From engaging into the Capstone project in late April until close to the end of this month, this term has shown me a number of things. Though this may not have seemed evident in the beginning, the capstone project has helped improve my time management skills, though in my opinion it never seemed to be a factor in previous semesters but only on occasion.This project helped me to incorporate disciplinary actions amongst the time management skills. When you work out a schedule, you stick to it unless you are ill, but if that's not the case, then you have to get accomplished all that you can in the given amount of times that you've set aside.
When Mr. Bezeau and I have our weekly meetings, I demonstrate what I have accomplished and I would ask if there are any changes that should be made. Most often when we do meet, changes are requested in one area or another, plus additional animation in other parts that may not seem so prominent, or that maybe lacking in quality and/or quantity. Since our first meeting back on May 3rd, his objective (and mine as well) has been to make something that carries the inspiration of some of Norman MacLaren's more abstract works except with imagery situated in amongst the abstract shape transformations. He liked the idea of having these shape transformations within the movie and had recommended that these transformations go along with a beat.
In terms of challenges, the lipsync has been the biggest challenge above all, because since there were issues of not being able to import the audio directly into Flash, I had to pinpoint where the syllables were and take notes. For example, between 0:54 - 0:55 --> EATH, 0:55-0:56 -->THLESS and so on and so forth. So with that I had to do a little bit of math. If I was 55 seconds into the movie, I would multiply 55 by 24 (frames per second) and from there I would work from that keyframe onward to the 24 frames after that one.
Other than that technical issue, the production of this movie was quite successful. The lipsync worked surprisingly better than I originally thought. There were no major problems of any sort that I had run into.
Having looked back at the entire movie a short while ago, I thought that something had been missing. For the longest time, I wanted to create something that was primitive, yet very effective. All of the imagery had no colour, so to experiment, I decided to add colour to most of the imagery. I didn't think it would make the imagery (and the shapes to the divide the tweens) look any better but when I applied all the different colours, it looked surprisingly better and so I decided to stick by it. From making a weekly schedule to go by, it surprised me about how much I could accomplish in one day (though, it did require the given weeks for this movie to reach completion). Over the summer months, I plan to continue experimenting and creating little animations in Flash in my spare time.
Thursday, May 27, 2010
Monday, May 17, 2010
The Animation
Here is the animation so far, with the 2 sections of imagery plus the one section containing the lipsync, though the lipsync will see further editing and then tweening. Imagery will also be animated with the lipsync, except the imagery will look as though it is appearing in the background. These are the only sections (so far) that contain the audio from the song 'Breathless'. The 3rd section hasn't been exported with the audio just yet, because the lipsync is going to be worked inbetween the 2nd and 3rd sections containing imagery as well.
Sections 1 & 2 with Rough Lipsync (and sound)
Section 3 (no audio yet)
This clip is an update of the first clip, except the lipsync section has tweens drawn in. Though the tweening isn't complete as of yet, it will be complete by the end of Wednesday, May 19, 2010. This clip, containing the tweens for the lipsync, showcases the progress of the animation as of Tuesday, May 18, 2010 at about 6:15pm (that is, with the exception of the 2nd & 3rd section of imagery).
This clip contains all the sections put together and with colour. The colour was added on May 21/22. This is the entire movie as of May 22nd. Further editing and animation will follow shortly after.
The clip below is the entire Falcon Records Movie as of 12:00pm May 28th
Sections 1 & 2 with Rough Lipsync (and sound)
Section 3 (no audio yet)
This clip is an update of the first clip, except the lipsync section has tweens drawn in. Though the tweening isn't complete as of yet, it will be complete by the end of Wednesday, May 19, 2010. This clip, containing the tweens for the lipsync, showcases the progress of the animation as of Tuesday, May 18, 2010 at about 6:15pm (that is, with the exception of the 2nd & 3rd section of imagery).
This clip contains all the sections put together and with colour. The colour was added on May 21/22. This is the entire movie as of May 22nd. Further editing and animation will follow shortly after.
