Brand Me: Creating a Vimeo Account

I have recently made myself a Vimeo account with the same branding as the rest of my social media. I thought it would be beneficial for me to set up an account, so I could have a professional page where all my finished animations could be found. I upload all my videos to YouTube and my blogs anyway, but they can get lost among other work and test animations.

Vimeo Account

A Talk With Barry Purves

A while ago, we were lucky enough to have Barry Purves come in to talk about his work and give us tips to help our practice. His work was so beautiful that it made me want to drop everything and start a career in Stop-Motion Animation and I found it particularly inspiring when he talked over his animations, breaking down each scene, telling us about what was happening and the reasoning behind each decision made, especially with Plume.

Still from Plume

Plume is a about a "primaeval winged man" that "falls to earth and is robbed of his freedom by his alter egos. He finds redemption by casting off his former existence", and according to Barry, is a "textbook 3 Act structure". Whilst watching, Barry explained the importance of shot framing, and how he had always shown the character facing and travelling right to left, to show his journey and the geography of the scenes. It was also made sure that the character fell from the top right hand corner of the frame when he was beginning to struggle and experience trauma, and rise up towards the top left hand side of the frame when he is beginning to heal in the end. The lighting and colour that was used also helped to portray how the character survived trauma. For instance the white character on a black background shifts to a darker character on a light/white background when he is recovering at the end of the animation. 

Barry's Tips:

- Try to keep a 'front' to your compositions. Sometimes it can make things confusing if you start working from the 'back' and view more than 180 degrees. 

- Similarly, always cut to things that are in the same relation to the frame. For example, if you have a wide shot of a character laid down and want to cut to a close up of the face, make sure to keep the same shot framing, otherwise the cut can be quite jarring and/or confusing. 

Example of Shot Framing

- Blinking out of sequence can help create un-nerving characters.

- Even the smallest gesture can greatly improve the story-telling

- "Tell stories to say 'I'm here'"

- Use colour, editing, texture and lighting to help tell your stories.

- 'Masks' can be used to help talk about ourselves, and are often used to aid storytelling. For instance, Mary Poppins is a mask that helps us see the damage in the family, and she helps the family see this so that they can heal. Mary's Umbrella is her mask that allows the audience to learn more about her character as she talks to it. 

- Have a good showreel for when you leave.

I thoroughly enjoyed listening to what Barry had to say, especially because he talked with such passion about his work. I thought the way he captured movement in his animations was astonishing, his love for theatre clearly shows in his work, as the characters really put on a performance that makes for very touching pieces. This is definitely something I would like to strive for, and shall practice in future projects. 

Creating Game Art: Jim The Annoyed - Menu Screens and Other Components

(I actually posted about this a few months ago, but I accidentally deleted it - oops)

The second task I was assigned to do was to create a menu screen for the game. The predetermined environment was simply going to be set outside, and the platforms were going to be made of grass and mud, so I thought it would be a nice idea to have the menu screen made in the same way. I made a sprite sheet of grass and mud titles, then made up a screen to the required dimensions.

Game Components

Animated Menu Screen

I also made a death screen and a paused menu in the same style as the menu screen, so that there was consistency within the game's style. 

Sadly, there hasn't been any further progress made with the game, as James now has other responsibilities with University. Because of this, I don't have any further evidence of my art and how it looks in game, but it maybe something that we begin working on again in the summer, once the university year has finished. I definitely hope so, as I have thoroughly enjoyed working on this project and I have liked experiencing what it could be like working on a game. 

Brand Me: Making a Promo-Pack

As I already had made myself a business card and a creative CV, I thought it would be wise to make a promotional pack. I completed the pack by making a letterhead, as well as a mock-up of a CD/showreel case and stationary. 

I'm really pleased with how well my branding has gone and how professional it all looks. I like the consistency in style and colour, and the way I have presented it above makes it look like the blue hasn't been over-used. It's definitely beneficial to me that I have made this pack, and I think it would help me further to get a physical copy; not so much the letter head and stationary for now, but I should definitely have at least a showreel and business card to hand if I attend any events or festivals, so that I can get my name out there. 

