cheznieba2b

[cheznieba2b]

Last post of year 2 and it’s all about a project bible

Honestly more proud of this than of my animation, sorry.

It works well as a whole, I managed to get everything from everyone I needed and it matches our team aesthetic, so that’s all lovely. 

It was made completely in photoshop (unless someone gave me an AI file for their assets) and was pretty fun to do.

So goodbye for now, see ya next year.

[cheznieba2b]

Recording the audio and adding that gem to my animation

Recording

I had a little something come up that meant I couldn’t make it to our recording session, so group, I am truly, deeply sorry.

Shoving it right on in there

The audio was lovingly uploaded onto our shared drive by some gem and all I had to do was locate the clip with my name on it and download it! 

I shoved it into a Premiere Pro file alongside my animation and got to fiddling around with timings until I was somewhat happy with how it matched up. There’s a wee moment where it’s not the best (it’s the bit about 52 stages, if you for some ungodly reason couldn’t tell), but the rest of it works so well that I kind of had to accept it, especially this late into the game with other stuff I needed to iron our for a multitude of projects. 

I am still happy with it, despite the little hiccup, and I can easily plop it into the drive for the lovely editor to stitch together with everyone else’s work.

[cheznieba2b]

Experimentation Reel!! Another visual essay update

right, so I have finished animating BUT I need to time it to the audio which we won’t have until Tuesday evening, therefore, you’ll just have to accept the sneak preview at the end of this reel for now

Here she is!

I just made the title in Photoshop and brought it into Premiere with everything else. Honestly, I’ve made so many experimentation reels at this point I could do it with my eyes shut.

Conclusion

I mean, it’s just pretty standard really. I don’t know what else to tell you. I’m so neutral to this project because it’s group work, so I can’t really have an opinion on the style, colours, blah blah blah because the ball isn’t fully in my court, it’s like hovering about the net. I’m happy with my own personal progress I suppose, I got to use some motion graphics which is always fun so there isn’t much to complain about.

[cheznieba2b]

Week 5

Research Report

This week was just purely based around improvements. Having finished the first draft of my proposal during the Easter, I was able to go to Lynsey with something that we could comb through and really pick out my areas of weakness. Words cannot describe how grateful I was for this, as there were multiple sections of my work that I really wasn’t too sure about when writing them up, so going through what I had completed and finding out what else I needed to add, what wasn’t necessary and what should stay the same helped me greatly to write something I was actually pleased with. I ended up changing almost all of my sections in the end, even if it was just slightly. The only areas that remained the same were my timeline and report type.

The section that needed the most help was my background, as I was unsure how to put my research into words, and was unaware that in-text citations were almost a must. I conducted further research and rewrote it, which at the same time improved my bibliography, which was something else we had discussed. I also heavily changed the section on my contents, as I had completely misunderstood the template and definitely wasted some of my word count unnecessarily on it. The research question, overall aims, research method, and potential outcomes were all also edited, along with some just general pointers for everything as a whole.

After all the alterations, I am definitely a lot more confident to hand this in, as I feel as though it has greatly improved.

[cheznieba2b]

Further Research!

I went to the library!

The Uncanny Valley

Pg2-5

Came from psychologist Ernst Jentsch characterized the uncanny as a mental state that occurs when you can’t tell the difference between something real or not, and something dead or alive

A disturbing and uncomfortable feeling that can begin to feel haunting, shocking and ghastly

Can also be applied to someone's characteristics and actions if they’re peculiar or disturbing

Sigmund Freud stated that the uncanny comes from something that is unfamiliar to us

Pg38-40

Takashi Minato did an experiment on males and females with a range of ages to test whether age and gender made a difference in the effects of the uncanny with a human-like robot

Children are more affected by the uncanny than adults

Minato came to the conclusion that it is because adults have come across more unfamiliar things throughout their life than children, therefore are more adapted to cope with it

