come exactly on a time. Especially animating dialogue, character should react on a perfect time. Ed Hooks made very interesting point in his acting workshop, that a person reacts for some reason in a communication. In this clip, reaction of the characters where more important. I am really happy the way animation worked in this clip. I also worked on expression of the each characters minutely. It was important to give them right expression. Expression of the characters added humor in animation. Even after putting attractive poses in the blocking, the animation was looking dull. But the moment I added expressions, it started looking better.

A highlighting point in this clip is, I developed a procedure of the animation. Starting with the blocking, followed by secondary poses. After doing secondary poses, I added in-between poses. End of the procedure, I worked on the graph. Covering the graph may have take time but, animation was looking very promising after cleaning the graph. Lip-sync was done at the end of animation. Expression were added after words.

Lip-sync Final

Planning: Character is a fortune teller by her profession. Her name is Katy.Her want to convince a person but, to make him realize that, she is telling truth. She starts with a very calmly which at the end becomes aggressive. After listing to the audio, I felt that she is really angry about the opposite person, who disbelieve her opinion. It could have been a normal talk between two characters. But I was trying to give her motive behind her talk. A character fortune teller, who likes to make others believe what she is saying is going to happen in future. I watched movies for studding this characters.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IrpXoNBCz7Q

This character is using her hands for gestures. Her hand are expressing every word of her. Anger is chosen to make other person believe what he is saying is correct. I wanted a same thought in my clip. Previously I planned this clip to get funny at the end but, it was not making justice to her character. I decided to keep her cruel and serious till the end.

Stage 1:

On this stage, I just want to see the silhouette of the character. Testing her features was the main motive. While setting the camera, I verified that the whole attention has to be on her face. She has to be on golden point of a camera frame. To justify her character she should have a strong body posture.

About the camera :

I am setting a moving camera for this clip. In this short there is no other character in the frame. Whole attention is going to be on Katy (name of the fortune teller). Zooming the camera was really working with the sound and mood. Giving attention to her facial movements was also important. Camera is still where it needed to be. When she is aggressive, a camera deliberately kept still. After she calm down, camera is again zoom out for keeping the moment going.

Acting reference:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=i_ZVTTi-Bo4&list=UUWsNFuhdtPquiuvgya6cuWg&index=10&feature=plcp

I acted this on my own. While acting, this scene my main aim was to get mood and emphasize on a character's expressions. In this clip, I was clear the way I want character's body movements.

Brief of the story : Katy is a fortune teller. She is setting on a chair, and talking to a person. A person is a practical guy who do not believe her predictions. To make him think what she is predicting is right she becomes violent at one point. That is the moment where other person starts thinking about her predictions. Because Katy convinced him to think on her opinion, she started feeling like a winner. This whole conversation after a dialogue should get expressed by her facial expressions.

Stage 2:

I did started doing lip sync before animation. My focus was on lip sync in this clip.

Lip sync was new for me as, I never did it before. Reason behind choosing this clip was strong punches in the dialogue. In Disney, animation artist make a lip sync chart before animating them. The same procedure I followed before animating the actual lip sync, I created an excel sheet of this where I wrote all the pitching points of the dialogue. Accordingly I added lip sync to the character.

Animation here is under progress. There is less weight in character movements. I am putting some extra poses to define Kety's weight of the hands and head.

Stage 3:

In this short, I added weight in a character. I also worked on her expressions. Animating eye was a first attempt of mine. While animating blinks, I thought about her expressions and a scene requirements. Sometimes her eyes are open more wide, especially when she is angry. Added minute detail in her gestures. Worked on her figure animation also.

Maya render vesion:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0iXIp2m_U3s&feature=BFa&list=UUWsNFuhdtPquiuvgya6cuWg&lf=plcp

Final:

According to suggestions I reduced spacing between two hands action. Previously there was a delay at the starting time of the character hand movements. I also made some changes in a camera. Final output is really satisfactory in comparison to my last animation work. Learned various things in this short as example, importance of the hold, strong poses, finger animation, eye expression and animation.