Happy Halloween

I did say I was planning on stalkin' you guys on here right? Well Happy Halloween and eat lots of candy!!

Weekly Comment Woo

This... This was a frustrating week... I have fallen behind and it stinks. I'm stuck on my diving board still and I have resorted to making a ninja the looks like he is made out of cheese. Meanwhile I have to plan out quickly what I'll be doing for the bag of flour. Gotta put my thinking cap on. Also I've been busy this weekend creating a bday present for my step dad. I decided to do a picture and frame it. So I took a picture of his from when he recently went to the grand canyon, spruced it up a little and then had it printed out on special paper.

This is the original one, kinda bleak and boring and you can see storm clouds coming in. The view is amazing but I saw a lack of sun and pretty colors, it needed a better vibe to it. 

This is after being edited. I had to ad a whole different sky. I admit, it definitely isn't my best and the little outline by his head is annoying but I couldn't fix it and now it's there to bother me forever. Since my mom also stinks at focusing the camera(you could see in the bigger version because his face was horribly blurry even if it's a background depth of field picture it wasn't a nice blur) So I softened the overall focus to fix that up. I also added uber obvious highlights that I wasn't able to properly smudge and blend because a certain Photoshop was lagging the smudge tool. But this was my bday present for him.

Anyways. If it weren't for me falling behind I would of enjoyed this more. On the upside I got to go on an epic field trip and watched an artist weld. It was pretty epic. I guess it was a pretty decent week though despite my minor issues.

Now... One of my favorite animations I've seen on youtube: 

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rHLwG3ioD4Y

See ya'll tomorrow!

Trick up his... Tie?

Izzy Hyman shares a few tips to people on how to hide a lav microphone. All are similar techniques, but it's where you put them. Lav microphones are annoying to hide and if you're not careful, the audio can be ruined. However, the tricks Izzy performs show us just how easy it can be to fix these problems. All you need is a little bit of tape and some clothing on and you're all set. What he does is tie a loose loop with the cable to create strain relief so the cable does not create vibrations for the microphone to pick up on. Another big issue is clothes rubbing against the microphone. What he does to solve this is fold the tape into a triangle, doing this with two pieces, and sandwich the microphone and keep it in place so it won't rub. After that, it's just a matter of where you hide it. You can hide it under a tie, under the collar, on a bra, or under your top shirt. Of course it all depends on who your Talent is. Some people are allergic to gapher's tape, so a good substitute would be first aid tape.

Though I'm not yet doing anything in filming where I'd need to hide the microphone, this will definitely be something I should remember for next year should this topic come up. It's definitely useful and the comments on the video agree for the most part. I'll keep this in mind for next year.

A Mentor's advice

Nicole Herr, a character animator, answered ten questions in which gave student animators insight on how character animators work as well as how to improve themselves. She explains firstly about herself, how she got into the job, why, and about the actual work. She first really knew what she wanted to do when she watched The Little Mermaid and had sent a message to Disney asking for advice. A Disney Senior animator had called her later and talked to her about it. After she explains the job, she goes into great details about how she decides to animate. First, she decides whether or not the little details are important. If they are for a more realistic project, she will use many details and get references of creatures with similar body types and study them. If it's a more cartoon-like animation, then she'll perform the movement herself and study it. After explaining the processes and steps she takes and the measures she goes to, Nicole gets into explaining what she often finds students doing wrong. Students do no plan well, they tend to over complicate their shots and forget to keep it simple. To fix these problems, Nicole states that you must know who you're animating and their motivations for their actions. One also must know the mechanics of the action, and the easiest way to do that is by doing them yourself. Another great idea would be to ask for others' opinions. Students should also remember that animating is a Team Sport so you need to act as a team. The last question asks Nicole what her dream shot is; she responds by saying it's the next one.


Nicole Herr sounds like an amazing animator with a lot to showcase. She has given great tips on how to go about animating a shot. One thing I can take for this is how she plans out her shots. I tend to give hardly any thought to it and it doesn't come out as well, so I will need to change that. Thank you Nicole for all the tips!

Weekly Life

This week was probably the worst for me-and not because of school but because of my circumstances at home. For one, my parents ditched me and went to the Grand Canyon, those lucky ducks. Secondly, my dog's fence was supposed to be finished on Tuesday and as it still stands-the people forgot about us /again/ and it's not finished. SO I could not leave the dogs outside and almost every day of that week I got to come back home to the mess the dogs made and cleaned it up. Among other issues, this week became stressful for me. In class, one of the hardest projects I faced this week was the wave. Bah, I just couldn't get the tail movement to my liking in the very end, but I did find a way to color eyes to a way more of my liking though I doubt you'll be able to tell. I still need to learn how to shade... It would help if my computer would not freeze up every few minutes and if I could actually practice drawing with my tablet but that still won't work either. Not only that but now it's starting to get jittery on my computer at class which makes it very difficult to get work done.

