Friday, 21 January 2011


Active Tale

You may be wondering why my title is called (Active Tale). This is how I see it, stepping back a long way to take a really objective view to see what I could see within the websites I studied the two websites for a very long time looking at them side-by-side. They reminded me of a character from the kids cartoon called "The Herbs" cartoon in the 80s. There was a dog-called (Dill). He used to chase his own tail so on one end you had the head which is active and at the rear. You had the tail, which were soft and fluffy. Therefore, this is why I called my title (Active Tale) I know it is in a tale or a story not a dog's tail it is a pun. "Activision" In addition, what I noticed straight away. The site straight in your face guns blazing, trying to pull you in to its world and shaking you with both hands, saying this is our website. Check us out now. This is how the website first grabs you, so hold on with both hands, and take a ride into stocks and shares giving you all the facts and figures of their latest ventures, to the depth of the company who they are and what they are about games films (money & power).

The site itself is colourful impressive and loud this is why I think they chose Transformers as their opening statement saying we are here come look. I did for two hours trawling through endless videos of games, astonishing graphics that grab you and try to control your movement within its realm this is just an objective view of what it looks like. It made me want to run into the living room throw on my PS3 and start battling in a game. It is undeniably a mind tugging website of corporate giants giving you tales of money and success and proud of it. I cannot see where this would not appeal to gaming enthusiasts who love the rough-and-tumble and the heart pounding sound of gunfire blasting and mayhem with no letup. I looked and it made my head want to explode, this would not be dare I say it, everybody cup of tea Okay I did; but the company website seems to be their pulling structure and foundation of what they are about, with a small number of other companies who they worked with. Which just had a small mention a few pictures at the bottom of the page under subheadings? This was like small end credits of the movie you know, this is whom else we worked with. I would say they run a tight ship keeping all their facts and figures close to their main goal of keeping their target audience interested with the occasional side trip to merchandise and sales.

Now to come to the tale soft cute and cuddly for this is how (Tale of Tales) seems just like a Sunday afternoon listening to birds twitter lawnmower, or sitting in a library being told to shush. It was funny the way the front page was more like dark Beatrix Potter book and made a change from smack in the face of Activision. I, am thinking what is your motivation? why would you ever want me to look through your website, but as I did it became more apparent of what there about, paintings, books, drawings, with a bit of Maya Autodesk thrown in, everything in its place under a neat little package heading like some squeaky little voice saying read me, please read me, I am interesting take a look. Therefore, I did for about an hour. There was no music no shelling you with fast moving graphics just still like a statue in a museum. You are bored, but you have to look and I must say I did like their drawings and paintings very bizarre and different. I enjoyed it, and I can see where this site would appeal to maybe a slightly older generation. I am not saying that younger people would not enjoy as much. No, no, no, it is just that I think younger people enjoy the first one Activision it gives them the power.

But what impressed me quite a bit is how many people or other companies they have worked with this seemed to be their main focus, 28 in all, all dedicated on one page. Sandwiched between a header and footer, a nice neat little package, no facts or figures no stocks shares no eye-popping in your face moving graphics just a book, or a trailer for the main feature film, a website. So on the whole there definitely very different but both successful tale of tales for the theatre lovers in us and Activision for a smash and grab or ram raid said, this is just an objective view of how I see the websites standing back (Dill).

Bouncing Ball Animations

This is my first piece of test animation for the bouncing ball done in rough just to get an idea of how it looks. I did this on my light box on Sunday 16/01/2011, started about nine pm, finished at about 12 midnight. I did this just to see the principle of the bouncing ball in motion. I found that hardest frames were the squash and stretch, and looking at a lot of bouncing ball animation, a real ball will not contort this much, but this is classed as exaggeration. Either way, I really enjoyed doing it; it gave me a bit more insight to how animation is so complex, even in its simplicity. I have a long way to go and a lot to learn, as animation is not as easy as it looks. 

                                                                              

I did this just to show all the This 12 Principles of Animation that are associate with moving ball or bouncing ball animation.
I can then keep it in my mind so when I do my animation ball in motion it will help me to do it right. There are a lot of animated moving bouncy ball on the net, some are helpful some are not. Maybe there wrong or just so badly animated.
I did my next piece of animation on photoshop CS5, It took me two weeks to put it together, and i finished it on Saturday 27/01/2011. I did not realize there was so much work that goes into a piece of animated work it's just unreal, but it gives you a whole new look at that side of the business, and makes you think what it really take to be top class. Moreover at the pinnacle of an animated career.
I look at it this way every failure that burns down in flames, a newer I dear grows up throw the ashes.
My piece of animation is entitled, (A Windy Day) it has 250 hands drawn frames with a character sheet, and bouncing ball layout sheet.
In the short clip there is a man walking towards a ball that is bouncing he interrupts the cycle of the ball and make it go off in a different directions with dryer concurrences. So please have a look.

