For this weeks lecture we focused on how to structure a critical report. where we ask different questions like, hot to reference, how to use citations and so on. For this class we learnt a way of academic writing like paraphrasing.
Of course when we do our research we use different sentences/quotes from different articles or books etc. When paraphrasing we use the Harvard referencing system at the end of our research page. For this class we got given a Quote to paraphrase.
The Quote: The authenticity of a documentary is ‘deeply linked to notions of realism and the idea that documentary images are linked to notions of realism and the idea that documentary images bear evidence of events that actually happened, by virtue of the indexical relationship between image and reality’
Horness Roe. A. (2013) Animated Documentary. Basingstoke: Palgrave Macmillan.
My Paraphrase: Horness Roe. A. states that a documentary shows that images have to give us an understanding of the reality that is stated by facts. documentaries rely on the evidence of the event that occurred.
For this week we discussed about politics in animation and about animated documentaries. We were showed a few different animated documentaries. Where I want to use one for an example of this weeks question, Is it possible for animation to be a documentary?
the animated documentary that really caught my attention was the one called Ryan
This is an Animated short by Chris Landreth and is based on the life of Ryan Larkin. Ryan made a very famous animated piece for his time but unfortunately got caught up in a very bad addiction. to where he lives on the streets asking for money to support his addiction.
The animated short is a documentary about how Ryans life went from an animation artist to living for his addiction. As for the way it has been animated. you can really feel how life has been difficult for him and eating him alive through the animated short Chris made. You as a viewer feel the blurriness of the animation as how Ryan has been living his life as an addict. As far as for the question, my answer would be yes animation can be a documentary. Animation can give a documentary based on facts a shape. so that the viewer can really understand how life is for Ryan. As far as I think a documentary has to be based on facts and realism. But that just means that the story has to be real not necessarily what you see on the screen.
Qouted from Annabelle Honess Roe ‘The long history, however, of the hybridisation of animation and documentary, one that stretches back to the earliest days of the moving image, would suggest that, as in many things in life, opposites can attract in a meaningful way.’ Saying that it would be able to go hand in hand.
In this class we learned about different kinds of abstract animation and conceptual animation. As for the abstract animation it has the question: what kind of story tells the animation or film? The old abstract animations we looked at during the class were all quite different from each other. for example there were a lot that were made on to old film and where they tried to ‘play’ with different shapes on the film, layer for layer. But also a different method used was with stop motion.
At the end of the class we were told to choose an abstract animation that we know or found and tell something about the animation. As for me I choose one that also has a little bit direction towards my thesis subject.
I choose the Video mapping project Ollo done by content creator Mr.Beam this project was shown on the Brussel light festival in 2015
Mr.Beam – Ollo
Ollo is a Video mapping project created by Mr.Beam. It tells a story about 2 blobs (called Ol and Lo) who ‘wake up’ in a new environment, first wakes up 1 of the two and then follows the other. They discover the surroundings that have been given to them and play around. When the’ve seen everything they try to go out of their boundaries and try to adventure even further. But this causes for trouble and delivers them many obstacles. They work together as friends to escape these threads.
As for the Animation self: it has been video mapped onto a building where you can see they played with the different edges the building gives us. The blobs have to crawl around the windows to discover new areas. This is one of the reasons I’ve chosen this as my abstract animation. It shows a playful method of animation and gives you as creater a more fun canvas to play with.
Also for my animation thesis I want to do my subject about how animation includes empathy for the audience in many different ways. I think the animation Ollo uses a very good way of showing these emotions of the blobs while they discover the area. The small movements of looking around when they see something pulls you in as the audience. as well as when he gets stuck into the ‘glue’, as a viewer it makes you worried about how they will be able to escape.
Using the Quad draw tool close upusing the Quad draw tool imageThe end product of the use of Quad draw tool with live action.
week 5: For this week we used the Quad draw tool to draw polygons over an already existing face we got from Nick, We combined this tool with the live-action surface option. For this class, we focussed on the orbital structure around the eyes and the mouth and how to connect the different faces we created to each other. The images above show this technique we learned during the class, the blue polygons are the ones I created using these tools. The end product of the use of the quad draw tool is also shown in the images above. You see a little difference from the head we used to draw on. I completed the whole blue polygons on one side of the face and then mirrored them over the X-as to get a symmetrical face.
Example of using blend shapes
Week 6: We continued working on the face we modeled the week before, we pulled and smoothed parts of the face so I could make it look more like the way I wanted it to look. After this we got introduced to the shape editor tool, this tool helped us create different expressions for our modeled face so it would be able to for example frown or look happy. If you look you can see we used this tool to open the eyes of our face. A thing we also added this week is the eyes, since we are opening the eyelids with the blend shapes we needed eyes for in his eye sockets otherwise it would be hull on the inside.
For this term we have to create a hot air balloon festival for our nuke project, this project combines with our Maya course because here we had to create a hot air balloon that would fit in our own made hot air balloon festival. so in our Maya class, we started to work on our hot air balloon. we did this for 2 weeks with the knowledge we got from the other things we already created. Below you see the different parts of the hot air balloon created during the classes.
Balloontop rope connected to balloon
For the balloon and the ropes, we used the spline tool that we learned during the class we made the wine glasses. for the balloon, it is quite the same process as the wineglass itself. You create the shape that you want and then resolve around this. after you finish this shape you add some detail so you get the right balloon shape for your hot air balloon. For the ropes, it is a little bit more complex, yet you still need the spline tool to create the basic starter’s shape. At the top and the bottom of the rope, I added a loop and a few tubes to get a system that would be holding the balloon to the basket.
bottom rope connected to basketCoil
For the bottom part of the hot air balloon, we needed a basket that is connected to the balloon, this was quite a simple process with mainly cylinders connecting to some pipes that hold the basket together. and we added a coil with a gas tank for the realism of the hot air balloon, these were both cylinders where I pulled some edges and pushes some edges to create some extra texture. And we used the bend tool to create pipes going from the gas tank to the coil.
Coil to gastankBasketProcess of texturing the hot air balloon End product of the hot air balloon during class
For the hot air balloon we created during class I used a lot of basic textures to create the finishing look of the hot air balloon. Looking back on my hot air balloon I feel like it is missing a lot, it looks like a hot air balloon but it is really basic in my opinion. I worked really hard and fast on this balloon to keep track of the classes and be able to use a balloon for our nuke project. But I feel like I could do way better, so this is exactly what I am going to do. with all the knowledge I got I am going to redesign a hot air balloon and start from the beginning to create this balloon. You will see this in a later update on the blog.