Some of the good aspects is being able to see everyone's work and getting amazing ideas from them. I've had fun speaking with everybody and though It scared me to have others critique my work it makes me give more thought to my work.

What I really want to learn is to draw scenes and someone please teach me how to shade because I'm hopeless.

Anyways, I don't have much to say about this week as not much happened for me otherwise. Have a great Sunday and see ya'll tomorrow.

Brain Manipulation

This article opens with a description of an intense scene from Iron man 2 to hook readers and get their attention. It then explains the point of speaking of this scene-which would be the experiment that took place. Both filmmakers and scientists are gathered, each sharing their knowledge of this particular subject. Where will the eyes travel? For filmmakers, they used their intuition and experience with audience reactions. They explain how they calculate what they can fake and what must be realistic. Two factors that must be always real to catch the audience's attention and for their brain to "stitch" together what's going; physics and faces. Faces-explains Jon Favreau-are just too hard to copy no matter what you use. The same is with physics. On the other hand, Scientists used experiments and analysis of the information they've gathered. They collected data on 75 people, using a camera to track their eye movement while software created frame-by-frame heat map. When this was looked at, Smith noticed that the red spot closely followed the movement of the eyes. It was found that people paid most attention to the action within the scene(the dueling and the cars bouncing).

I don't find this too interesting as myself, but as both a student learning how to take photographs and as an artist, it helps me get a better understanding of how to draw the eyes to and/or away from certain areas within a photograph or a video. Though, one of the rules in photography(rules of thirds) has already helped me understand how to do something similar to stimulate the viewers. I was able to take only small bits from this and connect it with other rules I've learned.

I wanna be a Rockstar!

In the world of video games, Ian Bowden is one of the most experienced. Formerly an Art director at Rockstar where he'd taken part in making GTA, Ian Bowden moved to a mobile company set in Berlin called  Gameduell. In this article, Bowden gives advice that has helped him within his years of practice.

1. Watch for the trends: When making art of any sort (drawing, logos, advertising, etc.) it's good to look at other examples. Don't copy them though, put an exciting twist on this trend and be original with your work!

2. Visual quality is important: The quality is a very important part in any art piece no matter how small of a screen or how small in general it will be. Don't do a lousy job! This is "life and death" for art, what makes it sell. Pay attention closely to details.

3. Sketch sketch sketch!: Ian Bowden says he always carries a sketch book and keeps a keen eye out wherever he is, for ideas of course! If you get an idea, jot down notes, sketch something real quick so it's fresh in your mind and you can go back to it and do something with your ideas.

4. Experiment!: Don't just do the same thing over and over, try new things, otherwise you'll be stuck. Sometimes-says Ian-the only way to get past a rut is to move forward. Look around for ideas as well.

5. Be Modest/Humble: There's always someone or something better, and they too can give you ideas, so be open minded and look for ways to improve. There's always something you can learn out there.

This article was very inspiring and has already begun to encourage me to test out new ideas, etc. There's honestly nothing I could disagree with since I do a lot of these steps myself-such as being humble about my work and watching for those trends especially on website designs since I do edit a lot. These are tips that any artist can take with them anywhere no matter what they're doing. Car designing for example. Car looks and abilities are all based on what everyone is looking for right now. So, artist or not, these tips can truly help you.

Cloudy with a Chance of Meatballs: Principles of Animation

Our class had the pleasure to watch Cloudy with a chance of meatballs, but not for our enjoyment; we had the task of analyzing the film to see if we could find all the principles of animation. Here are a few I found.

1. Squash and Stretch: You won't believe how over used this is in the film, but it does make everything really funny. Probably the best example of squash and stretch in this movie, however, was in the jello scene. You know... The scene where Finn had "casually" made a jello castle out in the middle of no where far from the town and then brought Sam there and they  had a lot of fun fooling around?

Yeah. This one.

2. Staging:  This was shown right in the beginning of the movie. Flint was just a little boy in school working on a good ol' project. Well that day of school it was do, and he decided to show the entire class!

 Just look at that sad little face! Aww poor Flint.

3. Follow Through and Overlapping Action: You know that fabulous lab coat Flint got from his mother? It creates a lot of this. Especially when he first gets it. Dare I say it "flows" like a cape behind him.

