Pre-Production for Specialist Study

In this report, I will be writing about the collaborative work with the third years mainly working on my specialism of 2D animation traditionally and digitally. I will be explaining the method on how I helped them and developed some of their work with supporting images in this report. Later at the end of the report, I will be writing about my conclusion and my employability for my animation course.

I have always been fascinated by all different kinds of animation, 2D, 3D and stopmotion. My dream is to specialize in all areas but for now, I will focus mastering them one at a time. I love the idea of combining all styles into one because it gives off a very unique feel to the animation. I love exploring different Medias and finding better ways to animate.

For now I will be focusing on 2D traditional and digital animation. This animation style inspired me as a child to one day animate like the professionals. I was very fascinated with the animation, creativity of the character designs, exaggeration and story lines. A good example is one of my favourite animes (Japanese Animation) called One Piece by Eiichiro Oda. During the 1997, One Piece was animated traditionally (cell animation) but then developed on through the years and animated digitally to save time and money.

My goal in the future is to bring back traditional animation with some help of 2D digital animation. The traditional animation gives more character and natural feel to the animation. I will be combining this with digital animation to animate most of the background and effects by using After Effects, flash or toon boom or any other new softwares coming out, which I will be learning soon.

At the start of the Pre-Production of specialist study, I have collaborated with quite a few third year students doing different kinds of tasks each which all relates to my specialism 2D animation. Some of my work for them is still on-going and will be complete after the deadline of this project.

My first collaboration was with a third year student Roxy Gomez. We have met quite a few times face to face discussing about her project which is about a Native American story which involves mostly about the animals. It is targeted to a younger audience from ages nine to thirteen. We have discussed about methods on how to complete her animation, she wanted a mixture of traditional and digital animation using many different softwares altogether. But her main style is to show a natural hand drawn characters that relates to the Native American theme. She has asked me to help her design some characters for her final year animation. She was very impressed by my drawing and photoshop skills, she wanted me to design her some Native American characters which will be based from her own research on her blog. After my designs are made, she will decide whether to use the same style I made or not. This will still be added on to her character development and art styles.

This is a crow design I have created for Roxy using Photoshop. I have based my design from her research cave paintings. I have used photoshop charcoal brush tool to create a grungy smudge effect and have used two minimal colours. I made a negative drawing by using the eraser tool to rub off the edges to create a nice clean outline. I made them look very spiritual with less detail and simple shapes, with soft edges almost look like they’ve been smudged. Alternative way is to create a white mask of the bird shape then colouring it afterwards.

 

These are some art work style I have designed for Roxy which has been taken from her story board. I made this to give her more variety of development work and she can later decide which style to follow. Doing this work for Roxy improves my knowledge and skills in photoshop, it also gave me more idea about Native American art, especially the character designs which are very simple based on basic shapes.

After working with Roxy, I have been contacted by Ashton Lewsey for wanting help as soon as possible to rotor scope her work. I didn’t have enough time to know what her project is about, all I know is that she needs this work done quickly, and her target audience are young adults. The task that has been given to me is a very easy job because I am used in handling photoshop. All I had to do is just delete the sky and the streets and replace textures at the back of every frame. The hard part of this task is to complete all frames in a few hours. The first thirty minutes was hard because I have only just started and not yet used to tracing around the images, but then I began working fast on two frames in every five minutes. I have met the deadline and I am proud of myself for working hard and fast with good quality. I feel I have achieved quite a lot from this task. I got to experience my first time rotor scoping and working on a tight deadline. This has also given me more idea about using mixed media in the future for my 2D animation.

