Kimi no na wa (Your name)

"Your name" is such a beautiful film that I cried not only from the story but from the art and animations, the realistic art has an atmosphere that soaks you into a beautiful world. I can't express how much I love this film but I'm going to explain a few highlights of the story and animation.

The story is about a boy and girl living in different areas of japan going about their daily life than to suddenly switch places is a story that is good enough to have with no reason to add more but, the story not only develops with the characters switching but there are hints as to something that is going to happen. It all ties up together if you watch closely to some of the conversations and radio, it also includes bit of time traveling but this will spoil the film which I dont want to do in this blog.  The director Shinkai Makoto has made some beautiful films in the past but the stories end up being not understood, somone talked about these previous films "if you are getting board of the story just watch the animation because it's pretty." but this is not the case with this film.

Since Shinkai worked with  bunch of people he was introduced to through other studio's he managed to learn how to develop a better story which is evidence in this film, as it's been shown world wide and is making a lot of money at the box office.

The animation also worked really nicely with this story, I really want to cry at how realistic everything and I would love to get to a level where my observational skills can create something as good as this.

Here are a few examples of a animation I love in the film:

To be able to create something this amazing is truly a difficult task that I would love to under take and hopefully reach in the future.

MAF trip

Throughout the 3 days at MAF, I attended many viewings as I wanted to get the most out of what there is out there and experience the animations people create to show. I'd like to highlight a few animations and talks that caught my attention and what I learned from viewing.

A few animations that stood out amongst the others were, White Horses, The Red turtle, Cold Coffee, the Witch doctor, HSBC short, In other words, Invisible Barriers, Blue zoo VR, Phantom Boy, Modern love: a kiss deferred, Morph, Once upon a line, Mr Madila and various others which I could list, there were so many animated films that spammed over the three days that each showing/viewing had a few interesting animations.

My favourite short Animations were Witch Doctor, Modern love: a kiss deferred and Once upon a line as each had a particular take on creating animations. Witch Doctor focused on 3D animation, It's a music video that includes a singer in the middle surrounded by hundreds of 3D male figures going around him and interacting to his hand movement, here is a link. I'm amazed at how 3D animation is just progressing.

Modern love: a kiss Deferred animation was based on a real-life story. What really caught my attention in this animation was the way the story was conveyed through simple transitions of simple flat stills, it shows that you do not have to do much movement in order to convey a story. I loved the simple lines that shift around to express emotions.

The last Animation I mentioned above was Once upon a line, The reason behind what I loved about it lies in the way it showcases a story without needing any dialogue, it slowly progresses through the same pattern of a man going to work every day and how his life changes bit by bit. what this shows to us the audience is that we slowly begin to connect and watch this character progress, which was the entertainment and the purpose of the animation.

All the shorts were good in terms of the story, composition and audio that was conveyed throughout the each animation, and I could write a blog for each one but I'm only highlighting what I learned and what inspired me throughout the 3 days.

We the had the films we watched that includes The Red Turtle and Phantom Boy. I really enjoyed each film and not only for the story but how it was portrayed through it's medium,

Walking into The Red Turtle viewing I was expecting it to be a small preview of the film which turned out to be the full film, I'm not sure why the ticket had preview, but besides that, the film was absolutely amazing, Even though there is no dialogue we are able to connect with the main character as he develops on this island he got left on, each scene was composed in certain ways that it either focus on the background taking most of the shot to signify that they are bigger than him or placing the character in one of the rules of thirds point, which is important as it's a way to frame. I heard about studio Ghibli working on this film so I was expecting something from Miyazaki, One scene that felt like it was done by Miyazaki was the main protagonist flying on a bridge; the reason as to why I feel as though he did it was because of an interview I listened to about how Miyazaki loves the aspects of creating flying scenes as we see in most of his films, which was animated beautifully. Another aspect I enjoyed about this film was the fluid animation and colour palette that was used to keep the viewer engaged within the atmosphere the character is living in.  I learned a lot watching this film, such as how to make the audience engage with the character, how to place the character in a scene which the background can take advantage of, and to change camera angles within each scene.

