fae_alba

Now that is sweet!

I see this in Papa Bear's near future!

I'll note that this is a bit more specific effect and rather different than rain-drops on a pond. To do this right we would need to know what the shot is and be certain it's not going to be changed. The special effects you see in movies are designed for the the shot that is planned. Everything about he camera location and angle and lighting are known before had so hey can build the effect to work in that circumstance. Haven't gotten that far in storyboards yet. But the basic scene is bright sunlight, wooded stream... but enough of this ... we need to get back to your original post!

Not to usurp Robert's thread, but yeah. I have a scene in the animation being story boarded right now of Papa Bear fishing. What I need is a lure hitting the water and the ripples (and splash) generated from the lure.

Master Holmen, I never responded to your invitation because I am already a lucky owner of the DVD.

Rain drops falling into a puddle, causing ripples.

When this community project was started I volunteered to do the production work. That was a while ago. Too long ago, and for that I apologize. When I originally got the submissions (from five of you) I was struck with, in my opinion, a problem. While the submissions were great in their own right, they didn't come together to tell a story. I had the sense that, if put out there in the wilds for all to see, if tagged with Rear Window, by Alfred Hitchcock, there would be some flak received over the fact that, other than the set, it really didn't have a plot coming close to the movie. So I set about devising some animation of my own that I could stitch into the submissions to give it the feel of Hitchcocks' film. I think it would work, and be able to show case the work that these five submitters put into the project. My issue came about, when between job changes, life in general, and my weakness in animating, I started to put off getting this project done. This has left me with a serious amount of guilt, to the point that I told myself that I won't work on any of my other projects until this one gets put in the can. So that brings to this post. I've attached the five submissions together for you to view (without sound for the moment). I'd like for you, in particular the folks who submitted their work to Rear Window, to come together and decide, is this enough? Is it enough for you to just put this together, with sound, and call it a day, or would you rather see it with a story line to give it the Hitchcock feel. If your vote is continuing to work on it to get the feel I envision, then I'd need some volunteer to help out with the bits I envisioned to tie it together. It really comes down to 5 quick shots, with stock characters. I have a simple script, simple story boards etc. for the animations I would need. While I'm looking for feedback, I am not looking for debates. Just give me a sense (particularly those who put the work into the submissions) of what you want to see. sample.mov

That process Rodney, is something I've been trying to get my around for some time. With the projects I'm working on I've dreamt of building a team or project approach to do just as you suggest. Be interesting to see Will's characters put through the ringer in this way.

Man that is a nice landing page! Looks great.

It's the journey that most often teaches. But this topic has turned into a conversation between you and me, which we already had! Where's everybody else?

Point taken. We need to develop that then , along with a library / list of courses being offered outside of A:M, then don't we?

Is there anybody within the A:M community who could teach/mentor the same or similar topics?

Rodney, I really think that between the "A:M Foundation", the "money round robin" idea, of mine, And all of your efforts (as well as many others) in TaoA:M all fit into the same grand scheme of things. To me, the real goal is to foster a greater sense of learning A:M, providing an avenue for those members who wish, to contribute to that learning (and earn some level of compensation in doing so) and in so doing, improve A:M in the industries eyes to some degree to boot. Providing a robust learning center is not a trivial task (as you well know), for that reason providing the means to compensate the teacher for their efforts will make that effort seem, hopefully, worth while. What I had envisioned was along the lines of employer paid education benefits. The producer of a short needing help, pays the benefit to a student needing some learning. In turn the student agrees a level of servitude in helping the producer with his/her current project. Hell, I'd be the first "producer" to pony up the dinero to send a student in need. We just need some teachers!

This idea, as they say, "has legs to it". Consider this; A) We have here in the A:M community several very talented folks who rather enjoy guiding, teaching, etc. an all aspects of what it takes to build a quality animation with A:M. Whether its modeling, rigging, materials, lighinging, whatever we have a deep talent pool here. Now consider someone who has a project in mind, a story to tell, but, wisely, realizes that they don't have all the skills necessary to pull off a quality timely project. C) Now, also consider, we have a broad array of folks here who are talented, and dieing to learn A:M to improve their skill set so they can, mayhap, tell their own stories. Now, let's put the three of these together, and say this: The folks who like to mentor create a loosely knit group of teachers in a sort of A:M university. They have set dollar amounts that they require for one on one mentoring in given subject areas. The bloke with the project in need of talent, connects with forum members interested in helping out, but in need of guidance to hone their skills. B offers C the $'s needed to hire A for a given offered A:M course. C agrees to take, and complete the course, then when done, use his newly learned skills to work on B's project. This gives group A incentive to continue to offer their knowledge and earn a modest income to boot. Gives group C the means to learn A:M and improve their skills. And Gives group B a talent pool of skilled, knowledgeable talent to get their project. The money circles the community, stays in the family, with the added advantage of supporting, improving and growing A:M.

