Manfred

I liked this little short by Arjen Klaverstijn. Nice style, simple idea, clear characters. Pretty solid for student work.


'Manfred' an animated short by Arjen Klaverstijn from Arjen Klaverstijn on Vimeo.


found via 3dtotal.com

Fun films I've seen whilst strolling the intra-nubs

Something refreshingly different from Gobelins



And a Sheridan effort...

Look, the Gobelins chase animation meme- now in anime!

I think I've written this before (maybe not), but more than a few of those popular Gobelins short animated student films all seem to share a single element: the crazy, out of control speed chase/run/fall. It's been this way for at least 4 or 5 years now. Go ahead, look 'em up. It's a repetitive trope, but it has certainly been a good one if you want some popularity. One even was nominated for an Oscar. Well, the concept has flown from France to Japan-- somebody has made an anime short employing the same central concept. With panties.



Kinda like the love story angle, though.

Sunny's toon-shading breakdown

Former APT student Sunny Kharbanda (featured here and here on this blog) has a new post up on his blog. This time he goes pretty in-depth into how he developed a different kind of toony shading (but not a specific toon shader, per se) for this recent cartoon inspired animation work in Maya. I love his thought process. Definitely take some time to check it out, and then (if you're interested) see how you can expand upon the idea with your won twist.

APT Student Profile: Gary Macarevich

Here's another look at a student of my Animation Personal Trainer program (see previous APT student spotlights here, here and here). This time I want to highlight the work of Gary Macarevich. Gary had been working as a professional animator, but wanted to improve his skill level. He first took the APT last summer and then took a follow up session in January. His progress has been steady and solid and his hard work has been well rewarded. First here's a quick sample of some of Gary's work before he participated in the APT...

I determined that Gary needed to work on loosening up his characters and add weight to the animation-- a problem all too common in CG animation. Stiffness and a lack of weight tend to go hand in hand. Thus the plan was to liven up his character's movements by adding more drag and overlap, putting some balance and weight in the torso posing, along with cleaner arcs. Gary also wanted to focus on acting since his reel was a bit short on that. So by putting all that together we made a custom curriculum that targeted Gary's weaker areas while developing his acting skills at the same time. After his time in the APT here's what he was able to accomplish...

Definitely solid improvement. There's a lot more weight and flow in the performance. The tracking on the arcs are clean and add a lot of strength to the motion. The torso is looser and filled with a sense of life. His drag and overlap are much better and the acting picked up, too. As with everybody (myself included) there's still room for improvement, but Gary is definitely on  the way.

Gary's progress shows why I enjoy coming up with customized lesson plans for each animator that comes to the APT. Targeted training is a powerful teaching method and I think it's a great way to get a lot of growth and improvement in a short amount of time. Here's what Gary shared with me after his second session..

I've noticed an improvement at work and find myself finally realizing why my lead was getting frustrated trying to explain and re-explain concepts that just weren't sinking in.  Some "ah ha" moments for sure. Thanks so much Keith, please keep me in the loop on upcoming APT's... I'm definitely interested in doing this again.

If the Animation Personal Trainer sounds like the kind of animation training experience that you'd like to try,  now is a great time for you. I have a new session starting in a few weeks, and due to some late cancellations I have a few spots available. So if you're interested take a moment to email me to learn more about getting involved in the next APT session.

APT Student Animation: Sunny Kharbanda

Sunny Kharbanda first took his first APT session this summer. He wanted to improve pushing his poses, add some texture to his phrasing, make better acting choices as well as tighten up his polishing skills. Here is one of the better pieces that he made before the APT...

click here to play

I like the boldness and willingness to take chances with such a challenging clip. But there's a few things here and there that could use some help. The poses are awkward at places, alot of the poses are the same intensity so the texture is lacking and the arcs, eases and overlap need more polish. It's not terrible, but it has areas that could use improvement.

After 4 weeks in the APT this is what Sunny was able to produce...

click here to play

The polish is much stronger, the acting is interesting (and funny), the phrasing and texture are more defined and his poses feel more comfortable while at the same time being stronger and more graphically appealing. Overall it's a solid improvement.

Sunny is currently wrapping up work on his second APT session. Wait until you see what he's done in this latest class- it's really, really good. I can't wait to show it to everybody when it's done.

APT Student Animation: Anand Kumar

Anand Kumar is one of my favorite APT students. Anand has been in my APT twice, both times focusing on learning more extreme cartoon animation style. The first time was definitely a learning process as he broke out of his comfort zones as a Cg animator. During his second class I could really see that he was "getting it". He was beginning to think like a cartoon animator.

Here is a nice sample of what Anand was doing before this latest APT class...

Not bad. There's some nice stuff going on. It's a little lacking in some technical polish, but overall it's pretty solid. However it doesn't stand out- I don't think it's unfair to say that it's pretty typical of most CG scenes you see.

Now here are two scenes that he recently completed in APT. First an acting scene...

Kumar_toonActing.mov

And now a more 'technical' motion exercise...

 

Kumar_toonExit.mov

Now that's a different way to go. I really like seeing this style being explored in CG. It's been a lot of fun teaching this stuff. I grew up watching cartoons- it's what made me want to be an animator in the first place. Not surprisingly Anand felt the same way. He wrote me...

I will be doing more of this stuff :-) its fun and challenging to do.  ... This APT has really been an eye opener for me . ... I wanna do moreeeeee... :-)

So congrats to Anand for a job well done. I'm sure he's only going to get better and better at this sort of thing.