Sunday, August 11, 2019

VFX Lessons List

If you wanted to learn how to do many of the VFX Animations & Motion Graphics I Did in my Recent Films (2018-2019) I will list them HERE.


I also use some 3rd Party Plugins & Scripts, Especially Red Giant/Trapcode & Video Copilot, and Cinema 4D here & there.... After Effects CC already comes with A LOT OF STUFF including: Cinema 4D, Raytrace, Particles, and 3D Extrude, as well as a variety of options for masking,  track-mats, and camera tracking goodness! I also love the multi-plane camera styles which uses 3D cameras and Layers as well as 3D lights, cast shadows, blurs, and motion blurs as well as blending options, and layer styles! ^_^

 It took me a LONG time to wrap my head around "Precompositions" (Precomps) and "Nesting" since I often like to use particles & mats. 

Other things to focus on, if you have the patience are Curves animating (which I HATE but often need to use)  as well as F9 Easing in & out for Keyframing. 

 Most teachers of After Effects have a limited area they understand of the software, which comes with biases n personal preferences such as VFX, Video Editing, Motion Graphics, Vectors, 3D, Videographer, VS a Traditional Animator, or Text animator. NOBODY EVER sees eye-to-eye, they all often act like they're an expert BUT ARE NOT, and they ALREADY expect that you understand everything LIKE THEY DO.

 Like, DO YOU KNOW what a Precomp is? It took me 3 years to wrap my head around that. 
Did you know there's different ways to use masks, masking, and mats? 
Most people only use 1 or 2 ways, and have no idea about the others. 

 Also, the updates n the software can change drastically in just a year or 2. Don't give up, and u can always ask people at Adobe's website. 

Also, on 1 hand you need to be open minded, and open to different things. On the OTHER HAND, if you HATE the way someone is doing it or teaching it, IT'S TOTALLY OK TO DO WHAT YOU LIKE. Give yourself permission to be ORIGINAL. 

AND, many teachers are from foreign countries, so dont; get frustrated if you can;t understand their English. I often have to rewind to be sure I understand too, and I'm good with langauges. 


Here's a list of the Tutorials, Demo, and Lessons I referenced my VFX Animation & Motion Graphics From:

























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Sunday, July 7, 2019

WIP Succor Forlorn Animation N Stuff

I would REALLY prefer it if LIVE would just function at a pace that works much better for me.

Unfortunately, this film, which I assumed would be done in just a few weeks, is taking much longer than I was expecting. I had a really bad bout of fatigue starting in March, and it didn't clear up until May, but THEN I got to contracts to shoot hockey games and that set me back quite a bit. I also found out that I ate too many plant based foods which is not good for you. So, I had to eat more products from animals. We also had several power-outs, internet went out several times in the past few months, and I had QUITE A LOT of job offers which ate up my time. (No, nothing went anywhere yet.)

Here is a compilation of the rough animation:



I actually had so many problems due to fatigue, which might have also been a mix of malnutrition and mono. It caused me to have several cognitive function impairment, and I couldn't even talk right, let alone think right. It was pretty embarrassing. I thought maybe I was getting old people brain diseases.... but I wasn't. I just needed to have bone broth, fish oil pills, and B vitamins.

So, I redid my animation multiple times. I was just VERY unsatisfied with it.

At some point, after dozens of animation re-dos. I just said that was enough.Otherwise I'd NEVER GET IT DONE.

I am STILL working on the cleanup, n I try to get about 10 frames per day, but ever since my kid had her birthday, things haven't always gone smoothly.
I've also been working opn the composite. So, here's a frame from that:



I was also producing 3 TV shows n contributing to my friend's. The scheduling was frustrating n annoying. Things git rushed, or screwed up. It wasn't all roses.

A lot of the stuff I was already working on for THIS film also got reworked n repurposed for a show I've been doing with my friend Roland. I crammed together some stuff for it within a limited abrupt time, so it wasn't perfect at all. I'm also THE ONLY PERSON in this entire region that knows how to use After Effects to do ANY of this stuff. So, there's no one to help or assist me at all. I'm all on my own. PLUS, the summer heat FINALLY HIT THE AREA. So, my video card won't work above 80F+ degrees for anything beyond a basic edit.... and the hotter it gets it might not even work at all.

Here's the show we rammed through:




The first Episode we threw together in a few days, and I'm shocked that the video graphics rendered out at all.

