Wednesday 27 October 2010
More References
Here are some bridges. These are as you see them, but a good starting point as to how I want the bridge itself to look. It may be leaning more towards looking like the far right picture, but at the angle of the far left.
This is a test for placing 2D in 3D and This is a camera angle test. These tests were made with Flash and Maya and basically prove I can put the 2D element in a 3D element. My next test will revisit an old animation of a couple of guys flying through the air shooting at eachother, and will allow me to make some crazy camera motion.
References
I think the best part about this project is the fact that I have literally limitless reference material. Type in 'Kung Fu' when you visit Youtube and you are awarded with every cheesy fight known to man, amateur and otherwise.
Best of all however, I have my friends and myself. There's a certain beauty to being able to perform something your drawings can perform, and you get a better feel for the motion when you do it yourself. As for my friends, they can certainly make this a personal experience, as well as provide leverage to ask their teachers and other friends to help.
This here is an intense little choreographed fight that is one of the bases of my animation. Pretty much any of the linked videos that relate to the Chinese Olympics are utterly spectacular and perfect for this. However, I'd only reference them to the point of motion, since my two characters are essentially trying to kill one another.
As for camera angles, a good reference would be some of the later anime that has been released, where the animators realize that sticking the character in front of sparkly lines in the background doesn't cut it any more. Cowboy Bebop, Ghost in the Shell 2, Full Metal Alchemist, Tekkonkinkreet... They all take the movie style steady cam approach to their fight scenes that gives them much more punch. Granted that in traditional kung-fu movies, the cameras were too heavy to hold, thus were fixed and smoother, this however is taking the easy route. I can't take the easy route if I don't want this to look like something one of the Newgrounds kids made...
Which brings me back to how I'll reference it. For some parts, I'll need my own epic footage. This will allow me to create said steady cam effects since all I'll really have access to is a steady cam. It's up to my pen hand to recreate a home martial arts movie into an art piece.
Best of all however, I have my friends and myself. There's a certain beauty to being able to perform something your drawings can perform, and you get a better feel for the motion when you do it yourself. As for my friends, they can certainly make this a personal experience, as well as provide leverage to ask their teachers and other friends to help.
This here is an intense little choreographed fight that is one of the bases of my animation. Pretty much any of the linked videos that relate to the Chinese Olympics are utterly spectacular and perfect for this. However, I'd only reference them to the point of motion, since my two characters are essentially trying to kill one another.
As for camera angles, a good reference would be some of the later anime that has been released, where the animators realize that sticking the character in front of sparkly lines in the background doesn't cut it any more. Cowboy Bebop, Ghost in the Shell 2, Full Metal Alchemist, Tekkonkinkreet... They all take the movie style steady cam approach to their fight scenes that gives them much more punch. Granted that in traditional kung-fu movies, the cameras were too heavy to hold, thus were fixed and smoother, this however is taking the easy route. I can't take the easy route if I don't want this to look like something one of the Newgrounds kids made...
Which brings me back to how I'll reference it. For some parts, I'll need my own epic footage. This will allow me to create said steady cam effects since all I'll really have access to is a steady cam. It's up to my pen hand to recreate a home martial arts movie into an art piece.
New Project
So, I'm scrapping Feral. After numerous attempts to make it something special and personal, it lost substance. Something that demanded narrative had no narrative, or rather, it had narrative, but it was too big for a small animation.
So I'm going in a new direction. Something small and with a simple, clean narrative. This will still contain hyper-kinetic martial arts. I won't ever escape the fact that I really want to show off my animation ability. In the long run, the stories will be given to me by someone who is, frankly, much better at it than I am. My personal projects are to remain personal. This however, is something to showcase my ability more so than a powerful literate piece.
Simple characters laid out in a simple plot involving a bridge, martial arts and the concept of honor. I can assure you the style used before this was more detailed visually, but when push comes to shove, you can have the prettiest looking visuals, but it still loses out to simple, beautifully animated designs.
The general idea is that two guys, meet on a bridge going opposite ways, but their pride denies the other passage past them. So they end up fighting, awesomely, but end up stopping the fight when they realize that they passed eachother in the fray and are on the right side of the bridge for their journey. There's a brief pause, then they bow and leave. I might add other elements, like a smile that shows these two enemies becoming friends through respect, maybe cheeky little comedy elements at the end where one makes a gesture at the other behind his back... Stuff like that.
In all though, this idea seems more manageable and more solid, and maybe more fun to work with. Now to propose the damn thing...
So I'm going in a new direction. Something small and with a simple, clean narrative. This will still contain hyper-kinetic martial arts. I won't ever escape the fact that I really want to show off my animation ability. In the long run, the stories will be given to me by someone who is, frankly, much better at it than I am. My personal projects are to remain personal. This however, is something to showcase my ability more so than a powerful literate piece.
Simple characters laid out in a simple plot involving a bridge, martial arts and the concept of honor. I can assure you the style used before this was more detailed visually, but when push comes to shove, you can have the prettiest looking visuals, but it still loses out to simple, beautifully animated designs.
The general idea is that two guys, meet on a bridge going opposite ways, but their pride denies the other passage past them. So they end up fighting, awesomely, but end up stopping the fight when they realize that they passed eachother in the fray and are on the right side of the bridge for their journey. There's a brief pause, then they bow and leave. I might add other elements, like a smile that shows these two enemies becoming friends through respect, maybe cheeky little comedy elements at the end where one makes a gesture at the other behind his back... Stuff like that.
In all though, this idea seems more manageable and more solid, and maybe more fun to work with. Now to propose the damn thing...
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