Here is a gif of one scene that tells you everything that is happening within a few seconds:

The next animated film that I watched was "Phantom boy", this film explores a young boy that has a special power that has an effect on his body but allows him to become this kind of ghost that helps a detective solve a problem within the story, will this cause any problems to the boys body find out by watching it. I really enjoyed the story, how it connects everything together, for example, the meeting of the boy and detective was seamless. I can see how it was put together.

Plot:

Boy is already in hospital because of his condition

Detective crosses by the villain of the story 

gets injured from chasing the villain (plot devices to show the first failure and that he can't do this alone)

ends in the hospital where he meets the boy who helps him.

There are many other plot devices scattered throughout the film allowing the viewer to piece up everything to figure out what is happening which is what I loved. I'd love to make a story that not only progresses with the character but how they can meet in a way that does not cause the viewer any distress to figure out how they meet.  

The animation was an eye opener as it explored the world the characters lived in, which allowed the viewer to understand what the characters have to go through. The film's style is unique in that it is all done entirely with boiling point animation, this combined with the flat colours and lighting really suits the story.

Some of the viewings I entered were kind of disturbing and questionable as to why they were made, but everyone has their own opinions as to what they like, for example as everybody laughed at the short film about this teacher acting like a dog and then suddenly progressing into bad habits. It felt really worrying to think that people would accept such a concept, but I guess I've grown up to not respect such concepts.

but besides the viewings, I got to experience VR for the very first time. which was an amazing experience and it was interesting being able to interact with the characters within the animation, This was made by Blue zoo Hoodoo who also had a masterclass explaining the process involved in making the interactive VR animation. This opened a new world to me into the production of VR creation, they talked about how it started with an idea which was chosen from the team, the person who created the idea becomes the director and leads the team as to what is needed to be done in order to achieve what they wanted. They then went on to explaining the methods of animating, which seemed complicated as they had to draw out the whole landscape, here is an example of what I mean:

They stated that it was done by 4 perspective points on a horizontal line that works as you can see from the quick example I did above, the lines also curve towards each point. They then talked about the animating process, all of this is done in the sketching stages so that the team can quickly understand what is needed to be done before it's translated into 3D programming, every viewer is going to have a different experience, in terms of what they see as they move around the space, it's not possible to view everything that happens. 

It was a very interesting talk about the production and I would like to do something similar hopefully in the future if I get into VR animation.

I also went into loads of talks each talking about different aspects of animation and how the industry is developing with young animators, Aardman also celebrated their 40th Anniversary showcasing all the animations they created and how they got to the point they are creating stop motion animations. Other talks included people from studios such as Studio AKA who work on many projects, they also showed their work and gave advice on what to do when starting on projects, which I hope to adopt for the projects I will create this following year.

Like I mentioned above I could explain each aspect of MAF in single blogs but I'm only trying to give the overall view of my experience, which was similar to last year.

I'm surprised I managed to watch so much and listen to talks within 3 days, and I would like to try to reflect and use ideas from what I watched throughout the year, and I hope I could one day produce something for MAF.

Who am i, and where am i going?

Things that i learned on the program?

Communication
learning communication between animators is very important, because there is a lot to learn from people who have gone through similar situations or rather problems and have solved the problem which helps you develop and not commit that mistake, which I find very helpful and helps in that being in future conversations with other creatives, I will need to understand ad be prepared for such events.

Techniques of drawing
There are multiple ways of drawing, and throughout the course I've gone through multiple methods that involve doing studies of objects and I've also under gone the theory of many objects such as light and have different surfaces reflect which help me understand how things work.

Using different software
There are many software's I've learn to use throughout the program and this includes After effects, Photoshop, Animate and a bit of Premier. Also throughout the course I've discovered  other programs such as Clip Studio Paint which i find really good for painting and also animating in because they introduced an animation feature which is supposed to replicate the animation process that Japanese animators undergo since its made by a Japanese company.

Observational skills
This is similar to Techniques of drawing but rather doing more observational drawing, which i lacked at since and should of focused on, but I have progressed in learning within this course that it is important to look at real objects and study how light works in the atmosphere.

