11/12/03

I start animating in 22 days! that's just barely more than 3 weeks, and I am surprisingly calm about it. I'm actually getting more and more excited by the day, which is much better then me hating my project more each day (which has happened to people in the past). Every time I get to a new milestone the film becomes that much closer to being complete. I now have the set almost completely finished, and looking at it as a whole (almost) is great, since I never really knew exactly what it would look like when I was planning it.

I've got about half the film blocked out (I'll post the blocked out animatic as soon as it's done), and just need to finish up soem loose ends on a prop, figure out my lighting, finish my backdrops, and finish blocking the rest of the film in the next 3 weeks. No sweat....

oh...and figureout the cat....but thats in the works as well. I shot about a second and a half of the stop motion cat walking to use to test the CG integration, and should have "something" next week. I'm hopefully going to be able to use real smoke mixed with the maya particles to get the final composite. I'm working on it....and I think it'll be easier and better looking in the end to do it this way. But for the next 3 weeks I fight computers and pixels to get what I need.

I will win.

...because my site IS mindoverpixels...

The metal pieces have been removed from the gate for painting and will return soon.

Plank (left) and Bridge (right) used to get across the ravine by "the dudes"

One of the cliff faces.

11/05/03

The set is now completely covered in plaster (left). I am getting ready to start painting and lighting now. Also, the cat rig is well under way (below), with it having a few controls. It can only move three legs right now, but hey, it's a start.

I've also started to block out my scenes. This is great because I can see how my characters will move throughout the movie before I really do the animation. That's pretty much what I've been working on this week. Also I've been working on building two other fly rigs, but they still have a good amount of work to get done on them.

Basically I need to finish blocking the scenes, paint the set, make backdrops, finish the cat rig, do some cg integration tests, and light the set all within the next four weeks. Then the animation begins and I descend into the hot sweaty secluded hole of my room in a seven week animation binge, cutting off communication with the outside world save my crew (who will start getting busy with my work as well), and a select few people.

10/31/03

HAPPY HALLOWEEN!!!!

Workin', workin', workin'. When does it end? ...May.

Still plastering the set. It's about 60% done, and you don't get to see the progress because I don't feel like taking a picture. I will have the plaster finished by 11/5 and will post a picture then, and then I start painting.

A lot of the work I did this week isn't stuff that is really interesting or able to be shown, however I do have an animation test for the lantern to show. The exposure is a little out of whack, I'm not sure why, but I'll figure it out and I'm sure I can get it to look even better. I think a little light has made its way into my room from the outside world, I need to patch some holes in my trash bag barrier.

I have the rig (skeleton) for my computer generated cat underway. It should be done soon and then I can test out replacing the armature with smoke....finally.

I'm also going to get started blocking out the movements and timing for my shots this week. I might post some of it, I might not, I haven't really decided.

As long as I can get a whole lot of stuff done this week I'll be on schedule and in good shape. It's going to be rough as the semester is rapidly coming to an end, but I need to get it all done and start animating in almost a month or my film will not be finished in May. But I will finish, oh yes.

10/24/03

Here is the beginning of the plaster covering my set. (as of 10/21)

Here's the other side with it's starting plaster. (as of 10/21)

Well, I figured out how to use plaster, and it turns out I really like the stuff. Which is a double good thing, because I am able to finish my set now in a reasonable time frame, and it's fun to work with.

I got a new book entitled "Stop-motion: craft skills for model animation" by Susannah Shaw. It was a wonderful read (and I don't like reading), and I highly recommend it to anyone interested in stop motion animation. It is more geared towards beginner and intermediate animators, but anyone can get at least something out of it. I know I learned a lot, the only thing I didn't like was that it ended. Anyway, GET IT....the book is great. I recommend getting it from Amazon.com as it is cheaper and they ship pretty fast.

I have a new temp track for my animatic...though the visuals are the same. I like this much better even though it changes the mood of the piece as a whole. I think it's better this way, plus the music is all in a similar style and key, so it sounds better together. Obviously I don't want the final piece to sound like it's a Danny Elfman rip off, but I do like this sort of creepy mood. It's interesting to watch the animatic with the old temp track and then with the new one and see how by changing the music the piece as a whole changes. I'm not posting it yet as there is not much different BUT the music. I will post the blocking out of my scenes though, in a few weeks.

What that is, is once the set is finished I will put the characters in all the extreme poses for the correct amount of time and put that in place of my animatic. This lets me see the movie with the characters "moving" before I animate. This way I can further work out timing issues, and know exactly what it will looks like.

I have some good momentum going at the moment and expect to have a cool animation test by wed 10/29, you'll just have to wait and see what it is, I don't want to ruin the surprise.

All in all I'm happy with the progress so far, the set is coming along nicely, and I have a lot of my technical issues worked out, and am getting close to working out the kinks with the ones I don't.