Females were less affected than men

Acting for Animators

Pg14-18

The degree of emotion someone feels is directly related to the values they hold

You want the audience to empathize and identify with the character, not to pity or sympathise

Too much sympathy will cause the audience to emotionally distance themselves away from a character

Stop Motion

Pg61

When an animation goes into the uncanny valley, the audience doesn’t connect with a character

When something is too lifelike, the audience reacts negatively to it

Pg92-93

The fact that emotions can be conveyed through what bits if brass, wood, fabric, silicone, and clay is what gives stop motion its appeal

It’s more impactful because they exist in our physical world, and it gives puppets credibility

3D

Pg322-325

Audiences get to know a character through their posture, facial expression, hand gestures, and silhouette

Bibliography

Tinwell, A. (2015). The Uncanny Valley in Games & Animation. Boca Raton, Florida: CRC Press, pp.2-5, 38-40.

Hooks, E. (2011). Acting for Animators. 2nd ed. New York: Routledge, pp.14-18.

Kerlow, I. (2009). The art of 3D computer animation and effects. 4th ed. Hoboken, N.J.: Wiley, pp.322-323.

Purves, B. (2014). Stop-Motion Animation. 2nd ed. New York: Bloomsbury Publishing Plc, pp.61, 92-93.

Conclusion

I’m so happy I forced myself into the library to get some books on my topics because I feel so much more prepared not just for finishing up the proposal, but also for the actual dissertation?! Like I have a nice little base to build of off now and I can finally see why you lot drill research into our heads as much as you do, I’m sorry I doubted you.

So come at me theory work, I’m proper prepared.

[cheznieba2b]

Animating, wow

Stop Motion

my first idea was to hand the pieces of MDF from the scaffolding in the studio with some invisible string. Don’t ask me why because I genuinely have no idea.

wowwww chez, great photography!

Clearly, it went wrong, it was an absolutely horrific idea. I lowered them back to the safety of the table and used those metal rigs to prop ‘em up instead.

I’m actually offended by myself for trying to hang them up in the first place.

I shot the teenie tiny sequence backwards, just because I thought it would be easier to remove parts of the house without knocking anything else than trying to place them. I’m guessing I was right due to the fact that I didn’t manage to knock anything!

This literally took 2 minutes once I set it all up and shamefully put the string in the bin, so I feel proper bad that I booked the studio for the whole morning.

2D

Listen, we’re so close to the deadline now that I couldn’t be dealing with exporting a bunch of random clips, uploading them to Vimeo and then go here, so I beg of you to just accept these screenshots and bullet points.

Scene 1

The house comes in one bit at a time

The numbers go from 0 to 130 to represent the number of sets. I found a quick little tutorial for this here: https://youtu.be/RQPwWZuyzZk 

Scene 2

those scrolling houses come into play (and also act as the transition from s1 to s2)

52 for the number of stages comes onto the screen like 5 *pause* 2

Scene 3

houses scrolling are once again the transition

those outer lines appear in the middle, move out and reveal the text and central line

Scene 4

oooo no more houses

the bottom line spread out from the centre

the bars come up not at the same time but not quite one after the other

the numbers are the same 0-whatever that the 130 was

Scene 5

Angus comes along to transition you into the next person’s animation!

Techniques

To animate this it was all just a case of keyframing positions, making masks and keying the path, with just one tutorial I had to find which I mentioned earlier in the post. It wasn’t the quickest animation I’ve ever done, but it was far from the hardest. I actually enjoyed doing it, just because this style of animating is proper soothing for me since once you know how to work with After Effects on a basic level, she just goes ahead and does it all for you!

Conclusion 

All that’s left is to make sure this times up well with my audio, which should be relatively easy in premiere, and then I can just hand this child over to whoever is editing (sorry group, I have completely forgotten who’s in charge of that part) and we’ll be sweet. 

[cheznieba2b]

Assets!