Collaboration of producing ideas
Being in a class of animators with loads of ideas has help me develop my own ideas and also improve their idea with suggestions to smaller ideas which could help develop their story or characters back stories. Making a story needs more input and development from people giving ideas to you which is what i learned throughout the course.

Things i want to know more about?

Special effects
I'd love to learn how to make special effects using programs such as After Effects and Animate CC. I want to understand the different methods that can be undertaken to make a scene look even better. Manually or rendered special effects is something that could help alot in my future projects.

Lighting and Shadows
Throughout summer i have been researching about lighting and shadows but am still inexperience in preforming or rather applying the methods i have understood from some articles to my concept work, I need to understand and try to figure out how to light and shadows work to make good scenes with correct lighting.

Uses of Colours
Digitally colouring my concepts/sketches is difficult enough if im not using a reference and can be time consuming. Colours are very important and can make a concept look completely different, for example mood of the drawing, is it tinted blue or red to make it feel either cold or warm. I want to understand colours because there are some many things that are important with colours.

How to make a business
Making money from my work is important aspect as a creative and I'd love to learn ways of creating a consistent flow of working and getting paid. Right now im conflicting as to what does well to sell from my work.

3D
As a 2D animator, i dont know much about 3D animation because it never appealed to me and i have found that it is important to learn as much as possible because there can be opportunities that could come up and I'd be able to create something if needed in 3D.

Skills that you think are your strengths?

Understanding movement
Throughout my life I've always been interested in animation and how movement works within the animation, most of the time its observation.

Details
Being able to spot if something looks wrong in an animation is a nice skill to have, as it would help when was asked by anither animator if something looks wrong in an animation and id be able to give them some advice as to what looks critically.

Perspective drawing (free hand)
Since ive been learning and understanding perspective for the last 5 years i have come to a point where I'm able to free hand perspective and it being almost correct when putting a perspective grid on top of the drawing. Im still learning and getting quicker at drawing landscapes.

Idea generation
Having ideas is important but being able to generate and link ideas together is something i like doing, being able to make connections and getting some sort of story from the main ideas help develop animations.

Knowing how to solve software problems
Understanding programs abilities and how to help to make the animation better is important in that I would know what is needed to solve or rather create what is needed, there are many programs all with their own features that can benefit learning in some way or another.

Things i want to improve?

Strong saturated backgrounds
Learning how to control colours and understand which colour work or rather blend together is something i want to experiment on since it is necessary when creating backgrounds and characters, it's important to learn how to make a character and background fit each other.

Composition ( golden ratio)
I have developed an understanding on the rule of thirds which is a composition method to place objects in a manner that is pleasing to the eye. but recently ive discovered that my compositions felt flat even with depth and that is because of something i didnt understand called golden ratio which is a way to allow the viewer to let their eyes follow a path when looking at a composition and easier to read and looks natural.

Character design (variations)
As an animator it is important to have different styles that i can adapt to and create my own variation, which i lack at and is stopping me from producing different styles and causing me to stick to a personal style which wont get me anywhere.

Matching colours of characters and backgrounds
Briefly explained above is something that needs improving on because if i want to let people fall in love or be entertained by the characters and backgrounds, surly they would come back for more because they like and feel connected to the animation.

Making more special effects
I intent to learn how special effects works using various programs and expanding my knowledge in 2D special effects because i find it more aesthetically pleasing to see 2D effects (since i knew i was able to create it myself rather then program it on a 3D software)

People that demonstrate your interest in animation
BahiJD
Mike Inel
Hyun
Resh
Alan Becker

Areas that showcases your interest in the creative industries 
http://www.hyunsdojo.com/
http://www.devientart.com/
http://bahijd.tumblr.com/tagged/animation
https://sakugabooru.com/post
http://www.pixiv.net/

Artist influence: Snatti

I was first introduced to Atey Ghailan by a classmate, I had no idea who he was and what art he made, so I checked online and he had recently released an artbook full of drawings he did every single day for a year, 365 days is a difficult task, for me at least. The introduction of his book explains his process and what he did to create 365 drawings, each day for 2 hours he would sit down and create concepts based on what he had experience, he states that he wanted to learn how to produce concepts that have a sense of story boarding/telling.

