With this exercise, we are to animate a character doing a lip-sync based on our friend’s audio clip.
Research/references:
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I filmed my friend as she was speaking and also filmed myself as my reference for how I wanted the character to move.
I initially interviewed my friend and she told me that her favourite animal is a panda. Thus, I thought it would be a good idea to animate a panda wearing a human’s skin. I then began my character design process and drew the key moments.
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After, I imported the audio file into TVpaint and started animating. I was advised to get the body acting done first and see whether it works before adding in the lipsync part.
I had some problems with perspectives with the hands since I’m not too familiar with foreshortening. I took a video and pictures of myself for better comprehension.
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EX1_Lipsync_References_Pictures
After getting approved by my teacher, I then started adding in the lip-sync part.
I tried using a candies bag to do foley but it wasn’t as effective as the sounds I found on the internet. After I added the lips part, I then imported the video into After Effects to add sound effects and to hold a frame longer when the panda smile.
Reflection from class:
I found this exercise challenging because I had a lot of extreme movements that I needed to pull off so it took me a long time to finish it. I ended up having so many different versions of the animation just because most of it either have bad timing or I didn’t hold the frame long enough according to my teacher.
I usually feel rushed when it comes to animation so my animation has a lot of things fast-paced.
I have learnt a valuable lesson to hold the main key frame longer for the audience to understand what’s happening.
Stop motion TECHNICAL WORKSHOP (31st of Jan): Charcoal Animation
We had the chance to use an application called IMGPlay to film our charcoal animation on paper. After getting the hang of it, we then moved on to doing a self portrait.
For both of the exercises, I wanted to explore something creepy and unsettling so I thought of guns and ghosts.
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Reflection from class:
I had a lot of fun today although it was messy. I didn’t have enough rest the past few weeks so I found the exercises challenging as my brain couldn’t think of what to do next. It seemed that I ran out of ideas or the class so I was extremely sad.
Still, I enjoyed doing charcoal animation for the first time in my life and thought that the results were pretty fine for my standard.
I would highly recommend planning hard before drawing anything since it was a hassle for me to erase the charcoal to draw what I wanted.
Life drawing (2nd of Feb):
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https://at.tumblr.com/bt-noodles-doodles/life-drawing-on-2nd-of-feb-2023/bimzkqmcwrov
Reflection from class:
I struggled a lot with today’s life drawing class. Mainly because I have never really come across a model with this type of body and didn’t know how to portray what I see on paper.
Hence, I focused a lot on the ‘beans’ and how to construct the movements in the hip and bottom in general.
I wasn’t particularly happy with today’s results but I’m glad that I understand how to assemble the ‘beans’ more and will apply this knowledge for a future class.
Overall reflection week 14:
This week has been horrid because I felt like there are a lot of unfamiliar and complicated things that I tried which pushed my comfort zone a lot. It made me doubt my abilities and whether Animation is something that I want to pursue seeing how complicated things are.
However, I am grateful that all my teachers and friends are supportive and willing to give me the advice to head in the right direction. Hence, as of now, I still enjoy animating and experimenting. I look forward to next week’s class.