Pretty vid + Ramble

Saw this awesome speed-paint/making-of video, and its just... awesome. Love the detail and the colours. Id so love to do something this colourful and detailed :P



Making film of Circulation(2011) 6Min from MinjaeLee on Vimeo.


Holidays are still happening. I dont belive Im going back until the start of March. Im starting to really think I should be doing something worthwhile, or teaching myself some things or at least practising!

But Im not...

I have been commissioned to do 9 pictures though, so Im quite very happy about this. Ive only ever done small $5-10 ones. I like being commissioned...

Ive also been reading a fair bit, and I like that.

Im not such a fan of xmas, so I doubt youll be seeing any crazy xmas stuff from me. I shall be spending it with the familys, which shall be interesting. But oh well.

I shall try n animate something. Dont know what, but I shall try. Just to feel like Im doing something worthwhile...

21 and concerns for next year

So not too much has been happening. Ive been a little less motivated than usual the past few weeks. But thats fine. Ive also been playing Psychonauts a bit, and thats quite distracting...

Anyway I have a few pictures I want to draw for friends and family for xmas, so I suppose I should start on them.

I had my birthday on the 6th, I am now 21, which is nice though theres been no great revelations or wisdom thats come with it. I did however get 'Drawn to Life volume 1 and 2' and another Terryl Whitlash book that I love. As well as some pretty nice watches and bag.

Im happy too. Which is always good.

Im a little concerned for next year. I always have been really.. though I am excited, Im still worried that I might just not be able to animate anything decent. Ever... but I shall try, and I want to learn all I can. I just dont feel as creative as others. but maybe that only means that I wont be an animator or storyteller.. I quite enjoyed what little 3d modelling we did, and I do enjoy doing character design.. so maybe they will be the areas I go into? Or maybe something completely different.

Its hard because Im interested in such different things, its hard to fit any together... for instance I love history and behaviour. As well as animals and research and drawing, books, learning, photography... siiigh.

I really like learning about behaviour, in particular canine behaviour. I wont go into it, mainly because I dont really know too much and dont want to sound like an idiot, but I love their social behaviour. The way they sort out their problems together and their social hierarchy.. its amazing.. I love em..

Anyway one good thing about next year is we also get to choose an elective class. Which Im excited about. I wanted to do the photography course, but Im worried itd be too... crap. I want to learn how to take better pictures, I want to learn about the proper camera settings to use etc. I dont want to learn about stuff I already know..

Then I was thinking I might do a language course. Id love to learn french, japanese or german. I learnt german in high school, but I dont really remember much.. then I though what good will another language do me... siiigh.

Ill keep thinking about it.

Heres a fjord horse I drew. Theyre cute. And I had fun with this style.

Heres a cute and funny little animation

Been a lil distracted with my freedom

So my first year of uni has finished! Im very happy. And I admit Ive been a lil distracted and havent posted on this for awhile. Sorry about that. But Ive already drawn a few things, and Ive also bought my paints here, so maybe Ill play around with them at some point just for the 'lolz'. Paints hate me a little...

Anyway!

I managed to finish everything off quite well. Im happy with what Ive done. Even my imaging storyboard assignment wasnt too bad. Im quite very happy with my design work. Here is my brochure design -

Again, photos are my own. Im happy with this and I enjoyed making it.

Cant wait until second year though. For one thing, theres no imaging class, and we also start learning some more interesting animation techniques. The classes are 2D animation, 3D animation, Interactive and Video. Im looking forward to it.. I still dont think I have the patience for 2D, but we'll see. Itll be fun learning about it anyway.

Heres a very cool lil animation, Im not sure who made it, but I keep getting the song stuck in my head and I just love the 'story' :P

The end is in sight

Only 2 more week and Id have finished my first year on university. Im looking forward to it. Perhaps a little too much. Its so close that Im already planning what I want to do.

Im not too stressed about it coming to the end of the year. Ive been pretty good and kept up with the homework. Ive finished my design stuff, I just have to make some simple motion graphic. And Ive pretty much finished my little 3D class project.

