Class 2 Week 8: Animating is HEAVY business

Hello friends and friends of animation,

Last week was a pretty rough week, and this week it seems I thrive in that kind of pressure.

In this Blog (Index):

- Last weeks E-critique

- This weeks Distractions

- Revision of Dance Shot

- Last minute Panic

- Getting Organized

- New Planning Sketches

- 1st Blocking pass

- 2nd Blocking Pass

- What I learned this week

- New Maya Layout

In my ecritique I was given the advice to focus on reversing curves in this shot. since last week my planning was all very one note:

See.

This is what Scott Lemmer suggested. Like it? I do. : )

So what do I do with this information?...

I sat on it all week and let myself get swept up in other priorities:

1) Directing a scene from Farragut North for school

2) Rehearsals for Footloose the Musical

3) Making time for friends

and

4) Revising my shot from last week.

Scotts notes:

- Tone down the head bobs

- Make the last jump higher.

Course I waited till Saturday to get organized on my new shot, and I realized what was in my way.

I needed to redo my planning.

Now I think "duh!", but before, I felt I could simply change a few poses around. So I go back to my video reference and my keys that I selected (there's like 24 of them), and it also dawns on me how intricate my shot is (five little steps+ hand positioning) It looked super simple but to include every high, and low, of the hips, and each foot, and the head would take me more time and organization then I had given myself. 

So I made a list:

4:30-5:30: redraw Planning

5:31-6:30: Block Poses

6:31-7:30: Timing Pass

7:31-8:30: Dinner

8:31-9:30: Refine/ Fill in Poses and Timing

-After this I will always make a schedule before diving into work-

Here is my new Planning sketches:

That's it; one page, seven poses. 

Much more efficient and appealing then the 3 page- 24 pose- same curve planning from last week. 

What's more, I like the results.

Here's my Shot after an hour of Posing, and an hour for Timing: 

After dinner I was able to go back with fresh eyes, and refined by adding a few anticipation poses (and changing the background to a warm olive green):

This week I learned:

- It's okay to back track

- Good planning makes a good shot

- Schedule your time to get the most out of it.

- Always draw over planning sketches in dark pen if you want it to show in the picture.

- Variation is appealing

- Sometimes in Planning and Blocking "less is more."

- For me, putting aside 2-3 solid hours for work is better than 6 days of scattered work time.

I also found a layout that worked for me:

Left Camera:

-"Shot camera"

- Locked

- Curves are hidden

- Grey Frame

-Info Bar

Right Camera:

- "Work Camera"

- Movable

- Visible curve.

- Where I make all the pose adjustments.

When I get into animation I'll open up a third panel on the bottom for the graph editor.

Thanks for reading,

Looking forward to next week,

--Max

Class 2: Week 5, 6, & 7 "Dancin' Fever"

Ok, so our second assignment for class two is now complete.

Here you can see the evolution of my Dancing Fever shot.

Week 7: Final

Week 6 Blocking Plus

Week 5: Blocking

What I learned this Assignment.

Have faith in your shot, and keep moving forward.

- In the last week of the shot I was feeling done with my shot, and not because I'd done as much as I could do, but rather because I was overwhelmed by all the things I had to do. Thinking of my shot was painful. I felt that nothing I did would make a big difference and that the mistakes I'd made were deeply rooted in the basic steps. I resolved to simply do the minimum. Address the notes from last weeks ecritique and turn it in popping and jittering. Take as low a grade as I've ever gotten, and get started on my next shot. However the  guilt and shame I felt abandoning my shot like that hurt more then the weight of fixing it would be. So I dig down deep and did what I could. It's not perfect but I made it and I didn't give up. That's something to be proud of. 

Exaggerate, what you see.

- My notes for the first and second weeks had a lot of the same critiques:

---Exaggerate, the up and downs (Y translation)

---Exaggerate the curves of the torso

---Go higher

---Go farther to the side.

-I'll continue working on creating strong and appealing exaggeration. 

Smooth arcs make a Big difference.

- One of the things I got in my ecritique was to address a specific arc. Once that was addressed I continued to do a whole "Arc Pass" of the shot. That and addressing all the foot planting, and graph overshoot. Those simple steps took my shot to a whole new level and were so worth it in the end.

If you want to make an "S" curved pose keep the torso in a "C" curve, using the head and legs to make the "S" rather then snaking the body.
-Honestly I'm glad I got this note from my mentor, the movement looks much more natural and organic. Also I want to remember that snaking the body though not always appropriate had great appeal to me while I had it in the shot, and I will keep that in my tool belt as well as Scott's tool of Torso C.

Planning starts with an idea.

-Getting started on my next shot, a Heavy box pull, I did the most logical thing for a student to do. I turned on a camera and started filming myslef pushing some chairs without a clue as to what I actually wanted to do. Of course once I got that on the computer and started to analyse it, it was clear that the reference I had shot was bland and sloppy. Recognizing this, I decided to make a three word story arc, 

"Assess"

"Attack"

"Re-assess"

this would illustrate how I wanted to film my reference, and gave me a basic framework for how to approach the shot and build an entertaining story. 

That video reference was much better and funner to film. However once I got that to the computer, I found all my passes were to long in terms of frame rate. (I was mistaken thinking the shot was 100-200 frames when it's 100-250) So, I went to youtube and found a great video to reference instead. 

- Still planning out a shot on paper before getting up and "doing" it will be a huge part of my process I'm sure.

Here's My planning for Next Weeks Shot: "Heavy Pull"

And here's the reference video I found on youtube.

and here's the sight were I got the tools to download youtube videos, and convert them into quicktime.Youtube Downloader

In the spirit of not giving up I was up till 3am Saturday night/ Sunday morning just to get this work done.

(Of course if I'd planned ahead that wouldn't have been necessary) ; )

Completing this dance shot has given me a renewed sense of pride and achievement and a renewed sense of humility. I plan to keep the box pull simple and of a high quality. 

Thanks for stopping by, and I'll talk to you soon. : )

--Max