Postcards From Nowhere

Seasons greetings!

(Whatever season it may be)

At the time of posting, it's about that time of year that people go about sending cards to each other to let them know what they're missing out on. So, it only seemed fitting that I work on some postcards to get some new Photoshop skills under my belt! Granted, I didn't get too much into the Christmas spirit at the time, so I stated off with a postcard about my favorite season: Fall!

The skill I demonstrate with this simple card is the use of clipping masks!

As you can see, there a nice, autumn-themed images nestled in the text. Now, how does one do this? Clipping masks! A clipping mask is an effect that allows me to frame one image within the boundaries of another. For example: framing the image of the apples in the letter A. (because apples starts with A, ehehehehe)

I used some glow and stroke effects on the text to make them have more 'POP' in the image.


Next, there was a call to make a personal postcard for ourselves! I may not be a destination, but that didn't stop me from trying to represent myself as well as possible in the card! Now, image wise, I tried to incorporate as much of my original work as possible. So, the last four letters of my name have pictures I created all by myself. (The first I have incorporated my favorite bird, the potoo bird). For the main back image, I found a shining sky and clouds background, to represent my head being 'in the clouds', and reaching for 'sky high'. To contrast it, I placed a storm in the thought bubble of the majestic Jackalope. (Kind of like a brainstorm, right?)

So, To create a nice balance of bright, shining colors, I delayered the clouds on top of themselves, and applied a screen to the top layer. To add even more shine, I put a light yellow, transparent ray of light over the majority of the image These effects gave the whole image a surreal, dreamy feel to it. The Jackalope only seems to add to the fantastical feeling.

And for any who are curious as to what are in those letters, they are a variety of creatures that I have drawn within the last year. All of the full images can be found on my
Deviantart account, as linked above.

The pinnacle of this venture, the icing on the cake, perhaps, was an independent card, made with no tutorial (though, in the model of another) over a theme or topic of my choice. Since I was, again, not in a christmas mood at the time, I went with the theme of sugary sweets of the colorful, fruity kind. (Maybe I was just hungry) To start, I had to extract the two gummy bears, one having it's ear overlapped. To fix the chunk of ear missing, I made a bite out of it.

one difficulty I encountered was the picture of the candy (Clipping mask+stroke), as it looked too powdery and light. One way I fixed with was to do something similar to what I did to the sky background on my personal card: I made a duplicate of the layer, but instead of a lightening screen, I gave it an overlay filter t make the colors more vibrant and bring out the contrast to a higher degree. Now, doesn't that big lollipop in the back just make you hungry? The degree of quality gets me every time.

Lastly, to make things pop, everything has it's own little drop shadow: giving the picture a sense of depth and letting each element separate from being lost in all the details.

Shadow Time

Recently, we attempted a shadow tutorial for Photoshop. We were to extract an image, remove the pixel fringe, then create a shadow for it on a landscape that it was not originally matched to. So, I chose a chipmunk as my shadow model. With a mirrored and skewed image of the chipmunk overlaid behind, I tweaked it's shadow to match the background.

The trick? Gradient overlay! How did that work? We'll get there in a moment! If we take it one task at a time, then we truly start by removing the chipmunk from it's habitat. Using the refine radius tool (Which is good at selecting fur and thin parts of a selection) I got a relatively clean, transparent clip

 Now for that tricky overlay! If we take the chipmunk, copy him, and skew him off to the side, it looks more like a mirror than a shadow, doesn't it? But, here's where the gradient overlay come sin to play!

An overlay layers a color, gradient, or image over a layer. So, if the shadow chipmunk is a layer, I can layer a black to BG gradient over it, and the result is...

A Shadow!

Castle Building

 Recently, I have been given the privilege to work in Autodesk Maya (A program made by a company who also released my favorite drawing program) and dive into 3D animation! For the first task we undertook, a castle was our goal. Using primarily rectangular prisms, cylinders, and a few planes, we were able to construct our basic castle structure.

The stairs that accompanied it were made of a simple rectangular prism with parts dragged up.



The extrude tool was our new friend for this project, and allowed us to drag up the blocky chunks of wall on the side without warping the whole wall in a similar manner to the hills.

The door was actually one of the hardest parts to put together. Using a thin cylinder and rectangular prism, we fused them together using the Booleans. Using it once for combining the two into a door shape, and a second time to use that shape to cut the respective shape out of the wall. I used a duplicate of the cookie-cutter shape to make the wooden door.

