Bone Appetite

So here is my final piece for Uni:



Bone Appetit from Simone Hunt on Vimeo.

Update on Artefact Five

Update on Artefact 5 from Simone Hunt on Vimeo.

Basically the last animation I did was pretty awful, lots of things wrong with it, people expected better of me. (Although that was two weeks of work, so not too bad in the time frame).

Anyway I've been getting some feedback from a friend of mine who used to do a bit in the industry, small animations and stuff. This piece has been re-worked 3 times. Still not 100% happy with the walk and the odd flick, but its not too bad.

I've simplified everything down, concentrating on animating one character and doing that well.

two thirds done, one third left to go.

The more successful

So this is Another of my Artefacts, well I've added the two more successful experiments. What I've learnt is that to replicate a take using a 3D model takes a lot of control, and is all about camera angles. A lot of the time spent on this Experiment was going back, re-rigging and adding more extreme Blendshapes, but ultimately I feel it still wasn't enough. Proof is in those experiments that failed as the rig found it almost impossible to contort itself in such away, even with a rig as simple and flexible as the Anzovin Rig. I will be adding another experiment to this list, one where the limbs are more stretched and exaggerated, rather than the face and eyes. That's it, the face, eyes and tongue were the things that needed the most work as that is where the life come from.

See something like the Take above is near on impossible to accomplish without using almost a completely new character, this is literally just down to the facial side of things, the rig is able to be manipulated like that. Yet the face, mainly the jaw becomes twisted and gnarled due to the bend and lack of neck. I will be having another go, pushing the Blend shapes further seeing if that will help. 

This is from the Take I'm currently tweaking at the minute before uploading. It is one of the easier of Avery's Take to replicate due to is mainly being about stretching the limbs and body, although again the jaw is proving to be a bit more difficult. 

Drawings can hide a multitude of sins, 3D cannot.

Process

 Thought I'd upload some of the stuff I've been working on. Below is my character process, from designs to modelling and rigging.

Its a bit like Tex Avery meet Shaun the Sheep, well that was the rendering style I was going for. I've learnt a lot in this process though, I mean about Maya. This is my first time using Maya for character animation, the last time I used Maya was last year and that was just for Dynamics. 

Above is a shot of  the model, then its rig and then textured. Texturing was a bit of a long process, but making sure it all fit means I can stretch the limbs, and have the wolf character in exaggerated poses.

This image I though summed up the whole idea and story, sleeping farmer, un-bothered sheep and sneaky wolf. My actual animation for the Client project had to be sped up and cut short in places, but more of that later.

Getting There

Sorry nearly at the point to add the finishing touches to my Animation, but this is a shot from the first scene with all three characters together

Initial Setup

Just sorting through my folders and came across this image. I think its from my initial scene set up, before animating. Its like Tex Avery meets Shaun the Sheep!

Le Update...

Add some screenshots I should have uploaded last week, but not had the chance.

Both of these shots are still in the T pose and early stages, but all rigged up using the beautiful software ANZOVIN. Amazing stuff and super simple to use, very straight forward. Will up date later with animation I am working on.

Sheep Test

Sheep test.
Now making the farmer character, should hoefully be finished modelling him today all being wekll and no more distractions.

ATRG Advert with Music

So made the music to the animation last night, using Garageband. I think I like it, in my eyes this is now done I can now just tweak and play with it as much as I want to before the deadline, its a good feeling. Now today onwards I can concentrate on conquering my real weakness writing.

This is my ATRG Advert (with no tweaks):


Eventually I will add little ATRG signs everywhere, like in the sands of egypt, the cave paintings and Punk graffiti, but for now I have to just be done with it.

Backgrounds done

catalogue ideas

ATRG Update

ATRG Update

Halfway through the backgroudn now, just have Georgian/Colonial to Modern day left to do. Still not hundred percent how I plan to finish it, but as long as I get the bulk of it done I'm happy.

I'm drawing a lot of it on the iPad using procreate and just transferring it over via dropbox to Photoshop, its so much easier to draw I find and then I can just tweak it and make it fit when I need to.

YAY

Got feedback for my last essay, high 2:1 which means I'm on track. Thats really good considering I havent written anything formal or done referencing since over a year now. Anyway also means I was only few marks off a 1st too.

Well I've been carrying on with trying to finish my Client and Catalogue projects this week, also this afternoon I've touched up on Maya again. Will be honest have been avoiding it a little, but I have no choice have to get back on it. so here is my updated evolutionary timeline



Plus a this is an updated version of Hagatha:

Ived added thr walkcycle below (shortened version).

