Shot 1 is almost there!

Mid Term 5 Animatic

I know this is a little late, but here is my mid Term 5 animatic. Term 5 is flying by. It's hard to believe we're almost in term 6! I've been working nonstop to have everything the way I want it. I have done lots more work since this so it's looking much better now. It's been color corrected and shots 1 and 2 are almost done. I will post it again once I finish shots 1 and 2. Also, I've shortened it. My mentor and I agreed that it was running too long. Below, you'll find the shorter edit of just the animatic.


Mid Term 5 Presentation:



Shorter Edit:

Term 4 Presentation

Here is my end of Term 4 presentation. There's still lots to do, but, as you can see, I'm making progress. I'm scheduled to shoot my final plates this week so I'll have big updates coming soon!

Spider Assignment!

Here is my version of VFS's legendary Spider Assignment. It is an assignment that everyone gets in Term 4 and has been done forever! It's hard to come up with something original, but I think I did ok. This was also one of those sink-or-swim assignments. We were just kind of expected to do it without really knowing how. I think I did pretty well. What do you think?

Rigid Body Systems

Last week, in Advanced VFX, we learned about Rigid Body Systems. It was definitely fun for a while, that is until we had to make our own creative chain reaction. That's when things got tricky. Rigid Bodies are a way of making objects collide and move with gravity, turbulence, air fields, etc. just like they would in real life. It's a very finicky process.

Our first assignment was to make a bowl dump some mints onto a table:



The second assignment was to make a ball swing from a chain:



Our third assignment was to make that ball crash through a wall of bricks, like a wrecking ball:



Our fourth, and most difficult, assignment was to make our own creative chain reaction. I used the board game Mouse Trap as inspiration. Let me just tell you, this was NOT easy:

So, this week in Advanced Visual Effects, we're working on particles.

We started off with making these random particles that act as if they're in car wind:

The next one we did was supposed to simulate a flame stream and look good at a distance:

The last one we did, we used instancing with bee models to make it look like they were flying in a random path:

So yesterday, we had a little time to get into the green screen room to shoot some test footege for our rough compisitions (slap comps). We all worked together and ended up learning a lot and having quite a bit of fun...

Bob is wearing a SWAT costume for someone else's reel. He had way too much fun running around school and scaring everyone, haha:

He had fun posing with my Toy (Moishe):

A little justaposition:

He Just saved Moishe from the apocolipse:

I'll be posting my slap comped animatic soon so stay tuned!

One step closer to taking over Canada!

I now have universal Health Care...Woot!

...aren't you jealous? ;-)

My spot in the Antfarm!

So here is where I'm scentenced to spend the next 6 months. I got lucky and got a corner seat, so nobody can come by and stare at my screen or bug me without making some serious effort. I also got a window seat, although that doesn't matter that much due to the fact that we have blackout curtains which must remain closed at ALL TIMES!. The room is normally pitch black with nothing but the glow of the monitors anc a few scattered desk lamps to keep us from tripping over our own feet, but I was lucky enough to get these puics while they were cleaning so, for once, I could actually see well enough to give you guys an idea of where I am all day.

Here is my station:

A closeup of a few of my decorations:

My very own high powered PC: *my MacBook Pro is just off screen ;-)

And the toy im making for my final reel:

So that's it! Hopefully I'll be able to post a video soon of life in the Antfarm. It's pretty cool in here. I hope this was at least mildly interesting.

What I'm working on today:

Today I'm working on motion tracking and creating an enhanced explosion in NukeX. I'm using PFTrack to do my tracking (muchh MUCH better than match mover) and working out the logistics on a test plate for my spider assignment. The (infamous) Spider Assignment is where we have to incorporate a cg spider into a live plate. Here is my spider all textured and ready to go:

What's left is that I have to shoot my final plate, track it, animate the spider, and composite it all together in Nuke.

