Gia Hien Lam

Student Number: n9051546 ----- Hi, my name is Calvin and I am a student from Queensland University of Technology. I've created this blog to upload my assignment progress from the unit "Drawing for Animation".

[giahienlam-blog]

Rotoscope Sequence (Final)

Here is the final version of my rotoscope sequence (basketball dunking scene).

Firstly, I filled up the rest of the frames for the second construction and gesture drawing parts. After that, I went back to the first gesture drawing to smooth out the movement of the player that I mentioned before in the previous draft. It turned out pretty well, I supposed.

Overall, I’m quite fond with this piece of work that I had comparing to the Head Turn and Weight Lift animation that I’d done. This one felt the most natural out of all of them. The amount of frames was also a great difference between each of those animation as wells. Head Turn only had 96 frames, Weight Lift only had 164 but this one had 264 frames. The craziest thing was the fact that I hand drew every single frame for all of those animation. For Head Turn and Weight Lift, I copied a little bit such as the object, or the simple rotating of the head and body. However, for this one, I drew every single frame, one by one, without copying at all. It took quite a long time but I think it was definitely worth it.

In conclusion, I had learned so much more in this semester. Last semester, I was only introduced to the design and storyboarding parts in animating. This semester, when I actually had to get my hand on the animation, it was a lot more tougher than I expected. The amount of drawings that I had to do was insane, and it was only a few seconds video at max. I can’t imagine the amount of effort that professional animators have to do for hourly movies. Regardless, it gave me all the motivation to push myself forward in order to reach that level.

I had a lot of fun from this unit. Thank you.

[giahienlam-blog]

Rotoscope Sequence (Draft)

After I got the image sequence from my referenced sport video, I started sketching out all the frames available, which was only about 58-59. The first frame was given to me by the fellow student above me, with a Tennis video as a reference.

As you can see, I divided up the frames rather weirdly at first, but it was actually quite simple. Here was the way how I worked out my frames:

1 second morphing transition - frame 1 - 24 (given frame)

2 seconds gesture drawings - frame 25 - 72

2 seconds construction drawings - frame 73 - 120

2 seconds fully rendered drawings - frame 121 - 168

2 seconds construction drawings - frame 169 - 216

2 seconds gesture drawings - frame 217 - 264

The second version of the animation can show how the style changed more clearly.

After I split up the frames equally from the image sequence to 264 frames, all I needed to do was filling in the gap.

The next one is going to be the full morphing transition of my rotoscope animation.

The fourth version had the first gesture drawing part fully done.

The fifth version had the construction and fully rendered drawing parts done. However, I also realised there was a strange movement back in the gesture drawing, right after the morphing. It was as if the basketball player froze for a bit, and then quickly moved up the ball, which wasn’t really what happened in the referenced video so I needed to fix on that.

[giahienlam-blog]

This will be the actual reference of my sport video for the Rotoscoping Sequence. This is a slow motion dunking scene that I got from Youtube which was very similar to the one I wanted to do previously.

When I tried to export the video into images sequence, it didn’t allow me to do 24 frames per second. The amount was too large so my computer would freeze and stopped the video, while constantly producing the images still, on the same scene. That was why I dropped the frames to only 6 per second in order to get my image sequence that I need for my animation. I then simply calculated out the amount of frames in between each image to fill in the gap. It wasn’t a big deal since the difference of movement in each image was so tiny.

[giahienlam-blog]

This was the first idea of the sport sequence that I wanted to do. A quick and epic dunk scene from the anime “Kuroko no Basket”. However, I dropped the idea because the reference was animation, instead of real figure and I think Rotoscoping Sequence needed an actual real life action-based video.

[giahienlam-blog]

Weight Lift (Final)

Here is the second version of my Weight Lift animation, with more frames in between to show clearer intention and image.

The animation was not too bad, but needed a bit more work in the end, such as getting exhausted after the lift or something.

Here is the next draft, with more frames to smooth out the movement and also an extra action in the end of the character sitting down after a heavy lifting session. It makes the animation a bit more realistic in my opinion, especially with the heavy breathing.

Moving on to the next version, I simply added more frames to make the animation more realistic, but there was still a bit of stiffness on the character and the block when it falls down.

Finally, this is the last updated of my Weight Lift. I made the movement a lot more smoother but then at the same time, there was several problems with it. 

First, the beginning of the animation wasn’t that great when I tried to make the character bending down to observe the object. It felt like a simple rotating action instead of actually bending down with curiosity. It felt very unrealistic and unnatural there. Also, near the end of the animation when the character sat down, it was somehow too fast. I wanted to make it like a quick drop as how someone would seem when they fell down from exhaustion. However, it was fast at the beginning just to be slow near the end which didn’t make much sense. I tried adding more frames at the beginning of it, and lessen near the end but it still felt a bit unnatural.

Overall, it was just okay in my opinion. It wasn’t a great job comparing to the previous running and flour sack animations that I did. It was lacking the sense of natural movement, which was really essential in animation.

[giahienlam-blog]

Weight Lift (First Draft)

I used several references for my animation, some of them are:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iZrWNhMqL4g&t=1s

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bklPD7U9XIw

But the one I used for the final version of my animation, was this one:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nOO-5kfwtBo

I wanted to do a lifting and pushing way of animation, which I found the above video to be perfect for that. However, I had to convert it back to 2D and I wanted to do my own style so I didn’t try to trace the movement there.

Here is the first draft of my Weight Life animation.

