06.10.2008

My project is completed after hours of perfecting, troubleshooting, and general stressing. To give you an idea, the image below is a map of my frames rendering on various machines. I ran into some issues with the depth and field and had to turn it off because everything came out so blurry that the video was indistinguishable. The batch render was also having issues, there were two frames that it would always stop on and I had to manually go through and render and save about 70 images.



Things that really worked:
- For the most part, the camera movement is exactly how I envisioned it.
- The harsh black and white style and the blood worked flawlessly.

Things to work on:
- Adding in depth so that the object I want are in focus and the everything else is not.
- Changing the distance between the camera's when the objects are very close in front of the camera for the best stereo effect.
- Having the blood reappear in the ending with the trees soaking it up.

Overall, this project turned out very well. It is not perfect but was in the direction that my focus is heading towards, which is the parenting of video and 3-D in a stereo environment.

05.02.2008

I have successfully created my dynamic blood. I created a scene using the blood and also the aestethic of the 2 1/2D animation that is a rough version of what the final product will be.



The story has changed to fit the time scale of this project. I am including three of orignal ideas I had with abstract transitions between them.

1) The boxing scene
2) The cocaine scene
3) The shooting scene

04.08.2008

Rouge: An abstract journey of what we give blood for

Overview:
This sounds like a very heavy subject, but I am not interested in making a political statement. Blood is the means that takes the audience on a journey from point A to point B. It is vehicle that remains constant while its surroundings and settings change around it.

I was really inspired by a music video called 'La Terre Ferme' by Luke.



In this video, the main 2-D figure is falling through an endless and boundless space. The idea for my animation holds the same kind of aesthetics as well as theme. I plan on using a combination of photos and 3-D animation in order to achieve a 2 1/2-D look but with very fluid movements.

A major focus of this project is the smooth and precise flow of the camera's motion. The music video below called 'Only You' by Portishead and I was inspired by the beautiful movements and transistions from slow motion to sped up and reverse to normal playback.



- A man holding a gun to another mans head fires the gun. Blood sprays and the camera tracks a drop of blood falling down a open stairwell. As it falls, the stairs slowing transform into DNA strands. The camera pans out to a scientist looking at the blood sample on a petri dish.
- There are tons of flashing lights and, in slow motion, a boxers face appears. He is getting hit and blood and sweat are spraying with his heads movement. The camera follows a drop of blood which falls up to a nose bleeding. There is a quick reverse shot of the blood going back into someones nose and then the woman doing a line of coke, also in reverse.

Timeline:
04.14 - Complete story and storyboards
05.26 - Complete animation and test stereo