The clip below is the entire Falcon Records Movie as of 12:00pm May 28th
Sunday, May 9, 2010
Animatic Drawings
These 5 pictures are a few of the images used for some of the shape tweens between the imagery.
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The bottom panel is a collage of some of the various little drawings to be used for the animatic.
Wednesday, May 5, 2010
Capstone Journal
Monday, APRIL 26th -
Work begins on the first storyboard, an e-mail is sent to Mr. Bezeau about capstone project specifications, a phone call to Mr. Bezeau confirms the first meeting to be after classes on Monday, May 3rd.
Tuesday, APRIL 27th -
Further work continues on the first storyboard, a neighbour's laptop is borrowed for future work on the animation, the soundtrack for the animation is composed on piano (the idea was to start from a simple bass line for 2 bars, then to accompany itself with the piano chords that follow the same structural path.
Wednesday, APRIL 28th -
Further work continues on storyboarding, research commences on the Flash software online and the price ranges.
Thursday, APRIL 29th -
Further work continues on storyboarding, research continues on the Flash software online, a minor error occurred with the laptop but was resolved through rebooting.
Friday, APRIL 30th -
3 storyboards are started and completed on this date, an unknown error prevents access to login on the laptop, these complications continue with the laptop itself throughout the weekend.
Saturday, MAY 1st -
No further work commenced on this date.
Sunday, MAY 2nd -
2 other storyboards are started on this date and completed, written descriptions are made for every panel for all of the 5 storyboards
Monday, MAY 3rd -
A meeting takes place at Mr. Bezeau's classroom on this date, the 5 storyboards are presented, the plan of my own composed soundtrack for the animation is acknowledged but later dropped because 2 fellow members of Falcon Records have composed their own track of which Mr. Bezeau envisioned will be the soundtrack for the animation itself -- no particular storyboard is selected for the project, having already acknowledged all 5 of them, however from each of them, he garnered the idea of having the animation based on the abstract styles of Norman McLaren, so the idea now is to have the animation reflect the imagery and the symbolism that is represented from the lyrics in the song the 2 members have composed, and to end with the appearance of the Falcon Records logo, mascot and possible slogan, though it's not confirmed if there would be a slogan as of yet.
Tuesday, MAY 4th -
The laptop's complications reach attention when it was brought to a place called Computer Angels in Chester, NS to be looked after and for revival, in the mean time a new laptop is purchased and awaits activation. Also purchased is the Flash software from ebay on this date
Wednesday, MAY 5th -
The neighbour's laptop is revived and the new one is activated.
Thursday, MAY 6th -
Reviewing of the mp3 file 'Breathless', to be used as the soundtrack for the animation
Friday, MAY 7th -
The 6th storyboard (to accomodate the soundtrack) is completed on this date, the Adobe Flash software arrives and is installed on the new laptop. The Flash file, titled 'FalconRecords' is saved to the desktop and backed up on a thumbdrive.
Saturday, MAY 8th -
Work begins in Flash by creating the background, plus some of the basic drawings to be used to visually describe the imagery that the lyrics evoke.
Sunday, MAY 9th -
Work continues on the drawings in Flash
Monday, MAY 10th -
Work begins on the animation in Flash on this date. The first 5 seconds of the animation are completed. A meeting takes place in Mr. Bezeau's classroom at 3:00pm. The 6th and final storyboard draft (the one that accomodates the imagery presented and the lipsync) is shown to him, along with the first 5 completed seconds of the animation. I tried to import the mp3 file of the song 'Breathless' into Flash but an error occurs. Later that evening, the problem isn't resolved but an alternative comes to mind. The alternative is to import the avi files of the animation and import the sound into Windows Movie Maker, and to match them because obviously the mp3 file works in that particular software.
Tuesday, MAY 11th -
(8:00am-12:00pm, 1:00-4:15pm) Animation on 'Falcon Records (Part One)' continues and is completed on this date. 24 seconds of the animation are completed today. An idea comes to mind that all of the animation of the imagery should be completed first before starting with the lipsync. Part One is imported into Windows Movie Maker along with the mp3 file and, from watching the clip so far, the lyrics and the imagery sync together quite nicely, that is except for the beginning, which is only slightly off sync.
