Audiovisuals, Winter 2014

Here is a sequence of audiovisuals collection. I've been working on it throughout the winter for a couple of events. At the moment I'm thinking how to integrate digital painting too... I'll share some test results at some point I think. Thanks for watching (:]

Little Pet

A piece of old work I got permission to share very recently. Zombie pets. A project intended as an augmented reality game extension to physical pet figurine.

 I have taken one of the designs through 3D character pipeline: modeling, UV layout, texturing, skinning and rigging.

(press the image below to see the virtual model using your mouse)

The following short video shows the puppy animated. I have created various lengths animation cycles for each body part. Essentially it is a looped animation, but because cycles are offset it isn’t repeating itself identically.

Animation Reel

I have compiled a separate reel to give examples of my character animation.It showcases both 2D and 3D animating skills. I am hoping this is just an initial reel and I will be able to go back and refine some of the animation sequences.

J.J. *Jolanta Jasiulionyte* Animation Reel from J.J. *Jolanta Jasiulionyte* on Vimeo.

The Baltic Pixie Animation

Pixies are charming fairytale character, different in Celtic, Germanic and Baltic folk stories. 'The Baltic Pixie' is an animated short presenting an intricate and ambiguous Pixie character from Baltic culture. The queen of all the pixies , Laumu Laume Vaiva, introduces her kind as inviting, yet dangerous creatures and it is revealed what gifts they’d bring and how dangerous they might become to an everyday man.

Vaiva's Animating Progress

First week of animating has finished, so far I have 18 seconds of animation. Here I add a short glimpse to Vaivas introduction animation. To see clean shape deformation it is rendered out as AO pass (ambient Occlussion)

The rest of planned animating time ( 2 weeks) have the rest of 70 seconds…. However it is far from bad news. Usually getting into animating and solving those last rigging problems, which appear only when controls are used intensively, do eat some time.

Also, I thought this is an interesting fact: A standard length of completed animation per animator, in studios such as Pixar, is 1,5 min maybe 2 min …per year (!) … I suppose therefore everyone in CG Arts who’s in this task of bringing their characters to life during the relatively short time we have left , should take this fact into consideration and in a way have realistic expectations.

Lastly, I feel fully in the mindset for animating and thinking with the character ( Vaiva now appears in my dreams too ) And it seems that couple of scenes are asking for slight modification to work out audience’s distancing to and from the character better.

Vaiva's Controls Test Animation

This is an exercise of Vaiva’s body animation controls. The animated sequence has only some indication of her character, however I was more concerned with learning the workings of her rig and warming up.

 

 After this test I see that some controls work very closely together, so it means when using a particular handle it would only work correctly if couple of others go with it, for example: her feet controls work together with the middle ring of the spine, which is responsible for the skirt and the avoiding of leg/skirt geometry clashes.
  Also, great consideration should be taken to create organic and feminine animation instead of something closer to Ivan the Bird – clunky robotic animation :D However I have great belief in acting reference I am filming at the moment (with some struggle taken to borrow a camera from Universities resources for photography students). Lets see how it will work :]

Wrap up and Result of D Commission

3 weeks ago I have been asked by Iceage Musics Limited company to create ident animation.  It was a kind of one-man-band type of commitment s o I was responsible to coming up with the presentation idea after they gave me guidelines what they want to see in it ( re characters and environment) , designing, producing, animating and making a soundtrack.

The time was also quite short, only 4 days for everything. So it was least 14 hours a day.. But was worth it! :]

 The project was enjoyable and the pay  too . I totally enjoyed being the director designer and animator of a professional assignment and I could totally see myself doing something similar in the future :]

WW Character Presentation Video

Here is compiled character presentation. I chose to show characters in contrast to each other: how obviously different they are in modeling , texturing approaches, and how the time-lapsed animations also embody that difference. To solve some funny perception issues (they looked like about to sniff each other) I have posed the characters slightly differently and increased the distance between them, Hopefully that does it. As for soundtrack, I Used Dave Keefe's earlier soundscape tests.

Wolves Run Cycle Animation

The animated sequence presents both wolves trotting. I’ve laid out the base animation which will be pulled for scenes. The second pass of animation will be done once they are put within the environment and the particular situation. The key achievement in these sequences are the proper use of the animation handles so there is no twitching anymore. Also and again, Muybridge’s photo sequence of dog run cycles were invaluable reference source.

Ormie The Pig (2011) by Arc Productions

"Ormie is a Pig, in every sense of the word. Pig see cookie. Pig want cookie. But they are out of reach... or are they? Ormie attempts to gain the warm sweet taste that is his obsession. "

Arc Productions present an animated short which is a fantastic example of character animation. A pig is trying to get a cookie that is all you see for entire 3 minutes. But precisely because the animation is figured out down to every frame, these 3 minutes doesn’t seem to bore the viewer.

