HUGE GINORMOUS EXCESSIVELY LARGE POST AHEAD!
Originally, I was gonna break these projects up by the class, but today's a blogging day according to my calendar. So I figured why not spend a bit more time with one big post today about all my animation projects instead of spreading them out... >.> I got time. ... I love saying that.
Sooo, where to begin...??
We'll go with my 3D animation projects. ^^
And, no, we're not talkin' Pixar status here. I swear, I will never view those movies the same ever again. The amount of time and effort that goes into this kind of work is EXCRUCIATINGLY wearisome. And the big Mac computers (lol bigmac) could barely handle the short animations we were putting together. I can't even imagine what kind of system is needed to produce a professional movie of Pixar's caliber. 3D modeling and 3D animation were two different classes I took as we saw in earlier entries. Had to take the modeling first, 'cause of course animation was just built off that knowledge.
Not gonna lie, I was pretty miserable throughout both courses. I realized the skill is valuable and highly sought after, so I signed up for the classes. And...pretty much, they made me hate life. Just so tedious, and it's like making art with numbers. SO MANY THINGS can go wrong. And with my luck, if something can go wrong, it does. And it did.
Software crashed, my geometry got screwed up beyond repair, somehow I missed a step or something wasn't working the way it should so the entire project was screwed to hell, or I couldn't remember how to get a certain function to work...omg...all on a regular basis. I wanted to throw the computer out the window. Rendering in high quality took hours if not days. Literally. We had to leave the jobs running over night, so it was impossible to get things done in a timely manner. I was in the lab on weekends, even...by myself...trying to get everything done. You can just tell how happy I was about that...
And because of that time issue, I missed out on an opportunity to have my work showcased in a big museum because I had to change something I was told would take 2 hours........and it ended up taking 10 hours to render. I hated it.
Instead of 3D animation, I kinda wished I'd signed up for Advanced Electronic Art so I could become more familiar with web design instead of stressful animation crap.
EVEN SO.
I'm not entirely regretful.
I can learn web design on my own if I need to. Okay, technically, I can learn any of this stuff on my own, but it'll be nice to say I got formal education on 3D art.
Anyway, let's finally get started with the work. lol
This was the first animation I did - everyone's was different. We were given the assignment to test out all kinds of deformers, and make a composition with various ones. I went for a strange squishy, breathing cylinder-thing with a diaphragm that was blowing a spinning disk into the air. lol No, I had no idea what I was doing, but prof liked it, and that's what counts. I used 3D models I'd created of certain objects I like to draw on a regular basis. It turned into a huuuuuuge motherflippin' project we weren't expecting to take half the semester, but it did. x_x Basically, we learned new things each week, and were tasked with updating the animation with something showing what we learned. Deformers, motion key framing, motion paths, camera paths, color changing effects, etc.
Eventually, the assignment was to develop the thing into a conceptual piece (we weren't told this directly, but prof expected us to have an idea behind our work every time it was critiqued), and I was like...great...wtf is this supposed to be?? So, I went with critique discussion about how this composition looked like it was alive, and changed the color scheme to red to make it seem bloody/fleshy/alive/what have you. I liked my first red version best, but prof wanted me to do more with the blood basin...thus the second one was born with the red liquid hanging out upside down as per her suggestion ... -_- I don't understand how she thinks sometimes, but all I wanted was to stay on her good side. There are sacrifices to be made in art classes sometimes if you want a good grade. ART IS SUBJECTIVE...as dangerous as that is, there's no getting around it.
Also went with the checker board world from my Alice and Wonderland-esque model done the previous semester to keep my work cohesive (also suggested).
You'll notice the diaphragm has an image mapped onto it in the first version and is more of a chrome material in the others. That was a fluke. Our render farm was ridiculously buggy and could not get that right for the life of itself. You'll also notice the ocean jiggles in the first version. It was supposed to do that a lot more, and in the others, too...but again, the render farm couldn't handle it no matter what I tried. I worked on that damn jiggle for at least two months to no avail.
