I call it. . .

So now there are things moving and scene changes. I call that progress.

http://vimeo.com/40636514

It's got style.

So this is an introduction to my final film. It shows the style for the rest of my film.

http://vimeo.com/40199367

Ruminating. . .

Um, wait. There's an easy part to animation?
There are always things that are easier than others, but most things that seem easy either a.) weren't really done right the first time or b.) got easier with practice. As for right now, for me, it's not really that animation is crazy hard or difficult to understand, it's that it takes a lot of patience, thought, and time in order to complete a fun-to-watch well-crafted animation. I am slightly lacking in the patience category and completely broken in the time category which also affects my thought process. So if you were to ask me, animation is not hard. Learning animation is hard.

I have just finished shooting for my second animation film in which the only requirement was to create an object based film using stop motion. Stop motion is a time consuming process like all animation, but not only does it take a long time to create, most likely all the work has to be shot at one time. In my case, I made things even harder on myself because I chose to do a stop motion animation outside dealing with things like the melting sun and miniature whirlwinds. It was only a plastic bottle who wanted to be recycled, but by the end of shooting, doing the ending of the film was my favorite part. When I finish the film, you will understand. I have shot the film twice now and I hope to never do it again. That's another hard thing about doing stop motion is that if a scene isn't done right, the whole scene has to be redone because there's no way to go back. That's miserable.

Moving along, there are things that are easier in animation. For instance, creating an idea is easy. Anybody can have a good idea. The hard part is making the idea interesting to watch, but that's another story. The programs for animation now a days make creating an animation easy as long as a person knows and understands how to use the program. Once again, it requires practice to learn the programs, but the general idea for the programs are all the same which makes transitioning between programs and different types of animation much easier. For example, now a days it's much easier to make 3D animation blend with 2D animation or putting live action movement in an animation. I say now a days as if I was actually there, but from what I've heard about how it use to be done, I prefer the method these days.

Animation isn't as easy as a lot of people think it is. Most people just think that "oh, well you just draw a bunch of things multiple times and it makes it move. If I could draw, I'm sure I could do that." To those people, I just wanna say, "Can you draw a stick figure? Then make it move. And make it move well." Then, maybe, they would have a better appreciate for the movies they go see.

Progress Report on Recycle

This is the progress report for my second animation film. It is not complete. I still need to finish out the story, do my recording for the ending, figure out some sound, and adjust the pacing. Hopefully I'll have this all done by next tuesday. D:

This is the link to my progress. Just Recycle Me

The Learning Process

Learning animation is a process. A very long, time-consuming process that makes you hate yourself and your life until you produce a final product that you like. For my blog this week, I've been asked to describe the things that help me learn animation in my animation class and the things that might be hindering me. First, lets talk about the positive.

One of the main things we do in class that helps my animation learning is watching several different types of animations. Not only does this help me analyze what works and what doesn't work when working with animation, but it also shows me several techniques. It's through these animations that I have come to realize that it's not how complicated the animation is that makes a good animation, but it's the story and the intention. Now sometimes a movie can receive a lot of attention because of the technology or complex process used to make the animation, but in the end, it doesn't define whether the actual movie will be good. For example, Avatar received huge amounts of attention because if it's "breakthrough cinematic technology" but all in all, it's a pretty lame movie about Pocahontas. There was no real depth or emotional breakthrough in the film and it just seemed typical. In conclusion, the main thing to learn is that a good animation starts with a good story.

I've also learned more about using animation programs. While we don't actually go step by step into the programs in class, the videos uploaded online and the exercises required for class force me to learn these programs. While I have opted out of learning toon boom and I seriously dislike any 3D program, I have become very familiar with After Effects and how the program works learning about keyframing and timing, etc. The great thing is these ideas don't only work for animation and thus, I've also become a lot faster and more efficient in my video editing in non-animation projects.

There are two things that I find hinder learning in class. The first one is time. It's not anybody's fault, but I just feel there isn't enough time to fully grasp animation at the level I would like to achieve in just one semester. So it's a little disappointing that there is only one class offered at USC. Instead, I think there should be atleast three different animation classes, one covering theory, one covering 2D animation, and the last covering 3D animation. While 3 semesters is still not a lot to cover everything about animation, I think there would be a stronger development of skills if this would be possible. If only people would pay more attention to the art department. We have needs too. In addition, it's also a matter of personal time. Because of other classes and just not needing to spend my life in the labs ALL THE TIME, I don't have as much time as I would like to spend on animation. Yes, I know, that's a personal problem.