Wednesday, MAY 12th -
Work begins on 'Falcon Records (Part Two)' on this date. (Note: They are labelled as Parts 1, 2 and 3 because they are each separated from the lipsync sections which are to be completed last and imported inbetween each of the 'parts' with Windows Movie Maker)
Thursday, MAY 13th -
The animation for 'Falcon Records (Part Two)' is completed on this date. All together, 50 seconds of the animation have been completed so far. I import the avi of 'Part Two' into Windows Movie Maker with 'Part One' already there and once again, the ever-changing imagery along with the music synchronizes together quite well.
Friday, MAY 14th -
The animation for 'Falcon Records (Part Three)' is started and completed on this date within most of the afternoon. The next goal is to complete the lipsync sections that divide the sections containing the imagery.
Saturday, MAY 15th -
No further work completed on this date.
Sunday, MAY 16th -
The lipsync section of the animation is worked on today, focusing on the keyframes.
Monday, MAY 17th -
(9:00am-1:00pm) The keyframes for the lipsync section are complete.
A meeting has taken place in Mr. Bezeau's classroom from 3:00 until 4:00pm.
At this meeting, I have shown him the Windows Movie Maker file of the animation (with sound) all the way up until the end of the lipsync section. (Note: This lipsync section repeats 2 more times in the animation for the reason that it is the chorus of the song). Mr. Bezeau was pleased with the results so far, but recommended that I edit the first few seconds of the animation for the reason that the sync between the lyrics in the song and the imagery are just slightly off. He also suggested having the name of the artist (C-Boutz (I hope I'm spelling this correctly)) at the beginning to give credit to the artist who has composed the piece. Mr. Bezeau said he would get back to me about the correct spelling of the artist's stage name. After we discussed these changes, I have finally scanned all of the storyboards and had saved them to the thumbdrive, so they can be posted on this blog. The individual animated sections of the project with the imagery are re-exported as wmv files and attempts at posting them on the blog had failed due to an error on the website. Also on this date, the animator for this project decides to change his work ethic for the better by putting in longer-than-usual hours as a way to make up for the dismal time set aside for the project work in the past. The animator will treat this not like a evening homework assignment, but like a job and will work normal job hours and then some.
Tuesday, MAY 18th -
2 clips of the animation are uploaded onto the blog. One clip contains the first 2 sections of imagery with the rough lipsync and another clip is only section 3 of the animation. On this date, tweening for the lipsync section has started and is worked on most of the day. The tweening is to reach completion the next day. A milestone update by phone happens on this date as well.
Wednesday, MAY 19th -
The lipsync section of the animation is completed on this date. From there, I exported the flash file and imported it into Windows Movie Maker with the soundtrack. Knowing that the correlation between the lyrics and the lipsync could be tighter, I adjusted the positions of the keyframes with the tweens little by little until the vocals and the animation were in near-perfect sync. Since I couldn't import the audio into flash, I exported the flash file to put into Movie Maker with the audio every time an adjustment was made.
Thursday, MAY 20th -
The second mouth in the lipsync that sighs has been started yesterday and was completed on this date. The imagery within the lipsync has been completed on this date as well. The beginning of the animation was edited to include the authors of the song before the arm drops the microphone. Doing this, as well as adjusting some of the keyframes and tweens has brought the lyrics and the imagery in much closer synchronization than before, whereas prior to those changes at the beginning, the imagery and the lyrics were slightly off sync for a couple seconds, but everything else was on sync.
Friday, MAY 21st -
Further editing was done with the lipsync, with the adjustment of some keyframes and tweens to make the correlation between the audio and the lipsync tighter. A decision was made to bring the imagery into colour, so the colours for the imagery have been worked on on this date. The colouring will be finished tomorrow.
Saturday, MAY 22nd -
The colouring of the individual pieces of imagery and the shapes used to divide the shape tweens has been completed on this date. Also on this day, after a few little adjustments were made to the lipsync section, all of the sections of imagery, along with the repeating lipsync section have all been edited together in Windows Movie Maker with the sound. The entire movie (so far) was posted on the blog today.
