Final Uni Project Animation: Journey to the Centre of the Earth!

[eightgr]

Nice short and great tribute to Jules Vernes Universe

[JurajMolcak]

Man, I was expecting very classical approach to the theme. But you really catch me with that style you have there :thumbsup:

[DaveWortley]

well done matt, prefered the old music but hey!

good luck in the real world!

[mediaramas]

it had definitely an unexpected ending, that was hilarious!

why did you decide to go for block animation on the character ?

[Harrad]

eightgr - Thanks for the comments, And also thanks for the plug on your site (http://www.itsartmag.com/news/)!

Oweron - Thanks, Yeah the style i was going for was realistic lighting on a cartoon character. With the main focus going to the shot/comp and the mood of the peice.

DaveWortley - Thanks, If anyones wondering what daves talking about; The original version was cut to blurs 'we've got a file on you' which is a very upbeat and noisey punk sounding song. I decided to change it to chris clarks music as i felt that the other music didn't fit the theme as well. And also the Block-style animation. I've had mixed responces to the new music. Some people like this version some people like the other version!

mediaramas - Glad you liked the ending.. it was actaully the 3rd version of the ending. I decided to change it as i really like the way it capped the whole thing with the quote. Plus its all part of my 1st Trillogy! lol.. in which all my animation from the 3 years at uni have ended up with the main character ending up dead! ... I'm sure thats not saying good things about me!

The block animation came about partly by acident. When I was planing this animation I got a bit carried away and decied to do a fully rigged character in 3 different sets with full props and mave it full rendered and lit... and lasting over 1 min! all of which i had to do my self! (most people just stuck to ... character design or environments or just animation! which is probabley a safer bet).

And while making it, it became clear that i had bitten off more than i could chew, so i decided that the animation would take a back seat as that was the part i was least intrested in. When it came do to it the animation (plus rendering) was all done in the last few days. My mate paul said to just have it blocked out like a moving comic as this would make the best use of the time i had left.

So i blocked it all out and rendered it, but upon watching it, the effect seemed to work and so i decided to leave it as it is... I would have liked it to be fully animated but I also want to move on to other things, so its staying as it is for now (but who knows!)

[steve_sloper]

Wow, thats a really cool animation!

I really like your 'accidental' stepping keys for your character. It adds a really nice contrast between the camera and the character's actions. I have a feeling there's going to be a spurge of this approach popping up now! :)

Great lighting and use of shots! i want to create a short soon. Just need a cool idea.

So how long did this take to complete?

[amannin]

need a mirror or something...

[Harrad]

steve_sloper - Thanks for the comment mate! I have no idea how long this took me as it was on and off over 3 months, but most of that was spent designing it. Maybe 1 month in total if i were to add all the days up! (You know what us students are like..)

amannin - cheers, yeah I've just got an e-mail about that!

lol.. I thought 12 gigs was loads, never under esitmate the power of cgtalk! If some one could mirror this it would really help me out, as i've got no money to buy more bandwidth... so my sites going to be down for the next 2 weeks! :( ... (thats not going to be good helping me find a job!)

well gotta think of it in a good way, 405 people have now seen my animation!

[DaveWortley]

can supply some mirroring, contact me on msn

[Batchem]

I would love to see this short!

Batchem

[Dennik]

Try Youtube, or google video.

[-SD-]

Please no YouTube or Google Video :rolleyes: The degradation in quality is too much with those services...

I'm also waiting for a proper mirror to arrive :thumbsup:

[AdamHerbert]

Looks pretty cool. I look forward to seeing this when you get a mirror.

Try:
Badongo.com
MegaUpload.com
rapidsharing.com

They are all free.

[harmonic01]

:( I really want to see this. Hope you'll get a mirror soon. :)

[Harrad]

DaveWortley - Cheers mate, Thanks for the mirror!

Batchem & harmonic01 - Now you can! Would like to hear what you think of it.

Dennik & -SD- - Yeah, I agree with SD here, I would put it up cos its unlimited downloads but the quality just isn't worth it when your trying to show off CG.

AdamHerbert - Cheers for the links, i'll look into it, but lucky daves put up a mirror of now.

-----------------------------------
MIRROR VERSION NOW ONLINE



GOOD NEWS EVERYBODY! My animations back up now, thanks to dave! Hopefully his server will hold out a bit longer than mine!

You can download it from here... NEW MIRROR (http://www.digitonaldesign.co.uk/dave/Journey_web.mov)

[Sid Barnhoorn]

Ey Matt,

Very nice work! Love it!

Cheers,

[Batchem]

I feel very unsettled about the story, but the animation was very good. Ending with "curiosity killed the cat" ... I think if you brought in that suggestion you should have made a cat a character ... had a cat been aggrevating him during the story it would have all tied in. Just my thoughts and feelings and thank you for sharing your work. It was a pleasure to watch!