Secondly, I think it's just a matter of technical aspects. I have a basic understanding of the programs we use, but I know there are limitless possibilities of things that can be accomplished with these programs. I just don't know how to do it or where to start. I see a lot of great animations in class, but sometimes I don't understand how they were made exactly. A lot of this will have to come with time and doing research outside of class, but once again time is against me, and also procrastination with a hint of laziness.

All in all, I do really enjoy my animation class and its probably one of the only classes I'm taking this semester that I actually take seriously.

Reception

The official viewing for my first animation film happened this past Tuesday. I must say it was pretty terrifying waiting for my turn. My professor can be quite intimidating, not because what he says isn't true, but because what he says is like a slap in the face. But in a good way. Like a slap-in-the-face that wakes you up and gets your head on straight. Nevertheless, I am so glad I wasn't first. I'm one of those people that likes to see other people's work first so that I can kind of see where my work places. Knowing where my work is helps to prepare myself for what kind of reaction my work will have. Should I beg and plead others not to destroy it? Should I give a warning of terribleness before it begins? Should I play it cool? Those sorts of things.

Overall, I don't think my work was bad. Compared to some, I can definitely feel better about the effort I put into the work and the time I spent on it. I don't think the piece got very much reaction in class for a couple reasons. One, many of them had already seen most of the animation during progress day since I was already halfway through the piece by then. Two, I didn't have sound in my piece. I'll discuss this a bit more in a bit. And third, the pacing on my piece was a bit off. There were some unnecessary scenes and some scenes ran a bit long so the joke got a little distracted. By the end of the class period, my professor was not happy with the results of the animations. He did say that "most" had potential [I will not discuss the epic fail of the bat and the scarecrow, but my mind = blown. Not in a good way.], but there was still work to be done for these animations to be portfolio worthy. I agree with him. He decided to give us the opportunity to redo our first animation to not only receive a better grade, but also I think to give us the opportunity to show him what we've really got.

As for my redo, there are a couple things I plan on changing. First and foremost, it needs sound. I know it needed sound, but honestly I don't know that much about sound design. I haven't had that much experience actually building a sound envelope and I wasn't sure where to start. I was afraid the piece wouldn't flow very well and so I just opted out of sound all together. For the redo, I'm definitely going to tackle sound. I have a couple ideas to drag the piece along, but there are some moments where I'm not sure what sound to use if any at all. I know what I'm working on for my spring break. -.- My next plan is I'm shortening the time sequence in the piece. I portrayed the time piece this way because we're not allowed to have text, but I think the piece just got a little long winded and annoying. So I plan on fixing this issue. Finally, I'm going to take another look at the beginning of the piece and try to clean up the animation, change the point of view, and remove unnecessary scenes. If I can pull all this off, I think this piece should clean up very well.

As for my next project, I'm still at a lost really. I know what I need to do and I've managed to collect all the props I need, but since this is my first stop motion, I know I'm going to have to redo this several times. I also plan on putting sound in this piece the first time I submit it, but I'm also at a lost as to what the sound design should be like. I have a lot of work to do. So while everyone else is taking a break and going to the beach on spring break, I'll be home. Making animations. Yay.


BTW, here's my Scarred For Life animation completed. I forgot to post the final piece earlier.

Scarred For Life from Brandi Palmer on Vimeo.

Butterfly Wish

STORYBOARD TIME. Again. -.-

So for the final film, there are no guidelines. Scary. Originally this story was suppose to be inspired by a poem by Pablo Neruda, but as I went along the idea kinda morphed into my own thing. This story is about unrequited love with a bittersweet end. My idea is to create the entire piece with paper stop motion, but we'll see if I come to hate myself later for it.




And just in case, Google Docs decides to be stupid, here's the link. https://docs.google.com/presentation/pub?id=18iUxRk_NBjMiNm_4jEOf_5syIVuZmSpRwRFhB4gy_QE&start=false&loop=false&delayms=3000

Practice Makes. . .