Plain old shapes don't add much life to an image, so with the aid of tiled images and pre made Maya textures, I placed stone and sand images all over the image. The bumps just added extra shadows.


Polygons are a concept in 3D animation that let me create the hills. As you can see to the side, the smaller squares have been warped together to create the hilly surface the castle sits on. With a soft select that influences all faces around it (The opposite of the extras function) I slowly dragged up small parts of it careful to not make the hills too blocky or unnatural. The final touch was the water



The small pond was actually quite simple, as you can see it's only one plane. I gave it a water texture, lowered the opacity, and set it in a low area of the ground. And viola, we had a simple pond.

This castle demonstrated many basics of animation, and I have found Maya less and less intimidating as I go on.

How Plumtrr's Escape Came Together

It's Story Time:

And today we're going to see how much can go into a single story

(The original story is actually quite complex: involving arranged marriages
and daring escapes, but this is the summary version)

What is a story without a good character? Not much, I'd say. Meet Plumtrr: an avian alien on the run. He's a character I made a year ago, (And one of many, at that), and he will be the star of the short animation I'm exited to share with you today! Shortly, we will be able to see him make his escape! The Idea for this was to create a short, multi-scene animation with a basic plot, and I feel I navigated those parameters easily.

Now, The story may be the meat of any animation short, but there is a lot that goes into setting up that  storyline meat and cooking it in a presentation-ready fashion. For this story, I dived into AfterEffects once again. Now, I am steadily getting more and more comfortable with the tools provided to me in after effects, and adjusting to the timing of walk cycles and similar things, so this was destined to be a huge step up from my last animation posted here.

I started where I perform best: on standard paper. I used up many sheets to get all the necessary bits and pieces for my animation (Line wise) in order. To the right, we se only one of the total 3-4 sheets I used in this stage of the development.

I had to be careful, while drawing, to leave anything I wanted to move separate from it's related parts. On the picture to the right, you can see how disjointed everything looks: the Bridge is apart from the ship, and Plumtrr's limbs are all over the place. There were even parts I didm' end up using later, but it's better to be safe than sorry, I'd think.

The next step was to scan the images in and drop them into Photoshop for some color.

In Photoshop, I used multiply layers to give color (And some texture) to the various aspects of each scanned image. I didn't do much shading, for a lack of time, but that would be something I would do in the future. And perhaps I'd have to make several copies of shaded images for different light sources. But for now, I didn't focus on that so much.

After each part was colored and separated out in Photoshop (With the use of the quick select and magic wand), they were ready to be plopped right into AfterEffects to be set up.

In AfterEffects, I began by setting the central point for each layer and putting the isolated pieces together like they should be. I parented most layers: The head to the body, the eyes to the head, and so on. The before and after images can be seen below:

Maybe We CAN put Humpty back together again. We just need AfterEffects! 

Look how cute and pixel-y he can be!

Now that we had all the pictures and images together and colored, it was time to put them into action. How did I do that? With compositions! Now, for those of you unfamiliar with the concept of compositions, think of them like those little Russian nesting dolls. If you make an image, like Plumtrr here, into a composition on it's own and make him walk, you can place that walking character composition as a layer in any other composition you want! You can even resize it as you please.

The two pictures to the right are images of the same composition in two different settings, set to two different sizes. If I edited the composition to dance, then in every scene containing that composition, he would dance rather than walk. (Which would be funny, but not quite what I was going for).

Using compositions, I was able to save time by not having to reanimate the walk cycle every time I needed him to go somewhere. This also works for backgrounds or environment objects, where it can be much easier to animate on their own, as not to be confused working on them in a more crowded and busy scene.

Now, I also used compositions to separate out individual scenes. For each separate scene I put together in a composition, I could edit how much of that scene or what order I wanted them in on the fly! It was very convenient and I will be happy to organize projects like this in the future.

But, to be more detailed, there was a lot more to it then just sticking everything in a composition and saying "That's good". This project tested my timing abilities and planning skills. If I didn't plan out the timing of a scene before hand, then one mistake meant I had to backtrack a lot to fix that mistake, which was never fun.

For example: the scene with the ships navigating the rocks took much longer then any other scene, because without a defined coordination to the ships, I was constantly redoing each collision to adjust.

