Enter the Vector

Prior to the final render process, Paul Sinclair discussed with me the possibility of using a Vector render in Maya. He showed me how to change the settings in the render globals, and I was able to experiment with the vector render.

The Vector gave the drums a much flatter, 2D feel, which would compliment my film considerably better than a straight render.

For the final render, I used an area gradient with medium highlights and reflections, with a black hairline edge.

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Work What Kat Did

Kat Downes was signed off for 30 hours on Pinny Gig. The following are overviews of the work she did:

Animation Assistant: When work become too much, Kat offered to help with inbetweening my key frames. This was a huge relief, and helped a great deal, even just to feel that a weight had been lifted.

Kat inbetweened shot 13 (picking up sticks before playing drums) first. This was brilliantly done, in good time with care and consideration. She also shot the frames into iStopmotion and arranged the frames so that the pauses were in the appropriate places. The animation itself was lovely and smooth, I was very pleased with the outcome.

Kat then inbetweened shot 2 (hands picking up sticks) and 24 (guinea pig sitting back and thinking.)

Concept Artist: The following images are pieces of concept work that Kat produced for my piece:






Kat offered her services as a concept artist, which I was happy for her to contribute to. Her naturalistic style made a change from my very simplistic, caricatured way of drawing.  

I was pleased with the outcomes, they are good support to my own concept work.  It's good to get additional insights into my character as well.

Uphill Struggle

On reflection, my film is big. Really big. Too big, really. Really too big. Really.

And suddenly, I'm not sure if I'm going to finish the film. There's not just the animating to take into consideration, but the Maya side of the work, then the cleaning, the inking, the colouring, the editing... it's a huge project to be tackling alone. In a way, I wish someone had turned to me and told me that it couldn't be done when I did my first animatic which totaled 3 and a half minutes. Plus there's 80 hours worth of group work to complete.

... help...

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