Because I sit in front of a screen for days on end, I need something to keep me going. While I draw, I watch stuff. Movies, Dramas, YouTube, Ted Talks, Podcasts... My (wacom) pen almost never stops while something is playing (there are exceptions). This is what my screen looks like when i'm playing something (Photoshopped, screen capture doesn't work with DVDs);
Small box in the corner. Nothing more. I have now gotten to the stage where I don't watch anything and not be working (it's a waste of valuable time right?). Another thing I do is, when saving a file, instead of sitting and waiting for bar to finish crawling across the screen, I pick up a pencil/ pen and scribble something from the screen. Here I am watching Season 4 of House MD.
The actual job? That blue art I am working on? It is an 8 page comic for the Hepatitis C Council of New South Wales (Australia) and the comic is this;
Guess what the topic of the comic is? It's nice to be working on this kind of stuff. Knowing that these comics are being put out there to help people. I'd like more work like this.
So, today I was interviewed by faster than light about the stuff I have have been and will be up to. The presenter Grant Stone quizzed me about Rombies, Briefcases and the topic of this post - the Vowels video clips I am working on for fantastic Japanese based duo Yongen.
Due to current events and reshuffling of projects, the next video doesn't have a solid time line as such. And so I thought it might be nice to let people know that the project IS in fact moving along steadily. More so - I thought I would critique the first video and show some of my techniques being implemented in the next video, Rococo.
Let me start by saying that I am a naughty boy. I haven't made any story boards for these videos. which is both odd and funny because that has been a big part of my work over the past years. So what did I do instead? I paneled the videos out as comic book chapters. Yeah, that's right. Comics. I thought that they are so close to storyboards I would give this method a try. One page for the in production Rococo looks like this; From there I tear all the panels apart and throw the individual files into iMovie to mock up the video clip - matching timing and events to the music (Which I have heard 100's of times and am still not sick of. Nice - I don't think I could keep going making these if I didn't love the music). Almost every frame becomes a cut in the video 'Rococo' has 33 cuts. ''. From there I illustrate all the backgrounds that will appear throughout. The pic below shows one such transition;After I have finished all the BGs for the video, I proceed to plan my animation. The above is pretty damned simple to imagine. A bouncing bug. For any difficult animation, I keep reference and Preston Blair's 'how to Animate' (I've had a copy since pre-lower-region-hair) close at hand.
Thinking of the pacing of the video, I make a path and act out the movement with real objects to the music. This makes me look like a 4 year old in a 30 year old's body. I do this indoors with the windows closed. The red represents the screen size I am using with the videos. 822pixels by 486pixels - which is both widescreen and broadcast quality. From here I mark out the basic animation using shapes in Photoshop using the Animation window. After making repeated tweeks, if the basic movement is smooth (or as smooth as I can be happy with without tearing my heir out) I begin roughly sketching in the characters shapes and subtle movements. The above picture shows both the moving shape I mentioned and the sketched out character for a few frames. Incomplete but I think you get the idea. I will hold anything more detailed back for another time. Now. You may be wondering why I am insisting on drawing and posting 100 vowels characters on my blog? Well, Rococo calls for street scenes. and I need a LOT of variety to fill out those scenes. Once my 100 are complete, I think at least half of those could find their way into the video. In fact, I am trying to focus on the types of characters you might find wandering about the streets of Rococo. The biggest issue I had when I finished the 'Give me your sun, give me your moon' video clip was that I had drawn many of the animation using a pencil in Photoshop. Why is that a big deal? well, a brush gives a soft edge while the pencil gives a hard edge. Why did I use the pencil? Because I was doing 2D sprite animation for games. Using the pencil immediately means pixel art and thus makes things a whole lot smoother for work flow and of course editing with a simple click of your magic wand. As shown here;
But I don't like the look. So I will be doing away with it completely in this video. There are other thing I would love to change would have to be the clouds and steam effects (in future videos) - it may mean going back to the earlier animations to edit them and bring them up top the new standard... I don't know. I like 'Give me your Sun, Give me your moon' - it's just that it's looking like the continuations of that video are looking much better. I am no Animation pro, and was never properly trained but I am enjoying these videos and should I manage to finish all 10 - I'll wager that I would have learned a thing or two along the way and that is reward in itself.
Just because it's interesting and this Pachinko illustration work is doing my head in. Seriously hardcore game background illustration happening at the moment. Well, for others it may not be, but I am really pushing my skills on this one. I cant show the final product, but perhaps I can show just one section? Ill try that. Thursday deadline which means I shouldn't be fooling about on my blog. ok ok, back to work after this; Actually, I will(EDIT - am not allowed) post about the game work. There's far too much paid work that I just don't show anyone. Likely up over the weekend or Monday.
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Right. That is meant to be an animated giff. doesnt look so animated. SO. Here's a jpg breakdown for anyone interested (includes roughs and working pencils);