Prof also wanted me to add a breathing sound effect or a heartbeat or something for added depth (she doesn't usually like music in pieces, btw), but I got caught up in other class priorities and just had to put my foot down about it being done.
Moving on.
I actually had a bit of fun with this next one, and love it to pieces. Gasp. :p
After our first project was finished, we were told we had to do another complete animation for our final. And we were like...uuh...it just took us 3 months to make that damn thing, and now you want us to make a better one in a month? LOL YAAAAaaaaaaaayyyyy.....fuck.
I talked to prof about using the 3D model of a mystical pond I'd created the previous semester as the base for my animation to save on time. I also asked her one more favor she agreed to, but I won't mention it 'cause I promised I wouldn't. :P Basically, I wanna highlight that she understood my screwed situation and helped me out a bit by allowing me to do certain things. And I'm very grateful. Rest assured, I did all the work you see here.
Of course we're not allowed to create mindless works of art, so there's a concept. I knew I wanted to keep the mystical feel of the pond. At first, I had the idea of animating a gold fish (as seen in an animation I'll share later) that would emerge from the water and swim up to the sky, creating bubbles of life that defined who I was in each. The bubbles would then become the stars in the sky. BUT THEN I GOT A BETTER IDEA. Since the fish didn't have much to do with me personally (and prof is always encouraging me to make my work a reflection of myself) I decided the bubbles would act on their own.
The pond is the unknown from which we develop. Dark, mysterious, and foreboding. Within, we are undefined. There are aspirations which arise in our desire to grow and break away from that darkness, and some of them don't flourish. But certain aspects we carry do take flight, and end up defining who we are. Those are the bubbles that rise and become stars. Stars have been symbolic in my life for a long time as representations of how we should strive to be - lights in the dark, shining brightly amidst the overwhelming darkness/odds against us. There's a lullaby I wrote toward the beginning of my college career - the first part reads as follows:
When you lie awake, gazing at the stars
Tell me what you see, my dear, they show you who you are.
In the dark of night, behold the shining light
Summoning the glow of dawn despite the rising odds.
And that's where the music in the animation is from. I actually started fooling with Garage Band on my MacBook Pro, and found out how to create a simple tune. It doesn't follow a beat, I regret to say, but I was in a bit too much of a hurry to figure out how to make it perfect. I still like it!
So, everything in the piece is made by me, and represents something extremely important, which is why I like it so much. Luckily, the creation process went a bit more smoothly than usual. I actually freaked out at how well it was going ... it was a little scary, I thought something devastating was about to happen as per my luck. xD
I used Adobe After Effects for the objects inside the bubbles. Using effects and filters, I gave the illusion of them being inside the 3D bubbles while they're actually on top. The speech audio was edited in Adobe Premiere Pro.
The first bubble holds round, colored lights, representing the watercolor paint palette I was holding when the audio was recorded (I was 2 years old - 1992). The bubble is symbolic of my artistic side that's been with me since the beginning.
The second bubble portrays a bright light already like a star while the Lord's Prayer is read. This represents my spirituality which is literally what has lit my path ahead.
The third bubble contains purple smoke. While I'm singing the song "Stand My Ground" by Within Temptation, my favorite band, the purple smoke is a tribute to my favorite singer, Amy Lee, who often appears on a stage themed in purple these days. This bubble symbolizes my inspiration.
The fourth bubble entraps a feather, which, if you know me, of COURSE represents angelic influence. :] The line being spoken is meant to be Uni's. "Sailor Universe...is what I'm called. And I am not bound by the borders of worlds...or dimensions." This is symbolic of so much more than it seems. Yes, Universe can travel across worlds and dimensions, but that's how I also feel about my artwork and worldview. Limitless. The bubble symbolizes enlightenment.
The final bubble holds a burning fire as I lead Air Force cadets in reciting the Airman's Creed (audio retrieved from this video). Officer training was the toughest challenge I've endured to this point in conjunction with college, but I persevered. Determination is a prominent trait I carry, and that's what this bubble symbolizes.