Batchem

[DaveWortley]

I feel very unsettled about the story, but the animation was very good. Ending with "curiosity killed the cat" ... I think if you brought in that suggestion you should have made a cat a character ... had a cat been aggrevating him during the story it would have all tied in. Just my thoughts and feelings and thank you for sharing your work. It was a pleasure to watch!

Batchem

Thanks Batchem, that made my day! lol

[Dennik]

Why did you leave the animation portion out? I mean for so much work, it looks like you made an excellent piece of art and you hang it facing the wall. And thats the animation forum you know. People expect to see some animation!

[harmonic01]

Hey Matt,

Great job on the short. :thumbsup: Artistically, it looks great. I did wish that you actually animated the character, though, instead of going for that stepped, blocking thing.

Story wise, I can't help but to think that the guy could have saved his life by better planning. Maybe he could have sent down a probe to gather enough info before going down himself.

Otherwise, really cool modeling, lighting and rendering. :thumbsup:

[Peter Chen]

Hello Matt,

I really liked the style and designs of your animation. The rendering and lighting is superb~ I would love to see this character animated, but since you said that you're least interested in animation, I would probably just leave it as blocked animation.

However it's such a waste not posing your key poses better. For example, the finger pointing he did after he read the book could have been stronger, the hand placed on the head as he looks at the black board is a bit unnatural (try shifting the weight onto one leg), the jump onto the machine can be more dynamic, etc. I think just think that you might as well milk the most out of the rig you spend hours creating. However these are just my suggesting and I might be wrong.

Great job overall! :thumbsup:

[Harrad]

I've Had a few people tell me that daves mirror is a really slow download... so my mate chris has said that he'll help me out as well and he's hosing a smaller version on his site.

----------------------------------------------

MIRROR #2

DOWNLOAD (http://www.realtimeworkshop.com/Journey_web_sm.mov)
10MB Quicktime H.264 Half-Res
----------------------------------------------

Thanks guys for all the comments sofar...

Sid Barnhoorn - Thanks.

Batchem - Why do you find the story unsettling? Do you mean the end? The text at the end was just a last minute thought.. i just added it in because i like that saying.. lol, He did almost have a cat a one point, but as with all things i just didn't have the time. Thanks for your comments.

Dennik - As i've said before, I left the animation out as that was the part i was least intrested in and that i ran out of time. I think you comment about hanging a piece of art facing the wall is a big over the top (not in an offecive way, but as a metaphore). As the animation was 1 out of the long list of things that i had to do on this project (design/model/texture/etc..), but i can see where your coming from. And as for the animation forum thing.. i couldn't put this video in the still gallery so it had to go in here.

harmonic01 - LOL... he could have planed it better! hehe... yeah he could have, it seems ironic that you say that as its the way i feel about myself and this project.. I could have maybe gone for something a little bit simpler. Thanks for you comments out the rendering/lighting as thats what i was aiming for. Cheers.

Peter Chen - WOW! someone that actaully aproves of the block animation! hehe. Thanks for the feedback. I aggree about the poses... a few of them are weak and could do with tweeking... but i was so rushed for time at the end and I had to take into concideration that i had to render the whole thing and do post in only a few days... it was all very rushed at the end. And i'm happy with it now, i don't really want to keep going back to it. But thanks for the comments anyway.

[Batchem]

I just thought it was an idiom a bit out of place. Thank goodness for curiosity though... we are all products of that. I truly enjoyed the short.

Batchem

[adib]

Great job!Very wel done!:bounce:

[TeriWesterby]

well if you were more focused on the design/rendering/style ect then you definatley hit the mark. the lighting and rendering were really good, great sense of depth and I love the style and textures you did. the poses were great as well. I would love to see this animated! I do have to say though that the story kind of falls short in the end. I would have suggested from point A, picking a better story, or no story at all. But looking at your demo from a rendering/design/lighting/texturing point of view, great job! .. just dont become a writer ;) :P

[Dennik]

Hey Harrad. Sorry if my comment seemed harsh. Its just that you blocked so many poses it left much to be desired for animation. Especially since you did move the camera, to create a movie out of it. I think it would be much better if you created QTVR out of those shots kinda like interactive still frames, instead of creating a movie with still poses. (i have yet to see an artist making QTVR from their artwork in here)

But other than that, your work looks great.

[Harrad]

Batchem - Yeah, I can see your point... I'm just going to blame any problems on the lack of time and me being a little bit over ambious.

adib - Thanks!

T_Dub - HEHE! Yeah... Well don't worrie I have no ambition of becoming a writer! I think the story i did have kinda got lost in there somewhere with all the other stuff that i had to do. The original story board was about x2s as long! so alot of the story got cut. But then as you said, It works as a demo for rendering/design/lighting/texturing, which its ment to be! Thanks for your comments and input!

Dennik - Oh no.. they arn't harsh, crittisium can be good and bad and i think you've got to take both on board to improve your self! That QTVR thing sounds like a good idea.. thats more of what i was going for (in the look) kinda of a snapshot/comic book style. But there is also the fact that this was for a uni project and part of brief was that it needed to be handed in as a DVD movie.

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