What is my daily practice like? How often do I practice animation? What do I do to practice? How have I improved?

So I'll be honest daily practice doesn't happen in my life. Well conscious daily practice doesn't happen. I don't set aside thirty mins to an hour everyday to practice animation. I should. I should also write a paragraph a day, read a script, sketch, blog ideas, exercise and eat healthier, but I don't. I'm not really sure why I don't. Actually, I do know. I take five classes. Three media arts. One graphic design. Random history. By the time I finish doing the work I have to do for these classes, I don't want to work anymore. I understand animation is something I like to do and I should find great joy out of doing it, but it really is a lot of work. So by the time I finish everything else, I don't want to think about things. I just want to relax and enjoy some mind numbing tv and video games. I know this is just an excuse, but hey, I'm being honest.

I have had to practice animation. It's not like one day, POW, I'm an animation master. Not that I'm an animation master now. I'm more of an animation one time wonder. Anyways, I've learned things in class. I've watched videos about how to use animation programs. I've googled [I'm pretty sure that's a verb now] different animation styles and techniques. Then I just get to work learning how things function and what works and what doesn't. This isn't an every day occurrence, but I do practice animation. Like most anything you learn in your life, animation is about discovering things as you go. When I started my first animation, I had an idea of how I was going to do it and got to work. As time went on, I discovered some layering issues and things that I could have done differently that would have been much easier. So as I got toward the end of my project, I was a lot more proficient and the animation technique was smoother. I'm still not very good at animating objects. I spend most of my time trying to figure how things move and if this moves, what else would move? This is something every animator has to go through and it's really frustrating which is usually why I work scene by scene. I do a scene, take a break, do something/anything else, and then come back to do the next scene. This way each scene I have a fresh start.

On a side note, I do believe I practice animation everyday unconsciously simply by watching other animations. Ever since I started animation class, I find myself studying animations more. I look at how characters move and what's different depending on the type of show and animation. I watch how the compositions are different moving from scene to scene. A lot of the time I'm wondering how did they do that. I watch kids cartoons with my nephew and find myself analyzing the movements and making comments when something doesn't work. On one hand, this has ruined my animated movie watching experience, but it does help me become a better animator. I can only get better.

Making Progress

One week left until my first animation is due for my MART571 class. I'm not satisfied with the progress at all and there is a lot of bugs to fix and timing/animation to work out, but I have the basic process down. Long and tedious. Blah. Here is a video to how it's going so far. I have a week to make it much better. Wish me luck.


Progress - Scarred For Life from Brandi Palmer on Vimeo.

New Media

Earlier this week, I experienced the work of my professor, Simon Tarr (Quaknova.com). The most intriguing part of the presentation for me were the new media projects. This is probably due to the fact that I'm in MART 380 New Media class with Halverson. Since we've been studying different types of new media and we have to create a project for the end of the semester, I've become interested in new media projects and how they're made.

The glitch video, Interruptus, was an idea that caught my attention. Since it's made from interrupting the download of a video, I had never thought about even attempting that since usually my computer does it anyway and makes me angry. I never even checked to see what kind of effect it would have. I haven't ever really messed with glitching, but I've seen a lot of it since I started taking 380. My one issue with glitching is that the intent of the piece is generally based in the process and sometimes the final product has no relation to intent unless the process is explained. So I feel like in order for a glitch project to be fully appreciated, there has to be a description with the process. That's the only reason I tend to stay away from glitch projects because I feel like the final product should have it's own impact and then a description of how it was made should enhance the viewing process.

The main project I was interested in was the Waveform Art. I'm actually really intrigued by this idea and plan on trying to create some of my own Waveform Art for my final project. Now I just have to do the research to learn more about the actual process and what programs to use in order to get an interesting final product. For my readers out there who don't know what Waveform Art is, it's the use of the visual forms of sound waves to create an art piece. What's most interesting to me is creating the artwork and then converting the art back into sound based on the sound wave. Then presenting the sound with the artwork is really intriguing to me. It's like a visual audio experience.

The videos shown in class were also intriguing to watch especially the piece about Japan. I am familiar with the Japanese culture and was not surprised to see Harajuku in the video. A lot of people find it odd and weird, but it's a way of expression in Japan. Many Japanese students usually wear the same outfit every school day and can only express their individuality in the items they use which is usually why they have very decorative and creative notebooks and pens. So Harajuku station is a place where Japanese students can meet and show their creative side. I found it very interesting to see Harajuku shown as it's own "class" in the video.