                                                                                     
 

                                                                          
 

 

 My first piece of 3-D animation in a Maya Autodesk was not as easy as it looks to make a ball just simply go up and down and put the key frames of the animation in their right place.

When I first started using Maya Autodesk to do 3-D animation. What inspired me the most? I remember the first piece of footage, where I saw the first use of 3-D animation used within a film.
In 1976, the film was called future world. It was a 3-D moving image of Ed Lasater's right-hand this was the first time a handed had been animated in this way, with a Lambert looking texture and smoothed to eliminate all jagged edges. What a marvellous breakthrough for its time.
3-D animation or any type of moving footage must have perfect form and good workflow to capture the essence of a moving object within an animation.
The first animation problem. I came across in making my first ball was the speed, though this can be adjusted in the graft editor of Maya Autodesk. This is something I need to find more about to have better skills in animation.
In my second piece of ball animation. The speed coming down was fine. This had been sorted and learned from my first piece of animation. The new problem was the up speed. I found the ball going too fast in an upward motion by my second piece of animation. I had learned more about graph editing and breaking tangents within the graph, so I just had to apply that same skill I had learnt and just slightly change the speed in the graft editor going up then after I put the animation together and baked it and then rendered it. I found a pause at the top of the animation with the ball seemed to hover just for a split second so I analysed the key frames for this problem and found that key frame 48 was the same as key frame 1. Therefore, when the animation passed from 1 to 48 and looped back to 1 there was my pause. I eliminated. This by dropping a key frame down to 47. So then key frame 48 would go slightly up from 47. Therefore, 1 would then be coming down. This eliminated the pause. I really enjoyed doing something so simple but yet so technical and there is nothing as perfect as a sphere.
I have applied the same techniques to my bouncing ball with motion the graph editor looked a bit more technical for this bouncing ball sequence. I think to myself sometimes I wish I could be more creative within my writing. I have so much inside and I would like to put down on paper but I am not a journalist or a creative writer. I am more of a realist and just say what i see.
The technology age of 3-D animation is here so you could say artists challenge technology and technology inspires the art, this would be in all of us. There was a group of three men that had the dream of three-dimensional technology long before the technology was available. The founders of Pixar these three people inspire me the most, Ed Catmull, Steve Jobs, John Lasseter.
If anyone is going to be the best in whatever they do, it will all start from here.
For my last bouncing ball animation in my finished piece I have done the best job I can do but as I have said, there is always more to learn. It just takes time and more practice.

The last two in this set are my final Pieces of work on ball animation.

                                                                              

12 Principles of Animation Good and Bad

Squash and Stretch-the spacing of them between frames to achieve stability and timing and movement. The first is a good example. The second is a bad example. They are both light box animation. The first shows a weightlifter trying to lift weights and being squashed. The second is a bouncing ball. The second has the squash and stretch in the wrong place and is of low poor quality animation.

Time and motion spacing action to define the weight and size of objects and the personalities of characters. The first time in motion clip shows a girl and a boy stealing a case and getting a slap in return from the girl the shows time and motion and personality of the characters with weight the second clip has no timing and motion and no way to the characters or defining size of objects.

Anticipation-the preparation for an action. The next two animate clips show a good and bad example of anticipation both clips art light box animation. I think the first clip is of the same origin as the first squash and stretch clip by aniboom anticipation is a face we make when waiting for something to happen next, or anticipation on a new father waiting for his first born in the waiting room of some hospital.

Staging- presenting an idea so that it is unmistakably clear the first clip is a good staging animation of the red balloon and a lead balloon motion it is unmistakably clear that the balloon will float and gravity will take over and eventually touched down after a few seconds of free-floating the lead balloon. On the other hand. It to the ground with a thud. This is also unmistakably clear the second clip is a small string of photos on staging event but it is unmistakably not clear what the purpose was.

Follow-through and overlapping action-the termination of an action and establishing its relationship to the next action. The first clip is a dog to show that his ears and tail are the overlapping action. The motion of the dog moving forward and the tail is lagging behind. The second was under the heading follow-through overlapping action by could not see any overlapping action. It was just a run, cycle, so this was a bad example.

Straight-ahead action and pose-to-pose action. This is defined the two contrasting approaches to the creation of movement. I could only find one good example I could not find a bad one it has been noted that we did not need to do this one. I thought I would just give one good example.

Slow in and slow out. This next sequence of clips demonstrates the 12 principles of animation.