Mmmmm... Coffee. But yes it flows life a cape.

4. Ease In/Ease Out: There was one particular scene that showed this and always comes across as creepy. The mayor on a wheelchair circling around Flint who wants to shut down the machine before anything bad happens. 

 Just look at him. Evil pours from his body. Yuck.

5. Arcs: Aah.. This can be seen in most scenes but one good example is the part where Sam is trying to come up with an introduction for the news.

There's also the.. Ice cream scene. Just look at that gesture. Ignore the awkward Flint in the background.

6. Exaggeration: Ladies and gents. This is the most abused principle I've ever seen in this film. You can look at every character and see exaggerated details, expressions, movements, etc.

One of the best is when Flint's eyes widen and seem to sparkle.

Look. Look at these sparkly eyes. 

Be hypnotized by them...

Is anyone else hungry now?

What time is it? Time to animate!

This week has been very lively for me. We've finally began to animate, and while we aren't do anything major, it can still feel like a lot.

Unlike several others in class, this is my first time animating on computers. I can tell I'll be having trouble being super creative because I may find animating certain objects too tricky for me to attempt animating just yet. Hopefully I'll get better though. This week, besides learning how to animate, we learned a lot of scientific fact that will help us for creating realistic animations. Most of it was simple terminology such as Gravity, Friction, Energy, Force, etc. I felt pretty satisfied this week class-wise. Out of class life has been a little more hectic.

This Tuesday I went to the podiatrist and I swear the look on his face when he saw the x-rays of my face.. It was like a 3-d animation where the guy's mouth dropped down way too far to be realistic. Maybe I'll animate that out one day and show you guys. Anyways, my feet are really horrible and now I can finally understand why it hurts to walk after five minutes. I could try and list all the problems with my feet but I can't even remember the words he used to explain it. I know I have fallen arches and extra bones that are causing a lot of issues all on their own, but that's about all I know-besides the fact that I need an entire reconstruction of EACH foot. My first appointment is November 14th for the left foot. So if you see me coming in on crutches around that time, that will be the reason. I probably will miss a day or two of school just to recover from the surgery before I begin the challenge of getting myself to classes. I've planned all of that out and can just imagine myself taking a decade just to get to second period which is all the way on the third floor of my school. And yeah, I could take an elevator but the nurse there apparently only gives you a pass for it that works for three days max which is kinda annoying. So this foot problem of mine.. It's the only thing bugging me this week; I'm extremely nervous about the entire thing.

Now that I have sufficiently ranted about my feet, link time!

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=v0o3CcFpBfU

See you all tomorrow!

Tensions Are High

To start us off, I just wanted to say today's my dad's birthday, so I've been a very busy girl this weekend. He's an oldie now. So to celebrate his birthday, I made a cake. Well.. By the time I finished baking and then decorating the cake, it was confirmed that the outside looked like something from monster's inc(color scheme was epic), and also that I should never try to write on cakes, not ever again. Otherwise it looked awesome. As for the inside... As a little joke, we made it camouflage pink. Not even joking! So the inside became known as the secret Barbie's Hunter edition. In the end, the cake turned out to be super delicious so that made everything ten times better.

Moving on

This week felt verrrrrryyyyyyy hectic. Not only did I get a lot of homework for school, but I was having trouble making a flipbook. I think it turned out "decent" at best. Ha.. That was a big pain. Note to self, don't use markers to color, they are pains in my butt. After everything calmed down during the end of the week though.. It was a lot better.

So this week I had my first real technical difficulty. I just think the computer was being rude, for the most part. So while we were diligently working on our "beautiful"(mine was scary) design principal project and color scheme project, the computer did not like me trying to put items on different layers, and if I tried selecting an item after creating a new layer.. It said "NO YOU CANNOT DO THAT AHAHAHA". Oooor something along those lines. Was anyone else having issues? Anyways, I'm soooo glad that's over with. Now for the really hard stuff-animating. I've never tried animating and the whole gist of it seems pretty intimidating. I better hope that A) I gain a natural knack and keen understanding of it(being the program AND how animating works) or B) That my neighbors will be there to help me. and or C) That my hair grows fast, because without A or B, I predict I'm going to be yanking my hair out or that I'll "spontaneously" burst into flames from being overwhelmed with confusion/anger/all them feels. All them feels. So those are my worries.