Sunday, MAY 23rd -
Some work on additional drawings used for animation had been started on this date to fill the gap between the end of the 2nd section of imagery and the lipsync section that followed.
Monday, MAY 24th -
No further work commenced on this date.
Tuesday, MAY 25th -
The drawing of the falcon and the 'Falcon Records' logo had been started and completed on this date, as well as the credits and the animation of those symbols that went along with it.
A meeting was held on this date in Mr. Bezeau's classroom at 3:00 (as usual) to show the entire movie as of May 22nd, plus the additional animation that was edited into the final movie, which had been worked on at this date. Mr. Bezeau's suggestions were to fill the gap between the end of the 2nd section of imagery and the lipsync section that followed it. Another suggestion he had was that after the falcon, the logo, and the credits go by, to continue the abstract animation with just the shapes up until the last 5-10 seconds where a slow fade would take place. The slow fade, he said, should happen at the point when, in the song itself, all you hear left is the implied percussion up to the abrupt ending of the tune. Further work continues on filling the gap between the end of the 2nd section of imagery and the lipsync section and work on the ending of the movie, which would require basic shapes with tweening, and with considerable thought in the process.
Wednesday, MAY 26th -
The gap between the end of Section 2 and the beginning of the lipsync section has been filled on this date, with imagery arising in different points up to when the lipsync starts. Also completed on this date was the abstract animation that would continue on until the end of the song after the appearance of the falcon and the credits.
Thursday, MAY 27th -
The entire movie is uploaded onto the blog. After a few minor additional changes, the final movie will be posted on the blog tomorrow at noon. The reflection had been typed up and posted on the blog on this date.
Friday, MAY 28th -
On this date was the final meeting with Mr. Bezeau in his classroom. The time of the meeting was 2:10pm instead of the usual time of 3:00pm. At this meeting, one of the authors of the song 'Breathless' happened to be in the classroom at the time and had watched the final movie along with Mr. Bezeau and I. The author (Cody Boutilier) and Mr. Bezeau were quite satisfied with the final movie and were determined to put the project onto the Falcon Records compilation that they release annually, containing the completed works by the members of the record label.
Work begins on the first storyboard, an e-mail is sent to Mr. Bezeau about capstone project specifications, a phone call to Mr. Bezeau confirms the first meeting to be after classes on Monday, May 3rd.
Tuesday, APRIL 27th -
Further work continues on the first storyboard, a neighbour's laptop is borrowed for future work on the animation, the soundtrack for the animation is composed on piano (the idea was to start from a simple bass line for 2 bars, then to accompany itself with the piano chords that follow the same structural path.
Wednesday, APRIL 28th -
Further work continues on storyboarding, research commences on the Flash software online and the price ranges.
Thursday, APRIL 29th -
Further work continues on storyboarding, research continues on the Flash software online, a minor error occurred with the laptop but was resolved through rebooting.
Friday, APRIL 30th -
3 storyboards are started and completed on this date, an unknown error prevents access to login on the laptop, these complications continue with the laptop itself throughout the weekend.
Saturday, MAY 1st -
No further work commenced on this date.
Sunday, MAY 2nd -
2 other storyboards are started on this date and completed, written descriptions are made for every panel for all of the 5 storyboards
Monday, MAY 3rd -
A meeting takes place at Mr. Bezeau's classroom on this date, the 5 storyboards are presented, the plan of my own composed soundtrack for the animation is acknowledged but later dropped because 2 fellow members of Falcon Records have composed their own track of which Mr. Bezeau envisioned will be the soundtrack for the animation itself -- no particular storyboard is selected for the project, having already acknowledged all 5 of them, however from each of them, he garnered the idea of having the animation based on the abstract styles of Norman McLaren, so the idea now is to have the animation reflect the imagery and the symbolism that is represented from the lyrics in the song the 2 members have composed, and to end with the appearance of the Falcon Records logo, mascot and possible slogan, though it's not confirmed if there would be a slogan as of yet.