I'm so surprised that he managed to do these concepts in 2 hours that I had to find his social media to then discover that he is a concept artist working at Riot Games which explains why he's so good. Working for Riot Games a big game company that don't employ many artists shows the greatness of his work.

I not only love his colour technique, his composition understanding. he adds various effects such as blurs for the background so that we focus on what he wants to be focused. here is one example that showcases what I love about his colouring:

To simply explain what I love about his colouring, it's that when he wants to focus on a part of the composition he gives that area a lot of saturation amongst the rest of the background that is always desaturated, another aspect is the lighting he uses, here's another example:

The use of red lighting in the background really pushes the characters forward closer to the foreground and really defines the character.

Here are a few examples of how he focuses on an object withing the composition (his compositions are also an aspect that plays a big part which I'd love to learn from):

As you can see from the 2 examples above, we are focused on the character closer to the foreground,  I'd love to create a concept that blurs out the background like he has done. I've noticed that he uses this at a medium shot composition.

Atey art is going to be very helpful this year to inspire my work, I hope I use what I've understood from the compositions and apply it to my own work.

artbook collab

I started this artbook project with a bunch of friends online as a way to not only promote my work but their work in the process, the purpose was to create a character and all draw the character in our own styles. We started first developing a character, discussing how the character would look like and what they would be wearing which also sparked the idea of this artbook being a seasonal theme book where we explore the world of the character throughout the seasons.

Since this project is still developing, I've decided that the team and I are not to show any of the sketches or concepts we made until we have finished the book and the only way to promote this book is to publicise it through preview posts on all our accounts, once we have an audience which is likely going to happen quickly since most of us in the team have big social presence, boosting our chances hopefully.

So far we have started on the winter seasonal book, and we have created a character that lives in japan exploring her daily teenage life, we have made some character designs to suit the theme and how we want the character to look like. Everything throughout the project is done by all of us, even if I started the project, we all worked together to create her.

To explain our process someone developed a simple base of the character with a bunch of clothes, hairstyles and accessories, then I mashed the base with the things I liked and made a mock up of what I wanted. Someone from the team then took the mock up and made a lineart of the final design which another teammate and I coloured, from this we all started to create simple sketches and concepts of the character going about her day. I hope we can finish the winter season artbook as soon as possible so we could move on to spring edition.

update 03/04/17

unfortunately, we did not manage to complete the winter 2016 artbook, but not at all lost interest in creating the artbook, we have decided to combine spring and summer into an artbook and hopefully get a lot done for it.

we are all just trying to finish our studies and hopefully, continue with this project throughout the end of spring and start of summer.

ppp3 Copyright

In this seminar i learned a lot about copyright symbol and what it does for creative artist like myself.

Copyright is essentially giving the right to the owner who produced something.

this can be the following:

Films
Games
Animation
Music
Computer app
Drawings and illustrations

Anything that has been produced independently or collaboratively can be copyrighted
and can last over 70 years after the person has died which is important to many music artists and film producers.

there are many rules that stop people from copying peoples work and that you can act against them to either compensate to what they have copied or make sure they don't do it again, but on the other hand it can be used to tell them to publise the work but not claim the characters as their own and to give credit to the original artist.

In the uk there is no registration system to copy right so where ever we post we need to make sure that the site has some kind of copyright which can be recored on the work.

If people were to copy something they should ask the original artist so that if the work is being copied with the artists consent it won't cause much of a problem.

this has told me a lot and hopefully i will make sure that each piece of work i make should be copyrighted on websites that have the system to protect my work from others which has happened to my piece but the person who did apologised for not noticing the copy right symbol.  

ppp2 presentation

In this seminar we learned that a presentation is a story or a journey to give information to the viewer. it is important to make it clear and understandable to the viewer. which is basically getting straight to the point.

