I've just uploaded my animated short: CRABAPPLE . I've pretty proud that I actually finished something this time. Yet this has been brought with some noticeable sacrifices. I was taking 18 credits of college classes that made me cut down on the animation alot (you'll notice it probably) just to finish it. Anyways, the 2-D was hand drawn while the 3D was done with Maya, rendered using toon shading and the particle effects was with Blender.
some images:
There's a "Making of" video (43 MB) in my website (www.weakchild.com)
I'm currently brainstorming for my next project...hopefully it'll be better..
cheers,
--weakchild
Blue,
Glad you liked it! That section of him poking and biting the robot just came to me one night during production. It wasn't part of the original story of even storyboard. I thought it was funny also and decided to add it.
cheers!
--weakchild
WEAKCHILD.COM
I want to see this really bad but it'll have to be later tonight; when I tried watching earlier something crashed my comp.
The animation on the air-tapping hands as he descends towards the apples is straightforward but fluid.
The coloration is exactly what I'd expect to see from this kind of cartoon on television.
The absolute COOLEST part of this entire thing is actually the apple slowly rolling towards the camera. What a beautiful stall. I also like the swift-then-stop action moves as he's first trying to win against the robot.
My complaints (constructively) are that the shot change after he gets punched, while he flies back through the air is disorienting. The robot is very huge and likely made of lots of insides and yet he has virtually no sign of weight to him at all. He doesn't even settle down or smack down when he lands on the roof. The closest it comes is the single-frame smack on the head. It might just be me but those wires were confusing. Maybe it's being tangential background elements, maybe they half-look like they're attached to or suspending the robot, who knows. I thought I had one more but in retrospect I was thinking of something else.
All in all good job and I'd like to see more, especially as you work in more drawings to smooth out your actions. You can tell the planning was there. On to the Making Of!
Thanks for taking the time viewing and commenting on my piece, Scattered.
As far as the coloration, I used only NTSC safe colors. You can get color charts from Chromacolour. I'm so paranoid about colors burning up when I view it on the TV so I made sure they don't as much.
The apple rolling shot was another idea that just came to me during production. Alot of people told me that they really liked that shot...plus you can never go wrong with the "Karate Kid" stance :D
cheers,
--weakchild
WEAKCHILD.COM
Here's a new thing I only caught by watching the demo reel. You probably can't do much about it now, but just an observation: When he's viewing the robot from far away, through the space between his legs, the robot disappears and then when he reappears it is just a few feet closer, but now the hardly insurmountable obstacle of the railing is behind it instead of in front. Could it possibly be more cinematic if it landed very close to him instead? Perhaps close enough that all we can see are its feet, and/or legs up to the knees? Knowing how big it was from that far away, and then seeing just a piece of him big and up close after he comes back into the shot -- I think it could be more dramatic, more imposing. Thoughts?
Yeah I pretty much can't do anything now but nonetheless, your suggestion is very good and cinematic. At the time I was boarding it, I kinda liked the full body shot of the robot (Unit 81) between the space of the kid's legs. But yeah, come to think of it your idea adds more tension because of the added suspense of just seeing the Unit 81's legs up to the knees, you don't know what his hands would do. Although if I revised that shot, which is not that hard to do, the next two shots of the kid running towards Unit 81 and then screeching to a halt would have to be scrapped.
Thanks for your suggestions! I'm working on a new demo reel now, the one on my site is just there so I can show something ;) ..
cheers,
--weakchild
WEAKCHILD.COM
Then you enter in a segue, like him getting another "love tap" from the machine...or perhaps at first not being so brave and scrambling away. Or do something on the robot's end, like him coasting back to power up for something (I don't personally think that fits with your film but I'm just saying it isn't a dead end).
Again good work and it was cool watching someone work traditionally, especially since the closeups of you flipping animate very well frame-by-frame.
Incidentally watching the making of...I see you taking photos of the drawings, but in Photoshop pre-coloration they already look pretty well-outlined. Is it the drawing instrument you use, your photographic process, or do you use something like Streamline or a filter macro?
Oh no, the photographing part is just for pencil testing. Much faster than scanning, I don't have a DV camera so I had to use my crappy and ancient HP digital camera. I still scan my drawings one by one, and the scanner has a peg bar taped to it also.
I don't really "ink" my drawings. I trace over them with a .03 B lead mechanical pencil and then scan them in.
Once digitized, I bring the drawings to Photoshop where I have custom actions that rotate the drawings then I adjust the levels manually for each drawing to make the outlines black and the BG white. I then use a free filter called "Eliminate White" (you can search for this in Google, it only works up until Photoshop 7 though, not CS and above) this filter deletes the white pixels, so all you're left with are the black outlines and a transparent BG---essentially you have a digital cel. To make sure the outlines are all black, I check the "Lock transparent Layers" icon on the Layers Tab and fill the layer with black. This is basically the "digital inking" phase and it makes sure that the outlines are black but it doesn't fill the transparent pixels with any color. Then I proceed to color the drawings, with the "color" layer beneath the "line" layer.
Then, when all the drawings for that sequence are all colored, I compile each drawing into ONE .PSD file with each drawing on separate layers. Then I import the .PSD file in After Effects as a Composition. I just work from there basically.
cheers,
--weakchild
WEAKCHILD.COM
Have you also tried using the b/w drawings on a separate layer with a Multiply blending mode?
yeah, but I feel more comfortable to actually have a "digital cel" where the drawing has a transparent BG. Sometimes, for some reason I can't bring a sequence of drawings as just a single .PSD file composition instead as a .TGA sequence and I don't think Targas support blending modes. Plus it just makes everything on the same page as the 3D renders which has an alpha channel.
cheers,
--weakchild
WEAKCHILD.COM
Ah I see what you mean now. Have you tried using MonkeyJam or Flash (only for composition of layers, I mean)...
I know what it is now! The thing I forgot! The feet slip like crazy when he's scaling the wall. Mine would too =) but he freezes then pulls in a stop and start manner, which to me implies that his feet should be firm against the surface for the friction to allow him to climb. Like you said though, it's pretty much set in stone at this point, and I'm sure you've got a reason it couldn't be done just then, but an addition to my previous comments nonetheless.
I liked it! The part where he does the onslaught of biting and stick poking at the robot was great. The 'making of' video is the best, it's always cool to see the technical side of things. :D