Tuesday, MAY 4th -
The laptop's complications reach attention when it was brought to a place called Computer Angels in Chester, NS to be looked after and for revival, in the mean time a new laptop is purchased and awaits activation. Also purchased is the Flash software from ebay on this date
Wednesday, MAY 5th -
The neighbour's laptop is revived and the new one is activated.
Thursday, MAY 6th -
Reviewing of the mp3 file 'Breathless', to be used as the soundtrack for the animation
Friday, MAY 7th -
The 6th storyboard (to accomodate the soundtrack) is completed on this date, the Adobe Flash software arrives and is installed on the new laptop. The Flash file, titled 'FalconRecords' is saved to the desktop and backed up on a thumbdrive.
Saturday, MAY 8th -
Work begins in Flash by creating the background, plus some of the basic drawings to be used to visually describe the imagery that the lyrics evoke.
Sunday, MAY 9th -
Work continues on the drawings in Flash
Monday, MAY 10th -
Work begins on the animation in Flash on this date. The first 5 seconds of the animation are completed. A meeting takes place in Mr. Bezeau's classroom at 3:00pm. The 6th and final storyboard draft (the one that accomodates the imagery presented and the lipsync) is shown to him, along with the first 5 completed seconds of the animation. I tried to import the mp3 file of the song 'Breathless' into Flash but an error occurs. Later that evening, the problem isn't resolved but an alternative comes to mind. The alternative is to import the avi files of the animation and import the sound into Windows Movie Maker, and to match them because obviously the mp3 file works in that particular software.
Tuesday, MAY 11th -
(8:00am-12:00pm, 1:00-4:15pm) Animation on 'Falcon Records (Part One)' continues and is completed on this date. 24 seconds of the animation are completed today. An idea comes to mind that all of the animation of the imagery should be completed first before starting with the lipsync. Part One is imported into Windows Movie Maker along with the mp3 file and, from watching the clip so far, the lyrics and the imagery sync together quite nicely, that is except for the beginning, which is only slightly off sync.
Wednesday, MAY 12th -
Work begins on 'Falcon Records (Part Two)' on this date. (Note: They are labelled as Parts 1, 2 and 3 because they are each separated from the lipsync sections which are to be completed last and imported inbetween each of the 'parts' with Windows Movie Maker)
Thursday, MAY 13th -
The animation for 'Falcon Records (Part Two)' is completed on this date. All together, 50 seconds of the animation have been completed so far. I import the avi of 'Part Two' into Windows Movie Maker with 'Part One' already there and once again, the ever-changing imagery along with the music synchronizes together quite well.
Friday, MAY 14th -
The animation for 'Falcon Records (Part Three)' is started and completed on this date within most of the afternoon. The next goal is to complete the lipsync sections that divide the sections containing the imagery.
Saturday, MAY 15th -
No further work completed on this date.
Sunday, MAY 16th -
The lipsync section of the animation is worked on today, focusing on the keyframes.
Monday, MAY 17th -
(9:00am-1:00pm) The keyframes for the lipsync section are complete.
A meeting has taken place in Mr. Bezeau's classroom from 3:00 until 4:00pm.
At this meeting, I have shown him the Windows Movie Maker file of the animation (with sound) all the way up until the end of the lipsync section. (Note: This lipsync section repeats 2 more times in the animation for the reason that it is the chorus of the song). Mr. Bezeau was pleased with the results so far, but recommended that I edit the first few seconds of the animation for the reason that the sync between the lyrics in the song and the imagery are just slightly off. He also suggested having the name of the artist (C-Boutz (I hope I'm spelling this correctly)) at the beginning to give credit to the artist who has composed the piece. Mr. Bezeau said he would get back to me about the correct spelling of the artist's stage name. After we discussed these changes, I have finally scanned all of the storyboards and had saved them to the thumbdrive, so they can be posted on this blog. The individual animated sections of the project with the imagery are re-exported as wmv files and attempts at posting them on the blog had failed due to an error on the website. Also on this date, the animator for this project decides to change his work ethic for the better by putting in longer-than-usual hours as a way to make up for the dismal time set aside for the project work in the past. The animator will treat this not like a evening homework assignment, but like a job and will work normal job hours and then some.