I re-worked the background graphics multiple times, and even tho we shot 3 MORE episodes, ONLY the first 2 have been edited, with one more that's not done yet. AND those have the old video graphics on them, but some of the new reworked graphics in the intro which we edited.

Not my most IDEAL version of how I wanted it to go.... but I DO have some NEW graphics for future video episodes.















BTW: We're NOT just going to be discussing Star Trek, but other content as well. We're STILL working out the kinks, and since I'm ONLY person who knows how to do most of this stuff, it takes time. Also, Ana is still learning to be a Control Room Director, so she's working on it.

As you can see, its a significant improvement... and, also a repurposed & reworked version of stuff from my film: Succor Forlorn


Something I'm been tossing around in my head, also, is this idea of making another brand of my own (another one), and calling it "Oppressed By Purple" ©2019 and/or "Oppressed By Violet" ©2019! So, I'm gonna copyright that right HERE! MINE!!!


Oppressed By Purple TM ©2019 Kandice Kathleen Zimbleman

Oppressed by Violet TM ©2019 Kandice Kathleen Zimbleman 

OK! BOTH are MINE now! Yay!

The OTHER stuff I also managed to squeeze to get done was THIS Final Edit:


(I STILL need to do the INTRO graphics FOR THIS, because I have enough content to make an episode or 2 for that. THAT show is called "A Spirit To Be Free".)


AND, THIS SHOW:


I'm GENERALLY happy with my intro graphics on THIS.... HOWEVER, on SHOOTING DAY several things went wrong. I had insomnia the night before, it poured all day, and getting students to show up for the painting class didn;t go smoothly.

ALSO, I was VERY unsatisfied with the footage, the shots, the angles, and people were often impatient with me. I also didn't know how to explain why it wasn't right, and how it OUGHT to look. So, that was MAJOR learning experience on ALL SIDES. 

ALSO, the head TV Station Producer BOTCHED the first half of the shoot SO BAD and we lost EVERYTHING! ALL OF IT! 

We did shoot the episode. and I DID have to edit EVERYTHING, and CROP like almost EVERY SHOT. People were not always great at taking direction either. I had to just LET IT GO, and just ALLOW it to go badly, because if I DIDN'T I'd blow a gasket... NOT WORTH GETTING UPSET OVER. Everyone needs to learn... so, once it was all shot, I had to explain WHY the shots were bad, ineffective, and didn't help to TEACH anyone. and NO ONE could FOLLOW and actually learn anything JUST because they were shot wrong.

I do HAVE that episode, and it DID actually air on TV, but after my assistant producer finally understood what was wrong with it, we've been trying to get arrangements to shoot at a different TV Station because we can shoot at THAT one at night and weekends.

I haven't uploaded THAT episode yet. Because I kind of HATE IT.

But, HEY! At least my Intro Graphics are BANGIN'! ;) 


Anyways, I wanna get through all my Cleanup animation stuff.

MAYBE I can get it done this month or next month. I try to reach a quota of 10 frames of cleanup animation PER DAY.

There's OVER 200+ and I'm already at 130 frames done. It's also SHOT ONE ONES at 24FPS.


I JUST signed a contract for another Hockey gig which is NEXT weekend. So, THAT will set me back. I might have 1-2 more, and I MIGHT have a job interview coming up in Boston for Animation/Motion Graphics. MAYBE....

I also try to do Life Drawings EVERY DAY at the Dog Park in South Field w the kid. AND, I just made a Bulbasaur/Ivysaur Sculpey planter. AND, the pool still didn't open, but MAYBE Monday... }:(

I also play Pokemon Go HARD CORE!





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Friday, March 15, 2019

Animated Short Film WIP: Succor Forlorn

Concept Art Color Mock-Up
HOW THE HECK DID I GET HERE????

Well, THIS is HOW; It started LIKE THIS:

I'd already gone through all the trouble of blogging my goals out on my Main Art Blog when when my #ArtVsArtist/#ArtVArtist/AnimationVsAnimator


Meme videos were still charting on Twitter, plus the fact that Pokemon Go suddenly hit an all time HIGH in user-ship and my Pokemon Go Tweets were also charting still, so my friend Roland & I were discussing stuff, and I had been wanting to re-cut the stuff in my #AnimationVsAnimator meme video into an actual animation/artist/Filmmaker/Dirctor's Demo.