Only thing thats going to give me grief is the imaging assignment. Its a storyboard. Though I got a lot done on it today, but that was the easy part. I started doing the next step, which is pretty much drawing each storyboard panel neatly, and its already disheartening me. But oh well.

I got my results back from the last imaging assignment, the silly after effects animaton I did of Snow White + Rose Red, and I got a pretty good grade for it. So thats good. Perhaps what I think majorly sucks can pass as decent in this class.

Thats got to give me some hope at least.

Anyway, Ill end this silly blog post with a very awesome little animation. I absolutely love these, theyre so clever and so damn well animated, the timing and sound is brilliant. Just look up 'Simons cat' on youtube or go to simonscat.com and you can see more.

Website designs + red panda

Had a small presentation in Design today showing what Ive done so far. I cannot remember if Ive mentioned exactly what we have to do but we have to design and identity for a company of our choice, I chose painteddog.org

We have to design a business card, invoice, letterhead, postcard, sticker, fax form, with comp slip, envelope, cd case and cd as well as a website with a minimum of 4 pages.

Oddly enough I quite like doing this. Or really I like seeing what Ive done when finished, as usually I surprise myself.

Im quite happy with how everything looks at the moment. Its not perfect, and Im certainly no designer, but I like it. And I didnt completely fail giving the presentation, so thats good too.

Heres what my 'Home' page of the website design looks like -

Photos are mine, I went to the zoo on sunday and had so much fun, it was a gorgeous day. I sunburnt my eyes though, and I find that odd, I didnt even know it was possible... Anyway the design will probably be tweaked a bit more, but not too much.

Here is a website design I did last semester, this time unofficially for Wildcroft Friesians -

Again pictures are my own. Id say Ive improved a little. Or at least tried not to make so much stuff up on my own this time. I actually did research on what makes good websites and tried to follow that. Which is good. And I created the webpage and everything in illustrator rather than photoshop.

I admit Im starting to like Illustrator.

And just for fun and cause red pandas are epic, heres a photo I took of one of the red pandas at Melbourne Zoo

Design

I wasn able to go to that lecture by Shaun Tan. My design teacher decided to make all our work due in a week, where I thought we'd have at LEAST another 2 weeks to work on them, so I couldnt really skip the class...

Oh well.

Im enjoying design though. I cant say if Im any good at it.. what Im making at the moment I quite like, but when others look at it and I get some feedback I might not be so optimistic about it.

Ive reworked my logo, because the last one was a piece of poop and I hated it...

Heres my business card design as of now, Im still deciding on the back of the card, and I keep turning back to the silhouette of the logo, but I believe I should stick with the more detailed one. I also like the text placement on the top one.

Im thinking I might go to the zoo tomorrow. I really hope the weather is nice. I have to use my own photos for the website and brochure etc. and the only photos I have of African Wild Dogs suck.

Presentation of all my designs on Wednesday. I really hate presentations, I dont have the confidence to speak to a group of people, but I guess I just have to suck it up and learn if I want to get anywhere in this industry... if only the teacher wasnt so intimidating >.>

*Sigh* Back to work.

Lost Thing and walk cycle

On wednesday, as of now, I shall be going to a lecture given by Shaun Tan, the academy award winning creator of 'The Lost Thing'. Shall be good. However Ill be missing part, if not all of my design class, which I reeeeally need to get some feedback on my work...

Anyway, check out 'The Lost Thing' its quite good. I adore the soundtrack and nice calm narration throughout it, not to mention the very nice story and amazing art/illustrations/style.




Heres another awesome lil animation, compleeeetely different to The Lost Thing, but no less awesome.

I absolutely love the expressions and movements in this, its well worth watching!




And now I shall contemplate doing some hw. Though at the moment its looking more likely that Ill be going to sleep. Mondays are evil, Im so tired after them...

