Faculty Review

Good luck, everyone!

Week 14: Pee Pee Dance

Tonight has been dedicated to the art of the Pee Pee Dance. Sadly, my attempts have been less than successful. It's such an odd motion!



Since this didn't feel right, I decided to do some research.



I watched several other videos and sketched out poses as I noticed them.

While these are an improvement, I'm still not happy. I might have to reframe this shot in order to make it work. A lot of the pee pee dance has to do with foot placement. A full body shot of Rose might have more impact.

Never did I think I'd put THIS MUCH effort into mastering the pee pee dance.

Week 14: Clean Up

Happy Belated Turkey Day! I hope everyone rested over the break. We all needed it.

Since the semester is ending soon, I've decided to focus on clean ups. My main goal is fixing up the classroom scene. Rose isn't twitchy enough right now. I want her to look INCREDIBLY uncomfortable for the faculty review.

Shot 3 was the first shot I animated this semester so Rose varied a lot keyframe to keyframe. She's much better now!

Shot 21 is after Rose sees the magic door and before the boy's bathroom is revealed.

Shot 69 is after the magic door melts away and before she walks off screen for the last time.

Week 13: Cutting Down

This week, I met with Trixy. I'm not sure what I expected her to say but what she did say took me by surprise. She felt that the bathroom scene was too long. In hindsight, it was obvious.  I've been lengthening my animatic every time I touch it. My week 3 animatic was 3:34 while the week 12 one is 4:36!

Based on Trixy's suggestions, I've redone the bathroom scene. The rainbow sound is, of course, temporary. I just needed something BIG for that moment.



In case you want to compare and contrast, here's what the bathroom scene looked like for seminar.



The short version drops 6 shots, making it 13 seconds shorter. Of course, shorter doesn't necessarily mean better. If I want to, I know that I can finish the longer version. This is all about what works better as a whole. I do like some of the new gags but part of that might be the fact that they are new.

I'd really appreciate some feedback so that I can nail down my game plan. Should I stick with what I had before? Switch to the short one? Mix and match? Do another even shorter cut?

Edit: Last night, before I went to sleep, I had the two videos "race" each other. It was gave me a better sense of how the edits effected the overall timing but, more importantly, it was funny.

Week 12: Animatic for Seminar

This is the animatic that I put on HAL for seminar. There are a few whoopsies like a frame disappearing or the sound being too loud that I'd like to tweak tomorrow if that's allowed. If not, this ought to be good enough to get a critique. I just don't have any more time to work tonight.

Edit: Updated it!

Week 12: Entering and Exiting

When I finished roughing out Rose entering and exiting the bathroom, I realized she is really small in the frame. I'm not sure if I want to reframe it or if her tininess is okay.



The smirk at the end was added in last minute. I like it but I need to tweak the shots after it to match her new pose/attitude.

Week 11: Test Colors

This picture begs for a caption but I'm not feeling witty enough right now.

Week 11: Animatic

Next week is a real beast for me in terms of schoolwork so I wanted to finish this ASAP. I don't know how much else I'll be able to do for Tuesday but hopefully this is enough to get a good critique!



Now that I've listened to my thesis, there are a few rough shots I want to tweak. The way Syr delivered Rose's lines doesn't always match my rough take at Rose's acting. However, I am REALLY happy with the way the teacher and the mermaids create atmosphere. They crack me up.

Rosalinda and the mermaids have their actual voices. Mar agreed to be the teacher at the beginning and I'm actively questing for a man with a deep, booming voice to be the tikbalang. I have tons of other little sounds (grunts, screams, grumbles, heavy breathing, etc.) that I'll probably add in at some point but, for now, I'm happy.

Finding all those sound effects has convinced me that I need professional help. My brain just doesn't do audio. I'm still devoid of ideas for how the rainbow and magical door should sound. Suggestions are much appreciated.

Week 10: Halloween

Since it is Halloween, I'm back home. There's trick or treating in my near future! However, I did get some work done.

Shot 31 is when Rose first walks into the bathroom. Originally, I only had her looking concerned. But, when I was cleaning it up, I decided to try making her a little happier. The bathroom is pretty after all. I'm not sure if I'm going to keep things this way and, if I do, I'll probably lengthen the pauses

At the end, she looks over and sees the waterfall, which reminds her why she is here.

I'm in love with shot 39. It fought me the whole way but I think it ended up looking really nice. This is when Rose falls into the stall after nearly running into multiple monsters.

