Reflection On The Week: (Week 31): Starting Monday 12th May

The week started off with a Programme Meeting to discuss this Semester's assessment and have a look at previous years work. This film from a couple of years ago was of particular interest due to the hand-painted textures on 3D models - which is what we would like to do for the Tug of Biscuit film:

Also this week I've been creating some artwork for the Production Bible. Not very much concept art had been produced for the props and garden plants in the environment. I took some more detailed research and reference photos in the back garden to help with the designs, modeling and texturing:

These are some watercolour sketches and drawings I produced to explore how these might be translated and textured into our watercolour-styled environment:

Helped Giorgos out on Monday by having a look over the dog model. The tail needed to be slightly wider to appear a bit more furry, so that when it is animated there is more of a swoosh to it:

I thought the top of his head needed added to, because he didn't seem to have any forehead. I suggested to make it rounder as it it might help him look younger:

Had a look at the dog model progress again on Tuesday and it was definitely looking like a younger dog! Just needed a slightly wider nose and then it was complete. I did some eye tests with the finished model to check that the eyelids would look ok when stretched over the eye for blendshapes - all good!

This week I also re-edited part of the animatic which needed some timing/camera changes:

For shot 6, previously the dog's head had been moving around to fast to fit in him looking at the biscuit, the sky and the tree. To fix this, the dog now enters the frame already looking up into the sky, searching for the bird, before looking down at his biscuit and then over to the tree where the next scene will take place:

A shot was needed to break the previous shot up from the next one, as the dog was seen in one place and then suddenly in another. I therefore added a close-up shot of the bird on the garden who appears to watch the dog as he walks over to the tree:

The next shot is more zoomed out and follows the bird as it creeps over to the biscuit, as the dog is distracted digging a whole for the biscuit:

Once these changes had been made to the animatic, I updated the shot list to reflect the changes:

Reflection On The Week: (Week 30): Starting Monday 5th May

Monday 5th May
Making progress with the animatic.
Human model has been finalized! Dog still priority though.
Organised to have a meeting this Wednesday.
Wrote some notes out for going live report.

Tuesday 6th May
Finished all of the playblasts for the 3D animatic.
Imported the clips into Premiere Pro to teach myself some more about how to use it, it is very similar to After Effects, but I couldn't  get the Timecode effect to work. I looked up the problem and it seems I will need to download a patch to fix it.

So just to be time efficient for now I went back to After Effects to edit the 3D animatic together:

(Fox Rig 1.0.0 available here to download - LINK)
(Malcolm character courtesy of AnimSchool.com - LINK)

Gathering all work for relevant blog posts and for assessment.

Wednesday 7th May
Group meeting for Tug of Biscuit:

• Reviewed the 3D Dog model.
• We've decided to make weekly goals to achieve for each Wednesday. For next Wednesday:

Sheng - Human model UV-mapped plus some texture tests.
Lilly - Production Bible finished, 3D animatic finalized and shot list updated.
Giorgos - Dog model finished and UV-mapped.
Kirti - Shot List updated, basic environment model finished plus UV-mapping.

• Also a production schedule for semester 3 needs sorted.

Also been updating the blog today.

Thursday 8th May
Put together some notes for Giorgos on the Dog 3D model with some possible adjustments to be made:

Working on blog updates for all of my Going Live work.

Oh no! Coming down with a cold! :[

Going Live - Animatic

I helped out with sorting the timing and rough animation/layout for Shot 1. There was a limited time-frame to fit in the tree-hand grab, eagle transformation and dragon swipe. Kieran had already started it and animated about 7 seconds in of the eagle flying. This is one of the first drafts I did:

Feedback was to remove some of the pause before the tree-hand shoots up. Also to start moving the camera back when the eagle starts falling, to give a sense of the viewer falling with the eagle. For when the dragon swoops down and off screen, by moving the camera back, the full size of the dragon can be fitted in. This will also allow for some nice sweeping animation of the dragon.

Here is the latest version I made:

Working on this shot for the animatic was a great way to start helping to block out the animation and timing - as I was going to be doing the final animation on this shot.

Reflection On The Week (Week 28): Starting Monday 21st April

Monday 21st April
Going Live Meeting:

• Me and Kieran going to be main speakers at Axis presentation.
• Made a list of all areas need to cover in the presentation.
• Created a new folder in the shared GoingLive folder for everyone to add all their development and final work to be included in the presentation, in order to collate everything into a powerpoint/video presentation.
• The film has now been made live online here: https://vimeo.com/92521991

Also today, had to install an updated version of the animation picker on my laptop.

