AX3003: Notes from the Creative Festival

These notes were taken from lectures given at the Creative Festival, where the following animation professionals were talking:

• Tristan Oliver (Wallace & Gromit, ParaNorman, Fantastic Mr Fox)
• Simon Partington (Old Jack's Boat, Slumberless)
• Jean Flynn (Cosgrove Hall)

Gopher Golf: Golfer Shoot - Part #1

The first scenes to feature the Golfer were filmed this week. The Golfer was extremely tricky to animate as, sometimes, the puppet was easy to stand up, other times it wasn't. Plasticine was often attached to the feet to help the puppet stand up correctly.

I have finished animating the scenes which feature the Golfer walking - all other scenes now will rely mostly on his facial expressions. Two versions of a golf swing also need to be animated.

The Golfer, a key for his new home, two leaflets and a golf club will be the only "live" props to be filmed in these scenes. A golf ball will be added in later with After Effects for the golf swing scenes.

The walk was very difficult to animate as it was hard to make the puppet stand up by itself some of the time, but the challenge made it all the more fun to work on.

Gopher Golf: Finishing Touches to the Golfer Puppet

The Golfer puppet was finally finished this week, after adjustments had to be made to the measurement of the arms. This was because the arms were too thin for the hands and arms to fit, so they had to be re-knitted to be made wider.

The Golfer also now has a neck made of Plasticine, covering up the joint between the head and main body.

Gopher Golf: Gopher Shoot

Since amendments are currently being made to the Golfer puppet's measurements, and the Gopher puppet was finished a long time before the Golfer, it made sense to film the Gopher's scenes first.

These pictures are from the shoot for the Gopher's scenes.

Only the upper half of the Gopher puppet will be seen on film, so I was able to support the Gopher's posture by using the wires from underneath, to make him stand up correctly.

This is my first time using both Dragonframe and the Nikon D300 camera, so the settings were different to what I had used in the past - Canon cameras and the Stop Motion Pro software. Dragonframe was great to work with, especially because of its simplicity and having its own purpose-designed keypad, which meant I could operate the software's controls without leaving the set.

The Nikon D300 camera was more difficult to get used to at first. It took a long time to get the focus right and find out which lens was best. I had to make adjustments via Dragonframe as well, because the software wouldn't capture any images when the camera was out of focus. Thankfully the problem was down to the choice of lens - after this was resolved, the animation could continue.

These pictures show how the Gopher was attached to the set. The wires were moved to different holes when the Gopher was walking. The wires were also flexible enough to help posture the Gopher's main body.

Gopher Golf: Setting up the Shoot

These pictures show the stop-motion set for 'Gopher Golf' as it was being set up.

Every stop-motion scene in the film will be animated against a blue screen (not green screen, as the main character's clothes are green), so there was no need to install any backgrounds as these will be added digitally later. The animation software I am using for this process is Dragonframe and the camera being used is a Nikon D300.

Gopher Golf: Lip sync test #1

This video is the first lip sync test for the Golfer in 'Gopher Golf'. Here I'm testing out the idea of creating lip sync animation in Photoshop, but I feel like the styles clash here so I will likely use replacement Plasticine mouths in the final film.

Gopher Golf: Background Characters

These videos are short animations completed in Photoshop, showing the background characters for 'Gopher Golf'. These will all appear in one short clip of a crowd behind the Golfer, cheering for the winner. The characters will be in darkness as the Golfer is the scene's main focus.

Farmer

Old Man

Middle-aged woman

Young Man

Gopher Golf: Further Background Designs

Here are some of the final (and near final) backgrounds I have developed for the film 'Gopher Golf'.

These backgrounds were drawn out first, then rendered in Photoshop. These drawings lack shadows and fine details which will be added in post production.