So this blog has drifted away from animation in general, but I don't think that really matters. In order to create better animation, one should also familiarize themselves with other forms of art.

Recycle Me?

Time to start thinking about my next animation...but wait, I haven't finished my first one! Aisshhh. Second film has to be about a giving a concrete object human emotions. I decided to do a water bottle that wants to recycled to start a new life, but he just can't seem to get across the fence.

Why are you doing this?

Honestly, this question comes up a lot. Seriously. Srsly. Usually before I answer the question, I want to know what do they mean by "this"? This as in, why am I in media arts? Why am I not in business? Why am I breathing? Define this universal "this" because I apparently don't know the meaning of it. Usually asking for explanation ensues a lot of pointless hand gesturing and random word spewing. Then a moment of silence when they realize things have gotten awkward because they're not sure what they're asking either. I usually nod sympathetically because I've seen it all before. In my head, my sarcastic somewhat cynical mind says, "Why are you NOT doing this?" but I know this comment won't settle the matter. Then right before I'm about to answer this redundant yet somehow rhetorical question I try to discover the reason for the question. I've broken down the usual reasons in to three different categories. First there is the nonchalant curiosity. What is Media Arts? What can you do with it? I usually answer this form of the question with a standard, "Well, media art is about using different technologies, video, photography, web, etc and using them in a artful and creative manner, something, something, something."   They usually nod having no clue what I'm really talking about and continue about their day never thinking back on our conversation ever again. Second there is the cynical sneer. What could you possibly do with this? How are you going to find a job? You're life is MEANINGLESS. To this people, I don't even bother wasting my time and usually respond with "Eh, I'll figure something out." They usually mumble on about "waste of time" and don't bother to take me seriously, but I don't take them seriously either. So it's a win, win. Last there are the people who express honest curiosity and it's too them that I write this blog.

I've thought many times about why I'm doing Media Arts and what I can do with it. I was first drawn to it simply because it contained everything I enjoyed and wanted to learn about such as animation, photography, web design, and video. Then as I began to struggle along in the classes, I began to worry that I was only drawn to the "idea" of Media Arts. The "idea" of working in the media industry working with the creative minds of the world and becoming someone whose name was recognized and acknowledged. I don't want fame. I don't plan on being a big director or some major star who usually get all the credit that the background people do. I just wanted to create something amazing and have everyone see it and be able to say, "I was a part of that." The problem is I haven't figured out what that "something" is. I can see myself doing media arts for the rest of my life, but I don't know how and I don't where. But really, I don't think that's a big deal at this point as long as I start somewhere. Taking Media Arts as my major is my beginning to reach an end. That's why I'm taking it. I don't know where I'm going or what I'll do, but I believe Media Arts will get me to what I want.

Confession.

I must admit. I am a bit terrified by my first animation piece due at the end of the month. The only guidelines for the piece said, "Make a 1-2 minute film about one of your scars. You may use whatever medium, method or style you wish, and you may interpret "scar" in any way you like. Do not use music or text." Ugh. As stated in an earlier blog, while I have an artistic ability, creativity is not my strong point. I usually focus better with a more solid direction. I thought about this topic since I read about it the first day of class. I had no idea where to take it or where to even begin. So like I usually do when I don't know what to do, I put it at the back of my mind. I let it settle there and sizzle a little bit so that I don't dwell on it, but it's always there in case I come across inspiration. This usually helps calm my nerves, but it also encourages my procrastination. Week after week started to go by and I still couldn't figure out a reasonable idea. I was running out of time and needed something for the day of pitches. So my first step was to analyze the guideline literally. What scars did I have? I thought about it and thought about it and realized, I must have been a very cautious child. Never had a broken bone and while I had scrapes and bruises, they weren't anything long-time. WHAT DO!? Then I remembered this one time I decided it would be super awesome fun to rollerblade in the house. Ah, the good times. Long story short, I ended up scraped and bruised with a permanent scar on my elbow. While this is a story about a scar, I was interested in creating an animation about it at all. So then I thought about interpreting the guideline metaphorically. Everybody has emotional scars, but the problem was I didn't really want to make an animation out of that either. I was stuck in this endless cycle of boring concepts and now was the day of the pitch. Left with no other options, I decided to just stick with the rollerblade story to get through the class. Then I was giving inspiration. I was discussing my problem with a friend when she made a comment that stuck with me, "Scarred for Life". She went on into this crazy story about, well, that's another time, but it did give me an idea. Rather than a physical scar or an emotional scar, what about a psychological scar? This I could work with. I've always reacted deeply against scary movies. I can't and won't watch them. Ever. My friends don't even bother asking me anymore because they know my immediate answer. That's when I decided to make my movie about a kid's first experience watching a scary movie and the impact is has on them in later life. I really enjoyed this idea and when it came time to pitch the idea, my story was different than everybody else and I felt it could relate to a wide audience. Scar Story Idea: Success!