Simplicity in the art direction and editing would be another thing to note. Only what and when it is needed, perhaps this was the key aim: aqua-paint-like background and merely the objects the character is interacting with; story is told mostly in one long take and camera facing front.

Ormie the Pig is quite a charming piece.

Presenting Ivan the Bird by J.J. *Jolanta Jasiulionyte*

It's finished. And I don't have words in my pocket to describe the joy for having done it or the gratitude for all the help...

Transcription Crit: Project's Work; Entry 1

As it was said on the crit, The animation isn't finisedas a product. However, arguably, what has been achieved in ten weeks frame is pretty satisfying.
Like the bird himself, the 'mish-mash' of the story is presented in the following video:

Letting it Loose and Inspection

Before I started animating the scenes I once again prepared the dope sheets/production sheets, as all the past animations, in particular trailer's project,  showed how they can really help to ,manage and improve the production of animation. The head is free from little bits of notes to remember, what in my case actually doesn't happen, I forget the little ideas :/
These are few examples:

Sheet 1/10

Sheet 3/10

 This is the little modeling I do when there isn't an opportunity to focus on some more serious tasks such as animating. These objects will crowed the workshop.

Also the basic representations of other mish-mash models are being prepared. I'm planing to render out a still image of these mish mash models staged in the workshop and  in basic white lambert shader and then paint in the colour and texture . This still image would then be connected with the actual 3d scene.

The still render will give me the precise perspective, shadowing and shapes to work with.

Shiball

The next in the pipeline is the scene of Ivan reacting to the window and running towards it.








I'm animating with the soundtrack uploaded to the timeline. And here also music suggested the sudden change of Ivan's body language where all of a sudden the bird forgets his confusions  and lets loose towards what he's attracted to.



the bird reaches the window and inspects the new. Again he is only assured he wants to reach outside, but has to come up with the way to overcome the first obsticle - shut window. He comes up with an idea after he sees the little lock.

These two videos were yesterday's and today's animating. I'm taking the time there. But these scenes are a great warm up before the much more complex animating still waiting ahead.

The Attack of 50 ft Alien from Toyland

Weight lift Animation: Key Poses and Inbetweens

A professional approach to animating a character was presented last week. When having an idea of an action to be animated, it is vital to find appropriate reference, which you then analyze, edit and stylize.

When uni was shut I found the files of weight lifting video and character in my uca and figured its another homework task, much like lip synch, where we had to build animation ourselves. So I gave it a go and animated weightlifting using the first rig.

The result is as follows. ( refinement needed)

But when we came back Alan actually had tutorial prepared, presenting gnomon way of animating. So I gave it another go. So far this video is a result of key poses and in-betweens.



I  believe there will be a refinement stage and tips for thatin third week's tutorials. Because I would continue on refining the animation...Only that it is time to bring our own characters to life :/

11 Second Club Lipsync

“Finished” my second lip sync. But actually it now feels that truly it’s rather  you choose the moment when to abandon it.  Animation like anything else really showed the  numerous possibilities of  acting out the same information. It was a great fun to do this, and hope other ones I make will get better and better.  

For this one the goal was to get better acquainted with the facial rig and try use it but keeping it controlled, avoiding any over-the-top expressions. Also I tried to capture the expression suitable to the voiceover.

Intro to Lip Syncing

When I'm sad

A peace of brilliantly stylised animation. I particularly enjoy the repetitions, the colour palette but mostly how smart the state of a sad person is portrayed.

The Life Cycle of Slime Mold

Animation Test: The Last Scene

First of all, I haven't finished the animation, I just stated doing it from the end to the beginning :)
Its a test of render and settings, because it was beginning to be hard to understand how it's going to look, because renders of still shots couldn't show how fluid the lighting will change or the bump map (all the setting were key framed). I had to animate this settings because a) there is a "secret" hidden from viewers then revealed, b) there's a huge contrast of scale and its showed in ongoing camera movement.

I don’t know.. It’s too bright. I might fix it in After Effects or rerender it... I used spot light rig from Alan's bonus tutorials, but I guess the angle has to be shifted, or yet other types of lights, because now it's looking flat... :/
Also , there should be an illusion of amoebas moving slightly , at least while the camera is relevantly close to them and wee still are aware of separate units of amoebas. I’ll definitely discuss that in aftereffects lesson.

So. . . lots to be fixed.

The sequence here is very glitchy, sorry for that :/