Final.Blog

1. Why did you take this class?

I always wanted to make a movie...since discovering Wes Craven and horror it's been one of,my goals to make a successful film..

2. In general, what did you like most about this class?

Being on camera...acting was super fun and although using the cameras and stuff was fun, being on screen was more fun.

3. In general, what did you like least about this class?

Rendering time....my God....it took FOREVER especially in After Effects..and when you screw up the settings...you have to render it all..AGAIN

4. What was your most favorite project and why?

Video poem...without a didn't...I got to use lyrics from a song by my favorite band and make a pretty cool costume.

5. What was your least favorite project and why?

Video Contest...it just...fell apart, green screen wouldn't cooperate, my diagram I used was dumb and the lighting just...didn't work.

Video Contest...mine just fell apart...green screen wouldn't cooperate ..my diagram was dumb and the lighting didn't want to work either...

6. Discuss the overall effectiveness of the instructor (for example: preparation, availability, interest, content knowledge, expectations, etc.).

Very good indeed..always helpful and supportive...until the whining...not giving out names.... The resources we were given helped alot and the class was always fun.

7. What are the most valuable things you learned in the class?

Operating the cameras...we wouldn't even be doing anything in this class if we didn't know how they worked...

8. Do you feel that this class will help you achieve your future academic or career goals? How or why (or why not)?

Yes, because I now have the skills to indeed...pay the bills...but seriously all this helped me learn how a movie is made and im one step closer to my Wendigo film!

9. How could this class be improved?

Better tri-pods...these one kept rand omly breaking throughout the year...we need more durable ones...

10. Additional comments:

It was awesome....so many memories...it's gonna be sad to say goodbye, it was super fun every step of the way.

Animation Demo Reel dos and don'ts

    This article offers some helpful advice on making a good, submit-able demo reel of your animation works. One little slip up  can cause your reel to be tossed out and possibly not even get fully looked at by employers, as they have alot to sift through and not alot of time to do it. DO include only your best work, begin and end with killer shots, and be mindful of how you piece together shots and hand in a portfolio of extras. DON'T  hand in a five to ten minute demo reel (the shorter the better) or put in alot of over the top transitions and title (the animation should be the focus not the in-between stuff).

   Alot of useful info in here.... some of it is common sense like submit a portfolio with your reel and only use your best work, but straying from transitions and a legnthy reel were two bits off advice i wouldn't have considered at first, good to know! Overall this was quick and helpful the inclusion of example reels helped sell the point and I liked it.

Weekly comments

Another week down...another week closer to graduation... I drew alot of FNAF things this week, speaking of which..THERE'S A NEW TEASER PICTURE ON THE WEBSITE! (initiate fan-boy scream of joy) Now that that's out of the way, I was happy for that exact reason...also because im apparently acting in alot of final projects(which is slightly exhausting) but im not complaining....or am I? I was frustrated to see that my beautiful skin peeling scene for my final looks wired..AND NOT IN THE GOOD WAY...so im gonna be editing that alot... And by alot I of course mean 60% of my time I learned that if you hear about a major filming being done in you area...it's probably not anything,special...I went to watch the filming of the next TMNT and saw only ONE explosion, and none of the,major actors...still got to watch it though so...yay(?) I also got Majoras mask for N64...which is awesome!..that's it for this week until next time....
http://www.scottgames.com/
(*fanboy screaming of joy*)

Animating Game of Thrones' dragons

As woulda expected the dragons featured in the show Game of Thrones are 100% animated(because dragons sadly don't exist). This article talks a little bit about the whole process over the course of the show. In the beginning when they we're just hatchlings they weren't very complex, mostly just walking. As the series progressed they got more pivot points and control because they got,more complex, for example the wings and frills needed to get rigs for realistic movements. They used bats as reference for flying and gorillas as reference for walking, even slight emotions we're built into them in their facial rigs. As the series goes on they will continue to get more and more complex, eventually have people riding them and fire fights against other dragons.

Wow...it's like these things are living creatures, they grew up and got,more complex as the time passed. They had over 200 rig movements....animating that would,be worse than rotoscoping with my left hand.... I have to appreciate the work that went into these beautiful,and sadly non-existant creatures, so much rig.....so much texture...so much.....dragon...

weekly comments

So...this week was pretty okay (I'm sorta feeling it!) Didn't do much...besides see The Avengers: Age of Ultron...which was awesome! I also found some cards for the Hyperscan...a failed game console..which I don't have...I still bought the cards though...NO REGRETS! I also dove and swam through a bush to catch a snake....I didn't though...twas disappointing...WORTH IT THOUGH.. I decided to have a firend of mine, Kieth (who somehow complains more than Kevin) star in my final...most of the time spent was just him making sure he looked good on camera... kinda frustrating...but worth it to see him flip out about the aforementioned snake, that experience taught me that if he ever steps out of line..I know what to do.. welp...that's all for this week.....