I never got to actually do my final After Effects VFX final edit because the program kept vetoing the clip no matter how compressed I made it, but had no problem importing other videos... this is an issue I often get with Adobe CC and Windows updates, the updates also screwed up my entire iTunes, and my audio/sound card in my computer which was already going bad. (I litterally just started to sort that out FINALLY since last night and all morning today, for the ba-jillienth time trying)

So, not only had I done things like spruce up my Vimeo, portfolios on ArtStation, but I felt this desire to work on JUST a Demo that was a Director's Demo but as a DP (Director of Photography for Cinema).

Here's the HD version from my Meme Clip:



So, I'd started going through my video clips & B-Roll I shot Spring, Summer, and Fall. I wanted it to be a "Video Portrait" but a "Self Portrait" style as a Director/Filmmaker but with just regular camera work and maybe a few VFX thrown in, or some fancy edits.

I found a number of clips I shot of myself, experimental stuff... and at the time, I hated all of it, but, I'd ALSO hated the stuff I actually ended up using in Self Portrait clip I used in my Meme video. So, I decided to try some VFX experiments with the video clips I had. It actually went incredibly well, and was much easier than I'd thought. I'd been so frustrated with After Effects for a week on my Animation/Artist/Filmmaker Demo that I had no expectations for anything to work....

But, THIS is what happened in the 1st one:




Then, I figured, what if I tried this with Trapcode? SO, I did. I did a number of experiments with my B-Roll using Trapcode form...

I had also been suddenly on a 90s/Y2K/2000s Techno kick, and kept finding all sorts of goodies there, with another uptick in my tweets & follows just for THAT stuff on Twitter.... So, I posted more....









Then, a few Techno/Eurodance oldies came up:















Anyways, those were just a FEW of the things that I'd dug up on YouTube, or in my own archives... I'd also even found out that there's a NEW Winamp, and even spent a about 1-2 days making my own Winamp Skins, which ALSO made me VERY interested in 90s & Y2K EVERYTHING all over again! I also got a Skin maker program. If you want some of the Skins I made you can pretty much download ALL of them HERE.

And, since I had been doing VFX Animation Experiments with my B-Roll, I kept stumbling into other things I'd originally wanted to try doing using After Effects CC so then THESE happened:


(BTW: These clips are Creative Commons if you want to rip them n use them for ur own projects)


We had also been hit with so many kinds of weather, and despite this Pokemon Go was going crazy with events, so I often wanted to participate in as many as I could even tho all the PokeStops & PokeGyms are a long walking distance in both directions from my home. Some days I went out, and other days I was stuck inside. Either too cold, too windy, too much snow up to my waste, floods, road construction, power outs, you name it. Not a fan of living in New England AND NEITHER IS MY BACK.

But, it just so happened that on a Thursday evening I was outside playing Pokemon Go trying to do these Pokemon Go event tasks and it was, really cold, I had all the music in my head.... and, I started to realize that maybe a Demo wasn't really the way to go with what I had just made...

I mean, LOOK at all of that stuff!

So, as I was walking around that night I started to have these concepts come into my mind, and it reminded me of some things I had done as a teenager... only more EMO. I didn't usually do EMO sad stuff.... except THIS: (-and maybe some other stuff I no longer have, which I don;t have this one either... )

Fathoming Oubliette

It's titled "Succor Forlorn"

I started to have this concept for a video art piece, the themes, and all of that... so, I sketched up a rough Concept Art which I am hoping to animate starting within the next day or 2:



Also on DeviantArt: Sketch & Color Mock-up

I also wrote a Poem of how I wanted the themes to go. I spent an evening writing it in my paper notebook, then reworked it the following day, and then I also typed and reworked it on another day for about half a day.

The Poem is called "Stargazed Yearning"

You can read the Poem texts HERE.


Then, I wanted to record the audio of myself reciting the poem, but also acting it out... it was a very frustrating endeavor because my spouse was on Spring Break from MASS ARTS Boston, and my daughter also kept having days off, or half days, and I can ONLY record it with NO ONE AT HOME.

I was REALLY feeling it when I 1st wrote it, but couldn't record it due to all the home/house noise. My friend also kept making & breaking his plans with me as well... so, I finally just gave up trying to re-record it after the 3rd day of trying because I just couldn't into the right groove again to connect with the FEELINGS I wanted... and I mean, I tried EVERYTHING like digging up old songs that used to make me cry after a teenaged break-up, dug up photos of ex-boyfriends, or dudes that rebuked me... but, I was just so fed up with wasting time, and since I had recorded at least 7 full long takes, and multiple spot takes of certain segments, I just spent 1-days just chopping & Frankenstein'ing everything until I fore-fit it to work... hopefully it sounds LESS like a hack TRYING to read word-for-word out-loud, and MORE like someone actually abandoned on a planet.

