Traditional Animations Update (from school)

School and some proyects have taken my time away from writting on my blogg, but here I am again, trying to keep it up to date.

The next excercises are all part of the school course designed to teach a little bit of traditional animation, using Richard Williams' Animator's Survival Kit as a guide.

SIMPLE CAT DOING A SIMPLE WALK 

Checking simple walks again, this time was required as an assignment. I think it came up better than the last ones I've done, considering that this time I solved entirely by myself, without books or references.

It is kind of fast and exaggerated, but hey, it is a cartoon after all =P



A FAT BEAR 

Aaah this bear walking, I really enjoyed working on this one.
I wanted to work with weights, counteractions and some overlaps too, and a fat bear had all it was needed to do so.

I went through a lot of planning for this one, i had to:
>think about how his tiny legs would open to avoid tripping with his belly

>Show a good weight not just with size but with timming

I made these charts to figure out the poses and the extremes on the belly (curve). The curve shows how the weight shifts from left to right. Since the curve is not entirely symmetrical, the belly goes slowly to the side, then returns quickly to the center, and then goes again.

>Understand how mass remains static until something acts upon it (the leg pushes the belly forward and to the side)

>Have balanced poses through the walk cycle. 

Here is the finished animation, the first gif has only key poses.

A HAPPY WALK

Not much can be said here. The enterity of the movement and poses were taken from the book...And yet is too fast for my taste.

GOAT KID DOING A SNEAK

Awww yeah! I really loved working on this one too! But maan it was hell of a ride...

It is a slow movement, so I needed lots of frames... this one runs at 33 per step, making a huge total of 65 frames.

The excercise was asked to be worked on 12fps(twos), but I thought "hey, perhaps the goat kid deserves a little bit more effort, I'll go for 24(ones)"  Hahaha, what a crazy idea! I drew tons of tiny goat kids this past week!
Certainly it was really hard to do the entire animation, and what is more, cleaning it up.

I worked on the pencil test at first, fixed some head and arm issues, and the went to the cleanup phase, in which the clothes and face were added.

As you can see, the clothes are not perfectly done, but I like them ^^. In fact, I really like this animation, even if it's not perfect. First, I like it because it as one of my characters, and actually makes me think he is there moving!! :D

Second, it took me a huge effort to finish it on time(almost). And third, it has to be my first nice cleanup :P.

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And for the non-animated stuff, here are some pastel pictures I did:

thanks for reading!! :D

Back to school

I'm back again to school, which explains the late update, but here it is, a huge amount of stuff I've done during the last few weeks of summer and this first week of school.

SOME 2D ANIMATIONS DONE AT SCHOOL

-Eased arm

I've done one before. This one has a small anticipation.

-Eased ball

-pingpong ball

I really do not like this one, it has too much spacing. What I wanted to do was to get the timming for a pingpong ball, which has a quick bounce. 

What makes it look even more wrong I think is the squash...

It's lacking a nice cushion at the top of the last bounces, which adds to the lousy movement...

-bouncing marbel 

And this one is much better, with a quick bounce, not much energy is preserved. 

-falling ballon

-falling vase

Hmmm, I think that's it for animation. I havn't done too much with traditional these days... 

I've also worked on some dialogues and words, but those with some 3D characters. When something nice is done I'll show it to you  ;)

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OIL PAINTING

I've got a lot into oil painting lately. It has a lot more to it than digital stuff, even though it's harder, without instant mistake correction (ctrl+z), and it doesn't dry out instantly either XD-

But it does has a lot of artistic stuff, improves decision making and problem solving.

Here are some of the tiny paintings I've done.

All of them have been done in one sit, taking from 1 to 1:30 hours each. Some made from direct observation, others from imagination, and others from places I've been. 

I saw this scene on the airport, then some days later I made the painting from what I remembered, but mostly liked, about the scene. 

observation

observation

observation

observation

observation

imagination

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ILUSTRATIONS / SCENE STUDIES / NARRATIVE

This picture came to me while reading Crime and Punishment. This scene has to do with the main character walking down the streets, when suddenly hearing some particular conversation that pushes the series of events that makes up the whole story.

It is a really quick picture, focused on the colors and the composition. Figures are not defined, just enough to understand the scene. What I wanted to settle down was the way colors, ligths and shadows, tell a story within a picture. 

In this case, the silhouette, watching from the dark, belongs to the obscure character thinking obscure things. The bright guys in the right side of the scene talk about random stuff, not so random for the main character though, but they are good guys. 

I added a little bit of red just to make a small "prediction" within the picture. Perhaps going too much into the cliché (Red = danger), but it helps tell the message. 

This way of doing pictures, taking inspiration from stories, really puts the basic concepts of art into work, since they are not just created to paint nice pictures, but to make pictures work, or say something. 

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Here is another picture, this time without a concrete story, but with some words in mind:

afternoon, coffee shop, rain, comfortable, city. 

Yes, it has something to do with the Goat Kid story, it may exist within its world; cluttered buildings, a dirty city, lots of stuff, etc.

What I was looking for here was the contrast with these two colors: yellow and blue, and how yellow, being a warm color, can create a comfortable atmosphere within a blue, cold scenario. 

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And here is a quick sketch with another character that may be part of the Goat Kid world.

This guy, The mechanic, perhaps is someone that lives alone, building weird things, inventing machines, talking to 

himself, etc. 

He is a cat or something similar. 

And thats all for now! 

Thanks for reading :D 

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RANDOM 3D STUFF I FOUND AND DID

Funny smoke

Falling Brick and more 3D

Following that schedule I wrote about the other day, here is the third excercise.