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AJvQJ9Nz09k enjoy the feels

modern animation = bad????

  This article is basically just a bash on modern animation... It talks how it isn't how it used to be, the quality has gone down drastically since Walt Disney's era and it's just getting worse. It's mentioned how most artist are going for quality over quantity, skipping out on making something amazing for profit.

    Although I agree that he quality has declined..it has not declined to the level this article is making it out to be....There's still alot of good animated shows..Family Guy, Adventure Time, and South Park just to name a few. I severely disagree with the statement about internet series not being good or relevant after a short period of time.. Some of the most famous animations on the internet.. Charlie The Unicorn, Annoying Orange, The Ultimate Showdown, and Salad Fingers are all over five years old and still talked about and watched. overall, this kinda bothered me..it's an opinion but it's definitly an angering one.

weekly comments

   So this week was somewhat eventful, i brought my little buddy R.O.B. to school and people treated him like a little pet..which was cool (but i still think he's evil). I'm getting a ocarina in the mail..now i just need to learn how to play an ocarina.... I was quite flustered when my fight scene filming was interrupted by a meeting..kind of awkward having people walk in on you filming someone fighting a toy robot attached to a pole by strings while holding an NES zapper. I learned that my little robotic friend is quit resilient, taking several falls and still remaining intact. Also I decided that I'm gonna build a costume of Foxy from FNAF and a replica of Majora's mask. I'm considering wearing the costume to the movie's premiere, by the way....  http://www.designntrend.com/articles/47113/20150411/five-nights-at-freddys-movie-story-production-release-scott-cawthon-warner-bros-film.htm

Until next time... I'll be taking over the world with an army of tin toys and robots!

movie mind control

    This one speaks about how movies affect the brain while we watch them. The video included cover the topic of "neurocinema", a new area of study. On a test done with a couple participants watching The Good The Bad And The Ugly, certain scenes effected all of their brains the same way, and when shown those scenes along with Curb Your Enthusiasm, Alfred Hitchcock Presents, and a video of New York Central park each video affected the cortex differently, with Alfred Hitchcock Presents (not so shockingly) having the biggest affect. This science could even eventually lead to movies that change based on how your brain reacts while your watching!
       Science again coming in to change the way things work..for the good of course. Movies obviously had a affect on the brain..but this is just cool, seeing how it effects our brains is awesome. The cortex's activity changing based on the interest levels of what we watch..I really want to see that idea of changing movie become a reality...maybe if we think hard enough we could make it change how we want..that would be even cooler.

Why you shouldn't want a JOB in animation

   This article is mostly the personal experiences of Will Fin in his career as an animator. He starts out by stating you shouldn't want a job, because that is ruled by someone else and can be taken away, you should want a CAREER, something permanent, that you enjoy and are responsible for. He mainly talks through the rest about his various jobs, starting out working on parole for Disney (only to be fired after nine months) then moving on to Don Bluth studios, then onto Filmation, then BACK to Disney, then to Dreamworks and some freelance jobs on the side. He ends it by giving a couple bits of advice; never take a gig ffor granted and each job is not an end in and itself, its part of the bigger picture, a career.
    Let me just say that when i saw the title "Why you shouldn't want a job in animation" i said to myself "What.." Then after reading on i got it it was talking about changing the from wanting a JOB to a CAREER., then i said "oh..nice trick" I thought it was cool how he worked on Dragon's Lair...I enjoyed that game. He has had quite the career..lots of ups and downs... and many companies. Overall nice read, I liked that trick in the title.

Drone filming

This article talks of the rising popularity of using drones to film. The drones can provide incredible video feed at a birds eye view and provides filming of things that we're previously impossible for humans like erupting volcanoes or the insides of storm clouds. Even though heavily restricted in the US we should see more lenient laws soon.

Drones, sounds like fun. I mean flying around and capturing first-person video is awesome..can't wait for them to have their heavy restrictions removed..I would totally buy one, just to fly it through forests and abandoned buildings. I wonder if I could get it into blocked off abandoned buildings...hm.. Now I really want one.

Go with your strengths?

So this article talks about the problem of "do you leave your comfort zone or stay within your boundaries?".  Both have their advantages and disadvantages. Leaving let's you improve upon your and broaden your overall skill set, while staying makes your life easier and you always show your best without worrying about screwing up to much. Another thing mentioned is self-efficacy which forces you yo focus on what your doing and f pi ever about comfort zones entirely in order to pump out the best work.