And even when I did get a good deal of the timing down, I still feel that I needed more of a reaction when the ships hit the rocks. Everything moves a tad too smoothly and there needed to be more a jerk to each stop.

That scene had, by far, the most keyframes than any other, as seen on the left. it was the busiest scene in the short, and took the longest to produce in after effects.

(But even after all that, I regret nothing involving the attempt)

The last tool I revisited was the puppet pin tool, for a minor movement towards the middle. The puppet pin took is a good tool for living movements, but I had to use the opposing starch tool to hold the head in place.

With all these different tools set up to put my pieces into motion, I finished by placing the scenes together in a single composition, and exported it.

I and happy with the result, but I aspire to do better each time I attempt an animation. Soon I plan to incorporate shading and other physics aspects into my work.

The Intriguing Quandary of Photoshop

The Re-Greta-ble mountains

For this mini-project, we went through the process of extracting a mountain and placing it on a sky background, to make  surreal floating effect. Using a quick selection and duplicating certain parts of the mountain to give it a smooth bottom, I was able to make a solid, solitary rock out of a complete scene. The hardest and most intricate part of this was getting the mountain and the sky to match up enough in color so that they did not seem to clash or be out of place.

Using the color adjustments (Hue and saturation adjustment) and layer styles (Multiply, screen, soft light, etc.) I was able to match them. I used a similar technique on the other animals, but they do not quite match as well. For all objects in the scene, I used the quick select and refine edge/refine radius tool to get my selection. I used both a selection expansion and a manual eraser to eliminate my pixel fringe.

The result, clad with a pun-derful name, wasn't bad, but I probably could have feathered (aha) the bird a little bit to blend it better.

If anyone hasn't seen the spider yet, now may be time to look, ehe.

Here I learned about color and resolution blending, and how certain resolution images, like the bird, have a tendency to clash with the rest of a more blurred photo, unlike the fish or spider. The crisp details contrasted with other details of the image. I also messed with a soft layer mask to take the harsher bits of the fish out of the picture for a more seamless insertion.

Next time, I will be sure to find more complimentary images and extract them with more precision.

A Spherical Adventure

Spheres, simple shapes, right? such a shape holds a lot of meaning when used properly. Spheres can reflect uniformity, creativity, continuity, and even forward motion with a straightforward rolling, or an excitable bounce! This s not endemic to the sphere alone, though. it's 2D counterpart, the circle, also carries feelings of balance, unity,  a free flowing feeling, or even a window. Both are good tools in one's arsenal, but recently, I've put my thoughts into spheres (as you may have seen by my last post)!

After our introduction to the glorious sphere, we branched out a bit more and found more interesting tutorials than that of a simple, red, sphere. It was then I dived into the realm of the SHINY. I found an absolutely BEAUTIFUL sphere tutorial right off of the bat (Found Here), and it wasn't easy, either! I  had to learn how to use\ things like compound paths and division tools to eventually come out with what you see to the left! I started with a sphere, then applies layers and layers of gradient on top of it to create the coveted reflective effect! I had to repeat many steps and redo a lot of shapes, but I feel it was worth it! It shines like a glass marble!

Then, after wrangling Illustrator, we hopped back over to the more familiar Photoshop, which didn't turn out to be as familiar as usual with this new tutorial! With a HEAVY use of layer masks and a rather simple look to it, this glossy sphere was a lot less complex in build than the Illustrator variety. I had to adapt to the use of layer masks, and have learned a few more tricks to mastering them! (except for the vector mask, I would like to learn and understand how that one works) I like the glow affect that sits around the edges, but not the biggest fan of the sudden cut off to the lighter gloss. I liked the softer tone better. For my own experiment, i put a textured type within the sphere, duplicating the main body and layering it between the two copies, the upper one with a lowered opacity to give the feel of being inside the sphere itself, like on of those bouncy balls with they toy dinosaur inside. I don't like it too much, but I try to follow the creative mantra of "Fail Faster", and did it anyway to see what i could manage with it, which wasn't as much as I'd have hoped. I had to keep it off center to prevent a clash  the composition with the corner of the G and the edge of the glare.