I now there was someone who lives/lived in Springfield... Vance maybe? We do have several Chicago denizens (and while he hasn't been seen in ages David (he wrote the book)Rogers use to hang his hat there. The Tinkering Gnome and Jeffrey (Zayrin) Bolle are a bit farther to the north in the Milwaukee area (I need an excuse to visit family there). Den Dotson lives close to me near St. Louis. All we need is a reason to gather. Actually, the next time Hash Inc is in Chicago (is the Chicago Comicon/WizardCon still hosted there?) that's a likely place to meet. Since you (Paul) fly in and out of IL from quite a distance away I suspect you don't care to travel a lot once on the ground. I sort of missed the gist of your original post Rodeny... You're more interested in "how can we help fund a project" versus "how can we get a project funded"? correct? There might be possibilities. Perhaps if seed capital were made available to create an initial project, that could be used as the "flagship" model for A:M projects, then income made from that could be used to fund the next. There's a couple of real big issues with this, primarily, who manages it? Fiduciary responsibility is a big one, not lightly taken. I have other ideas, but they are a little more self serving, so I'll refrain from airing them here. A comiccon trip is a cool idea, but you're right Rodney, once my wheels hit the ground in Springfield, my job owns me from 8am to 5pm Tuesday thru Thursday. Mondays and Fridays are always travel days with my flying the friendly red-eye skies.

First, let me say it was a pleasure spending (several) hours with Rodney. We covered just about every topic even loosely related to A:M. It made my week in Springfield just a little bit more tolerable. As an aside, anybody else who might be in that particular area is welcome to join us the next time around (I'm scheduled to be back the week of August 18th). Now to the subject of grants: Over the years I have looked into grants for the arts, and at least in the U.S. are incredibly tough to come by. Primarily because most are funded throught the national endowment for the art (http://arts.gov/grants/apply-grant/grants-individuals) . At looking at the site, grants for individuals (non matcing) is $25,000, and is limited to literature. If you are an organization, then funding for film projects is possible. In searching the site (NEA) of funded film projects since 2000, I find that most were for film festivals, museums, etc. It doesn't look, from this grant avenue at least, it is likely to get a film project such as we would put together, doesn't have much of a chance of gaining funding.

I guess I'm too set in my ways. Looking at that thing makes me head hurt! There's no way I could get used to working with a device like that since it is so in grained in me to simply mouse to a command button, click. I have a hard time remembering keyboard shortcuts let alone shortcuts from another device..

All I've got to say, you got it done. The next episode will be better (in your eyes), and the next one after that even better. Like Mark, you sir have raised the bar for the rest of us A:Mers. I'm not one to offer critique, since my animation talents are not up to snuff in my own opinion, so whatever I said just simply wouldn't hold water. As for other's opinions let me shre the advice that I always gave my daughters as they were growing up: "Don't respect the advice of those you don't respect." If you value the individual offering up a critique, well then listen to them and learn. If not, take it with a grain of salt and move on. As a famous meerkat and warthog once said, "Hakuna matata"! Bask in the glory of a job well done, and be God get busy on the next one!

Will, my daughter does a decent job at generating soundtracks digitally...If you have the need still I can put it to here.

I like robcats idea, even if it is an honorable mention and a pat on the back. Actually it would be cool to hear how every image fared a comic con, not just the top three.

the mesh free approach is what I have now. The issue comes when perhaps your character decides to wear a sleeves shirt... What I need to decide is if I can for see Papa Bear needing this flexibility or not.if not then I can change shirts by simply changing materials. Certainly an easier method to manage.

Or...Which Approach is Best for Wardrobe changes. When i started the first iteration of Papa Bear I knew he was gonna be cloths wearing bear favoring this wonderful, quiche tropical print shirts (his tastes favor mine, surprisingly). So I modeled him wearing a shirt, still uncertain how to go about changing the decaling on the fly. In rigging I discovered that it was a real pain in the neck trying to get the setup right to prevent the arm mesh from overlapping the sleeve. The solution at the time was to simply remove the mesh from the arm where the sleeves were. Fast forward to the latest contest where I wanted Papa Bear to wear a vest, instead of a shirt. Go figure that presented problems since he hasn't got any arms! Again a quick fix was to leave the shirt on, reduce it's mesh down to be close to the body, color it the same as the body, then add the vest. It worked because I was only interested in a still, I'm sure if I were to try and animate it all sorts of problems would present themselves. I did learn that applying the vest as an action object worked nicely. But again as a still that's fine, but I'm still unclear who to set up a rig so that when animated each article of clothing performs as expected. I'm toying with the idea of backing up a step or two, replaceing the mesh on Papa Bear's arms, rigging without clothes at all, and perhaps adding a series of bones in the shirts and body that can be constrained so that when the action is applied, like magic all works well. Gonna take some serious experimenting, and if anyone has any wild suggestions, let me know. Chow for now from Bear Land!

I hadn't planned to be in Springfield but... if you are going to be there I might just make the trip. Will you be there and free any time on Wednesday (earlier preferred) or more optimally Thursday (anytime)? Tuesday (anytime) might also work well. The important thing would be to get together if even only for a short visit. You might then say, "Good grief, I never want to see THAT guy again!" Rodney, I will be in lovely Springfield from Monday afternoon through 4 am Friday morning! Lucky me. I'm usually out of the clients office by 5 each night, but might be able to duck out a tad earlier unless there are meetings that get scheduled (they tend to pop up like weeds in your yard). I'm sure we can find a time that works.

that makes it 4 am my time....which is when I will be stumbling out of the rack to catch my first flight of the week. Anyone gonna be near Springfield Illinois this week?? First rounds on me!

Good luck, Paul! Oh I'm sure there is much better talent out there than mine, but it's still a good excersise to put it together. Actually learned a bit on the way too, so I already won!