Phi-Phi Fanny

This is the second style test I did! Changing the paint brush settings in Flash helped so much!

I still need fix stuff before I color it… Her hair seriously needs some in between frames and I'm still messing around with the fps, but for the most part, I love how it’s coming out! By the way, this is more fun to look at while listening to music!

DTV 2???

I'm trying to come up with ideas for a sequel to my 2010 Degree Project film, DTV. I want to start script writing and storyboarding it in the near future. I think it'll be super fun!

I really need to officially post the process work of DTV 1 on here from my Degree Project blog... In retrospect, creating an alternate blog for my film was not the greatest idea... I'll have to get on top of that...

Also, I'm trying to work on style tests because I want the second film to have a different look and feel as well as more control, (ie: getting rid of a lot technical problems from the first film).

This is the first style test I did and I'm not all to fond of it... I don't like how Flash registers my lines, however, I learned that I could change the the settings in Flash to not alter your pencil strokes. That style test is in the post above.

I just in case you forgot...

Done in Flash CS3

I finally have the time and resources to take on some art commissions. If you're interested, please refer to my deviantART journal for more details :)

Hatsu Timeline: 2007-2011

I think between all the confusion and craziness running around during my graduation this past May I totally forgot to post this. It's my final project for my Graphic Novel class. I felt that curriculum of the class could have benefited from a little more structure, but I can't complain to much... I got to learn much more about the art of comics, while still earning academic credits. Couldn't ask for a better class :)

Anyway, my final consisted of making a summary, character sheets, and a comicbook page. I thought I'd use my character Hatsu Moto, the mini forest emp, since she's been present throughout my time in college.

2007:
Hatsu is a relatively recent character. She was created during a watercolor drawing practice assignment during my first semester of college:



2008:
I was finally able to get my hands on my own copy of Photoshop CS3! I was so excited that I thought I'd try my hand at digital drawing.

This was my first completed digital drawing in Photoshop ever. Not to great, but it was a start.



Later that year, I completed my Animation 2 college course by creating a faux animated opening title sequence called, "The Days Of Hatsu Moto" :)



2009:
2009 was the year I tried my hand at digitally coloring a full animation for my Animation 3 college course. The animation was never finished because that kind of digital coloring took way too long to complete for each individual frame. However, Hatsu, and several of my other original characters are featured in it.



2010:
Hatsu is one of several of my original characters to be featured as a guest in my degree project talk show animation, "DTV". She was only featured for a few seconds, but so far she seems to get the best viewer reaction than any other character in the animation. She is voiced by me.




2011:
Finally, for one of my last classes in college, The Grapic Novel, we had to make a summary, character sheets, and a comicbook page. So, I thought, "why not use Hatsu?"

Summary:

The Days Of Hatsu Moto takes place in present day Los Angeles. The story chronicles the life of a mini forest imp named Hatsu Moto and her quest to save a man’s soul from his own ill-deeds and crude personality, which has been prophesied will lead to is death 3 years from now.

Hatsu plays the literal conscience to Rodney, the man who she’s supposed to “save”. She does this by accompanying Rodney where ever he goes and by putting him through many seemingly ridiculous tests, much to his dismay.

Despite her tiny size (she’s only 5 inches tall), Hatsu is very resourceful, and having magical powers doesn’t hurt either. Rodney initially despises Hatsu’s presence and finds her constantly chipper attitude and high-pitched voice extremely annoying. However, he very slowly starts to warm up to her.

Character Sheets:



Comic Page:



--
And that's about it... Hatsu's history since '07 :)

I felt happy doing this because it made me feel so sentimental. As a character, Hatsu was born during my first year of college, in one of my first courses. For those who don't know, Hatsu means "first" in Japanese (初). Throughout my college years Hatsu Moto has been a resource for me to use to push myself to try new things. And while all those things may not have worked, I still learned so much from doing them and I'm a better artist/person for it.

So thank you Hatsu, my little forest imp :) <3

"Phi-Phi on the TV" Complete-ish...

