FINISHED! I mean it this time!

At long, long last I've finished this cartoon.

Ultrafoot from Sam Niemann on Vimeo.

I had vowed I would finish, that I'd never completely abandon the project, and I've finally made good on that promise.

The neglected little tyke had no budget and no schedule. I'm sure the band had long ago given up on me, and so, even as I promised not to forget him, the poor fellow was easily deferred by any other project that seemed interesting.

On top of that, I probably made every production error possible.  When I started, it was intended as a portfolio piece. I employed, and even feel I innovated, many techniques I thought the cartoon would show off. But before I finished they became standard procedures and are now kind of quaint.

As a director, I really didn't know what I wanted. I, or in some cases others, would spend hours on a background painting just to have it discarded.

This rough layout, if you could even call it that, was handed to the talented Jessica Buuck.

 

She did this sketch, which after a few revisions, became...

...this lovely painting.

She did many such paintings for me. Unfortunately, I just didn't feel they stylistically fit. I like to think Jessica's work wasn't wasted, though, because of how strongly it inspired my final version.

Here are a couple other examples of hours of misguided effort:

So there's that.

I also thought I could use Ultrafoot to build a staff for my growing studio. Many talented, but in some cases inexperienced, people were willing to volunteer their efforts toward the project with the idea that when paying work came along, we'd have our work flow in place and be ready to hit the ground running. Unfortunately, the real result of that was I spent long hours instructing, fixing, revising, rather than getting real work done. (This blog contains some of those demonstrations if you care to check them out)

Not to mention, I'd worked on it so long that during it's production digital video standards changed and I had to reformat everything to increase the resolution.

And finally, though not least, since starting the project I had a son. And then a daughter. My day to day life became exceedingly full. I felt I could only afford two modes of being; either earning money, or caring for the children. If I wasn't doing one, I was obliged to take up the other. That made the notion of "unfunded side projects" frivolous, and I often even felt guilty if I stole a couple hours here or there for them.

But I stuck it out! The kids are school age now. My wife has paying work. I found myself "between projects" as we say in the freelance business, and finally had a few solid weeks to devote to finishing Ultrafoot. It's all I ever needed but have been unable to arrange all these years.

Animation Complete!

I realize that the blog entry title makes it sound like the cartoon is finished, but sadly, that's not the case. What I'm trying to say is the task of rough animation is complete. Not as good as being completely finished, but it's an important milestone. (Coming several years late, but a milestone reached none the less!)

In fact, in most cases the animation has also been "inked" (it's all digital, so no actual ink was involved), except for just a few scenes where I feel I need to tighten up the layout before I can clean up the roughs. There's even a couple instances of "paint" (digital - not real paint).

Have a look-see...



What's next? About 30 or so background paintings. (I'm really looking forward to doing them!) After that is cell painting, a bit of effects animation, and compositing. Can I finish before the end of the year? That's my hope... but I doubt it.

One day...I will finish this f**ker!

Work in Progress, version 21

It's been about a year and a half since I posted last. Compare this version with the previous one to see what I've managed to accomplish in that time. (Hint, clean up on 12 scenes. Some of them actually already cleaned up and painted before but that I decided had to be redone)

Bounce Cycle

I love seeing this kind of thing on other people's animation blogs, so I thought I'd post the stages of this Ultrafoot bouncing cycle.

First the scribble pass:

Then I go through and solidify the forms, add the inbetweens, and repair the spacing and timing.

Sometimes the scribble pass is no more than squiggly lines, so rough that you can't tell what they are. Other times I get caught up a little and can't stop myself from adding elements like facial features and other details. It's usually a waste of time, though since they almost always have to be adjusted.
Then I add the details like facial features and an indication of clothes, and secondary motion like his hair and cape.

If someone else were doing the clean up, I'd do another pass to tighten things up and add the final details, but since I did the final line myself, I was able to skip that step.

Build 19

Seems like a good time for an update.



There's been some progress, but I want to take a moment to bitch about how difficult it's been for me to find time to work. Seems the world conspires against it! When I can manage it, I seem to just get little pockets of time. That's not conducive to animating. It takes me a couple hours just to get into it properly. A scene that might take me 8 hours if I could work on it all at once, takes 16 if I only get to work for two hours at a time.

Whew! That's off my chest. It might be hard to see what's going on in a lot of the new animation since it's just line art.

I couldn't resist working on the last scene with the dance moves. I've been anxious to replace those hideous storyboard drawings. Of course, what's replaced them is extremely rough still, but it's fun to post a scene this early. It gives an indication of my process. What you see there is my first pass, what I call the "scribble pass", where I just try to run through the scene and feel out the animation. I try to zip through it as quickly as I can. It's about the movement and not about the drawing.

Here it is again on it's own:

Take a Thug Take

"Takes" are a staple of cartoon humor, and I've put together a scene with seven in a row! Should be seven times funnier than any other cartoon!

I'm inclined to be selfish and do this scene myself, really get an opportunity to stretch some useful animation muscles. But I think instead, for the good of the project, I'll spread this one around. I'd like everyone involved (who's interested) to pick a number and do a thug take.

You'll need to design the thug first, and then stay a little within certain parameters.

• You don't have to use the exact same number of frames that I did in my place-holder animation. Do what you need to do for your special take.
  
• I'd like to say you can "go crazy", but not TOO crazy. It's a cartoony cartoon, but not the cartooniest cartoon. Something like this won't work in our context:

• Every thug wears the same outfit of black body suit and ski cap.

Sign up today!

For your edification:
I've knocked out my thug take. Here it is moving...

And stills...

Build 18

There's been some progress.

I've been working on a "dead spot" in the animatic where UF was standing waving to the crowd for too long. I decided to have him vamp for his adoring fans with some karate moves. The scene is a lot of fun, and full of things animators hate! Crowd scenes, animated camera moves, and weird camera angles. I think I got this idea because I've just seen Kung Fu Panda. Loved it!

This version also features a new music edit. I wanted to build up the phoney super hero getting suited up, so they've added a little to the front of the song for me.

There are also several other updates throughout. Enjoy!