AN04 - Final Reel

My how time has flown!  I can't believe it but it has been a year and I am currently done with Animation Mentor!  

Now I say currently because when I started the Animation Fundamentals program, last September, the course was completed when you finished class 4 and class 5 and 6 were extra classes after the fundamentals track.  I'm going to stick with that frame of mind because it really reminds me of when I was taking my undergraduate courses at UCF where they would try to make you change you catalog year to be current but then it would actually make you stay in school way longer.  

Now I know that class 5 and 6 should be taken at some point because they are very good and useful classes, but honestly I do not have the means right now to take them.  I might take them in the future though, who knows!

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Well here it is, my final reel for both AN04 and Animation Mentor as a whole for the time being...

You may notice this, or not, but I did make a few revisions to my dialogue assignment before including it in this reel.

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I want to thank all of the mentors that I had the opportunity of learning so much from (Anthony Wong, Steve Cady, Steve Cunningham, and Joseph Antonuccio), they have taught me more in a year about animation than I would say all of my undergraduate years.  Thank you also to all of the AM community, they are so very helpful with everything!  I really want to thank my classmates as well as those who took me on as a peer buddy.  You guys gave me so many helpful critiques, were so supportive, and I'm so glad to have met all of you!  Last, but definitely not least, I want to thank everyone else who has supported me through this program as well as those of you who have just read my blog from time to time, it means the world to me!

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Well that was longer than I planned on it being, but I just think you guys are all awesome!  And don't worry, I will still be posting stuff on here even though I will not be in class anymore.  Have a great week everyone!

AN04 - Second Assignment Wk.6&7

Hey guys!  So to be honest, I forgot to make a post last week.  But to make up for that, you get to see both of my polish passes in one post!

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So first up, my first polish pass!  I went through all the channels of all the curves to smooth everything out in the graph editor.  I also cleaned up the mouth shapes and timing for some of the dialogue so that it looks more dynamic.

My mentor also noted that I could go through and make some nicer looking arcs on the arms and head.

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And now for this past week's pass of polish!  This week I went through the mouth shapes again and pushed some of the open shapes even more.  I made sure to go through the tongue animation to add a little extra finesse to the dialogue too.  Also, I went through all the curves again to smooth out any hitches in the graph editor.

All in all I think this assignment turned out pretty good for being my first legit dialogue assignment.  I'm not going to include the dialogue assignment I did in undergrad as being a legit dialogue assignment, that one was pretty bad, haha!

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Well have a great week everyone!

AN04 - Second Assignment Wk.5

Hello everyone!  So for last week we had to submit the second round of our blocking plus/first spline pass.  We also had to submit a dynamic hand pose for our mentor to critique.

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Here's what I submitted for my second blocking plus pass...

This pass was mostly me adding even more breakdowns to the animation.  My mentor also pointed out that he seems to be doing a lot with his hands so I'm going to simplify that this week and start smoothing things out in the graph editor.

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The dynamic hand pose I chose was one that is in my animation...

Again, my mentor pointed out some changes I could make to make this hand pose more dynamic, so I'll adjust it for this week.

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Also this week I attempted to use my Wacom tablet to animate...

Let me tell you, that did not last long, lol!  I was just so slow with it and I needed to be moving at a faster pace so I'm back to using my mouse.  I might try it again when I don't have homework due every week.

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Well I hope everyone has a great week, see ya!