Ani 105- Crystal Refences Colour: Crystal 2

The second crystal creates a larger shadow when the normal light then that of the first crystal because of all the imperfections at are within it. The same colour test was use on this as the first. The results are below:

Orange

Yellow

Green

Purple

Red

Brown

Pink

Blue

The results of this colour tested showed that the crystal did let the light through but not as much as the first crystal. There is also a larger shadow that the crystal casts on the paper below. The main point that i have seen from both of these tests is that the crystals both allow the light to come through. The next step is to take this knowledge into maya and creating the crystal itself.

Ani 105- Crystal Refences Colour: Crystal 1

The first crystal that we will look at will be the more clear one of the two. Using the sweet wrappers over the front of the touch and with the help of someone holding the touch I was able to take the image below:

Brown

Red

Blue

 Green

Pink

Purple

Yellow

Orange

The colours from the sweet wrappers worked well over the touch and these are the results. The crystal does not have much shadow but lets all the colour through to the paper behind. 

Ani 105- Crystal Refences Colour

I needed reference on how crystals look in different colours and thought that the easiest and quickest way to do this was to get some coloured see through sweet wrappers and a touch. The image below shows what I have used for the research:















The next two posts will be of the two different crystals and how the colour looks on them. There will be one post for each crystal because of the number of images.

Ani 105- Crystal Refences

Creating a crystal within maya will be hard. Also colour changes will be taking place as well, making looking for reference even more important.

I brought two Quartz crystals, both shown below:

Crystal 1:

This crystal allows the light through to hit the paper below.









Crystal 2:

This crystal is not as clear as the first and has more imperfections that do not allow as much light to come through, creating large shadow.







Using these as references for the shape of the crystal, I will also use them to look at how colour passes through and effects the crystal.

Ani 105- Idea

The idea for the group was to create something simple in shape, but enough to show what we can do.

We came up with the idea of a crystal and book animation. The first part of the music will be of the crystal (myself) and the second of the book (Tony).

The way that the animation will play out is after the title sequence, the music will start in the black screen and then move onto the crystal animation. I am still thinking of how to move between the two scene, but for the moment the animation is high on the list then the transition. Once onto the other scene the camera will start at the bottom of the crystal and pan upwards. As it moves upwards the camera will change between different shots of the crystal and smaller crystals around it. The music at 0:03 starts to add in a main beat and to that main beat I want to work with light strikes coming on and off screen. This can be done within after effects, once the maya has been completed. This will continue as the camera moves up the crystal until 0:26 where the music changes. At this point the I want to use the crystals to change between soft pastel colour with the main beat. This makes it more interesting to the viewer. By the time of 1:06 the camera will have reached a misty, cloud layer which is at the top of the crystal. This will continue until 1:10, where the animation will change to the book and Tony's part.

Through the animation of the crystal I wish to use different angled camera shots, nothing fast as this will get very tiring and the audience will lose interest. Also I wish to change the focus of the camera shots to create depth of field that will re-focus onto different parts behind or infront of the object. This will be planned out into storyboards to be used as a reference when animation begins.

Ani 105- New Idea, New Group

The music animation for the Ani 105 unit, had no moved on for the first two weeks of the assignment. This is something that I could not keep going along with and so left the group with one other, forming our own group.

The first day, we started to look at what music we should chose for the animation. Each of us chose three different piece of music and looked at which one would be used for our animation. The following are the three songs that I had chosen to look at:

1 | Rob Dougan- Nothing at all:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fxofkW5iPpI

2 | X-Ray Dog- Time Will Tell:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4VOt_Mlrwnc

3 | E.S. Posthumus - Lavanya
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7uVfNpQDb4A&feature=related

Number two from the list was my number one choice because it has a lot of different changes to the music through out the song, making it more interesting to animate too.

After listening to the songs sent and received the two of us decided upon the song Time Will Tell by X-Ray Dog. We have chosen to animate to the first 1:40 of the music, as the song splits itself into different sections. The splitting that happens within the music makes its easier to have a rounder animation as we do not have to fade off in the middle of the music.

The next post will be about the project idea and what we are both going to do.

Animation Techniques: Bouncing Ball

After the formative assessment, I took the advice that was give and changed how my bouncing ball ended. Also there were a few frames that need to be move and/or take away.