I’m sorry for the lack of pictures in this post, you already know the excuse of ‘I just wanted to get it done’. Don’t judge me.

Stop Motion

I have reached the peak of my terrible habit of just getting on with things and not taking pictures, I’m so sorry.

Basically, what I did before the image you are about to see is:

Went to the 3D workshop with my paper templates

Got some sweet advise from a super nice dude with glasses

Cut out all my pieces in MDF (including extras because I didn’t want to do a walk of shame back in there if I fucked anything up)

Came home and sobbed as I hot glued it all together at the same time as burning almost every part of my hands

Painted it all white. Why? Because someone, at some point, told me to always do a coat of white (or whatever base colour suits you best) when using MDF because it absorbs the paint quite a bit so you need a base to take that initial hit so that your colours stay true?? Is it true? Don’t ask me, I just do it anyway

Painted all the pieces pink and a weird grey brown tan kinda colour to match Coraline's house

Now we’re all caught up, let’s move on to what happened after this photo:

I woke up the next day, stared at these pieces of MDF for a seriously concerning amount of time, and let out a huge sigh

I repainted them all to match the purples in the group colour scheme so now it looks like this - 

And I actually like this! Sure, the colours are literally nothing alike to the OG Coraline mansion but I’m proper digging this, and I think you can still tell what it is??

This is what they look like solo and ready for action:

fun!!

2D

Most of my 2D isn’t premade assets, but rather nonsense that I’ll be making in AE while animating, but I still have a couple of things to treat you people with

Basically, just copy and pasted the house a bunch of times.

The plan is for this to endlessly scroll behind some text at some point?? Hopefully, you’ll see what I mean in the near future.

This is for my transition, which took me what felt like 5 years to come up with.

Angus over here is one of those crazy old ladies’ stuffed angel dogs and I just thought him wheeling across the screen with buttons so my group doesn’t get made that I haven’t included buttons as literally the most basic type of transition aside from cut would be fun! The wheels are separate in the PSD folder so I can rotate them in After Effects, BTW.

He’s cute, not gunna lie

Conclusion

Get me into that After Effects, baby, I’m ready.

I’m shockingly really happy with my assets, I think they work well with Coraline and my own personal style which always makes a project more fun. I don’t think animating will be too much of a strenuous task, just because it’s mostly movements and techniques I’ve done a bunch of times before, so my hopes are defo high for finishing this bad boy rather soon.

[cheznieba2b]

Another beautiful chat with Lynsey

Honestly the first time I’ve considered myself finished with a project and then actually gone back to improve it. I usually just shove that nonsense in a folder and forget about it until the day before sub

General

Change the title to ‘which of the three main types of animation…'

Just use type when talking about the animation types

Bigger Bibliography 

Take out anything about comparing the popularity of types because it’s not actually relevant   

Background

Add in-text citations

Explain the three types of animation

Include that animation is traditionally for humour but I want to test empathy/sympathy

More research-based text (look into Barry Purves and texts on 3D) 

Research Question

Why I’m only doing the 3 main types of animation

Overall Aims

Take out popularity comparison

More broadly understand emotion in animation

Don’t do the same aim just reworded

Include something about my final animation?? 

Research Method

More on the animation I’m making

‘as little variables’ to ‘as few variables’ 

Contents Page

Take out everything apart from actual chapters

Expand to 3 chapters

Chapter 1 - theory and method

Chapter 2 - the experiment

Chapter 3 - the results 

Potential Outcome

Take out the first sentence

Instead of saying it will help the industry, say it will help future animation students

Expand on the last 2 sentences

Conclusion

My mind is blown when it comes to this woman, I was so anxious about this project before our meeting because there was just so much I had no clue about but now I feel ready to hit those theory waves. I’ve already made a start on a few of these, just because I sat in costa with a peach ice tea and my laptop for a couple hours before heading home, like a true art student and it’s so far going quite smoothly. I am still slightly worried about some minor aspects, but I think that’s just me being a worrying person.