I'm flying back at the crack of dawn tomorrow morning. My brain might be gone but my body will definitely be in class.

Week 9: Bathroom sequence

Since I'm up at 3 am anyway, I figured it'd be fun to slap together all the rough stuff I've done to check how it looks. I need to slow a lot of spots down and there are some transitions that need improvement but it's still fun to watch.

Week 9: Rough Animation

Yesterday was a very productive day! I'm going to try to keep this pace up for the whole weekend. Wish me luck.

Here are the shots I finished yesterday. I might update this post with new things as a finish them. Or maybe I'll keep them as a surprise for later. We'll see ;)

This shot will have mermaids in the background but I decided to focus on Rose for the rough stuff.


Rose almost runs into the duwende. The way she dodges causes her to fall backwards into the stall. I'm going to add in a little bit of a bounce when I clean the shot up.


The monsters tell Rose to clean up the rainbow mess. She's given a plunger, takes a deep breath, and then walks over to the stall.


Immediately after this shot, Rose cowers from the rainbow. I'll probably add a little bit of movement to Rose but, with this shot, I wanted to figure out how to do the rainbow's movement correctly. If it's just a straight line, then it doesn't look like it's moving. Everyone I've asked so far enjoys the "snaking" rainbow more so I'll probably stick with that one.


After she cowers from the rainbow, Rose musters her courage and goes over to the rainbow. She stabs it with the plunger but it gets ripped from her hands and thrown away, never to be heard from again. Versions A and B of this shot are very close to each other. The difference is how fast the plunger spins.

I'm considering changing it so the plunger disappears with a twinkle like Team Rocket.

Week 9: References

When I made my colored shot this weekend, I put together a quick little reference for Rosalinda's colors. Everything is dull and grey in the rainy real world but the magical world is brighter/more saturated.

I also realized that I need a height chart now that I'm doing shots with multiple characters. I didn't include the mermaids since they are going to be in the water the whole time. The manananggal's legs are only there to help me figure out how big the rest of her should be. She doesn't have her legs on during my film. It'd be too hard to tell what she was otherwise.

Costume wise, the tikbalang has a loin cloth and the manananggal is wearing a t-shirt. I'm tempted to put something ironic on the shirt but that might be too much work. The pugot is wearing a hoodie because it makes me laugh.

I'm not sure what the duwende should wear though. He is a white duwende (a good/not evil one) but I don't think that effects his clothing choice. Some of the pictures that I've found give duwende pointy hats but not all of them.

Week 8: Magical Door

I'm having a hard time deciding what the magical door should look like. I know it's going to have a unisex bathroom "sign" on it.

But the door itself varies in my head. I know that I don't want it to look the same as the normal restroom doors. There is a lot of bamboo in the bathroom now. It's build into the sink and the stalls. So one idea is to make the door look like it's from a nipa hut.

But that's a really old design. Pre-Spanish colonization old. Since the tikbalang myth is linked with Spanish colonization, I've been considering doing a very Spanish door. It'd be pretty looking and clearly ill-fitting with the school's surroundings.

I like both ideas but I cringe when I think about animating them. It's not just opening and closing either. This door has a dramatic entrance and exit.

I ought to just pick something and move on but I'm mentally hung up on this door right now. Suggestions would be appreciated.

Edit: The cubicle consensus was BAMBOO.

Week 8: Female Voices

Yesterday, I recorded Rosalinda, the teacher, the mermaids, and the duwende. It was a lot of fun and not nearly as intimidating an experience as I had expected. We did quite a bit of yelping and screaming, plus a tiny bit of kung fu. The only thing I regret is not bringing a video camera with me. Syr made some amazing faces and gestures while she was in the booth and I'm sorry that I won't be able to refer to it when I animate her lines.

I'm still working on backgrounds but, if I finish them up quickly, I'm going to try doing some lip sync. Until then, enjoy this SUPER ROUGH version of the classroom scene with the teacher droning on. It won't be this loud in the final product. I was just checking to see if the words line up well with the images.

Week 7: Lola

This last week was more about people than drawing. I met with Rosalinda's voice actor (Syr Law) and found a composer (Felix). Both of them are great and I'm looking forward to working with them. Careen is going to be the teacher. It ought to be funny. I've got the ADR room is booked for Friday. Wish me luck!

When I mentioned to Syr that I named my main character after my Lola (grandmother), she asked for a recording for reference. Obviously, my character Rose won't sound like my grandmother Rose but Syr thought it'd help her understand the character more.