Ah, the puzzling question of the comfort zone and strengths. Which does one choose? Personally im fine with both, I like staying within my boundaries but if I can learn something new I won't turn it down. But that's just my opinion, it varies between everyone and is a question that will be with us forever.

weekly comments

This week was pretty okay....got my Video Contest in on time (yay) but not how i wanted (boo...).  I was pretty upset about that..... lighting sucks. However filmig for the video poem went flawlessly.....I got through that one pretty good! Also the Walmart by me started stocking Mountain Dew White Out (AW YES) I was sooo excited about that! I need to figure out how to get the lighting right for filming in my basement...it looks so much different on the ameras LCD screen than it does on the computer...so yeah....problem there... At least i learned that i need more lights....like perhaps alot more..maybe even 12 or more. I did mange to beat the Stone Tower in Majora's Mask however.which took a while...yay.. Anyway here's an interesnting trailer for you.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XAHprLW48no

weekly comments

    This week went by pretty well. I was pretty happy to get second place in the regional Skills USA competition with Jake (woo!). It was really upsetting to try to navigate the campus where the competition took place, especially with the horribly unlabeled and pixelated map, and we had to stop early beause of weather(yay)...which also meant no stopping for food(double yay)... I learned that turtles dont like being cleaned...he bit the toothbrush...alot........ I'd like to learn how to block light without making it obvious on camera. It would make night vision effects much more believable....and thats all for this week...

Bouncing Light

    Using bounced lights helps give little adjustments to lights by giving a softer, more even illumination in confined spaces where moving lights is difficult and is used by pros to soften a subjects face but can also create atmosphere. There are three methods for using bounced lights, bouncing light off of walls, using a light card which gives more control of how bounced light is positioned on film, and bouncing off of ceilings which gives the most natural look but also is the most dangerous because it can burn ceilings or set off sprinklers.
     
      Bouncing light is something I've never thought of using (or really knew how). The video provides a ice tutorial on how to use the different types of bounced light and frankly, i wish I'd known this earlier, it would have come in handy during the documentary...

making spongebob come to life

        This article take a look at the making of the new Spongebob movie. The movie features CGI over live action scenes similar to The Smurfs and Alvin and the Chipmunks movies, and keeping them similar to their original 2D forms while still making them believable in the real world proved difficult so little textural details such as pores on spongebob and tiny bumps on Patrick's skin were used to help with the problem. Small amounts of sub-surface scattering were also used to give them a fleshiness. 3D printed models were used in the acted scenes to give a feel of where the characters would be and actors with simple frameworks were used to give a feel or the human sized versions of the characters. Extensive research into how the characters moved in the series also helped with animating.
      Wow, alot of stuff went into perfecting this movie. As a spongebob fan I can appreciate everything that went into perfecting this film and seeing them come to life is only made better by seeing how it was done. I especially found it interesting how 3D printed models were used to simulate placement of the characters while shooting with the human actors.I was realt hyped for this movie and it actually lived up to expectation.

weekly comments

 This week was definitely a week.... not much happened... again. However one of my actors won't be able to at in my fictional short, so now I have to find a new one, that's fun and by fun I mean annoying. however I did see both Gravity and The interview, the Interveiw made me laugh and Gravity gave me astrophobia. I need to learn how to make distortion on purpose for my fictional short, as ghosts tend to cause that to happen to videos. I learned that geckos love tomatoes, i placed one out so i could slice it and fedd it to is feeder crickets and turned my back ad within 2 seconds he was out of his cage and sucking out the insides of the tomato.

This is how i'm making my ghot in my project (sort of)https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EwhFf1mnvBQ

The tortoise, the hare, and the car.

       This article talks about the making of the Mercedes commercial featuring the tortoise and the hare. Which just so happened to be made by the guy who directed Maleficent. The director, Robert Stromberg says that he was up for the challenge of building this new commercial  and liked that it was different from what Mercedes usually does. He states that the hardest part was the animals, because they were humanesque he had to fit alot of expressions and personality into a short period of time. And the other big challenge was trying to works with Oregon's uncooperative forests. The reason for this commercial even existing is because Mercedes wanted to do something different during the Superbowl to grab everyones attention.
  So the tortoise and hare Mercedes commercial was made by the guy who directed Maleficent. Yup that commercial where the tortoise drives the car to win the race was made by him. Quite a different tone that this commercial sets from that movie, but I liked it. It was cool to see something different like tha during the superbowl but I also found it odd that they tried to hype it up. I've seriously never seen a commercial being hyped up before this......

