Amateur Animations

Cat stalking

2011-06-11T11:49:00.000-07:00

It's week 11 now, so I'm due to upload my final assignment tomorrow. I realized how far behind I'd got in posting to the blog though, so thought I'd better try to catch up!
This is the refining stage of the cat stalking. A few little bits and pieces that I would like to tidy up, but this is finished for the most part.

Cat stalking from Sarah Knight on Vimeo.

Cat walk cycle

2011-04-11T13:08:00.000-07:00

Here's my first walk cycle.
There are some things that need working on, but overall I'm pretty happy with this as my first attempt at a quadruped walk cycle.

Cat walk cycle from Sarah Knight on Vimeo.

Animals and Creatures

2011-04-10T13:33:00.001-07:00

Hello!

I'm enjoying the start of the new Animals and Creatures course. I've already learnt all kinds of interesting things, but animating quadrupeds in a realistic manner is going to be a big challenge.

I'm sure people are interested to see what the new course consists of, so I'll do my best to post on semi-regular basis so you can watch my progress.

Week 1, we had to do a couple of still poses that were dynamic with nice lines of action, showing weight etc.

Week 2, we had to do vanilla walk cycle.

We're just starting Week 3 now, where we do an advanced walk.

I'm finding it a challenge getting to grips with the rig (for example in the pouncing pose, I couldn't get those front arms bent to match the photo), but I think I'm starting to get the hang of it.

Here are my poses - I'll post the walk cycle in the next couple of days.

Thanks for reading!

Final Animation Mentor Reel

2011-03-20T12:39:00.000-07:00

Hello!

Unbelievably, I've reached the end of the Animation Mentor course!

So here's my final reel. Still a few things that I want to sort out (especially on the final shot), but this is what I've uploaded as my final assignment.

Hope you like it!

Spring 2011 Demo Reel from Sarah Knight on Vimeo.

Life at the business end of AM

2011-03-16T13:35:00.000-07:00

Hi everyone,

Thank you for continuing to read this blog, despite the lack of posts. I see my number of followers has gone up - thanks for adding me!

Life is busy at the moment, with the day job taking up a lot of time and energy and it's a struggle keeping up with the animation in the evenings and weekends. However, I've stuck with it, and plodded through, and nearly have a demo reel!
Just 2 weeks to go before I've finished at Animation Mentor!

Well ... sort of.

They've just added a couple of new modules to their offering, and as I'm slightly addicted to Animation Mentor I've signed up for another 3 months of animation goodness - Animals and Creatures!
Quadrupeds - oh yeah!
(And even if I turn out to be not very good at animating them, at least I've finally learnt to spell the word "quadruped" - I could've sworn there was an o in there...)

So once I finish THAT course, I'll be done.
... Until I decide to do the 2nd 3 months of Animals and Creatures ... but no! I mustn't! I'm going to start applying for jobs first, and see how that goes before I do any more studying. I owe it to my bank account. And my friends and family. And my sanity.

The demo reel's looking ok - sometimes I think it's pretty good, considering how far I've come since those spinning cellos ... and then other times I think it's terrible and that I need to keep studying for at least another 2 years before I'll be approaching anything remotely close to a decent professional standard!
I'm assured that this is a natural feeling and that everyone hates their own work and doesn't think it's good enough. But still.

The shots that have made it onto my reel are:
- Monologue "gone forever"
- Monkey bars
- Weightlifting
- Pantomime with Tailor
- Monologue "would you like to resign?"

Short and hopefully sweet.

It was with great sadness that I decided to drop chicken lady, but in the end I decided the amount of work required to get that polished up wasn't worth the effort as it would have taken up most of the term. Focussing on the shorter shots meant that I was able to get through more, and I think ultimately benefit more from the wisdom of my mentor - Jason Taylor.
It's been a great term, and I've learned loads from him.
Definitely feeling like this whole animation thing is starting to click - finally!
2 years of studying, and I'm beginning to feel like maybe I'm starting to get it!

So I'll save the finished reel until it's all completely polished up - still a few more tweaks - and then I'll post it up for you to enjoy/judge/rip to pieces.

Stay posted!

Final Class at Animation Mentor

2011-01-07T12:09:00.000-08:00

Hello!

Things are starting to get going at Animation Mentor again, so I thought I'd update you on what's happening! My Leave of Absence was definitely needed, as my day job got very busy and tiring, but in terms of doing new shots and revising all my learnings, I was only partially successful I'm afraid.

Successful because I got going on 2 new shots, but only partially so because I would have liked to do a bit more. And I almost entirely failed on the revision front.
However, I think I needed a break, and am feeling a lot fresher coming back in. It's great to be properly a part of AM again, as I really did miss being on campus and utilizing all the amazing energy and passion that place exudes!

So, Class 6 - Polishing and Portfolio. This is where we take all of the shots that we've done at AM, pick out the ones with the most potential, and spend some time polishing them up nice so as to dazzle anyone that looks at them.

So I thought I'd upload my shots here as well and get your opinions on your favourites. I've just thrown them together in a roughly chronological order - this is in no way what I would consider to be a "Demo Reel" of any kind. Just all my shots in one place.

Let me know which ones you think work best or have the most potential!

Animation Reel Classes 1-5 from Sarah Knight on Vimeo.

2 person shot progress

2010-09-15T13:57:00.000-07:00

Class 5 is now over - just had my last Q&A. I say this every term, but where is the time going?! As my AM experience draws nearer to the end, it becomes even more unbelievable.

It's been a fantastic term - I have learnt so much from my mentor Michelle Meeker. She has worked on some fantastic projects, both in big studios (Pixar, Dreamworks, Weta) and independently, so has a good variety of experiences to draw on and lots of brilliant advice to share.
While I've learnt loads, it's also been a really tough term, and am a little disappointed with how my shot finished up. I try to take comfort from the fact that it was quite a tricky shot to do, with lots of physicality and cuts, as well as the acting, but the perfectionist in me is quite frustrated that this is what I handed in as "final".
However, I will keep working on it and hopefully turn it into something a little better.