[cheznieba2b]

Further Advancements (Visual Essay)

Project Bible

Now I’m finally in charge of something, I can let the Leo in me run free

I have a checklist with everyones names on it with what they need to give me so I know exactly who to yell at!

JK there’s just soooo much stuff I need to collect off of these poor people that I think I would have a genuine panic attack if I didn’t keep track.

Not gunna lie though, looking at this sheet made me so nervous because I was like ‘how the hell am I gunna chase up 8 people for so many random pieces of work’, but it’s working out alright so far.

What it looks like so far!!

I’m aware that in the list picking through up there I haven’t checked anything off yet there’s work here, don’t hate me, I just don’t time my blog posts correctly.

I took the woolly background we have for our animations and changed the colour a wee bit, alongside adding a sweet little purple gradient to it just to spruce it up slightly. I stuck with our colour scheme and fonts and got to work, making sure to upload an empty iterative sheet template to our shared google drive so that everyone could access the background and it would look nice a cohesive. 

Conclusion

I’m absolutely digging this bible so far, but whether or not I have those same feelings a couple days before sub and I’m missing a stray piece of work or two, idk. Everyone is happy with the aesthetic and I’m pretty chuffed, so yay.

[cheznieba2b]

Group Meeting Round 2

Our little meeting today was revolved around the theory side of things, the timesheet, invoice, project bible, and whatever else none of us fully understood. A fair bit of our meeting was spent just trying to wrap our heads around some of these things, but we also did some delegation. I went for the project bible, since I didn’t have another other role apart from the actual animation so I had some guilt I needed to exchange, and also because I knew it was something I could put my joy of design into. I have a serious obsession with making things like this like I loved doing the character bible for character bestiary, so I gently eased two birds into landing with one bit of breadcrumb by volunteering for it.

Basically, we just had a lil’ catch-up, checked up on everyone's progress and made sure we were all on the same wavelength. It was actually rather necessary and helpful. 

Let’s get started on this bible shall we!

[cheznieba2b]

Easter Break Summary

Personal Branding

Having started 4 different iterations of my website, all with the same outcome of me getting somewhat aggressive towards them and hastily deleting them, I was starting to lose hope that I would ever come out of this with a site I liked. It wasn’t until I gave up trying to follow the current trend of white and grey with a splash of colour that I came across a colour scheme that I really felt suited me and my brand. After I had worked that out, it was just a case of organising my work properly and structuring the portfolio in a seemingly professional way. It was now, more than ever, that I was incredibly grateful for all the websites I had looked through leading up to this point because I would have been truly clueless without them.

Out of this whole project, I can confidently say that my CV is the aspect I’m most proud of. Having finished it during this Easter break, I almost feel a sense of excitement about putting to use. I have run away from the classic black structured text on an A4 sheet of paper method that I often see CVs come in, and couldn’t be happier that I did. I feel as though going into a creative industry requires a creative CV to make you look the part, and in my opinion, I have successfully done that.

As I have said in every blog post after finishing my showreel that discusses it in even the slightest, I am still unsure of the music choice. I do really enjoy how the intro turned out, and even though I just revamped the outro of my old showreel to fit my current work better, it still works well. I only used the work I have some pride for, instead of just everything this time around, and I genuinely think that it is an accurate representation of my brand.

Although setting up my LinkedIn profile was only something I did to complete an internship application, I am more than happy that I did it. It’s certainly something I can see myself being thankful I did further down my career timeline, as I’ve already made so many connections that I could now easily message when the time comes. To me, this part of the project (although not necessary) has been the most helpful to me when it comes to reducing my fears of what will happen when university comes to a close.

Having now applied for 6 internships and being turned down for one, I have built the confidence to put myself out there in the industry. I am well aware that there’s a strong possibility of none of these going any further, but it has still been useful to me and has become a learning experience.