The Explosion is an assuignment for our Advanced Compositing class where we have to take a really shitty live explosion and enhance it. So far, I've replaced the blown out center of the explosion with fire, incorporated debris, and enhanced the smoke. It's still a work in progress, but I'll post the final when it's done.

End of Term 3, Beginning of Term 4 Update

Now, since then I've term 3, we are now working on our final reels! We had to make anamatics for a HUGE presentation and here is mine. Our animatic are just a shot by shot loose plan of what we are doing for our final reels. We had to include shot numbers, color coding (Green=Live Plate, Blue=CG, Yellow=Undecided). We also needed to include reference and plans. It was a big deal and the feedback was valuable. I would like to note that the mentors LOVED it, said I shouldn't change anything, and that they couldn't wait to see more from me. Not bragging...just facts :-P

So, now that this is done, I've moved into Term 4. We are in the Antfarm which is kind of a big deal. The Antfarm is a HUGE studio where we all have our own high powered PCs with duel monitors for the next 6 months. It's where we will finish our final reels. We have also now split off into streams. I am now only taking classes that pertain to Visual Effects. It's really exciting. We are almost through our first week and the classes, thus far, have been INCREDIBLE! I've already learned so much! I can't wait to keep attending them and getting more information. All of our teachers have TONS of industry experience (District 9, Sucker Punch, Fast and the Furious 5, Percy Jackson and the Olympians, Night at the Museum, and The Incredible Hulk, just to name a few) and they really know their shit. Work is intense now, but we knew that going into Term 4. It's all very exciting. I'll be posting pictures of the Antfarm and my station in it soon. I'll also continue to be posting my work. Yay!

This got left out of my Term 2 Presentation because it wasn't finished in time (it wasn't due until a few days later), but I found it worth posting for shits and giggles. My teacher really seemed to like it. It was a lot harder than I thought it would be.

Term 2 Final Presentation

At the end of each 2 month term, we have to submit a final presentation for the class and all of the professors. It has to include almost all of our work from the whole term and needs to look cool, haha. It's not graded, but it has to be nice or you look stupid in the competitive class full of nice work.

Term 2 Cherry Darling Sculpt

Here is some of my work from term 2:

We had to do a Super Hero Sculpt for Modeling and I chose Cherry Darling from Grindhouse.

Updates

It's been a while since my last post, but I can assure you, it's not due to lazyness. Term 3 has been flying by. We're now working more on defining our ideas for our individual reels. This is the last term we will all have the same classes together at the same time. Starting at the end of February, we will move into the Ant Farm where we will all have our own computers, duel monitors, and work stations. Each computer will have all of the licenses we need and we will only have classes that pertain to our stream (in my case, Visual Effects). Our mentors will work closely with us to guide our questions and help us to make the best reels possible and, as a result, hopefully get jobs! I'll be adding clips and images of things we've done this term soon. Yay!

Tamara is Here!!!!

Tamara is here to Visit! I picked her up at the airport and we went for dinner at a place that serves a sandwich called "The Anaconda." It's a burger with bacon, lettuce, and tomato served between two grilled cheese sandwiches.

This was right when we got The Anaconda.

This was just upon finishing the Anaconda. We definitely look fatter.

This is a nicer photo of out post Anaconda selves.

Tam's first Canadian Money!! Now she is a sleepy monkey...

Brittany Walk Cycle

This week we wee assigned a walk cycle in 3D Animation. I downloaded this rig ofline and used her to create a sassy walk!

Baby Beluga!

For this Animation assignment, we went to the Vancouver Aquarium and studied the Beluga's so that we could take animation criteria and make them move believably.

VFS Man Jump

Here's the jump we had to do for Term one Animation. I spiced mine up a bit for the end of term 1 presentation...

Female Anatomy Sculpt

We had even LESS time for this than we did for the male, and this one had to be a SPECIFIC person. We were given a directory of anatomy references and had to sculpt a particular lady. I got Renata and, although you don't have references, you'll have to trust that I did a good job...