I've decided to take a Leave of Absence before doing the final Polishing class. It was a difficult decision, but working full time and doing AM was starting to take its toll, and I really want to get the most I possibly can out of the final class. So I'm taking some time out to try to consolidate all my learning and work on a few new shots to practise my techniques and then return to AM in January for the final class.

So watch this space - I'll be posting up work in progress on my new shots here and would be even more grateful of feedback and comments!

For now, here's where I got up to on my 2 person shot:

2 person dialogue in progress from Sarah Knight on Vimeo.

Bishop 2.0

2010-08-02T14:28:00.001-07:00

So it's all very exciting over in AM-land at the moment, because they've just launched a new version of their classic rig - Bishop!
The little introductory video they created shows him off to full effect - you can see it over on the Animation Mentor home page.

It is now so easy to create a range of very different looking characters, and I am really excited about the multitude of possibilities. Previously I would probably think twice about doing a shot with a child, especially a really young child in it, or a very old person as you'd have to do a fair bit of remodelling (and with my modelling skills, they wouldn't be very convincing), but now it's so easy to create new characters that it really does feel like my imagination (or animation skills at any rate!) is the only thing limiting me. Even just having them dressed in clothes is SO much easier than it was.

I've already substituted in a new old lady character for my monologue shot. It's definitely highlighted all the little glitches that my eye had got used to. So once I've polished that up a bit, I'll share that here.

For now I'll leave you with a still of the characters I've created for my 2 person dialogue. I think the guy looks quite a bit different from the classic Bishop, and while the woman looks a bit more Bishop-esque, she's wearing a chicken costume which would have been impossible for me before (I just had to model some feathers), so I'm pretty pleased with how it's looking at the moment!

General update

2010-07-18T13:54:00.001-07:00

Just saw that my last post was back in May! Apologies for the long silence. Have been quite busy, and also not really felt that I had much to show as progress on my shot has been incredibly slow until recently. So here's a little update on everything.

In June I attended the Annecy International Film festival for the first time, and it was just as good as everyone assured me it would be! The setting itself was perfect - Annecy is a lovely little town, easy to find your way round (important for me as my sense of direction is beyond bad), with a nice lake, and a lovely old area with cobblestones and canals. The festival itself was fantastic. Lots of things going on, films, talks, gatherings etc. There was a great atmosphere, with everyone there to have a good time and share a love of animation.
I watched a lot of great films - and some pretty terrible ones! It was great to have the opportunity to watch films in other styles or from countries that I might not otherwise be able to see. It was fun to be a part of special events, like the European premier of Waking Sleeping Beauty with a Q&A afterwards with Don Hahn, Ron Musker and John Clements. I also attended a Dreamworks talk that went into the research and preparation they did for working on How to Train Your Dragon. It's always fun being shown video reference used for particular shots you recognize from the film, that you wouldn't otherwise get a chance to see.

Because there were so many people at Annecy this year (apparently a couple of thousand or so more than last year) I didn't get to see everything I wanted, but didn't feel that I missed out on too much, and there's always next year!
The other huge benefit of Annecy was getting to meet fellow AM students in person - some of whom I've seen around online, or been in class with, others who I'd never heard of but quickly made friends with! It's great just being able to turn up at an event like this and know that you already have a ready-made group of cool people to hang out with!

All in all it was a pretty fantastic week, and I'm already looking forward to next year!

So the week after Annecy was the last week of term, but I was quite behind due to my trip, so didn't finish the term as strongly as I would have liked.

So now we're just beginning Week 4 of Class 5. I can't quite believe that I'm about to embark on the final shot of my Animation Mentor experience. Guess I'd better try and make it a good one! It is scary that I'm nearly finished, and still don't feel particularly competent at this animation business. However, I've decided that I need to try and make the most of it before it's all over, and learn as much as I can. And while I may not feel confident about my animating skills, even I can see that I have made a huge improvement from when I first started just over a year ago!

So this week I'll be picking my 2 person dialogue, and starting to think about costumes and scenarios.

In the meantime I'll leave you with the latest pass of my monologue. Still some polishing up to be done, but I think it's getting there.

Monologue polishing phase from Sarah Knight on Vimeo.

Drum roll please ...

2010-05-23T10:44:00.001-07:00

Ladies and gentlemen, the moment that every AMer dreams about has arrived ... starting dialogue shots!

It's really weird to actually be here now. I still feel like I've just started, but actually all of a sudden I've worked my way through all the classic AM rigs - and have finally got access to the Bishop rig. He's got eyes that blink, and fingers that move and is generally a fairly complete humanoid character.
However, as with everything at AM, they ease you in gently. So we don't have full facial controls yet - just a jaw that can open and close, and eyelids that can open and close. All the rest of the goodies come next term.

So the assignment is to find a piece of dialogue, spoken by one person, that has some kind of texture or emotional change in it, and animate your character to it. I've been thinking about this assignment pretty much since I started, so have been keeping an ear out for great dialogue. I think one week isn't really enough time to come up with something good when you've got the entire history of film, TV and radio to trawl through so I think it pays to start early.

That said, the piece of dialogue I actually ended up using, I think I found in the last week! But it's nice to know you have some other options.

I decided to go with this piece of dialogue for several reasons:

- I'm confident that very few people will have heard it before, so won't have any pre-conceived ideas about it.
- It's English, so a bit different to the usual reel stuff and, you know - I'm English.
- There's a nice change in emotion and timing.
- It's by Joyce Grenfell, one of my all time favourite comic actresses.
- It makes me laugh.

My original video reference that I shot was of the character sat down writing, but my mentor said that was too boring and that I should re-shoot with the character stood up and working with props. I thought I was going for nice subtle acting, but as he pointed out, all the acting is in the face, and with no facial rig till next term, I wouldn't have a whole lot to work with.
So after gathering together my slightly crushed ego, I re-shot the video reference, working with a tray and some teacups, and my mentor loved it.

