Return to Earth

[reason808]

Here is the link to the film I made for my grad shool application for MFA animation programs. I found out that I got into CalArts, still waiting on UCLA and USC.

 

http://www.michaelrobinson.com/returntoearth/

 

I've been hoping I'd be able to make this post for two months. I didn't want to post until the results were in, and good!! Some of you may have seen this thread

 

This is a pretty rough animation. I put myself through a 6 week AM bootcamp (with all sorts of great help from the forums). The Caveats are on the link - and man, there are a lot!

 

Since I won't start school for several months, I'd like to make a full fledged version of the movie to teach myself all the things I didn't have time to figure out. Like pose silders, IK chains, and especiallly better character animation.

 

Love to hear your thoughts.

[heyvern]

Excellent job!!!!

 

6 weeks! You should be extremely proud. This is amazing considering you had to go from 0 to 60 in such a short time.

 

The story line was very clear, and it worked well with the music. I can definately see you after some "skoolin" going back in and redoing it. Of course it has a lot rough edges. Don't even worry about that. It's the big picture that counts.

 

I won't make any critiques as you probably know the big ones anyway. It would be pointless to go into too much detail at this stage... it did its job.

 

Did you do all the shots in sequential order? I mean did you do the begining first and the end last?

 

I thought perhaps I saw a progression in the skill level from the beginning to the end. Forgive me if I am mistaken.

 

Great job and congratulations. You should do well with that kind of dedication.

 

Vernon "!" Zehr

[gschumsky]

Hey, 6 weeks isn't bad considering you had no prior 3D background, and you were learning the software as well.

 

My first foray into AM was back in 1996, using version 4. I had picked up AM to do some work on a national TV spot for a golf company, and they wanted it in eight weeks. That was a whole 'nother program at the time. No IK, no bones, smartskin, lipsync...nothing. First thing was to untrain myself from the work I had done with 3D polygon programs. In AM you had different components where you had to build your model, then cut it apart, then reassemble it in another component. Then you could open up the animation component. What a pain. I had to have 30 penguins for one shot. And, AM rendered slooooowww. So, I had to rent 8 Macs to do the rendering.

 

This is it.

 

 

So, in other words, I think you did a great job considering your situation.

[Rodney]

Bravo!

From zero to CalArts in 6 weeks is most impressive as is your music video.

 

It's easy to see the potential that the screeners saw presented in your film application. I'd guess the tight deadline probably helped more than it hurt too.

 

Now just don't forget to follow the words of that song and return to planet earth occasionally and visit those of us landlubbers.

 

I'm sure whether you attend CalArts or some other university you'll go far.

I guess what I'm trying to say is... Don't be a stranger!

 

 

*Addendum: Nice penguin advertisement Greg. Version 4 magic!

[reason808]

Thanks guys!!

 

Did you do all the shots in sequential order? I mean did you do the begining first and the end last?  I thought perhaps I saw a progression in the skill level from the beginning to the end.

 

Good catch!! I pretty much shot in sequence. I made the spaceship scenes in the intro first, and then spent a lot of time rigging the entire house so the whole set could break apart. Then I went back to my frantic animating. I did the titles at the very end and ovelaid them in Final Cut Pro.

 

I was unhappy with the intro animations. It was one of those things I thought would be easy since it was 'mechanical' spaceship motion, but it turned out to be very tricky, so I had to cut my losses and move on to other shots. I'll add fly-by animations to my list.

 

So, I had to rent 8 Macs to do the rendering

Man I remember those days, I tried to do a 3D cover image for my business plan in 1993 on a Mac IIci and after 2 days of rendering it still wasn't done!! Unfortunately, it discourged me from exploring 3D, and then the internet boom and bust distracted me further. I wish I would've had your patience, your ad was great, esp. given the tech at the time.

 

I'd guess the tight deadline probably helped more than it hurt too.

Oh yeah!! Although learning with a gun to your head isn't the healthiest way in the long run, it sure helped here. I've been taking it a little too easy AM-wise since then.

 

I won't make any critiques as you probably know the big ones anyway.

It'd be great to hear from an outside prespective. Yeah there's some obvious stuff to improve, but I'm a little too close to the project, so you might notice some less obvious things that I didn't. It would help with my 'skoolin.

 

-mr

[heyvern]

My advice would be to not even look at this for a long time. Months and months.

 

When you do go back to see it... it will look like someone else did it. Things you never noticed will pop right out.

 

As for imediate critiques...

 

Well the obvious ones are...

 

More secondary motion. Characters shouldn't freeze solid.

Lip synch of course... sheesh! That's going to be a lot of work.

Smoothing the joints on the models. Either fan bones, smart skin or weighted bones/CPs.

 

And one big picture kind of thing. Camera moves and angles. I don't have a specific suggestion for this, just think about some possible dramatic camera moves on some of the wider shots rather than a hold from the same spot.

 

For instance when the house is disasembled... man! That would look so cool if the camera could pan around and in the house as it is pulled apart and float away.... You could have the characters visible during this process as the parts drift away....

 

That is directing though... you are the director and will probably learn better and more at school than my feeble attempts.

 

A lot of these things I noticed starting to come through in the last section, when the woman goes up into the space ship. It was almost like you hired a new animator there. Definate change in quality. Some of the "acting" improved as well as the lighting and composition.

 

I won't kid you and say it was ground breaking but it is obvious at this early stage you have the potential.

 

p.s. Great penguins Greg! v4! I am impressed. I am working with a golf client right now. They chose a dog as their mascot... I may get to do some AM stuff with it for the web site! At least a dog can have arms and hands to hold the clubs properly...

 

Vernon "!" Zehr

[reason808]

Thanks for the additional comments. The quality shift in the interior spaceship scene, isn't that noticeable to me, but I'm too close to it, so that's why these forums are so helpful.

 

At that point I was using a lot of slo-mo in Final Cut to strecth out the scenes. I also animated most of those shots with only a day or two left. Does that mean I should always animate with a deadline gun at my head? Yeesh, that doesn't sound like fun. I suppose that's the biz.

 

You're right, when I was building the desinegrating house scene/model there were some pretty cool camera angles, I may try and find a way to work them in the final version. I wanted to keep the camera moves pretty conservative so the focus would be on the character's reactions.

 

I'll eventually start posting my experiments for the "real" version of return to earth in the WIP section. I'm looking forward to learning the advanced aspects of modelling to make the joints smoother, the clothes better, and the faces come alive.

[KenH]

There were great camera moves in there. Also, was it just me or was there some "well expressed emotional bits" there also....Definite potential in you young padawan.

[reason808]

awwww. thanks, particularly about the 'emotional bits' - one suprising thing I learned from making this was how much expression you can get out of a pose. I didn't have enough tech skills to animate the faces, so I had to rely on the angle of the head & neck, and body. I was pleasantly suprised that I could get some emotion with just poses.