Added a few things to Shot 1 in the 3D Animatic, including some clouds and 3D text for the title of the film:

Started sketching out a layout plan to work out where the characters move to and from within the environment, also sketched a new idea for the shot where the dog goes back to ask for another biscuit:

Tuesday 22nd April
Talked to Kirti - the Owner model is being aimed to be done by Monday to pass to on to Giorgos to rig.
Sent a message to Giorgos to ask about starting dog model this week as he had said before that he was interested in doing that.
I carried on work with the Tug of Biscuit Animatic, working on Shot 2 today.

Wednesday 23rd April
Spent today setting up my model for Going Live for a turnaround. It involved some re-modelling in order for it to sit flat on the turntable. Also been working on some rigging screenshots/renders for the presentation and assessment.

Thursday 24th April
As we are compiling all of our Going Live work together for next week's presentation, I wondered if there was a better way to present rigs instead of just a screenshot. I searched for a way to make rigs visible in renders and came across a relevant tutorial and article.
These are the steps I went through: Click here for relevant blog post link.

Group Meeting for Tug of Biscuit:

• Had a look over the human model Kirti is working on. We all decided a simple mouth with no lips would work well with the cartoony style. Also discussed how the scarf/snood should look - it will help cover the join of neck.
• Also looked at the dog model Giorgos has started. We were worried that it was starting to look like a bull dog again, but we thought it might just be an illusion, as it's a cartoon dog, some of its proportions have been exaggerated which might be making it look bull dog-ish.
• Sheng is going to continue working on the environment model, before starting texture tests.
• I'm continuing to work on the Animatic.
• We also agreed that a production bible should be put together before the end of this semester, so that all pre-production is completed. Need to write out a list of props and do some plant and foilage designs for the garden.
• I wrote out a calendar so I could see all the important dates in the one place:

Starting to pencil in our new up-to-date production schedule - the human model is due to be finished for next Monday by Kirti, and then passed to Giorgos to start rigging.

Discussed the Going Live Presentation with Kieran. Started by writing out a bullet point list of everything that needs to be covered. Then started putting a PowerPoint together and worked out what additional material is needed for the presentation, turnarounds etc. We've decided that I will be talking through the Pre-Production work, and Kieran will talk through the Production work.

Friday 25th April
Spent most of today collating everyone's work and putting it into the PowerPoint Presentation for Going Live:

Ran through the PowerPoint towards the end of the day to the rest of the class, to check with everyone how it was looking an if there was anything missed out.

Supervisor Meeting - Tuesday 4th February 2014

Talked through the storyboards that each member of the team contributed to.

George drew panels: 1-7, 25-27, 37-38, 54-60
I drew panels: 8-24, 39, 53
Sheng drew panels: 28-36
Kirti drew panels: 40-52

Myself and George arranged the storyboards in a storyboarding program called 'Shotbox', I then added descriptions to all the panels:

I then put the panels together into a roughly timed animatic:

Some ideas that were discussed and generated from the meeting included:

• Do we need the INT. environment? The human could be outside in the garden as well, gardening, hanging out washing, raking leaves. First this would save us time having to model, texture and light another environment, and it might also make the scenes more funny, because the human is also in the garden but is completely oblivious to what is going on.
• During the 'tug-of-war' scene, the humorous situation of this could be heightened by having the small bird pulling the dog along the ground/through the air (Bird appears unusually strong - could show how much it wants the biscuit)
• Zooming out at the end to leave on a similar shot that the storyboard began with at the beginning could round off the film nicely.

I've also typed up the script (yes the girl's name is 'Lily', I did not initiate this decision! :p Decided to differentiate this character from myself by spelling it differently from my own to avoid confusion):

Tug of Biscuit

03/02/2014

Director and Script Writer: Lilly Durrant

EXT. House and Back-Garden – (DAYTIME – AUTUMN/WINTER)

A young dog, named PIP, plays in the Garden and runs towards the back door of the house.

INT. Kitchen – (DAYTIME)

A young woman, LILY, is doing chores in the kitchen. Pip comes in through the door; Lily greets Pip,

1.                                            LILY

“Biscuit?”

She then throws a BISCUIT out into the garden for Pip.

EXT. Back-Garden – (DAYTIME)

SFX sounds of kids playing in neighbour’s garden. Dog approaches biscuit, sniffs it and then opens mouth to eat it.