But, anyways, the feedback I got was pretty positive. 

I wanted it to be this kind of fantasy theme, because she mentions she's been stuck on a planet for "1000 orbital planetary years".... So, how long is a year on that planet's orbit? And, how long is 1000 of those years???? So, u start to get a sense that she's not "normal".... as far as Earth goes.
Is she a ghost? 
Is she an alien humanoid? 
Is she an immortal?

So, it's open to interpretation...

The Audio Version is called 
"Stargazed Yearnings" (plural)


This Final Audio Design version took me about a whole day and evening alone:

Also on NewGrounds for Free Download HERE
The short film will be called "Succor Forlorn".

There's a number of discrepancies about the pronunciation of the word "succor". When I was in high school we were taught this words as sounding similar to Olde French and Lantin original pronunciations like "soo-kor" however, online a number of dictionaries tend to list the pronunciation as sounding like "sucker" and is the origin of a baby's pacifier and lollypops & hard candies which were originally all called "suckers". The word originally means to soothe or comfort, but also can mean solace, safety, haven, help, aide, relief, respite, assistance, etc.

But, it's also a pun for "sucker" as in being gullible, mislead, or duped.

She keeps on hoping that when she was left on the planet by someone to save her that they would come back for her, so she keeps on calling out for him to return. 

Anyways, I want to start animating it, hopefully within the next few days. I'm really tired from working on the audio this week, so I didn't work on anything today.
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Wednesday, December 27, 2017

Lively Exotic Motion Graphics Affects Animation in Adobe After Effects CC 2018

 Here's the original graphic circa. 2008:

GIF version on DeviantArt

I'd ESPECIALLY wanted to make THIS ONE into a motion graphics/effects animation video with Adobe After Effects. This one I DEFINITELY could NOT pull of in Premiere. I used the Puppet Pin tool feature to animate the curtains. But, I definitely had to update the graphic to a size for HD. I did this with the "Fallen" graphic as well. Honestly, it's just way better to do this in Adobe After Effects than Premiere Pro.
 

This composition is generally WAY different than my usual stuff. I'm WAY dynamic as an artist, os much drawings are way more animated, in motion, etc. This one is still. It's actually SO rare in my art that I went through my gallery looking for ANYTHING still enough to add effects animation/motion graphics so it wouldn't look like a frozen person, or a sticker on a video.


Adobe After Effects CC 20018


Original Artworks can be found in my gallery HERE on DeviantArt.


At the time when I did this one I was studying dance especially raqs sharqi & tribal fusion (belly dance). I studied every day, because I was suffering from depression, and it made me stop feeling sad or painful. But, I eventually hurt my back.

Several of my influences were people like 1 of my teachers, Zoe Jakes, but also other members of the Belly Dance Super Stars & The Indigo like: Rachel Brice, Sharon Kihara, Mardi Love, Kami Liddle, Cherchez La Femme (Sherri), Ansuya, Sadie, Ariellah, Vagabond Princess.  There's so many, really! But, also the legendary Mata Hari. Virtually ALL of them drew inspiration from her, and antique silent films, as well as Star Wars, Star Trek, and comic books.

 I'd been drawing furries for the longest time, and wanted to get back to human figures, and especially my own original characters BEFORE the internet had influenced me to change.  So, I started doing several bellydancer images with my own character, Lively.

Lively is a brunet, ranging from browns to black, but I've had her in various colored hair such as blue, indigo, purple, and green, usually a darker color. Just NEVER BLOND. Her skin tone can also range in many hues from fair-skin which is something I started doing as I got older, but originally she was either tanned, bronzed, or olive skin. So, this is 1 of several of her incarnations.
Original Sketch




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Fallen - Motion Graphics - Effects Animation in Adobe After Effects 2018

The Original Graphic:
Original Graphic

I reworked, re-painted, re-colored, and edited this in Adobe Photoshop CC 2018 & Adobe After Effects CC 2018 last week.
Some are longer Meditative loops, and it's basically my process as I was tweaking it:









Here's the original version I did several years ago:




You can find this on my DeviantArt Gallery.

I was suffering from very bad depression, AKA Heartbreak, and around 2009 was when I was going through some major changes within myself. That year I'd realized that many persons whom I'd believed were my friends, were not actually friends, but "friends", or fake friends. I'd also been going through some doubts about whatever my beliefs were, or what I'd thought they were. I'd already known that the government and political system was already flawed and broken, and you didn't need to watch X-FILES to know that... but, the new president at the time, whom I was very happy to have elected, had broken several of his promises, but talking about that made you persona non grata. It was also the aftermath of the Bail-Outs and the economic meltdown. I'd wanted to be at CAL-ARTS by that time, but was screwed by the economy.
Since governments, relationships, society, and even history came into question, things like religion, spirituality, and theology also did.... things just weren't adding up.... accountability was an actual thing. And, I became very enamored with Philosophy, ethics, and epistemology.

I remembered sitting at out cart/kiosk in the mall, with my sketchbook, trying in vain to sketch something. ANYTHING! And, NOTHING came out. It was THE MOST depressing thing! To be an artist, and award winning one, and not being able to draw. I cried EVERY DAY and at night. And, the ache was in EVERYTHING. Sometimes, I didn't eat.

I had NOTHING to look forward to, and all ANYONE ever had to say about ANYTHING was: Your daughter -blah-blah-blah... that NEVER cheered me up. It's a VERY sexist assumption, and I don't know whether it's worse from women or from men... but, I got it on all sides.

Then, out of nowhere, I gave up sketching, and just randomly doodled something only to have THIS show up on my paper.


I'd used this artwork for an album cover on 8Tracks.


The Original Sketch:



If you would like to create your own experimental graphic with these, color it in Photoshop, or print out and hand-color whether for fun, practice, or educational purposes you MAY do that, but NOT FOR PROFIT. I did license the sketch versions to the Creative Commons so you could do that.
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Lively Unicorn Morph Animation Adobe After Effects Redux


I've reworked this to be closer to what I was actually, originally going for when I'd first produced it back in 2000-2001 in Adobe After Effects.

The original was hand-drawn by hand, and also the clean-up animation was hand-inked, then manually scanned & cleaned in Photoshop 5.0, 5.5, and 6.0 with my old, original, Canon scanner.

Old Version 2001/2005:


Reworked:


With Fog:



DeviantArt GIF

Older Version from Older versions of Adobe After Effects 2000-2005 & 3D Studio Max:





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Friday, December 15, 2017

Spring n Summer Animation Tests: Lively 001

You know, last Semester (Spring Semester at UMASS Boston) I really did have quite a number of very nice animation concepts. Really I did. But, other people, and broken promises get in the way.

Here were some of the rough animation test I did, trying to learn some animation programs during the summer:






I had also cleaned up some old vintage pencil-test animation. Most of these were created at the U-ARTS Philadelphia from about 1996-1998. and the AIPH one was about 1999-2001(somewhere around there)


You know, it's just REALLY too bad that I couldn't really do what I actually wanted to do, and frequently had to compromise.

My original idea was a more stylized version of or own artistic interpretation for THIS clip form the 1980s:




I can actually DEFINITELY make that happen NOW. And, I probably will. I need to wrap up the "Maple Bacon" animated short I'm doing for my own animated independent film "Ying Qilin" with my daughter first, and I'm also a DP on another live action film "The Holy Maple Tree" in Brockton.




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Thursday, December 14, 2017

Inktober: Djehkäujaa Doodles at UMASS Boston

The huge, main bulk of my Inktober this year was of Djehkäujaa. I was obsessed with drawing her profile in her humanoid form. I can feel her coming forth in a new more streamlined design, but I can't quite decide on it yet. I definitely need to do more Life Drawing croquis.

I barely had any free time at all, and i was frequently stressed out. She ended up being doodled on virtually all of my notes, and my homework.

I was almost i pain at ties because the muses were just poking at me, and I couldn't sit still. I was obsessing about it for days, and all throughout the day, and evening back in October and November. the sketches aren't that great, but at times it was like I was really reaching it, and HER. THERE SHE IS. But, I couldn't quite catch it, or reach her. I also wanted to give her eyelashes a remake, and make them thinker and bolder. I was also frequently rethinking how I wanted her hair to be. Much like Lively she has a lot of freedom in her hair design and can be full, flat, wavy and part anywhere.

I was trying to get in touch with one of my idols. (I'm sure you might know who), but also my old teacher from AIPH. Ths also fueled my sketching fever back I Sept-October.

I was trying to get an Open Life Drawing "Club" started, which I might actually still do, sponsored and registered to the University. But, I suffered from burn-out so badly while also trying to manage 4 full academic classes, AND a work study job in biology, PLUS commuting. It was KILLING ME. So, I had to let it go in October.


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