Character Making- Herbert

Herbert was made in the same way as Norman, with a hole in the top of his head to pour in the latex foam. 

An issue I had was that, because of the plaster covering the joints, it made the joints a bit thicker and then the foam struggled to fit around all of the armature and left some parts uncovered. This can, however be easily fixed and hidden with paint and the clothes that will be added as all of the uncovered parts will be under clothes.

Character making- Norman

To build Norman, I first made an armature from a kit I bought off of the animation took kit and then assembled it according to the sizes I measured out. I then made a wire frame that was the same size as my metal armature so that the clay mould I made was the right size. 

Then I built the clay mould based to the character designs drawn by Rosy.

Unfortunately, my Norman clay mould dried and fell off my desk, meaning it cracked and I had to re-make it which slowed down my making process, however the second mould I think looked better so it all worked out.

To create the actual stop motion puppet, I rolled out a square of clay that was thicker than my character, drew a line around the size of my character and then carved down into the clay square so that Norman fit halfway into the square. 

Then, after putting up boards around the clay square and sealing all the gaps with more clay to make it air tight, I mixed and poured silicone into it. I, however, didn't make enough the first time around and his head, feet and stomach were breaking through the silicone so I had to mix some more and add thixotropic to make the silicone thicker to cover those parts. 

Once the silicone was dried, I expanded the clay walls and poured a plaster jacket over the silicone to hold my mould in shape for casting my character. 

Then I flipped it over once that was dry and covered my silicone with a release agent repeated the process for the other half of my character.

Once the second half of my mould was dried, I opened up the two, cleaned all the clay off and removed my clay mould placed my metal armature inside. I had to tie some string to the armature so that I could suspend the character in the middle of my mould. I also had to cover the joints with plaster so that the substance I cast my character in would not get into them and stop them from moving. 

I had originally wanted to use silicone to cast my characters, but as I was running short on time to get these characters casted, and I didn't know how the silicone would move as I hadn't had time to experiment with it. I also did not want to risk being unable to get the metal armature out if it did not work. Because of these reasons, and the fact that I had already practiced using it in our workshop, I chose to use foam latex. This was not my first option as I think foam latex bounces back a little too much when moving and it might be a challenge for stop motion.

Set Building- The Farm

To build my farm, I first got some mdf cut in the woodwork work shop, cut to 1m by 1m, and then used modrock to created some grass banks and soil banks to give my farm some texture and depth. 

I then covered all of the non-grassy elements of the set with sand, and then soil when I ran out of sand, to add texture. 

While the glue was drying, I made some fences out of popsicle sticks. I learnt that these worked best when I made each half of the fence seperately and attached them when they were dry. 

Once the pva was dried on the farm, I spraypainted the whole thing with a matt black undercoat.

Then I begun painting. I painted the grassy areas so that they were darker on the outside and then grew lighter in the middle. 

With the path, I painted the whole path brown and then went over it with the yellow ocre and naples yellow to give the road some depth. With the soil, I painted them all dark and then the raised parts I painted gradually lighter to exaggerate the depth. 

I recruited my friend Noel to dry the paint with a hair dryer while I painted the fences so that I could continue painting the set as quickly as possible. I painted the fences all dark brown and then drybrushed some pale yellow over the top to give them the appearance of wood.

After the farm was painted, Rosy and I built a farm house with more popsicle sticks to act as beams, and grout to give the walls a texture and then spray painted them black. 

I then painted these, cut out a door and assembled them on the set. The house is a little small but it fits with the set and the amount of it that will be in the shot gives the appearance of a house well enough.

Project Evaluation

I found this module a lot more difficult than I had first thought, and I really struggled with the workload and time management as I felt there was too much work to be done when considering all the other modules as well. I did enjoy some of the individual briefs that I chose to do. Of the 6 briefs I did, I most enjoyed the 11 Second club brief, the Slipknot brief and the Qwertee brief. I enjoyed the Qwertee brief because it gave me the opportunity to practice my drawing skills and practice new styles to draw in. In particular, I think the style that I drew the Chuckie design in was the strongest and it is my favourite design of the 5 that I did. It was in a style I had never tried before and I’m really happy with how it turned out, even though it did not do as well in the competition as I would have hoped. I also like the style that my Stitch and Gremlin designs are in as it’s quite simple but effective. I enjoyed the Slipknot competition as it meant I could practice my drawing skills and meant I could try drawing a different subject matter to what I usually do.