The bubbles as a whole are also a significant cohesive factor in my work as I've been known to use spherical shapes in other projects to denote importance. I.E. :
...to name a few.
The animation was featured in the Senior Art Ball on campus. :]
2D Animation~
So much random crap. lol Okay, here we go.
The Intermediate Electronic Art course I took this past semester was all about exploring digital 2D animation options. We used Photoshop, After Effects, Flash, and combinations of the three.
I was already familiar with animating in Photoshop and Flash, so those came pretty easily to me. After Effects took a bit to get used to, but it literally is almost just like Photoshop. Same filters, layers, and everything...very cool. For our midterm project, we had to animate a collage kind of work. And prof wanted us to sync it to music...her music...everyone did the same damn music. And after hearing this a million times over in critique, you go kinda crazy.
Yes it had to be random as hell, and filled with action. :v I did some frame-by-frame illustration, there was some nested animation which was a new thing for me, I created those Zelda fairy and rupee gifs in photoshop, of course there are some animated gifs in there I brought in from online, but most everything's mine. Including that pretty sakura background. :3 Don't ask about the plane creature...that was a separate assignment we had to incorporate that I kinda hated. And yes, that's me dancing at the beginning.
I wanted to include rockin' Mario, but couldn't find a good place. >.<
Next, we have one that was animated solely in After Effects, although I used Photoshop to comprise the graphics. It's called "Impossible Space" because the assignment was to create a world with impossible dynamics and animate it as though we were going through it. There were some pretty creative ideas, like a world on the palm of someone's hand, and abstract worlds within a lake reflection and such.
So, I had a surface city under the ocean where pencils grew and planets and planes flew. lol Then I take you up into space where the fishies are, and you eventually find out you're in a cosmic fish bowl within a marble in an abyss of nothing. xD How's that for impossible...
Those fish were a blast to animate, though...stagnant images put to motion by means of the puppet tool. Pretty neat thing.
All stock images were free for use.
And last, but not least...the stop motion animation.
Yes, the type of animation where you take a million photos and put them together to create a motion picture. I only took 400+, but it was still a hassle.
The semester before this last one...when I found out how horrid my workload was going to be, I went to Ms. R and asked her what I could start on over winter break to alleviate the burden a bit during the semester. The only thing I could really work on was the stop motion, and get a head start with the photo taking...which...does take quite a while. So, that would explain the Christmas theme.
However, this also had to have a sensible concept behind it, and I tried many ideas before Ms. R would let me settle on one. By that point, break was almost over, so I had to rush. -_- Stop motion is generally choppy, but this one is extra choppy due to rushiness. You've been warned.
We've had these translucent M&M Christmas light covers since before I can remember. When I was little, I used to make them go on little adventures around the Christmas tree and interact with ornaments. Funnest thing ever for a kid. :] But I got the idea to bring that to life again in this project. In case the idea wasn't clear, the little red dude is visiting ornaments that symbolize significant moments or things in my life throughout the ages. Hence...Memory Tree.
Animating the project came with all KINDS of problems. This was a bunch of photos...not video. So, I couldn't put a filter over top of it to edit lighting or anything. I had to take all 400+ photos into photoshop and put them through an automator action. but when they saved again...for some reason they were all out of order. I have no idea why. Simple folder arrangement wasn't working. Cue the Mac's Finder automator. Messed everything up even more for some inexplicable reason. It took me hours to separate all the scenes into folders, rename them, and put them in order manually. Then, After Effects wasn't importing the images correctly, files kept going missing during import. Had to rename some again. Then it was going too fast and it took be a few days to find a way to slow the frame rate. By that point, I'd had it...and really don't care that there's a slight pause after every 10 frames. = | I don't know why it does that, but any slower would be WAY too choppy, and faster doesn't give you a good idea of what's going on. -__- Dude. If I EVER do this again, it better not be when I have to rush things.
But, that's it for now. We're pretty much up to date on my class animations. If I find some obscure exercise animation I wanna share, that'll go up another time. :]
Later!
~Uni
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