Animation Mentor Week 7

Tailor Ball Animation from Matt Long on Vimeo.

Here is my assignment from week 7 of term 1. The assignment was to have the ball and tail rig named Tailor, hop around and show overlap animation of the tail within 75-120 frames. So I made it harder on myself by introducing a second Tailor, and making one chase the other for a more interesting scene. I'm fairly happy with how it turned out, I wish I could have a few more frames though to show the big one's reaction after it leaves the log, I'll just let your imagination come up how that goes, for now consider the end a camera cut to the next scene which will never exist.

Animation Mentor Week 6

Pendulum - Animation Mentor Week 6 from Matt Long on Vimeo.

Here is my work for Week 6 of Animation Mentor. Overall I'm pretty happy with it, though there are things I would have liked to have done with it but couldn't due to the 200 frame limit. Even now, I had to cut off the first 3 frames to get the ball and the pendulum off screen (except the tail thing) at the end. So most of my time was spent hacking up previously animated stuff and trying to figure out how to do similar things with less frames.

There wasn't a sketch assignment or pose for this one, and there isn't one for next week either. We have the one legged ball or the fox tail ball to animate for next week, we get to choose so stay tuned.

Animation Mentor weeks 4 and 5.

Weighted Ball Bounce and Obstacle Course from Matt Long on Vimeo.

Here is my animation from week 4 and week 5. The assignments were a heavy and light ball bounce (no squash and stretch enabled on the ball rigs,) and a ball capable of squash and stretch bouncing through an obstacle course. Both were limited to 120 frames. The obstacle course took longer than I anticipated, it's difficult maintaining those arcs and not going through the geometry while making timing and spacing adjustments.

Week 5 had a sketch/pose assignment due as well, we were supposed to show somebody feeling devastated. It kind of looks like he lost an eyeball now that I look at it, I should add one to his lower hand.

Generator Rex Premiere

The show I've been a part of for almost a year now as a production assistant is gearing up (pun not intended) for it's big premiere this Friday the 23rd at 8:30pm right after the new Ben10 premiere. Generator Rex is a really ambitious show and we're doing things that you don't usually see in American TV animation, like slow motion action sequences, hand-held camera type moves, detailed anime-inspired BGs, licensed music from a real band and more. So check it out.

You can find some stuff online already, like there is a free music video of the theme song on iTunes available right now: Link

Here's a promo that's been available for some time now:

My First Animation Mentor Assignments - Meet Stu

I am now in week 4 of animation mentor. So far everything is going smoothly, some pose assignments, bouncing ball assignment, and some sketching have already been completed. This week we have a light and heavy ball assignment. Here are what I've turned in so far.



This was my week 2 assignment. This is Stu, the assignment was to go sketching on location and take one sketch and pose it out with Stu. The top one with the basketball is the one I turned in for credit. The bottom was just an extra one I did for practice and now I'm liking it better than the one I turned in. Oh well.
These are my poses for week 3, the assignment was to pose Stu expressing excitement. and below are the ball bounces I did for the week's animation assignment. I did 4 total, here are 3 of those, the last one is the one I turned in for credit.

Ball Bounce Exercise from Matt Long on Vimeo.

A new journey

Today was the first day of Animation Mentor for me. For the next 18 months I'll be taking part in this journey trying to build a large body of work and learn how to improve my animation and hopefully become comfortable with Maya for once. I discovered trying to animate on my own that I really need hard deadlines to force me to get my butt moving and finish some work, back to school I go :)

My mentor for this first term is Raquel Rabbit who's site and reel can be found here: http://www.raquelrabbit.com/ we'll be meeting with her for the first time Thursday.

So stay tuned for regular updates again with some work-in-progress videos (It's about time!)

Something fun

Over at Firingsquad.com a computer tech site I read, they're running a contest where you use screen captures to make a comic explaining how the new DirectX 11 technology will effect you using your favorite game characters. I took it a bit further and drew in the characters to get them situated how I want. So I've come up with this. Voting is over at http://www.firingsquad.com/matrix/cluster.asp/91 you need to register to rate the entries.

Oh, and go see Princess and the Frog if you have not already. Help bring back traditional animation.