In contrast, the spheres have very different qualities to them. As always, the Illustrator sphere is more versatile. That doesn't go to say this Photoshop marble is without value! It is an easy format for the effect I tried to display, of objects within. I feel that it may have been cooler to make small bubbles of the sphere ad put them inside the sphere, like a carbonated drink. Each with their own color, but always a alight tint of the mother green. I found that In Photoshop, making a shadow is much easier. I don't have to worry about a stroke or a path, like in Illustrator, or worry about the shape not transforming the inner gradient with it. The blur is more appreciated there, Lastly, in contrast of the two methods, The Illustrator version's reflections and gradients are crisper and cleaner than Photoshop can normally acquire without some skill. In Illustrator, it more readily handles the crisp, sharp contrast of he brilliant shiny sphere, while Photoshop sits happily with it's fuzzy, blurry gradients that provide a warmer feel to them than a crisp and cold glare.

Sphere

Last week, we started working with spheres. We started out with a good, old, hand drawn sphere on paper. With a template, we went over values and shading that go into a sphere, creating the beloved optical illusion of depth on paper. here, we have my copy of the sphere page. I tried to stay away from pure white, and the effect made the sphere seem more muted in color, which is't bad, but not quite my aim for this one. I've always loved shiny things.

After our initiation to the sphere that i was, for the most part, VERY familiar with, We moved to the computer, and opened up Illustrator. Creating a sphere in illustrator isn't hard, and there are many simple ways to do it, but the red to black gradient we used just looks gross to me here. In hindsight, I should've gone with a darker read rather than flat out black. This would eliminate the muddy color and make it more appealing. Working with this newly made sphere is easy in Illustrator, with it's re-sizing capabilities, and makes for a versatile object.

On the other hand, we have Photoshop. I liked the look of this red sphere much more, a softer aesthetic and a gentle gradient. The shadow, however, I wish I had been able to use tricks I've only recently acquired on. It doesn't blur like I would wish it to. The difference in Photoshop, is that instead of manipulating a circle, you have a space filled with colored pixels that you cut off and them fill with a gradient. This makes the Photoshop sphere much less editable and versatile in almost any respect. Re-sizing such a sphere will make it pixel-y if the size is increased.


When it comes to preference, it's a tough choice. both methods are very different, and give similar results. I have found that, if I would like to have a sphere template, to which I can edit the color and glossiness with ease, then illustrator would be best, with it's gradient editor and paths. I like the look of the Photoshop sphere, and enjoyed making it more, but the uses are less outside of Photoshop itself.

It's a bit of a mental hoop to jump through to understand both Vector and Pixel graphics, but understanding both is a nice harmony and gives me a wider range of versatility.

Logo Development

Recently, it became relevant that I develop a logo for myself, so I dived into my sketchbook for some quick ideas to get me going. My two main thoughts involved a cube (Lined up isometrically or a little lower in angle) or something forming in the shape of a capital G, which is my first initial. Not too many people have names starting with G, so I feel that it's something rather personal that represents me. It's like one of my points of uniqueness.

I also took a rabbit, or a creature similar to a rabbit, into consideration with my design. Quite a bit of my presence online involves a bunny (Many usernames on art-based sites, and other places, are typically either Bunytech or Bunnytech, for days when I can actually spell check my information before hitting the 'done' button) and there is a lot of positive symbolism that comes with the image of that animal. Rabbits carry symbolism of luck, speed, wit, and motion (preferably in a forward direction). I want people to perceive me as a positive or energetic person, one that has the motivation to get stuff done.

So these were my sketches, and matter messing with the cube and the rabbit, I started to focus my attentions on the rabbit, as you can see below. I chose the colors Purple and green for personal reasons, but they also carry symbolism I'd like to affiliate with. The color purple is synonymous with both creativity and royalty, though the former is more of my goal with this model. Green, synonymous with nature, was a color I chose more to symbolize the green GO of a stoplight. I felt it went well with the idea of motion.

To start, I began messing around in illustrator with a box, but promptly gave up and decided to favor the running rabbit(?) idea.

I wanted to curve the rabbit into the shape of a capital G, letting it bend in the general 'C' shape, with it's ear pointing in to form the 'G'.

The most key thing I learned, in my opinion, was how to effectively manipulate strokes. With the aid of the might width tool, I finally surmounted one of my greatest challenges and conquered the vector path (To a pretty great extent). With this leap forward into illustrator, I have seemed to overcome my previous hurdle that was my relative intimidation from illustrator. Being used to the pixel-based programs of Photoshop and Autodesk Sketchbook, it was certainly a mental leap for me. I desire to be able to go further into the conveniently infinitely-scale-able realm of illustrator, for more versatile designs! 

