My animation- Loves cruel victim.

For my animation I made a 2d stop motion animation. 2d stop motion is normally where you draw your animation using a foreground and a background. You then animate the f0reground and background using stop motion. Stop motion is where you take a photo, then in this case move a part of you foreground a little bit then take another photo. When you play this photos quickly they will then give the illusion of movement.

I created a foreground and a background by drawing it free hand. The foreground where parts of my character or my whole character. I had to have different foregrounds such as arms so I could move them and only them. The reason for me having different backgrounds where for the different scenes.

For the ideas for this animation I drew them from my own emotions at the time. At the time we where set to start are animation I had recently gone through a bad break up which I had took badly. After it was over I found myself question my place in the world and what my true purpose was ?

I believe I done quite well in my animation. I believe the guy in the story the one whose story it actually is, has a lot of personality. I also think my animation is a reasonable length even through I would of liked to make it longer but couldn't do to time restrictions. It runs ok as well but you can tell the difference between the weeks because the paper changes in the camera positions . This was due to the changing of the weeks. I couldn't do all the shot in one day, and so had to come back to it. When I did come back to it however I couldn't get the paper in the same position in relation to the camera. The other I did do through was to add music. I think this went very well and gives the animation extra depth and meaning.

Mine and Ben's and Tiffanies pixilation

This is a pixilation animation. Pixilation is normally where people are used like stop motion puppets. A shot is taking then the change their pose slighty and another shot is taking. On this particular animation I worked with Ben and Tiffany. Me and Ben came up with the car idea. We where also the live people who where used as stop motion puppets and Tiffany worked the camera. We where trying to learn how to do pixilation well and where experimenting with it. We watched many other pixilation animations before trying to create our own. We watched things like human tetris. We developed our team and commucation skills through this exercise.

Compared to other anumations I had done by myself and with Ben this one wasnt very good. It had a good base fro a plot line but could of been expand upon and it didnt run smoothly. Notes I took from this for the next animation I did where to make sure get enough shoots and keep camera still. If I had to do this again I would make sure Tiffany put the camera further back to start with and didn't move it. Knowing the things I learnt from this to improve on precious work I would of took more shoots.

Mine and Ben's whiteboard animation.

This type of animation is whiteboard animation. It is done by taking pictures of a image you have drawn on the whiteboard then redrawing the image in a postion making sure they aren't to far apart and taking another picture and so on till you have taken enough picture also known as frames. When these frames are shown quickly they give the illusion of movement. For this sector of animation I worked with Ben. Ben contributed the idea of a guy jumping of a cliff and then I contributed the idea of the guy jumping off a cliff then landing on the same cliff again after falling through the sky. Ben drawed the background and the character, he was also the one who redrawed the character as he moved and I took the pictures on the camera of the character as he jumped of the cliff then returned. The aim of this animation was to make to broad our knowledge of the animation sector and the different mediums that can be used. It was also the aim that we make a succesful whiteboard animation what me and Ben did quite well I believe. The tecniques we where trying to develop where thinking skills e.g generating ideas, camera skills e.g such as shots, focusing the lense e.t.c.. Also we had to work on computer skills on Preimere Element to develop the animation and put are shots together so the played smoothly and quickly and gave the illusion of movement. I believe we did develop these skills. The skill I most developed upon was using the computer to finish of the animation and make sure it was smooth and ran well and of course that it gave the illsuion of movement.

Compared to other animations I have created I believe this one was better. it is longer then the others and also Ben has more artistic skill then me. The smoothness and illusion of movement is when excuted but it could of done with more character develop and story line. I have learnt how to do whiteboard animations which I could use in futer projects and I have developed my skills on Preimere Elements so I can use this for future projects. If I where to do this again I would add more storyline so you actually knew what had driving the character to jump of a cliff and I would develop the way he looks e.g clothes ect to bring out personality. I would also add music for added depth and effect.

Claymation

This type of animation I made is claymation. It is used taking pictures of clay figures, yoy move the glay figures a little then take a picture to give the illusion of movement. On this particualr part of the animation sectored we had to look at I worked by myself so I contributed the ideas of the story and the making of the characters and the camera work itself. The aim of making this animation was to better my skills in clay mation and to help me understand it more which I believe I did. The animation that influcened this was A short love story in stop motion by Carlos Lascano. The skill I developed through this execise was taking good shots and to not move the models to quickly otherwise the animation will not come out smooth.

This aniamtion is good and runs smoothly which is a strength but to I could of made the characters look more like people and done more on character development and concept art. I will take this into acount to help me with future projects. If I where to do this again I would develop the characters and the story, also I would make it longer because it only lasts right seconds. I may also add music to give the animation more depth and emotion.

Metamorphosis and Zoetrope

We went to the Norwich University College of Creative Arts.

We started of are animation workshop there, doing metamorphosis, the tutro who lead the workshop was Jodie Wick. We all got a word to start with and we had to draw that word. We also all had numbers. The picture we had we had to change to the person's who number was infront of us, for example say if I was 6 I had to turn my picture into the picture that number 7 had drawn.

We done this by drawing frames for various stages of what we believe would be the transformation process from the item we had to the next item. After we had drawed these pictures we took pictures of them on a rostrum.

The rostrum took two shots of each of the frames we draw. The reason two frames where shot is so in the animation it look more clear and runs more smoothly.

To the draw the pictures we used layout paper to draw on. We done it in pencil first incase we weren't happy with them and then when we are we went other them in pen so we could see them through the layout papere. Layout paper is another item of equpiment we used, it is half way between normal paper and tracing paper. Another item of equpiment we used was also the peg bar. This is so are pictures were lined up and we could make sure they were always central to the middle of the papper.

The skills we had to use were: drawing skills, and tracing skills. We also had to have patients as the process seemed to take quite a while and drag on a bit, but the end result was really good. Another skill we had to use was we had to visualise the transformation in are minds.



After we had done the Metamorphosis, we all done are own zoetrope (also know as light box)animations. This involved us drawing eighteen pictures and setting them out in a comic book lay out. The picture we had to draw had to be not to do detailed and the change had to be distinctive and simplistic, for example someone waving their hand or something distinctive like that.

We then had to put the pictures into a zoetrope.





You then sping round the zoetrope and you look through the slots in the side and it gives the pictures the illusion of movement.

To make it more effective it helps if you go over the outline in black pen and also colour in the pictures.

These are the pictures I done on the workshop. The top set were for the Metamorphosis animation and the bottom set of picturse were for my zoetrope animation.