 I also finished my little 2d animation of a walk cycle. You can see it here - http://fc07.deviantart.net/fs71/f/2011/259/6/6/panda_walk_cycle_by_hymnsofmisery-d4a2cvs.swf I have a lot to learn, but Im still quite happy with this.

Procrastinating

How amazing is this?






I love it! Its not an animation or anything, but an amazing artpiece. Part of how amazing it is comes from how it was made and Im glad they shared that with us. I adore all the colours and the detail put into it!
When I have time to work on my own art again, I think I shall try something like this. Not nearly as massive, but just to experiment. I enjoy experimenting with new styles.. its probably why I havent set on any style for myself yet...

This one keeps popping up to me too. Another animation thats not only great from what its showing, but how its made.




Now I shall get back to doing homework. Im working on my 2d animation which is a walk cycle. Im happy with it so far, though tis nothing amazing. I still have sooo much to learn... Im also reworking my design logo because I hate the last one... lets hope the design teacher approves.

Butterfly dragon

I saw this animation a few months ago, but I forgot the name of it and I stupidly didnt save it to my favourites.

I managed to come across it randomly today whilst procrastinating.

Check it out!







I love the character designs and the beautiful flowy animation.

I dont think people will ever move away from loving 2D. 3D is big and popular now, but it doesnt have the same feel as 2D... in general, I love both types. But it seems theres a certain extra lil something to seeing a great 2D animation.

Though even in saying that, I absolutely loved Kung fu panda 2 and Up. One with amazing animation, the other with a great story and brilliant timing.

Anyway, watch the pretty animation. I should get back to this thrilling homework.

Uni work

Oooh I like this new layout Blogger.

Anyway, Ive finally finished that evil long imaging assignment that was getting me so bummed. Ive uploaded it to youtube as promised, though its being silly and not showing in the right format. Oh well, its not so great anyway.

Im just glad that assignments over.



Now were moving onto doing a storyboard assignment... Im really not excited about this one. The teacher is giving us extremely little free rein.. I mean, he's given us a scripts, the layout on how he wants the characters to move, their reactions, everything... its depressing.

I understand that this is how it would work in the industry. But for now Id love to be able to show what I can do, what I can create, rather than just doing what someone else has thought up.

Anyway, its also another project where I have to draw people... arg. Cant wait until next year. Im hoping I wont be forced into doing so many people things and Ill be able to practice on animating and drawing what I know and am good at.

Its just not fun when you work on something for hours and hate it at the end...

So, while Im showing some of my uni work I may as well show you my logo design. I did this for 'Painted Dog Conservation' http://www.painteddog.org/ ... not officially though, just for my assignment :)

Next thing I have to do for design is do a website and business cards, stationary etc. Should be interesting. Im not tooo happy with the logo, I wanted a more illustration-y type logo, but everyone I asked advice from chose this designer-y looking one.

Oooooh well.

Next post I hope will be more interesting.

Motivation

Still not so much happening here. Motivation is at a low. But Im pushing through it.
Half of my design project is done, thank god.. the logo is finished. Now just to do the website, brochure, invoice, business card etc.

But I have a week of 'holidays' now. Most of which I imagine will be filled with finishing the project for my imaging class and doing my little animation. And of course, sleep. I like my sleep. I suppose I should be social at some point too... we'll see.

Anyway, about this motivation. I believe its based purely on me being forced to draw something Im not comfortable with. Im an 'animal artist'. Im best at drawing animals, whether it be horses or little fluffy things. I dont do people. People dont so much interest me. I wish I were good at doing them, and I know that if I practise enough I will get better. But now, all I want to do is draw animals and improve on those skills.

But I cant.

Cause I have to draw people for class...

Its frustrating because I know what Im making sucks. I just dont have the time to experiment and improve on my people drawing skills and do these projects.

I also tend to get distracted a lot.

Anyway, heres a good little quote made into an interesting text-animation thing. It gives me some motivation to just try and work through this crappy art time.


Ira Glass on Storytelling from David Shiyang Liu on Vimeo.

