Final Edit

Better late than never....Reference footage for Artefacts

Artefact 1:
I chose a number of different scenarios to reference here as I wasn't sure which one would work best in animation




Artefact 2:
This one was hard to see if you would actually stop, stand still, turn as you're walking if someone calls your name, especially when you know whats going on! I think the last take got it....


Artefact 3:
Such an exaggerated dialogue...it was difficult to seem realistic!


Artefact 4:
There is an actual fall in in one of the takes....Can't get much more realistic than that!!


Artefact 5:
Definitely works better in an animation...

Client Project - Animatic

Client Project Animatic from Hannah Gregory on Vimeo.

Client Project - EDIT 2

Client Project - EDIT 2 from Hannah Gregory on Vimeo.

Client Project Full Render TEST

I presented this today and recieved some good feedback. Generally it works quite well, although there are a dew minor lip syncing errors that I need to refine better. I think a lot of it could be exaggerated more, especially in her facial animation, just to emphasise the scenes where not a lot is happening. Also I need to credit the morpheus rig in my next test render.

Test render of client project edited so far...

Artefact 5 Evaluation - Creating believable characters through the key principles of animation : Anticipation, Secondary Action, Exaggeration & Timing

My fifth artefact concentrated on a combination of each principle that I have previously researched and experimented. Therefore I had to consider Anticipation, Secondary Action, Exaggeration and Timing. Although generally the principles of animation are not used individually, I attempted to show each of these clearly within this artefact. I animated this artefact to another sound clip from 11second club.
Anticipation is awaiting and predicting the next movement. As the character first rolls in shot on a chair, he is not facing the camera. I felt the anticipation was used here, as we are anticipating when he turns to directly face the camera. Anticipation was also used at the end, where his head leans towards the other chair, his head moves backwards before leaning forwards. Bearing in mind what I had learnt from the research project, anticipation is best used with a backwards movement prior to a forward movement. However, after presenting this, feedback suggested anticipation was the least obvious principle. Therefore to enhance this principle in my artefact, I am going to make these movements more noticeable.
Secondary action adds more life to a scene. To show this principle, I had my character sit on a chair throughout the animation. The leaning back and spinning of the chair was the secondary action that was used to make the animation more realistic, without overpowering the primary actions of his body and facial animation.
Exaggeration is used to emphasise an action. Throughout the whole of this animation I exaggerated most movements and facial expressions. This worked well, especially considering the dialogue used.
Finally timing establishes a characters mood, emotion and reaction to something. Timing was used when animating with the dialogue. For example, when the dialogue was sharp and blunt, so was the characters head movement. Feedback from this artefact overall suggested that the animation captured the point of what I have been researching well and that it ran smoothly.

Run through of cameron

This is the entire animation run through of the second character. Next one up should be edited in with the first!

Brainwave

I been meaning to change the skin and eyes for cameron and I just remembered how to do it! This looks more like her...

Squirrel!?

Animating Cameron!

So I have started to refine my second character, who I am calling Cameron to make it easier, as she plays this character in this film. I've used Camtasia again for now to show what I have done for quickness, so again there are parts where she won't be doing anything, but this is where I will edit in the other character speaking. I will render out more of what I have done properly tomorrow to show in tutor on Thursday what I have been doing.

Artefact 5

This artefact is a combination of all the principles of animation that I have been researching and studying in my research project. These are: Anticipation, Secondary Action, Exaggeration and Timing.

Refining the eyes

I've noticed I haven't animated the eyes as much as I should. The eyes are what I believe give away the emotion and mood being portrayed. I will refine the entire clip eventually but this is a quick test of refining the eyes/brows and seeing the believability in the character.

Reference Film

Ok so this is just a rough reference film of my client project. I have been using the clip from youtube as my reference, but a lot of it you are unable to see when the film cuts to the other character whilst the main character is still speaking. I will be editing my final clip slightly differently so therefore needed another reference clip for me to be able to animate. It's obviously not entirely accurate, but there are a lot of natural movements that Charlotte has portrayed in this film that have actually really helped. As a lot of the youtube clip the main character is standing still, in an animation is doesn't make it seem realistic. So such things as adding a hand on the hip for example definitely adds more life.

Refining Test

I think I could tweak and refine animation forever. The more I play it back the more I can keep changing. So I know this will be refined even more, but just to show a small part of some changes made and the bigger impact it makes. Just with a few small hand gestures and eye blinks and squints, it automatically give the scene more life, making it more realistic.

Camatasia

Due to having no editing software to render out my client project to see the progress being made, I remembered reading about CamStudio on someone's blog - a software that records your desktop to show your work which saves any rendering time. I couldn't get this to work, not sure if it works on macs or not so had a little browse and came across Camatasia. I've got a free trial at the moment to see how easy it is to use. I've found it really useful and it comes with some useful tutorials. You can add all sorts of effects, animations, transitions, annotations and play around with cursor, audio and video FX. Don't really need to experiment with those for the purpose of what I am doing but nevertheless is a very good software. 

So, this is a recording of my client project. Obviously this isn't the finished product, as I will be using cameras and editing in the other character so in places my character may look like she's not doing anything but they will be the places where the other character is speaking. Also as this isn't finalised, this will be very much refined throughout all of it when its finished.

Premiere Pro FAIL

So a few months ago my Premiere Pro decided to not work any more and have since used different versions on the 30 day free trial download. As I've never downloaded the CS5.5 before I thought I'd download that last night as I have no access to the software as its easter break. Managed to download it successfully late last night and started to import my latest render of my Artefact 5. When I exported this I realised again that the sound was out of sync, and went back to edit this when it then decided to tell me that my free trial had now expired. Hmm maybe I have had that version before, pretty sure I haven't but ah well was worth a try. So this is my only test I managed to render before I lost the software, and am fully aware of the syncing issues! I have a few more test renders that are just going to have to wait a few weeks!

Client Project Classroom

Started to add some colour to my scene to so I can start to see what it's going to look like as a final piece. Kept the textures simple, so I didn't want any realistic textures, as they need to tie in with the type of characters I am animating. Quite pleased with it so far but the actual animation and getting that realistic instead is my main priority!