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The Official Animators and Modelers Thread!

K

Kikarian

Member
duracell017 said:
my senior portfolio instructor noted it in my demo reel assignment. I'll post my demo reel most likely tmr here.

actually im not sure what role I want to do lol. my study is 3d modeling, but I have dabbed in particle dynamics, visual effects, and texturing and lighting as well during my studies. plus I have an engineering background and do I can dab into the tech art side as well such expressions and programming.

I was planning on making a short film that used particles, hard surface models, animation, and texturing in hopes that would land me an internship, job, or admittance into a training program at Disney. I know all eggs in one basket. but really any opportunity would be great. I'm currently working on small projects to finesse my hard surface modeling and redo some old projects after learning anatomy through ecorche that involves characters.
Click to expand...
I'd say you should look into Motion Design, with what you are describing.
 
D

Dabookerman

Member
duracell017 said:
my senior portfolio instructor noted it in my demo reel assignment. I'll post my demo reel most likely tmr here.

actually im not sure what role I want to do lol. my study is 3d modeling, but I have dabbed in particle dynamics, visual effects, and texturing and lighting as well during my studies. plus I have an engineering background and do I can dab into the tech art side as well such expressions and programming.

I was planning on making a short film that used particles, hard surface models, animation, and texturing in hopes that would land me an internship, job, or admittance into a training program at Disney. I know all eggs in one basket. but really any opportunity would be great. I'm currently working on small projects to finesse my hard surface modeling and redo some old projects after learning anatomy through ecorche that involves characters.
Click to expand...

I personally think you're gonna find it harder if you haven't picked a specific role.

If you're studying many different skills within 3D it's hard to get especially good at any of them. I mean dynamics, vfx, lighting are completely different skills. You'd need to learn a bit of code for some of them. Since you say you've done that, that's a good start, but I've never come across a junior 3D generalist.
 
S

Shin Johnpv

Member
If he was getting into commercials it would make sense. In working in commercials in the NYC market, I ran into a lot of people who could do a couple things really well. Though usually they were tied together in some way. Folks who could do compositing, lighting, and texturing. Folks who could do Modeling, rigging, and animating. Folks who could do particles, rendering, lighting, simulation stuff etc. Granted it wasn't always called for, but there were instances of it. Shooting for a Disney training position though I would agree with you and go for focusing on one thing. Hell any aspirations of working in feature films I would focus on one thing, and being as damn good at that one thing as possible.
 
F

Futureman

Member
learning After Effects by making my own little cartoon.

did an XMAS episode:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9AQIKSiKy2g

I guess I hope within a year or so I can start to become an AE master and get a real job (currently work at a college bookstore).

I'm going through Creating Motion Graphics and treating it like a textbook.... I think I'm gonna get How to Cheat in After Effects next.
 
C

CyclopsRock

Member
Shin Johnpv said:
If he was getting into commercials it would make sense. In working in commercials in the NYC market, I ran into a lot of people who could do a couple things really well. Though usually they were tied together in some way. Folks who could do compositing, lighting, and texturing. Folks who could do Modeling, rigging, and animating. Folks who could do particles, rendering, lighting, simulation stuff etc. Granted it wasn't always called for, but there were instances of it. Shooting for a Disney training position though I would agree with you and go for focusing on one thing. Hell any aspirations of working in feature films I would focus on one thing, and being as damn good at that one thing as possible.
Click to expand...

Absolutely agree - it's the same in London. In fact, it's not so much about type of work, in my experience, but simply the size of the teams. I'm sure that if you had a feature film made by a team of 6 people, you'd find they were all generalists too, only that doesn't happen, of course. But, in my experience, it doesn't matter if you're working on a high-end TV advert, music video, architectural or product viz, TV spot etc - if you're in a small team, you'll usually need to be able to do basically everything, have a specialist area where you're much better, and then often one particular area where you're just the bee's knees. Where I work at the moment - mostly advertising - there are only 5 or so of us. I can "do" everything to varying abilities. My special area is lighting, shaders and rendering, and then my absolute specialism is scripting. It all ties in quite nicely with the other guys' specialities.
 
