Some Updates

Here's the AFC stuff I've been working on since the last post -

First off, I needed to add a little more life to the street scene. I animated three generic shoppers to walk by in the background.

After the street shot was complete, I had to go back to this toy store window scene and give the boy a size reduction. It was a low angle shot that was supposed to have a little forced perspective - but in the end he just looked fat. The image on the bottom is the boy after the fix.

While in LA a week ago, I painted up the BG for this scene and finished the animation a day ago. I'm back to working on the end sequence of the film - this shot was an easy one. The boy does some subtle breathing as we truck in on him in bed. This immediately follows the reindeer on the roof scene.

Here's the shot I'm currently working on. The boy, peacefully asleep in bed, wakes up suddenly as a dark shadow passes through the light of his open door. I hope to finish this one up soon!

More soon!

Finally coming to a close on this one - Just a few missing details.

Cowboy Doodle

Here's a doodle from today - probably subliminally inspired by Bob's cowboy sketches - some wonderful little doodles. Go check 'em out. Maybe this cowpoke can hang out with those guys.

THESE FEET ARE MADE FOR WALKING


Thought I'd share some process today. Maybe there are some Flash beginners out there that may benefit from some tips. In the beginning of this shot, the family walks forward in perspective into position. Since the Dad's walk is fairly basic and steady, I can save a lot of time by using symbols that gradually scale as he gets closer. After I make 2 keys and scale the body towards it's final pose, I can make tons of keys throughout the movement to simulate the up and down motion and various follow thru action (like the hat and the present bow). The feet are a different story. I draw a perspective line that shows roughly where the feet would land as he walks forward. I then loosely draw in Flash - frame by frame - the positioning of where the feet need to be Here you can see I drew the foreground foot in red and the background foot in blue. This helps from getting the feet confused. In this image, the onion-skin mode is on so you can see the sketched images overlapped. I scrub through the shot until I feel satisfied, then I use a few symbols that were pre-prepared for the shoes and move them into place over the rough digital drawings. This is also done frame by frame. In this case, I could get away with using about 4 symbols for all the needed foot shapes (You can see the final shoe symbols in the final foot position). After the shoe walking is complete, I hand drew the pants (legs) into place frame by frame to get the proper perspective on the complicated movement.

Storyboard Frame

It's taking some time but this bugger is slowly getting completed. Two characters are done and I'm working on the animation for the last character - the Dad. Here's a storyboard frame for some reference. Here, I thought to have the boy walking in a position to easily see and react to the window as they walk up. In the final shot, I have the boy walking between the Mom and Dad. It just felt more "family like" that way. The boy now has some extra action as he runs from between them closer to the window.

Thanks again for stopping by to see the latest!