Emotion switch

My next motion studies assignment was to animate a switch of two extremes of emotion. So for example one minute the character is happy, the next he is sad.

Experimental Animation- Test 1 Sand

 

 

On of my projects is to do an experimental piece synced to one of seven pieces of audio given to me. The idea is to get away from using the computer (except for listening to the music and exporting the animation onto the computer) and use materials such as sand/paint/household objects etc to create a one minute animation.

I had a go at using sand to animate today. It's mostly just playing around and seeing what I could create with the medium but I found it quite difficult to form shapes with it without the sand collapsing in on itself. It's an interesting medium but not the material I think I would want to work with.

Perspective Backgrounds

In this week's assignment I had to draw some three-point perspective drawings. Coming from a Foundation course and Art A-level background I had previous experience drawing perspective. The bridge drawing below looks ok, maybe the far pillar is slightly out of line and the buildings below give the illusion of distance and depth.

Life Drawing

 2 minute poses

 

5 minute poses: Right: Depicting depression, left: Happiness/joy 

The distribution of weight in the left drawing isn't quite right as her foot that's forward is too high up.

 

 

Right: Laziness- The shoulders need to look more floppy.

Left: Anger

 

 

Hand sketches

 

 

 

Wine Glass model

Practiced using the revolve tool in Maya to model a wine glass. I then went that step further and played around with the lighting, shadows and texture to make the glass look a bit more realistic.

Shot ideas

For the Sea Project, a section of the animation is potentially going to involve the metaphorical white horse waves and for that I envisioned a cavalry charge. The cavalry charge was a foot-soldier's nightmare as not only were they having to go up against another soldier armed with a sword but they also have to contend with a charging horse which has the capabilitiy of killing a soldier just with its weight and momentum alone.

So to see a dozen or so horses in the form of a wave charging towards the two people in the water is a good way of increasing the fear because naturally when we see a horse running towards us, our reaction is to run away.

Portraying this idea is all in shot design so below I've picked out shots from two films that contain a lot of cavalry charges, Lord of the Rings and War Horse.

Close up: The horse's flared nostrils, mouth frothing and eyes bulging depict the speed we naturally look at the face for emotion.  

Medium shot: Head and chest of horses are all that are seen. Powerful muscles, flared nostrils, heads held high. It's a good shot to suggest a wave.

 

Another close up

 

Legs: Depicting speed, in this case emphasising the fact they are galloping. Could be hard to animate a line of legs though and when we are frightened of something we naturally look at the face. In addition to this with it being a wave, the legs are more likely to be hidden under the wave anyway.

 

 

Long shot to establish the power and danger. A good shot to consider to depict an incoming wave.

 

'They're dangerous at both ends......crafty in the middle'   

 Sherlock Holmes: Game of Shadows

 

 

The Second test on the first clip was un-finished, this is the completed version.