Major Project/ Year 3 Evaluation

This post pretty much sums up what I've been up to during my last year of studies at UCA. I've been working on a collaborative animated short called Kinnaree with Dayle Sanders as Mango Mercury studios and recently submitted our last piece of work for our 3 year Ba (Hons) Computer Generated Arts and Animation course. 

Kinnaree was a major challenge for both of us. Taking up a project for the whole year was a wise decision which enabled us to spend more time on animating and explore pathways that half  a year's project wouldn't allow us to do. One part of the project which was completely new to us was editing which is partly why Act 3 of the animation is not resolved at the moment. I've learned a lot through this project; like what it's like to be part of a team, professionalism in work, time management, art direction, editing, character performance and of course technical approaches in Maya and Mudbox. 
A lot of the small errors in the animated short we submitted will be tackled during the next month and a half for the upcoming New Designers exhibition in London in July which I am very excited about. I am overly satisfied with our work so far and would never admit our decision to make this a year long project. The updated version of the animation will be uploaded on this space in July. 

Final (WIP) Animation

Art of Document

Kinnaree Major Project Art Of by andriana_laskari

Technical Paper

Major Project Technical Paper by andriana_laskari

CD Design

DVD case design

Demo Reel

Promotional Stills

Major Project Update 2

For the past month or so I've been getting deeper  into quadruped animation and learning so much about this complicated field. Looking back at my very first animation tests I can't help but cringe at how 'horribly abnormal and awkward' they looked. This is in a way positive, as it shows that I know it can be improved even further in order to work better.

Animation in this project could go on forever, but due to its tight deadline we have to keep looking at it from an overall point of view and do the amount of work required to meet the deadline.

So here is my progress so far in animating Hemmy:

This was my initial scrapped run cycle.

And this is my latest one.

At the moment I am working within the final scene and  using the pre-viz camera to help me with timing the shots.

These are some of the great dance sequences my group partner Dayle Sanders is working on with Kinnaree.

This is some progress on the environment that I've been working on. At the moment we are discussing the possibility of rendering everything in layers and render passes which will help in gaining control of the different 'chunks' and improve the look of the animated short.

Overall, I am very satisfied with our progress so far. To make make the most of our left time we are going to start rendering as soon as Kinnaree gets her dynamics sorted out and we can keep on animating in the mean time.

Watch this space for more progress on Mango Mercury!

CGAA - ACT Speed Paint Challenge 03

http://ucarochester-cgartsandanimation.blogspot.co.uk/2013/03/cgaaact-live-commission-speed-paint_6.html

CGAA - ACT Speed Paint Challenge 02

Check out the music piece this was based on here.

Major Project: Interim Crit Presentation 04/03/2013

So yesterday we had our last crit day, the last day we could all get together and show progress of our work so far on our Major Projects. It was a bit of a sad realisation that our final hand in will be just a normal one. Anyway, I am looking forward to, hopefully, get back into warm presentations in the outside industry.

PreVis V2

Hemmy's walk cycle V2

Interim Presentation