Nature is Beautiful Making of

Also here is a booklet talking about the pipeline making this project.

Animation: Nature is Beautiful

This is my final project for MA studying in the University of Huddersfield. In spite of the trial to show the beauty of nature, I attempt to represent with some abstract elements like dots, lines and growing shapes. Also this animation is based on an ancient Chinese theory called '5 Elements'.

This frame cost 4 and half a hour to render. The depth of field effect performs nicely however I do not possess enough time to continue this efficiency. I had better to render rpf files with z depth so that I can apply this effect in After Effects.

This is the same frame using Frischluft Lenscare and additionally added glow to the metal melt. As a matter of fact it might sacrifice some detail comparing the image made by previous way. On the other hand, this is the best solution considering the balance between quality and efficiency. What's more a video requires less image standard than an still picture.

One significant difficulty during making Nature is Beautiful is the animal movements, especially the interactions between them. Owing to the basic theory of this animation, their actions playing to each other must be filled with hostility. On the other hand they are additionally performing as natural phenomenons as well. Consequently there could not only be physical attack, strike and impact, but also deformation, burning, blowing and so on. Hence it is not enough to gain information from Muybridge's animal movement pictures.

Additionally, all the animals characters created for this video are more like abstract and geometric creature than realistic and muscular. In spite of the 3D model statement, they are acting flexibly. If their movements are all made by 3D software, they do not look as agile as I expect.

Then I reviewed a shot animation which is one of my favourite. Thought of You, made by Ryan Woodward, performs with an incredible visual method.



Then my mind was purified and I realise I do not have to stick all the characters always 3D. They are so simple that even I replace them with some simple 2D geometries, it will not be abrupt if I keep some features like colour, shape or sound effect.

This shot will follow another one with the 3D tiger and this running 2D creature is easily considered as the same one just shown with another way.

Woodward's animations inspires me a lot when making this shot. Actually I just made several masks in a single layer. With the mask animation, I can conveniently convert the shape of each mask so that to create some movements. One thing quite satisfying is After Effects can automatically create all the animation among key frames. Hence now the character animation is more various and there is more diversity to control it.

Showreel August 2014

Some shots are intentionally made for my previous characters who never appeared in any animations.

Appreciation to Seb and Lewis who made this fantastic music for me.

Also thanks to Stephen for providing me significant help for some technical problems.

Making of Quenching Blue Chapter 1

This is the first work during master studying.

The finished piece is proceeding on sound and music making by Banana Studio and will be uploaded recently.

Special thanks to my turor Professor Anneke Pettican who supported me all the time mentally and practically. Also thanks to my uncle who gave me the Intuos painting template which is significant for most work in this animation.

Several Visual Experiments

Last month I spent a week travelling in Paris. Except for the Louvre and the Triumphal Arch, there is a morning for a journey at the Centre Pompidou.

There is a kind of place where affects everyone walking inside. This place does not merely make me shocked by its unique structure and embellishment style, but radiate a specific category of atmosphere intersecting with the people inside.

Unfortunately I can just understand quite limit information provided by the artists owing to the lack of French. On the contrary, the free and artistic ambience there can be distinguished obviously from other museums and galleries, even just in Paris.

To capture appropriate era applying for work opportunities, I finished my showrell before the accomplishment of final project. Due to some of the previous work of me that only displayed only in 3D models and pictures, I decided to make some video shots suitable for them.

In addition, many animators and visual effect artists' showreels, as I observed, contain comparably number of title animations. In spite of some previous working period in media groups, using those effects I made as my showreel was not completely accepted as they are national groups. Consequently, I made a decision to temporarily make several title animations with similar skills I used before but not quite close.

Generally speaking, the showreel, including intentionally-added extra shots and edit, has been finished. It may take Banana Studio, the audio maker I know, some time to make a background music and then it will be sent to some companies with my resume. I hope this can work smoothly cause I do not have much time and opportunities. I could have job chances only if the interviews can be performed before October.

This week I mainly work on 2 things. One is to correct the cloud I made for Nature is Beautiful shot 3. As they may look not realistic and coherent enough, I tried to give it more various lights and enabled the age so it could be rolling around through time.

