Weights, waiting and experimentating

Here's my weight lifting exercise:


I think over all the animation could be smoother, I did use a lot of double-frames to make the slower movements less 'twitchy'.
Another problem, after looking back at the finished animation, is that when he stumbles to the left while lifting the ball (numbering my frames on these videos would make doing this analysis easier) he doesn't seem to put enough weight on his right foot. I don't think it's too noticeable, but it bugs me. Might fix it.

When this guy strains, he doesn't sweat like other cartoon characters, rather, he vents smoke/steam from 3 volcanic pores on his face.
The smoke went really well. You'll probably have to watch it again and just concentrate on it, but I think I nailed it pretty well. I used a mix of single and double frames, and I tracked individual 'pieces' to make sure it all flows and decelerates properly. If you look carefully at the second plume as he picks the ball up, some parts are double framed but are overlapped by faster pieces.
It was quite difficult keeping mental track of them all, and while it was a completely unnecessary detail, I'm glad I got more smokey practice.
You can never have too much smokey practice. Crazy fluid dynamics.

There were some preliminary sketches; character designs, storyboard etc. But seeing as my (extremely expensive) scanner at home is busted, I'll have to wait to use a uni scanner.

Up next, the experimental stuff.
I made a quick storyboard in PS to fill in for the one in my sketchbook.

(The gullet sequence was inspired by this piece of work we were shown. I think everyone was inspired by it.)

I fell in love with this visceral idea straight away.
Seeing as my last pixilation/stopmotion outing was a lovely cute little thing, I want to balance it out.

Here's a quick test of the black arm veins.


I think it went pretty well. I quite like the untidy nature of the capture, it adds a sort of madness to it. It's just black biro, and I drew over it with every frame, so older veins got thicker. I'll have to stop my arm from rolling next time.
I'll have to try the bacon next.

Finally, my head model is close to completion.
It's also REALLY creepy.

The texture is a planar map of the reference photos. Once I finish the model I'm going to make a proper composite texture.
I hope the Dead Space head modeler does a better job than me.

Lastly, in case you haven't heard, Aardman did a miniscule little stop-motion animation called 'Dot'


The entire short was shot on a Nokia phone.
They used a new system whipped up, called 'CellScope' to help developing nations' healthcare.
The full article is here.