Another awesome motivation animation is 'Boundin' by Pixar. I really love this short. Especially the little expressions the jackalope does when he's listening to the sheep... its damn well done.



On a more interesting note, heres an absolutely AMAZING animation by Ryan Woodward. The timing and movements are stunning... just watch it!

Not too much happening...

As the title states, nothing much exciting has been happening the past week.

2D class was alright. Ill look forward to working on my short animation. But in the meantime I have a big imaging assignment Im stuggling a little with. Its just a lot of work so far and I have less than no motivation for it...

Oh well. Ill finish it and post up the result here whether I like it or not. Just to prove that Im doing something.

Ya never know, it might not turn out as bad as I think.

2D class starts tomorrow + Pink phink + Presto

Tomorrow I start learning about some 2D animation in Flash. Apparently I will have to make a 5-10sec animation.

It shall be interesting. I look forward to the classes.

I also have design class tomorrow. Im still sketching out my logo design for "Painted dog conservation", and I have an idea on what direction I want to take it. Im hoping the teacher wont completely shut me down.

We shall see.

Now to the more interesting part of this blog entry. Ive just finished a lecture series learning about the history and types of animation.. one of the shorts we watched in these lectures was the Pink Panthers 'The Pink Phink'.

Its brilliant. I love it. Simple idea, very well done. Love the music and the expressions. Its well worth watching.



Another lil animation we were shown was Pixars 'Presto', which is damned brilliant! I love that theres no voices in it, just various sounds they make. The timing is amazing too, not to mention the gorgeous animation.





Ahhhh I must find more motivation for these things. Ill try and post some of my sketches, and Ill certainly post my 2D 'animation' once its done.

*waves*

Stop motion

I had four weeks of stop motion class. Now its over.
I really enjoyed it. I mean, who wouldnt enjoy sitting around playing with plasticine in class?

I have to admit though, that I dont believe the world of stop motion is for me. I respect people that can do it and are passionate about it.. Im just not one of those people...

I really liked making the model though, I think I might play around with sculpting in the future.

Heres my model. I think its cute.

And heres my stop motion attempt. The model started dying halfway through.. his whole shoulder and neck were falling apart, my ocd side wasnt liking it...

Darn assignments

I just received the Terryl Whitlash book in the mail that I was talking about a few posts back, n damn it looks amazing! I only flipped through it a little because I didnt want to torture myself too much... today is all about working on my sound editing assignment.

Ive already had a few issues with the silly pro tool and mbox things. At first it wouldnt install, and after messing around with it for an hour or two and finally getting it installed, getting my assignment opened.. the damned sound didnt work. After another 2 or so hours, I realised you needed fancy headphones or speakers. They wernt just going to play out of my mac speakers... I felt like a fool.

But I have the headphones now.. and I quite like them. They make everything sound better..

Anyway.. must get back to homeworking. Perhaps if it doesnt turn out to be a total failure I shall upload it somewhere and post it here.

Graphic novels

I was a bit bored the other day and I started browsing around different art sites. I sometimes do this if I feel uninspired or want to find some talented artists.

I was looking around the OFF-White site (link in my sidebar) and I looked at their outgoing links, and they directed me to a few other comics. One in particular I quite like. Its called 'Sfeer Theory'. They only have one chapter down so far, and it tell you to wait until september before the next update, but I love the style!

The expressions and storytelling is wonderful. I recommend everyone to check it out.

Find it here - http://sfeertheory.littlefoolery.com/index.html

Another comic I really want to read is Lackadaisy. Ive seen the art for it and absolutely adore it! Again, I love the expressions, and the characters seem quite well developed. Though I cant really comment more until Ive read it...

You can find Lackadaisy here - http://www.lackadaisycats.com/

One of my favourite artist and storyteller at the moment is Yummei on dA. Just wow! Simply beautiful emotional stories. The way theyre displayed also interests me, theyre in interactive flash comics. The art is absolutely wonderful, but the storys are so beautiful.

