#unitba1b

[ba1bmysteryboxanim]

I managed to get an extension on my submission deadline and so felt a lot less pressured and also manged to reach out for help.

I had already managed to finish the motion when my peer stepped in to help and initially we couldn’t get any of the lighting to work for some reason but we managed to get the directional light to finally work. Luckily this scene only took about 2 hours to render and then I managed to composite the video on my own at home using Adobe media encoder. Overall this is definitely a case of ‘finished not perfect and at this point I was just more focused on getting this animation finished and ready for submission. 

I’m not happy with the finished product and I know it’s about 2 seconds too short but at this point it’s better than not having anything to submit for this project. Getting some help really, really made this so much easier to tackle though and I feel like I would have been much worse off without my peer who so graciously helped me out. 

[stopmotionintro]

I decided to look into studio Laika a bit for some personal research and I found that I really like what the company stands for. They’re been a key force in revitalizing the stop motion industry and I feel like that is a major feat considering the reputation that stop motion animation had pre-Laika.

The studio is very open about their working process and so there is a lot of easily accessible information online which gives valuable insight into their working process. Laika blends traditional puppet making techniques with innovative modern technology such as 3D printing that I feel has really acted to make the process of stop motion films a lot more approachable.

[stopmotionintro]

I forgot to post these earlier but these are the stories for the walking with expression change and the picking up the box animation we did. 

Both these animations were definitely changed but the introduction of a partner into the project and I’m not complaining. It’s pretty cool that your ideas can develop in new directions so quickly once you have a partner involved in working on a project. 

I felt pretty lost while story boarding these two scenes and i think I’m starting to find that I really struggle to think in a 3D sense. 

[stopmotionintro]

So this project ran into quite a few problems. For this animation I was paired with Ella and we ran into issues setting up our camera as well as maintaining our lighting. I feel like overall we also struggled to communicate our intended movements and something about the overall animation just kind of doesn’t work. 

I enjoyed working with Ella and I feel like we work well together but I feel like we were both pretty uncomfortable with stop motion animation and unsure of how to execute our intended motion. I feel like our discomfort comes through in the form of stiffness in this animation. 

[stopmotionintro]

Ruth and I finished our standard ball bounce a bit early and started working on a ball bounce with secondary action a bit but sadly couldn't finish it because we had to wrap up and had a class after. It was off to a pretty good start though.

[stopmotionintro]

I actually really enjoyed working with the Plasticine for this animation and I was paired up with Ruth. Overall I’d say we did a pretty good job even though the Plasticine was pretty tough. 

The only major issue that we kept running into was catching our hands in the shots while we were working. I feel like that’s just something that comes as a result of working with someone you’re not entirely familiar with though and overtime happens less when you get used to your working partners. It definitely made me question how effective of a communicator I am in a group setting though.

It was pretty cool to get a chance to use the proper stop motion set ups in the filming booths of the media lab (I don’t actually remember what they’re called, oops). And I wish I had put more time into experimenting with stop motion.

[fantasticcreaturedesignproj-blog]

Second attempt  at making my maquette. 

Honestly, I’m not impressed with the way this turned out. I know that I could have done a lot better, especially with regards to the legs. I don’t know if I like the overall design all that much and going forward I’ll definitely be considering editing the design a bit.

But I’ve fallen behind in other areas so much that I decided this project was going have to be the kind that was simply finished and not perfect. Not feeling too great about the outcome of this project overall at the moment.

[fantasticcreaturedesignproj-blog]

I started out the design process by examining the forms found in chickens, cats and the peacock plant. I was also toying with the idea of possibly integrating a bat for the wings but quickly abandoned that idea.

Overall I really liked the idea of a sort of rain forest dwelling creature that was for the most part friendly and domesticated. Though I’d wanted them to be treated more like cats than chickens as I don’t think they’d make very good food! 

I found that the sleek form of the Abyssinian cat made it easier to break down the forms found in a cat but I really liked the way that the fur of rag doll cats fell on their body. I planned to combine the two somehow.