Taking into account the picture above, of my nearly full art-board, I felt that I did well in the department of experimentation, I even tried things I felt may look stupid just in case!

And below, you ca see the finished(sh) product that I came up with! I was a fan of many of the designs, but some came out to cluttered, or took too much focus from what I personally wanted to achieve.

The end result was, in the end, the running bunny, which doesn't QUITE look like a bunny, but I feel it is close enough, looking like more of a jackrabbit with a cartoon-ish motion blur dashing behind it. The inner green circle turned into a green ring, which then became a hoop when i accidentally shifted one of the legs behind the ring, and by a happy accident, I had the bunny suddenly jumping though the newly made hoop. This flew by really well with others that saw it, and myself, so i gave it (the ring) a gradient to finish it up. The gradient gives a kind of a sunrise feel to it, and adds some visual interest beyond the flat shapes and color.

With that design in my head, i tested in in gray-scale.When I transferred it, i ditched the ring gradient, for it didn't add to the design at all in that state, and it looked much more balanced without it, but it still needed a bit more POP. So give it that visual interest, I gave the lighter colors, namely the ring and the eyes, a bit of a glow to contrast with any darker backgrounds that it may be placed on. 

That gave it a nighttime feel, and I can almost see a stark contrast in terms of daytime/nighttime between the two logos. I am very happy with the result!

In the future with these kinds of designs, I will try to do a batter job of catching little visual quirks that mess up the intended focus of the piece. I'd hate to come up with a nice design that people do not catch the cleverness of. Next time, I will make sure to take a step back form it, and collect much more feedback! But for now, I am quite content!

Shiny Shield tutorial

(Tutorial Link)

In the shiny shield tutorial, I went step by step to create just what the name implies: a glossy shield.
I went on my own with the colors, and could get the shape down easily! This tutorial taught me some applications for using the muti-stroke function, and how to use gradients to create luster.
In this tutorial, i feel that I did well with creating the shape and applying the styles, but I struggled mightily with the high gloss section in the corner. The way the tutorial described it (with the multiply function), wasn't working, so I changed it up a little bit.
Instead of using a black-to white gradient with a layer mask, i just used a simple white-to-transparent gradient for the gloss. It was much easier and got the same effect.

After this, I would like to go more in-depth in creating both high and low glosses on different shaped surfaces both 2D and 3D.

Plausible impossible

My examples of Plausible impossible:

In this frame, Gus goose's neck is shaped like a tall sandwich. This is impossible, because swallowing something that large would both cause you to choke, and not change your neck's shape in such a way. But, it is plausible because he did just eat a large sandwich, and it hasn't been swallowed yet. his long neck just kind of has it sitting in there before he swallows it, therefore showing an outline.

In this frame, Gus Goose is eating spaghetti, unraveling it from the sock shape he knitted it into. This is plausible because noodles have the shape of string, and it wouldn't be too far fetched to be able to knit them. it is still impossible, though, for the noodles would break apart, and it wouldn't hold together. But in this situation, it makes sense for them to unravel nicely.

In this scene, Mickey is leading a procession of playing cards. This is impossible, since playing cards cannot walk. In this context, however, it is plausible because they are given arms and legs, and along with many other inanimate objects in the room, have human qualities to them. In cartoons, this is accepted as okay.

In this scene, dopey is hiccuping bubbles.  This is plausible because he has just swallowed a bar of soap. However, it is impossible, because even if you did eat a bar of soap, bubbles wouldn't form and come back up your throat. It is anatomically impossible.

In this scene, Dopey is swallowing soup. When he swallows the soup, it makes a sound like water draining down a pipe drain. This is plausible because he is drinking the soup fast, and it is draining into his stomach like it would in a drain. This is impossible because the sound of water on metal would not really happen in real life when you drank soup. But in cartoons, this sound effect gives you the same feel as to what is happening.

Multiplane Animation

This week in animation, we messed around with perspective and backgrounds. We learned about a technique called the multi-plane camera, and how things at farther distances appear to move slower than things up close.

Here is what I came up with:

A chunk of scenery from one of the alien planets I enjoy developing in my free time. I call it Chi'Kciponn.