Here is their '1000 words' short comic. Its well worth reading! I hope one day I could tell stories half as well :)

1000 W0RDS by `yuumei on deviantART

Zombies & Vampires

Nothing much happening in the way of creativeness.

Ive been watching a few zombie movies though. I should probably stop.. theyre starting to make me a bit too paranoid and jumpy...

On another note, Im reading my favourite book series again. Its the Vampire Chronicles by Anne Rice. Ive just finished reading her 'Lives of the Mayfair witches' and thoroughly enjoyed it.

Lestat de Lioncourt is probably my favourite character from a book. His arrogant yet charming spoilt personality is brilliant. Anne Rice makes amazing characters. You either fall in love with them or hate them.

Im looking forward to seeing her take on werewolves too. (see here - http://www.pinkisthenewblog.com/2011/07/watch-anne-rice-reveals-that-she-is-writing-a-werewolf-novel/ )

Im usually not a fan of werewolves... I see them more as ruthless stupid monsters that kill without any control. I cannot see anything romantic about them compared to Anne's vampires.. but Im sure Ill be proved wrong.

And no. I am not a fan of the Twilight series.

Creature designing

I just bout this book off ebay. And I cant wait for it to come.
One thing Id absolutely love to be is a character/creature concept artist. Though at the moment I have a LOT to learn and a LOT to improve on.
But theres nothing wrong with having a dream :)

I loved the world and creature designs in Avatar. That would have been so much fun doing them!And I love the beautiful storybook looking worlds in Legends of the Guardians.
One thing I really like is anatomically correct animals but they have humanistic expressions. Just like the owls in Legends of the Guardians... ahh they were beautiful! So real yet they had such human qualities in them.. I love the armor and weapons designed for them too.. I would have loved to have worked on that film.. *dreams*

I have one fairly developed creature design that I call a 'runedog'.
Here is a character sheet I made for them - (click to see it bigger)

He is being massively redesigned at the moment to be more 'realistic'. I originally wanted this character to be tall and slim, he somehow turned into this cute chubby thing.
Here's a sketch of what I have of his new look so far -

Im much rather liking this new design.
One thing I know I have to improve on is anatomy and more dynamic poses. I want my character to have a little life of the screen, and bland standing poses dont help with that...
Im hoping I might get some ideas and be inspired by Terryls book. I already love her work.. itll be great to have this book to always look upon.

Design project chosen

Finally!

Ive been tossing up between a few ideas the past week now... or really the past month since Ive known about the projects...

Im going to be do an African Wild Dog Conservation group. Ive chosen to revamp this - http://www.painteddog.org/ a great little site, but I think I can improve on a few things.

I love AWDs almost as much at red pandas at the moment. So its all good.

Im hoping Ill be able to take some decent photos of the AWDs at the zoo, otherwise Ill have to draw everything, which takes considerably much more time...

Anyway, decision made. Hard parts done. Now I can finally start working on my ideas for it.

I wish these guys were more known. I get a lil' peeved when I go to the zoo and people are pointing at them calling them hyenas...

Long day

Long day at uni today. Was cold and raining too. But I suppose thats what I get for living in Melbourne.

Heres a very intriguing and creepy animation by Rodrigo Blaas. It have very nice animation and character designs. The storys very nice and very creepy.




Heres another short animation that I love! I watched this one ages ago, even before I was interested in studying animation, and I really love the simple story to it. Its a student animation, so its not perfects. But everythings so simple and beautiful. You dont understand what the Kiwi is doing until the end, and its all very sweet and has a nice 'meaning'.



I think now I might go be boring and normal. I have a day off tomorrow, so Ill attempt to get some things done. I really should take some photos for an after effects project were doing in Imaging.. and I really should pick a design topic already. Im quite fond of doing a red panda conservation identity... but I dunno... I have until wednesday to decide at least.

<3

Obsessed

Couldnt help myself. I drew another red panda. Im thinking maybe I should do my design project on them. Then maybe Ill get them out of my system and move onto other interests.