So here's how the shot is looking at the moment - this is my blocking plus pass.

Dialogue - Blocking plus from Sarah Knight on Vimeo.

Pantomime shot

2010-05-04T10:36:00.000-07:00

Apologies for the delay between posts, I've basically been ill for the whole of April, so have been struggling to keep up with my animation assignments and the day job, let alone blog posting!

However, I'm feeling much better now, so thought I'd get you up to date on my animation.

Class 4 is going great (illness aside!). I have a fantastic mentor who gives great feedback, and lots of it! He is Justin Martinsen, currently working at Double Negative in London, so I actually have a decent Q&A time! 8 in the evening - woohoo! My eyes are open, I'm not wearing pyjamas - it's incredible! You can check out his work (and even his acting skills - check out the Reference comparison section in the animation menu) here.

Our first assignment of the term was a pantomime shot (i.e. telling a story with no dialogue) where we had to pick a scenario that had two contrasting emotional beats in it. Originally, I was going to have Stewie sat crying, and Tailor (the ball with a tail) comes along and snuggles up, trying to cheer him up. That doesn't work, so then Tailor jumps on Stewie and runs all around tickling him and making him laugh.

I really liked that idea, and got a lot of positive feedback from other students about it. HOWEVER, it's my mentor's opinion that counts, and he thought that having Stewie sat there would be too static and that it's good to keep practising the ol' body mechanics. And I agree.

So after several re-thinks and different variations, this is the final shot. Still a story with Stewie and Tailor, and I'm relatively happy with it. Still don't feel like I've really made my animation sing though ... but maybe nobody feels like that about their own shots. Got a fair bit of polishing left to do, but it's getting there.
Let me know what you think!

Pantomime shot from Sarah Knight on Vimeo.

Class 3 finished!

2010-03-25T15:52:00.000-07:00

So I have now completed a term of Advanced Body Mechanics! I honestly, do not know where the last 9 months have gone. I'm halfway through Animation Mentor already - how did that happen?!

This term has been fantastic. I have learnt so much and am really starting to feel like I'm finding a workflow that suits me. The more I learn about animation, the more I realize there is still to learn ... but the more enthusiastic I get about continuing with my education! The couple of days with Pixar reminded me of what being an animator means - you need to understand acting, story-telling, cinematography, physics, anatomy, movement - and life in general. Which I find incredibly exciting - there's always going to be new things that I can learn, and apply, to improve myself as an animator. I bought a load of books and am trying to learn as much as I can about all this stuff to help me in Class 4 - acting! I'm really looking forward to it. Which is just as well, as the break between these 2 terms is only a weekend! However, I'm raring to go, and can't wait till Monday!

Here's all the work from Class 3 - I'm definitely starting to see an improvement in my work, which is so encouraging. Still a loooong, looooong way to go, but it's nice to see I've made a few small steps.

There's still a certain amount of jitteryness on the first two shots, and I plan on cleaning them up later, but have run out of time for the moment.

Progress reel from AM Class 3 from Sarah Knight on Vimeo.

Weightlifting - polishing

2010-03-21T12:37:00.000-07:00

Here's the next stage of my weightlifting shot. Haven't had as much time to work on it as usual, what with the 2 incredible Pixar days. However, have spent the majority of today working on it, and think it's nearly there. Been smoothing out some of the movements, and trying to add more weight.

Weightlifting - polishing from Sarah Knight on Vimeo.

When Pixar came to town

2010-03-20T14:14:00.000-07:00

I just spent the last couple of days voluntarily shut away from sunlight in a dark, incredibly hot room, at the brink of dehydration with a large group of other sweaty, mostly male people. And paid a fair bit of money for the privilege.

It was worth every penny and I loved every minute.

Why? Because I was attending the Pixar animation and story masterclass, and it was awesome! You know, awesome is a word that has become overused, however, these last couple of days were truly "awe-inspiring" so I feel justified in using it here!

Taught by Animator Andrew Gordon and Story Artist Matthew Luhn, they got through a huge amount of very informative material and by the end I felt like my head was going to explode with all the incredible information I'd crammed in!

Obviously, for them to work at Pixar you know that these guys are among the best in the business. But being a great artist doesn't necessarily mean that you're a good teacher. However, they really are. Both of them had a wealth of examples to back up every single point that they made, which really helped in driving home the information and demonstrated how these concepts are applied in the real world. They were also entertaining speakers, as well as very patient with answering the endless questions that poured from a slightly star-struck audience. And as a massive Pixar fan (as most animators are I think), I was in geek heaven!

Being an aspiring animator, I was unsure what the story-focused second day would really have to offer me. The answer turned out to be "a hell of a lot"! Naturally, Matthew Luhn knows how to tell a good story, but what surprised me was that actually he showed me that I can create stories too - we all can. He did a series of interactive exercises with us, that demonstrated that with just a few simple tools, we are all story tellers. And we can all create characters, and situations, and even gags, out of nothing, in just a few minutes. It really opened up my mind to exploring the endless possibilities and utilizing my own creativity. And all the cinematography stuff he covered is going to come in handy as I move onto my acting shots in the next couple of terms at AM. So I got a bonus day of amazing information and inspiration that I was not expecting!

They specifically requested that we don't post any of the notes online, which is fair enough, so unfortunately I can't share any of it with you here. However, Andrew Gordon has posted a huge amount of information on his blog, as well as some very interesting podcasts, so head over there if you haven't already.

I'm sure a lot of the information that they both covered is available either online, or in books, but having it presented in this way by people from Pixar was really incredible. It was like being in an enormous, live, behind the scenes DVD feature, but with specific information tailored to you, and your interests and that lasts for 2 days! And being live, you get to control it to a certain extent by being able to ask questions and have them answered - right there. It was truly inspirational and has completely reinforced my desire to be an animator, and made me want to work at Pixar even more badly!

I know that a similar masterclass was held last year in London (this one was organized by Escape Studios, so subscribe to their newsletter for any future events) and I've read that Andrew Gordon has taught this class all over the world. So if it comes to a city near you at any time in the future I would highly recommend it!