After working with Roxy and Ashton, more third years wanted some more help. Roshni Kakad asked me to make a series of different smoke intro using after effects. At first, I didn’t know how to animate the smoke and make it look realistic. I looked online for video tutorials and found a really good tutorial on Video Copilot.com. This kind of animation style is still too new for me. Using stock video footage in after effects and using it on Trapcode’s particular to create my own smoke effect. In that tutorial, I have also learnt how to use colour corrections which makes the footage bring out the best of its qualities and change the colours and effects. After finishing the first test sample, Roshni wanted more smoke effect on the text as it disintegrates and animate the text flying around. So far I have created three tests and the work is still on-going till the twenty fourth of May. I have enjoyed myself working on after effects because, there are so many interesting things I can do with it. I can make effects, animate, edit videos etc…

Working with the third years was enjoyable, because I love collaborating with other people. Group meeting is always important for easier discussion of the work and more can be done. Although I haven’t met Ashton in person to discuss about her work, we communicated through emails, facebook and calling each other. I have completed all work needed on the right deadline except for Roshni’s because it is still an on-going work. I have followed the learning methodology of kolb’s theory by planning and experimenting different ways to achieve my goal, then trying it out first hand by experiencing it. I have then reflected on my process and learn from my experiences. This resulted in a series of solutions to various issues that have helped me to improve my animation practices.

I love learning different process of animating, using mixed media and digitally. This also gave me an idea for the future final animation in my third year. I will be combining all techniques I have learnt during my three years in university. At the moment, I am concentrating learning more about Affer Effects, Flash and Toon Boom. After mastering these programs, I will then move on and learn more new programs such as Nuke, Smoke, 3DS Max.

After graduating from University, my plan is to get my name out to the industries and gain knowledge and experience from them. I probably won’t get paid straight away because I have less experience from them. After working and learning more from the professionals, I will incorporate all I have learnt and create more of my own animation, build up my show reel and apply to other better companies. A good way to apply for a job is to apply in more than one company. One should hire me, if not I should try every month.




This is my video presentation for my Pre- Production of specialist study

This is the Final Animation Me and Michael Price made for the Caslon Project

3D test

Unedited green screen stopmotion

1st text stopmotion animation

We wanted to combine 2d, 3d and stop motion, we would like to add in a live footage of a person dressed as a victorian person for the intro using the milo. but thats only if we got time.


this is the finalised the story board in photoshop i drew  explaining step by step how to animate in 2d, 3d and stopmotion


me and michael have worked together before and we trust each other to do our best. we will be dividing our work half and half to save time


while i finalised my storyboard and animate the 2d intro as a substitute of the live footage, michael went ahead and animated the 3d animation of the gavel
then later on we worked together on making a stopmotion text writing test frame by frame which gives off a more natural feel


after the test, we started shooting our stopmotion on a greenscreen, we will then key it off aftereffects after the  animation. it took hours to shoot but finally succeeded very well


we learnt quickly how to key the green screen off from youtube tutorial, it is very easy. then we edited all our animations together combining the 2d, 3d and stopmotion. we are very pleased with the results.


in my conclusion, I have found communicating with the group is very important and easy to get the message across. I have learnt new techniques, rotorscoping, green screen keying and editing live footage on after effects.
time management is very important to balance all project work. I found some difficulties with universitys facilities equipment but over comed it in the end

L5 Infographic FINAL ANIMATION and tests

FINAL ANIMATION

IKEA INFOGRAPHIC

I have Finally completed my animation. it took me quite a long time to animate. I am happy of my results. I have followed my storyboard and cut down some sound clips and leave the important informations in the video. I have followed all the designs and techniques from my research.

Here are some tests and development of my animation.

Sound file tests
I have 2 versions of sound files with different wordings to it
In the end, I have combined both version into one and cut down unimportant parts

This took most of my time animating because, I wasnt used on making 3d on after effects. and also making the arrow curve was very hard for me because it was my first time. but finally managed to do it.

 This is the tutorial I have looked at to make this scene

http://ae.tutsplus.com/tutorials/motion-graphics/map-your-destination-in-ae/

L5 Infographic Planning, Story Board, Assets

My  plan for this project is to work on my clients animation first and then relate it to my IKEA infographics by putting this as a side video. I plan to animate my infographics combining techniques from my research and applying it to my animation. If ever I my work for the client is taking too long, I would stop it and work on infographics because I can submit the animation to him at any time.