Research Report

When beginning the research for this project, I felt slightly clueless as to where to start, so I reverted to something that I would always have to research in college which is the history of the animation type I was focusing on. This obviously includes 2D, 3D and stop motion. I also looked into the popularity of films within these categories via IMDB, something else I wasn’t too sure about but did until I figured out what kind of research I really needed to dive into. Looking back on this now, I must sadly admit that I feel as though this was a waste of my time. I have looked more thoroughly into the proposal template and at other technical reports and have come to the conclusion that this would not be of use to my personal work.

After losing some confidence in my research abilities, I emailed Lynsey to try and figure out what I should actually be doing. As always, this was such a valuable amount of feedback, and for the first time in the project, I had a direct path to follow. I started researching how emotions are portrayed in the respective types of animation and even got use out of a book that had been sitting, unloved, on my shelf for 3 years. However, I am still slightly unsure about my research for 3D and stop motion in this field, as I struggled to find better resources than just websites and online articles.

The final block of research I conducted was just generalised for all three types. I am unsure as to how much use I will get out of this, but I have more confidence in it than the history and popularity work.

I have begun to write out my proposal, and hope to complete the first draft before a meeting with Lynsey on Tuesday so I can really get to know what all the different sections should include, and what aspects I have put in are irrelevant.

[cheznieba2b]

Personal Branding Update

Internships

Gram Games has declined me, sad times.

didn’t want your internship anyway

I am joking, of course, it would’ve been a fab opportunity but in all honesty, I wanted the other one anyway so fingers crossed I hear back from those lovely lads and lasses soon. At least I got experience in applying?? I mean it forced me into improving my LinkedIn profile sooo, cheers.

I’ve also applied for 4 internships at BlueZoo (so hopefully I’ll at least get an interview for one?) thanks to a beautiful email from Helen

Now I know that 2D isn’t exactly my speciality, BUT, I’ve loved BlueZoo since the first-year of college and I think I would actually roll around on the ground in fits of disbelief and joy if I was asked to an interview for just one of these rolls.

LinkedIn

I now have over 250 contacts, which was so unexpected. Most of which are art directors but I’ve got a few general animators and model makers which is fun. I feel like I’m really gunna thank myself in a couple years time for this, so yay!

Conclusion

I’m still as stoked about LinkedIn as I was like 4 days ago so this is just so fun to me. My mind is being blown with the fact that there are actual opportunities out there in the world, and as long as I pursue them I’m not just gunna end up as some commissioned furry artist in my childhood bedroom because I couldn’t use my degree and only work part-time at dominos so I don’t make enough to get my own place. I’ve actually had that nightmare, don’t question me.

[cheznieba2b]

Applying for internships and actually making use of LinkedIn

I found both of these job listings on Indeed.com, so there’s that.

Attempt 1

Oh I realllllly want to get this one. Framestore is so fun and although I had to google it to find out what they actually did, I was thrilled to see so much stuff I loved. I applied for the model maker, which now I’m a bit nervous means 3D model maker and not like a physical model maker, but fingers crossed??

Attempt 2

Sure, 2D isn’t my speciality, and nor is games, but you never know unless you try, right? The more applications, the merry I’ll be.

LinkedIn

https://www.linkedin.com/in/cheznie-w-66a510131

So I already technically had a LinkedIn profile, since we had to set one up randomly in college, but I never even bothered to change the profile picture, let alone put actual effort into it. I won’t lie, I didn’t even think of it until Gram Games asked for it, so cheers to them.

I set it up, added a profile picture, banner, my contact info, website and even a cheeky showreel as well as filled out all the information sections because I’m clearly a professional.

I then went to add a BUNCH of people from the industry. I have been watching a load of Catfish the TV show while falling asleep and one of their big things is if a profile doesn’t have many friends, then it starts to lose credibility. I started out with animation directors, since I thought they would be the handiest latter on in life, and then just went ham with and added anyone with animation in their description. My logic here was if I could even get a few people to view my profile, see my work, all that nonsense, then I can start worming my way into the industry like an unwanted parasite.