Oh, and they said that Pixar are hiring right now. So if you think you've got what it takes, send in your reel!

Me? I'm not planning on giving up the day job just yet, and need to get my head out of the Pixar clouds and back to my weightlifting shot ...

Weightlifting - refinement

2010-03-09T11:58:00.000-08:00

Here's the next pass on my weightlifting shot. Tried to address notes given to me about making the weight "weightier" so have taken more time from the beginning to slow things down a bit on the lifts. How is the deep breath looking? Is it reading? Still not sure whether it's working or not. Does the weight look heavy enough?

Let me know how you think it's looking, thanks!

Weightlifting refinement from Sarah Knight on Vimeo.

Weightlifting splined

2010-03-05T14:18:00.000-08:00

Here's the next pass at my weightlifting shot - trimmed the beginning to allow more time for everything else.

I realize I've had to that on all 3 shots this term. I've put in what I think are nice little bits of character, and then had to radically chop them down to allow enough time for the main action.
Maybe soon my planning will improve so I won't waste time on things that are going to get cut!

Let me know how you think it's looking. The video itself should be looking a lot better as I finally got round to altering the playbast resolution to match Vimeo.

Weightlifting blocking plus from Sarah Knight on Vimeo.

"Nnfffhghghhhhh!"

2010-03-02T11:43:00.000-08:00

In case you didn't guess from the title, this week I have started a weightlifting shot. To be honest, I wasn't entirely enthusiastic about this. I got completely carried away by the Winter Olympics, and was thinking about doing some kind of ice related sport as my final body mechanics shot this term. However, in the end I decided to go for something I thought I should do, rather than for what I felt I wanted to do. The first two shots I did were both propelling the body along, so I thought it would be good practice to do a more stationary shot. And everyone loves a good weight test don't they?! I was also attracted to the challenge of making something look really heavy.

And actually, once I started to really analyze the video reference for this, I got really into it! I have no idea why anybody would want to engage in this sport, as it looks painful and dangerous, but once you really go into what they do, it's fascinating! The key to it seems to be to get some momentum going on the weights to launch them upwards, and then get the full body beneath it to power it upwards.

Really interesting body mechanics vs. physics.

So here's my first blocking pass. I'm pretty pleased with it, but feel that it's lacking character and any real oomph. I think I'm starting to get the hang of blocking things out, and continuing with my shot to a certain stage. However, the polishing stage is still a real issue for me, and also, I tend to err on the repressed side of caution. I feel that everything I animate is just a little dull. And the motion might all be correct for the most part, but there's no wow factor to it. So I think I need to start trying to exaggerate things a little more.

...That sentence illustrates the problem exactly. I end a sentence about exaggeration with the words "a little more". Aaaaaargh! I need to get out of that mindset! I'm going to exaggerate things! By a lot! That's what makes it exaggerated!

So anyway, let me know what you think of it so far. Thanks for dropping by, I appreciate you reading my woffle :)

Weightlifting animation blocking from Sarah Knight on Vimeo.

Tennis Refining Pass

2010-02-22T11:20:00.000-08:00

Have worked really hard on the tennis shot, putting in a lot of hours over the weekend. I'm starting to see it come together but there are still alot of areas that need more work. I think the beginning is starting to work, but the running backwards and the fall still have plenty of room for improvement. I'm glad I was able to really put the hours in, but it's a little frustrating to spend so much time working on it, and only see it improve infinitesimally!

Agreed with feedback last week about it all being too fast, so I cut the racquet spin. Was really sorry to have to let that go as it was one of my favourite parts, and I felt it really added to the character. However, I think the shot as a whole is working better now it's got some more time, and that's what counts.

By the way, I've removed the ball at the end as I needed to re-position it, but didn't have time. It will be re-instated for the final!

Thanks a lot for stopping by, let me know what you think!

Tennis - refining from Sarah Knight on Vimeo.

Tennis - next pass

2010-02-16T09:36:00.000-08:00

Here's the next pass at my tennis shot. It's starting to come together (complete with new ending now), but still got a long way to go.
However, I thought I'd post it for those interested in seeing my progress - hoping the next pass should be a LOT better! (... I hope)

Still need to work on the hands in a lot of places, and the fall is supposed to be a lunge at the tennis ball that's out of reach, rather than a pathetic stab at the tennis ball that's practically at his feet.

Tennis blocking plus from Sarah Knight on Vimeo.

Anyone for tennis?

2010-02-11T13:00:00.001-08:00

Right, in an effort to keep these posts regular, here is the blocking pass for my next shot. I thought a tennis serve would be pretty cool body mechanics to study, and I also really wanted to do a fall. I think falls are pretty hard to get right, and I fancied taking on that challenge. As you'll see below, falls are hard, and mine still isn't reading properly! T. Dan made some great suggestions in his critique though, about where the weight is coming from and how it would probably work better if the hop to screen right started from further over, to allow a greater weight shift across. So I'll try to apply that in the next pass.

So this is the blocking pass I submitted on Sunday. However, since submitting, I discovered I really needed to have paid more attention to some tricky little things called constraints (that allow characters to hold things). Holding is fine, but letting go ... that's were I came unstuck (unfortunately the racquet didn't, which is the problem!). So basically I had to learn about how to set them up, and then discovered that it messed up all previous animation.
So I ended up spending a precious day off, re-blocking out the arms. And they still don't look as good as they did originally! Grrrrrr.

So anyway, this is how it looked before I had to re-do it. Once the re-done stuff is looking ok, I'll post that too. Sill need to do a final polish pass on the Monkey Bars, but they'll make an appearance at some point too.

Tennis serve 1st blocking pass from Sarah Knight on Vimeo.

