D4M Final: Reel Animation -Post 5-

A "Reelly" Good Animation.

A "Reelly" Good Animation, is my final for my design for media class. This was my first 3D animation, and I think I did pretty good for a first attempt. Enjoy.

A "Reelly" Good Animation from Melanie Mescher on Vimeo.

         My sound effects are a little spotty, because I did not have a real reel to use. I ended up using a frying pan to create these noises, they are pretty good for what I used. Anyway this is my last big final I had to create. 

Thanks for reading,

     MELANIE S MESCHER

D4M Final: Reel Animation -Post 4-

Getting to the nitty gritty...

      I fixed the kerning of the text in my name for the final shots, and also started to play around with color in the lights. In the previous renders I thought everything was too grey, so I added some purples greens and oranges to all the different lights.

       Before I began animating I decided to do some key poses sketches. I know I had the storyboard, but i wanted a more in-depth storyboard for my own purposes.

       I also began animating through the shots, it really needs sound effects in my opinion. With sound it'll have so much more life. Originally I was going to have this be a 10 second animation, but it is turning into a 30+ second short. So far it is 15 seconds long and I am about half way through. If it was faster like I had planned the film strip would loose all the character he has.

Reel: Progress Video from Melanie Mescher on Vimeo.

       I still have quite a bit to do, so this next week will just be concentrating on getting the animation done. I will use the time after tuesday to do post editing such as sound and anything else the piece needs.

Thanks for reading,

     MELANIE S MESCHER

   

Project Yoakam Completed!

Murphy, CCAD, and You...

      After long anticipation, Murphy, CCAD, and You is completed! It was a great group effort and we have a lot of time in this project. So I hope you enjoy it, I know I did!

Murphy, CCAD, and You from Kevin Harkness on Vimeo.

Project Yoakam Blog

Thanks for reading,

     MELANIE S MESCHER

D4M Final: Reel Animation -Post 3-

I Have Everything "Reelized"...

     So this week I concentrated on figuring out the texture and beginning to rig my film strip for animating. I also played around with lighting and creating the text for my name.  

When I was texturing the film strip, I kept running into a problem with the transparency. I couldn't get the alpha to work in the transparency plug-in in the Mia Material X, because in this material the alpha needs to be plugged into the Cutout Opacity. When I figured this out I didn't have any problems with the transparency. 

This is before I figured out the problem

This is after I figured out the texture

    After I figured out the texture I began rigging the film strip. I decided I am going to use the rigging for the first half of the short and then use blend objects for the part when the film strip turns into an "s" shape.

Thanks for reading,

     MELANIE S MESCHER

D4M Final: Reel Animation -Post 2-

Finished Modeling...

      This week I finished modeling the film canister, and played around with the film strip texture. How I went about modeling the canister was working from a a plane rather than a box like I normally do. 

Finished plane of the canister shape

Another Progress shot

Canister with cleaned up geometry

   

        I'm feeling really good about this model, this reminded me just how much I do enjoy modeling. I'm exited for this whole project and to start experimenting with blend shapes, rigging, and just 3D animating in general.

Thanks for reading,

    MELANIE S MESCHER

D4M Final: Reel Animation -Post 1-

FINALS ARE COMING..

     For my final project in Design For Media, I would like to do a short 10+ second 3D animation. Since I want to do something so short, I decided a animation for my name. I was inspired by Pixar's lamp animation, and how the lamp is part of the word.

 
      So I decided I want to do a classic movie real as the object i want to play around with. I chose a movie reel because I want something that can turn into an "S" and be descriptive of what I do and who I am as an artist. It is a littler predictable, but it is the perfect object for this project.

I also did a simple storyboard for the short, giving an idea of what I want the short to look like.

 Thanks for reading,

    MELANIE S MESCHER

Project Yoakam Contribution -Post 5-

Final Week...


     Yes we are on our final week! We got a lot done in a little time. Everyone on this project should be proud of the progress they made, and the short we have! Currently the film is going through editing and final touches. Tuesday, for the class we are having a pre-screening of what is done of the final film, and to get final comments from everyone.

     As a personal contribution to the project, I sent out emails like always and made the credit list. I also filled everything out for film festival submissions. For both Flicks Film Festival, Columbus Film Festival and any other film festival we want to enter.

     For the film festival entry information, I used temporary pictures until we have our meeting to decide on our final poster and banner. Also on what would be the best screen shots to use. 

Don't forget to check out the project's blog, to see the final video when it is finished!

Thanks for reading,
    MELANIE S MESCHER

Project Yoakam Contribution -Post 4-

Filming has begun...

     The puppet was completed by last Tuesday, and made it's big show. This last week we started actually filming our shots. The first day we shot, some of the videos were over exposed and we needed to reshoot. Actually in the second time we shot the dark room scene I am an extra in the corner, you can barely see me but I'm here. 

      

      The marketing team began brainstorming titles for Project Yoakam, and are having some final ideas by Tuesday. Also Tuesday, we are going to go over different credit information for the end of the short, and any other loose end we need to tie up. 

       As a personal contribution to the project, I again sent out information emails, and I began research on different competitions we could enter Project Yoakam. 

     This week we should finish all our filming and really begin post-editing to all the shots and visual effects, and have a finished piece. We also will being wrapping up the documentary and all the credits and marketing. So, next couple weeks are going to be busy, but we're almost there and we have something great!

Thanks for reading,

    MELANIE S MESCHER

Project Yoakam Contribution -Post 3-

This are going great...

