Amie McGovern's Portfolio
Script Idea 1 - Using Creature Comforts Technique of Interviewing People
Ask People a number of questions about lock down and edit out parts of the audio that could relate to the animal.
Using this as the animals audio.
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Interview Questions; (The interviewer will not be herd)
-How excited are you to be out of lock down? What will you do?
-Any funny lock down stories?
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-What is it like being stuck with your housemates in lockdown?
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-What do you make of London/England during Lock down.
Script Idea 1 - Audio Clips From The Interviews
Kane Audio (Compressed file)
Sound Collaboration - Kane Obrien
I will be collaborating with Kane a year three sound design student, who will be sorting out the sound to my final piece along side helping me with script ideas. We have been communicating through voice calls and emails, exchanging many notes and ideas to how the final piece should sound. Kane has been very helpful with helping me come up with potential ideas and is also one of the interviewees. Below are some of the notes we shared;
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Kane's notes to me after looking through my original ideas at possible lines for the animals to use.
My Notes to Kane after we discussed on zoom that we are to just use the interviews and not any scripted voice acting. As we both agreed the interviews have a more organic feel to them.
Kane's Script idea using the interview recordings. The pink and purple notes are my impute I added once he sent the script to me. We had previously both had desiccations about who to cast as what animal. Kane really helped me decide upon this as he knew less of the people who were interviewed so was able to picture there voices as animals better.
Sound Animatic By Kane
Kane put together the final recordings, creating music to go with it. He added his sound to some of my pictures and drawings to create this animatic. He also came up with the end scene lines which I really love.
Feedback
My teachers and classmates did not think the audio fit the characters very well and felt instead of using people I should make a script which progressing I will do.
My Ideas for new script
Script Redo; I decided to switch to using a script after the feed back from my first animatic. I am going to focus more on the animals and how these animals would react on a day out.
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Chameleon
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"Its kind of ruff out hear in the wild" (Make him quite anxious) - Chameleon changes colours so they blend into their background. Eyes dart around franticly.
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Giraffe;
Idea 1;
Cheeking themselves out in their reflection admiring it, possibly in one of the shiny skyscrapers, e.g., the shard. "Wow who are you, you gorgeous thing?" (Possible don't even need lines for this section the Giraffe could just be pulling funny faces at himself).
Idea 2;
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Place the Giraffe in shot with the meerkats, so that you just see his legs, at the end of their lines you hear him say "Lovely view from up hear guys." They could possibly be looking out for the meerkats as personal look out.
Meerkat
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Idea 1;
Have one nervous Meerkat with one very chilled out Meerkat. One Meerkat is very nervous with all of the sounds, very on edge.
Nervous Meerkat; "Did you hear that? Did you hear that?"
Chilled Meerkat; "Just relax bro, chill out, enjoy the sights"
Show Lion peeping out from around the corner.
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Idea 2;
"Dave" "Dave" "Where are you mate?" (Looking for their friend)
Cut of Dave somewhere completely different.
Dave- "Please don't take me back to the zoo! I can not stand those two"
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Idea 3;
Two mischievous meerkats catch them on camera as they are running away giggling from something, they stop as they see the camera and act very natural. "nothing to see hear" Run off.
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Ox
Idea 1;
Grumpy Ox trying to walk down a small Camden lane, struggling to squeeze down it says;
"Everything is closed. I went to the Tate.. it was closed, Thorp park.. closed, Shops.. closed.. I mean what's the point in having a day off if everything is closed?"
Idea 2; Ox
Looking in a house window "I'm just Trina see where all the humans have gone"
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Gorilla
"Just out and about seeing the sights. This Tube is taking forever." Be impatiently waiting for a tube. Picks his nose and eats it, funny Gorilla behaviour. Possibly pic up and read a newspaper.
Kane's Idea for new script
Kane the sound design student who is collaborating with me, sent me this script idea once he saw my original script ideas above. Overall I like his Ox and Meerkat idea.
Finalising Script Ideas
Chameleon
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Slowly walk into shot "Its kind of ruff out hear in the wild" (Make them quite anxious, lots of eye movement) - Blend in with background image.
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Giraffe
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I would like to use this video as my Giraffe reference. I don't feel although The Giraffe needs audio. If I were to use this reference. As it looks although the Giraffe is just pulling funny faces at the camera.
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Ox
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very Grumpy "Don't like it, Not only is everything is closed, everything is so small and close together.. Its worse then the zoo. "
Shot of him trying to squeeze through a small alleyway.
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Place to squeeze through.
Meerkat
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Nervously Looking for their friend Dave, however you then see a cut away of a lion peering out, licking their lips.
