Friday, June 1, 2012

Practice, practice, practice!

Isn't there a saying that you need to get a thousand crappy drawings out of your system before you get a good one? Well, the same is true about computer animation. You have to practice and not be burdened with the pressure that every shot or sequence you start will end up on your demo reel (more about this in a later post). And my plan is to do just that.

But give me every option available and no deadline and it's going to take me ages until I decide on something. Deadlines and restrictions are one of my favorite things at work. I love finding the most creative solution within a set of restrictions. It's like a puzzle! ("It's like a big old mammogram!").

Enter the 11secondclub.

One of the things I've wanted to do for a while but never had the time for, was submitting entries for the 11secondclub. It's perfect for what I need. A DEADLINE! Each month!

So from now on I will do just that, enter a clip each month using every spare minute that I have. And it doesn't matter how much time I spent on it, how crappy it is, it's all about practice, practice, practice.

So here we go! This is my entry for the month of May. For this month, I had a day where the stars aligned and I was granted 10 hours of free time (sort of). I dove right into it and submitted the work about 2 minutes before the end of the deadline! HAHAHA! Better start practicing and improving my timing for that as well!

The clip was fun to do, especially the ending, where I totally went overboard. I just wanted to practice and have fun. There's a good mix of reference and imagination, pose to pose and straight-ahead animation in there. I loved it! And the Malcolm rig from AnimSchool is fantastic! So many controls, but never confusing! Btw. the stairs were built using this kick ass tool: Davveys Stair Generator 1.1.2 (maya script)

The clip here is zoomed in and rendered, which was not what I submitted but I prefer this one. Can't wait to start the next clip!

Here are also the usual suspects of formats: Vimeo and Quicktime


Dinner

Awesome (thanks Yen-Shih for the tip!)

Wednesday, May 30, 2012

The Art of Brave

This is great! Every art-of book should have a short video like that where you can quickly see the content, so you can decide if it's worth it or not.

Thursday, May 24, 2012

Marnie - new AnimSchool rig


Very cool looking rig, must be awesome to animate with. Head over here for more info!

Monday, May 21, 2012

The Pod (trailer)

I was fortunate to see the full short and unfortunately I don't know when it is going to be release and what the festival details are, but if you have a chance to see, you should. I loved it.

The Christmas Elf Hater (Nissehaderen)

Cool look done in Maya!

Ernest et Célestine

That looks great. Love the chasing cops!

Sunday, May 20, 2012

SloPro - iPhone app for shooting Reference





If you have an iPhone, I recommend you check out SloPro. It's free to check out but you won't be able to save your movies. For $1.99 you get the full version with more options.




Here the official info list:

 - Toggle slow motion while recording!
- Trim and change slow motion afterwards if needed
- No rendering delay--watch slow motion immediately!
- Facebook upload
- YouTube upload
- Upgrade to email, export to camera roll, and export raw 60fps

 For non-iPhone 4S 60fps is only on the iPhone 4S. Other devices can still record, edit and share great slow motion videos at 30fps. 

The slow-mo sound is fun, especially when it makes your baby sound like a huge ogre beast. :)

Wednesday, May 16, 2012

Tennis Serve Reference

This is a very cool analysis of Roddick's serve and the slow mo footage is great reference!


AnimSchool Interview: Animator Aaron Gilman


Check out the full interview at the AnimSchool blog!

Uncomfortable reference - Joe Hockey

Good squirmy and uncomfortable reference. Thanks Mike for the tip!


Faceware Webinar Series - Facial Rigging Techniques with Josh Burton


Summer 2012 SOS Workshops open for sign-ups!

Now that the Spring Workshop is done I wanted to remind interested animators that the sign-up window for the Summer Workshop is closing in a month. Spots are filling up for a June 18th start, so if you're up for it, head over here for the sign-up procedure!

Summer blocks are shorter, 8 weeks in total, giving you 8 sessions for $400. Unless you want to work more and sign-up for the twice-a-week option (Monday and Thursday) for $800.

As always, if you got any questions, feel free to check out the FAQ.

Cheers
JD

Online Workshops: all-year sign-ups and new features

I've been doing this for a little bit now but haven't officially announced it via a post yet.

After doing the online workshops for a while I figured that it was a lot easier on animators who wanted to sign up if the schedule wasn't blocked out in the usual Spring, Summer and Fall fashion (which I carried over from the on-site workshops).

So from now on you can start at any time for the 16 week block! It's the usual $500 for 16 weeks, with all the details and options outlined in the SO FAQ.

I've also added the option of having animators sending me their Maya files so that I can illustrate certain points hands-on, if the written feedback is not clear enough. You can find one of those examples in this shot, where I concentrated the tweak on the hip:


(click image to play the movie)

I've also switched to Scribbeo (more on that app in a later post) for the majority of the feedback replies, which allows for a more structured breakdown of the notes.



It's still a WIP, but so far the feedback has been positive.

 That's it so far!

Cheers
JD