I thought it'd be hard to get Lola to talk but, once I had her on the phone, she told me stories for a good hour and a half. The first half our was all about Lola's sister Kun Cheng (I'm not sure if that's spelled right) and her duwende. It's much too long to post here but I enjoyed Lola's insistence that everything was true.



Ultimately, I did not send Syr any of the Kun Cheng stories since they were second hand recollections of events that didn't really effect Lola. Instead, I send Syr this clip about how my grandparents met. It's not relevant to my thesis but Lola was defensive while discussing Kun Cheng. She's more animated talking about grandpa.



Now that I've got all this taken care of, I've moved on to backgrounds for the bathroom. Once I have those, I'll start animating again. It's a little surprising how much research is needed to make the establishing shots look right. So many types of trees and waterfalls to pick from! Once I've got that figured out, though, the other bathroom backgrounds ought to be fairly easy.

Week 6: Revised Animatic

Here's my revised animatic! No audio, though. I focused on revising the visuals of the bathroom scene and, now that I know where I need jokes, I can update my script.





I need another joke for the Tikbalang when Rose bumps into him. Also, the mermaids need gossip and the duwende is going to have Popeye like mumbling. I'm not planning on having the manananggal or pugot talk.

I'd love suggestions for dialogue!

Week 6: WIP Animatic

Don't worry! My "final" animatic won't be this rough and the timing will be better.

I've been working on making the bathroom scene more exciting/funnier. I don't feel like the angles are quite as interesting the ones in the classroom but Kristina gave me a peptalk which, combined with my tiredness, convinced me that this is okay.





You can tell exactly when I stopped caring about making an understandable image and just scribbled notes for myself. It's funny. Or, at least, I think it is. It is 2 AM so I could be wrong.

Everything will be cleaner by the end of Monday. Promise!

Right now, I'm planning on ending the story the same way (Rose goes back and leaves rainbow footprints). However, earlier, I was thinking about changing it so that we end with her sitting down to talk with the mermaids. I'm waffling but I think we are going to return to the real world. That feels a little more solid to me.

Week 6: Calendar

I haven't looked at my calendar in at least a week. It was nice having a rough plan but it wasn't working for me so I started ignoring it. When I went back and marked off what I've done, the results were amusing.

Instead of a calendar, I've been using an excel file. I love the little bar graph and pie chart. This may not work for most people but reducing everything to numbers makes me more comfortable. I feel like I'm focusing more on the final goal instead of all the steps in between.

Week 5: Animatic

When I watch this, I'm torn between stomping around shouting RAAAAAWR like I'm godzilla and falling asleep. Is that how I'm supposed to feel?

The After Effects file that my previous animatic was in got really messy so I started over. This file is beautifully organized. I'm rather proud of it. Unfortunately, however, that means no sound for the time being.

Week 5: Roughs

The theme for this week is VERY VERY VERY ROUGH animation. Also, effects.











Earlier this week, I posted casting calls on Now Casting and LA Casting. It's been a lot of fun checking people out. There are some new ones I haven't looked at yet but, so far, there's only been one lady that I like for Rose and two guys who could both do an amazing tikbalang. It's hard to choose!

I'm nervous about the whole recording process. Out of everything this thesis needs sound intimidates me the most. Hopefully I'm worrying myself over nothing. One way or another, we're about to find out!

On a completely unrelated note, I've tried to leave comments on everyone's blogs but they aren't going through. I'll type out my comment, pick OpenID, type in my blog's URL, click Post Comment, then my comment disappears forever! It's getting annoying.

Week 4: Rain

I'm trying to decide if After Effect's rain is good enough or if I should take the time to make my own rain. There are only two shots from outside in the rain looking in on the school. However, most of the indoor shots include windows.

Here are some tests using After Effects generated rain.

Week 4: Shot 13

I'm forcing myself to be ridiculously clean because I'd really prefer not to have to go back later.


I remember someone in class talking about conversion issues when going from Photoshop to After Effects. What was that all about? My laptop has been fussy about exporting anything that's too big but I'm almost positive that's just my laptop.

Week 3: Rosalinda

Somehow, I forgot to post Rose's updated design. Whoops! Here she is.


Now that I'm animating, I've decided that I want to focus on the "real world" part of my thesis first. The backgrounds are easier, there are less characters, and I'm happy with those sections of my animatic. Hopefully, while I'm working, I'll be struck by inspiration for how to improve the bathroom scene!

I'm very happy with my backgrounds so far. They're coming along really nicely, if I do say so myself.