3.- FALLING BRICK
This one has to do with timming to achieve a sense of weight -I think XD

Here is my planning. I decided to give it half a rotation and make it hit hard with the edge.
I noticed that, in this case, the full movement ending suddenly adds a lot to the stiffnes of the object, but what do you think?

I also kept myself from using squash and stretch, since it is a very solid brick, it should not deform at all. BUT, perhaps I could use some kind of stretch to create more impact to the exact moment it touches the ground. 



Here is the outcome:

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I also did a tiny animation with my goat dude. It was aimed to practice small movements, eyes, and some expressions.

I know he lacks his mouth hahaha but I decided the eyes were enough to tell what's going on.
I have to say I didn't made too much planning on this one, it was more like straight ahead and just from what came to my mind, trying to keep the idea as fresh as possible.

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Aaand the 3D stufffs!

>>watching some kind of sports<<

Using the same character I used last time on my walkcycles, with a simple rig (no iks, no animation curves) I'm creating a scene in which the character is watching some sports broadcast, having a good time.
I'm using 3 poses to tell the idea:
1)just sitting down watching
2)interest
3)reaction to goal

THE SITTING DOWN WATCHING POSE

 In this pose I want the character to look relaxed, almost uninterested. He is sitting on a sofa, with his shoulders relaxed, hands and arms on the armrests, no tension nor stress.

I went trough some issues with this one, form the position of the soulders, to the overall tension of the body.
In the picture at left I drew some front views of the guy, looking for the way his shoulders and hips would tilt.

The doodles at the top left are the first ones I did with the idea in mind, perhaps too exagerated, they help to explore the strongest poses. I also drew some kind of timming chart to figure out the overall rythm of the scene.

This is the pose I chose in the end. It has a much more relaxed hip, shoulders tilted to the other side, and a straight head.

This sheet has some alternate version, with a very sassy pose, not what I was looking for. His shoulders have too much energy and the hips are way too high. 

INTEREST POSE

Before getting into the actual interest pose I created a tiny anticipation in which the character notices something on the screen, which makes his body go up a little.

This picture shows some studies on how the guy will go from resting to stressed. I was thinking on something getting you to the edge of the seat pose, in which his hips go forward, hands go to thighs and head gets closer to the T.V. I also explored the idea of making a small gesture with his right hand, like arguing with the T.V.

In this frame the character lifts his chest a little, showing some interest on what he is watching. This happens before the entire movement takes place.

Breakdown pose from notice to interest. Arms get closer to body, torso straightens, legs get closer to sofa.

This is the extreme interest pose, in which his head is going forward, and his arms pressing his legs, just as if he is going to jump, but holding in emotion.

 The fact that this guy has no eyebrows, mouths, ears, or something that can create a face expression makes it quite difficult, but leaves the job to the entire body gesture. The pose is the subject I'm trying to get here, on how it can tell the story, even without a character blinking or saying something.

This is the 3D animation. Extremes are done, as well as some inbetweens and breakdowns.

Timming is also done, but it doesn't read as much with the long hold frames.


















And that's all for today guys! No picture making this time. I did worked on some stuff, but is not dry enough to scan it... :P

Thanks for reading and see you later!! :D

WalkCycles Revisited and the 3D

I decided to make a quick review of WalkCycles, why?
Well, I noticed I was spending too much time detailing figures, instead of focusing on the movement, which is the thing I'm trying to learn after all.

That's when I noticed that Richard Williams, the guy from the Animators Survival Kit, makes use of a very simple figure, one which almost looks like a stickman.

Here is my try, basically animating one of the excercises he talks about:

It is nothing fancy, just the pure walk, legs only. I did this one pretty quickly, in photoshop.
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And here is another one, which I added some arms and a dumb cushion at the up-contact, which makes it look wrong ¬¬.
But I wanted to try the forward-backward movement of the shoulders and hips, which, in a way, looks better than the past cycles where such movemen wasn't there at all.

The bad notes:
-The arms are quite boring...
-And the overall timing of the step (16f) is just slow.
The nice thing is that, again, I realized I can work on quick drawings that focus on movement, rather than wasting too much time making those fancy. That'd shall come later on.

The idea is that, if the movement is right, the animation will be, no matter it is a boring stick dude or a great designed character. 

And that makes me question: Which one is better? A bad character animated greatly, or a great character, beautifully designed and rendered, but animated terribly?

THE 3D ---

Oh my god Maya!!! Pandora's Box has been opened.

Yes, I finally decided to get into 3D, being careful not to be seduced by its averwhelming illusions and amazing ease. 

With the most traditional animation in mind, I jumped on my 3D package, willing to experience a new animation tool.

So I decided to make aaaaaanother walk cycle.

And here is my shot:

No IKs, no joints, no curves, no nothing. 

Just keyframes, polygons, transformation tools and timecharts, and the most important thing: animation theory (the stuff that comes in the books).

This first gif shows what may be called the blocking; keyframes that show the important positions of the character. In this case, the common parts of a walk: contact-down-passing-up-contact.

This second gif is the final animation. I inbetweened odds, that is, I keyframed as if I would be animating in 12's(twos), using autotangents at the last moment, letting the computer fill in one frame each. [1-2-3-4-5-6]

But well, it was not as bad as I imagined. in fact, it was more like stopmotion than anything. Taking one picture, then moving each tiny bit of the doll, then taking another shot, over and over again. Of course you have some advantages, like the doll doesn't move while it is manipulated, you can review your animation countless times, etc.
And that puts another question in my mind: Does stopmotion is done straightforward?

Anyways, that's all for now.
Thanks for reading! Have a nice day ^^