This project, like all the others, taught me knew things.

one of the biggest things I had to work with was blurring and shading things closer and further from the camera. I used more blurring on further objects to accompany the motion, and the things closest to the camera are darker and have less details, as they are closer than the camera projected focus of the layer before that.

The atmospheric changes in the backgrounds is also a subtle thing I messed with. There is a faint layer of clouds in front of the buildings, helping them blend back a little. So learned how to balance those changes as well.

Another thing I learned from this was some of the application of textures and brushes in photoshop in terms of making an object look less flat, and giving it more definition. The tree in front is my best example of this. It should be more defined and detailed than the ones the back, so I put extra effort into that one.

Google logo

The Google logo, one of the more famous of the logos, has an interesting story to it.

Based on the Catull typeface, this logo came a long way to where it has come to be now.

One of the earlier versions makes me chuckle a little:

(look at those 1990's graphics aha)

The original idea behind the colors was to stick to primary colors, but they turned the 'L' green as to show a kind of freedom from the rules, a kind of abstraction that Google can represent. Like they think 'Outside of the box'.

They chose 'Google' as a misspelling of 'Googol' (A number containing around 100 Zeros) to give the feel of their great number or resources and data speed.

The Google logo seems to also represent creativity in it's google doodles, where the simple logo is taken to new mediums with animations and celebratory designs.

Font anatomy

What's in a font?

Well, in class we each took a test to see what font supposedly describes each of us the best.

My font was Architype Van Doesman, accompanied with the traits of 

-Emotional

-Assertive

-Progressive

And 

-Disciplined

Architype Van Doesman is an interesting font where all letters take up an equal amount of space, and I find it very balanced.

Looking at these words, I find that they fit me in different ways.

I am indeed very emotional and passionate about the things I love, and will talk or work for hours on something that drives me.

When it comes to assertive, I do try my best to let my ideas be known to others, and will try quite hard to be heard over a din, or a noisy group. And I love to let my work stand out on it's own!

Progressive; now that's a word I can go with. I am always open to new tools and ways of doing things that will go faster and more easily! All the new computer programs and such, I love so many of them.

And in terms of disciplined, however, it's more of a loose term. I do meet my deadlines, and can be very particular about things, but there are some things where I cannot bring myself to commit. So out of the words, that one is the most iffy, but if I'm motivated and driven, i am VERY disciplined with my work!

Character Walk Cycle

My Character:

For our first character animation in this class, I drew a bird-cyborg character I've been drawing and working on for at least a year now. His name is Hahn, and he has some robot parts to replace parts of himself he lost in an attack on his town. The bird face is mostly for aesthetics, to be honest. And I felt that being able to animate Hahn would be very cool, since I've been doodling him for so long.

My Original Character Sketch:

We had to draw them in pieces so it'd be easier to animate!

When we got them into after effects (After coloring and refining them), the walk cycle took a while to piece together. It was a matter of timing the most ion of the torso so that the feet would seem to stay in place while he propelled himself forward.

First, I gave each leg a repeating cycle of forward and backwards, alternating with each other: that was the easy part. Then, I experimented with moving the torso forward in time with the feet, and gave him some up and down motion on each step to make it look more natural than simply moving forward. After I got past that part, I gave the arms some motion a little off timing to the legs, to give him more of a real feel, and less of a shape moving across a plane feel.

A Snapshot of my Timeline:

(The legs mostly used rotation for movement, rather than physical motion)

When it comes to my finished product, I learned a lot from it. I discovered that using the transparency grid as a reference point for movement help you keep something consistent in motion. I also discovered a good method for converting drawings in photoshop into easily manipulatable pieces in Aftereffects, like a paper doll you can assign the joints and regulate motion. the third thing I can pull form this assignment is what makes a walk cycle convincing. The trick, I have discovered, is to keep one foot on the ground at all times, and keeping it in the same spot. If you do this, the illusion of propelling themselves with that one foot while it stays there becomes much more real.

That last tidbit in itself was the hardest part of the whole process to nail down.

If I were to redo it, I would probably go in and give him some more give, like a bit of squash and stretch when he steps and such, as he goes by. And maybe give him some shading or a shadow so he isn't as flat.

Beyond that, however, I am in love with this animation, and I cannot get over how cool it feels to bring a character to life, and for the first time, see them DOING things! And I can only get better and better at it! I look to the future eagerly, and now I'm sure it would be the coolest thing to get After Effects at home so I can do things like this on my own in my free time!