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Looking nervously for their friend;
Slightly more brave Meerkat1 "Dave? Dave? Where are you Dave?
Nervous Meerkat2 ; "Did you hear that? Did you hear that?"
Slightly more brave Meerkat1 ; "Its ok, just relax"
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Show Lion peeping out from around the corner, liking their lips.
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Gorilla
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"Just out and about seeing the sights.... This Tube is taking forever." Be impatiently waiting for a tube. Picks his nose and eats it, funny Gorilla behaviour. Possibly pic up and read a newspaper.
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Final Scripted Audio Animatic Plus some block out Ideas
Audio Files For Vocals
Overall I am not too sure if I will include the Giraffe In my final piece as I think it may be too short, therefore I will leave the Giraffe till last and only animate it if I have time. I decided to change the audio of the Chameleon as I felt it should be a little more upbeat, I also think it will be more engaging to watch a Chameleon eat ice cream. When the Chameleon licked the ice cream I want them to change colour to the same as the ice cream.
New Chameleon Idea;
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Chameleon could be walking around trying to try out new foods to eat. Eating half melted ice-cream, turns into the same colour as the ice cream. Possible lines; "At first I was a bit nervous to get time off, I don't usually like change, however I've been really enjoying the local cuisine." ; Licks half melted Ice cream on the side with possible fly's about. Then eats one of the fly's. "Mmmm, pretty good... bit cold though."
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Lion Reference For Meerkat Scene;
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Lion Rig from Truong;
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I found a nice lion rig from Truong to use for the meerkat scene. The lion will be peeping around the corner licking his lips at the already nervous meerkats. This will happen towards the end of the scene shortly before the scene cuts. I could get Kane to create some suspenseful music for this scene.
Render Test Plus Ice Cream Model (Collaboration With Oliver)
I sent my original blender composition to Oliver who I am collaborating with to help me with the VFX side of my project. Oliver helped set up my scene and add lighting and shadows. He also created a 3D model of a ice cream melting, for my Chameleon to eat. Overall I feel he helped my scene look a lot better then it originally did. I love the shadows as I feel they make the Chameleon look much more realistic.
To This (Oliver's Test Render)
From This
Wave Movement Test
Oliver experimented with adding subtle wave texture movements to the water. I really like the outcome as I feel it helps the scene come to life.
Render Timing Test
To render the scene with the wave ripples it took roughly 1 second per frame.
Taking into consideration my animatic is 1 minute 27 Witch is 87 seconds that is 2,175 frames.
2,175 frames converted to minutes would be 36.25 minutes of rendering time for my project.
Elephant
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First Pass;
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Second Pass;
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Third Pass;
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Forth Pass;
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Fifth Pass;
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Mentor Advice;
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-Head moves too much. Crunch the curves down in the graph editor.
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-After front foot lands head drops and follows through. On x axis and z axis add in little head bob and off set timing. There is a little bit on second step however is more anchored as trunk is more set on the grass.
Frame 48 drop head slightly more.
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-Add more overlap and follow through in tail and head. Avoid head coming up the same time as the chest.
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-Tail slightly too even spacing, have more poses at top. Follow through tip of tail even more.
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-Frames 55 to 83 instead of shifting hole body back only move the front chest. Wilst moving chest over rotate it so it puts up more.
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-Shift weight more when left foot leaves ground.
-Make sure whatever leg the elephants weight is on is strait.
-Check spacing of back left foot in graph editor as foot lifts too fast. Foot is also too twisted.
-Make tail tip poses more extreme also make the tail move in a figure eight.
Tip; Animate so you can see it then use the graph editor to crunch it so you can feel it.
Sixth Pass;
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Mentor advice part 2
Frame 64- head hits a wall check curves in neck and chest motion.
First step- head is moving same time as foot.
Chest would go ever so slightly higher and then the head would drag and then come up ever so slightly.
Frame 104 when head drops play with x axis more as heads is rotating back angle it more so it looks like it is dragging behind (chin is dragging).
Frame 140 looks sticky should have more ease despite bum stopping in reference think more animation and add a little curve, have a longer ease.
Final foot movement do a moving hold as it moved back and forth. Do a more extreme version of the pose then bring it back.
Back foot sticks a little bit frame 102 accelerates too fast and foot looks like it sticks on ground too much. Have it slow out and slowly pick up speed.
Last step When foot leaves floor their is a very small movement of bum dropping and rolling under a little. As foot takes the weight rock hips a little.
Frame 84 Truck moves same time as head curve trunk mass a little so it is still favouring its last position as the head starts to pick up.
Frame 90-91 spacing is too big for the tail.
Add a little more drag to tail frame 175.
Final Animation;
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Gorilla
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Teachers Feedback;
-Create negative space between the gorillas legs.