This week was quite an interesting one overall, if I were to analyze it from another perspective(oh optimism don't fail me now). We learned all about how to make characters, scenes, art in general, far more interesting and appealing to the viewers. That was all in the first three days. The last two days, we focused more on the principals of animation: the basic rules every animator should follow. Some of these rules were Squish and Stretch. A character won't be in the same proportions for every pose. There was also a time, exaggeration, ease in/ease out, staging, etc. I think my top three go from Squish and stretch, Exaggeration, and finally Time. I like how realistic or over the top Squish and Stretch can make something. Exaggeration reminds me of Emphasis (from design elements), because Exaggeration can emphasize an emotion or the size of one object in correlation to another. It can also bring humor into play. As for Time, I think it shows a lot more meaning into actions and just how a character may think. For example, in Cloudy with a Chance of Meatballs (which we watched in class yay), As Flint went to push the button to stop the machine, he moved slower. It showed how hesitant he was to stop the machine. Anyways, we seem to be a little ahead of schedule and that makes me excited because that means we can now begin to dabble into the process of animation!(Oh and maybe if we work as well as we have been, we'll be able to get to 3d animation a little sooner as well, for those who are looking forward to that)

And now for the famous link of this week:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bbiALaUzUhc

I'm very satisfied with this second (full) week of school and can't wait for what's in store for us.

Now that I think I've covered everything in this week sufficiently.. It's around that time for sleep.
Good night guys and see you tomorrow!

13's little secrets to a perfect film.

Recently held was the 2014 TIFF(Toronto International Film Festival) Doc Conference. This Conference goes over several facts regarding distribution, content, artistry, etc. This year, the beginning keynote speech that morning was a wild surprise. Michael Moore, one of the best documentary filmmakers(as he prefers to be called a filmmaker over documentarian) and he decided it's about time someone point out how not to bore people and how to really get them interested in non-fiction films. These 13 points went over the need for comical relief/humor, the type of facts no one knows much about, the fact that if you want it on the big screen you need to be creative, a reminder of how humorous we could be/used to be and how those tactics are out-dated, whom(or what) you should go after, how to make the film seem more personal and relevant, that sometimes we should take a look at "behind the scenes" media, the fact that America truly does love non-fiction(cough dancing with the stars cough or biggest loser cough cough), to get a broader view point(by filming those who don't agree with you), to ask yourself what are you feeling(or your crew members, because you are technically the audience as well), to use less words(dumb it down for those who don't like using their brain), and that what truly carries the story isn't the film, but the sound. (So those who do voice acting should get a raise.) Overall, the passion this man showed in his speech trying to knock sense into those still making documentaries feel like a teacher making a speech to students.

This man has got a mouth on him, that's the first thing that comes to mind. But it isn't in a bad way. I love the way he points out everything, as if it should be common sense. It's the most hysterical article I've read. This article does a great job in hooking the readers in-it made me wish I could be there; with the great and lengthy detail of how these words were being expressed, I was able to imagine the face the speaker must of been making. The crowd also sound very energetic and had gotten excited the more that Moore went on (hey I made a joke! I swear that wasn't intentional.) After his valuable points and suggestions on how to make an epic documentary that won't put people to sleep, I should hope that others will follow his footsteps all the while creating unique twists with each step.
By the way, did you know that the number 13 is my favorite number? It sure can't be considered an unlucky number now, can it?

What the Hullabaloo is truly about!

So, what is the Hullabaloo about? 
In recent years, 2d-animation has become less and less common. For several animators, this has become a desperate situation. That brings us to a project in the works! Hullabaloo is an animation project who's focal point is on proving that 2d-animation has come no where near kicking the bucket! With Disney veterans; The Creator James Lopez: Animators Bruce Smith, Rick Farmiloe, Minkyu Lee, Sandro Cleuzo, and Sarah Airriess: along with several other brilliant workers. So many have gathered to help create something magnificent. Using the "world's most established crowd-funding platform", Indiegogo, they have managed to unlock all of their "stretch" goals, or extra goals that they had in mind for the project. What is the story behind Hullabaloo? Starring Veronica Daring, a brilliant young scientist, Hullabaloo revolves around the missing father, Jonathon Daring, who's mysteriously disappeared! Veronica and her friend Jules search for clues to unlock the secrets behind this mystery. But just how did the name come about? Well, It's soon after their investigation that clues lead to a shady/mysterious group of influential and wealthy people that have kidnapped her father. Because of their influence, Veronica and Jules cannot openly stop their evil plans-to which they are unsure of what they are-so Veronica assumes the secret identity of Hullabaloo! One thing she abides by, her family creed, will help her: "Technology should be used for the good of all and not for the greed of some."