This is my own design on how to assemble a TV Shelf for my client. He isnt very sure about what I am going to animate about, but he wanted any kind of furniture. I had designed this very simple and clear so anyone can easily  assemble TV Shelf. 

These are some designs I looked at so it can help me design my own TV shelf

Character he wanted to have in the animation. A young lady mid 20s Caucasian, brown hair, blue eyes and simple clothing but fashionable to target young audiences

I have started designing 3D models for my animation, everything is looking fine and up to date. all I need are some confirmations about layout and styles from client

After 2 to 3 weeks not hearing anything from my client, I worked on my storyboard for infographics. following important lines from my script. I have to cut most of it because it is too long. I think when I start animating, there will be loads of changes will be done because it might not look right to me.

I havent heard anything from my client for 4 weeks and never reply to my texts. I have decided to stop all my animations for him and focus on animating IKEA infographics instead. Next time I work for a client, I have to make a contract so they wont waste my time anymore.

These are some assets I made for my animation and ready to animate.

Ingvar Kamprad. Owner and founder of IKEA

This is my 3D design of my inforgraphic. I have noticed that it wouldnt fit my animation because every thing is 2D flat. maybe a tilt of a background could work but using this design wont. I have decided to only use a side view of it.

this is the 3D van side view

L5 Infographic animation style Inspiration

Animation style inspirations

These are some good examples of infographics that I really like. Each has their own way and style of delivering their messages.

This is more of a live presentation more than the actual animated infographics. I have posted this video because it is quite interesting how the person presented old school without a moving image. this kind of presentation is called Pecha Kucha which was invented by japanese engineers to presesnt to their coworkers in a short about of time.

I like this animation because the use of one colour makes the audience focus on what the main topic is about. The animation is very clear to understand because the sound and minimal key words work very well together. I have notice that all visuals are all balanced and layed out in the middle so audiences focuses on the subject.

This is another interesting animation where the animator focuses more on animating characters and story more. this has less text to it. this targets children 5 above because of the childish doodle styles, and a voice over of a little girl.

This next animation has an interesting style to it. The animator uses 3D in text and objects. This makes the animation look very appealing to the audience and make them amazed. I also liked the clever way of animating it.

In my animation, I hope to combine all these styles together

L5 Infographic Module (Research)

Another new Project, Inforgaphics.

I love infographics because it is easy to learn from it because of its graphic visual representations of information, data or knowledge. The striking images or graphics presents a very complex information quickly and clearly, even some young audiences can understand

The task was to pick an infographic given on moodle or choose my own. I have chosen to work on something related to furnitures because I am currently working with a client, to animate assembling a TV shelf. I have then decided to relate it to IKEA because it is a company well known for building furnitures. I have decided to focus on IKEA's history

These are some interesting infographics, I have found related to the history of IKEA Furnishings 

This infographics is about the comparisons of the owners of Ikea and Apple company. This are some more important informations related to my work which focuses more on the owners life.

I will only focus on the owner Ikea Ingvar Kamprad

This isn't an infographic about Ikea but it relates about furnitures, this will help me develop my ideas and scripts for the animation later on

This is a rough Script I have made for my infographic. I have summarised some information of the infographic so it will hit the 3 minute mark animation because the original was too long.

The purpose of this video is to tell a brief history of ikea

Ikea is well known for its good design, good function and good quality, with low prices

IKEA

IKEA stands for Ingvar, Kamprad, Elmtaryd, Agunnaryd

IKEA was founded by Ingvar Kamprad in Sweden by the 1920's

He was raised on Elmtaryd, a Farm near the small village of Agunnaryd.

By the age of 5, Ingvar began a business by cycling to Stockholm buying cheap matches in bulk and resell them to his village in Agunnaryd. He later then expands to selling flower seeds, greeting cards, Christmas tree decorations, pencils and pens.

1940's

By 17, his father rewarded him money for succeeding in his studies. He used it to establish his own business.

Ingvar business has become successful, he began to advertise in local newspapers. He uses the local milk van to deliver products to the nearby train stations.

