401 Module Update #2

• Defined each character more
• Added names, basic character traits and group roles
• Added some overall 'story' to tie them together (mostly for context to influence design rather than to be used in the response itself)
• Explored some design with the first character

Overall story: 

An urban fantasy world with a civilisation destroyed by a fungus based pandemic. A group of fantasy creatures join together to survive.

Character Updates:

• Tasha - female, she/her - lesbian - Werewolf - shy, resourceful, good in any situation. Leader
• Brivar - male, he/him - gay - Dark Elf - confident, strong, eager. Soldier
• Hriva - female, she/her - bisexual - Valkyrie - goth, badass, ready to set fire to everything. Strategist
• Dawn - female, she/her - pansexual - Fae - hippy, relaxed, smokes a lot of weed. Herbalist/Healer
• Dracsahr - male, he/him - asexual - Incubus - reserved, awkward, very good cook. Chef
• Gurukk - transgender (ftm), he/him - Orc - loyal, big buff cheeto puff, works out a lot. Commander
• Brear - transgender (mtf), she/her - Selkie - optimist, thinks everyone is redeemable, really hard to make angry. Entertainer
• Eraax - non-binary, they/them - Gargoyle - intelligent, D&D nerd, a little high and mighty sometimes. Advisor

Character design exploration #1 - Tasha

Started with some form explorations. More human or more wolf? Would she have a human and wolf form? I went with a single anthropomorphic wolf form to stick to the urban fantasy theme more closely

Looked at the design of the head and face. Initially started with a small, thin muzzle, then made it longer, but found it to be too fox-like. Kept the second shape and just shortened it and ended up with the final face design. 

Finalised form shape and added a ripped shirt to break up colour patterns. Added various notes about the design such as 'Keep her chunky' 'Keep her poofy' and 'Use simplicity' Also added a small look at the underside of the paws so it was noted she has paw pads and her claws are part of the fingertip rather than separate.

Scanned the design into the computer and re-worked some of the lineart so it was cleaner and added colour. Based the colour palette of the lesbian flag (included with the design) as the colours work well together and are used as a reference to the flag (if the characters were to appear in a piece of media, it would be something for LGBT+ audience members to notice, like a mini easter egg).

401 Module Update #1

• Broke down points to use in research journal
• Listed examples and some ideas for analysis, including characters to focus on and how they link to the question
• Started exploring ideas of practical response to the question, looking at genre, sexualities and gender identities to explore with characters, and design choices
• Picked an over-arching genre to keep each design to a theme
• Picked a list of LGBT+ identities to incorporate into characters - lesbian/gay, bisexual, pansexual, asexual, transgender (ftm and mtf) and non-binary
• Wrote some basics of each character (sex/gender, sexuality, race/species)

Universe genre - urban fantasy/post apocalyptic (fungus based plague)

Characters: 

• Lesbian - Werewolf
• Gay - Dark Elf
• Bisexual - Valkyrie
• Pansexual - Fae
• Asexual - Incubus
• Transgender (ftm) - Orc
• Transgender (mtf) - Selkie
• Non-binary - Gargoyle

403 Module Update #9 - Exaggeration

Greetings!

In today's continuing adventures in animation we looked at exaggeration!

To experiment with exaggeration (and introduce us to some software) we created a very short animation (with SOUND) in TVPaint. Using a goat scream sound effect that was around three seconds long, we had to create a short animation that was at most five seconds that used exaggeration.

I quite liked the very simple movement, allowing me to go crazy with the squash and stretch, and the simple character design made sure it never went near uncanny valley in any of the smear frames. Despite this, I feel it could have been more exaggerated and used more elaborate squash and stretch and anticipation with the jumping motion.

403 Module Update #8 - Anticipation

Greetings!

In the continuing adventures in animation we looked at using anticipation of action for more realistic and (if exaggerated) cartoony movement in characters.

To experiment with this, we created very short (around one second) animations using anticipation of action. I decided to use good old Birb Blob doing a Road Runner style escape. I absolutely loved how it turned out, with the arced head movement and blink when it sees something off screen and the way form was kept even though it was a very simple character. However it was pointed out that there could be a few select improvements, such as the anticipation action (the head and leg pulling back) be exaggerated more and arced, which, once implemented in the second sequence, vastly improved it.

I wanted to explore it a little more as well, so did another short animation of Birb Blob following something in the sky (off screen, but meant to be other flying birds) and jumping up to fly too. I loved how the slight follow through action of the body squashing a little after pulling the leg around to jump up gave Birb Blob a little weight and looked more realistic and less cartoony, and I loved how form was kept with the wing positions to make a basic 2D shape seem more 3D.
However if I were to do this again I would have Birb Blob look up normally and then have the exaggerated following as a reaction to looking up, as currently Birb Blob just looks like it's stretching.

403 Module Update #7 - Squash and Stretch

Greetings!

In this week's adventures in animation we looked at using squash and stretch in animation to create more exaggerated, nicer looking movement.

We started with a simple single drop ball bounce, although we did not do it correctly, either in what happened in the actions themselves or in how the squashing and stretching was animated. We re-animated the single drop so the squashing and stretching worked better. Despite the reanimation being better than the first, it's bounce was too short.

After doing the single drop ball bounce we did an arced ball bounce. The squash and stretch worked far better, although the arc wasn't as high as it should have been.

