Taylor - Production Manager

I have aquired a Production Manager and her name is Taylor.

I had a big whinge to Taylor last week and explained the utter confusion i was feeling in regards to my animation, basically i had about five different opinions of what i should be doing and this resulted in me doing little bits of everything but not really finishing anything. So, in steps Taylor, she arrived at my house 9am sharp, sat me down, told me to stop getting distracted with cups of tea and to focus! So i did, and together we went through step by step and made a to do list, she also went through my storyboard and listed all the shots for my backgrounds, i.e. which ones repeated themselves and how many needed to be done etc etc.

My god this has made an imense difference.

So now focused on my backgrounds, im currently drawing the windmill, fence, farm house, int/ kitchen, and of course still painting my wheat.

I also had an interesting conversation with Darren today involving dropping the wheat into After Effects and using a motion grid (i think i got the name right). Basically the grid covers the wheat and you can bend it and animate this way, ideally i would love to paint frame by frame but its nice to know i have a few options up my sleave considering time is burning fast. I've drawn my windmill and i must say im quite happy with it, now just to colour it in photoshop and its good to go.

Here is my production schedual, and shot list for my backgrounds, also a quick test in after effects with the motion grid:

EMILYS ANIMATION CHECK LIST

BACKGROUNDS

à DRAW: Windmill base, Fence, Ext House, Int House

à Backgrounds 26 and 27 first and complete them

à Begin wheat, Background 4 first

1. Make wheat big enough to fill frame but also make a sky that can move behind it

à Finish all other backgrounds, remember remove the character from the space and do what would be behind them.

RUNNING COMP

à IMPORT: Finished backgrounds and animatic into After Effects

à Make Animatic smaller and put in top right hand corner

à Drag background into timeline and space as per animatic timing

ANIMATION

à DRAW: Using flash draw key poses.

à Do any repeated movements first, IE: Running, Walking

à Try to do all of Sam first and then move on to the lesser characters. Don’t forget the dragons as dots.

BACKGROUND ANIMATION

à Animate Wheat moving. Luma Key Wheat into backgrounds

à Animate backgrounds IE Zooms, pans, focus pulls.

COMPOSITE ANIMATION INTO BACKGROUNDS

à Import FINISHED animation into After Effects and add to relevant background layers

SOUND and FX

à Edit final sound track

à Import into After Effects and Add to Night Lights comp

LIGHTING AND EDITING

à EDIT: Cut out scenes (if needed).

à Fix timing (if needed)

à Add lighting and Shadows on characters/ground

CREDITS AND TITLES

à Add title to After Effects night lights comp

à Finish is credits and YOU IS DONE!

NIGHT LIGHTS

BACKGROUND CHECK LIST

BCKGND #	SHOT	DONE?
1	SH1 SH24 SH25
2	SH2 SH8 SH22
3	SH3 SH21 SH23
4	SH4 SH5 SH6 SH7 SH10 SH11 SH12 SH13 SH15 SH20
5	SH9
6	SH14 SH18
7	SH16 SH19
8	SH17
9	SH26
10	SH27