splinebender

The pantomime story: Sting like a butterfly.
This is a simple acting test that consists of two distinct and contrasting "beats". -SH

Sting like a butterfly: FINAL

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Planning Page 1 of 2



Planning Page 2 of 2

Sticky Door: Final

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In this assignment we had to choose from five scenarios: Balance on a beam, Dive off a diving board, Throw a ball, Pull or push a heavy object and Open a sticky door. I chose the Open a sticky door because I thought it would be challenging and it really looked like a lot of fun. Here is my process. -SH


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In this assignment we had to choose from four scenarios: a run, character leaping over a gap, jump up onto a box, or a jump from one post to another. I chose the post jump with a character named Stuie who has no arms. Here is my process from thumbnails to final output. -SH

Final Revision

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Planning Page 1 of 2



Planning Page 2 of 2

Finally, I’ve polished the shot, taking critiques from my classmates and mentor.

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Here I’ve blocked out the shot using the video reference and planning sketches.

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Semester Two. New semester, new mentor, new class. Things are moving pretty well after a little vacation – our task was to pick an assignment from a list of three that ranged in difficulty – I chose the more difficult one of “Ballie” turning around 180 degrees. The first thing we had to do was shoot some video reference of our selves and then plan out the process through thumbnail drawings. I also decided to do an animatic using my thumbnails, which is going to help out a lot during next week’s assignment of blocking. Well – enough yammering – here is week one:


Planning Page 1 of 2



Planning Page 2 of 2



Animatic

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After a long week of adjusting and tweaking here is the “Exhausted” walk in 3D (focusing on hip movement) …woo-hoo – 3D Yeah! Also here are drawings and a pose of this week’s theme “Balance”.

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Planning

"Balance" Sketches

"Balance" Pose

Add some character to that walk! So our theme this week - draw and pose characters that communicate that the character is "Exhausted". I took it a step further and animated a character that was exhausted.

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This is a revision for the vanilla walk. I've smoothed the up and down as well as the leg extensions.

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Here are sketches that depict a sense of "Concern". This was tuff - especially knowing that the final 3D character pose will not have a face.

This week we focus on adjusting the last weeks walk and then finishing the walk cycle adding necessary in-betweens to make it all come together.

Vanilla Walk - Finishing

Here are sketches that depict a sense of "Strength". The following is a selected pose sketch that has been translated to the 3D character "Stu".

The WALK!
No in-betweens - just keys, breakdowns and extremes.
Basically this is going to be kind of choppy but will have the essential ingredients to define the walk.



Vanilla Walk - Stepped Mode

This is a revision of my Tailor animation.
Needed to quiet the tail a bit and work on my arcs.

Revised Tailor Bounce

This weeks study was on arcs and path of action. Arcs are everywhere in life, the swaying of a branch, the swing of your arm, etc. Arcs give an organic feel and add life to your animation.





Here is the animation:
SH_107_Tailor_Bounce.mov

This pendulum lesson was a study on an organic action generated when forces like gravity are applied. This really sets us up for the next lesson when we work with Tailor a squish and stretch ball with a jointed tail.



Here is the animation:
sh_106_pendulum.mov

Here I had to create a "devastating" pose for Stu.

Had to find dynamic poses in comic books and sketch them.
My references were from the following:
Burne Hogarth: Dynamic Anatomy
Frank Miller: Sin City

This week I had to use the principle of Squash and Stretch as a ball moves through an obstacle course.





Here is the animation:
SH_105_obstacle_course.mov

Here is the animation:
BouncingBalls.mov

Continuing the session is sketching depicting an excited character.

Here is the pose in 3D:

My first animation in class so I must prepare.
Here is my planning sketch of a bouncing kid sized basketball.



Here is the animation:
BouncingBall.mov

My good friend Dan and I went to Starbucks the other night for some good java, drawing and a little BS’n. Here are some of my sketches from that night. The circled sketch above is the one I chose for the posing assignment.

Here's another that did'nt make the cut:

This week and a half have been crazy busy. Learning Maya and the Principles of Animation.

-Sh

Second day of class and I'm meeting all of my classmates -it's amazing! What a great job they've done with the AnimationMentor site.

-Sh

I've been learning Maya over the last week or so and it's going well. The tutorials on lynda.com have been outstanding. Moving on to animation.

-Sh

Animation Mentor classes start on April 3, 2006.

Animation Mentor provides software training in Maya. Also they offer fully modeled and set-up characters ready to go for Maya. So it looks like I’ll be learning Maya over the next couple of weeks. Ironic though - I have been working in Softimage for over 10 years now and I love it and feel very comfortable with it, it’s like my own 3D nigh-nigh. But, in the end I think learning Maya will broaden my horizons and allow me to be a more versatile animator.

-Sh

Accepted to AnimationMentor.com
WooHoo! Let the animatin' begin!

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