Taxonomies Complete

I forgot to mention in the previous blog that I have also exported and published the final presentation in .WMV (Windows Media Video) as well. So there will be a few different versions of the presentation to choose from. I have included a folder containing all the research and preparatory work used for the project, except I did delete most of it by accident. But I managed to recover alot of it so there will be something there to see. I have also finished my 500 word self evaluation report / rationale for my project.

Taxonomies Project Finished

I have finally just finished my taxonomies project and I am happy with it. I feel that my choice to do it on "Things To Love And Hate" and the topic being about fruit was the right choice to make. It gave me many ideas and allowed me to be more creative using the tools that I chose. The project was created in Flash and all the tiny bits of animation in it is what took so long. Every inch of animation was time consuming. The images were also created in Photoshop and exported out to Flash. The file dimensions according to the submission requirements have to be 720 x 576 in a .avi format and I have made it that. I have exported the taxonomies project into various formats such as: SWF, HTML + SWF, EXE (projector), and AVI. The film is exactly 2 minutes long according to Flash and I have timed it with the windows clock as well. I had alot of trouble importing sound into Flash and using it as it would not allow me to export or publish with that track. So after trying for many days to figure out what was wrong I decided to export and publish the project without the sound on the SWF, HTML + SWF and EXE versions. But luckily I was able to sort out the sound for the AVI finished film which is actually the most important format. The music was created by DJ Supreme who is a friend of mine and local DJ who graduated from Cardiff University with a degree in music. I was going to create the music myself as mentioned in the previous blog, but I was having alot of trouble with that and decided to get my track made from scratch from a professional.

Taxonomies Final

I am finishing up with my taxonomies project and I am happy with my choice. Taxonomies is a classification of things into groups based on similarities of structure or origin etc. Basically another word for list or category. So my idea for my taxonomies project was to do "Things to love and hate" and I chose it to be about fruit. I don't like all kinds of fruit and since they are all very similar in structure and origin I thought that would be a great idea. I need to add audio to it so I am probably going to make my own soundtrack to it using my casio and other musical equipment I have at home. It's been a fun project to make and I look forward to seeing the final result. I have been creating and animating it in Flash which is why it's taking so long to finish, but the effects will be worth it.

Taxonomies

The project is coming on nicely, I have sourced all of my images and I am doing some of the artwork now.

Taxonomies Project

For this project I have to develop a 1-2 minute audio-visual piece that portrays a taxonomy of things that are important to me, like things to love and hate, unpleasant and pleasant things, nice things about being old or even favourite and least favourite journeys.

The journeys part I will leave out as there isn't much to say there. I am very interested in the things to love and hate as I could go on and on about that. Unpleasant and pleasant things are pretty much the same as things to love and hate and then nice things about being old, well I can't think of anything really interesting for that one.

So that does it then, things to love and hate I feel will be the subject I will choose for Taxonomies MAN4_Pt1.

Learning Journal for MA Animation 2007/2008

This is my learning journal

Semester 1 and 2

2007/2008

I started this blog last year October 2007 but somehow my account was compromised and my blog was deleted. I don't know what happened but Blogspot somehow managed to remove my whole blog and everything that I had been adding to it. It was either them or someone else I don't know but I had to change my email address and my password to prevent this from happening again.

The assignments that I had completed in the first semester were, Drip Splat Boing, Lifedrawing, 50 Images, Timing Exercises and a 2500 word essay called "Realism in Animation", and a presentation of our work shown to the group which I couldn't complete as my disc was stuck in my pc and I couldn't remove it.

This second semester my assignments were, Group Film, a 5500 word essay called "The Media Reality" and The Body Exercises which I did in Flash. There will be an individual presentation again later on based on our experience of working in a group.

My role in the first project of the group film titled "Clayman's Crisis" was:

Photoshop Shot Compositor (aligning the stop motion shots with the 2D Pencils)
Board Builder (putting the new style boards together)
Tester (testing the board based animatic in Premiere)
Compositor’s Assistant (green screen removal and live action filming)
Original Clayman Model Creator

This project was cancelled and a new project was created called "Tooned In".

My role on this project remained the same as before and I worked in Photoshop changing all of the .png files to a higher resolution and removing the black off the computer screens and replacing it with a light blue. These .png files will be placed into Premier and added to the group film. The total amount of Photoshop files I worked on was 233. It took five days to complete and 7 hours a day. Each frame takes about 8 minutes to change and save.

I attended the filming which took place in room H1 on that Saturday with my group which included, Christian, Richard, Kieron and the Live Action Crew. Filming took all day from 9am to 5pm but I was only there for a short time as I was supposed to be the actress if the real actress didn't turn up. She did eventually and my role was finished but I stayed a while to watch and help out. The other work that I will be doing for "Tooned In" will be in Premier. I will be working with Paul if he needs any assistance.

The hand in date for the group film is May 8th before 4pm at AMD Desk.