A few's a crowd

     This article gives some advice to create the illusion of much more people being in a film than there actually is. One technique for doing this is to close the camera in on someone with a small group of extras in the background and some party sound effects or whatever you need to make it sound like there's more of whatever's there than there actually is. The other option, which is more complex to pull off is to have a camera at a fixed angle and take multiple shots of the same actors in different costumes in different areas then editing them together to make it look like there's a lot of people.

        I've actually know about that second method for a while, but that first one was something I've never thought about. It's a great way to create the illusion needed for a shot with a low budget for hiring extras, the masking method mentioned in the second option for making it look like alot of people are walking to the camera is something I don't want to do, let's just say I don't have great experiences with masks.......

weekly comments

 This week was pretty acceptable, although not much happened I was happy to find out that in Trig I was not the only one to fail the last test on Logarithms, in fact most of the class dd, like 90 %, i was  still frustrated that I failed it, but I guess you can't win them all. I need to learn how to make easier masks in After Effects because I'm pretty sure they just created a metaphoric noose around my neck, but at least i only handed the PSA in 2 day late,, it could have been 3. I at least learned that using color correction with masks makes the process SOOOOOOO much easier. That's pretty much the jist of what happened in my week..... so until next time
Here's why Nintendo has a hard time making new game series

http://kotaku.com/one-reason-nintendo-has-such-a-hard-time-with-new-ideas-1680988301

Battle of The Five Armies effects

      The latest hobbit movie used alot of programs to get the epic battle and destruction sequences to unfold. The battle sequences were done with two different programs one to simulate the battles and one to create the armies. The laketown scene however was much more complex in programming using rigid body animators along with a multitude of particle and wind simulations t create the fire from Smaug and the destroying houses.
       Wow, all these effects but still no awards. I seriously wonder how many computer it took to run  all the simulations simultaneously  because if it's less than 100 they better be on the level of HAL-9000. It's crazy how they did this stuff, merging simulations and programs together to make this happen, it must have ben hard but i guess in the long run it was worth it for the outcome.

Micheal Bay explains his style

              This article/ video is Micheal Bay talking about his ways of over-the-top action. Contrary to what some might believe Micheal Bay prefers practical effects and stunts over CGI when making his films, and he likes to have alot of fun while doing it. Even when there no human actors in the scene he still opts for special effects to make his famous explosions. His ways of sometimes forcing actors, stuntmen, his effects team, and cameramen might seem harsh at first but in the end it works and even they are proud of the outcome.
          I'll be honest, while I HATE what he did to the transformers his use of so much special effects in action movies definitely has an awesome outcome. He makes some awesome effects and this look behind the scenes was cool especially considering his preferred use of practical effects which actually makes me like him a bit more I especially liked that car hitting the stuntman's face effect . Love him or hate him, we could all learn from his extensive use of effects.

weekly comments 1/11/15

This week I learned  that wildlife + explosions = something very beautiful.

I want to learn to create a realistic ghost in after effects, (I forgot how)

I was happy to have a couple of now days this week, days off are fun

I was frustrated because of snow days because i lost work time....

http://www.ign.com/articles/2015/01/06/five-nights-at-freddys-3-in-development
Freddy's back, back again, Freddy's back now go cower under a desk as you wait for your demise

Disney creates realistic eyes

    This article talks about Disney's new method for creating realistic CGI eyes. It is a complicated process involving 6 different cameras set up to take pictures of an eye in different poses and pupil dilatations in order to ensure the highest amount of detail goes into creating it perfectly. This new advancement will let us see more realistic characters in animations, movies and games bringing us another step closer to recreating humans perfectly in the virtual world.
    Ah Disney, you never seize to amaze. Aother wonderful thing comes out of disney and advances animation even further. This is quite the unexpected event, realism getting more... real, because of Disney. What's next from them, i hope it's virtual reality, it probably won't be but it's Disney so who knows.

camera tricks for manipulating size

         This article talks about various ways to make actors seem larger or smaller than they actually are. It mentions various ways to do so based on budget and time constraint such as simply using a lower or higher camera angle or adjusting head room in a shot to more money consuming ways like Orsen Wells' method of using smaller sets in Citizen Kane.
     These are some unique ways of manipulating size, I would have guessed that camera angles could change perception of size but using smaller sets is definitely different. I honesty would have thought to just use green screen and after effects. I kinda wish i had the money to make a smaller set like Orsen Wells did it seem fun and it would be funny to watch people walk around in a tiny set.