Reflections: Week Two, Pirates and Plans

After sending Lewis from the Pirates group my walk cycles, this is the response I received back:

'Hi Hayley,These are really nice. Very good work. I'm impressed. We should have acharacter ready for animation very soon.Could you look through the animatic and see what shots you are interested in?coolio x'

I am very happy, although I do not know for sure yet whether the Whack'D group want me, and if they do I will have to ask my tutor to make sure I can work on both projects. For now until they have character models ready, I will look through the Pirates animatic for shots I like, and I also want to decide which of my previous University projects I would like to improve so that I have an even better showreel and portfolio for my DVD. I already know I wish to add a character to my environment project, as the last section was a disappointment to me and I feel it would be greatly improved by adding character animation and also a background. I may even make it more of a dusk evening than night time so that the lighting has a warm redish hue and is more dramatic.

On reflection for the last week, I am really pleased with my walk cycles I think they have improved so much since my attempts last year and I have also completed them an awful lot faster than before (obviously as I know more about Maya and the userface now). I do want to add even more to them over the next couple of days, whether this be more steps or even an environment for the character to move in.

Plans for this week:

1. Watch the Pirates animatic
2. Decide which shots I would like to work on
3. Try animating with Max these shots until I have the animated rigs from the Team
4. Continue to contact the Whack'd team to see if they also would like me to work for them... then decision time
5. Choose which of my previous work to improve
6. Begin animating more with my old projects
7. Start making new sketches to also add a gallery section to my DVD ( I want to add more life drawing so will take my drawing pad into London and make some quick sketches of people on the streets, and also some architectural pieces)
8. Continue with my walk cycles

I am giving myself major starting points this week, as I am working as a Runner at The Mill and realise I will probably not finish my ideas, but have the strong foundations to work from so that come Sunday and especially my next University week I can devote my time entirely to drawing and animating. I am really excited about the prospects for this term now :)

My response to Lewis:

'Hey Lewis,Thank you so much I am happy you liked them! :D :D

I was wondering if your animatic appears on youtube or vimeo etc as I tried to watch it on your blog but it is a bit small and slow to watch via blogger. If so please can I have a link to it.

I was also wondering if we will be given one character to animate or for example if we choose a scene with like three characters then will we animate all of them?

I would ideally like scenes of varying difficulty so that some I can complete quickly for you where as others will challenge me, and I can devote time to making them of a high standard.

Oh and I was also wondering if any of my classmates are working on your film and what roles they are taking so I can start talking to them about the project too.

Hope you are well, Hayley'