Animatic With Sound

Final Post

Well...here's everything I have. 

Some Progress

Here is what the street scene might look like:

Character in progress:

The character hasn't turned out as well as I would like, but it's getting there I guess.  

Lastly, here is a quick render of the stage. This also needs some work..

Added Color

I just quickly added some color to my character model and the stage layout.

Additional Research and Inspiration

Emmett Kelly is one of the most famous hobo clowns in history.  He became a full-time clown in the early 1930's, and his character was known as "Weary Willie."  One of his most famous stunts was trying to "sweep" away the spotlight.  I used this image as a reference for one of my character poses.

This clip is a good example of Emmett Kelly in character.  I plan on using this as reference for the facial animation on my character.  

Although he is not a clown per-say, Charlie Chaplin is one of my main inspirations, in general and for this project.  I based my character design greatly on his famous "Tramp" image.  

I'm not sure who the artist is for these paintings, but I also used these, mainly the one on the left, for inspiration.

#13a, b, and #15 Production Progress

I'm trying to catch up here, so I am just combining three posts into one.  Below is my storyboard, and progress from two class periods.  I will be coloring these in at some point.


Story:
My story is about a sad clown, most commonly know as The Sad Hobo.  My character is sitting on the street, reading a newspaper, when he glances at his suitcase (which is used to collect coins), and notices that it is empty.  This causes him to perform a trick, in hopes of attracting some attention.  When the trick is over, the only witness seems to be a tumbleweed passing by.  This saddens the clown even more, so he slumps back down onto his crate.  At this time, the camera will zoom in until one of the clowns eyes fills up the whole frame.  The camera will zoom back out and will show the same character in a different location, which is a circus stage.  The clown performs the same trick, and when he is done, a large audience is heard applauding and cheering.  The clown bows, and when he stands back up, the camera once again zooms in until his whole eye takes up the frame, then zooms out again.  Once zoomed out, we are back with the clown on the street where he is still sitting on the crate.  The ending shot is a close-up of the clowns face, and a single tears rolls down his cheek.

Character Model:

 

Prop designs:

 

Background design for the stage:

#14 Falling Leaf

I did this pretty fast, therefore it's not that good, and I didn't do any lighting.

#12 "Out of Reach"

#11 Project 2 Character Pose

Here is a frame from my project 2!

My Jack O'Lantern

I rendered my pumpkin first with just point lights, and then with physical sun and sky.  

#10a Short Film Proposal

For my short film, I have two ideas.  The first is from my blog and the second is a new idea.

1. An older man trying to wheel and deal at a yard sale.

In this short film, the main character would be an older man, and the setting would be inside a garage or outside.  The old man goes to this garage/yard sale and he finds something that he absolutely loves and is determined to buy the object.  However when he sees how much the owner is selling it for, he nearly faints, but determined as he is, he decides to try to cut a deal with the owner.  At this point in the animation, the two characters would be going back and forth with each other.  I'm not sure who I would have get their way in the end.

I really like this idea, but it would be largely based on dialogue, which I have never done before...

so ya here is my next idea....

2. An ant, or some kind of insect/animal, invading a picnic.

So for this idea, my character would either be an ant or some other kind of insect or small animal. The setting would be a picnic setup outside.  I want the character to be considerably smaller than the items at the picnic.  The whole film would be based on my character trying to dodge the humans' crushing blows, in order to get to a small crumb of food.  I would probably have the character get to the food quickly, but then they would have to struggle to get away from the picnic with the food.  

Project 2 character and prop models with texture.

I know I missed the past couple posts, but I figured I would make a post anyway.  Here is my character model and one prop model, complete with textures. I just did a quick render of each, and the character still needs fingers ( so I guess it's not really complete). Also I think my character's head, or Fred's head, might be too big for his body, but I'm not sure.

 Just a simple rustic looking cart, that took me way too long to model...

#7 Fred model sheet and action sheet

#6 Project 2 Idea

#5 Project 1

Here is my final animation cycle! I played around with the lighting and background quite a bit, and finally settled on this.  

#4 Ideas from Sketchbook

Some story ideas I have for short animations include:

• A cat who thinks he is a dog and acts like one as well
• Somebody trying to wheel and deal at a yard sale, over nickles and dimes.
• A cat stressing out during a car ride
• A cat interacting with the printer

These are just a few ideas that I have right now.  Most of them are inspired by my cat Templeton.

Test Animation

Here is a quick test render of my animation cycle.  In some cases, poor modeling and rigging restricted my ability to animate better. Overall though, I think I achieved the idea I was going for, which was to show the flower-bot trying to fly.

  

#3 Character With Texture

#2 Project 1 Final Character Design

I decided to remove the two legs that my previous design had, and added one main stem that sprouts from a flower pot.  My flower character will hop around and also try to fly around by flapping it's leaf hands. 

My Lamp Rendered

#1 Project One Character Designs

Here are three possible character designs for project one. 

Above: The character on the left is a mechanical flower with a few organic parts.  The character on the right is some kind of alien.  I was unsure if it should have arms, flippers, wings, or some other kind of appendages. I would also probably put a tail on the character.  

Below:  This character is simply an egg dressed up in a suit of armor.