Baby's First Animation

Today has been full of learning, experimentation and animating.

Starting off with a simple dose of picture collage, we took a number of images from the internet to help inspire us with our Invisible Cities final piece. We created a few thumbnails using this technique to get a good grasp as to what we would like the images to look like. Here's the work I've done;

Here you can see the compilations I've created and the notes I've taken on the side throughout the lesson. I will be painting over these to make them appear more concise instead of the colourful mess that you may think it is at the moment.

For the afternoon, we were taught about timing and spacing within animation. Having missed the first session of the animation, I had a quick rundown of where everything was, and how to use the program. We used Adobe Animate (2019) for this.

Here is my workspace;

Once again, you can see my progress, my notes, and the program I used in its entirety. I found it quite easy to work with all of it, once I figured some things out. For example, holding down shift while moving things with the arrow keys makes it move quicker than simply holding down the buttons.

Yes I did realise that after almost finishing the animation, but at least it happened!

Here is the final animation;

Nothing spectacular, but I'm still very happy with the skills and knowledge I've gained today. From a spinning penguin to a pendulum that actually works. Progress!

[Disclaimer. The title is a play on the children's toy, "Baby's First Doll" by Fisher Price. I'm not calling myself a baby, even though my sleeping schedule would say otherwise.]

Whoops! But we're back on track.

Hey again! Been a while, hasn't it?

So! To start. The big 'Whoops!' Is all about the work I've been doing over the past week. I missed information, but tried my best to start and complete the set work to the best of my ability anyway, to no avail! I managed five images, five exterior and one interior, as you can see here.

This is the exterior of a building from one of my many stories. It looks a bit odd, because it isn't completely fleshed out, but I tried my best with the little materials I had.

Only to find out that I didn't even need to do that at all, and I was making things incredibly difficult for myself!

Now, I'm on track, I know what I'm doing, and will be regularly uploading the images I draw for the Invisible Cities thumbnails. Hope you enjoy them!

Here is what we did today;

We were taught about Cinema, Radio, Television and Videogaming and how people continue to say, 'This one will be the death of the other!' Which is simply not true, due to how the mediums vary so greatly.

We were also taught about the Acts that each story, film, and videogame follows. Act one, Act two, and Act three. Three climaxes, and one Plot Twist.

Finally, we were asked to write a short piece, no more than 50 words, using the things we've been taught through the day. Here are my written versions;

And for those of you who can't read my handwriting, here it is typed;

Her curiosity blooms, lifting the heavy book. Red hair in her eyes she reads the page, a purple glow filling the room. A crash, the noise interrupts her casting. A scream, the demon is let loose. An amulet, to protect the father, but the daughter remains defenseless. 

She falls, eyes red. Possessed.

Any of you that were counting the words would know that I went over the limit! Look at me, rulebreaker I am. There are some things I could have replaced, I now see, but I'm sure I would've seen it, given more time.

Overall, it's been a great day! And I look forward to everything else I have to learn and complete over the upcoming days. See you soon!

Autodesk Maya Tutorial

Today was our first tutorial on Autodesk Maya. We were taught the basic shortcuts, where everything is located, what the locations are called and how to use the basic functions.

Over the course of the next few weeks I'll be uploading approximately five different compilations of these four blocks, perhaps even experimenting with texture and such too, to show I have a goo understanding of how to use the program.