Character and Narrative.

You can tell so much about a character by how he/ she or it walks into a room, doing the same task. This character study for Big Hero 6 shows how much the way a character behaves can tell a story without words. 

Baymax's character clearly looks quite timid and unsure about his surroundings and how he fits within them. He doesn't know his own size and appears to be easily flustered. 

Hiro acts like a typical teenager, always on his phone or using some form of technology, not really paying attention to his surroundings. He clearly looks comfortable in the room he is in, perhaps it's his home?

Tadashi on the other hand looks very much like a guest in his surroundings, he's very polite and careful about everything he does.

Aunt Cass clearly works in this restaurant that is the set. She looks like she works quite hard but when she sits down she curls up on the seat like she's still quite young. She looks comfortable.

The way a character behaves means that you get an impression them or their day just from watching a few seconds of their behaviour. Their walk cycle, the way they sit down, it all tells a specific narrative about that character. 

UPDATE: Improved walk cycle.

I took the advice of Mike and Rosy to smooth out the walk cycle a bit. I also lowered the body of moom so that he was less bouncy and dragging his feet more as his character is supposed to be having a really bad day. I also made him hang his head a bit more. 

I have made him sit down at the bar and get a drink in as well, I think this part moves really smoothly and well and I used his arms to make it look like he was lifting himself onto the stool at the bar.

UPDATE: Walk cycle.

I've created a walk cycle for my moom, however it's too jumpy and unnatural and I can't work out how to fix it..

Rosy suggested exaggerating the hip swing and Mike has suggested looking into the graph editor and evening out spikes and getting rid of flat lines to make it move smoother.

UPDATE: Blocked out movement

I've blocked out the movement that moom will be walking from the door to the bar to work out timings. Next I will do a walk cycle for moom.

Stewie Griffin- Rocketman.

Here is an example of they type of thing we're being asked to do in our brief, in the industry. 

Stewie Griffin is speaking the words of the song with a different tone and emotion than the original song and the character is animated to fit the scene and lyrics.

Using 3D software for stop motion.

Thanks to 3D software, stop motion animation techniques have improved in leaps and bounds. 3D printing has enabled companies like Laika to create interchangeable faces for their characters, making lip syncing a much easier and faster process and it means that its easy to replace them if they break. For each full length film, Laika can produce up to 50000 faces overall. The ability to print whole faces off also means that every face for each character is identical and there wont be any unwanted small differences between frames, leading to a consistent animation.

itv2 Storyboard

Here is a basic storyboard for how I would like my itv2 animation to look. I might change the colours in the final thing but this is the style it will be in and presents the idea for the images of some of the shows. It also gives an idea of what the voice over will be like.

The music will be upbeat but simple, I think this will make it grab peoples attention and hold it. 
I have chosen to leave the itv2 logo out until the very end of the ident to make people wonder what it is about and keep them watching until the end.

Benefits of 3D over 2D animation.

The ability to animate in 3D has had a great impact on the animation world.
3D technology has meant that more realistic animations can happen and it's making it quicker to churn out lengthy animations because you don't need to draw every single frame. Once the characters and the set are modelled, key framing makes 3D animation a quick and effective animation style. 3D animation software also allows for effective camera angles and lighting effects that would be more challenging in 2D traditional animation. 

Computer Generated Imagery is being used a lot more often in modern film. It is used in live action films and fully animated features.

With 2D, everything is drawn out individually, but if an arm goes behind the character, you don't need to draw the arm. However with 3D, you need to be aware of every body part and its positioning even when they are obscured behind the figure. 
2D is obviously drawn on every frame and therefore takes a long time to sketch out, draw and colour each frame and you need to make sure each image is consistent and that the character doesnt change it's appearance between frames. This can be a challenge as tiny differences between frames arent noticeable straight away but become apparent over time while watching the animation through. 3D doesn't have this issue as the character will stay consistent between frames as you are just manipulating a modelled character.