My Finished Animation:

(I suggest viewing it at full screen for the quality at small size leaves much to be desired)

Inchworm Animation

This time in animation we learned about the puppet pin tool, and went though a tutorial on that tool and many more, with my work on that tutorial shown above. I feel that I spent more time on the tutorial than my original worm, so the second one did not turn out as well as the tutorial. It does make a difference how much effort and time you put into an animation.

Pencil Design

When it comes to graphic design, one of the many tools you come around to using is Adobe Illustrator. it's a vector-based program with a mean learning curve. So to start off we made  a step-by-step basic vector pencil. As soon as you understood what was going on in each step, it became easier to create and alter. One of the big things I learned from this first project was: That you can actually detach nested tool groups and transform them into a window. This was very helpful to me in this and the next project.

The next step was to elaborate on the skills that you learned the first time around, to create a more personal pencil. I went with purple, since it's a color I'm quite inclined to. The difference and learning this time around was in the use of gradients, joining, and the deceptions of the live paint bucket tool.

I was shown that the live paint bucket tool creates a separate fill layer instead of joining a fill to the actual lines, making moving these shapes hard. Instead, it was easier to join shapes with 'Command+J' and insert a fill beyond that. My biggest takeaway from this part was the use of gradient fill being more versatile than the paint bucket.

The third part was to create your own pair of complimentary objects, and it was there that I discovered the wonderful use of the option button with the scroll wheel. It allowed me free zoom and made this part a lot easier! I had to wrestle with the ship, however, a the triangles needed to be mad outside the group before they could be added, or the gradients wouldn't align right and try to cut off at the underlaying paths. The planet still isn't aligned right, but I do not know how to fix it.

So in summary: The biggest three things I learned were:

-The paint bucket tool is not as friendly to moving shapes as regular gradient fill used with the join tool.

-Free zoom scroll can be activated by holding 'Option'

-Nested docks can be detached and made into windows by clicking the bar on the right when expanded.

I hope to learn more about this program as I continue to use it!

First Bouncing Animation

Animation class so far has been all that I hoped for! The first thing we began to work on was a simple ball bounce. Of course, we discussed that there is more to a bounce than a simple up and down motion. Things such a timing, height, physics, squash, stretch: all these things added to the quality of the animation. We added the proper squash and stretch, and that made it look so much better, learning this trick. It may have taken a while to get it down, but I am very happy with the results! Keyframe animation is something that I'm getting the hang of, and I can see where it would be useful, but also cases where that would be a tough way to go about animating, like something subtle. (That or I have not considered it) For this case, however, keyframes were the way to go, and the process went much smoother than it would have in photoshop.

It may be a simple animation, but it's got me pumped for the rest of the year, especially character animation! So far, the hardest thing i've had to do was get a handle on the various programs we used to make this. (After Effects). But I will soon triumph that learning curve!

What is Graphic Design?

"It can mean a lot of things, can't it?"

Coming into the realm of the graphic design class, we were set off to discover what the word meant to the rest of the world, and to us. When I, personally, think of graphic design, I think of colors, shapes, and perfectly placed contrast all used in harmony to draw the eyes of whoever looks at it to a certain area of the image in a certain order.

Like a book title, it aims to draw you to it's cover with the design, and to the title next to display what it is in all it's glory. 

(My oh my, don't my word choices make me sound so preachy?)

Learning graphic design is like learning how to grab someone's attention. Learning how  to make them feel a certain way, understand a certain concept. it's almost to me, appearing like a subliminal art that gets into someone's head and makes them think certain things or feel a certain way.

Like an advertisement that invokes a sense of pity or tugs at your heartstrings to get you to donate. Like a sleek ad that just screams 'New!' or 'Shiny' at you to convince you to get that new car. Though this art isn't restricted only to advertisements.

I am exited to learn the art of inspiring people and communicating my message through my designs, and I hope when people see my future works that they get something from it to take home, and possibly create things of their own for the inspiration I give them.

It's always been enthralling to see someone creating something based on something they saw from me. I love to create, and I get the same thrill form inspiring others to create. I feel that this is why graphic design is so appealing to me.

It's the art of communicating ideas, sharing feelings, and that maybe why I feel such a deep connection to (And am so exited by) the idea of it.