But damn theyre too cute! Look at this video on youtube. I literally lol'd a few times.



I really should have a go animating one of them. I tend to save videos like that to my favourites as they are great for seeing their movement... whenever I go to the zoo I never see the red pandas out and about. Theyre always hiding way up in a tree...

I wish I could have a simpler style. Something more 'animateable'. I always tend to overdo things. Im jealous of artists who can stylise animals in a gorgeous unique way.

I have to experiment more and try to care less about correct anatomy...

Deer, oh deer

Im feeling remarkably less motivated today than I was yesterday.

Im reading a book by one of my favourite authors, Anne Rice, and every now and then she describes a scene, it might be some major or minor scene, but something about it makes me want to illustrate it. Like a book cover-type-thing I suppose. While I was reading another of her books I also kept thinking about how this scene might be played out in a movie or a comic book.

Considering Im doing an animation course, I think I should start thinking more like an animator rather than an illustrator...

I also watched Bambi today, to try and get motivated. I watched it twice actually. Once normally, the second time with a sort of commentary taken from the meetings with Walt Disney while they were planning the movie.

All it really made me want to do is draw a deer.

So I did. Or I just sketched one... I might finish it. The photos were taken from wikimedia commons.

Ideas and inspirations

Im only in my first year of Uni and yet Im already thinking about what I might do as my 3rd year animation. I still dont know which Ill choose to do, 2D or 3D animation.. or even both..
I have classes this semester that will teach me basics of 2D animation in Flash and 3D animation. Maybe Ill have a better idea then.
Id love to do something like theyve done in the Fantasia movies. Where they have a classical song and animate a story for it. Ever since I was a child Ive loved Fantasia, I watched it so often I destroyed the video I had. I especially love the animation to Beethovens "The Pastoral Symphony". Those pegasus characters are so beautiful and the little black pegasus is adorable when he's so proud he can fly :)



Another early inspiration of mine are the Krtek cartoons. My grandparents were born in the Czech rep. so I grew up with a few Czech traditions. Whenever I visited I used to watch the Krtek video they had. I loved it imensly. Krtek is such a gorgeous character and though he rarely actually speaks, I love the way he comunicates and all the little adorable sounds he makes.



I really dont know what Id want to do for my final. Suppose its a good think I have 1.5 years to think on it.

A more current desicion I have to make would be what company I have to choose to do my design project on. I have to design an identity in my design class this semester. Im thinking maybe a red panda conservation group. Im a little obsessed with red pandas at the moment, and I do like designing the more corporate/businessy websites and such than the 'artsy-fartsy' ones. Or really Im just better at it...

Ahhh well. We'll see.

Inspiring animation

I just found this animation while browsing youtube. I absolutely adore the animation. Im usually not a fan of 3D being used this way, but I love it here.




I love the 2D look everything has here and the soft muted colours they used. The movement of the deer is beautiful too, especially when he wakes up to the ash falling down and the obviously careful way he carries the leaf to the water. N damn it looks amazing when the leaves/vines spring up and you get the brighter colours... *dies*
The idea of a deer being used as a symbol of rebirth isnt so unique.. but oh so beautiful dont you think?

I especially love the animation in Fantasia 2000 "Igor Stravinsky's Firebird Suite". I just watched it then and it still sends chills down my spine. I absolutely love semi-realistic animals in animations. Probably why I love Legend of the Guardians so much, even though I admit their lacking a lil in story...

Anyway, heres "Igor Stravinsky's Firebird Suite" from Fantasia 2000. Definitely worth watching!

First post... yay

Hiya

Figured I should start a blog of some description. Ive done this before, a few times actually.. I usually get sick of it in a few weeks. But Ill try and keep focused this time.

I wanted to make this to sort of record my progress in my course. Im studying Animation and Interactive Media in Melbourne, Australia. Im thinking I want to post here whatever I want in reguards to my course. Inspirations, ideas, progress etc.

Lets see how this goes :)

<3
Elle