Another reason for making a presentation is to gain feed back which is important for future developmentand and for constructive criticism which can help to convey meaningful information to the viewer.

In order to create a presentation we need to plan everything we want to showcase or discuss so that we can easily order the presentation and will make it easier to produce.

If we are going to present a project we need to first explain who we are to the viewer, giving them a bit of information which allows them to understand what your position is. Then showcase what you have done and give them information for each thing that is presented.

Then explain how you got to this stage of the final result. the presentation should not be about myself but rather in this case should be about the project I'm presenting.

I've learned a lot from this seminar and i hope to produce clear and understandable presentation which will hopefully push my confidence to showcase my work.
 

ppp1 Reflective practice

In this similar i learned about how to reflect on everything i produce and evidence in my blog.
pattern to follow:

-Look at what I've done.
-Evaluate the result, and produce more idea
-Re-do what you have done with the improvements.
-make sure its done in the best quality.

With the following method above I'm sure I will be able to mange to look at my work and try improve it as much as i can before making the final product which goes with everything i will be doing this year.

I will also once finished my animations critically analyse it and make an action plan which will hopefully improve the future projects.

Adman

One of the produces from Adman came into to speak to us about how Adman started as a company and what films they have developed in the last year. In this case they showcased the shawn the sheep movie. As you can see in the above picture we have the main three protagonist looking towards everyone in class.

Within this session i learned a lot about the behind the scenes and this included the development of a story to then producing story boards. form this we then move on to reanactment stages  where the main animators react the scene so that they could use it as a reference when they are animating the particular scene.

The producer showcased many videos of the preproduction's stages so that we can see how they went about creating some scenes such as when bitzer is running up the hill, they had to do it in stages and then place all the footages together on After effects and this allowed them to get rid of the blue screen they had in some of the scenes.

I've always wanted to understand how they do this and now that we've seen how its done i would like to try and develop my skills in doing more stop motion.

i took many more pictures of the models but this picture above was my favourite shoot because all the models are put in a piston where they are scared.

Kung Fu Panda 3

I recently watched Kung Fu Panda 3, and i really enjoyed how their was a learning curve for Po and for the audience. The lesson to be learned is to believe in yourself and you will be able to achieve pretty much everything.

The Animation starts of with master Oogway resting in the spirit world and suddenly a legendary warrior comes to attack master Oogway and within this short fight scene we find out that this legendary warrior called Kai has taken all the Kai (spirit powers) from all the great masters in the spirit realm, this causes master Oogway some trouble and makes it harder to defeat Kai. near the end of the fight Kai puts master Oogway at a disadvantage which stops him from being able to attack and Kai takes this chance to defeat him by taking master Oogway kai.

Kai then transports himself to living world where he wants to defeat the dragon warrior, within this time Po has been told that he is a master and should now teach the furious 5 which was a challenge because he didn't know how to teach.

I dont want to spoil the rest of the story but the last fight could of had more impact in my opinion. Besides that i really loved how Po learns the truth and is able to fight off against many foe's who stand before him.

The animation at the beginning where Kai vs master Oogway was just brilliantly constructed, the imagination that the animators had for the spirit realm was just perfect, i loved how they used all these different effects that don't apply to the real world. Im going to observe this short clip below and try to understand how they develop these effects.

deadpool film

I recently watched Deadpool, and i found it to be incredibly funny and very live action based. The film is about how Deadpool came into existence. He was basically forced to mutate to give him abilities such as incredibly fast regeneration which means he can't die.

What i want to discuss is the animation at the very beginning which showcases amazingly animated CGi of a camera panning around a scene and gradually zooming out, there is an immense amount of detail in this shot. We don't understand what is happening until around about halfway when we can see people that are frozen in this time frame being kicked, punched and wedgie.

This whole scene captured my attention straight away and has inspired me to figure out how they created this scene as in what 3D software did they use to achieve this whole sequence, i figured out how they were able to place the text using motion tracking in after effects, but that just simple text placement in a sequence. I really wonder what they had to do to create such a scene, and how they applied such detailed textures on top of the models that they made.

