Café Bar

Another one from British Animation Classics — Café Bar by Alison de Vere.

I'm really liking the style — the inclusion of a mask is an added bonus — using colours to emphasise all the important or dreamlike segments, a ray of excitement in an otherwise bland existence, establishing false identities before finding acceptance in the mundane and regularity of everyday life.

The scene in the beginning where the man takes off his beard and glasses also got me questioning my use of masks and whether they have to be masks at all — could they not be props or costumes used to project a different identity? What if they weren't human masks? I think the biggest issue at the moment is that I'm trying to make a concept around a film rather than a film around a concept, causing me a bit of difficulty in actually progressing. It feels a bit like I'm creating symbols with nothing to actually symbolise. I think what I need is to take a few steps back and try to come up with a solid concept or theme. If I can summarise my intention — the message of the film — concisely in one sentence then it might be easier to start fitting the rest of the pieces into place.

'Oozat'

Had an absolutely terrible time of it this afternoon, I don't know if my brain was just fried or what but I just could not get anywhere. I couldn't seem to hold an image in my brain — I've got a real headache now. And snow blindness from staring at a blank page.

Managed to get my hands on a copy of 'Oozat' though — featured on the British Animation Classics Volume 2 DVD. I had to watch it a couple of times to really 'get it' — it's actually pretty straightforward but I think I tried to over-analyse it the first time, looking too hard for some kind of deep and hidden meaning. I'm always afraid of seeming stupid so I tend to try too hard to 'get' things rather than taking them at face value. Sorry, rambling again! Melty brain no work good.

Anywho, there's a really imaginative use of masks here. I found it interesting how they were used to show expression and identity rather than conceal it — something I'd never considered before!

I was fairly surprised how close it was to my original idea — having the confusion with constantly switching identities rapidly is perfectly captured here and it's kept very simple with only a few characters. I tend to think too much about the larger mechanics of things and sometimes find it difficult to boil it down, so this is a very useful reference. It shows that you really don't need to go overboard with detail — you can summarise potentially complex relationships very quickly with only a few characters. Certainly something to bear in mind.

It's not really related but there was another great short I came across on the DVD — Manipulated by Daniel Greaves (also ex-Farnham!)

It's an absolutely fantastic piece of animation. Demonstrating an animator just having a bit of fun, with an astounding result. I think I've seen something similar before but I don't remember what it was called or who made it (how helpful) but it involved the animator interacting with a rabbit-like character? Always loved these kinds of animation — pure body language and character oozing from every orifice.

'The Itch of the Golden Nit'

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-london-13298320

Interesting example of children's illustrations used in animation — this could be an interesting technique to use in contrast to some quite 'adult' phobias, such as debt, redundancy or getting old.

Phobias are often seen as something quite childish and even a sign of weakness — animating with contrastingly simplistic and childish drawings could represent the perceived innocence of fear, the idea that even the strongest and most authoritative of us are reduced to 'children' in the face of fear.

Electro-Phobia

Really nice little animation I just found on Youtube... super-simple story, just over a minute long, in which a pint-size criminal spends the days leading to his impending execution avoiding everything electrical. I especially love the shower scene.

It's a simple idea but quite well executed! It brings to mind other situations in which you can play around with characters and unfortunate circumstances or conflicting situations — perhaps a vet that's afraid of dogs or a bird that's afraid of heights. The tricky part is keeping it simple and fitting it into a narrative...

Animation Principles Completed Sequence

 

Well, here it is, the completed sequence. I've actually had this done for almost a week now but I was too embarrassed to upload it! 

I'm really not at all happy with how the cleanup stage turned out. I feel a lot of character has been lost in the process and the animation just looks a lot stiffer now than it did before. The stair climb, especially — I originally animated it on ones but shot it on twos and it's really suffered for it. I can still see so many mistakes — missing inbetweens, dodgy arcs (particularly on that angry walk) but I think there comes a point you just need to say "I'm done working on this." Have I said that on my Digital Skills blog already?

I opted not to add the bannister on the stairs. I found it difficult to draw without it completely getting in the way and it just looked sort of odd, floating there — plus I quite like the idea that the character is almost a kind of mime — though that excuse would work better if I'd not drawn the stairs ;]

Still, it's nice to see it finished after so much stress and strain. The sound isn't too sophisticated... a bit hastily slapped on but I think it adds a nice little finish. It sounds a bit squiffy when burned to a DVD for some reason so I may need to look at tweaking that a little.

I'm not entirely sure what I'm typing at the moment. Feeling pretty tired, so forgive my incoherence!

