Keith Talk about Bubbles and Books

This week has been very fruitful, learning how to flow with the creative current as opposed to resisting it, when I second guess myself. I did several Sparky graphics, and some equally challenging grandma post cards. They are sooo very fun to do. I'm really enjoying the whole playing with colours and calling it  "work" thing.

A highlight- someone got a surprise birthday cake that looked very much like a huge burger. It was hilarious!!

That and gigantic bubbles!!!    on the rooftop!!!     soo fun!!!!!

 

Brad demonstrating how to make massive bubbles

Finally caught up with "the girl with the dragon tattoo" series, and am on the last chapter of the audio book. its really exciting, I love the sense of divine retribution the author put into the book, it makes it so much more enjoyable, like everything gets wrapped up, and everyone gets their just desserts. 

Spoiler alert lol

I mention the audio-book, because I find they work much better than movies, or t.v. shows at keeping me just on the edge of my seat and alert so I don't get fatigued when painting all day.

It really adds to the experience, almost like you're on the adventure with them, feeling their sorrow, their joys all from the safety of the office.

Meghan Paints Toronto

Last week I was still working on prop building and built the most challenging prop I’ve done so far. I had fun doing it because I was able to learn a lot and problem solve, so I’m glad I had that opportunity. 

I’ll be transitioning into Background painting in the near future and hope to learn a lot from that. I have been watching different videos and tutorials to help improve my painting with colour and light, and working with artists at the studio will only assist me in improving quicker, so I’m very excited about that. I want my fourth year film to have nice layouts so I’m doing what I can to improve. 

Since I’ve been at Smiley guy, I’ve been taking the streetcar from the train to the studio and have really been noticing the vibrancy of Toronto. I’ve never paid any attention to it before, but while I’m riding the streetcar I love watching the people. It’s helped me with my film idea actually… I plan on going to liberty village soon to draw the people and their dogs, I want to have some of Toronto’s vibrancy in my film.

The Birds and the Faeries and Mary

I've been animating scenes for Chirp for the past two weeks and I'm having a blast! I'm learning how to play with timing and secondary actions in my animations, and so far, I'm feeling a lot more comfortable using Flash puppets. The Chirp characters were entertaining to animate, and it was fun to play with their poses. I especially love playing with Chirp's character - I like giving him that smug, sassy look for some reason. Maybe I'll make them do the 'french pose' next for fun. Hahah! I wonder if I can show funny pose screenshots...

The voice acting of the birds were really well done in the show too - the kids were animated and funny to listen to. Kudos to those talented kids~!

Anyway, I'll write more next post, but here's a little faerie me drawing on a leaf! I'm on a faerie hype right now for some reason...

Mia Learns Flash Flash Flash!

This week, I am still working with Flash but I got the chance to work on animating with Flash which I wanted to do to learn more about Flash. I built up 6 different background characters in Flash what I designed last week. And then, I am working on walking cycle animation for the characters from the Wildlife for testing them. This is my first time to use tween tool to animate and it is hard to get used to it but, It is so cool! 

I saw flash file for the characters from the bedbug affair and its head rotation is so smooth and so good and that 2d drawings looked look like 3d!! I am still playing around with tween and mask tools and this is so interesting and fun to do it. 

Hope I will get the hang of Flash quickly to become easier to work with soon!

David's To-Do Lists

So I’ve been giving the opportunity to work on something other than Furry Force, which I am thankful for. It was starting to ruin my brain, even though it was HILARIOUS to work on. For example here are some of my favourite notes from a shot i was working on just the other day.

Now I'm on working on Chirp in scene set-up and I get notes like “switch the instance of Squawk’s torso” and other such mild mannered instructions. Its a good change of place and I'm learning that there is a lot of different elements that all need to be properly organized and labeled and checked and double checked.

Keith's Musings on the TTC and Sparky Graphics

Wacky Wednesday:

I wake up to the sound of  the radio show host saying that all the subway lines are shut down. With a groan I fall back in bed, while his co-host tells everyone to just take a day off. I drag myself out of bed and trudge along to start what promised to be the start of a terrible day. As I dose off on the bus-ride to the subway station, I wish the subway lines would magically just be open when I get there, that they were never closed in the first place.  

Imagine my surprise when I got to Islington Station expecting a crowded shuttle bus and instead see the subway functioning as normal.  Bewildered I get on, did I dream that the subway was closed? Did i fall asleep and dream that it was open?  I ponder these questions as I drift off once more. 