The idea for this animation is done, but the hard part has yet to begin. I just hope I can pull my self together to finish out this animation and the future animations to come. Wish me luck! D:

Scarred For Life

These are the storyboards for my first animation for MART 571. It tells the story of a child's first experience watching scary movies and how their future progresses.










And just in case the slide show decides to be stupid, here is the official link.

Never Too Old

Doesn't every kid's world revolve around cartoons?
Maybe it's just the power of good marketing, but I don't know of any kid who doesn't have a favorite cartoon character. Even in the new generation with the super lame why-are-little-kids-watching-this cartoons on television now, the kids that grow up with them can tell you all about them. My three year old nephew can recognize Scooby-Doo in an instant and even sing you the opening theme song. I was no different as a kid. Though my choice of cartoons were completely different [and not to mention much better], I found myself enveloped in the world of cartoons advertising my love all around me
.
When I was a kid I had no interest in reality TV or live action TV and the safest kid-friendly channels to watch were Cartoon Network and Nickelodeon. Being a 90s kid, there were several good cartoons that I remember watching such as Doug, Recess, Hey Arnold!, etc. The one cartoon character that made its way in to my bedroom and all over everything was Tweety from the Looney Tunes. I don't know where the madness began and I'm not really sure when it really stopped, but for a long period of time I was always surrounded by Tweety. I had the Tweety pillow, Tweety blankets, Tweety dolls, and Tweety tshirts. I was a walking advertisement. Warner Bros should have paid me for my marketing. Over time my taste in cartoons began to change. The first major change came with the introduction of Japanese animations on Cartoon Network with the original Toonami. It came on every day at five and I planned my whole afternoon around watching those shows. As soon as I got home for school, I immediately got to work on homework to get it done before five. Then I settled down to watch my Sailor Moon [the original], Dragonball Z [the best], and other such shows. I was really getting into these shows in addition to the Pokemon and Digimon explosion when my world ended.

No, really. My life with cartoons died. My parents killed my soul and got rid of cable. Oh, how I argued and complained. Due to this traumatic experience, my cartoon experience changed completely. In order to get my cartoon/animation fill, I turned to Disney movies. Our collection of Disney VHS tapes grew immensely as there was nothing left to watch. I did manage to sneak in some Dragonball Z whenever my gma picked me up from school and took me to her house, and I did get to look forward to Saturday morning cartoons. Yeah, I was the kid up early on Saturdays just to watch cartoons. My options were slim, but I still found time to watch what I could. Cartoons really drove my childhood.

As I am now, I still watch cartoons. I find myself flipping the channels to Cartoon Network when the classic cartoons are on and I will secretly admit that I know the theme song to Wonder Pets. I blame my nephew. >.>;;  I also enjoy Japanese anime every now and then. For a period of time, I watched atleast two hours a day worth of anime. This is to the point that I've managed to see every episode of Inuyasha [subtitles ftw]. I haven't really been able to get in to them anymore/have the time for them, but sometimes I will find a good one to watch when I'm in the mood.

From childhood to young adult..hood.., I have always been surrounded by cartoons and I don't plan on stopping anytime soon. Cartoons = <3.

