Monday, March 26, 2007

Walk Cycle Animation

Finally I have some animation done.
What I've done is try to show how I build up a walk cycle. The different colours correspond with different layers being used. I've kept the arms on their own level because I will need to flip the animation and the shovel and arm will need to be animated over the far shoulder.



Still lots of animation to do. Of course I will post more when I have more completed.

Stay tuned

-Jake

Friday, March 23, 2007

Updated Animatic

I couldn't resist seeing what the backgrounds look like in the scenes. I had to adjust the first two scenes. In scene one the pan was to quick which I doubled its length. In the second scene I added a stop to the panning background.
Here it is.

PB101-BG
Uploaded by JakeMacher


Stay tuned

-Jake

Backgrounds

Not much to say about these. Very simple backgrounds. I may tweak the colours later if the colours are too saturated. It might turn out that the characters are hard to see on them. In all I figured I would need six static backgrounds. One will be animated when Platypus is going through the tunnel.
Here they are.







In the last two backgrounds, the bubbles are just a placeholders. I'm planing on animating them just to give the scenes more life. Also in the under water background I will have to add some under water effects.

Next up Ruff Animation.
I will be keying the scenes out. I'm still debating is I should insert the scenes as I go into the animatic, or if I'm just going to upload the scenes as individuals? I guess I will have to wait and see.

Stay tuned,

-Jake

Tuesday, March 20, 2007

Storyboard & Animatic

Jump to the bottom of the page for the animatic.

The inspiration/ideas for the first story Treasure Map came from 2 sources.
First was this sketch I did while my wife Lilly was watching some sort of reality tv show.



The second source was this.

The Russian Winnie the Pooh.
I just love the whole intro with Pooh marching and singing in the forest.
After I have the idea I open Flash and draw the storyboard directly in Flash using my trusty Wacom tablet. This took me one evening or about a few hours to complete. Here's a screen grab of the storyboard.



As you can see I drew everything on 1's, and really ruff. I'll be tightening up the background and characters later.
Here's a detailed image of the timeline.



There are a few things I want to point out.
First is I like to keep elements to their own layers with a description of what it is.


Second thing is labeling the scenes 01,02,03 and so on. This is useful when timing out the storyboard into an animatic, more on this later.



Third thing is as well as labeling the scenes is to label the backgrounds. Remember reuse is your friend, only if your well organized. Mislabeling will cause problems down the road.


Once I have all the basic story information down. I added lots and lots of frames to get the storyboard timed out to a length that felt right. This was most of Sunday afternoon. Lots of back and forth between QuickTime and Flash, making some scenes longer or shorter till it's just right. Which can be seen here.



Now this being my own film I'm not restricted to ridged time restraint. So I can add or remove frames to make it work.

Some of you might be wondering what's with the red "O" is, or what it's for. Well I'm trying to keep it timed to a tempo of 120, so when I add music later the action is ruffly timed to a beat. This beat just so happens to be every 12 frames. I'll be using this as a guide only.

Here's the final animatic.



If this had too much or too little information let me know. I want to post what people are wanting to see.

Up next I'll be seperating the scenes into their own files. Once this is done I'll be tackling the layouts and backgrounds. I'll update when I have more to post.

Stay tuned.

-Jake

My evil plan revealed.

So what is this "experiment" that I'm planning?

I love behind the scenes material, and production diaries, just the whole how films are made. I find it interesting seeing the way different people work with animation in Flash. This is what I plan on using this blog for, keeping track of my production of Platypus & Beaver, with screen shots of how I work.

The other reason I'm doing this all out in the open and online like this is, I'm hoping that if I have stuff posted and out in the wild it will keep me motivated to finish.

My plan is to do everything in Flash. With the exception of final composition, this most likely will be in either QuickTime or iMovie. The other thing that will not to be done in Flash is the sound which I plan to do in GarageBand. I've also imposed boundary's for myself to try and keep the shorts under one minute in length. If all goes well then there will be more Platypus & Beaver. I have lots of ideas bouncing around inside of my head.

First things first. Here's a picture of Platypus & Beaver.



I don't have any model sheets completed. Mostly because I'm the only one working on P&B so quality control is easy to manage.

Up next, the Storyboard and Animatic process.

Stay Tuned

-Jake

Sunday, March 18, 2007

First Post

This will be the home of my Flash cartoon experiment I call, Playtpus & Beaver.

My intension with this blog is to update weekly. Most likely on, or just after a weekend. (I do have to work at my day job)
Or I'll put something up here when I have something to post.

Should be fun and interesting for all.

Stay Tuned.

-Jake