New Showreel!

Just a quick upload of my updated showreel!

More backgrounds

I've spent the past two days producing some more backgrounds using the new Wacom Cintiq's in the studio, these were amazing to use and made my work so much quicker and precise. I've also experiemented with gradiant fills here to enhance the light shining into the cave.

2011 Showreel

I spent today editing and updating my showreel, It was pretty cool to be able to stick work in with the BBC watermark in the top left hand corner!
Hopefully in the next few weeks I'll be able to bolster my showreel with some of my new 2D work for my film.

An Evaluation...

Since Christmas, my feelings towards this half of the project have been mixed. Most of my time since the last presentation has been devoted to my dissertation, because of this I fell behind right after the dissertation hand in date. However, even though I lost some time working on this project, I feel that in the past few weeks I have made Massive leaps forward in terms of motivation and drawing skills. As mentioned earlier in the blog, over the past two weeks, I have made a solid descision to come into university every day and from opening to closing. This has meant that I have been in an exciting and productive atmosphere all day, every day. In these past two weeks I have developed what I believe to be a coherant and unique aesthetic style. Developing this style for my animation has meant constant drawing, this has greatly improved my drawing skill. Another skill area that has improved due to my recent mindset change has been my technical skill with regards to photoshop and premiere pro. I made full use of the new computer equipment and have gained experience using the graphics tablet and photoshop. I believe that this is evident on my blog.
Although I feel that my drawing and compositing skills have improved, there are areas that have not have been so successfull. Due to not revising my storyboard and animatic right after that last feedback/crit, It has meant that I have devoted a lot of time closer to the deadline to this task. This meant that there were no safeguards in place if there were any problems with premiere. During the exporting phase, I found that premiere was exporting in extremely low quality. This lead to a mad rush at the end to get to campus on time to use the faster, newer machines to export.
Also, due to not sorting the aesthetic and character designs for my film,

More Storyboard Shading

Yesterday I continued to add lighting and detail to some more of my Animatic frames, I also begun drawing some of the more basic frames and animation.

Animatic frames

I spent the rest of today drawing and shading some of my animatic frames. Because I won't be able to shade all of them in time for the animtic presentation, I plan to spend the rest of this evening and tomorrow drawing out all of the remaining backgrounds and then choosing a select few to fully shade. The rest will be partially shaded and highlighted to show lighting. I will then spend sunday blocking in my character and key framing a few select scenes.
Today was especially exciting as I was using a brand new graphics tablet (which was much bigger than the one I used for my other art this week) and I had an additional monitor. Plus, I've been drawing and colouring in 720p HD, so it should look great when Its presented.

Section 3 storyboards

Section three has now been storyboarded, I've decided to give drawing my animatic frames straight into photoshop a try as I've just been given use of a new, larger Intuos 4 graphics tablet (with the cintiq's being installed as we speak!).

Section 2 storyboards

Section 2 has now been completely thumbnailed, this has given me a better grasp of the story and its pace. The next step is storyboarding section three (which will not take long), then re-drawing all the frames and adding detail/lighting for my animatic.

Storyboarding...

Due to my last Animatic not achieving what It set out to do I decided to do something crazy, nay, suicidal. I've started a new storyboard/animatic from scratch...

With the presentation deadline looming and my distinct lack of ANY form of linetests i've decided that a clear animatic, that shows an effective and varied use of camera angles and lighting is the best course. I've been really motivated over the past few weeks and have really pushed myself to work long ours in the studio every day. It is the only way I will be able to get this film finished on time.
Before I started storyboarding I made pages of notes detailing the characters, setting, locations, motivations, plot points and much more background information. I've really tried to flesh out my idea as best I can. Then, from these notes I have begun work on what I consider to be my best storyboard to date. I have seperated my storyboard into three segments to help me manage my time and get a grasp upon the timing and pace of the story. By thumbnailing my storyboard first, it has allowed me to really think about where my story is going and which different cinematograpy techniques to use.
Below are the notes I have made on my story and the first thumbnailed section of the storyboard. I intend to work on into the night until all three sections have been thumbnailed.

Tomorrow I shall Draw each panel in a larger format, scan into photoshop and add light, shadow and detail. This work will most likely lead on to saturday, when I plan to compile the segments in Adobe Premiere to create my animatic. This leaves sunday morning to tie up any loose ends and to create one well animated linetest that I can hopefull place over one of my detailed backgrounds to show that I can inideed animate this film in the timeframe given. Sunday evening/early monday morning shall then be left to tie up any loose ends regarding the professional practice module.
I know that I am further behind than many of my classmates who are working in 2D, However, I feel that this time has been extremely well spent. These past two weeks I have refined the Aesthetic style of my film, created and refined my main character, finalised my story, and created my storyboard. More importantly however, I have gained massive ammounts of motivation and I have re-kindled my love for sequential and animated storytelling. I expect that come monday, many of my tutors and classmates will remain skeptical with regards to my ability to produce this film on time. However, In these past two weeks I have learned an incredible ammount about myself and about animation in general. It has given me a new drive and determination to finish what i've started. Let's Do this!

'The Children Who Built Victorian Britain'

Last night the documentary I created an animated segment for entitled 'The Children Who Built Victorian Britain' was shown on BBC4. It was great to see something I created finally get to broadcast and the creation process taught me a lot about what it's like working for live a live client. You can watch my clip along with a selection of others from the programme Here.
The program will be repeated again at 7:30pm on BBC4 and is still available on BBC iPlayer.