If i ever develop my 3D skills i'd like to try to make something similar to this and find out the process they used in order to create a similar scene but not as detailed as this sequence because i'm not a professional when it comes to 3D.

Mirrors edge Catalyst drawing

Mirrors Edge is one of my favorite games I've ever played. Its about people free running or people know it as parkour. The game takes place in a city of glass, Our main protagonist is taken out of prison after a 2 years sentence. She is now set free to either go find work or be taken away to another city within 14 days. But within a few minutes we are introduced to someone who helps us by taking faith (us) of the grid surveillance which sets off an alarm.

The game is not currently out but the crew have released in sights into the development of the game, here is a production insight video.

In this short video we get to see the ideas they have developed for how they are building up the city, using the first game which had all these gritty buildings that needed repairs to new building that had a future realism. The level design is so complex, I'd love to learn how they develop the 3D space and how they make these textures that look really realistic. I hope to explore this area of 3D and learn how its all done.

as for the drawing mentioned in the title, here is a WIP which i hope to complete before the game is released.

 

I want to create my landscape drawings such as the above, creating old/futuristic buildings used for my animations. and expand my knowledge on creating 3D spaces to save time drawing each individual buildings, using 3D programs such as Maya or google Sketchup.

Skipping test animation using clip studio

 

This is a test that ive started on but still havent finished, ive been using the new clipstudio animation toolkit which is awesome and i love how much easier it is using a raster based program, it also has vector layers so that i dont lose quality when i draw. It is also backwards compatible with photoshop so i can save the file as a .PSD and be able to open it on photoshop if needed to edit something which is very useful.

 

currently as you can see above all ive done is given her draft clothes that you can get a glimpse of in the first frame and just the movement of her hands and rope. Using the new timeline animation toolkit they provide is so simple and each cel/frame you make will automatically make the folders and layers ready for it so you dont have to waste your time recreaating each frame folder.

 

also its very easy to navigate between frames and be able to change the timing and placement of a frame just by dragging it alog, theres also a light box which is similar to oninion skin which is also included in the time line which allows you to place a frame in the current frame your working on and just check if your proportions are correct which is really handy if i wanted to loop an animation.

i hope to finish this over summer, this was a experimentation which i want to develop.

Inside out

 

Disney's Inside out film was very intresting in terms of the story and how each character reflects the human characteristics. the story first starts of with a baby opening its eyes for the first time and smiling and within the few moments we enter the babys head where we see the first two characteristics which are sadness and joyful.

The story develops really quickly as we see the main character grow up with many more characteristics in her head such as Anger, Fear and Disgus.

What i like about the whole film is how each character expresses what characteristic they are in the film, body language is very important and could be used in various ways to change the thought of the viewer, Expressions is something i want to improve.

throughout the story you can see how each character reacts to a situation, for example when joy and sadness are lost and this leads on to joy trying to stay positive to the situation and sadness always being negative about it and its a challenge to work together since they are the oppisite.

The story overall is creafully created on a very deep level which shows that storyboarding was a main part of this whole film and i would love to create such a film based on thought process of a story in detail, not just simple based.

one of my favourite scenes was sitting at the table scene:

 

The way Riley and her parents react is something we can relate to, because we are brought into these situations not all the time but it does occour, and I love how we enter the heads of the parents to see thier thought process to the situation. I want to work on my storyboard to make it relate to the viewer and also make the story clear and understandable.

Akira

Akira is an amazing film about gangs that ride bikes and is set in a cyberpunk genre mixed with distopian rural landscapes which is a representation of what the late 1980's thought of the future. This film starts by an establishing shot which shows the ehole city this story is based in, behind the scene footage showcases that this background was all done traditionally and so was the explosion that happens in the first few moments of the film.

the animation was done all traditionally, which makes it one of the best animation ever because the effects they produce is very hard to do traditionally. but since they didnt have the technology we have now it is very impressive to watch all these effects.

I really love the backgrounds they made for this film, this is because of the variety of shapes the buildings use, snd that not all the buildings are same. I would love to learn how they developed these types of buildings and learn how the lighting is made like the picture above.