Oscar nominations

2010-02-02T11:15:00.000-08:00

Really exciting news about the oscar nominations - Pixar's Up, an animated feature film, has been nominated for Best Picture! This is only the second time (well .. joint second if you count Avatar?!) that this has happened, and I believe this is the first time since the Best Animated Feature category was introduced. This is such fantastic news, as it means that animated films are being taken seriously as films, rather than just "cartoons" or whatever people think they are. This can only be good news for the industry, and it's really exciting that Up is getting the recognition so many of us believe it deserves. (Best Picture is one of 5 nominations).

It's also great to see a variety in the Best Animated Feature nominations - stop motion, hand drawn, as well as CG, reflecting a great year for animation. I'm delighted to see that Disney's re-entry into the world of 2D animation (The Princess and the Frog) has been recognized as well. However, I was disappointed that Cloudy with a Chance of Meatballs didn't get a nomination, as I thought that was a great film. But on a positive note, it's great to see that Wallace and Gromit are still up there with the best in the animated shorts category!

So all in all, a very exciting time. I would watch Up in celebration, but as it still hasn't made it to DVD in the UK yet, I'll have to settle for listening to the Oscar nominated soundtrack...

Charity auction - Pixar memorabilia

2010-01-24T05:59:00.001-08:00

Toy Story 3 director Lee Unkrich is generously auctioning off mementoes from his time at Pixar, in aid of the Clinton Bush Haiti fund. I think this is a lovely gesture, as these are from his own personal collection, and he's stated on Twitter that he will pay postage to anywhere in the world.
So if you're a Pixar fan, and have some spare cash, what better way to donate some money to a worthy cause while getting some great memorabilia at the same time?!
Check it out here.

I think I've already been priced out of the lots that I had my eye on, however, I can't be too disappointed as it means that even more money is being raised! I think this is a great example of how far a little initiative and personal sacrifice can go towards making a big difference.

I know there's a load of other people out there doing their bit as well, for all kinds of great causes, but this caught my eye, and I just wanted to let you know about this great opportunity to get some one-off Pixar items.

Monkeyin' around

2010-01-21T13:21:00.000-08:00

The new term at AM has got off to a flying start - I can't believe it's Week 3 (or class 3 come to that) already! My latest mentor is T. Dan Hofstedt who is an awesome animator and mentor. My Q&A sessions are at 6am in the morning ... and I'm not really a morning person. However, T. Dan once filled in for my Class 1 mentor, so I knew how great he was and decided not to switch classes for a more reasonable hour. And so far, it's been worth getting up for! T. Dan has worked in traditional 2D animation for Disney, among other studios, as well as CG for Sony. Can't quite believe that someone who animated on the Lion King, now knows my name and critiques my work! SO exciting! You can see some of his work on his website.
This term I'm starting off with a monkey bars shot - hence the cheesy title ;p
We can pretty much choose what we want to do, as long as it's got good body mechanics in the shot. So it's great to have that freedom, although can feel a little daunting with so much choice! However, I settled on monkey bars and am really enjoying it. Almost everyone that has stopped by my workspace has commended me on choosing a "challenging" shot though, so I hope I haven't bitten off more than I can chew...
It's certainly proving a challenge but think I'm starting to get there. It's certainly going to help me refine arcs in my animation, as that's pretty much all the swinging consists of. However, getting that rhythm and flow is proving challenging.

Here's what I've got so far - Blocking Plus. I've moved past blocking, in stepped mode, and this is currently in linear. Done quite a bit of straight ahead on it to try to get the lead and follow actions working. Still got a way to go though as the action still isn't quite there, and there's a lot of refining to do.
Let me know what you think of it so far!

Monkey Bars blocking Plus from Sarah Knight on Vimeo.

AM full Progress Reel so far

2009-12-19T04:19:00.000-08:00

Here's a quick post with my full progress reel so far. I updated my hopscotch shot a little, but am going to leave my other class 2 shots till later. My mentor said that as I improve, I'll look at them in a different way and it will be much easier to see what needs doing, and bring them up to the next level. So that makes sense.

Looking forward to next term, although I think it's going to be a challenge - hope I'm up to it!

AM Demo reel classes 1 and 2 from Sarah Knight on Vimeo.

Walt Disney 2D animation - back in style

2009-12-18T11:58:00.000-08:00

So, I promised you lots of posts all at once ... ahem. Here's the second! It's a little film review, my first ever, so I hope you enjoy it and that I don't get too carried away with purple prose. Feel free to stop reading at any point, I'll never know! :p

On Sunday I was lucky enough to attend a special preview screening of the new Disney 2D animation The Princess and the Frog. I very much enjoyed it - absolutely worth the early morning Sunday start.

The story starts off in typical Disney fashion with a fairy-tale, but then suddenly twists off in a new direction, which keeps things fresh - you're not entirely sure where the story will end up. It's set in New Orleans in the 1920s and there are some stunning backdrops that set the scene beautifully, with some catchy jazz music to further enhance the setting.

There are numerous references to past Disney films which are fun to spot, and a few modern updates to Disney's worldview. There's a strong female lead who is getting on with life, pursuing her goals, and not waiting for her prince to arrive. When a prince does roll into town, she ignores him. There's also a more modern take on wishes - the message being you can still wish upon a star kids, but don't expect your dreams to come true unless you work for them too. Nothing comes easy - it's not enough to be a good person and find a star to wish on like in Pinocchio's day - nowadays you've got to back it up with hard graft. The moral messages were sometimes laid on a little thick, (I prefer to be shown these things rather than hear them spouting from the characters' mouths), but I can forgive a little overcooked sentimentality, as there were also plenty of laughs and entertainment along the way, with some brilliant comic characters.

The animation was great. There is a huge variety in characters - from people (at both ends of the animation spectrum - realistic and charicatures), to animals (hulking alligators to tiny fireflies), to malevolent skulking shadows. All of them move in a natural and appealing way. There was some fantastic exaggeration, (I'm already looking forward to the DVD so I can frame through some of this stuff!) the frogs jumping demonstrated some beautiful arcs ... in fact I could pretty much sit here and list the 12 principles of animation and tick them all off for you. However, I'll refrain and let you discover them for yourself. I also really enjoyed the more stylized graphical 2D animation (not sure if that's the correct term) that was used in some of the dream sequences. It broke things up a bit and added some more texture.