D

duracell017

Member
It would make sense to focus on one area for Disney Talent development program. I can't choose lol. I like all the areas I dabbed in. I guess if anything it would have to be what my focus is in class. I asked the director of the program for some insight. I will keep practicing and refine my skillset.

I will definitely work on all areas though for freelance work to be versatile but keep 3d modeling as the main focus.
 
D

Dark Octave

Banned
Pretty cool thread. You guys have some great stuff on here.

I'll be trying to learn in the next few weeks so it'll be nice to have a community of knowledgeable people to fall back on for support.
 
D

Dabookerman

Member
Spat_triate said:
An After Effects animation I made for a college course:

https://vimeo.com/55994514

It's nothing special, but I got it done in 2 days, so I'm pretty happy with it.
Click to expand...

That's really awesome dude! Especially for a college course! I remember my uni work being utter utter shite.
The only thing I would have liked to have seen is the actual pounce/kill :)

8354805385_220fb8a4f3_b.jpg


I think I need to adjust her neck/clavicle area. Looks a bit odd I think. Just gotta add her shoes, feathered straps and wings and it's onwards to texturing!
 
Spat_triate

Spat_triate

Member
Futureman said:
that was pretty cool! Good job. Any advice on how you did everything? What kind of texts do they assign you for an After Effects course?
Click to expand...

Dabookerman said:
That's really awesome dude! Especially for a college course! I remember my uni work being utter utter shite.
The only thing I would have liked to have seen is the actual pounce/kill :)

8354805385_220fb8a4f3_b.jpg


I think I need to adjust her neck/clavicle area. Looks a bit odd I think. Just gotta add her shoes, feathered straps and wings and it's onwards to texturing!
Click to expand...

Thanks!

For the actual animation I wanted to do elaborate shape animation but ended up going with a simple hierarchical setup. The environments/assets were painted in photoshop. The only 3rd party plugin used was Trapcode Particular for some of the dust effects.

To be honest I never bought the book (I don't think anyone in my class did). I relied on free online resources (like creativecow) for much of my learning and went from there.
 
A

Animation-Imp

Member
It's been a few years since I graduated at the Royal Academy of Fine Arts (KASK) in Ghent Belgium. And since then I've worked on a pilot for a kids series, before choosing for security and taking a job as a member of the board at the Museum for the History of Sciences at Ghent University.

But the itch is returning, and since a lot of people I met recently asked me if they could see some work I did in the past, I decided to upload my student projects I produced in my master years...

There are three small shorts I did in my first master year, and an aproximately 5 minute short I did as graduation project, called Jarred. Several of these had the honor of being shown at international film festivals, including Annecy in France.

I hope you enjoy them, and hopefully I can start something new in the near future.

Oom Jan (1° MG) (Voice over in dutch)
http://youtu.be/qbdahjsEWro

Pulse (1° MG)
http://youtu.be/MS6XYsRwqZs

Meat (1° MG)
http://youtu.be/qLa5vB7iHSU

and
Jarred (Graduation Film) (HD, so switch to 1080p)
http://youtu.be/6zBEd9PRueg
 
D

Dali

Member
Animation-Imp said:
It's been a few years since I graduated at the Royal Academy of Fine Arts (KASK) in Ghent Belgium. And since then I've worked on a pilot for a kids series, before choosing for security and taking a job as a member of the board at the Museum for the History of Sciences at Ghent University.

But the itch is returning, and since a lot of people I met recently asked me if they could see some work I did in the past, I decided to upload my student projects I produced in my master years...

There are three small shorts I did in my first master year, and an aproximately 5 minute short I did as graduation project, called Jarred. Several of these had the honor of being shown at international film festivals, including Annecy in France.

I hope you enjoy them, and hopefully I can start something new in the near future.

