Inna 'Meets' Norma and Foosball

Norma Kassi

We finally heard from Norma about Mandala Designs that she liked most -out of six options Norma picked #6, the spacious one! So cool to get feedback from Norma herself!

I was so excited to know that Norma is a real person, so I just Googled her name and found out that she is actually Chief of the Vuntut Gwitchin!! She was elected in 2010 and she has also been vice chair of the International Gwich'in Steering Committee.

Norma Kassi devoted her life to activism and served as an elected tribal spokesperson for the protection of the Porcupine Caribou as well as director of Indigenous Collaboration at Arctic Institute of Community Based Research. Here’s some more information about Norma.

Here Norma Kassi speaking about climate change and presenting the film she was on of the producers on: Our Changing Homelands Our ChangingLives.  Here's the film trailer and film.

I found this article while reading about Porcupine Caribou activism.

The more I work on First Hand Stories, the more I learn about Canadian First Nations. It’s such a beautiful and meaningful project!

So back to Mandala designs, they are here: 

Norma's Choice

Here’s some of my research on Mandalas and some sketchbook drawings for First Hand stories designs:

I will post some animation tests in July when I jump onto Mandala animation. I tried rotation in Flash two weeks ago and it’s so nice, it looks like kaleidoscope if the timing is set right:)

As for our studio’s life, it’s awesome. Every Tuesday we have Cartoon Lunches and Joel brings us cool animated shows to watch. Last time we saw Steven Universe, Adventure time and today it’s gonna be Gravity Falls. Awesome-awesome. It’s great to see different styles of animation and be updated on the industry new shows.

Last week we were invited for celebration of the official Canadian launch of Warren United, funny animated show about about a soccer fan Warren and his family. I enjoyed watching the show on a big screen, it was fun! My Sheridan groupmates David and Jordan who did their internship with Smiley’s last year and got to work on Warren, were also invited, it was great to see them :)

Smiley Guy Studios made super high quality animation for the show. UK partners were happy with the result and it seems like the second season is coming soon into production.

 

We also had to watch FIFA : the England Vs Uruguay game, there was lots of fun. Uruguay guys won, they were crazily intense. Carol introduced me to foosball and now my adrenaline level is pumping every time I see any game:) that’s awesome, now I can help my husband watch his NFL games:)

Jordan's Week: From Super Hero's to Popcorn Makers

Hello again! Jordan here.

So I just wrapped up on colouring animation for Captain Canuck, which was a lot of fun! You can view the finished episode right here: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CsTuqytpC84&feature=youtu.be

It's so cool seeing the progression, the end result looks really fantastic and I'm glad I was able to play a small part in making it happen. :)  I just love what they did at the compositing stage, the effects and shadows really add a nice polish.

Next I was moved onto props and character builds for Warren like all the other folks. I wasn't able to work on them very much, so I've slowly been playing catch-up, getting used to building stuff in flash.


I sort of jumped into character builds right off the bat and was a little daunted before my fellow pals here recommended I just start with props. When building things in flash, I learned that it's not at all about doing lineart, but rather literally "building" these props out of solid shapes and then adding details after. It's fun and looks a lot better too this way.

Here is a popcorn maker I made as a first pass:

Jordan's Take on Captain Canuck

Hello folks. Jordan here!

So these days I've been on colouring animation for Captain Canuck, the upcoming new web series. Honestly, I was super excited when I heard that I was going to get to do some work for it. Ever since I saw that teaser trailer it was stuck in my mind, and it's been a real treat getting to stare at all of these beautiful scenes. Everything is just solid, it looks like a proper superhero cartoon and I hope I can absorb some of it via osmosis.

When colouring a character with so many details you come to realize the importance of flipping your animation. Even though I'm only filling in gaps and colouring, there are so many little gaps that I wouldn't have caught had I just focused on each frame. So I've just been spending time trying to make it as neat as possible.

When I first heard the words 'CAPTAIN CANUCK', I didn't expect to see someone as cool as that. I pictured some toque-wearing, hapless doofus, apologizing to everyone in sight.

And then I started wondering, why is that? Why was my initial reaction to laugh and mock? Isn't Canada as deserving of a proper superhero as any other country?

 

According to "Flump787234,"  the answer is no.

 

 

Also here is a drawing of what I pictured. Drawn in Flash to demonstrate my newfound comfort with this program. I am not afraid of it anymore (I actually have no idea how people draw in this)

 

"Some toque-wearing, hapless doofus, apologizing to everyone in sight"

 

Jordan's on the Case!

HELLO AGAIN. It is I, Jordan, and I am delivering the going on's here at Smiley Guy.

So I've been spending my time colouring a leica reel for DETECTIVE DOCTOR ATTORNEY AT LAW. I love colour and it was pretty fun once I grew used to the idea that Flash's "fill bucket" and "close-large-gaps" tool does not work.

I actually really love the fact that I was able to work on a leica reel of any sort! I'd love to be able to do more stuff like that, like board cleanup or something.

Just getting to poke around the file in general and see how it was done really showed me how useful flash is for animatics.

PICTURED IS what a typical day looked like for me. Lots of linetooling going on to get the shapes to close.

Also word of advice: do not engage the fake monks that walk around Toronto. I was too nice to say no and now he has my subway fare. 

Jordan Gets Thrown in the Deep End

Hello hello hello. So my name is Jordan Shereck and I am Sheridan Animation Intern Number 3 at Smiley Guy studios this summer.

So I've been here for two weeks this far and it's been a lot of learning and funtimes. Getting put on productions right off the bat was a tad daunting for someone who hasn't had any experience with puppet animation before, but I guess if you sit in front of something long enough it slowly starts making sense. Slowly.

It's super nice having other fellow interns to pester, and the folks who work here are just incredibly helpful. I find that it's so much better to have a specific question to talk about, so actually having things to work on that actually need to get done have proven themselves an excellent gateway to questions and learnimation.  I've always been more of a "drawing type" than an animator, but working on flash animation has given me this very sudden hyper-awareness of the concept of timing and spacing, as evidenced in these panels detailing my recent late night breakthrough:

 

 

At this rate I might actually get my walk cycle done some time this century.

Jordan's creative file names