Project 2_William

     10/6/21

    Yo, waddup? I don't have much to report on the project yet, as we were just informed of the Project today. The only solid work I have at the moment are these notes for themes to try out. My next work will be to pick a theme and storyboard it over the weekend. See ya then.

      10/15/21

    Okay, I think I have a lock on the main concept and execution, but the details are highly dependent on what props I have to work with from the school. I'll buy some stuff myself, but any extras are beneficial.

    Here is the loose storyboard I have, going by the codename "Stew's Crew". I have more effects under my belt, but figuring out how to flesh out the limited stop-motion animation is my big concern here.

    Luckily, I have been recording some test footage this week. This is my "set" I have prepared for Lars to do his parts in. Because of its isolated location, I can record here whenever I want without too much disturbance.

    I personally don't feel the need to risk a fancy camera for the stop-motion so far, so I am just using a phone tripod and recording in batches with my phone. Using Voice Detection, you can take snapshots without having to touch the phone itself. Thus, the camera is much steadier compared to my previous work.

    

    The background here is just some layered cardboard paper taped to the wall, but I think it works well enough for a final video less than two minutes in length. At least it keeps the background from being too boring. Now I just need to figure out where to record my own lines. 

    I think this setup is certainly a form of progress. I just need to plan all the details before I do more complicated shots. That's all I got this week. See ya in the next one.

    10/22/21

    Due to extensive homework in other classes, my work this week was pretty limited. However, I was able to work on a couple of different things. 

    Since we don't have a solid date on when the class will provide materials, I went ahead and bought some clay for the purpose of experimentation. Mainly, I want to see how it will look for some visual effects I need in the final project.

    In other news, I cut up and drew the letters I need for an animated title sequence that will play early on in Project 2. I will put a moving background underneath them as well, but I will have to cut those up later. When it comes to animating this, I will either film it in the classroom with the use of a tripod, or film it in my house where I can control the lighting a lot easier.

    That's pretty much it when it comes to "new" things to show. Hopefully I can make more substantial progress in the next week. See ya in the next one.

    10/29/21

    I worked on the moving background during classes this week. It's essentially two pieces of cardboard paper cut in diagonal shreds and reassembled into one thing. It doesn't look clean, but it has that amateur, homemade feel that I wanted. 

    As mentioned before, this will be underneath the "Sketch" title sequence that I did the letters for. 

Here is the tape on the back holding the whole thing together.

    It might be a tad fancy for something only used for about five seconds, but I think the final sequence will at least be fun.

    I also decided that, since I already had all the assets to do more letter work, that I would additional letters for other titles and things early on in the short. They will have different colored cardboard, so that I know the difference.

    

    With this baggy arrangement, I can get a bit more mileage out of the handmade title idea. I also did more footage of Lars this week. I managed to grab another twenty or so seconds to use in the final product. I don't show video in this blog, but the footage uses the same set as before, so there isn't much visually different for me to show.

    As of now, I have about a third of the animation done, and nearly all the props have been crafted for transitions and other mild effects. With that progress check in the books, I'll see you in the next one.

    11/6/21

    I have begun to animate the lettering for the title sequences. The lighting may be inconsistent, but redoes should be relatively simple. If I can keep the letter movements, that would be greatly appreciated. 

    As for salvageable footage, my animated background seems to be working after a bit of testing. With that working smoothly, I will do what I can to redeem the lettering via a redo next week.

     When thinking of a setup, I thought a lamp would bring more consistent lighting, but it appears that the lamp does not help out either. I think animating the letters where I animate everything else is the best move at the moment.

    With that, everything this week has been shown from me. For next week, my focus will be finishing up the Lars footage, recording the live action, and then the editing bay for final changes.

     See ya next week.

    11/13/21

    I redid all of the lettering sequences during the previous weekend. After testing how the chroma key works in premiere, I believe the V2 versions should work well enough for the project. I just need to extend the frames in a couple places to get the timing right, but that will be more of an editing thing.

    I have also been working on Lars Scene 3, where Lars works on his sketch, throws away the first one, and is satisfied with the second. It ends up as another eight seconds or so to the animation timeline for this project. It also contains a lot of classic tricks from my previous stop-motion work.

    When gravity applies to anything, I try to utilize the prop trick as best as I can. As long as the play-doh prop stays out of the camera's sight, fake suspension is possible for stuff like the pen and the first sheet in this scene.

    Both of these add some different movement to the scene, which I find critical to keeping user attention. 

    Over the last bit of this week, I have successfully completed all of the Lars Scenes! Scene 4 and Scene 5 were much shorter in scope, but needed to get done. I have gotten used to the animation setup by this point, but it was still a tad arduous.

    The final thing I got done this week was an experimental shot that I hope makes it into the final product. I won't spoil what it is exactly, but it involves my hand. It was weirdly demanding, but the shot looks good enough the last time I checked.

    With that, everything work-wise from this week has been summarized. See ya in the next one!

    11/17/21 (Final Week Part One)

    Since everything is a lot more hectic during the last week or so, I am splitting the Final Week record in half to avoid overlapping all the things I had to do.

    First off, over the last weekend I recorded all the Live-Action footage I needed. Since I don't feel like hassling other people for free acting and I have no money for talented people, I have to resort to myself again for the live portions. The only consistent location where I could do all my lines without annoying others was my own closet. So, in actuality, I am acting on the opposite side of the same closet where I did the stop-motion segments.

    With that, I can finally get to the editing for the project. While I thought I could clutch all the editing before the 17th, I fell a bit short. At this point, I have half of the footage edited, so I can talk about what I have been doing for that. After some re-tweaking, I got the green-screen to work for the cutouts I did before. While they only serve as the Title Sequence and a couple of Name Cards, I'm glad I got them to work regardless.

    As for editing, my main focus is to get the footage cut up and clean, add a few visual effects, and finally get the sound right. Since the whole allure of this is me interacting with Lars, getting the sound design to be at least believable is very important. 

    So, in terms of work, it's pretty much just a bit more editing for me. Until then, see ya next (whenever I get done with this)!

    11/19/21 (Final Week Part Two)

    Okay, I lied a tad. There wasn't as much left as I thought initially. After a couple more long editing sessions, the final product is done! The only technical thing I hate is that the Hand scene could be explained better. However, reshooting the live stuff, incorporating it back into everything else, then retweaking the flow all over again would be too much of a hassle to fix a minor issue. It's currently Friday, and since I'm leaving for family stuff, I can't work anymore on Adobe anyway. Whatever the case, the end product is a tad over the 3 minute mark. It has a bit too much me in it for my liking, but hopefully the concept is at least chuckleable for the average audience.

    With that, I am actually done. I may have missed a couple things technique-wise in this report, but for the most part this information will be useless when the semester ends anyway.

    This project was alright for me overall, with me learning a few new things in Adobe, similar to the previous project. My tools for aesthetics and little visual touches have improved, but I find that my actual animating skills are barely any different. Practice is practice, I suppose. Maybe my workflow has improved, considering these projects have been much longer than the previous Animation 1.

    

    After all that, I hope everyone else is satsified with their Projects as well, and I hope y'all have a great end of 2021!