Overall this plot summary is something well developed and very interesting. The Steam-punk flow to it all makes it very enticing and a movie/show to look forward to watching. I am really glad that so many people have supported this project as it has so much great potential to tap into and will really give 3d animation a struggle to surpass. I believe that this 2d project has the ability to be one of the top 2d animated programs. I simply love the drawing style and the character designs and I can't wait to find out more about each character!

If you guys are really interested in keeping updates, you should also check out their page on Indiegogo: https://www.indiegogo.com/projects/hullabaloo-steampunk-animated-film

Almost forgot...

I've seen recently that everyone's skyping and talking about what to do for t-shirts. So if anyone was interested in contacting me for ideas, my skype is simply alyssa_lohr you'll see an anime girl from the anime Watamote and my nickname on it will come up as Aly. Apparently there are a lot of people with my name so yeah.. If you add me, be sure to tell me who I'm talking to or I'll probably just ignore you.

See ya later

The Order & 6 Tips

"The Order"

The Order is an upcoming video game that takes history into a whole new twist. Not only that, but a new way of animating-to perfect imperfections that some gamers don't seem to notice as much.
The basic plot: Players are put into an alternate Victorian-Era in Europe where the reality is fragmented and divided between a savage war between humans and "The Order"'s Half-breeds. (Half-breeds are Lycans/werewolves)

While watching this video that explained it, I was really impressed with the graphics. They were unbelievably smooth and vivid with detail. I also like the somewhat generic plot and the twists it has. I am excited for this game to come out so I can see and appreciate just how amazing it is.

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"6 Tips"

Six tips gives animators several ideas on what they should do in order to appeal to recruiters.
It also gives a perspective on just what the now-a-day recruiters are interested in seeing.
They don't want the generic scenes nor do they want to see school work(let alone everything you've worked on since the beginning). Give them brief examples (2-3) in a 1 to 2 minute span. It's also very important that the animations you choose for the demo reel can appeal to the particular audience that the studio you're applying for. Also be aware that you should be careful about potentially offending the recruiters. Stay on the safe side.

These tips aren't only good for demo reels but for creating well developed portfolios and what you should and shouldn't put in there. This article is very helpful and if I had seen it before coming in to interview for Digital Media, I probably would've been more organized than I was.


______________________________

These articles were very interesting to read as well as fun to watch the videos that went with them.

Let's get it started! : Weekly comment #1

Hey everyone, first posts are comin' out like crazy and It's harder than you'd think to read em all. But I've read a good half of them so far. I really enjoyed the ones I have so far.

Moving on.

Okay, so-I don't know about you guys-this week seemed hectic for me. I was racing all over the place. Incredible how much has happened over just a week. So much home work already, and pretty much in every class as well. But I did it all and now it's calmed for the most part.

Well, this week I learned several interesting facts/topics/subjects/etc about animation that I probably never would of thought about until now. For example, I learned about the several jobs that comes in the digital media department. Unlike many of you guys, I haven't looked into animation until now, so I'm definitely behind on all this. But I'll catch up soon. We also went over the dreaded Safety rules, Copyright Laws, and took several tests/quizzes. But in return, we got to drown our parents with plenty of information sheets to fill and sign. I'm pretty sure my mom wanted to go on a rampage about that since she had just finished eating dinner when I had bombarded her. Oopsies.

In the upcoming months of class, I am not only interested in learning how to animate, or the neat tricks that come with it, but especially about all of you guys. Despite not really being a fan of blog sites and related websites, this is a good chance for me to get involved I guess. What I really want to learn is about the several different styles of drawing/animating and how to add cool effects to the animation. LOTR is very inspirational on that end.

So the frustration was high for all of us this week. For me, it was the homework and the house scene. I had had over half of the original scene done(as sloppy looking as it was) and the very next day everything had vanished. I had saved it, and it opened just fine, but none of what I drew was there. It was very daunting to start from scratch. Now we have to do flip books.. Not sure how this is gonna turn out but we'll just have to see about that.

I think the best event that happened was the very first day. Learning about everybody and their hobbies kinda made me feel a lot more homey. When I think about my reasoning to join, it was the hopes that I'd find more students around my area that are into the same/similar activities as me. So I'm really excited that I was able to be one of the few students accepted into these classes. It's a real honor.

Now for the link of interest! So I was browsing around, hoping to find something that might just help me get started and some simple tips. It doesn't go into the greatest detail but it did help clear up how to time the frames.  http://www.wikihow.com/Make-a-Flipbook

Have a great weekend everybody and see ya all on Monday!

Sigh.

The hardest part of having a blog is actually creating one, do you know that?