One of my favourite scenes in the film is this bike scene.

i love this whole sequecne having a battle whilst riding bikes, and each hit felt exciting as each biker that fell with their bike scraped across the ground. the effects in this scene are incredible and must of been very difficult to animate, such as the smoke and the sparks that come from their bikes.

Spirited away

Spirited away is one of my favorite films which has ever excited, the animation is done by studio Ghibli which are a well established film studio, they are known for the quality and amounts of details within each film they create.

The story takes place of a girl and her parents moving houses, they almost reach the house but the father takes the wrong turn or rather thinks the road ahead is a shortcut towards their house. This then takes them to a new world where Chihiro wonders around a village as her parents eat in an empty restaurant.

The story then develops as we follow Chihiro trying to enter a bath house and has to work to survive.

From the start of the film the animation is flawless full of amazing details that tricks you to believe its real life which is hard to create when animating and this is one of the reasons why i love this film and Studio Ghibli behind it all.

One of my favorite moments in the film is the part when Chihiro is putting her shoes on, it may look like a simple scene but it is made by observation of a girl actually putting her shoes on, for example when she puts the foot in the shoe she holds it then stands up and taps the floor in order to fully put her foot in her shoe which is quite complex but its these moments that make the film seem alive as ever and makes you believe its real. 

i want to observer and try to create a realistic feel to my animations, i would love to achieve this for my future animations and hopeful have an eye for movement to give the impression of realism.  

practice animation (fan animation)

one punch man is a popular anime at the moment, and its inspired me to create some tests and create some interesting animation,

I really like the movement and the way the animators are able to achieve certain effects which produces that impact of surprise using camera shakes and strong punch impacts with the great explosions. You can easily analyse how all of these works in each scene.

The test i have done which is still a WIP and might not be done because i may have to improve  my anatomy then get back at it. here it is at the moment.

i really like what ive done so far for this, the idea came from talking with my friend discussing about funny things the character is able to do. i want to improve on this and see what i can do also i need to animate the clothes on saitama, my friend Reshanims helped me with the crack 

camera conventions

Types of camera conventions

What we know of camera conventions are the basics:

For example camera angles, composition and mise-en-scene.

Applying all these, produces a narrative we can easily follow and understand.

Camera Angles:

over the shoulder shot:

above head shot:

wide shot:

Without these basic camera conventions it would be hard to follow the narrative, meaning that the audience will lose interest and not understand.

Camera angles are important within a narrative but we must make the best use of correctly positioning. for example:

camera cannot cross over the line because then it will confuse the viewer as to what it happening on screen. as you can see the transition the camera should do is shown in the image above.

1st camera angle:

2nd camera angle:

3rd camera angle:

As you can see its easy for the viewer to understand that the person coming from the left is going to sit down from the three camera angles above. if we crossed over the line it would make it seem like we are looking from behind the person who just sat down, which makes it difficult for the viewer to understand what just happened.

Early age of camera convention in animation

most early animations were all done with a basic composition using a wide shot, this was because it was easy to animate a character on a flat background.

It was hard to convey an effect back then because sounds were limited, in order to showcase an effect or an emotions given by a character they would produce indications.

Here is an indication given by mickey mouse from the old cartoon:

  These indication lines above his head are suggesting what hes looking at.

Modern day camera conventions in animation

Nowadays we use camera conventions effectively and in many ways.

We have made compositions of scenes more interesting by adding the rule of thirds, an example of that is with this short clip.

In that small clip you can see how when he picks up the car the scenes continue using the rule of thirds.

Here are screen shots with the rule of third lines:

As we can see here how Mr incredible and the kid are in line with the focus points in the rule of thirds, also because the camera conventions are following the 180 degree rule it makes it an easy narrative to follow.

with modern advancements of composition and technology, we can develop really amazing scenes that could've not been made in the early stages of animations. we use all these different techniques in composition.

one of these effects which are commonly used are blurs. here's a short clip to showcase blur in an action sequence.

https://streamable.com/c0f8