Sunday, May 11, 2014
REFLECTION
ACM 216 has taught me a lot of useful things and has expanded my knowledge of how animations are made and the process of making an animated film or short. Although it was a little intimidating at first but with the variety of readings that explained in depth of the seven principles: Arcs, Timing, Squash and Stretch, Reversal of Curves, Successive Breaking of Joints, Anticipation/Secondary Motion, and Overlapping Action, I was able to grasp a better understanding as to what made animated films as effective and entertaining to the audience no matter how many times one watches it. By taking this course, I have learned more about 2D animation and now have a better understanding how 2D animations are made and the amount of work that goes into it, it makes me appreciate 2D animation more. Through the various assignments such as the 360 degree rotating head, bouncing can, bouncing ball, and etc. I was able to apply these principles and was able to get hands on experience on how things were done and not just read about how they are done and also being able to receive feedback on my work was really helpful and it allowed me to understand what my strengths and weaknesses are and how to better myself. The readings were also useful because they not only provided step by step instructions on what needed to be done but also background information and I got to learn more about the history of the animation industry. By taking this course, I not only learned the skills needed to be a successful animator but I also got to learn some of animation's background. This class also scratched the surface of 3D animation of walking, blend shapes, and puppet binding, which helped me a lot with understanding how Maya and 3D animation works because ACM 215 mostly taught us how to create a 3D character in Maya. Overall this class has taught me a lot of useful skills that I will help me in the animation industry and I will continue to practice and work on during the summer and in the future.
Monday, May 5, 2014
Monday, April 21, 2014
Write-Up #3
The four readings that helped me with my animations were:
1) WalkHandout helped me with the recent assignment of animating 2D walk cycle. It provided me with information of how to approach the walk cycle assignment by having pictures that explained the walk cycle of a character. This handout had pictures depicting what legs should look like as the character lifted up its feet as it began to walk. There was also a good example of Grumpy's walk cycle which helped me understand how a good walk cycle is created and I used this example as a reference when doing my 2D walk cycle assignment. This handout is also very useful because I can refer back to it when doing my 3D maya walk cycle also!
2) Ollie_johnston_notes reading was also very useful. It explained the process of creating a character. This reading talked about things such as planning out what exactly you want your character to be like hence "illustrate ideas or thoughts, with the attitudes or actions." This article gave me a lot of information on what to do and what not to do when creating a character sketch such as picture in our head on what you want to draw, everything has a function and do not draw without knowing why. There was also a section in this reading that had questions I should ask myself before drawing and putting something on paper which I find useful because I tend to not think thoroughly enough to expand my scattered thoughts and ideas. This reading is something that will help me with future animations and the upcoming animated scene assignment.
3) DanStpsAnimScn reading is very descriptive on what is needed to be done for the upcoming assignment of animating a scene of your choice. This reading provided step by step instructions on what needed to be done in order to create a powerful and worth watching animated scene. This reading talked about things such as planning the scene by storyboarding everything first and planning staging and such. After you have your idea you then draw thumbnails for the key scenes. Once that's done you can then do rough drawings of the scenes and once you're satisfied with what you have, you can then add in the overlapping and shoot a timing test and then clean up your drawings and shoot another test. This reading provided a basis for what I need to do in order to create a good animated scene.
4) FrankOllieStepsInAnimatingScene reading provided me with lots of information of animation and the process animators go through to create a scene to the best of their abilities. Although you have an idea for a specific scene, there is always a better way to execute the scene so it is better to brainstorm all your ideas out. This reading also explained what a supervising animator does. They are responsible for the work done by the people who work under them. If there is a rookie amongst them, the supervising animator will help the rookie in order to help produce satisfactory work. This reading also talked about what an animator does. An animator is in a way an actor. Whether the animator may be quiet, introverted, or quiet, these traits melt away as they work on their character. This reading explained some of the different roles in the animation fiel and it also explained perspective and staging a character. For perspective and staging, there were pictures provided explaining how perspective makes a big difference in your animation. There were example pictures provided of Captain Hook from Peter Pan. This reading not only provided me with a lot of information of animators and what they do, it also taught me more about perspective and how sometimes your first idea may not be the best idea. With the information provided by this reading, I have a clearer idea of how I will tackle the 2D scene assignment.
1) WalkHandout helped me with the recent assignment of animating 2D walk cycle. It provided me with information of how to approach the walk cycle assignment by having pictures that explained the walk cycle of a character. This handout had pictures depicting what legs should look like as the character lifted up its feet as it began to walk. There was also a good example of Grumpy's walk cycle which helped me understand how a good walk cycle is created and I used this example as a reference when doing my 2D walk cycle assignment. This handout is also very useful because I can refer back to it when doing my 3D maya walk cycle also!
2) Ollie_johnston_notes reading was also very useful. It explained the process of creating a character. This reading talked about things such as planning out what exactly you want your character to be like hence "illustrate ideas or thoughts, with the attitudes or actions." This article gave me a lot of information on what to do and what not to do when creating a character sketch such as picture in our head on what you want to draw, everything has a function and do not draw without knowing why. There was also a section in this reading that had questions I should ask myself before drawing and putting something on paper which I find useful because I tend to not think thoroughly enough to expand my scattered thoughts and ideas. This reading is something that will help me with future animations and the upcoming animated scene assignment.