Brand Me: Creating a Showreel

In order for me to put together a showreel, I first needed to create an ident. I wanted to incorporate my Logo, so I tried a quick animation in After Effects. 

First Ident Attempt

I liked the general motion of the ident, but I felt that there was something missing. It seemed a little too simple and it didn't scream 'animation student' to me, so I thought of how I could make it do this, and I thought "hey, animating the logo might do the trick". 

As my logo is just my face, I couldn't think of a great deal of things I could animate. I first thought of making the logo smile, but I didn't think this was much of an obvious motion/gesture, and it might be easily missed because of the size of the logo in the ident. Instead, I opted for a wink, because it was more obvious and required a bit more movement that would stand out more than the smile. I also thought it was a little corny which I thought suited me quite well. 

Final Ident

I really like how my ident turned out. Making it has restored some of my confidence at animating digitally, as I avoided cutting corners this time around. Some frames did take me quite a while to get right, but I found that using the pen tool for some of the features/the longer lines helped, and I have been able to make a nicely flowing motion. 

Icon Comparison

To animate my logo, I felt that I needed to tone down the level of detail, and at first I thought the difference in style between my logo and ident animation was going to be an issue. I thought about replacing my logo with a frame from the ident, so that there would be more consistency, but I was fond of my logo as it was. In the end, I decided that this wasn't going to be an issue. The characters are drawn and coloured in a similar manner, and the colour scheme is still consistent with the rest of my work, so therefore I think it's okay that there's a little variation between the logo and ident. 

Now that my ident was finished, I could move onto putting my showreel together. I started by trying to find a suitable soundtrack to accompany my work, and after hours of searching I found one that I liked. It was just a bit too long though at one and a half minutes, so I had to do my best to make the end of the clip flow with where I had trimmed the file, as I didn't want the music to just fade out mid song. It was a painful process but I think I did a good job and it wasn't all for nothing. Besides for being for my showreel - obviously - I have discovered that I don't want to pursue sound design and editing, meaning that I'm finally starting to narrow down on what it is I want to do, because as it stands, I still have (next to) no idea. 

Showreel First Draft

I thought I was on the right tracks with the first draft of my showreel, but I think I had made some of the clips too long; especially my infographic clip. I cut some of the scenes down, which meant I had to find a selection of little snippets to fill the gaps. I had to mix them up a bit so there wasn't scenes from the same animation too close together, whilst still trying to focus on starting and ending on a strong note. 

Final Showreel

My second attempt was much better, and I'm happy to declare this as my final showreel for 2016. I showed a couple of students my showreel to see if there were any changes I could make, but I actually didn't get criticized . Instead I was praised for how some of my scenes transitioned, which was great!

Brand Me: Designing a Business Card

Having no previous experience at designing business cards, I quickly did a google search of creative cards before I got started on my own.  I particularly like these designs as they are clean and professional. They don't use too many colours and they have a nice layout, which is what I would like to achieve with my own business card.

Business Card Research

I made a couple of different designs and layouts, and made sure to make the card consistent with the rest of my branding (same logo, font and colours). I have seen and been given cards before that have had a still from an animation or piece of art work on the front of the business card (or the back, depending on how you see it), and I thought it would be a good idea to do this with my logo instead. I experimented with whether text was going to accompany the logo, and if so, where it would sit and how big it was going to be. I did the same with my contact details.

Combinations of Front and Back

I was unsure which combination I preferred, so I asked others about their preferences to see whether this would help me decide which to go for. There wasn't a definite winner, though options 1,5 and 8 were selected the most frequently, so in the end I just went with my own instinct and combined the back of 1 with the front of 5.

Final Business Card Design

Now I have a design I am happy with, I will be able to get some cards printed for when I attend festivals or events so I can hand them out and get my name out there.