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!

What's Expected of Animators?

This is an unusual project in that there's no budget, no schedule, and no real client. (Of course I'm hoping to please the band, but probably for the most part they might prefer I put less into it and be finished already) I want the finished product to be an animation showcase for the studio, as well as for everyone working on it!, and yet I too am anxious to finish.

With that competing criteria, it could be confusing to know how to handle your animation assignments. Well I'm the DIRECTOR, and I'm here to make it more confusing! The answer is, do what you'd like and we'll work from there. To suggest what that means, here's some examples.

Nobody took scene 10, so I assigned it to myself. Here's the animatic/storyboard:

The simplest thing would be to make a graphic with the thug's arms and legs flailing and just scale it up and off screen, much like the place-holder art. That might have served, but there was a lot more opportunity for fun animation. Here's what I did instead:

It's hard to see, but I really enjoyed doing some full animation (on 2s) of the thug flying through space, obviously not following the storyboards very closely, but having fun with the set up.

Here's another scene that I handled very differently:

Maybe you can tell there are no inbetweens between these poses...

Only some squash on the foot and some secondary on his cape and clothes. It's a very economical scene and I think it looks great that way!

So do what feels right for you and the scene! Send me roughs and check in if you have questions.

Thug Designs

Anybody want to help with designing a half dozen (or so) thugs for Ultrafoot to send running scared?