These clips you will see slow in and slow out in the first clip you will see the animation is faster with less key frames in the middle and in the second clip extra key frames are put in to make the animation flow, allowing it to look more real. When sitting down. This is a short but delightful piece animation

ARC- visual part of an action for a natural movement. Both clips are light box animation first shows a Cat on a swing and a mouse jumping and knocking the cat. This could also go under the heading secondary action. The second clip was under the heading ARC for natural movement but there was nothing natural about so this was a bad example.

Exaggeration- accentuating the essence of an idea via the design and action first clip was under the heading exaggeration piece of Pleistocene and stop motion by somebody poked it with a pen and he smiles. This to me is not an exaggeration. Therefore, this was a bad example. The next examples are still photo shows a man in a funny pose this is a good example of exaggeration.

The next examples in the principles of animation are secondary action. The first shows good follow-through and the feather is the secondary action. The second clip was under the heading of secondary action, it is the wheel from the Mr. Ben going round I could not find any secondary action within the clip, it is a bad secondary action animation.

The next piece of animation in the principles of animation is the appealing factor. The first clip is very appealing to the eye with its use of colours and vibrant background. This clip is from Ringling College of Art and design and created by Jessica Lozano, and is called out of play. The next clip is to show the non-appealing factor. It is a clip of stop motion animation and it lacks any appeal. I did this at home on my camcorder to demonstrate bad animating knowledge. I can just say it did-not have the desired effect I was looking for and just turned out to be funny animation, but still non-appealing.

For my last clip on the 12 principles of animation, it is like a Pixar short movie and shows all of the
12 principles of animation. I have listed them all under headings so this can been seen easily.
This clip is by aniboom, and is a exultant piece of animation, aniboom has a big following on the net
For his work so please, enjoy.

This is my first piece of test animation for the bouncing ball done in rough just to get an idea of how it looks. I did this on my light box on Sunday 10/012011, started about nine (pm) finished at about 12 midnight. I did this just to see the principle of the bouncing ball in motion. I found that the key frames were the squash and stretch, and looking at a lot of bouncing ball animation does a real ball, contort this much, this is classed as exaggeration. Either way, I really enjoyed doing it; it gave me a bit more insight to how animation is so complex, even in its simplicity. I have a long way to go and a lot to learn, as animation is not as easy as it looks.

All animation used in this blog are QuickTime H264.

LIFE DRAWING

                                                                              

Life drawing. This is probably the most important piece of knowledge in any animators Arsenal. This will help define characters in motion and character building for your cartoons or any type of drawing for everything in life has some motion up and down side to side in and out, round and round swaying jerking for movement is just another form of character expression.
Life drawing can help you in so many ways as any great artists will tell you it is a must for body form work and proportion because if a body is out of proportion it just doesn't look right. This is where life drawing will help you hone your skills and not just in drawing but in character building.
For myself this will play a big part in my studies, no matter how good you think you are there is always someone better and this will reflect within your drawing your skills as an artist, as I said in any form of drawing, in the book illusions of life Disney animation life drawing is a forefront for their artists and a skill in itself also research is a must and it is seldom the case that ideas and style comes from one person, but a whole host of people doing research rather than just drawing and is said to be one of the most rewarding parts of any project. It helps you hone in on all aspects of the field of animation, not just one part, many of us will research books to teach us the secrets of animation so we can become instant success. Unfortunately, the craft cannot just be learnt by reading books. This is where researching all areas and keeps pushing forward to a time where we ourselves will become the best. We can be in our field or area. We decided and push to carry on the tradition and elevate animation to an even higher level of excellence. This will be the goal of any animator so a new art form can be born my art is Inspired by a lot of artists on the net today.

                                                                              

25,000 years ago in caves of south-western Europe men drew drawings of animals being hunted by man, also the drawings have an inner life combined with a suggestion of movement but none can do more than suggest what happens just before, or what happens just after a particular movement has passed, these would be key animations with the lack of understanding that what happens in between. So starting with key animation and the progression of drawings to the next key animation. This gives you flowing art and the illusion of movement and would admit a spark of life in the animation, what an amazing art form animation truly is we appreciate it in all its guises and it forms a new relationship in all, and this to me is an unequalled challenge in art and just as much a mystery as ever before. Sometimes I get it and sometimes I don't. I wish I knew then I do it more often. Animation is not just a single track it is not just the timing or just a well-drawn character but the sum of all the factors put together to create a stunning illusion that gives any animation the magical ability to wow audiences, so life drawing to me will help me achieve my goals in whatever field I may choose.

In my next drawing, I tried different ways of setting out my work to make it a bit special not just a drawing.

Inspired by Joanna Quinnan artist that would spend her time getting her friends to repeat all their actions just so that she could see them in motion.