Whilst I'm here, behold my DVD/menu designs:

I'm secretly quite pleased with these. Normally I'm horrendous at this kind of thing; design and presentation aren't usually my strongest points (gulp) so it was nice to see these come together fairly well. Simple but effective I feel! Not yet gotten around to the box design but it will be in a similar vein — I'm thinking of using the scene with Gustave at the bottom of the stairs or something. We'll see what Mr Photoshop conjures up...

Animation Principles rough sequence

Pretty much the completed sequence at this stage. Certain parts I'm really not happy with — resuming the walk after kicking the ball and landing in the puddle, specifically. Two very minor things that are causing me immeasurable frustration. I think I must just be really tired — I can't seem to focus, can't seem to get them right and it's really, really getting to me.

Obviously there is no visible puddle yet... still need to add that in, which I'll probably do during the refning stage. I'm thinking I may repeat the 'happy' cycle once more just to give the puddle a bit more time to enter the screen.

It's still not quite long enough though, only 19 seconds — and he's off-screen for at least two of them. This is really worrying me as aside from repeating the happy cycle and shooting the stair-climb on doubles, I'm not sure how else I can extend the time. I don't want to stretch and pad out what's already there too much — might make it feel a bit artificial and lose credibility/presentation. aghhh

Happy walk V2 w/ inbetweens

That didn't take long! Quite pleasantly surprised with how it's looking so far I must say. I think it could use another couple of inbetweens here and there to smooth out the arms and add a bit of interest to the legs but otherwise I think it's turning out alright. I think I messed up on the arms — seems to be a point at which I get confused and they switch places but it's not too noticeable in motion. There's a weird kink in the back arm and it kind of flails a little bit but that should be easy enough to rectify.

Happy walk v2

Long time no update! Essays and Digital Skills catchup have been dominating much of my life these past few weeks but I've been happily animating away all this time and have the majority of my animation blocked out in rough, which means I can spend the Christmas period simply cleaning up my lines. All I need to do is adjust certain parts of the sequence to get it all in order and it's ready to go!

I have about 18 seconds so far, around 300 — 400 frames on a mix of ones and twos. I think that once I've made the final tweaks to my sequence and doubled up some of my frames I'll be well within the timescale. Vimeo is currently still processing it so I'll whack that up later today, but in the meantime here's the last part I've been working on:

I needed a happy walk cycle for the section after he kicks the ball, something really quite jaunty and upbeat with large, high steps and swinging arms. I took a lot of inspiration from Milt Kahl's "Pinocchio" style walks. Some people very kindly animated Milt's thumbnails on Youtube:

There was also a very nice Milt-style walk in the Animator's Survival Kit that I kept glancing back to to make sure I was getting the posing right. 

In the end, this is what I came up with: (Keyframes, doubles, 12fps until I get the inbetweens done)

It's not tremendously original but it's been a very useful exercise in observing timing, not to mention drag/overlap on the arms. If I can get the inbetweens finished today then I'll be sorted! The day is still young!

Sad character walk V4

In between coughing up the contents of my lungs, I finally plucked up the courage to re-tackle the dreaded sad cycle! I want a medal.

I'm still not totally happy with it (as always) but I think (or hope) it's better than before. Still needs a few more inbetweens to get the timing right — mostly where he picks his feet up, I just feel it needs to be a little slower.

There are some arc problems with the hips, especially on the front leg's up positions. It should be easily fixable, I think I just need to bring it back a little bit. I don't really think the arms are working either. The swing seems a little excessive for his mood — I wanted the lower arm to appear really heavy and swing very loosely from the elbow to give the feeling of weight but I don't think it really worked. I animated the arm separately and it looked fine at first, but adding it to the body really changed the way that it reads. I think I need to drop the shoulders a little lower as well, to make him seem a bit more sad.

The more I look at it the less happy I am (dammit Alex) but hey-ho, they're all things that can hopefully be fixed fairly easily...

Angry walk V2

Technically V3 or V4 but I was stupid and didn't post the previous revision...!

(sorry, it's a little hard to see — should have looped it!)

This is for the scene just after he steps into the puddle — so he'll land in it around the centre of the frame, get annoyed and then storm off-screen in a rage.

Made a number of revisions to this, mainly in the legs. I removed a lot of redundant inbetweens and changed the way the legs move. Rather than striking the ground with his heel on the contact post I felt it would have more impact if his foot came straight down onto the floor. I think it serves to give the whole thing a greater feeling of weight. I think I'd like to tweak the foot a little more and have it tilt upwards very slightly just before it comes down. I think that might give it just a touch more power.