The video below is the bouncing ball animation with the changes made:

Animation Techniques: Ball with Tail Research

Now that I'm starting the animation with the tail, I need some research to have as a visual reference for how both the ball and the tail will move. The best reference for this is a squirrel, as this best resembles the ball and tail.

Red Squirrel Assault Course:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TamMqvk4Bb8&feature=channel

Squirrel Obstacle Course:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nWU0bfo-bSY

These two videos include but the jump, run and falls that will come into play within the ball and tail animation.

Animation Techniques: Bouncing Ball

The following video is of my final test for the bouncing ball.

The ball within the animation is intended to be a very soft ball, with a strong squash and stretch. The cross on the ball helps show whether the ball is turning/rolling in mid air, making it easier for the viewer to see the movement of the ball.

Ani 105- Research

After brainstorming a few ideas with the group, I wanted to research into the time period that the song was made. The song was created within the 1930's. At this time the world was facing the second world war and rationing. The song is very up beat and joyous, making me feel that the animation to the music should be the same way.

I wanted to create two characters, one male and one female. The style of drawing will be very basic and mainly be made up from lines-rather then solid shapes. I want to place elements of the time period and what was happening at the time into the animation. The first idea that came to mind were the two characters dancing in the swing style, this is mainly a very fast dance and would fit with the music very well.

Below are a few links to videos of the swing dance;

Swing dance by Darren and Lilia in Strictly Come Dancing
 http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=34s6qNvzeT0

Girls group dance-Strictly Come Dancing
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=S25lxqo7clE

Boys group dance- Strictly Come Dancing
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vGLV8j2Xzb0&playnext=1&list=PL800B98A3E31F45C4&index=23

My next step is to research into what type of clothing was worn. For this research I'm going to look both at the internet and in books.

Ani 105-Spread Sheet

After downloading the Metronome for Mac, I found the music on Youtube and started to work out all the information that was needed before animating could begin.

I found getting the BPM (Beats Per Minutes) was much harder then I first thought. I had first started to tap to about thrity seconds of the music but I never seemed to get two answers the same. So I took the time down to about ten seconds of the music. I tapped out the BPM again four times and had two answers to choice from. I could use 112 BPM or 113 BPM, as 112 is a nice even number it would be easier to work with then 113.

Taking 112 BPM as my answer it was time to find out the following:

BPS (Beats Per Second)
FPB (Frames Per Beat)

Starting with BPS, I took the number 112 and divided it into 60 ( as there are 60 seconds per minute).

60
112 = 0.53

To find the FPM I take the number 0.53 and then multiply it by 25, as the frame rate that I am using is 25  frames per second. The number that I get is the following: 13.25. As the number is not a whole number I need to round it to 13 and then keep track of the .25.

The next step was to find out how many frames it would take for the extra .25 to make a whole number, it worked out as follows:

0      0

   13    .25

 26    .5

   39    .75

52    1 

This shows that at frame 52 another frame will need to be added to keep up with the music. This will mean that I would add 1 frame to 52 making it 53, then start over again. 

Once ideas are more solid then I'll start working out how to time the animation.

A link to the song:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fhyhP_5VfKM

Animation Techniques:Toon Boom Bouncing Ball Test

A Short test to understand how to create a bouncing ball within the Toon Boom (2D animation package). I think I have the understanding of how it works, now just need to get the finally animations of the bouncing ball to have more squash and stretch to it.

The video below is of the bouncing ball test

Animation Techniques:Ball Choices Videos

The Ball that I want to mimic in my animation is the more flexible blue ball. This ball has a lot of the squash and stretch principle as it is made out of a rubbery material.

The ball has little tentacles coming off of it, but these will not be animated, as the project its to animate a simple sphere shaped ball.

Animation Techniques:Ball Choices Videos

The following two video's were taken as research into which ball I would finally chose, but were not my final choice.

The first was of the larger, multicolored ball. 

The second is of the smallest bouncing ball.

Animation Techniques:Ball Choices

Thinking over a few different ball types for the animation, each with a different bounce and a different size.

The first one and my most likely choice if possible as it has a good squash and stretch principle to it. Softer material ball with a smaller amount of bounce:

Second ball of choice, a harder material ball with a medium amount of bounce:

The third and final ball, but is less likely to be used as I want something with more of an extreme squash principle to it. Smaller ball but with a higher amount of bounce: