Wednesday, September 30, 2009

Class 6

Class 6, the beginning of the end for the Animation Mentor journey with mentor Greg Whitaker. Greg is from Toronto, Canada and his first experience was with traditional 2D animation some 16 years ago with the Warner Brothers cartoons. After that he's been with DreamWorks working on their major hits and currently working on their lates production "How to train your Dragon".

I feel fortunate that Greg, who has mastered both 2D and 3D animation, will be mentoring me this semester. There is a lot to be said about animators with 2D background. There is a certain finesse about their work flow and attitude that I can relate being one who started with traditional 2D animation.

Some of my ex classmates are with me again, Sandy Sze and Jude Brownbill, both excellent animators by their own right and they motivate me tremendously to do better and attain higher quality from my work.










I also found some time during the semester break to participate in the 11 Second Club September competition. This is the first time that I participated since I started Animation Mentor 18 months ago. I don't expect to win it, but I'm glad I did it to see how much my work flow and confidence has improved since.


Saturday, September 19, 2009

End of class 5

What a class it has been! The story development part was most exciting with input from mentor and students alike, which helped shape the story into a more polished and manageble content. In this class there is a feeling of separation from the previous classes, not much nimation went on but also the impending last class and graduation probably added to the feeling of, not so much isolation, but a sense of maturation. Dealing with story, script, scene setup, and a production workflow, took most of my time. I never thought the intensity level would be so high.

Needless to say, Kenny Roy proved to be a wonderful mentor, his dedication, enthusiasm, trained eye and immense knowledge of film making were instrumental in shaping my workflow and film development.

To keep my animation appetite satisfied I did this quick gag for fun and keep the animation juices flowing.