Composite Self Evaluation

Composite Self Evaluation

For this assignment we were asked to create an animation composite. We had to include different layers of media i.e. real life images, our own drawings/sketches etc., and we had to use a handful of different animating techniques to prove our ability.

I was fairly knowledgeable with using the editing software such as Adobe After Effects and Photoshop, so I felt quite happy with this assignment. However some students had little to no experience with them. This is where the core sessions became very useful. Although I was comfortable with using the Adobe software, it became apparent that my skill set would need to be improved if I wanted to make a successful composite. I found a lot of the sessions helpful and I was able to learn some techniques that I could implement into my composition. I also watched many ‘How to’ videos on the Internet for the specific techniques I wanted.

During this process I had to come up with an idea, which did prove to be a challenge in itself. In the brief it stated that the composite could be anything we wanted, as long as it was ten to thirty seconds long. I knew that the ten second boundary would be a problem for me as I always include masses of detail in my work, but that meant it would be hard to keep it around thirty seconds.

I finally came up with my idea. First of all I always knew I wanted it to be a dramatic sequence because I believe that’s the best way to attract an audience. I decided to create a cartoon animation of a military plane flying through the clouds. I originally wanted to use images I found online for the clouds and the plane, but unfortunately I couldn’t find any images that I wanted. Also there wasn’t enough images of the same plane at different angles so it would’ve looked really bad quality and unprofessional. This is where I used Adobe Photoshop. The clouds obviously took no time as they were very easy to create, but the plane was slightly trickier. I wanted it to be fairly detailed but not too much as it was only cartoon and I didn’t want to overcomplicate it. I was also planning to create my paratrooper characters on Photoshop, but then I wouldn’t have any input of ‘real life’ imagery that I needed. I took a selection of images from the Internet such as a male silhouette, cargo pants, a military vest, a gas mast, and a parachute. I then edited them together to create my own unique character.

I made various shots of the plane, which helped to set the scene and built tension. I then made a close up shot of the planes loading bay, and the door to slowly open revealing my paratrooper characters. This shot was the most time consuming as not only did I need to animate the clouds, the plane, and the door, I also had to animate my characters which was a first for me. It took me a few attempts to get the walking motion that I wanted. I watched tutorials to try and get the best technique I could, and I also watched clips from films of people walking to get a better understanding of how the characters should move. Even though they weren’t perfect, I feel that for my first time animating a character it was definitely a success, but I will be practicing to further improve my skill in this field. It wasn’t just the characters that made this shot the most difficult and time consuming, I also ran into the issue of animating the plane door to open. Every time I seemed to fix it, another issue arose. For example when I created the opening of the door, the characters body parts were brought forward which killed the effect completely, and then when I fixed that, the plane door would connect to the plane properly so they would drift apart. This was a problem I couldn’t ignore as it would ruin the effect of my whole composite and it would look unprofessional. However to solve this problem I didn’t resort to tutorials, I wanted to figure this out and correct it myself to prove that I am capable of working independently and can overcome mistakes.

I finally completed this shot and finished it off with a camera shake and zoom in effect, which, even though they’re very simple technique, they added a lot to my animation by giving you that extra edge of realism. I think spending most of my time on this part of the composite is what has made it my favourite section to work on. Its definitely the most detailed shot and it is by far my favourite.

For the rest of the animation I wanted to have the paratroopers jump out of the plane, skydive at high speed, and then deploy their parachutes where they would descend to the ground. However I had already reached twenty seconds and I was only half way through. After tweaking and editing my idea I decided I wanted to create a cliff-hanger because I thought it would be more effective and exciting. This was a successful idea. Not only did this add more suspense and tension to the composite, it also helped me to keep within the ten to thirty second boundaries, which made me even happier.

Overall I am very pleased with my work and believe that I have used my skill set, knowledge, and ability to the best that I could. That though doesn’t mean I wont revisit it, as I know in the future I am going to become a much better animator and I will want to improve it further to develop my portfolio.