Tuesday, MAY 18th -
2 clips of the animation are uploaded onto the blog. One clip contains the first 2 sections of imagery with the rough lipsync and another clip is only section 3 of the animation. On this date, tweening for the lipsync section has started and is worked on most of the day. The tweening is to reach completion the next day. A milestone update by phone happens on this date as well.
Wednesday, MAY 19th -
The lipsync section of the animation is completed on this date. From there, I exported the flash file and imported it into Windows Movie Maker with the soundtrack. Knowing that the correlation between the lyrics and the lipsync could be tighter, I adjusted the positions of the keyframes with the tweens little by little until the vocals and the animation were in near-perfect sync. Since I couldn't import the audio into flash, I exported the flash file to put into Movie Maker with the audio every time an adjustment was made.
Thursday, MAY 20th -
The second mouth in the lipsync that sighs has been started yesterday and was completed on this date. The imagery within the lipsync has been completed on this date as well. The beginning of the animation was edited to include the authors of the song before the arm drops the microphone. Doing this, as well as adjusting some of the keyframes and tweens has brought the lyrics and the imagery in much closer synchronization than before, whereas prior to those changes at the beginning, the imagery and the lyrics were slightly off sync for a couple seconds, but everything else was on sync.
Friday, MAY 21st -
Further editing was done with the lipsync, with the adjustment of some keyframes and tweens to make the correlation between the audio and the lipsync tighter. A decision was made to bring the imagery into colour, so the colours for the imagery have been worked on on this date. The colouring will be finished tomorrow.
Saturday, MAY 22nd -
The colouring of the individual pieces of imagery and the shapes used to divide the shape tweens has been completed on this date. Also on this day, after a few little adjustments were made to the lipsync section, all of the sections of imagery, along with the repeating lipsync section have all been edited together in Windows Movie Maker with the sound. The entire movie (so far) was posted on the blog today.
Sunday, MAY 23rd -
Some work on additional drawings used for animation had been started on this date to fill the gap between the end of the 2nd section of imagery and the lipsync section that followed.
Monday, MAY 24th -
No further work commenced on this date.
Tuesday, MAY 25th -
The drawing of the falcon and the 'Falcon Records' logo had been started and completed on this date, as well as the credits and the animation of those symbols that went along with it.
A meeting was held on this date in Mr. Bezeau's classroom at 3:00 (as usual) to show the entire movie as of May 22nd, plus the additional animation that was edited into the final movie, which had been worked on at this date. Mr. Bezeau's suggestions were to fill the gap between the end of the 2nd section of imagery and the lipsync section that followed it. Another suggestion he had was that after the falcon, the logo, and the credits go by, to continue the abstract animation with just the shapes up until the last 5-10 seconds where a slow fade would take place. The slow fade, he said, should happen at the point when, in the song itself, all you hear left is the implied percussion up to the abrupt ending of the tune. Further work continues on filling the gap between the end of the 2nd section of imagery and the lipsync section and work on the ending of the movie, which would require basic shapes with tweening, and with considerable thought in the process.
Wednesday, MAY 26th -
The gap between the end of Section 2 and the beginning of the lipsync section has been filled on this date, with imagery arising in different points up to when the lipsync starts. Also completed on this date was the abstract animation that would continue on until the end of the song after the appearance of the falcon and the credits.
Thursday, MAY 27th -
The entire movie is uploaded onto the blog. After a few minor additional changes, the final movie will be posted on the blog tomorrow at noon. The reflection had been typed up and posted on the blog on this date.
Friday, MAY 28th -
On this date was the final meeting with Mr. Bezeau in his classroom. The time of the meeting was 2:10pm instead of the usual time of 3:00pm. At this meeting, one of the authors of the song 'Breathless' happened to be in the classroom at the time and had watched the final movie along with Mr. Bezeau and I. The author (Cody Boutilier) and Mr. Bezeau were quite satisfied with the final movie and were determined to put the project onto the Falcon Records compilation that they release annually, containing the completed works by the members of the record label.
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