Week 3: Establishing Shots

Surprisingly enough, I'm really enjoying my establishing shots. Who'd have thought?


Right now, I'm trying to decide how much effort should go into my backgrounds. I want to include grand establishing shots (since they are so much fun) but how much is too much when it comes to the lesser shots? I don't want the backgrounds to be distracting but I'm not sure if that means toning things down in places or maintaining a consistent amount of detail in every frame.

Week 3: Animatic

Ta-da! My updated animatic! I wanted to work on establishing the spaces we are in more. Hopefully that came through, despite the very rough artwork.

Not all of the drawings are new so there are some inconsistencies. For instance, the palm trees at the beginning should be bamboo and the bathroom stalls have been turned to face the magic door. Any time Rose wears a bucket hat is new.

My animatic is still very much a work in progress. Now that I'm happier with the beginning, the middle is starting to bug me. However, there is certainly enough for me to get working on animating!

I'm somewhat concerned about how little dialog there is. I don't want to add more, both because it'd feel like padding and because it'd be more work, but it feels odd to hunt down voice actors for such measly parts.

On the plus side, though, there are a lot of fun sound effects in my future!

Back-up Plan

In the event of a technical malfunction with powerpoint, here are all my materials.

Synopsis:

Rain pours down on Rosalinda’s school. Her teacher lectures about the water cycle while water sounds fill the classroom. After hearing one drip too many, Rose runs to the restroom. However, half way down the hall, a magical bathroom appears. Desperate to take care of business, she goes inside.

  Despite the strange creatures, the restroom has normal toilets. Rose is relieved until the toilet in her stall spews out a rainbow. She attempts to escape but can’t leave until she cleans up the multicolored mess. She uses a duwende’s plunger to stop the flow then returns to school.

  The restroom door disappears behind Rosalinda, leaving her to wonder if her strangely mundane encounter with magic was real. However, she leaves shining, rainbow colored footprints behind her.

EXTERNALS
SUPPLIES	Paper Art supplies Lightbox		$40 $10 $100
MUSIC	Composer/Design/Musicians		$300
INTERNALS
SOUND	QST/Mixer MRO	$20/hr $15/hr	$40 $60
ACTING	Voice actors/Editing		$200
FINISHING COSTS			$100
UNEXPECTED COSTS			$100
		TOTAL	$950

 

Animatic: Take Three

Animatic: Take Two

Animatic: Take One

UPA Rosalinda

I did a sketch of Rosalinda in a UPA style for Tom Sito's class. I liked his suggestions so I redid the picture digitally.

I'm not planning on changing the style of my thesis but I like the colors and playful mood.

Rainbow Splatter Test

Saturation Test

I'm not happy with the colors yet but I wanted to do something with the bathroom for this week.

Cats Don't Dance

I really like the way the colors were handled in Cats Don't Dance. The disillusioned characters are desaturated but you don't notice it until the bright colors show up.

For my thesis, I'd like to do the same thing. The real world is desaturated and the magical one is colorful. 

Mermaid

The background isn't accurate but I like the mermaid and most of the colors.

Bamboo

(Click to enlarge)

Second Pass at Thumbnails

Rosalina's Uniform

According to a Filipino friend of mine, if the story is set in present times, Rosalina ought to be in a school uniform. Here are some uniform designs that I am considering. Stephanie talked me out of the frilly socks so ignore those.

Rose’s poses ended up a lot cuter than I intended. She isn’t supposed to be this cutesy, at least not at the beginning of the story.

The last design with short skirt was fun to draw but I don’t like that it changes Rose’s silhouette. I’ve always imagined her being triangular. Also, I can't shake the urge to put her in plaid. Once I decide on an outfit, I'm going to experiment with patterns.

There is a way to keep Rosalina in her old outfit but I would have to establish it properly. June 14^th is Independence Day in the Philippines and people all around the country wear traditional clothing. According to my friend, this can last from a day to a month depending.

In case anyone is confused right now, the Filipino school year is from June until March. Wet season starts in June and ends around October. The dates work out, which is awesome.

I don’t dislike Rose in a uniform but I liked her with a really loose collar. Something about it worked for me. She seemed more relaxed and open. Of course, if Rose is in a uniform, designing her classmates will be easier. Any opinions?

Update: I did a really, really, really fast picture of Rose in plaid.

Completed First Set of Thumbs

I made it through all my thumbnails. Good luck deciphering them!

Kristina and Stephanie gave me really good suggestions for changes so these thumbnails are a little out of date.