Unfortunately, after a 3-days-long rendering, there was a severe glitch appeared. The cloud began to disappear when it came to frame 150. Due to this the beams seem weird as the projecting points were supposed to hide behind the thick cloud.

This could be caused by the could age. As the Pyrocluster is based on particles, this age function could be fitted in a situation with a constant emitter. My scene create cloud with an irregular surface and the particles are just matrix without birthing and life. So there are no supplemental particles to keep the cloud displaying. To deal with this, I have to render again without cloud age. It might sacrifice some rolling effect, however the whole feeling of this shot would not be damaged.

Another thing is my showreel has began to be made. I want to begin with my previous work like this guitar player robot. Owing to my purpose to make it move, it can not be rendered by Keyshot. Consequently I attempt to use Mental Ray of 3ds Max to render.

In order to have better result, I watched Aaron F. Ross' tutorials to understand the renderer better. One thing really inconvenient is there is some annoying gains when rendering with depth of field using Mental Ray. It could only be removed a little bit when increasing bucket. But that movement will loose some detail and make the image murky. Hence I decided to render out rpf files with z-depth so that I can add some depth of field in After Effects. It could not be best solution, but considering the time arranging and the visual quality, this is a rational plan.

A Journey at D&AD

 Yesterday I spent some nice time at the D&AD New Blood exhibition in London. Most of these work made by students from different Universities and Colleges around the whole Britain are pretty brilliant.

 The majority of the work is about concept, graphic design and some product design. On the other hand, some of them are quite inspiring for me.

 I tried this 1 minute representation action with a given topic 'pencil'.

What is really exciting is I met some of my amazing schoolmates there including Damon and Lucas. It was fantastic to see their booth quite popular. And this is a stall mainly about digital design which is not many in the whole exhibition.

Attempted to combine a camera moving and depth of field between Cinema 4D and After Effects. The most significant experience for me this time is, it is not easy to create some 3D elements like using Plexus when the camera is not in front angle. There is a realisation for me that I am still raw about the principle and utility of cameras in After Effects.

The rough shots are representing the images in my brain nicely. The final result might be much less logical but the ambience will be similar.

The style of my Postgraduate Final Project Nature is Beautiful has been confirmed containing incoherent and fragile shorts mainly rendering some shapes, beams and other visual elements of the nature.

Actually, I have never created a work with just concept and consciousness representation yet. All video or image work I did before was based on some commercial or solid utilities. From my previous work for some authentic clients to the animation Energy Drink: Terminator that based on my interest, I was merely following the requirement from majority of the market. They were filled with realistic colourising, impacting camera shots and robots, and violent actions.

Subsequently, I created another animation Quenching Blue with more cartoon style and also telling an actual story. Hence I realised the fruitful feeling when attempting to adventure to a unfamiliar domain. Even there could not be such qualified products as from the familiar field. On the contrary, the challenges expanded my horizon and gave me diverse experience. In addition, abundant styles of work is definitely beneficial for my showreel.

For my final project of MA, I am planning to create a video with a style I never tried before. As watched some masterpieces when taking part in some impressive activities and learning from reading enlightening books such as Paul Wells' Understanding Animation, there is some different methods appearing in my mind. There were enormous things changing when it comes to making animation and visual effects for me. In my conscious now, the soft and technology is not merely tools to tell stories, but also effective implements to show gorgeous images. An animation could exist not for telling a lore or broadcasting for commercial purpose. While representing one thing, it can only contain colour, shapes and characters only diffusing the information. For my final project, it can transmit the beauty of nature that is either obvious or hidden in civilization. It does not have to be a succeed logical animation but would be composed by some shattered shots.

For now I have to learn much functions of Cinema 4D which is proved to be a magic tool box that match what I am planning to make. Watching tutorials is necessary whilst reaping large amount of inspiration is required. I have already assured the After Effects plugin Plexus is going to be a significant tool for the work.

It can be foreseen that there is various work to do. Contrarily the result is exciting and worth to wait.

Got Inspiration from Gardner Raymond's Tutorial

The rough visual style is coming out. Also, it seems to be better if adding much cloud and beam in the atmosphere.

Watched some tutorials on Youtube and hope them can help making the work.

Tried to put some cloud in the scene. The animation style might be like this and there could be some material overlaying the image as well.