Its been quite a while since my last post, the vids comming along well, although a bit behind schedule (which was to be expected) we're over half way now and overall its lookin good.

Today me and james did more of the boat scene, 3 quite long shots which involved a fair bit of action and a camera move (i had hoped to get these done last fri but due to camera and lighing issues they took longer than expected) whilst james was animating i made a few more engine parts for the next shots.

We also had a little play about with adding in pupils on after effects, which i think will work quite well. This has also made me realise just how much post production work there is to do, finishing the animation is just the beginning of a whole new world of work.

(I'll try and post more next time).

~Dave

post number 60 whoop whoop!

where to start, its been a while since i last posted.

feedback:

Hayley's post #1...
firstly as you know we have been using both the background for the set, so it wasn't a waste of time for either of you, which is always a good thing.
yeah it is aparent that we have been a bit ambitious, and there are many ways in which we could have aproached the project that might have been easier, but who knows. we're here now so lets just work with what we've got. the stuff we've produced so far, allbeit minnimal, does look pretty good and if we work hard hopefully we'll get it done.
sorry about the camera hayley, i didn't actually mean to leave it in uni, if i had i would have left the charger, but done well for gettin on.

Jordan's post...
i beat you to it with that little gem of a music vid, was one of my first posts i think.

James's post...
those dungerees really did the trick, bills looking sutably awesome, which is nice.

i think if we put a bit more time into it, that float shot could work, but as grace said we might avoid this shot if it becomes too much work, good job for such a short amount of time.

Grace's post...
the boats lookin good, although as we found out the depth wasn't figured out correctly (sorry about that), but thats been sorted out now.
One thing about Paul S's walk is that it needs arm movement, that aside, nice work on the animation.

Hayley's post #2...
I do agree with hayley on the shirt, they shouldn't have been cut off so hastely. but i don't think there gonna fall apart and there would be no reason to point figures if they did, everyones doing the best they can with what they have and learning as they go, and that all you can really ask of someone.

Grace's post #2...
good job on the turn arounds. and its nice to see some of the trees, the only thing is if we're wanting to use them for blue screening we might have to do them again, as they might need to be from a lower angle and off the set so that theres no twigs in the background.

That shuffle walkin came in handy the other day, i agree with grace that this is the way foward for alot of the shots with most/all of the band in, although it woul be nice to have some full band walking we probably don't have the time.

What have i been doing...

i've been workin on the schedual quite a bit lately, and although its been hard to keep to it for the past couple of days, i'll e-mail everyone an updated version by the end of today. also, i was thinking its gonna be very hard to complete this by the 23rd so i think we should be prepaird to move the sets to another location and continue after christmas. The options we have here are either Ben's spair room or my room. I'm lucky enough to have quite a big bedroom and i think it wouldn't be hard to fit one or both of the sets in my unused floor space (i also have a spare table to put it on already in my room). So we can either have one at mine and one at bens or both at one persons, the only thing is that we only have one set of lights. what does everyone think about this?

Bill's head development....


Heres a test animation of Bill, firstly the aspect raitio is wrong because i shot it with the camera too close, so when i re-scaled it too much was cropped off, also the table props and chair move at points, so i need to make sure to stick everything down next time and it could do with a few more inbetweens. Overall, although it has its fualts i am quite pleased with the outcome.

Well heres a test i've done for the blue screen walking camera pan shot, i used the animation hayley did of Niel walking in front of the blue screen, a photo of the set i found on my hard drive, and the foreground trees from the animatic with a few ajustments.

As you can see its far from perfect but it only took a max of an hour to complete, from figuring it out to final render; and as you can see, i used quite a poor image for the background with terrilble lighting and the foreground trees are 2D, so with a little bit more work i think it could work really well. what does everyone think?

woow that was a long post for those of you who made it this far, thanks for puttin the time in.

i forgot this test.

i done this test of them walking by shuffling, i think this technique will work for medium shots eg waiste upwards. let me know what you guys think.

james and hayley have started shooting now and we will continue into next week and as long as it takes for everybody to shoot really.

Grace

tests and turnaround

here are the turn arounds we done , me and hayley done them, i done the trees.

Grace

Character Line Up - Responce

I love how prolific the stop motion team is, you are certainly the most active on th blog

Live is really coming together.

I'm sure you have noticed/worked on many of teh things i am about to say but here they are anyway.

All charcters need hands
Armature can been seen on PROFT T's leg and neck, fix some how
Felix could do with some dark red braces (or other suitable colour)
Ogre is awesome, head needs to match hand skin tone

Another photo with instruments and completed characters would be great.

Jordan

Nice

Also, in next line up add digital pupils so I can show client

Accident?

Firstly I was disapointed to see that my 2 hour effort on Paul's shirt had gone to waiste as someone seems to have hacked at the sleeves with a pair of scissors to shorten the metal armature. I take alot of pride in my sewing so I'm not mentioning this to be anal but it reflects badly on me as it looks like I've been lazy on the sleeves when actaully they were hemmed so they didnt fray. Now someones cut off the hems, I won't be suprised if its still me who gets the blame later when the clothes fall apart.

I respect other people's work and possesions, I don't touch without asking permission first. Please show me the same respect. I don't understand why the sleeve wasn't rolled back and the excess metal just clipped off, or alternatively I was in there all day today and didn't leave till 8.30pm when we got kicked out, I only ever left the room for toilet breaks and to get a USB stick from the vending machine in the libary, someone could have asked me to roll it back and hold it up with some stiches. Now it looks a mess and by the end of the animation would probably have frayed noticably up his arm, it wasn't even cut straight.

I have included a before picture when I was making it last night and an after picture of how I found it not long before leaving.

On a more positive note we now have a fully operational team of armatures and the day ended with a nice photo of them.

I think on the whole everything is looking good from what people are posting.

~Hayley Warner

this is the boat. what do people think?

This is my turn around for razor. i think the shirt is terrible so i am going to make another one tomorow. also here is a walk test of him. terrible lighting i know.

.

In reply to James's posts. cool man, nice dunagrees i like teh fact that the teddy fits in the pouch :) if you can get that shot to look good and it doesnt ruien the whole feel of the thing it maybe worth a shot but i know your aware of my feelings for cgi... but your blinkin an such looks good so. but maybe time wasted adam C did say no point in havin close ups we maybe better off cutting that shot out all together, we speak tomorow bout it i am sure. also i have made the boat as you can see. we shall talk tomorow as im sure everybody accept dave is in bed :P

also Hayley i sorry but im to tired to read your post tonight.. i hope to read it tomrow or you can speak it to me. we have that stop mo guy at like what 11-3?'till then.

Grace.