Two of the drawings from last nights class that I liked.
Tag Archives: aau
Checking In
I’ve fallen behind on posting my daily images. I’ve been swamped with homework and by the time I get to my daily image, I’m exhausted and just want to crawl into bed. I’ll likely get those up here later this evening, depending on how my homework for the day goes.
I’ve really been excited by this semester at school. I’m having tons of fun in each class and for the most part I’ve had a lot of interest in my homework assignments. I’ve reached the point with the classes that I’m taking, that I’m doing the sort of projects that I would want to do outside of school. It makes such a huge difference, having that personal involvement and excitement in these projects.
Today I’m working on my family assignment for character design. I have to design two parents and their children. Each child needs to, in some way, look like each parent (similar body type, nose shape/size, eyes, hair type etc). I’m having some difficulty with this assignment, in that it is completely open. The last assignment we did was to take a historical character (I chose Mark Twain) and do a design based of their likeness. That gave me something very specific to work towards. With this current assignment, I’m not sure what I want each character to look like, so the early planning stage is taking me a lot longer than expected. I decided though that I want the family to be space adventurers, it’s a fun subject for me.
Ready set go
Week one of the new semester is behind me and it already looks to be better than all the previous. I ended up dropping down to three classes. Four, along with working, was just too much. I didn’t have enough time to put into my projects and it showed.
Every so often I start to rethink whether or not I’m on the right track at school. When I’m at home, I’m much more likely to draw than anything. Looking back at my 3d origins, I was always into modelling and texturing. So where does animation come in? My thinking was that I had the least experience with animation and based on my research, it was not something I’d easily learn on my own. I also have a desire to bring my characters to life and animation seemed like the way to go.
After my Thursday animation class, Character Development, it was reaffirmed I’m where I want to be. I am so incredibly excited by the projects I’m starting and what I’ll be learning. I am so inspired by my instructors and the experience and knowledge they’re passing along.
I have a decent amount of homework for the first week. I’ll be doing two lipsync animations, one in my 3d class and one in my traditional 2d animation class. I’m very interested to what the similarities and differences will be in both mediums. I have to choose my dialogue for both classes, I’ll be gathering a handful of possible options to bring. I also have to start designing characters for my dialogue and film projects for 2d animation. I already have some of those done for the film, as I’m continuing my Stitched Together project from last semester, but I’d like to flesh out the character some more (and I still need to design the dog).
I have to do four “flour sack” drawings for my clothed figure drawing class. I have to show realistic compression and stretch of the sack. The samples our teacher showed us looked really cool. This project is going to be very helpful for my film, as the main character Elwyn is a sack himself.
Amongst the living
I’ve had a nasty cold this past week and it’s finally losing it’s grip on me. Yay, I am once again amongst the living! About damn time too, having no energy sucks! This has been my last week of vacation as well (before school starts up again) and spending it sick was lame.
I got a new laptop last week, a tablet pc to be specific. I wanted it as a mobile drawing platform and it is performing excellently. I’ll have a follow up post with more specifics.
So yes, school is about to start. I’m excited, but I feel like my break went by way too fast. I didn’t get done nearly as many projects as I had hoped (didn’t touch any animation the entire time, oops!) though I did draw quite a bit, for which I’m happy.
It’s a bit cool today, but I’m sitting in bed with a cup of coffee and sketching on my tablet pc. Warmth, I has it.
2d Animation test
I went into the lab yesterday to start on my pose test for my final project (Intro to Animation 2d). Two hours and 42 drawings later, I had something to show. I didn’t quite finish the pose test, I still need to draw out the last sequence in which the dog springs to life, frolics around and then runs off screen. There are also some sections where I skipped some drawings, such as elwyn entering screen right and sweeping as well as a few of the walk sections.
Some of that was due to time constraints. I wasn’t sure exactly how to approach those sections or exactly how I wanted him to walk. I’d jump to the next section so I could keep the action moving and then I’d approach the walks later.
The timing definitely still needs work, but I like the overall feel. There are some areas where I wanted to have a pause and I just didn’t space out the drawings enough for that to come through (such as when he first checks on the dog. His hand is supposed to hover above the dog for a moment and then he quickly taps it).
So far this is my favorite part of 2d animation, the really rough figuring things out stage. I only have 13 more days until this is due and I imagine I’ll only be in the lab for a handful of said days. Lots to do! I’m hoping to make it in on Sunday, Monday and maybe Tuesday as well. But of course I need to put time into my other projects as well. I’m looking forward to finishing up this semester and having time for my own projects, but I’m having fun.