     This week the puppet got close to completion, we started finalizing the script and plan to shoot our first few scenes Tuesday. Overall things are going along the schedule we made for ourselves.

      We also got a marketing team together from the story crew, Chelsea T. is now the director of marketing. Beth W, Emily C, Taylor H, and Catherine C have also moved to marketing as crew.

       Thursday we finalized who would be the puppet, our script writer, Jake B. We also discussed having everyone able to come in to be extras in the film where they are needed. 

       As a personal contribution to the project, I sent out emails after every meeting and help keep the meetings organized, and so Laurel can post the information on the blog in case people do not see their emails. I also checked in the Shayna M. the director of documentary, to see where they are at in their filming. 

      Overall I'm really excited for this project, and I'm excited to start filming and seeing this puppet in action!


Don't forget to look at our project blog for more detailed updates! Project Yoakam

Updated my Digication Check it out here!

Thanks for reading,

     MELANIE S. MESCHER

Project Yoakam Contribution -Post 2-

Week 2...

     This week we finished the puppet design and finalized the storyboards. We also discussed possible locations in more depth. We also had the fun job of naming the puppet! Chelsea gets credit for the name Murphy!

     Myself I have been keeping everyone organized with an attendance sheet and emails after each meeting going over the meeting and what needs to get done for next meeting.

     I also went with Kevin Harkness to Jo-ann to get some final fabric for the puppet. Even though I'm not part of the puppet crew, I know a lot about fabric and helped Kevin pick out the right fabric. 

     We also created a color pallet by laying fabric on the floor.

     Overall the project is going good, not too many bumps in the road so far. We are going to start filming once the puppet is completed. So excited about this project and cant wait to see the finished product!!

Thanks for reading,

     MELANIE S. MESCHER

Project Yoakam Contribution -Post 1-

Week 1...

    For our second Design for Media project, we had to vote on our favorite proposed ideas and only three would be created. This wonderful idea here, was one of the three that won. Everyone for class was given the opportunity to choose which group they wanted to be in. Our group has the most students the class has ever had on one project with 25 people!

    Thursday was our first meeting and we were all assigned jobs for the project. I was chosen to be the Head of Editorial. I am the person in charge of production documentation and oversee the project's blog, credit list, and the making of movie and research of potential competitions. At least that's how the project outline describes the Head of Editorial role. 

    Anyway for this week I created a customized organization chart that had everyone and their position listed. 

   I also was asked to collect some different choices of fabric to make the puppet out of, since I have a lot of fabric at home.

Mass amount of fabric

Different fabrics

 Personally, I am extremely excited for this project and can't wait to see how it turns out! It has the potential to be an awesome video.

Also here is the projects blog, so you can see the progress of Project Yoakam. 

Thanks for reading,

     MELANIE S. MESCHER

Project Pipeline Proposal

Paper Tales...

      For my project proposal, I was thinking a stop motion paper animation. Done the way the first South Parks were done. I've wanted to do a paper stop-motion animation for a long while now, and I finally came up with a concept/story. 

     I want to use 6 different fairy-tales or folktales transitioning into each other. I was thinking animation tricks could be used to transition between them. Using obvious symbols like, red riding's hood to tell what story is being shown. 

    Here are some simplified storyboards for the project. I think their should be a few more storyboards to give the project more life, but I just wanted to get the idea across. Please excuse the poor coloring, I just wanted to demonstrate how I wanted to separate the stories with changing the tree colors. 

        As you can see very rough thumbnails, and I want to explain on each story, give more depth to each story. For the proposal, I just wanted to give everyone a feel for the design of the piece and how the stories would transition to each other. 

       So everyone can understand the jobs needed for this piece, and in my head this would all be done on paper so keep that in mind.

We have 5 weeks to complete this project, so here is a timeline to keep us on track! 

      As a side note, I just wanted to add that I own a Cricut, so this means creating the background will not be so hard. we may be able to have the machine cut out the shapes, if the cartridges I have will work with the design.

Thanks for Reading,

     MELANIE S. MESCHER

Project Hiroshi Hayakawa -Post 5-

Final...

     

      Okay, I finished the three characters I set out to do. I thought about doing another one, but I didn't have time. It was my first time using Sculpey, and I think I did a pretty good job. I really enjoyed doing this project, and I really learned a lot from it. So Enjoy.

Here are some individual shots of the pets.

Pepper

Shadow

Rudy

   Here are some shot of them with themselves. 

Thanks for reading,

     MELANIE S. MESCHER

Project Hiroshi Hayakawa -Post 4-

Complete 180...

Rudy

     I completely 180'ed my project. Last week I had decided I was going to do the Victorian time idea, but I had a euphoria moment. I want to do the pet idea, but instead of drawing them in an environment I'm going to sculpt them! Personally, I love sculpting and am so excited about this project now. 

     Honestly, if I could just sculpt all day, I'd be the happiest person ever. Anyway for the project so far I only have one of the three I'm going to sculpt, finished. Of course it's Rudy, because he's my oldest dog (16) so he gets to go first. 

      Also I wanted to mention that this is my first time using Sculpey, I can see why people use it a lot. It has a lot of pros and cons. The fact that it doesn't dry is really nice, but also a curse because it messes and imprints so easily. But the post-sculpting part is so much easier than stoneware or any other kiln type clay.

Final Pallet 

Thanks for reading,

     MELANIE S. MESCHER