Progress report

-October 2015

-December 2016



I think this version has more natural timing and spacing, particularly in the moment upwards to the shoulder I considered how the different parts of the arm move at different times to create staggered movement, making it interesting. I am also pleased with the arcs in this piece of animation, particuarly the more subtle ones when he brings his arms down, the anticipation has a very little arc which makes it feel punchy and weighted. I also think I have generally improved at drawing and my knowledge of anatomy.

Practicing animating rough from reference

This is a very rough animation I did to practice locating keyframes from video reference, I used terminator as my subject since it's a personal favorite and I've always liked how visceral everything in that movie is. For the sake of this exerciser I simplified the character into it's basic shapes and stylized him in order to increase how quickly I could draw the keyframes, but I quite like it as a style anyways, so I may finish this short piece.

Second attempt at 2d jumping box

One thing I think I did better here is tone down the squash and stretch elements slightly to make them move into one another, instead of feeling like separate actions, however I think the anticipation still needs work, and I could still push poses to give the box more character and appeal.

Jumping box & Bouncing ball in room [2d]

(bouncing ball begins 15 seconds into video)

For the jumping animation I was trying to understand the principles of squash and stretch, whilst it works to an extent I think I tried using squash and stretch so deliberately that it seems quite jarring and doesn't quite match the speed or velocity of the movement. I also think the timing is slightly awkward, the moments feel separate, rather than one smooth motion. But I do think I managed to clearly communicate the movement and action, you can clearly see that the box looks both ways and then jumps.
 For the ball animation I think I used timing and spacing quite well, the ball feels like it has physics acting on it, such as gravity bringing it to a slow halt. But I don't think the changes in size for the ball are accurate, it doesn't hold form, even if it is supposed to get smaller at it travels through space.

Stop motion walks

 I think this went fairly well, but it was almost more of a character walk because it's quite stompy, when I wanted a more vanilla walk. I think I could also work on my fairing to create more natural movement, it's quite janky at the moment, but over all a good first attempt at a walk I think.
This was my attempt at a character walk, one thing I feel went well was the timing on the triumphant hand in the air at the end, I think that looks quite smooth. But I think next time I do this I should try to do a consistent walk rather than one that shifts half way through. It was fun to experiment with emoting through acting though.

3d tasks

This is my first attempt at doing squash and stretch in Maya, getting to grips with the program. I think it looks okay but definitely room for improvement.
I think this animation came out well, I was practicing follow through, and staggering movement with the tail, different sections of the tail move at different times which helps make it looks more real. I think to improve this I would think about the timing of the tail in relation to the tail more, as I don't think it syncs up very well.
I was learning constraints with this piece, which I did, but I still don't fully understand how Maya works so the animation here is quite limited.
In this piece I tried using principles I've been learning through previous tasks, such as staggering movement and squash and stretch, if I were to do it again I think I would use more varied movements and try to push myself more.

Smear frames in 2d

I did this to experiment using smear frames, it's very rough and I think it has a lot of issues with the volume of the character but I like the movement of pulling the sword out and grabbing it, I think it's quite convincing. I think in order to improve this I need to go over it and make sure I retain consistent art, and I would also redo some of the head movements, since I think that's what let's it down. I would also push the acting more, I think I could do more with the body to sell the action.

Coming back to the head turn

I decided to come back to a task I did near the start of the semester to see if I could do it better, and I think this piece of animation is better paced and timed than the old piece, especially since for this piece I decided to go back over it once I've animated once to fix errors that I noticed in the first pass. I also asked peers what they thought was wrong with the first one, the general consensus was it didn't hold form, things like the eyes, hair and jawline shifted very noticeably. It's also important to note that this is the first piece of animation I filmed video reference for, so in my second pass I more closley studied the shape of my head in each position, and replicated that in key frames. Whilst still not perfect I think the second pass holds form far better, if I were to go over it again I'd fix the body and neck, and maybe even the hair, as they still shift a bit. I also added in the blink, which wasn't in the video reference, to try to give the animation more acting/appeal, making it feel real. The eyebrow raise is timed as the same as the video but I think it would've worked better if I started the movement during the turn, maybe the end of the blink, so that it would feel more natural.

1st pass

2nd pass