Friday, August 27, 2010

Monday, August 23, 2010

Animation Analyze 02








director - Sloppy! The dog could have seen that... He could have seen that!

network lady - uhh... who cares if the dog seens a boom mic?


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for director:

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Wants: To shoot the TV series as if it was real for the dog.
objectives:
short term - capture the absolute life out of the dogs performance by
putting him in a what seems to be like a real scenerio
long term - capture the emotions in the dog what no man has ever seen
before and ultimately make the best dog TV series
Feelings: he is very passionate about the TV series he is working for.
he is upset and frustrated seeing the boom mic on tape
As if: An artist who looks at life differently and has his own world with his
work. (hans bacher)
Intentions: To let the crew realize they are doing a very crappy job that can
blow the cover of the very most important aspect of the film
-keeping the dog uninformed
Moment before: watching the take from the series and seeing the boom mic
right in the frame risking revealing the secret to the dog



Dialog - Sloppy! The dog could have seen that... He could have seen that!
Subtext - idiots! the show is put in danger! My art could have been ruined!
operative word - 2nd "seen"


the pause: after hearing the girl speak from behind, his subtext:
-who the hell is that?! how dare she speak out loud while i am talking?!

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for Network Lady:

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Wants: To get the director to fix his act and start producing unexpected more interesting series(threaten)
Objectives:
short term - make sure the do TV series is getting high ratings
long term - Make money for the network and become the leading tv
channel
Feelings: upset that the ratings for the dog tv show are dropping
she thinks the directors methodology is uneffective and plain
studpidity
As if: marketing agent... Its all about the money and nothing else
Intentions: threaten the director and other production people to make better
more money earning shows
Moment before: she has just heard the director ranting about the dog almost
seeing the boom mic


Dialog - uhh... who cares if the dog sees a boom mic?
Subtext - what a loser...no one cares about the dog seeing the boom mic?
operative word - "cares"

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In another sense, you could look at this director guy who is so passionate about this work, the Dog tv series and he absolutely believe that the star must act believable and the only way to do that is to trick him(the dog) into perceving it as really real. He, the director is an artist and he is crazy making sure this concept of disinforming the dog is followed at all times. Now when that director sees his crew messing up like that (by puting the boom mic into sight of the dog), it drives him nuts. His crew has just put his life's passion at risk.

On top of all that, you see this girl who has the dare to speak out while the director is speaking. jeez! hes the director! hes the boss and hes the man! This girl asks a stupid question like that.. For someone already renouned and at such a high positioning, this is very insulting..


This Clip is copyright of Disney and is posted completely for educational purposes only...

Thursday, August 19, 2010

Body Mechanics Refereshment

Since I'll be studying in iAnimate School in about 2 weeks, I thought I'd watch one of Jason Ryan's body mechanics tutorials to refresh myself before I get into semester 3 (close up acting). I watched his tutorial, took down a few notes and drew his keys on my sketchpad.. Then I went into flipbook and animated it on my own. I purposely refrained from looking back at the tutorial because I wanted to see if my animation instincts were still ticking properly. Well, I inbetweened them all on 1's for no apparent reason so there are lines shaking around a bunch...

*Note this animation idea is not my own. It was only reinterpreted by me and is completely for reviewing purposes..


Wednesday, August 18, 2010

Flipbook Thumbs for goat run animation

As you may know, Jason Ryan's 2d-cg workflow has largely influenced the workflow I use. Here are the thumbnail planning animations I'd did the goat animation I posted a while back..





Here is the CG version again...


Monday, August 16, 2010

Animation Analyze 01

Ok... I've decided to start studying feature animations and post them on my blog(might be of good help to people). I will try to do 1 or 2 a week depending on my schedule. I believe doing this exercise in a regular basis will help me expand my knowledge as a character animator. I will start out analyzing feature animation sequences and then later on live action. I think it'd be best if I study how people caricature movement to tell a story. Once I have a confident Idea of how to do this, I will go on to live action and try to caricature it myself using the same gestures and subtext, and so on..

Here is the Reference file




At first glance, it looks kinda complex.. look again.. Here I drew in the extremes only.. I included the moving holds as well..






-It looks much simpler now!
-in essence, it is just 2 golden poses.. near each other and very subtle.




Here are the breakdowns.. take note..
-anticipation for an anticipation extreme on frame 2
-anticipation is almost invisible.. it is just felt..
-settle on frame 11 (4 frames after extreme)
-the moving hold is sort of a breathing pass that goes up and down






Finally, last bits of breakdowns and lipsync..

lesson?