SFX loud kick sound! A BALL flies over the fence and past the dog, immediately grabbing Pip’s attention. Pip excitedly runs out of shot after the ball.

A BIRD swoops down, picks up the biscuit, and takes off with it.

Pip happily pads back into shot with the football in his mouth. He looks down at where the biscuit was and is shocked and confused to find it is gone! Pip looks around the ground and then looks up. Pip spots and focuses on something O/S and looks angry.

Camera zooms out to show the bird sitting on the fence with the biscuit. It then swallows the biscuit, which upsets the dog, and then flies away. The ball pops and deflates in the dog’s mouth.

INT. Kitchen – (DAYTIME)

Pip begs Lily for another biscuit; she throws one outside for him and gets back to work.

EXT. Back-Garden – (DAYTIME)

Dog runs up to biscuit and looks around suspiciously for the bird. Thinking maybe it’s best to save and hide the biscuit, Dog begins to dig a hole for it.

Meanwhile the Bird swoops down and creeps towards the biscuit.

Pip is alerted to a sound and turns around to see the Bird with his biscuit in its mouth. Bird then engulfs it whole and takes off, leaving a stunned Dog.

INT. Kitchen – (DAYTIME)

Pip begs Lily desperately for another biscuit.

2.                                            LILY

“Last one, ok?”

She throws a biscuit outside for him and gets back to washing dishes at the window, which has a view of the garden.

EXT. Back-Garden – (DAYTIME)

Dog runs towards biscuit and then stops. Camera pans up to reveal the bird standing opposite. The biscuit lies on the ground, at equal distance between the two. It’s a standoff.

C/U of the dog and bird, both look angry and determined; each glance between the other and the biscuit.

Both then suddenly race towards each other and the biscuit. Camera cuts just before they collide.

INT. Kitchen – (DAYTIME)

Lily is busy washing dishes. The view from the window shows Pip and Bird in a tug of war with the biscuit. Lily looks nonchalantly up, then back to the dishes, then double takes back to the chaos outside.

3.                                            LILY

Exclamation of Surprise!

Lily throws down what she was washing and runs O/S. Still looking through the window at the sink, Lily can be seen running towards Pip and the Bird, arms flailing and shooing.

4.                                            LILY

(Sound is muffled, as camera/audience still in Kitchen)

“Stoppp! Shoo! Shoo!”

EXT. Back-Garden – (DAYTIME)

As the Bird flies off past the camera, Lily picks Pip up along with the biscuit. She looks at the biscuit, and then O/S.

Bird is sitting on the fence looking very sad; its little stomach wobbles as it grumbles.

Lily looks back at dog and biscuit, an expression of realization crosses her face. She looks thoughtful and then has an idea.

SFX of DIY and building with a montage of C/U’s.

Pip watches with anticipation as Lily finishes constructing something. Camera dollies out to reveal a new BIRD HOUSE/FEEDER. Bird flies to it and looks joyous!

Bird happily munches on the bird feed as the Dog finally munches away on his biscuit.

THE END

The script is currently 2.5 pages long, meaning our film is roughly 2-3 minutes long, so a lot of editing is required. Ideally the animatic needs to be edited to under 2 minutes.

Lastly we went over some Moodboards, these are the ones I put together, wanted to find examples of simple 3D designs, followed by 2D and more illustrative designs:

I've started putting some reference boards together on Pinterest,

Cartoon Dogs: http://www.pinterest.com/2illybean/cartoon-dogs/

Garden Birds: http://www.pinterest.com/2illybean/garden-birds/

There are still designs, styles and colours to finalize. Originally we thought of having a 2D background with 3D characters, the more this project is developing the more inclined we have been to go for a 3D background instead. It will probably be a lot less trouble for us, not having to try and convincingly composite a 3D character into a 2D world.

We also discussed what everyone is working on at the moment and what we should be working on next. I will continue Directing and overseeing the whole project, including the designs, and I will be updating the storyboard and 2D animatic. Sourcing some free 3D rigs to use in the 3D animatic and creating the 3D animatic; this will aid background designs, give an idea of camera moves, and allow me to start animation tests.

For our next Supervisor Meeting in 3 weeks time:

• Have a new updated 2D animatic (fix storyboard)
• A 3D animatic (used with simple models and free rigs, having a 3D animatic will help with what backgrounds we need to help influence those designs)
• Background and character designs - start modelling a character