AM Class 3 Weeks 3 + 4: Inbetween

Here's my submitted Shot for week 4.

What I learned: 

#1: Don't wait to press on in the assignement. 

Waiting for direction from my mentor stopped me from working Sunday through Tuesday. That's half my work week.

I could have gotten much more done if I had been bold enough to do what I knew needed to be done.

#2: Working with props? Plan accordingly. 

- The box I was working with was merely posed in place during Blocking and Blocking plus. As soon as I began the transition into linear and splined curves the box began to show a life of it's own.

That's when I chose to constrain the box to a hand. This late choice took up most of my polishing time, and could have been prepared earlier if I had made that transition earlier; say after Blocking with story telling poses. 

#3: Tween Key is a tremendously helpful tool.

- Tween Key takes two neighboring key poses and invents a new key directly in between those first two. Allows a much quicker work flow. One thing I did overlook using the Tween Key was the definition in the feet. 

#4: Blocking Plus is the time to define the feet hands, pathways and arcs. 

- Instead of blindly in betweening keys it would have been more productive to analyze where those breakdowns were most needed to clarify the movement. 

Below are the earlier versions of my Box lift shot.

above: submitted week 3 Blocking Plus
below: Mid week Blocking Plus-Plus

And now for my 2nd Class 3 shot!...

Planning for next week: JUMP SHOT

Video Reference:

Thumbnails (Story telling poses)

More Thumbnails with a Shot layout image and costume description. 

Just for fun I traced the arcs during the fancy jump. Note the figure eight in the extending arm. 

Learned: Red Markers are the toughest to clean off my screen. 

Fun stuff in store this week. 

I'm excited for this shot, but still trying to find the balance with my current work load outside of animation.

Footloose the Musical is in full swing and is going very well. Now that we're in show mode there are less rehearsals and more time to animate. 

My Critical thinking Summer school class is also in full swing and expanding in the work load. This is the first class I can recall having to write a 10 page paper for. Love the content of the class. Do wish there was more time to absorb new information. 

My birthday was also this week. Felt lots of love from friends and family. I'm so grateful to have so many loving people in my life who accept me despite my schedule craziness. 

That's all for this week and thanks for stopping by,

--Max