Monday, November 4, 2013

Staying Inspired

I just found a couple of new ways to keep myself inspired.  I forced myself into a couple of new classes.  Lucky for me they were free of charge.  What currently has my interest is the new project I decided to take on.  I wrote a short idea.  Not really considered a complete story (in my opinion), but I think the idea is fun and can still make for an interesting ten seconds of animation or so.  Not to mention, the idea in my head is slightly above my skill set.  The title of the short animation is called "Stand Back."  It's an idea I came up with one day just before I headed to work.  Here's a link to the short story I wrote (Stand Back).

I know, I know I have a hard time finishing projects.  I think that doing this with my free time will help change that.  I know when I was in school I had the motivation to finish my assignments because of the weight each one carried.  That being the deadlines, the urge to impress my classmates and teacher, and the high cost of each class.  So now I believe that I'll have deadlines to keep and goals to maintain.

Saturday, September 7, 2013

Portrait Study

A couple of days ago I finished another portrait study.  I think it turned out alright.  I really want to say that I've done enough of these that I can create a character from the top of my head with out relying heavily on reference photos.

I know that I have to work on facial features a little more and the hair of in the portrait can get difficult to recreate.

Here is the latest portrait study...

(Click on it to enlarge)

Monday, September 2, 2013

Study, Study, Study

I've been trying to learn how to model, rig, and animate my own character for a long time now.  It's been a lot of self training.  Thankfully there is a lot of material online.  Work takes up a lot of my time so learning has been taking a lot longer than I want it to.

One thing I know for sure is I can't wait until I know enough to fully create a character without having to worry about learning the process of making one.  WORKFLOW, that's something that I'm trying to create and memorize.  Once I have my own process down I think can produce a lot of work.

I think that level of knowledge will give me the confidence to start and finish more and more personal projects.  Hopefully after that I can get a job and ultimately be where I want to be.  I want to do this stuff full time.  Working with a studio is the main goal.

Sunday, August 4, 2013

The last few weeks have been really interesting.  I've been studying character rigging from two different sources.  It's been going well.  Because of the lack in time I'm having a hard time picking projects to do.  So what I did decide to do is work on studying the books that I have had sitting in my collection and has only been collecting dust.  The only problem that I have with that is this makes me want to study other things.  I've realized that I have a little bit of an issue with focusing on one thing for too long.  Either way I did a quick video showing what I have learned so far with rigging the spine and a "free hip" setup.  The spine has the ability to turn on and off stretching.  I went through the step by step on this setup about four or five times and then I looked through the user manual on the program to fully comprehend every component used.

When I created the demonstration on the short video I came across a new issue with the clusters used to controls the spine.  I did manage to find a work around in the issue.  I'm just hoping that the next time I open up the file it will stick.

Here is what I have learned so far.  Next is working with arm; scapula deformations, clavicle rotations, and wrist and forearm twist.


Wednesday, April 17, 2013

Animation Compilation

I think I've said this a few times now, but either way here I say it again.  I had a lot of fun being apart of the "Video Game Animation" workshop.  In the last week or so I put together some new renders of each animation, at a higher resolution, with lights and shadows included.

Now that the course is over I'm trying to find new material to study from.  I picked up a couple of new books to study from.  One of them is on motion and mechanics and the other is all about creative writing.  The creative writing book is really interesting, but I'm not an amazing writer.  Either way I'm going to try and write a few short stories.  If I like any of them I'm going to make a couple of small scripts and eventually create my first animated short.

Here is a better look at all of my animations from the Video Game Animation workshop.


Friday, March 29, 2013

Second Assignment

Kind of a late look into the second week.  Since week three is almost over.  Week two was about transitions.  I worked on a character's death animation.  The animation evolved in a couple of different stages.  I did my first couple of passes on the animation and then showed my progress to the course instructor, Kyle Kenworthy.  He helped me see others points that really helped make the shot look better.

I thought that it would be fun to attempt a character from an action genre.  So I chose a ninja character.  The idea is that the character is struck with the final blow, which sends him flying.  Once he's hit his body spins out of control, flies backwards and lands hard on the ground behind him.




I'm still planning on coming back to the animation after the course is over and finalizing the hand.

Friday, March 22, 2013

First Assignment

I'm really loving this new animation workshop that I'm in.  I think what I like the most is just being around other people who enjoy animation.  Last week's assignment was on cycles; walk cycles and runs cycles.  Everyone in the workshop had different character in their walks and runs.  Some were more realistic and others were in a cartoon style.


At the end I animated my character to wave to the screen, which doesn't really work for game animation.  Lesson learned, Lol.  It was still fun to do.

Here's what I came up with in week 1.

















Friday, March 15, 2013

Class

My new class started this week.  Which is awesome!!!  The only issue I have right now is timing.  My job would decided to work us for 50 hours a week, this week and next.  It's proving to be a little difficult to find the time to work on my animation.  I'll have to show my first weeks assignments here soon.  The assignment for this week is a walk cycle and a run cycle.  The work flow that is used in this weeks lesson is completely new to me, but I really like it.  Hopefully it won't be much more time for me to finish my first pass on the walk.  I'm thinking of keeping it completely generic for now and then add some interest after I get the "final" mark on the basics.

Thursday, February 21, 2013

New Class

Next month I'm starting a new class in game animation.  I enrolled a couple of days ago.  I can't wait to meet new people with similar interests as my own, and meet the teacher.  I watched his 2012 animation reel and a few other shorts, at the end my jaw was on the ground.

March 12th can't come fast enough.

Thursday, January 17, 2013

Post CG Challenge

The last month and a half or so has been pretty tough.  Everyone in my family got sick at one point or another.  My entry got absolutely no attention during this time.  The deadline has already passed and I didn't get to finish.  So now I'm wondering if I should really put any more effort into completing the short.  I know that there are a few things that I still have to learn in order to actually complete an animated short.  Such as rigging a character for animation.  This project has been teaching me how to do the things that I'm not 100% familiar with.  On that note,  I think that the education that I'm receiving during all of this is enough to complete the short.

I know for sure that I'm going to finish teaching myself an efficient rigging process.  I just don't know if I want to continue working out the kinks with this project or start a new one.  I guess we'll see what I decide once I feel more comfortable with rigging and skinning a character.