1948

Furniture is introduced into the IKEA range

The furniture is produced by local manufacturers in the forests close to Ingvar Kamprad's home. 

1950's

IKEA founder sees the opportunity to sell furniture on a larger scale using a catalog. The IKEA catalog that we know today is born.

A big development of IKEA. For the first time customers can see and touch IKEA home furnishings before ordering them.

The showroom is born out of a price war with a main competitor  of IKEA. As both companies lowered prices, Quality was threatened.

By opening the showroom, IKEA clearly demonstrates the function and quality of its low price  products. The innovation is a success.

The decision for IKEA to design its own furniture stems, Ironically from competitors pressure for suppliers to boycott IKEA.

Exploration of flat packaging began when one of the first IKEA co-workers removes the legs of the table so that it will fit into a car and avoid damage during transit.

After this discovery flat packs and self assembly become part of the concept.

1960's

Gillies Lundgren, co-worker at IKEA designed the TORE drawer unit 

Marian Grabinski designs the MTP bookcase

Ogla chair on sale

Improving on products develops strong relationships between IKEA and Polish suppliers during the 1960's. These relationships are an important part of IKEA maintaining low prices.

THE LARGEST IKEA STORE opens in Stockholm, Sweden.

Thousands of people queue for the opening of the 31,000 square meters flagship store, IKEA Kungens Kurva. The store is a circular design which was inspired by New York's Guggenheim Museum. The store's success leads to the opening of a self-serve warehouse, giving birth to an important Ikea concept

1970's

Ingvar Kamprad wrote the testament of a furniture dealer and in 1976 it was published - it documents IKEA's vision and business idea and has a strong influence on the development and vitality of IKEA's culture.

TAJT, a multifunctional seat/recliner, is one of many good examples of how IKEA sometimes does things differently. By using a low cost raw material from another industry, in this case denim, a hardwearing and low priced product is created.

1980

The Klippan evolves into a sofa tough enough to stand up to the kind of punishment only children know how to dish out, yet sofa enough to fall asleep on during long bedtime stories. The entire cover can be removed for machine washing.

--This low priced, functional coffee table is made with a technique that is normally used for interior doors, making the table very strong and light. This sandwich technique is called board on frame and will be used in many IKEA products in years to come.

IKEA group is formed and its owner is a foundation, the stitching INGKA Foundation, which is based in the Netherlands

IKEA Family is launched, the new customer club, is launched. Today, IKEA Family is in 16 countries (over 167 stores) and has about 15 million members.

IKEA designs a series of high quality furnishings using some well loved material; birch wood, leather . The range has everything you would expect of high quality classics, except the high price tag. Stockholm is a winner of the excellent Swedish design award.

IKEA catalog print run expands to 4.5 million copies, in 9 languages.

1986, Ingvar Kamprad retires from Group Management to become an advisor to the parent company INGKA Holding. B.V Anders Moberg became the President and CEO of the IKEA Group.

By 1999 Anders Dahlvig becomes President and CEO of the IKEA Group, taking over from Anders Moberg

2000

E-shopping is launched in Sweden and Denmark. Since then many other markets have started offering online shopping at IKEA

2001

The IKEA Group moves its head office from Humlebaek in Denmark to Leiden in the Netherlands.

IKEA expands everything to bedroom and kitchen solutions.

IKEA launches its own food label covering about 30 percent of the 150 products in its food range. The range focuses on high quality food products based on Swedish recipes and tradition, for a low price. The products have and IKEA label and are sold in Swedish food Markets in IKEA stores and are also served in IKEA restaurants

, the sliding value of the U.S dollar put Kamprad ahead as the richest person in the world earning $23 billion, as of March 2010

IKEA rewards all of its 12,400 staff in the U.S with a bicycle each. The bikes were distributed to staff at its 37 stores in the country

On February 17, 2011, IKEA announced its plans to a wind farm in Dalarna County, Sweden, furthering the furniture giants goal of running on 100 percent renewable energy.

October 2011, IKEA have 332 stores in 38 countries.

These are some research I have found of important materials that IKEA has used

Birch Wood

 

Leather