OK, so the film wasn't perfect - there were a few incongruous moments, and the odd bit of slightly less than perfect draughtsmanship. However, all in all, The Princess and the Frog feels like a great way for Disney to re-enter the world of 2D animation. The group of animators I went with all enjoyed it, and judging by the well-behaved audience at the screening I went to, where children outnumbered adults by roughly 3 to 1, it's a film to entertain the whole family.
Disney is back, doing what it does best - solid story, gorgeous visuals, great animation and keeping hordes of kids (young and ... grown-up) spellbound.

It's out in the UK in February - go and see it!

Animation Mentor progress

2009-12-13T12:11:00.000-08:00

Sorry for the loooong absence. Keeping a blog updated is harder than it looks ;)
Or rather, writing about things I think people might be interested in is harder than it looks. However, all of a sudden there are a couple of things I want to blog about, so you're getting lots of posts all at once!

So firstly, my animation progress. AM continues to be a fantastic place to learn all of this - I'm not sure where the last term went! Would have liked to be a bit more active in checking out other people's work etc. - hopefully I'll start to get a bit more organized with my time for next term.

Here's the current state of my 3 assignments for this term. Not 100% happy with these shots, but am close to the point where I'm not sure what else to do with them to get them where I want them to be. The dance in particular feels a bit lacklustre, and still can't get the turn on the hopscotch working how I want. I've still got one more critique to come from my brilliant mentor Leigh Rens though, so maybe I'll be able to improve on them a bit more in the last week.

Hopefully I'll be able to raise the level of my animation next term, and start producing shots that I'm proud of.

Anyway, hope you enjoy seeing what I've been up to! ;)

p.s. Vimeo seems to have done something odd with the video at the end which wasn't in the original quicktime. Apologies for that.

AM Class 2 shots from Sarah Knight on Vimeo.

Hopscotch shot

2009-10-16T11:49:00.000-07:00

I am going to try to post a little more reguarly this term than I did last term, however things have already got off to a busy start!

Had a brilliant Animation Mentor meet-up with other UK students in London last weekend, which was great fun. Good to catch up with friends I'd met before, as well as chat to some new people. We went and saw Pixar's new film Up, which I highly recommend. The visuals were stunning, and as always, a very good story with plenty of emotion. A tear may well have actually trickled out from beneath my enormous 3D glasses ... and plenty of laughs as well. Think I might have to go and see it again!
Was good to catch up with everyone and compare notes on Q&A session times, Mentors and shots, and generally talk animation without boring people!

After a day of fun, it was back to work again on my shot. We were allowed to choose from a list of things, and having never seen another hopscotch shot, and because I thought it would be fun, I decided to do that. To plan the shot, I had to film video reference, so the neighbours had the opportunity of seeing me bouncing round the garden on no less than 3 occasions! After feedback from my new mentor (Leigh Rens - seems like a great guy, and a good teacher so far) I was able to get going on blocking out my shot, which you can see in the first part of the video below. Then this week I've been working on tweaking the blocking, and then moving into spline, which is the 2nd part of the video below. As you can see, everything is now a bit floaty and swimmy and "CG" in the worst possible way, so my next job is to go in and try to pull back the snappiness that was in my blocking, and improve the weight and timing.

However, I thought you might like to see where I'm up to. I'll upload the finished shot once it's all polished up nice.

hopscotch shot progress from Sarah Knight on Vimeo.

AM Term 1 complete

2009-09-19T07:40:00.000-07:00

So, term 1 at Animation Mentor has come to a bewilderingly fast end. I seriously have NO idea where the last 3 months of my life went, but somehow I have a reel of animation to show for it!
I had a fantastic time, have learnt so much, and made some great new friends. Looking forward to Term 2, but am also happy to have a bit of a breather this week.
Apologies for the lack of posts, I will endeavour to do better. It was all a bit chaotic, but I'll try to keep things a bit more organized in future and hopefully post a bit more.

Here's my reel, it was thrown together at the last minute, so is a bit rough and ready, but it shows you what I've been up to for the last 3 months!

Animation Mentor Class 01 reel from Sarah Knight on Vimeo.

AM Week 5

2009-08-02T08:45:00.001-07:00

Oooof this week has been hard work!
Assignment - animate a ball going round an obstacle course and do a "devastated" pose. The animation principle we're concentrating on this week is "Squash and Stretch".
Got some poses up for review early in the week, but really struggled with the animation side of things. It looked awful for so long that it wasn't worth putting up for my fellow students to critique, but I slogged away at it and got it up for comment yesterday. As always, had some very helpful feedback and then have worked hard on it for most of today (Sunday) and am reasonably happy with what I'm submitting.
Animating has made me realise both how long a second actually is - you can fit a surprising amount into it - but also how short 5 seconds is! That was the time limit this week, and it really was difficult to stick to.

I have re-done the ending in the bowl, over and over and over, trying to get the timing right, then take some frames back from it so I could make other bits longer. Animated that part frame by frame, again and again, but in the end I think it's come out ok. Not too sure about the very end, but it'll do.

This week has been a lot of work, and has meant I've missed out on fun - managed to escape for a couple of hours to go to a party but had to leave early, and then missed my friend's gig that I wanted to go to. Oh well, I guess sacrifices have to be made! And it'll probably only get worse. Am hoping that this isn't the start of increasingly difficult assignments ... but I suspect it may be. I'll let you know!

In the meantime, enjoy my animation (or what you can see of it - kind of hard to make out, and it seems to skip half of it the 1st time you press play, but will play it properly if you do it again):

Proud Animation Mentor Student

2009-07-28T09:15:00.000-07:00

I'm so proud to be an Animation Mentor student in fact, that I now have a badge :D

Shiny!

Haven't quite managed to work out how this might be displayed in my profile at all times, but I'm sure I'll get there sooner or later. It'll do here for now.