Analog Vs. Digital: Let the Showdown Begin

Animation is not a simple process. I know and understand that, but my ignorance assumed it only seemed hard because I didn't know what I was doing or how to do it. So when assigned the job of creating a one hundred page flip book, I was overwhelmed with the amount of pages, but thought, "It's just a flip book, right?" I settled down to create this "flip book" expecting to spend two, two and a half hours. Tops. Simplistically, I could have just settled for a dancing stickman with a random bouncing ball appearing in the background, but being the overachiever, I wanted something more exciting. Since the flip book had to include a ball, my initial thought was to have a dog playing with the ball. Great. I had the general concept and even though I wasn't sure exactly where I was going, I had a start. The first twenty cards the excitement was still buzzing. Dog was cute. Idea was creative. Things were going AWESOME until the cards continued on and on and on. Never thought it could be so difficult to visualize a dog running. I was really regretting my over-achievement and just wanted to ditch the whole idea and just have balls bouncing around the cards. I struggled on. Four hours later and five hours tops, the flip book was complete.

Overall, the process of the flip book taught me several things. One, I never want to draw a dog again. Ever. Two, technology has made me extremely slack. Several times I wished I had a real-life copy and paste function so I didn't have to redraw the same sections over and over. Three, my respect for 2D animators which was already significantly high somehow managed to grow even higher. And four, there has got to be an easier way that I somehow missed. I hope.

Then began the struggle to make my "analog" flip book become an awesome looped digital animation. Having already experience the analog meltdown halfway through the flip book, my expectations of enjoyment for the digital translation was extremely low. Generally time consuming and irritating, most of the hard stuff had already been worked out in the flip book, so the digital transformation just required the tiring process of scanning each card, trimming to the same size, and cleaning up the scans. After that, all I had to do was use awesome After Effects and bring the images in as a sequence and VIOLA! Eh, well that's the general idea. The actual process is not so smooth, but once in a groove, the process can be done without much thought. I'm feeling much more positive about the digital work than the analog, but you couldn't have one without the other. Technically it all could have been done digitally, but the best way to learn is to begin with the basics and grow into the newer media outlets.

Now to just figure out what I'm going to do with my first animation video....

Dear Spring Version of Self:

It seems like you are under some pressure right now in your 371 class with all those weekly exercises, blog talks, and not to mention, your big animation short coming up which isn't even considered finished unless it's submitted it to a film festival. Radda. Radda. Radda. I know you're feeling panicked especially with all your other classes on your mind as well. You really do push yourself more than necessary to make sure you have that 4.0 GPA. So let me give you a piece of advice. What you really need to do right now, the best thing to do right now is STOP. Stop thinking about all these things you need to do. Stop thinking about how little time there is left. Stop panicking and getting absolutely nothing done. Stop, drop and figure out a schedule. There is always enough time left to get the job done, you just have to manage it better. Time management is really the key to getting things done and done WELL. On that same note, please, PLEASE, do not let your procrastinating self wait until the last minute. Get things done as they are assigned and save yourself from a lot more unnecessary stress. Also don't get discouraged. While we are artistic, we do lack the creativity to be original and mind-blowing. Your idea may not come to you immediately. It might not even come to you in a couple days, but it will appear and it will grow. Look all around you for inspiration. Take a look at movies, animations, the people in your life, books, anything and everything around you can be made into a story. You just have to have an open mind and not get frustrated when things don't happen instantly. True talent doesn't develop overnight. It takes patience, perseverance, and lots and lots of practice. At first, you'll stumble, but eventually your talent will grow. Talent can only evolve into something greater than before. But that's enough advice, now for some inspiration. Let me remind you why you're forcing yourself through all these mind-numbing, eye-blinding, finger-breaking torture also known as an animation film. This is your life. Remember that little tingle of excitement realizing your finally going to get to learn about animation, the one thing you've really looked forward to in Media Arts. Yeah, you were nervous, not really sure what you were getting yourself into, but the excitement won over of the nervousness. Maybe one day, you'll find yourself working at Pixar or even better, maybe, you'll magically learn Japanese and begin working with Studio Ghibli and your favorite animator Hayao Miyazaki. There are so many possibilities and this is where it all starts. The work you produce this semester will finally be something to spruce up your portfolio. Make sure to put your heart in to your work and take the extra time to make your film the best.  So just keep your chin up and keep pushing through. Do make sure that your animation video exceeds expectations. I won't expect any less from my future self.

Sincerely,
Your Super Awesome Self