LAUAN 404 - Stop Motion

Our stop motion puppets were made of a wire armature, a layer of foam and bandaging and finally a layer of plastercine. I really enjoyed making my puppet and despite some downfalls, I generally made a pretty good one. She was mostly in the correct proportion, despite arms that were a bit long and a neck that was too short. Animating with the puppet was also mostly a success. She was easy to moved and despite being quite tall, wasn't too heavy either.

WWW- She had character and appeal, was very similar to sketches, well made.
EBI-  Movement could be improved. Texture, proportions and symmetry of character could have been better. Plastercine slightly ripped under her dress which could also be improved.

(First go at walk cycle)

LAUAN 404 - Maya 3

Learning how to make walk cycles on Maya was very useful. Importing a reference image into Maya made the process easier and more achievable. In this short clip on the WIP, one stance is missing so the movement appears quite jittery. Despite this, the learning in today's session was profound.

WWW- Existing poses are accurate and movement is distinguishable and clear.
EBI- Movement could be made much more fluid using graph editor, hands and hips need to move more accurately.

LAUAN 404 - Maya 2

After practising modelling and learning how to move a rigged character, we then learned how to keyframe and animated on Maya. This involved learning how to use the timeline and graph editor to add easing into the movement. Learning how to time blast was a useful tool.

WWW- Explored and grasped the concept of key framing and motion paths within Maya
EBI- Could have pushed the bouncing sphere further, added easing to enhance weight and lifelike qualities.

LAUAN 404 - Maya 1

In our first Maya session we learned how to navigate around the interface and began learning how to model from a reference. This involved using the bevel, extrude and mesh loop tools. My final outcome is pretty basic, lit with an Arnold light. the proportions are off and some edges need to be smooths however, as a first attempt is totally acceptable. 

Study Task 

Our task was to model another simple object; I chose to model a bottle of glue. Although the object was simple, it was still far too complex for my very limited modelling abilities. However with perseverance and some help I managed to create the shape.

WWW- Learned more tools, became more familiar with software.
EBI- Need to be more aware of what is achievable in the given time frame.

LAUAN 404 - Character Backgrounds and Secondary Characters (4)

After having refined the story and storyboards I realised that an antagonist was much more necessity than a secondary character- so I pulled the ghost out of the line up.
Conceptually I thought it would be interesting to have an antagonist who represented climate change, global warming etc, that destroyed the landscape/nature that Valda was trying to save- but also something that seemed visually ominous. Creating a shadowy character captured this ominous mood and could also resembles a dusty cloud of pollution.

WWW- characters and story has been refined and made much clearer.
EBI- Clean up drawings and line work

LAUAN 404 - Character Design (5)

After redrawing Valda a number of times I became more familiar with her shape and anatomy. Therefore it was a good idea to redo her dynamic poses. Personally this new board was a break through as this is definitely one of my weak point. So to produce a good character poses board was quite a personal win.

WWW- poses are much more consistent, more interesting and drawn better, hold much more expression and appeal
EBI -may explore a new silhouette as the existing one isn't as strong.