This week: Finalizing our Preproduction and Moving on to Animation!

From this point, everyone will adopt a different timeline for their respective projects! We will go through a check making sure people have the following contents:

• Quality Character Design Samples
• A Great Animatic
• Clear Storyboards
• and Interesting Environments!

Don't start animating until you have each of these things! The development process is something you need to learn and understand fully! I will do my best to communicate the nuances of animation production to you in the following days!

For Wednesday:  Bring in any reference materials you need to either

A: draw environment drawings

or

B: Start animating your characters!

Also, Check out the AN225 Server folder. I have dropped in a video file called "The Making of Little Witch Academia."  The movie is 45 minutes. Watch it so we can talk about it next class!

Notes from class today:
Today, we did a storytelling exercise with a card game called Joking Hazard, where you could pull cards from your hand to make interesting stories!  This game, as we mentioned today and we will show Wednesday, is a great way to see what the animation process is like!

Notes from class are below:

Class Cancelled

Hey Class!  I got unlucky with the changing weather. 

On the bright side, I should be better in time for Wednesday.  I know, in your respective class, we're continuing a big project we're working on. For now, consider today to be a day where you have a little extra time to wrap up any progress you were making on your projects over spring break. Wednesday will be a day where I'll review everything you've worked on so far, and help steer you in the right direction for what comes next.

Tuesday, (instead of today,) I'll drop information across all class blogs for you, just to help prepare for the following next steps of our projects:

AN225: Layout and Character Animation.

AN310: 3D Batch Rendering and Filming with Manual 3-D Cameras

AN299: Mastering Audio, Non-Linear Editing, Mastering, and Distribution

Apologies for not being able to see how refreshed everyone is after spring break! I look forward to seeing all of you again soon!

~Shaw

Notes for today, and Homework for Monday, March 18, 2019

“HOW TO DO THINGS THE WAY YOU WANT TO DO THEM (career, art, skills, etc.)”

• 1. Find and know your heroes and heroines (the people that have made the art you want to make).
• Resources:
• Tumblr
• Facebook
• Youtube, and other video sites.
• Bechance
• LinkedIn! - A great way to see official artists CURRENTLY WORKING in positions you are interested in!
• 2. Find a visual language (style) for your film that gives you both the time and “look” you want to develop in your own artwork!
• Don’t JUST look for a look that only looks great, or a look that is “easy enough to do.” Find a balance between both methods!
• If you stick to what you already know how to do (how you currently draw, or paint or color, etc.)  You will create the elements you know how to create well, but anything outside your skill set will be heavily difficult for you to do, and you will probably ignore trying to get better because you are in your “COMFORT ZONE.”
• 3. Keep it as simple as you can!
• SERIOUSLY.
• A “strong” idea is not necessarily always a “complex” one. It can also be a streamlined thought executed at a high level, or a tiny idea that is spoken in a way that the MAXIMUM number of people understand it.

ASSIGNMENT FOR MARCH 18th, 2019

• Come to class with the following:
• A FULLY developed storyboard in Storyboard Pro. Export a PDF of your storyboards!
• A FULLY developed animatic from storyboard pro. Export a movie file of your animatic!
• CHARACTER designs including
• model sheets
• sheets of facial expressions and character poses of your character doing “stuff”
• environment designs of the places your characters WILL be in your film
• Color your model sheets and designs! Your animatic can be black and white with greyscale shadow in areas. (refer to the examples on the blog)
• Remember I have added a Resources folder on the server that contains items that will help you on your preproduction journey!