An individual task we did as well was create a flipbook. I quite like how the flying motion worked, however the physics of the movements wasn't as good as I wanted, the figure seems to just teleport some distance behind and the speed as it travels up was too slow.

I'm very excited to improve my animation with the coming weeks!

403 Module Update #6 - Arcs

Greetings!

In the continuing adventures in animation we looked at using arcs to create more realistic and nicer looking movement. The first animation we did was meant to be a simple animation demonstrating the basic idea of arcs. I created a simple cut out animation of a plane falling like in the phone game 'Flappy Bird'. Although it fell quite well, I feel the timing was slightly off, as there are too many frames in the fall.

The second animation I created was a simple pendulum swing, which uses arcs in it's entire motion. I also included some use of timing and spacing to create a nicer looking motion. Although the 'string' was very inconsistent.

 I'm quite excited to continue to learn how to improve my animation

403 Module Update #5 - Timing and Spacing

Greetings!

In this day's adventures in animation we looked at the most important part of animation, timing and spacing! We looked at easing in, easing out, and easy ease, which focuses on the spacing of each frame to create more realistic motion.
Below is our showcase of each type using a sharpener, first going from easing out, easing in, and finishing with easy ease. I feel it went pretty well, considering it was just a basic look at the types of timings and spacing in animation, although something that irritated me was a single frame that caught a group member's hand. I attempted to fix it, but the knowledge I have of Dragonframe is limited.

We then proceeded to have a go at timing the frames right with a simply blink animation of the characters we created earlier in another class. The only issue I found with the blink was the lighting, which made it harder to see the pencil, although I found only having two frames made the animation feel incredibly basic.

We were then tasked with creating a very simple animated action using between 6-12 frames. The first version was stretching each frame to 12 frames and running it at 24fps. This broke down the animation into a slide-show-esque scene that allowed us to have a 'control' scene for us to experiment on to find the correct timings to create a nicer look. I created a lovely scene here of Etra yawning.

After editing the timings, I had this better timed yawn. I then finished off by completely rendering Etra with lineart and colour!

I very much enjoyed animating Etra doing something I frequently do, and I can't wait to do more with Etra here :)

403 Module Update #4 - Straight Ahead vs Pose to Pose

Greetings!

In this week's adventures in animation we looked at straight ahead animation vs pose to pose.

Generally I tend to do straight ahead animation, although I will occasionally work from simple storyboards, however the drawings from the boards won't be used as keyframes, rather simple outlines, so I found working with keyframes to be a bit more difficult as I am used to winging the timings and working back through it to fix anything.

To do straight ahead, I made a simple plasticine character (who I named Meatball) and initially made a very basic animation, then added tiny legs and tried some different motion, then added some arms and a tiny cowboy hat and tried some other motions.
I feel the animation was extremely basic and the frames weren't spaced properly.

Onto the pose to pose! I found it more difficult to work with, purely on unfamiliarity, but I feel it turned out quite well. I used a couple smear frames to exaggerate the animation and give it a more expressive feel.

I am very much looking forward to doing more of this!

403 Module Update #3 - Staging

Greetings!

In the continuing adventures of a student animator we looked at staging, how to focus the audience's attention and have a nice composition for various shots.
We were tasked with creating a storyboard with a fully rendered splash page/establishing shot focused around a nursery rhyme. I created one from the rhyme 'Hey Diddle Diddle'.

I really loved doing the character expressions and cinematography. I also loved how the splash page turned out, as I have not had as much practice with backgrounds.

I feel the cinematography of a few shots could be improved, such as the penultimate frame could have a better angle with the dog, and the final frame having a better background similar to the establishing shot.

I am very much looking forward to animating such camera movements properly.

403 Module Update #2 - Appeal

Greetings!

This time around in animation class we looked at the appeal of characters, both in look and personality.
I created a character called Etra, a large lizard lady who wants nothing more than to help the helpless and save the world. She's loyal, protective, but a little insecure and naive.

I really loved the simplistic design as it made doing expressions much easier as well as making her a more expressive character. I used more rounded corners and blocky shapes rather than separating the skull and jaw like in most of my designs.

I feel the hands could be improved slightly if they could be made a little chunkier and rounded rather than human like with sharp claws.

Can't wait to see where this journey into madness takes me next...

403 Module Update #1 - Solid Drawing

Greetings!

So far in the classes, we've done a little of the basics to start us off. We created Phenakistiscopes, mine of which features a character I helped name. Say hello to Curtis Fishfinger:

At a later date we looked at taking inspiration from life, such as creating a character from a walnut. Here's good ol' Nutboy, first as his lined variation, then with colour, then in a particular pose.

I like the lining in the colourless piece, the variation of thickness gives it a nicer style.

I feel the colours aren't the best, and the actual colouring isn't great either, but I had limited colours at hand and I am very out of practice with traditional colouring.

Aside from all that, we also looked at drawing form and constructing the human shape from lines of action to express emotion through movement rather than realism (very animation type stuff). Here's some of the better stuff I did, forgive the poor camera quality:

I have never been that great at drawing people (aside from hands) but I think the sketch vibe each drawing has made me more confident to try more so they came out better.

Can't wait to start the first proper project where I get to make some characters M O V E