AM Weeks 3 & 4

2009-07-25T13:00:00.000-07:00

Time is going really fast! I guess in my head I was thinking I would be doing blog posts every week, but maybe that won't be happening. I'll try to post pretty regularly though, and keep you caught up on anything. "You" being my exclusive and loyal audience of about 3 people!

Animation Mentor is still brilliant! Week 3 the assignment was a bouncing ball the weight of a football and an "excited" pose. Only the die-hard animators among you will have any interest in the bouncing ball, so I won't bother posting that! Here's my excited pose though:

My mentor's feedback was basically that I had executed it pretty well, a fairly solid pose ... but that 80% of people will have done a variant on the fists in the air pose! And to stand out as an animator, I need to start thinking outside the box a bit more. So I've taken that on board, and here is my revised pose (with a slightly nicer background!):

So that was a useful lesson to learn early on I think. I need to take risks and go for things that may be outside the 'safe zone' but at the same time will much more interesting and genuine.

Week 4 has been to do a heavy and light bouncing ball which again, I won't bother to upload here. It's gone OK I think - just waiting for last minute feedback from people before I submit it as my assignment.

Had a pretty awesome live Q&A webinar the other day with school co-founder Shawn Kelly as well as Scott Benza and Rick O'Connor who all work at ILM and worked on Transformers 2. It was happening at 8pm in California which is 4am here. Did I get up at that ridiculously early hour? Hell Yeah! Was it worth it? Abso-bloody-lutely! Really cool to hear all their stories and get a real insight into what it's like to work in the industry and have the opportunity to ask any questions you want. It's this kind of thing that makes me really glad I chose Animation Mentor - where else would you get the opportunity to have a chat with these people? And in my pyjamas too! Awesome!!!

Also excited by the developments with Mass Animation's Live Music. I discovered I now have my own entry in IMDB as Sarah Knight IV (animator). Being described as an animator on IMDB is a pretty awesome feeling and just reinforces what I'm working towards and makes me more enthusiastic and determined to get good at this than ever.

So yeah, a pretty excellent 2 weeks! Looking forward to doing more complex assignments and having more opportunity to add a bit of character to my animation. This week it's a little bouncing ball pinging around an obstacle course.

Thanks for reading, I'll update again soon! :)

Mass Animation announcement

2009-07-16T09:24:00.000-07:00

Just wanted to do a quick post to say that the New York Times has written about Mass Animation and that according to them, it will appear in front of Planet 51! Which is pretty cool - it's a film I've heard of!
And also, just that the New York Times, writing about something I've worked on?! The world has gone mad.

Very, very excited. I keep getting excited about animated things these days ... I hope my heart can take it.

AM Week 2

2009-07-11T11:08:00.000-07:00

So, Week 2! It's been a pretty cool week. I'm reluctantly starting to accept the fact that I'm actually hoping to launch a career as a Creative Person, or Artist. Not something I've really thought of myself as before. Animator? Hell yes! Artist? Oooh er. Creative person? Me?!?! (Side note: did you know that a question mark followed by an exclamation mark which I just used twice, is called an interrobang?! Isn't that just the most awesome word?! Look I just used 2 interrobangs in 2 sentences in a row! They're brillant! Anyway, back to my animation adventures...)

The assignment this week was to go out and sketch people in the street and then choose your favourite pose to create in Maya. I was a little hesitant about going out and drawing people. Staring at strangers isn't something I feel comfortable with, nor is drawing in public where people might come and Look At What I'm Doing. However, once I got going, I really started to enjoy myself and have decided that I need to keep sketching (advice that I keep hearing) whether out in the street, or while I'm watching TV just to practise drawing. So that when I move onto the more complicated stuff, I'll be able to really communicate what I'm trying to do, with a few drawings. And people can look at them, and know what I'm saying, without a running dialogue from me "Oh, and that's supposed to be his arm. And yeah, she's actually meant to be riding a bike. Oh, and here, they're hugging, not trying to kill each other". That's the idea anyway! And actually, I'm rather enjoying this drawing malarkey.

I found posing Stu the model harder than I thought I would. To begin with, I just could NOT get his arms to go where I wanted them to. At all. Just ridiculously useless. And I started to panic slightly as classmates had already posted some cool poses, and here was I with one arm bent double behind his back with his elbow coming through his chest, and the other one still stuck out at right angles to his body. And I thought "I must just not be cut out for this. Maybe I can still animate. Maybe there's a market out there for animators who specialize in characters with no arms. Yeah, I don't need to give up on my dream. I just need to stick to animating musical instruments ... or ... or ... double amputees ... "
However, with a little perseverance, and another watch of the "how to" video, I managed to get the hang of it. So I may yet become a fully-fledged animator, able to pose arms and everything!

Got some great feedback from my fellow students, and have submitted the above pose as my final piece of work. Looking forward to my mentor's critique.

Next week we actually get to do something that moves! It's your classic bouncing ball, but at least it's animation! I'm excited.

AM Week 1

2009-07-05T13:48:00.001-07:00

So apart from uploading my work for you folks to see, I've also decided to start a journal of my time at Animation Mentor here - apologies to those who aren't interested. You can just skip these parts - they're easy to spot, as they're the ones with all the writing and no video window ;p

Week 1 at Animation Mentor has been very, very cool. As good as I hoped it would be, and better. The website is a work of wonder in itself with SO much information in the form of videos, forums etc. And everyone has been really welcoming and friendly. It seems like a really great community, and I'm so excited to be part of it! After months of pondering, and then deciding, and then applying, then waiting, it's great to finally be there, and able to log into the site and have access to all this amazing stuff.

My mentor, Elliott Roberts seems like a nice guy, and has experienced VFX, Features, and is now working for a gaming company so he's got experience across the board which is great. Our first assignment was very easy - just upload a picture to your profile and fill in a bit about yourself. So having done that (and constantly remembering other 'favourite' films or interests that I wish I'd put and resisting the temptation to update my profile every 5 minutes) I've spent most of the week working my way through the Orientation videos which have been useful for finding my way around the site. There are still a load of other videos that I need to get round to watching - will try to get through those this week while the workload is still light.