OVERNIGHT UPDATE

YO I FULLY GOT A MESSAGE FROM AN ANIMATION DIRECTOR.

This was so sweet and boosted my confidence into the clouds. It’s shown me that people are actually looking at my work and seeing what I’m all about, which is exactly what I wanted to happen.

so

Let’s add more strangers that just so happen to work in animation!

Conclusion

I’m so overjoyed with the progress so far, and although it might be little to most other people, I’ve never actually really tried to put my foot in the door to the animator's world, so this is proper exciting. I have a slight feeling I’m about to get addicted to LinkedIn, but hey, I could be doing coke soooooo

[cheznieba2b]

Group work progress

This is all about the stop motion element, so honestly, there’s not a great deal to show you but I need to prove that I did actually do something for this project over Easter

I know you’re always taught that tracing is bad as an artist, but in my defence, I needed this as close as possible to the shape of Coraline’s house because I’m still not entirely sure where I’m going with this, so I needed something solid.

Baso, I took a picture from google of as straight up a view of that mansion as possible, brought it into photoshop, turned down the opacity and used my fav blue gritty pencil to sketch that bad boy out. I did it in sections and usually remembered to do them all on separate layers. Ignore the numbers, they turn out useless anyway.

I used the line tool to neaten those lil’ suckers up, labelled them because I knew for a stone cold fact that I would jumble them up if not, and printed them out! Looking back, I probably should’ve waited until I was back at uni to cut these out since I almost lost multiple soldiers throughout the time in between, but hey, they all survived in the end.

Conclusion

It’s a bunch of shapes, I don’t know what to evaluate here. I didn’t work anything out since I traced the mansion and Photoshop is so easy to use that this really didn’t take many brain cells. I did think about cutting everything out here at home so I contributed a bit more towards this project in these 3 weeks, but there’s a lot of small things that need repeating, and I'm pretty sure I need these somewhat quite accurate to fit together, so I thought me hacking away at a sheet of MDF with a hand saw and sanding my fingers tips away would be a bigger waste of time than just sitting this one out.

[cheznieba2b]

A finished website!

Good lord, I never thought I would finish this site.

Website

https://www.cheznie.com/

I am genuinely so pleased with this, it’s worked out better than all my previous attempts at websites PLUS it has its own domain name, how cool is that?!

Each page has a link to my socials, access to all the other pages and I even figured out how to shove my CV on there. It’s literally my whole artistic life on your browser. I’m glad I steered away from just white, grey and a single pop of colour because that just felt way too boring for me. Don’t get me wrong, I’ve seen so many websites where it works wonders, but I tried like 4 different times and it never suited me. Also, cheers to that one animator's online portfolio that showed me you can, in fact, add gifs! That spruced up my site to no ends.

Don’t get too excited though, there’s still hatred in me. I know that there’s only so much I can personally do in Adobe portfolio like there’s probably loads of like fun workarounds that I just have literally no idea about, so it still looks kinda amateur? I could’ve gone balls to the wall with Wix or even WordPress, but I knew I had 3 other projects on the go, I’d struggle enough with Adobe portfolio as it is (and I’m already somewhat familiar with it), and with creative cloud, Adobe hosts your domain for you, so I thought I might as well keep it simple.

Conclusion

It’s been a fun project, to be honest. I didn’t expect it to pull me out my deep life crisis of ‘what am I actually doing, what is happening, how do I live beyond education’ which is rather nice. There’s obviously still work to do when it comes to internships, making contacts, and all that industry talk, but the main chunk is done and I’m feeling a solid 6 outta 10.

[cheznieba2b]

Even more stuff to look at for my research report!

