ANNAMATIONS

The bathroom has been refurbished. Or it wil be very soon. Here is my new colour concept: 

new colour concept

Since the camera fish-eye lens did not quite work for the scene - as my tutor pointed out everything would be too ‘wibbly wobbly’ - so I deformed the room producing a similar distortion effect. I also added some more items in the room like a towel, loo roll and a door. Back to weighting the boy then…

room model

It is sometimes difficult to get 3D to look as you imagine. For me anyway, perhaps my 2D background makes it easier for me to imagine how I would draw or paint something - now i need to translate that into computer language and techniques. Nevertheless, these are some early tests of how the room and the octopus would look, i think i got carried away with the textures. My next attempt would definitely be Simpler and Less Distracting!

room texture test

octopus texture

comp tests

In the two images above i tested the fish-eye lens to get a distorted effect and then applied some ‘artistic’ filters in XSI compositor. I liked the rough pastels one and notepaper best, they could be a possibility probably mixed with other effects like toon ink outline like in the textured image above.

These is the latest version of the boy model made for my final major project. Still need to paint and dress him up with textures which should make him look more attractive!

boy model

Since a lot of the animation would be focusing on his facial expressions, I try to follow advice from net tutorials on how to model the best possible head for animation, using box polygon modelling and creating edge loops around the key areas.

wireframe head

teeth

Modelling the boy’s expressions in the Shape Manager was the most fun as at last he is starting to come to life.

expressions

more expressions

After a lot of sketches and photo research of millions of bathrooms i ended up with this image and colour scheme:

bathroom colours

And this is how it turned out in 3d:

bathroom model

Still needs work and improvements, i will end up deforming the actual room rather than using a fish eye lens and I have been rethinking the colours after playing around with textures and getting carried away..

Storyboards for the film. Timings for each shot will be finalised with the block test.

Click to enlarge!

After a few brainstorming and brainwrecking sessions i came up with an idea for my final major project while trying to sleep. A mixture of my childhood and the amazing comic character Calvin (& Hobbes), I thought of animating a story of a boy that hates bathtime. He imagines that there is a huge octapus in his bathroom that is very determined to wash or eat him or both. After a lot of kicking and screaming the boy loses the fight and is plunged into the bath tub with his clothes still on. In real life, it was his mum that put him in the bath tub and the octapus is just a floating bath toy.

Some early sketches and character studies:

concept drawing

sketch

squarehead boy

character pozes

octobathus

tentacles

The animator’s ideal holiday. I couldn’t have been happier, in a beautiful picturesque town in the south of France, between the lake and the mountains and animation screenings all day. Inspiring work, artistic vibes, good food. Too bad the weather wasn’t as beautiful as previous years. I definitely reccommend visiting the festival!

Some sketches I did while I was there.

merry goround

annecy

people

at the beach

Here is a low quality version of the short made in the second term of the MA by me and two other students, Sarah Hale and Justin Kent. Though a lot of difficulties with transferring data from XSI to Houdini, the result turned out pretty close to what we aimed for.

I was responsible for the visual look of the film (character design, storyboards, colour scheme) and shared the modelling, texturing, animation and rendering with Sarah and Justin. The idea is based on the Native American Legends of the Dreamcatcher, which allows good dreams through and captures nightmares which perish with the sun’s first light.

Storyboards I made for our group project 3D short, Dreamcatching. Team members Sarah and Justin liked the general concept and colour scheme so I took the task of a sort of an art director since we all worked on developing the story and all sections of the film.

Drawn in pencil and coloured in Painter - using a wacom and digital paint was new and exciting to me so i got carried away and coloured all the storyboards, which helped to keep in mind the look, lighting and colours we were aiming for.

dream-boards1

dream-boards2

dream-boards3

My first character from 2D to 3D! I really enjoyed researching into native american legends and visuals, and designing the character was quite fun.

character ideas

character ideas2

Below is the final design for the character and the 3D model. He is my version of a wooden doll that protects children from nightmares using a dreamcatcher as a net.I would have liked to also add textures to his wrist and ankle cuffs but being made for a group project it was more important to spend time bringing him to life! Rig by Sarah Hale.

character sheet