Animation Process and Practice: Progress So Far

6th - 17th October 2016

Due to medical reasons I have not been able to attend recent 3D workshops, however I have continued to work on my character performance assignment. I asked friends who attended the workshops what work has been done and what is expected for the next session. I was told the character needed to be blocked out with no animation. Therefore I have to create the keys and extremes of the character as well as figure out how to turn off in-betweens in Maya.

Notes: Animation Process and Practice Lecture 6th October:

Notes: Animation Process and Practice Lecture 17th October:

I had to find out myself the tools within Maya on how to turn off in-betweens as well as create all of the poses before the next week. I simply searched for the answers on the internet regarding the tools within Maya, and soon found the Animation preferences and graph editor. In addition to solving a number of problems with Maya I learnt how to ‘step’ my character which changed the positions of the rig without creating in-betweens.

Now that I had learnt the technicalities, I now had to plan how to create the performance. Firstly I recorded a number of live action reference videos of myself performing the dialogue. I mimed the words by playing the sound file through my phone and considered how the voice sounded and recreate an appropriate expression and act the piece effectively. I incorporated a number of my own quirks by naturally acting the part and exaggerating my movements which could then be further exaggerated in my animation, without over-acting the scene.

After I had recorded myself, I watched the footage and used the extreme positions as reference for the model. Moreover I had to learn this keys and extremes again by re-reading Richard William’s book on what to call these positions. Once I gained an understanding of this, using the video as reference I sketched more positions, expressions and takes to further plan my animation.

Using this technique, I started with the key positions, as this was a short scene I broke it down into giving and receiving. What I mean by this; my character will take/ or process information by physically leaning backwards and then slightly leaning forwards as he talks like he is giving information back. I believe this is an effective visual way to both give character life and visually support the character’s motivations.

Once I had create the keys, I moved onto creating the extremes, which are the positions in which the character is at his furthest point within a movement. These will act as the in-betweens of the keys to further break down the animation and give it structure.

I met with my 3D tutor during a workshop and he gave me feedback on my poses. He said he liked them and that I needed to secure my camera to ensure my poses are staged correctly. I will do this by locking my camera in a fixed position and staging my character effectively in front of it to give the best possible performance.

I believe I have worked effectively given that I have not been able to attend recent sessions, because I have continued to work and teach myself in this time. I plan to use further reference from other actors and continue to read books on both acting and how to animate a character effectively using graph editors in Maya and with the animation principles.

Continued work will be ensuring the camera is secure, staging my character, lip sync and the in-betweens.

Animation Process and Practice: 3D Workshop Support 1

3D Workshop: Support

Continuing work with the performance assignment, I have created the initial poses with the ‘Malcom Rig’. This is sophisticated and well-made rig which I intend to use for this project as I was facing too many problems with the ‘Morpheus’ rig. 

This morning was a support workshop which allowed students who have chosen 3D to attend and receive any assistance they may need with their work. I intended to ask if the rig would be acceptable to use, as a ‘Henry’ rig was provided by our tutor, however he was not in and I don’t see any problem using the ‘Malcom’ rig. 

I created more sketches of the poses as I continued to listen to the audio over and over again. I have continued to think about the personality of the character within the scene and how we would respond to the questions. Yes the dialogue is provided within the clip however it is the significance of the delivery and to how to achieve this effectively. 

Rather than being too eccentric, like my previous animations, I have chosen a ‘toned-down’ approach, as the delivery within the track does not suggest an enthusiastic performance. Therefore this is an opportunity to test myself to produce a believable piece of animation with sincere acting from a character. 

I will do this with strong poses which will then be added by effective facial expressions. I have chosen a building block route; as in I will create the rough poses and key positions, once they are effective, I will then move onto tweaking the movements, and adding the details such as the face, lip sync and kinks at the end. 

I believe I have worked effectively today as I have had to change poses a lot as I have listened to the track repeatedly, and changed my mind on the delivery. This has been from the hands, to the weight distribution and head positions. Today I have also added some facial expressions with lip sync, I understand this is too early to add these but I couldn’t resist thinking about the possibilities of squash and stretch in the performance. However I will stop this to focus on the other positions, I will play this over and over again until I am happy with the poses, then I will then improve the performance little by little. 

Animation Process and Practice: Week 1

Animation Performance 

For the first term we have been assigned to create a character performance based on an eleven second audio clip. The audio clip is some dialogue from the film ‘Hot Fuzz’ where Nicholas Angel (Simon Pegg) interviews a resident (Stephen Merchant) about a missing swan, and he must describe what the swan looks like.

Within the context of the film, this is a silly situation because everyone knows what a swan looks like, yet he must describe it for a police officer, moreover a highly trained police officer is sent on such a ridiculous task.

We must listen to the audio track over and over again to gain an understanding of the actor’s within the track, their pauses, breaths and thoughts. From there we must visualise the situation and breathe life into the character we choose to portray. Part of the unit includes choosing which medium we will use to create the scene (2D, 3D, Stop-motion).

Personally I have chosen the 3D route, this is because I already have some experience animating a rigged character in Maya (as mentioned in my SG Gaming Experience post) and I feel this will be the field I wish to pursue as my future career. For the 3D route, we are provided a fully rigged model, unlike last year where we were taught to model and rig the characters. This allows us to focus on the animation, and performance of the character rather than the technicalities of Maya.

Despite the medium choice, the principles and fundamentals are the same throughout. Therefore we share the lectures together to discuss ideas based upon the ideas of the animation principles and how to bring out the best performance in our characters.

I intend to plan the action of my character first and I will do this by first understanding the audio. I have decided upon a situation where the character is asked what the swan looks like. The character will be on board with the idea and describe the swan, and when he believes he has described it effectively, he finds it insulting that he has to point out that it is a swan. Much like a game of charades that the only person you see is the character, and the other who is asking the questions is behind the camera. I would like to take this idea further and have the character acknowledge there is a camera and this is shown through eye movements and consciousness of facing the camera. I believe this will add an additional layer of believability and express aside of the character such as embarrassment and consciousness of the camera much like an interviewee.

I started with initial sketches and ideas on how the character can be posed, if he talked with his hands, his emotions and how this changes through the clip. There are a lot of factors to consider, I intend to incorporate complex emotions and how they change through the clip without over acting the character. This will be done through eye movements with strong staged poses.

Initially I had trouble finding a 3D model which both provided enough control including facial features, and worked properly. I found models I liked including the ‘Morpheus’ Rig from the 11 second club, and I have chosen to use this rig so far. I had to search a number of answers first regarding customisation and problems with the rig.

I have created the first three poses illustrating the first positions the character will take. I have tried to time the positions to the audio, as I plan to create the key positions and animate between them. As I have had initial trouble with the rig, I will ask my tutors for help regarding this problem, but what is important that I have established the initial poses of the character; developing his personality.

I will continue my work with more thoughts on how to stage the poses to ensure that the body language alone illustrates the thoughts of the character effectively. I will do this with more thumbnails and experimenting the limits of the rig.