I give all credit for this blog post to Lynsey, she sent me an incredibly helpful email helping me with my severe lack of skill in researching <3

General

In the animated film, there is double potential for emotion - in the emotions of the characters and in the artistry of the work itself (in the writing, choice of material, design, presentation, staging, picture-making, voice acting, colour, music and animation)

Characters use ‘symbols’ to express emotion - gestures, attitudes, expressions, and timings

Looking at how actors portray a character's emotions is also useful, as they are basically trying to do the same thing but with themselves instead of drawings/models - Katharine Ommanney questions to a performer - ‘Are the characters interesting, lifelike and vivid? Do you become emotionally involved with them? Do the gestures and movements seem sincere, convincing, clear, and properly motivated? Does all of the action help to delineate the characters and their situation for you? Is the action clear-cut, prolonged sufficiently, and exaggerated enough to be seen by the whole audience?’ (Ommanney, 1932)

2D

The first example of an entire animated sequence showing real emotion was in Snow White (1937) - the dwarfs grieving over what they assumed to be Snow White’s death.

The animators wanted the audience to completely connect with the emotions of the dwarfs, but this had never been done with moving drawings.

To help, the animators tailored each reaction from the different dwarfs to fit with the personality - Grumpy went off to cry alone whilst Dopey buried his face in Doc’s shoulder.

They didn’t overcompensate - originally every dwarf had streams of tears, but it looked too theatrical and less realistic, so they stepped it down a notch to create a more believable reaction.

The dwarfs were also kept incredibly still, with only a few arm drops and sniffles here and there so that the audience had no choice but to concentrate on the emotions of the face.

In Bambi (1942) they used the gradual build-up of snow around Bambi’s mother to add to the emotion of the scene as it made the action more subtle.

Stop motion

The puppets used in stop motion films are often the most realistic to human, so it has the highest risk of falling into ‘uncanny valley’ - however because they are so realistic they can also connect with the audience the most 

Figure 1

Figure 2

Figure 3

Due to the handcrafted nature of stop motion, audiences have a preemptive connection with the action

The uncanny valley can be used to create a stronger connection with the audience, like in ‘Anomalisa’

Figure 4

Figure 5

The lines kept on the puppets' faces in Anomalisa does increase the uncanny valley aspect, however, it increases the theme of the film that people aren’t how they say they are and are hiding behind masks

3D

3D animators tend to avoid the uncanny valley, as it can give the audience the wrong emotion - this is clear from the comparison of the baby from ‘Tin Toy’ and newer 3D character designs

Figure 6

Figure 7

A study by Willie Bouwer and Francois Human shows that dipping into the uncanny valley in 3D can cause repulsion from the audience

In a paper about the uncanny wall, the writer discusses how as we become more aware of the technology used to create 3D animated films, the less we are affected by it

It’s easier to get children emotionally tied to 3D animated characters as they see it as more real than an older audience does.

Bibliography & Images

can’t say I’ve ever done a bibliography for a blog post before but here you go

Angela Tinwell (2011). The Uncanny Wall. Bolton: The University of Bolton.

Blackwell, M. (2016). Anomalisa. [online] Animation Unplugged. Available at: https://animationunplugged.blogspot.com/2016/09/anomalisa.html [Accessed 28 Apr. 2019].

Bouwer, W. and Human, F. (2017). The Impact of the Uncanny Valley Effect on the Perception of Animated Three-Dimensional Humanlike Characters. [online] Springer Link. Available at: https://link.springer.com/article/10.1007/s40869-017-0041-8 [Accessed 28 Apr. 2019].

Ommanney, K. (1932). The Stage and the School. 1st ed. New York: Harper & Bros.

Phillips, G., Mikkelsen, M. and Leite, N. (2017). How Stop-Motion Can Survive: The Past, Present and Future of a Suffering Art (Video) - MovieMaker Magazine. [online] MovieMaker Magazine. Available at: https://www.moviemaker.com/archives/moviemaking/other/how-stop-motion-can-survive/ [Accessed 28 Apr. 2019].

