A little extra

Soon I will post my newest leica reel which now has sound!
It can be pretty hard to direct a sound designer when your project is constantly in flux and I'm lucky to have such cool people to work with. Right now I'm enjoying the melodies and compositions they have come up with but there are a lot of places where the sound really has to be pushed or pulled back. i feel bad they they worked on so much and then I'll have to tell them I want next to no sound in these areas. It's their first time doing music for a film so I don't think it's easy for them to understand that no sound can be at times more powerful than none. But at this point it just feels great to have some working sound going. It has really helped people understand the tone of some areas that I was having issues with...i.e the ending. The ending is supposed to be simple, not happy, but quietly hopeful and it was hard to portray that with my imagery alone and the sound really hits the tone right on the head.

So anyways once I revise my leica properly I will post the reel for you to see.

I have been animating more which is awesome but I realized I ave to make another puppet on a smaller scale. So that will be work I can do over x-mas.
I have been held up by other class projects so I haven't had as much time to animate as I would like to.
Here are my last two motion graphics projects.


I am Harry Potter. from Daryl-Lynn Ramsay on Vimeo.

and


The Final Countdown Rainbow Rocket! from Daryl-Lynn Ramsay on Vimeo.

also here was an experiment with particles to see what a potential opening credits sequence could look like. Sorry for the crummy resolution.

My favorite teacher is Mr. Mistake.

So far in my years at school, teachers tell you to do things and they say why and you absorb it and tend to agree because it's logical and makes sense but maybe you don't actually completely understand. Because there is a huge difference between hearing and experiencing. This is what I find my Fourth and final year at ECU is all about.
For example.
 We have spent months perfecting our stories and really focusing on pre-production because it is the foundation for the rest of the work to come and it needs to be strong. Logical.  And yes I understood this, but I saw myself getting overly anxious about my workload and needed to begin animating and I see this urgency within my peers now. So I set my leica reel aside, chose a piece that I knew wouldn't be altered and began animating. Now I'm in this weird spot. I have gathered some momentum with my animating and it feels good and I'm really enjoying it, but I feel like I'm lost and can't continue because I didn't SOLIDIFY my story or fix my timing. Now my sound designers have a leica reel that isn't properly designed and I have to back track a few stages to rework somethings, and lose the momentum I have gained.
This isn't something I regret though. I can be particularly bullheaded at times, and I know that I needed this kind of mistake to teach me a solid lesson, and I really do want to gain a better perspective of my film before I continue on half blindly.
Is it better to listen to the people who know best and just stick to what they suggest, and maybe never run have into these types of problems, or is it best to fumble your way around it and learn for yourself even if it means making some critical mistakes?

D

OH MAN I STARTED

Hey you
Wanna see a previz of my film.
I have begun animating. I will have to reshoot the first section of this because the lighting is off and I didn't realise that she got darker as she moved into the scene. BUT I am excited because it's quite tricky to make her turn around because I have to replace her body and I think I did it well!

Now that i have started animating, all of my intense fears have gone away. All of my shaken self-confidence in my animation ability has flown away too. It feels great and I forgot how much fun I actually have animating.
So even though I'll have to do a re-shoot I feel excited about it, not down. That's awesome.

What I have here is a very quick color-key job so there are some things that need to be fixed, but I literally just pressed a button to make sure it was working ok.  If you look closely her cheeks key through a few times. The tech at our school suggested that I try using blue velvet as my "green screen". I think that sounds like a great idea.

Getting ready for the leap

Well, the step from pre-production to production is pretty nerve racking I must say. I spent a lot of time yesterday almost animating and then not and waiting for technical issues with lighting/greens screening etc....by the time I had worked up the nerve to dive right in one of my bulbs blew. So  just went home.

I do have a test runcycle. I always forget how slow it takes to aniamate even a fast motion! I had to slow my test down considerably so that is was readable. There's some quirks  because I had to adjust the timing in software but I think it's pretty good for the first try.


Untitled from Daryl-Lynn Ramsay on Vimeo.

I've also taken a picture of the multi-plane that I'm working on

eeeeee

Well today is the day.
I officially start production today. I'm probably just going to get through a test run cycle butthat's good enough for me. I've been having some problems with setting up the lighting for the "green"screen.... it's blue now.
One of the things I have noticed about puppets is just how much SPACE it takes to animate with them. You need your rig or stage and then the lights surrounding it, space for your extra parts and your computer then room for your body etc. The room I'm working in is tiny so there aren't a lot of options for moving the lights around.
It's exciting but I'm also very nervous. I'm quite clumsy and twitchy so I don't know how animating a whole film with puppets will look in the end, but let's hope it's great.


I will post some photos or tests up as soon as I can.


Cheers
D-L

Ouch

it turns out that cutting out probably about a hundred puppet pieces is quite painful for your fingers haha. I still have more to go too!
The good news is, that if I just power through I can start animating the film on Monday! I am very stoked about this. VERY!
But I must admit I'm having some qualms about my story. i feel like something needs to change, but I'm just not sure what, so yeah. That process is still in motion, so I'm going to animate what I do know is solid and keep on a truckin'

Puppet photos!

Here are some pictures of my puppets.
I wish I would have documented the entire process, but you never think of these things when you're really into something, do you?

The aftermath of my work station..well this is more middle math I guess

Two sizes! (no hands yet)

crude running pose, but you can see how her skirt is now working!

1st prototype vs the new one! What a difference.

Close up on her face

Close up of dress. I love the texture of the paper!

Updated leica reel

So this is my most recent Leica reel. There will be some tweaks (especially in the timing) but this is the general idea that I'm going for.
I'm really looking forward to getting some sound added in.