Have tried to "put myself out there" as they encourage us to do, so despite being quite shy at that kind of thing, I've been round and about leaving comments and messaging people and trying to really get into it. And so far, it's been a lot of fun and not scary at all :)
(Although for the moment I'm still shying away from video journaling)

Anyway, just thought I'd give a brief update on how the week has gone. Watch this space if you're interested in my Animation Mentor adventures and if you're not ... don't!

Bye for now!

Mass Animation trailer

2009-06-26T13:28:00.000-07:00

I am really excited to see the Mass Animation trailer out. It's so cool to be able to see everything lit and rendered, and I couldn't believe that my shot made it into the trailer!
Apparently they have a distributor now, which they'll announce at SIGGRAPH in August. The film should be out this Autumn so hopefully my work will be coming to a cinema near you soon!
In the meantime, Animation Mentor starts in just 3 days, so plenty to keep me busy while I'm waiting for the premiere ;)

House textures

2009-06-17T13:33:00.001-07:00

Back to the Escape course while I wait for Animation Mentor to start up.
This tutorial involved mapping textures to a model of the front of a house. Very simple, and once again, just following instructions, but I'm really pleased with the finished result. I'll have to attempt my own projects once I know more about how to create these things, rather than use ready made files. (And buy a copy of Photoshop?!)

Tutorial, model, textures etc. provided by Escape Studios

Animation Mentor here I come!

2009-06-11T11:49:00.000-07:00

I got my login details for Animation Mentor! I am so excited! It's getting closer and closer... really can't wait till the 29th when it starts properly.
It's hard to describe just how excited I am (especially to non-animators) but a frog on a pogo stick comes close...

Puppy

2009-05-25T06:22:00.000-07:00

I've been trying to improve my drawing skills, as lots of people say this is a good foundation for any animation. Did some sketches in the garden yesterday, and then today I decided to just copy an animation straight from Disney.
Here's a puppy run cycle, originally by Frank Thomas, which I've done my best to copy. I slowed it down a bit to show it more clearly. I think the spacing (or drawing?!) is a bit off in the middle, but in general I'm quite pleased with it. My favourite part is the ears!

Happy Birthday!

2009-05-19T13:55:00.000-07:00

I've done another 2D animation to wish 2 very good friends of mine Happy Birthday. Hope you both enjoy your birthdays, and that you're not yet too old for silly animations of guitar-playing guineas!

Guinea pig happy birthday from Sarah Knight on Vimeo.

Happy Birthday sis!

2009-05-03T12:45:00.001-07:00

Here is a special birthday animation to wish my big sister a very happy 30th birthday!

Vimeo test

2009-04-30T13:29:00.001-07:00

Just testing out whether my videos would work better from Vimeo. Here's the little girl skipping again, only BIGGER!!! (I hope).
Vimeo seems to have made the weight fall twice, so it slightly ruins it, but interesting to see how it looks on my blog page.

Skippety skip from Sarah Knight on Vimeo.

2D scribbles - skippety, skip

2009-04-16T13:05:00.000-07:00

I downloaded some cool open source 2D animation software: http://www.pencil-animation.org/
and have been playing around with it. The idea is that I'll be able to do storyboards, animatics, and general planning and timing with it, to help with the 3D stuff. I think I've barely touched on the possibilities, but just stuck to what I could work out.
However, I wouldn't rule out random silly animations like this one.

Waking lamp

2009-04-13T09:57:00.000-07:00

I wanted to do something slightly more creative with the lamp, rather than just following the tutorial, so I added a short sequence to the beginning of the jumping lamp to try to add a bit of character.

Model, rig and jumping tutorial by Escape Studios

The rest of the shots for Massanimation

2009-04-05T13:12:00.000-07:00

Here are the rest of the shots I animated for Massanimation.

Models, rigs and music courtesy of Massanimation and ReelFX.

The winning shot - don't blink:

A couple of Massanimation shots

2009-03-26T11:32:00.000-07:00

Here are my Facebook Massanimation shots that didn't make the final cut. Yes, they are very short.

Models, rigs and music courtesy of Massanimation and ReelFX.

This a shot of the Daddy cello jumping down off the shelf to go and sort out the rock guitar:

This is a shot of the Daddy cello going to sort out the rock guitar and the Mummy cello jumping down to sort out the Daddy cello. Probably my favourite shot that I did.

And now it is not letting me upload any more videos . Will try to upload the rest soon.

A Pixaresque Lamp

2009-03-08T15:32:00.000-07:00

Here's a lamp animation that I did at the weekend which I'm really pleased with. The model was made by Escape studios who do the online course that I follow, but everything else was me. (Following their instructions though, of course! No originality or creativity on my part whatsoever.) I just keep looking at it and going "It looks like a real light! An actual shining light!"

This is approximately my 50 millionth try to get this film up - finally, it has appeared! Quality's not great, but you get the idea. It's a jumping lamp.

Model and tutorial by Escape Studios.

The Legendary Rustic Scene

2009-03-08T13:24:00.000-07:00

It's my Rustic Scene! Finally you get to see its rustic wonder, in all its zooming out reveal glory, with your own eyes! You need imagine no more.

This was the very first CG animation I did. After spending hours creating the fruit, the bowl, the walls, the barrel and the concrete floor and then lighting it, it was pretty cool to see it all come together. It's a little blurry here, but you get the general rustic idea.

Chair model, textures and instructions by Escape Studios.

The beginning of a beautiful journey

2009-03-08T13:17:00.000-07:00

Hello, and welcome to my first ever blog post!
As I'm constantly talking about, and trying to describe my animations to you, I decided that maybe it would be a good idea to put them in a place where you could actually see them. I may make it public later but for now I thought I'd just share it with you guys.

I hope you enjoy it, please let me know what you think of my work!

Sarah x