ATRG Update

The evolution walk cycles done;

Catalogue

Given a new project so here is one of the pieces I've created for it. I might add a long walk cycle underneath just to put it better into context. I've also finished the character models, MODELS! For the client project, will be working on the background this weekend.

 This are just the first 4 of the 17 I've created, going all the way through to modern age!

Anyway will update again when I can this weekend as I have to dash now

The Butterfly Walk

So I'm taking a bit of a break from my animation, going to save it for my long journey back to the UK tomorrow. Trying to figure out to best do the background to my chicken walk, I've got all the ray ideas but getting it into the animation is going to be a bit tedious and complex. I've got a 14hr journey ahead of me so plenty of time to kill. So today went on a walk and came across this little fella. My sister though he was adorable and I manage to capture his fantastic little expression, definitely something I'm going to give a go at drawing.

Anyway this walk primarily was a butterfly hunt, haven't been on one of those since I was a child, can barely remember the names of most of them. I managed to capture three decent pictures of this very pretty little things. I think it's important that even though I'm on holiday and taking a break from my animation to still keep the creative juices flowing.

I spotted this Gate Keeper on my mums flowers. He sat there a little while just long enough for me to take the picture of him against the pink.

Then we saw this large White fluttering across to some flowers, spent ages chasing him, only find that these guys are fluttering all over the place.

And finally I saw this beautiful creature just chilling on some nettles. Such a lovely juxtaposition, I couldn't have asked for more. He didn't even move when he had my giant iPad in his face. The Admiral, one of my favourite butterflies as a child, he kept wings perfectly still so I could see all the detail!

I thought I might save this one till last, definitely my favourite of the three, and thats including the goat.

Anyway I've also been commissioned to create a logo for a website, similar to Groupon but for Gay men. Having a meeting with the creator next week. Hopefully I will be able to create something to his liking, as I definitely do need the money!

 

Oh Bullocks

Took a break from my animation and went for a walk in the country side, then I came across these two HUGE Bulls, Im so glad I brought along my iPad for photos, just so I could share them!

Such impressive creatures, and they were a beautiful colour. It really makes a big difference getting out of the city, I'm really getting into the whole country life thing, it's doing me a world of good. And my mind is soooo peaceful too. I've actually started animating the background of my Chicken cartoon, got a really good piece of inspiration from the Blot game on iPad. Really nice designed game, anyway onwards!

 

Just a screen shot from the game Blot on iPad

Chickens Walk Cycle

So I've begun my first ever hand drawn animation, just in time for the iAnimate competition. It's still a bit rough, but day by day I'm getting better and better, it's steadily being tidied up bit by bit. Considering I had no idea on how a chicken walks (my chickens must be fed up of my staring at them!) and had never successfully made a flip book or hand drawn animation of any kind, I don't think I've done too badly. I'm using the Animation Desk app on my iPad to create it, it's a bit fiddly at times and mid way through they updated the software and changed everything, Just as I was getting used to it! But with the mini set backs I think I'm getting the hang of it. I've only animated 72 frames at the minute, and at 12 frames a second that's only just 6seconds long. I'm planning to start animating the background, and have lots of things happening, like buildings being built, wars, aliens, chaos that kind of thing, life in general. Yet have the chicken causally strolling along, un fazed by the turmoil and chaos around it. It the lays an egg, and the end slogan will be "Life goes on"

That's exactly what happens, life goes on regardless of what occurs, or problems faced, life will always carry on in some way or another. I think it'll be quite interesting to watch, and if I can make the background elements interesting enough, I think it could be quite a good animation.

 

Tell you what, France is doing me a world of good!

 

I ain't no Chicken

Well since I've started blogging again, I've actually drawn something, rather than sat there thinking about it! It was a good idea to start again, and in France I have complete peace of mind. Anyway I've been drawing away on the Procreate app and have come up with these 6 designs:

After asking others opinions, number 3 was clearly out of the running, it was also my least favourite of the bunch, but it was my first attempt at a chicken, as I designed the others I got better and better until I finally finished with number 4 /5, my favourite is number 4 with four and 2 being a close 2nd and 3rd. Although he only reason why others liked number 2 was for the beak so I might transfer that over to number 4. I liked number 5 until someone said it looked too much like a cockerel, which is true, a fat one at that.

I think number four is the one I'm definitely going for, it's a cartoon without being too over the top, but there is still some humour there in the design. It also resembles the Magic flute (my real chicken). I'm going to start animating it today, just the walk cycle see if I can get the hang of their walk.

It won't be in colour in the actual animation, I'm keeping it simple!