The arms and head were driving me crackers for ages — I just couldn't seem to position them correctly and was having real trouble visualizing how they should move. Nick was really great and sat with me for ages, helping me figure out what to do with them. I have no idea if you're reading this Nick, but if you are — thank you again. You're a godsend.

Got some good feedback from Ron on it as well who helped me tweak the arms and figure out the kinks in the initial head movement. I think I've got it to the stage where I'm mostly happy with it now! All that's left is to clean up the lines. My plan is to get as much animation roughed out as I possibly can before Christmas and then spend as much time as I need over the break refining the lines if necessary. As long as the basic movement is there it should be fine.

I'm now at that awkward position where I need to figure out what to work on next — everything I still have left to do is pretty tricky so I'm afraid to tackle any of it! I should really get back to that godawful sad walk cycle at some point...

Angry walk V1

Naughty Alex, working on things completely out of sequence...

Mucking about, trying to get an "angry" walk for the last section — I think it's going alright, just having some trouble getting the arcs on the hips right as he brings his leg up and over. I find animating walks on the spot much more difficult in terms of planning arcs — I'm going to try spreading it out so he walks across the screen to see if that makes it easier. I think the trouble is that he raises his leg too high when he brings it up. I could probably make it work if I tweaked it hard enough but I think I might just try dropping it down to see if it makes it easier.

I think I need to try delaying the knee slightly as it's in the air to help give the leg more power when the heel comes down to strike the ground. Probably need to bring the leg on the contact position forward a bit too.


Rather than having the heel rise up on the up position I might try keeping the heel flat on the floor. I like how the pose looks with him really thrusting forward but I'm wondering if that's causing difficulty with getting the leg arcs right. I think he needs to drop down more on the inbetweens between the up and contact positions. His leg bends but his body doesn't drop much — I think I probably messed up the leg lengths!

I'm trying to shoot things on twos instead of ones to cut my workload in half. I'm not very good at planning things for twos — always comes out looking too slow!  

(Agh, I know what I mean to say... it's been a long day and I'm tired!)

Happy walk draft scribbley thing

Blogger's stupid video upload hates me. Arrrgghhh. It doesn't really seem worth waiting in Vimeo's 30 minute processing queue for a silly scribble like this. Ah well! Enough moaning.

Volume problems! Volume problems everywhere!

Still desperate to avoid looking at that sodding sad walk cycle for what feels like the fifty billionth time, I decided to have a crack at getting something drafted for the happy/confident/strut after Frenchy kicks the ball. This is what came out. As I was making it I was astonished that — gasp — I was really enjoying myself. I felt fairly okay about knowing the rules of walk cycles, and almost-but-not-quite feeling confident in breaking them. I was enjoying seeing my character (to quote Withnail & I) "prancing like a tit."

I dunno, I was kind of happy with how it was going at the time (despite obvious problems which I'll discuss in a moment) but I may have just been on a bit of an 'animator's high,' but looking at it now I'm not so sure. It's not really what I'd planned for the walk initially, and that's not so much what bothers me — if I keep working at it, it will definitely still work with the scene I have planned. I'm just feeling iffy about whether I should continue it or just re-do it another way.

The first step looks alright so far, aside from some arcing problems with the hip that I need to go back and adjust. His hip rises up on the front leg as he drops down — I think it should go back and stay at the same level, before rising back up and over as he brings it forward. I think. I'm not sure? The second step I just need to completely re-do — I think I need to add a little more drag to the leading leg as he swings it forward to give it a little more life.

I think the body overcomplicates matters with its changing shape and volume. I keep getting lost as to where the hip should be — I think if I make it a basic circle (as I did with the stair climbing) it will be easier to consider things like rotation/tilting of the body and help me track the position of the hip more accurately.

Stair climbing V1, take 2

 

Unfortunately not too much progress today, but I figured I'd post what I've got so far. I've tweaked the stair climbing very slightly — now he walks across the screen to reach the staircase. I'm still really unhappy with the first walk cycle so I will certainly go back and re-do it to smooth it out a little. 

Not too sure how happy I am with the slow down as he stops, but unfortunately it's difficult to animate without having a finalised walk cycle leading up to it. I'm thinking of it as a placeholder for the time being.

I've started trying to nail the arm movement as he goes up the stairs — the first part I'm actually fairly pleased with as he brings his hand up and over back onto the banister, but then it seems I lost my groove on the last step as it just kind of jiggles about uselessly. I'm going to go back and re-do it so it matches the earlier movement.

I'm feeling a little better about things. Though I don't think I've made too much visible progress I feel like I've learned a whole lot. Something as simple as his hip rotation as he drags his weight up the stairs has been astonishingly beneficial. I'm feeling a little more confident about arcs and limb movement and such. Certainly haven't mastered it yet but I think it's getting easier! (Or maybe I just lucked out...)