It has been done many times in drawings so I tried something ells to see if I could get a different result.

So I did my next drawing by folding it many times into the centre by using perspective view, and desaturated

all the colour out of it at first, then putting pinks, and blues to just see what would happen to it from just a pencil drawing to something ells.

It had a strange effect but something was there, I let people see this just to get a reaction, always the same one" WOW its 3D in a drawing" so I left it like this.

This next drawing was inspired by the artist Bill Plympton how's work was not realized untill later.

It is the way of thing many artists never are recognized until late in life some have to die before they are famous.

Bill Plympton has a style of his own without restraints and an excellent use of colour.

He did an animated film upside-down when he was still a student but got nowhere with it until late in his career.

My super hero is lowed and users his voice to shatters things, trying to keep to plane colours with-in my drawing and no symbols.

The characters is named (VOICE)

The next two drawings are from life drawing class, and a depiction of are subject with no colour just the use of highlights.

This makes parts of the body stand out without actually being there.

I enjoy all of the life drawings because it will make me a more efficient artist, and there is nothing like drawing the human form in it pure state.

Creating my own Animation Light Box

We had no contextual studies on Friday so I decided to make my own animation light box instead of buying one. I made it for £40 and it took me about 7 hours and its three times bigger than the normal costing £65, I made it from vermiculite and soft pine double sided hardboard and a piece a quarter inch Perspex that I had lying in my shed.  I brought some electrical cable three light fittings and three energy-saving bulbs I first cut and put the box together, followed by the mounting of the light fixings themselves and cutting lengths of electrical cable, I wired it on three sides of the box and on the base.  I placed double sided tape with two links of tinfoil to give it extra illumination it works great.  It plugs straight into 240 V .  I will put in a series of pictures to show how this was achieved now I'm hoping to do some real good animation.

As you can see from the last pictures it works well, and I'm looking forward to using it. If you make one of your own make sure you no what you are doing with the electric side of things.

Amazing pieces of Animation and Art and Bad Animation

Good and bad animation, here is an example of good facial animation provided by image metrics facial animation.  This started in England by Gareth Edwards , Kevin Walker and Alan Brett's they first got together at Oxford University and using their knowledge in mathematics.  This was a starting point, for as a real human face is made up of thousands of different colours.  Each one of these is a mathematical starting point.  The difference between motion capture or mo cap for short.  This involved placing hundreds of little balls or points of reference on the human face.  Then, using special cameras they were able to capture human expressions but not of  a high quality like image metric, motion capture seems to have lost on facial expressions and losers definition. But image metrics were able to do this by using raw video and put through a series of processors using each one of the different colours on the face as a reference for mathematical problem.  They later called this crazy maths or magic maths and this was a breakthrough in light scanning technology, which was broken down into hundreds a different coloured pixels.  The raw video of the actor/facial expressions was broken down into algorithms and analysed over a long period of time and after the process was finished.  This was then put to a digital puppet, which sent games, TV and films years into the future with this technology here is an example of a good facial image metrics animation.

 The next animation clips are considered to be some of the worst animation on the net with this consent of their creators.  I can now show you some of their work.  With this in mind, consider there is no bad animation only bad animators in whatever field of animation that people decide to do.  I believe that you should thoroughly explore the field that you wish to pursue this could be stop motion animation sketchbook animation CGI films or TV.  All these areas should be explored and researched thoroughly for as I said there is no bad animation only the people who haven't researched their field probably to get the best of their animation.  Some of these clips were starting points for the people who create them.  Some of them are still doing the same thing we have all got to start somewhere in whatever field you pursue.  So here are the short clips put together into one just to compare what people have created in their first endeavours to become animators.

The next piece of good animation was created by a Russian artist entirely on transparent celluloid by painting the pictures on different layers and combining them to make a finished product.  It is said that she is one of the forerunners in a field and watching several of her videos of animation.  I can see why.  The animation.  She has created is amazing, as this was all done by hand.  The Russian animators name is Norshteyn's, and the clip is called Good Night Children.  She had so many stunning animation productions.  It was hard to choose.  But I chose this one for its warm vibrant colours and it puts me in mind of an old Beatrix Potter book.  So as you watch.  Just remember, this was all done by hand and is one of the finest pieces of sketchbook animation  I have seen on the net.

The next piece of good animation is by Michael Stevenson, this is stop motion animation a short clip by aniboom entitled Pigeon Pilfer this was all done with plasticine.  It is very well presented and has some good facial expression, movement I went through 35 of his animations, but this one stood out as a good piece of stop motion animation very simple but effective in its simplicity to catch the eye.  There are so many good animation people out there that it's a wonder some of these people don't get together and form their own company.  For sure if they got together they could create really stunning work that people would want to watch.