Run Leica reel v5 from Daryl-Lynn Ramsay on Vimeo.

A good attitude is so important

You know, I have been struggling a bit lately.The stress of 4th year and the pressure I am feeling about moving on after school has caused me to lose confidence in my abilities not only as an animator but as an artist in general. Sometimes it can be so hard not to compare yourself to your peers, and I just feel like I'm not at their level, or the level I'd like to be at.
Then it seemed like everything I tried was failing and I just started to spiral into this really self-defeatist attitude.
this sort of thing doesn't just affect me badly but it affects my relationships as well and I can tell it was starting to weigh on my boyfriend that I was coming home in a horrible mood everyday... not to mention the fact that it has totally stunted any motivation or creative energy I had.
So I promised myself and Rodger that I would force myself to be positive instead of cracking under the stress. And behold! I solved my puppet's dress problem, and stress-free created a working prototype that I think is beautiful. Now I can finally see a glimpse of the vision I had in my head. And all because I just made that small effort to relax and try to enjoy what I am doing.
Animation is just too tedious and hard not to be loving it while you are doing it. You'd go bat-shit-crazy.

The thing is, that you can have everyone around you being supportive and telling you that you are doing great, but that doesn't matter to you if you don't agree with them.  So do yourself a favor, I guess haha.

My camera is dead at the moment but there will be pictures to come very soon. I am so close to being able to begin animating!

Puppets

The past few days has been spent making puppet prototypes.
I gotta say it's very hard on the back, I have to stoop over my table and get really close because the wire and joints are so tiny.

I'm also having difficulty with using a dress. I've always had my characters have pants on and the dress thing gets really tricky when my character makes very wide movements with her legs...like running, which here will be lots of...obviously.
I can up with this 3 piece skirt thing that could work, but there are a few problems with it.
a) the puppet is getting really bulky in the hip area and could create shadows when I have it lit.
b) the skirt pieces and the legs (5 pieces in total) are all working from the same hinge which can make moving some pieces without disturbing the others really tricky and I can't really have more hinges in this area.

Another problem I didn't consider was that when I draw I tend to cancel out hard edges so when there are bends in elbows and things I make them very rounded and stylistic. I can't do this with the puppets and I'm worried it will conflict with the replacement puppets I will be doing at times which are previously drawn. The contrast may be cool though, who knows.

Fail

Today I has half of a front-on run cycle completed when my foot unplugged the computer.

I suck!

Texture tests!

Now it has been really important for me to include texture on my puppets. I must admit I have become a paper fanatic, it's borderline financially crippling, which just goes to show how geeky I can get -.^
My biggest fear,however, is that there will be too much of a shimmer/boil. Sometimes my puppets will be hinged and sometimes they are replacements. This means that sometimes they will boil a lot and sometimes not very much at all. So this is a concern for me. I'm not sure if it will look cool or not. I have been comforted by a wonderful instructor that sound will subtract a lot from this effect but nevertheless it will still be there.

Here is a very rudimentary test I have done with two different paper textures.

paper Texture Test 01 from Daryl-Lynn Ramsay on Vimeo.

paper texture test 02 from Daryl-Lynn Ramsay on Vimeo.

A big issue I had was lighting. I just shot these with a reg camera in the kitchen. So let's assume they will be a bit better in better circumstances.
What do you think? Would you be very distracted by something like this or would you enjoy the texture?

Tests!

I have been working on tests lately. I'm actually fairly rusty with animation (especially hand drawn) after this summer so...you know... not everything is looking its best, but it's a start! and it's getting the ball rollin'; re-kindling the love affair.


  

So out of practice

I have reached this point where I am constantly freaking out at everything besides what I need to focus on. This week I realized just how out of practice I am in regards to drawing animation. I spent almost all of last year doing puppets and tactile techniques to the point where now that I need to draw something I forget! It sucks haha. but i'm back to practicing.
Here is an example at an attempt at a run cycle that looks like something I did in first year haha. I didn't animate the head or concentrate on the body's up and down... I was just trying to remember how the legs worked in general haha. I tried to start with a head on one but even then I had to resort to this sad profile view.....and it's still not so great haha. At least this one is working a bit..the other attempts I couldn't get past the contact drawings.


This has taught me that I really need to draw more. A lot more

Story

Making a compelling story is very hard indeed.

Marketing

I've gotta say that one of my biggest anxieties at the moment is finishing school and starting the process of marketing myself in the real world, for a real career. It's scary stuff.

I've been working on designing a professional yet interesting resume, and more difficult yet, a business card. It makes me wish I had taken a design course while I had the chance.

Who knew that choosing fonts would be so difficult....

 

Here is a prototype for my business card.

What do you think?

DL

My first post!

Well, I can't say that I'm new to the blogging thing but it has been a while.

I'm very excited and a little scared to be making my first film ever. It's going to be a paper cut out animation about a girl named Jamie who is trying to escape her family members.  They take the form of giant monstrous head that spew razor sharp letters at her.

 

This is Jamie.

 

Her grand-ma

 

And her mother. There is also a step-dad/ father figure but I haven't got his design down yet.

 

The character design has changed but this is my main piece of concept work.

One of my biggest challenges so far has been trying to remain connected yet distancing myself from my subject matter. This story is based off of my experiences as a teenager and it was hard to deal with the story when things were to literal to actual events. When I was first fleshing out the story I was very emotional about everything. But I have figured out a story line and characters that are now just inspired but my life and almost nothing is a literal representation. Figuring out this process has been really great for me and allowed more possibilities for the story to evolve.