FIRST DRAFT

[giahienlam-blog]

Head Turn Animation (Final)

Final version of my head turn animation. I actually wasn’t please of the final result due to the unnatural hair and body movement of the character. I tried to give myself more challenge by adding in a fringe and a ponytail but it backfired pretty hard on me. I tried to make the hair move in the direction where I think it supposed to go if the head moves like this, but it turned out pretty badly. I think the reason was because of the timing and a lack of stretching. If I make the hair stays in the same location for a little bit longer everytime, it would look a lot more natural as the hair would always be after the head movement. However, in my case, both the head and the hair moved at the same time, which gave off a very wrong and unnatural feeling.

[giahienlam-blog]

The second draft of the head turn animation, with more frames added in between. However the animation was still not entirely smoothed out yet so there was still a lot more works to do.

[giahienlam-blog]

Here is the first sketch of my new head turn animation using the same character.

[giahienlam-blog]

Head Turn Animation (New)

I decided to start all over again for the head turn animation because the previous one was too dramatic for just a simple head turn. I would have completed it if I was given more time, but the semester was closing by so I could not afford to spend too much time on one thing.

I started with a reference of a YouTube video I found about head turn animation. It helped me quite a lot in setting out the image of my final product and the base reaction, location and shape of the character for this animation.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mZa5YW5FS10

[giahienlam-blog]

I darkened the blue lines into clearer black lines because I felt that I could go straight into the finishing look and save a lot of time. I fastened the first bit of this video where the emotion starts hitting in because I was afraid that it was dragging on a little bit too long for just a head turn animation. I fixed the chest where it would be pushed out while breathing in, and I also added the flow of the hair even when she was standing still so it would look more realistic.

[giahienlam-blog]

I started adding more frames at the beginning first with a bit clearer lines. I really liked how the eyes closed down and opened up again. It felt really awesome when it happened, like a very emotional thing for me, especially when a drop of tear started forming. I also tried out myself that when you closed your eyes when something sad happened, you would have a deep breath. When you breathed in, your shoulders would move up a bit and your chest would actually get pushed out from the intake air. In this draft, I made a mistake because I was thinking too physically for her body. I thought that when your shoulders moved up, your chest would get pulled in because they are connected, but it wasn’t the case if you were taking air in. 

[giahienlam-blog]

I started to draw a scale and points to guide me where my head should be at which time frame. I wanted the girl to show a bit of emotion (start crying) before I moved her head. It would go in slow motion at the beginning of the turn, then speeding up in mid way, and back to slowly in the end. Her ponytail at the last frame also seemed to not be in a right position because it looked a bit strange to me. It was supposed to fling up the air but it looked like it stayed there for a bit too long. 

I am not sure whether I am allowed to do such a big body movement when I’m only supposed to be doing a normal head turn. Regardless, I would still want to finish this and if I have enough time, I will quickly do a simple head turn without moving the body as much as this one, using the same character.

For the character I’m using, I actually have a painting of her but it might be too irrelevant to the requirement of this assignment so I will not post it here yet.

[giahienlam-blog]

After I decided to make a full 180 degrees head turn, I felt that if I make my character crying then turning around to walk away would be so much more powerful. Just from imagination, I felt that it would bring a lot of emotions to the viewers, at the same time, setting a challenge for myself.

I am planning to have the character resting on the right, then she will start crying. Afterwards, she would turn away while having her eyes closed and tear would be floating out of her eyes into the air. She then turn to the left, while moving her hand up to wipe away her tears, which I believe to be a completely natural action one takes when crying and walking away.

References:

http://www.sadever.com/sad-anime-girl-pictures/

https://www.pinterest.co.uk/explore/anime-girl-crying/?lp=true

[giahienlam-blog]

These pictures are ones of the few that I had when I was researching for my head turn animation. I feel like a simple head turn with a stiff body doesn’t look natural to me. When I checked out some of the other students’ works, many of them have the character on the front view, then simply turning the head from left to right (actually 3/4 view, not full side view). However, some have their bodies staying still while the others only shift the shoulders by a bit. I found it really unnatural to do when I tried to do it myself. When I need to turn my head around to look for something, I always moved my entire upper body along. I didn’t move my head and body with the same speed though. My head would start turning first, then my shoulders and body would follow up. If I was going to do a head turn animation, I would like a make a full head turn, from right to left with a complete 180 degrees turn. In result, I would be able to turn the body around too, which in my opinion, would make everything a lot more realistic.

Reference:

https://au.pinterest.com/explore/drawing-heads/?lp=true

https://www.gamedev.net/forums/topic/683954-how-to-create-a-2d-character-turning-his-head-animation/

[giahienlam-blog]

Here are the first 6 quick sketches of our model today, Kat. This was the first time I used charcoal to draw so it was quite difficult to draw. The lines were a lot more thicker and darker than my usual lines. The first 5 weren’t as good as I expected it to be, but the last one was pretty alright to me. I started to get used to draw with charcoal so I decided to start shading the figure. Unfortunately for me, the pose would have been much better the other side because she was doing some unique hand, or fingers positions which I couldn’t capture from my view. The back of her seemed to be a little bit too long on my drawings comparing to the real life figure, but I think it wouldn’t matter much for rough sketches.

[giahienlam-blog]

Two drawing references from my tutor, Patrick, of both male and female figures. I took the photos so I can learn to improve my own drawing’s structure. I am uncertain on the male figure yet since we only drew a female one today. The right hand side was his drawing of our model, with structural explanation. I particularly really liked how he showed her hips there, with the joints and points. When you looked at the model directly, it was hard to see the difference between the round area and the flat area. But from here, it was a lot more easier to tell and when you looked back at the model one more time, it became a lot more clearer.