3) DanStpsAnimScn reading is very descriptive on what is needed to be done for the upcoming assignment of animating a scene of your choice. This reading provided step by step instructions on what needed to be done in order to create a powerful and worth watching animated scene. This reading talked about things such as planning the scene by storyboarding everything first and planning staging and such. After you have your idea you then draw thumbnails for the key scenes. Once that's done you can then do rough drawings of the scenes and once you're satisfied with what you have, you can then add in the overlapping and shoot a timing test and then clean up your drawings and shoot another test. This reading provided a basis for what I need to do in order to create a good animated scene.
4) FrankOllieStepsInAnimatingScene reading provided me with lots of information of animation and the process animators go through to create a scene to the best of their abilities. Although you have an idea for a specific scene, there is always a better way to execute the scene so it is better to brainstorm all your ideas out. This reading also explained what a supervising animator does. They are responsible for the work done by the people who work under them. If there is a rookie amongst them, the supervising animator will help the rookie in order to help produce satisfactory work. This reading also talked about what an animator does. An animator is in a way an actor. Whether the animator may be quiet, introverted, or quiet, these traits melt away as they work on their character. This reading explained some of the different roles in the animation fiel and it also explained perspective and staging a character. For perspective and staging, there were pictures provided explaining how perspective makes a big difference in your animation. There were example pictures provided of Captain Hook from Peter Pan. This reading not only provided me with a lot of information of animators and what they do, it also taught me more about perspective and how sometimes your first idea may not be the best idea. With the information provided by this reading, I have a clearer idea of how I will tackle the 2D scene assignment.
Monday, April 14, 2014
Monday, March 17, 2014
Write-Up #2
The four readings that helped me a lot with my animation assignments were:
1) The GlenHandout1 reading helped me a lot because the reading was about "the ideal animator." There was a list of things to keep in mind for animating, things such as "don't animate for the sake of animating." This reading helped me out because it highlighted important things you needed to do as an animator such as committing to an idea, using techniques such as squash and stretch, and etc. This reading was very insightful and gave me a lot of things to think about when doing my assignments.
2) ElEnt7_Anticipation was about the importance of staging and anticipation. It discussed things such as how animators have a certain allotted amount of time to get their message across to the audience, therefore things have to be well staged and the message should be clearly and quickly stated. The reading also stated things such as how your animation should go hand in hand with the camera movement that allows the camera movement to provide perspective and dramatic effects to your animation. This reading helped me with the anticipation assignment a bit because it helped me figure out how to stage my character by showing only what was needed and not doing anything extra that distracts from the overall point of the assignment which was to show anticipation.
3) GlnWhyAnimate reading discussed things such as anticipation, had questions I should ask myself when I animating that I would never have thought to even consider. Questions the reading said I should consider were thing such as: do I care about the characters? what does our character feel about himself? and etc. This reading helped a lot with the anticipation assignment because I did not fully grasp the whole anticipation assignment and this article helped a lot because it explained anticipation a lot more and gave me tips on what to do and what not to do.
4) ElEnt6_Timing reading discussed a variety of things ranging from anticipation to timing to rhythm and even reversal of curves. In this reading, it talked about the importance of each of these things and why they're needed in animation and what their importance is. This reading helped me grasp a better understanding of each of these topics by providing examples and why they're so important in animating. This article helped me a lot with the anticipation assignment because there was a long explanation on animation and how animation would look clumsy and awkward without including anticipation. This reading also helped me with the head turn assignment because of the portion of the reading where it talked about timing and how long we want to space the drawings and what kind of drawings should be included to give the overall animation a good flow to it.
1) The GlenHandout1 reading helped me a lot because the reading was about "the ideal animator." There was a list of things to keep in mind for animating, things such as "don't animate for the sake of animating." This reading helped me out because it highlighted important things you needed to do as an animator such as committing to an idea, using techniques such as squash and stretch, and etc. This reading was very insightful and gave me a lot of things to think about when doing my assignments.
2) ElEnt7_Anticipation was about the importance of staging and anticipation. It discussed things such as how animators have a certain allotted amount of time to get their message across to the audience, therefore things have to be well staged and the message should be clearly and quickly stated. The reading also stated things such as how your animation should go hand in hand with the camera movement that allows the camera movement to provide perspective and dramatic effects to your animation. This reading helped me with the anticipation assignment a bit because it helped me figure out how to stage my character by showing only what was needed and not doing anything extra that distracts from the overall point of the assignment which was to show anticipation.
3) GlnWhyAnimate reading discussed things such as anticipation, had questions I should ask myself when I animating that I would never have thought to even consider. Questions the reading said I should consider were thing such as: do I care about the characters? what does our character feel about himself? and etc. This reading helped a lot with the anticipation assignment because I did not fully grasp the whole anticipation assignment and this article helped a lot because it explained anticipation a lot more and gave me tips on what to do and what not to do.
4) ElEnt6_Timing reading discussed a variety of things ranging from anticipation to timing to rhythm and even reversal of curves. In this reading, it talked about the importance of each of these things and why they're needed in animation and what their importance is. This reading helped me grasp a better understanding of each of these topics by providing examples and why they're so important in animating. This article helped me a lot with the anticipation assignment because there was a long explanation on animation and how animation would look clumsy and awkward without including anticipation. This reading also helped me with the head turn assignment because of the portion of the reading where it talked about timing and how long we want to space the drawings and what kind of drawings should be included to give the overall animation a good flow to it.
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