-not much movement on the body to show to the audience the expressions on the face.
-audience must see face to empathize what the character is feeling


The majority of animation students, when planning for a shot put too much motion under impression that good animation has nice fancy movements.. This reference clearly shoes that it is not about having fancy movements.. It's about having the audience empathize with you character and making sure that it is seen very clearly with the posture and the facial expressions. The posture here in this shot is clearly read especially since the posture is pretty much held most of the shot...

Additional notes:

-when doing invisible anticipations (2-4 frame antics) make sure the antic poses are not too different from the extreme because it will just look like a pop and out of place gesture if they are too big.. keep it subtle..

*Video reference property of Disney. This is reproduced specifically for educational purposes and nothing more..

Sunday, August 15, 2010

iAnimate Entrance Reel

Angelo Sta. Catalina Rough Reel for iAnimate School Enrollment Requirements from Angelo Sta. Catalina on Vimeo.



Here's a compilation of work I put together for iAnimate enrollement. I applied to go straight to semester 3 (close up acting animation). In order to skip semesters, you'll have to pass a reel showcasing your animation skill. The people from iAnimate will then review your work to see if your current skill was at the level it should be to get into the requested semester. Jason (iAnimate President) told me that my body mechanics was good. There were a few minor timing and spacing issues (probably the trampoline animation which I did almost 2 years ago) but wasn't a problem since they were small little details that could easily be fixed. Jason said I was a perfect candidate for semester 3 and I was really stoked about it especially when he mentioned at the webinar that only students with feature level body mechanics are eligible for semester 3. I was there at the iAnimate webinar yesterday and asked a bunch of questions regarding how the school works and Jason did a great job clearing everything up not only for me but for everyone else. So I've already enrolled and paid for semester 3 so im pretty excited to start. There's a new project at work though and I'm sure the studio will need my help so I guess it wouldn't hurt to freelance there until the project is finished. I'll have to change my sleeping schedule because I dont want to miss the iAnimate events.


For those who are interested in the topics that were clarified in the iAnimate webinar.. here it goes:

-iAnimate will have their own characters that will be rigged by Victor Vinyals (just about the most popular rigger on youtube.. search him and you'll see)

-iAnimate will always be Live (first pure animation school to do this) that way you can ask questions from your instructors while they are critiquing your work and interact with them.

-All iAnimate instructors are CURRENT feature film animators. Jason Ryan makes sure that all instructors are at par with what is needed to work in feature films. He does not want instructors who have worked on feature films in the past but arent working now because he says the demand for more skill is rapidly changing in a feature film environment.

-No student will be allowed to go on to the next semester if their work isnt feature film level. Students who have not attained feature quality work will be asked to take a semester off and redo all that was asked to do to get their work up to that level.

-Dreamworks will keep an eye on the best students of iAnimate.

-there will be community animators(including dreamworks supervising animator Jason Ryan) to help you and give you critiques on your work throughout the week.

*there are a lot more but these are the details that appeal to me and convinced me that now is the right time to improve my animations and now is the right time to enroll.


Monday, August 9, 2010

Football Animation


Football animation I did at work again.. just testing out the rigs.. fun stuff..

*note, the red thing on top of his head was done dynamically just experimenting so its doing lots of funky stuff..

Turtle Swimming Animation


Here's a turtle swim animation I did at work just testing the new rig.. It was then rendered by an officemate Immanuel Matias.

Goat Animation


Here's a little goat animation I did at Holy Cow Animation.. This was fun because it had been my first time actually animating a complex quadruped shot.. fun stuff! I animated this in flipbook and polished it in Maya.. for some reason though, it had more flow in flipbook. Weird...

Sunday, August 8, 2010

Monthsary Animation


Its me and my girlfriend Majel's monthsary today (the 9th).. I thought I'd whip up an animation for her. It's far from perfect since my time working on it was very limited but it will do for now.. I'll try to go back and fix it when I have free time.

*notes to fix

-gotta fix some of the staggers (they dont look right at the moment)
-the second "momo" drops down as an accent.. I think it would look much clearer and more believable if it accented upwards
-I'd like to have step back again and smile after
-I'd like to show more of the subtext as well in the beginning where he might be a bit nervous at first
-elbow popping
-minor spacing issues

BTW, I did the voice of that as well so...


here's a QuickTime version if for any reason someone might want to dissect it.


Thursday, August 5, 2010

11 Second Club Rig

http://11secondclubrig.blogspot.com/

Guys! You have to check this out. The animators and forumers of 11SC realized its about time we added a new free rig. It's an awesome production because 1- production is being held around the world! 2-everyone is so enthusiastic about it and its a pretty big thing thats happening over at the 11SC forum. It has only been 5 days and already the forumers have filed up 11 pages of ideas.. I encourage anyone willing and interested to join in. Not a modeler/rigger? thats cool! passion, enthusiasm, and interest is what fuels the production and thats what we need!