Quora. (2016). Are one of the reasons why stop-motion films fail at the box office because of the creepy nature?. [online] Available at: https://www.quora.com/Are-one-of-the-reasons-why-stop-motion-films-fail-at-the-box-office-because-of-the-creepy-nature [Accessed 28 Apr. 2019].

Thomas, F. and Johnson, O. (1981). The Illusion of Life. 1st ed. California: Abbeville Press, pp.473 - 478.

Figure 1 - https://www.ecosia.org/images?q=kubo+puppet#id=B98625A54290394969A859B9092FF34FC340CEBF

Figure 2 - https://www.ecosia.org/images?q=sleeping+beauty#id=83219D354EA0AA145DD8DF9533664EC7B11E08E3

Figure 3 - https://www.ecosia.org/images?q=how+to+train+your+dragon#id=3E8D636EFA5DBFEA02F96A2F5F2BBF295993C93A

Firgure 4 - https://www.ecosia.org/images?q=Anomalisa#id=50638397F423E99935175CCF2CE48CF4834D8F13

Figure 5 - https://www.dailymotion.com/video/x3c792s

Figure 6 - https://www.ecosia.org/images?q=baby+from+tin+toy#id=15585FFFEA92BB27F939C97FC06B29AD5CB7FA22

Figure 7 - https://www.ecosia.org/images?q=inside+out+film#id=5458BFF32EFD510DA288AFAF9F9113EE10D7C9DA

Conclusion

Good lord, I think this was the most formal blog post I’ve ever written that isn’t a weekly summary. I know I’m not gunna use half this stuff in my proposal, considering this was all done just for the background section BUT it’s gunna come in so unbelievably handy when I’m actually writing out this report next year. I’m honestly so proud that I’ve done this amount of research for this project and even though I feel like my brain has slowly melted out my mouth and into the mango juice that was fueling me throughout this, I’m glad I did it.

[cheznieba2b]

oooo a CV and a showreel

The website is killing me and I needed a break, so hello, this is what I hurt myself with instead.

CV

My mum loves it so clearly I deserve a first.

No, but for realsy I do rather like this. I didn’t use the same fonts that I’m currently using in my website and showreel BUT I have stuck with the same colour scheme. The whole reason I didn’t go for those fonts was just that I saw a CV once upon a time that someone had handwritten and it caught my attention so much that I remembered it like a week ago and knew I had to follow suit (is that the saying, I’m not sure). My biggest inspiration was the fear of it looking like literally every CV handed to a dominos by a 16-year-old who’s mum said they’re old enough to get a job so it’s about time to get some responsibility. Also, I’m trying to get into a creative industry and who is gunna hire someone that’s just handed them a page of size 12 calibri black text to design for them?? No one. Or someone whose mental state is questionable.

I’m not 100% sure on the doodle additions yet, I’ll sit on it for a while.

Showreel

I don’t know what I can tell you that I haven’t already told you in every other showreel and experimentation reel post I’ve ever made. The intro and outro were made in After Effects, and then I shoved it all into Premiere Pro with the work I wanted to include and some royalty free music I found on bensound.

The music is another thing I’m gunna have to sit on for a while because I don’t know if it’s too aggressive?? I mean it defo has the attention grabbing-ness that I’m looking for, but is it too much?

Am I me if I say something is too much? My whole self is built on being too much so why should I hold that back for work. Let potential clients know what I’m all about from the get-go, ya know.

However, it is rather aggressive.

and that is the thought loop I’ve been stuck in for multiple days now.

Conclusion

Everything is looking like one coherent collection which is fun, I’ve never thought to match my portfolio to my CV and showreel, which explains why I’m in uni instead of getting paid for all this. Despite my struggles in getting the website anywhere near what I want it to look like I'm still feeling confident, it’s an Easter miracle.