Sad character walk V3, take 2

My head feels like it's stuffed with cotton wool and my bed is calling my name, so forgive me if this is a little garbled!

 

Started adding inbetweens and whatnot — I don't know if it's just because I'm so tired but it's really starting to give me a headache. I just can't get it to look right.

There are still problems with the crossover — I keep messing things up when I re-draw the frames for the opposite leg — I think because the rear leg is slightly smaller so I need to be careful and make necessary adjustments to make it fit with the angles of the front leg.

I think I need to perhaps tilt the foot upwards a little more (and perhaps delay it for a bit) before he brings it back down to help give it more power. It's a little too soft at the moment. He's quite a heavy character so the down step needs to carry more weight.

Also, when he comes down, the volume of the trailing leg/foot radically changes, creating a bit of a 'snap'. Need to look at adjusting that and perhaps add some more inbetweens to pad it out a bit

I'm really disappointed in myself — I wanted to get the legs completed to a satisfactory standard tonight so I could focus on the arms or something tomorrow. Oh well — there's no sense in working whilst in a flu-induced stupor, it'll just create more problems later on. Let's see what the morning brings!

Sad character walk V2

 

I began to attempt cleaning up the lines of my previous attempts and trying to nail the rest of the inbetweens. I'm really, really not at all happy with it. The leg volumes are a little more consistent and I think the timing is very nearly there but it just wasn't working for me at all. 

There are masses of problems with the feet — they don't really flop and drag as I'd like them to. They also delay in the centre of the body at the crossover which looks pretty weird.

Later on, when I attempted to add the body, I found it extremely difficult because I'd drawn the legs first with no consideration of the character's torso. I ended up with all sorts of problems like knees ending up where the chest should be.

 

You can see I struggled — I really couldn't figure out how to fit the body around the legs. That shouldn't have happened; I shouldn't be needing to try and fit things around other things. Everything really just needs to work together. I think it's okay to focus on the movement of one body part at a time but I really need to consider how the character's body will move in relation to the legs.

In general I think I tried to be too refined and controlled with my lines. I need to relax and be a bit looser in these early stages — I think that's why my first attempt had so much more character to it. Despite being flawed and rough, it had a little more personality to it.

Still, as they say, third time's the charm...

Sad character walk — 2nd draft

 

Slowly getting there! Added a lot of inbetweens to smooth things out a bit. It's still quite choppy but I think the timing of the legs is mostly there at this stage, though the feet aren't quite as smooth as I'd like and the volumes are pretty inconsistent. Now that the basic movement is there, though, I can work from that and start tidying things up a bit. 

Something with the legs looks really off to me but I can't quite put my finger on it. It's almost like it seems to fast? I think maybe I've just got some dodgy inbetweens that need fixing up. I'll need to re-check my arcs.

The torso is pretty much just a placeholder and I plan on completely redoing it — I should have left it out, having it waggle about is quite distracting.

"Sad" character walk practice

Knocked out a quick test-type thing earlier today; been on the go hunting for cows and windmills all weekend (more on that later...) so not had much time to sit down and animate solidly.

 

I didn't do much forward planning for this, simply scribbled it out and ran with it. It was mostly an attempt to loosen up a bit and get into the rhythm. It's less than stellar — missing inbetweens all over the place, generally quite messy — but it acts as a sort of framework that I can build from. I'm already able to see what I need to change in order to get the right mood for the character. It's far too quick, for instance. A sad character wouldn't move his legs very fast. He would almost kind of shuffle along with as little leg movement as possible, so I need to look at the timing and try to delay his legs a bit. Make them very slow coming up, a little pause before bringing them back down a little faster and more deliberately.

I think I've got the right kind of idea with the foot dragging and flicking —needs smoothing and refining, but I think it's kind of there? I'm going to film myself (or an unwilling volunteer) as a reference and have another crack at it.

Ball bouncing and other assorted excitement

Was awesome to get back to working again after such a long break. Left with one hell of a headache though — those lightboxes get into your skull a bit.

It's funny how complicated something like a ball bounce actually is. My ball kept shrinking (must see a doctor about that) as the path of the arcs got smaller — ended up just drawing around a coin to keep things consistent.

The angle of the first arc seems a bit unnatural to me — I think it probably should have started dropping a bit sooner. The arc on the second bounce looks a bit too high as well, and I didn't keep an eye on the ground level so the ball lands too far down at the end. Overall though, I think it's passable as a first attempt.

Might try a smaller ball next time and see if it makes things any easier in terms of keeping the size under control.