-Waft is a little stiff add more curve.
-Animate the gorillas toes add a little bit more movement to his lower half so that he looks looser.
Final Animation, with Oliver's render ;
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Overall I am happy with the overall look of the piece, I really like the way ollie added shadows and fur as I feel it helps the gorilla look even more realistic. I will add the audio all together with the others once Kane sends me the final sound file. To improve I would put more work into the nose picking as I still feel it could use some more work.
Chameleon
Block Out;
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First Pass;
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Second Pass;
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Teachers Feedback
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-More small eye twitches. Every time the eye does a big twitch add a small twitch afterwards.
-Move eye when character says "enjoy" to help exaggerate the word.
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Final;
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I decided to change the ice cream to a donut as Oliver said that the ice cream was too low down for the chameleons Tongue. If I were to redo this I would have considered how tall the ice cream was before animating.
Meerkats
Block Out;
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Second Pass;
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Teachers Feedback;
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-Focus more on curves when the meerkats are on their all fours. Look at straits and curves.
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-Look at where the meerkats nose is in relation to hand.
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Teachers Feedback;
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-Focus more on line of action and arcs, particularly when the right meerkat is standing himself up.
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Final Pass;
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Third Pass;
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This is my final animation I tried to focus on line of action and curve overall I am not too pleased with the way the meerkats tails look as I feel they move a little too much when the meerkats are standing up.
OX
Final Render;
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Overall I like the way ollie pans the camera in to make the lion more visible. I also like how he added the box in front of the lion as I feel it draws the viewers eye more towards the lion.
Block Out; First Pass;
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For this animation I wanted to focus on animating subtle weight shift.
Teachers feedback; Ears are too stiff and symmetrical.
Second Pass;
Overall I am happy with the ear flicker I like the fact it is predominantly on one ear as ox's move their ears very independently from one another. I also like the movement in the ox's hips.
Final Animation Render;
Overall I wish I angled the camera slightly lower to get the camera in the same position as my Maya play blasts.
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I really like the way Oliver incorporated some colour to his lighting to get subtle hints of colour on the ox that was reflecting from the umbrellas.
Final Animation With Final Sound;
Overall I am really happy with how Kane's sound design works with my animations I feel it helps add a sense of character and light hearted fun to the final piece. It also makes it more immersive and believable to hear subtle sounds such as the elephants foot steps.
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In addition I am happy with Oliver's renders and think he did an amazing job of bringing my characters to life making them look although they are in the image. However if I were to repeat this project I would take more consideration as of what angles to take the images as I feel this is my main let down as I think some of the characters would look better in different angles e.g., the elephant and Ox would look better from a lower angle.
Furthermore I would also use a tripod to take videos rather then pictures as I feel this would help my piece look more realistic due to the subtle background movements e.g., wave ripples, subtle tree movement or a bird flying overhead. I think this would also make the piece not only look more believable but also interesting to look at.
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Another element that I would change is the fact the chameleon does not look at the camera (audience) due to the way she is angled in comparison to her play blast where she did look at the audience. If I had more time I would make her do this as I think it would create more of a connection with the viewer helping them to feel more engaged, although she is talking to them.
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Overall despite feeling although the piece is far from perfect I am still happy with the final outcome. I feel it overall as a hole comes together and works well putting the concept across. I also learned a lot from animating this and enjoyed being able to animate a range of different animals.
I found animating multiple animals fun and interesting as I got to learn about their different mannerisms which was fun to play around with. E.g., Meerkats move very fast and are very jittery, whereas Chameleons move mostly very slowly they also do a lot of back and forth movement.
I feel animating larger animals taught me a lot about weight which was something I really struggled with, however now feel less intimidated animating. I still have a lot to learn but feel although this was a step in the right direction and I am now willing to practice more animating heavy characters. Seeing how I have improved has inspired me as it has taught me that the more I work on it the better I will become and the more I will understand certain concepts such as weight.
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I feel animating smaller characters e.g., the meerkats has taught me more about the importance of key poses, perfecting my arcs, knowing when a line should be strait or curved. I particularly struggled with the markets walk as the characters move so fast. Paying more attention to line of action and perfecting my key poses despite it being such a short, quick part of an animation helped me a lot with making their walks looks fluid, fast, yet also have weight shift.
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In the future I would like to continue to practice animating these characters now I have gotten to know them better. I also wish to learn more about blender. Seeing how Oliver was able to compose my animations and make them look a lot more interesting in blender has made me want to learn more about it, so I am able to render my animations in a more interesting way in the future.
In addition learning to use blender to 3D model will also allow me to make environments and props for my characters to use . I am excited to learn more about this in order to help my ideas come to life.
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