When I get to work, I'm still confused. I ask Joel if he heard about the subways, and he confirms he heard they were closed. 

With a shrug of disbelief I start painting...

 

I do love the crazy rain we're having, it always manages to put me in a better mood.

Been working on Sparky Graphics, which is something completely different from what I'm used to, which is great. It's funny, whenever I begin to feel the strain of working on something too long, I get a new assignment to balance everything out.

Really enjoyed playing with colors on the surfing grandma postcard assignment I got to do.

 

Meghan's Dogs Love the Birds!

The last couple of weeks I was finishing up scene planning and starting on prop building. So far so good, I’m really enjoying it. The designs for chirp are pretty adorable and I like how textures are applied to them to give them something extra. There have been a couple challenges but only because I’ve just started doing it and thankfully I have a really patient teacher who’s pretty awesome.


The other day as I was getting ready to leave for the train, I turned the TV on so my dogs would have some noise while I was gone. I usually just turn on whatever, but I managed to find Chirp on TV! It was pretty cool seeing an actual episode on TV so now everyday before I leave I turn Chirp on for my dogs to watch. I’m excited for the day I get to see a couple of the things I worked on, on TV!

Smileys, Dracula and Biiirds!

I had just finished my last prop/FX today for Smiley Guy Studios' tv show Chirp! It involved snow and icebergs and what I'd call...snowbergs! I'll miss doing props. It was so fun and relaxing! I've learned so much, from masking to animation techniques. I've made a collection of bananas, flowerpots, toilet papers, dog dishes, pickaxes, sandcastles, megaphones, nuts, leaves, playsets, snowballs and now snowbergs! 

There were times when I was just frustrated with my slow pace, but there were also times when I get so caught up making a prop that it actually turns out "Good!" according to Joel. I'm surprised by how much I know a lot more about Flash at this point. Thank you so much Joel! 

Aside from my Flashy adventures, I also acquainted with more Smiley faces like Tom, who had apparently worked at Elliot Animation (I've heard that studio did the show 6teen and Stoked, which are shows that I was a big fan of) and Cherry, Ashley and Kosta among others who talk about comics and superhero movies. It's really cool to get to know people in the studio with similar likes. We even have awesome lunch adventures, like last week, Julie took us to Kensington Market, and ugh oh...I think I found a new knick-knack store to lose all my money to...

There's so much more to talk about, like how I'm starting scene-planning and animating in Chirp this week, but because my ice-cappuccino beside me is crying out to be emptied...that's all folks! :)

P.S.

The Dracula part in this week's title was because of two things. 1) I had just finished Bram Stoker's novel Dracula and it was awesome, and 2) I had just got a part of a Romanian character - with fangs of course, because Transylvanian vampires, yoo - for an upcoming Q&A panel in a comic convention in Hamilton! (I can't believe I still have time for these things. pfffft oh well it's my summer) Anyway that means, it's time to practice being a vampire while animating.

  Here's a sneaky birdie for ya! Inspired by WussyWat's bird design.  Birds, birds, birds!

 

Mia Learns Flash!

It is already fifth week to work from Smiley Guy Studio! This week, I learned a lot about Flash program which I barely knew about before because I usually animated with other programs drawing frame by frame. Building up each part of the character to rig was unfamiliar to me and learning was a big challenge for me. Keyboard shortcuts were different that I used before with other programs and I don't know which tool was where and it was very confusing at first. But, I am really glad to have this opportunity to learn about Flash since most TV animations are made with Flash or Harmony.

I am currently building up a character for other short film from Flash. I think I get better than before for using Flash now. I am looking forward to learn how to animate with Flash later even if it will be another challenge for me.

David Just Enjoys FX

This week I have been animating Barf, Bubbles, Waves, Ripples, Splashes, Smoke, Electricity, Slime, and Sparkles. I’ve learned that shape tweens are pretty challenging to control, and that tracking objects to paths makes animation a lot easier and faster. Using shape tweens to animate colours on objects is also really awesome. I also learned about how different temperature objects fall into a certain spectrum of colour depending on how hot or cold the object is.

I liked working this week on the scene where Leon time travels back in time like in the Terminator movies. The scene was so gross and sexy. I animated so many sparkles on Leon the Cyborg Lion’s arm. It’s so hilariously disgusting. I never expected to hear to words “wolf-cum” used in a professional environment. Julie even asked me today if I “feel uncomfortable animating this kinda stuff”. It’s pretty gross, and a lot of it won’t be on my demo-reel but at least I'm learning a lot.

This is more PC than what David is animating