Well it's done... It's not perfect but it's as done as it's gonna get for a while...:P

Final Animation:


Original animatic with first recording:


I had to rerecord the audio of me speaking because my teacher's said the first reading was kind of dull and and didn't really showcase my personality. So to remedy this me and one of my teachers did a test rerecording wherein he (gently) punched me in the leg repeatedly to get a more... "enthusiastic" reaction out of me. It worked so he told me to get someone else to do something like that when I did the new recording. So I got my mom to do it and she threw books, tape, towels and water at me through the whole duration of rerecording. You can hear it a little in the animation.

The soundtrack itself is not really a 100% in my opinion because I didn't have time to properly clean-up the new audio and I didn't get the updated musical score from my composer on time. So I had to speed up the original music he gave me, (which was timed to the first recording), and match it the new recording. It works... sort of.

I originally wanted to line and color my animation work in flash then shadow it in Photoshop, but my teacher pointed out that I really didn't have the luxury of time to do that so he suggested
I settle on a more simple coloring.












We went back and looked at the style tests I did in 2009 for my first Degree Project and both decided that "number 5" would be a reasonable choice.




Now that's it's done, I need to enter it in as many festivals as possible and start looking for a job... Crap.

"Phi-Phi on the T.V." Style Test

In my last post, I explained I was making a new animation.

Long story short, this is what it's going to look like:



I have no idea what I'm doing @___@

My Demo Reel! :D

More to come soon! :D

Hi....

Sorry I haven't posted here in a little while... After the big Anime Boston disappointment [see here] and a super bad semester, I haven't really felt like posting much...Not only that but after the convention I got REALLY sick, then had to write a huge paper for my horrible North Renaissance class... ;__;

I'm also in the midst of a terrible case of insomnia... :P

Anyway, I thought I'd post something... so here's one of the final animations from my Animation 4 class: "The Powerpuff Girls" Style Test. Based on the style of Craig McCracken and Joseph Giardina.



I am NEVER using Frame Thief to shoot my inked frames again! It makes my linework look horrible :(

The other two style tests didn't pan out too well.......... :/

Also, here's my "Bird Calls" animation with the completed sound design work, by the wonderful Phoebe Danskin! :D


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This semester was a huge disappointment and definitely not my best... I have to completely re-color my PSA animation, because based the my on review (which went very badly) inking my animation was a terrible idea... This is something I didn't mind hearing too much, but really wish my teacher would have informed me of before I had invested so much time in it, since they were the one who suggested inking it in the first place. ;__;

I hope next semester goes better.

This summer hopefully, I can find a job and work on some of my side art projects that were on hold for school. Like, the AZU Project:

Made of WIN- Quite Literally

I won the award for "Achievement in Animation" at the 2009 SunDeis Film Festival! w00t!

For the video follow previous post...

Super Special Awesome!!

My movie, The First of May got nominated for three awards at the Sundeis Film Festival! And while I know it's a small festival I can't help but feel super excited! It's a honor just to be nominated!

Achievement in Animation, Best Documentary, and Best Film. Yay!

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DO NOT watch it HD... it makes the video and audio act weird...

Animation In Progress- Bird Calls part 1- Animatic

Found Sound Assignment: part 1

Agrggh... My second to last animation for my Animation III class is probably the most production heavy assignment I've done yet... :P

I HATE it...

The assignment was to go to and create an animation based on an artist with sound found on the website. I picked "Birdcalls" (God knows why...) by photographer Lousie Laweler.

This assignment is about 1 minute and 30 seconds of hand drawn animation, full of composting, over layering movements, and 3 extremely annoying women making bird calls for no apparent reason.

Here's the Animatic, done in Flash. My teacher liked my sketchy-ness in Flash so much he insisted I do everything hand drawn with a pencil, on paper........... Damn It! >:(



I hope I can get this done before Winter Animation Reviews... And this isn't even my final assignment... *Cries*

NEW Animation! --- "Green"- Poetry Assignment

Animated and Narrated by me! :D



Please watch in High Quality-- If you can :)

Done in Oil Pastels. My fingers are still sore... ;__;

This is my first finished animation for the 2008 Fall semester at school.
The assignment was to take a poem and (duh) animate it.
The poem I picked was "Green" by D.H. Lawrence.

Enjoy!