I really enjoyed the 11 second club brief because I had been wanting to improve my maya skills and try out some more complex rigs. I also had been looking forward to doing some more animating in this module as the large amount of my responsive work has been drawing and storyboarding. I am really happy with the way my animation has turned out. I had limited time to get the animation finished but considering the lack of time. In the future I will work on my time management. The other animated brief I really enjoyed was the bingomation. The idea for the brief was really original and interesting and once I looked up the bingo calls I had many ideas. I am happy with how my animation turned out, although some parts could probably be a bit smoother. This is because I did the animation in 12 frames per second instead of 24 as I did not think there was going to be too much movement and believed it would flow smoothly enough in 12 frames per second. This also saved me some time for my other briefs. If I were to do it again I would do it in 24 frames per second in the hopes that it would flow smoother.

The two briefs that were required for the studio tasks, the YCN brief and the D&AD brief, I did not find as stimulating as the more self directed ones. This is because I did not enjoy the structure these sessions were taught in and meant that I quickly lost interest in my itv2 and WWF briefs. Unfortunately this lack of motivation and inspiration had an effect on my projects. I am not pleased with the way these two briefs went and I feel that if I were to do them again I would plan my time better, and find ways to keep myself motivated so that I create pieces of work that I am proud of.

I was really excited for the collaborative WWF brief, but unfortunately, I had some trouble with my partner as our organisation was not what it should have been and our project suffered for it. In the future I will make more effort both to choose a reliable partner that I work well with, but also to organise my own time better and find new ways to motivate myself on projects that I don’t enjoy, as that is what I believe it will take to succeed as a freelance artist.  I do still really like the idea of working in a team, but in the future I will make more effort to delegate certain roles of the projects to each person instead of both doing every part, as I felt this slowed the project down and left me feeling like I was doing most of the work.

In conclusion, this module has taught me a lot of skills that I will need if I want to be a freelance artist in the future, and it has also taught me a lot about working with a partner or as part of a team. It also really helped me improve my drawing skills and taught me about going out into the world to search for competitions to enter and I will continue to enter competitions in my free time to get my work seen. This module was a very important lesson for me and I will take what I have learnt forward with me into the future and I will learn from my mistakes in this module.

Project Report

11 Second Club- April finished animation

   

Here is my finished animation for my April 11 second club entry. I learnt a lot about using more complex character rigs in this project and now feel a lot more confident moving forward with more projects in Maya. I'm really pleased with how my animation turned out, although next time I think I will attempt to give the characters clothes instead of the bodysuits they come in. I feel that my 3D animation skills have improved and I look forward to improving them more in the future.

I have had some issues with rendering as it kept going grainy because of the mental ray render engine and I do not know how to fix this. 

I've really enjoyed this project and I will definitely be entering more 11 second club briefs.

Bingomation submission

I have submitted my Bingomation animation and I am happy with the way it turned out. I chose this brief because I thought it was an original and interesting brief, and it is a good way to get my work seen, as they shared it on twitter and included a link to my YouTube channel. I really enjoyed this brief and I would consider doing another number in the future.

Slipknot tshirt designs

Here are my finished slipknot designs for the creative allies competition. The first design I drew on some of the themes that slipknot are known for, including a goat skull and the slipknot 9 point star. I am quite pleased with the design, however in my second design I will try a different style. 

My second design is in a very different style and I kept the colour palette limited to reds and greys. I created illustrations of each of the slipknot members new masks for their latest album and once again included the 9 point star. I considered adding the text 'Prepare for Hell' which is the tour name, however I feel this made the design a bit too crowded and busy and decided against it. Of my two designs, this is my favourite.  

Creative Allies

Creative allies is a site that offers artists opportunities to design artwork for their favourite bands. 

I have chosen to enter the competition to design a tshirt for slipknot, where the winning design will become an official tshirt on the bands world tour and be seen by millions of people. This would be an amazing achievement if my designs were to win. 

The brief states that the designs must be entirely your own and inspired by the bands image and music. The design must also include the slipknot logo that is provided and be exactly 6" by 6". 

I'm really looking forward to this brief.

11 Second Club

The 11 second club competition is a monthly competition where animators are given a sound file and are given the opportunity to animate the scene that could go with it. This can be done in any medium the artist chooses.

The April competition is a conversation between two men: 

TRANSCRIPT

Voice One: "It's been a hell of a trip."
Voice Two: "Sure has."
Voice One: "But, uh, after all is said and done you, you did get me home, and I really appreciate it."
Voice Two: "Hey, next time... let's go first class, all right?"

I have chosen to do a scene in maya using one of the free rigs provided by the competition. The scene will take place in the storage carriage of a train and at the end of the conversation the two men jump off.

I am really looking forward to learning to use some more complex rigs and improve my skills in maya