http://vimeo.com/1747155
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0MqoLpUmPcs&feature=player_detailpage#t=14s
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Px69eKV5lWk&feature=player_detailpage
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IJ9nOX4wuIY&feature=player_detailpage
http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_detailpage&v=aat1TRzKTOQ
http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_detailpage&v=ZWnkNZp0lCY

walk refrences

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kkPxs7TAvJU&feature=player_detailpage

Im going to start putting things on here first and then putting it in order on my final blog.

Here's my first pass at my box and ball animation. This was when i was still just trying to find out how to use maya. I didnt know about univeral/object transforming, so i was stumped when i keyed a transform and then found that it was stuck like that all the way through. So i constantly fiddled with it untill I ended up with this mess and decided to start again. Ah well, atleast its funny to watch!

so after starting and re-starting my walk about 10 times- i'v ended up with this :) I know its slow but im going to change the frame rate later. I might also make some more tweaks to the hip movements and weighting- but im kind of thinking that i should start concentraiting on my charicter walk now.... hmmm 

  anyways i wanted to shoew this before i tryed to loop it and broke it lol :)

ooh this page has laods of cool stuff! i'v only watched afew vidoes so far, but it seems really useful ;)

http://www.facebook.com/#!/CGMeetUp

 

look how pretty! <3 i would love to animate some ballet at some point (a bit ambitious since I’m still struggling with normal walk cycles. but I’m sure it'll b fine lol)

 http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fNasQfLWPHo&feature=player_detailpage

I'm not sure how much it would be considered cheating to use videos of professional dancers as references (coz its not likely that i could take them myself lol XP) or if there would be copyright issues or anything :/

Another issue would be to make the animation believable- based on the movements of dancers that pride themselves on holding some pretty impossible positions! So I’m thinking, if i ever do animate some ballet, i should use some semi-professional video references. So that there still beautiful and graceful- but not super human lol :)

Entropy

Ok so im having trouble posting any of my work 4 some reason, so instead i'll distract you with things i found on the internet ;P

Just found a really cute 2d short called Entropy <3 made by students from Freelance Animation school in New Zealand.

 http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nwltCgkB6Pk&feature=player_detailpage

There are some really nice stylistic things going on here, and the theme tune’s pretty too :) I did notice some weighting and timing issues but it's awesome for student work (I’m gonna assume there in 3rd year :P)
I wasn't quite sure what was goin on at first, but basically, I think, a girl magically travels to the moon. Where she falls in love with the composer man who lives there; but has to leave when the sun comes up.
The unexplained magic space travel (via turning into wind) lost me a bit. I think it's a bit too much of a complicated idea to throw into a silent short, but it’s a nice concept.
Overall I thought it was a really nice piece, which is why I decided to share it :)

 I kind of took the wrong approach with this, and did a detailed sketch- rather than building a collection of poses. but I quite like the background, and the pose could be used for plenty of things :)

Life drawing class was really busy, and when the model did a lying down pose i couldn't see from the back.  So I drew the people on the other side of the room instead :)

 

 I particulally like the girl on the right. She has a nice curl to her fringe. But I did find it quite hard to get the anatomy right, drawing the crossed legs under the sketchbooks.

 I think theres a nice selection of poses here. My favorite is the guy sitting with his legs really far open lol.

 the far left is probably the nicest sketch- but im also quite fond of butt girl- she really should wear longer tops with those leggins lol :p

 Jesus Nerd! We did an exercise to sit and draw the same person in various poses. Our group chose some guys playing with Magic Cards in the SU (Mucho nerdy!) because they looked like they would be there a while. One problem was that they didn't really moove much thou. Sying that- i really love the "flicking his hair back like something off of baywatch" pose! <3 Jesus Nerd!

 These are some more sketches from a cafe'. i really like the two girls in the top right corner. There so expressive- you could clearly see that they were cold an tired at a glance. i also like the possable braking up couple, felt kind of sorry for them thou.

 I quite like all of these tbh. The guy leaning over the table could be good for an intimidating gangster type charicter. Also, i got quite a nice sequence of movements from the guy trying to sell something; and multitasking guy was pretty cool :P

last but not least- burly guy and high shorts girl. i wanted to do some more poses of them flirting but they leaft :(

Rusalachka/ La Sirenita (Little Mermaid) another Russian Animation (1968)

 http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AV6ZX4govdE&feature=player_detailpage

Once again. I saw something pretty and couldn't resist sharing.

I couldn't find any versions of this in English, but you don't really need it to know what’s going on. This piece is beautifully stylized, and the waves in particular are so simple and effective. The only problem I had with it was the lack of depth, between the waves and the ships mast, when it was sinking. But its still awesome! :)

"Seasons" Pretty Stop Motion by Ivan Ivanov-Vano

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mG-FziMRum0&feature=player_detailpage

I've been thinking about a fairy-tale, winter scape setting for an animation lately- so you'll probably notice a theme in the stuff I've been looking at ;)  my favorite part is toward the end (at about 4.50) if you want to skip ahead.

This is a lovely old Russian stop motion animation (1969) by Ivan Ivanov-Vano, visually representing the music of Tchaikovsky's seasons.

Ivanov-Vano uses stop motion along side scrolling multi-planes, to moving through ethereally beautiful seasonal landscapes

Its a bit jumpy, and I couldn’t find a version with better quality, but the scenery is so beautiful! The beads, antique Russian lace, Viatsk toys and Tchaikovsky's  music combine perfectly. But unfortunately, while it looks aesthetically gorgeous, there isn’t really a narrative to speak of, and the doll characters seem a little too lifeless. All in all, though, it's still well worth a watch :)

.

 

The three inventors (Les Trois Inventeurs) by Michel Ocelot (1980)

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9r98ctMmolw&feature=player_detailpage

I love the idyllic atmosphere of pretty much all paper animation. The media is so delicate and crisp that its automatically beautiful! This is one of my favorites. From what I've heard, Ocelot hand cuts all these intricate patterns into embossed paper- if you dont find that impressive, you obviously havnt tried it ;)
Apart from it being lovely to look at, theres also just so many nice litte ideas in there. I havnt found a version with subtitles, but to be honest I dont really think it needs it.
Now, I don't want you to think im just raving about how awsome this is- so i'll add some criticism- i don't really like the superimposed birds over the hot air baloon, but it is cool that he experiments with difforent media becase I really like the way he uses fire at the end.

P.S If you like this, you should also check out- well his other work obviously :p
theres also the work of Su Blackwell. She mostly does still pieces but she has afew nice videos, and she had a beautiful feature in Vogue afew years back.

Thers also The Invention of Love (2010) While these two videos have a similar motife they also contrast nicely.
The first is a tragedy inwhich the charicters are persicuted for their efforts to improve the world with technology. The second, a tragedy about a world inwich mans efforts to improve on nature is his undoing... can't win i suppose :p 

but If anyone wants help finding more paper artists I have tone of names in my little book of artists so just ask :)

Hi :) i'v never really done a blog before so... here it goes!