Oom Jan (1° MG) (Voice over in dutch)
http://youtu.be/qbdahjsEWro

Pulse (1° MG)
http://youtu.be/MS6XYsRwqZs

Meat (1° MG)
http://youtu.be/qLa5vB7iHSU

and
Jarred (Graduation Film) (HD, so switch to 1080p)
http://youtu.be/6zBEd9PRueg
Click to expand...

Omg. Going for that shock value in your grad project were we?
 
A

Animation-Imp

Member
Omg. Going for that shock value in your grad project were we?
Click to expand...

Not really...
I honestly never thought the reaction would've been so strong.
I thought the innocent style and the music would soften the theme of loss and mourning.
I guess I was wrong. The film was shown at a lot of festivals, but almost never in competition, always in special late night screenings.

My first idea was to do it in pixellation (Svankmayer style).
But that would've made it go too far.

My idea was to take a part of my life experiences, we had a similar loss in the family and I got to see first hand how different two people can act when they're mourning, and mould it into a cartoon which would make a certain audience think and see the bigger picture, but which would also score instantly with the beavis and butt-head crowd (big fan).
Some grief, like the woman, and accept the loss, others want to move forward immediatly, like the man, act like everythings all right. This creates a tension, which causes break-ups in a lot of families who lost children.
Like I said, I was a bit surprised when at the premiere, all the men in the theater started gniffling at the first scene, only to be sushed by their girlfriends/wives...
 
Spat_triate

Spat_triate

Member
Animation-Imp said:
It's been a few years since I graduated at the Royal Academy of Fine Arts (KASK) in Ghent Belgium. And since then I've worked on a pilot for a kids series, before choosing for security and taking a job as a member of the board at the Museum for the History of Sciences at Ghent University.

But the itch is returning, and since a lot of people I met recently asked me if they could see some work I did in the past, I decided to upload my student projects I produced in my master years...

There are three small shorts I did in my first master year, and an aproximately 5 minute short I did as graduation project, called Jarred. Several of these had the honor of being shown at international film festivals, including Annecy in France.

I hope you enjoy them, and hopefully I can start something new in the near future.

Oom Jan (1° MG) (Voice over in dutch)
http://youtu.be/qbdahjsEWro

Pulse (1° MG)
http://youtu.be/MS6XYsRwqZs

Meat (1° MG)
http://youtu.be/qLa5vB7iHSU

and
Jarred (Graduation Film) (HD, so switch to 1080p)
http://youtu.be/6zBEd9PRueg
Click to expand...

Awesome! Your style is very Svankmajer-esque. Jarred in particular is very evocative of Svankmajer's Faust. Do you have anything more to show?


I worked on this model a few months back. Not sure if i'll ever go back to it:

 
A

Animation-Imp

Member
Spat_triate said:
Awesome! Your style is very Svankmajer-esque. Jarred in particular is very evocative of Svankmajer's Faust. Do you have anything more to show?

Click to expand...

Thanks, and unfortunately, no I haven't done any animation projects since.
I did a corporate film for a pharmaceutical company, some editing on educationnal films for our Museum, a motion presentation for one of our projects and editing and remastering of a documentary about our science department, aimed at highschool students.

I really want to get back in there, but with family, work and gaming sucking up all my time, I just don't seem to get there.
 
C

CyclopsRock

Member
desu said:
Which one is it?
Click to expand...

The Q&A about scene scale in 3dsmax. NB this is the March 2013 issue, I only just got it today (technically I'm a subscriber, though it's actually just a freebie because of a thing or two i've written for them before) so it might not be in shops yet, not sure!
 
P

paile

Banned
What would be the best way to learn to model? I mean I've done some stuff in Maya and 3DSMax, but it's usually just following along with tutorials I find online.

I know some of the basics but tell me to model a car or a plane and I wouldn't really know where to begin.
 
K

Kikarian

Member
paile said:
What would be the best way to learn to model? I mean I've done some stuff in Maya and 3DSMax, but it's usually just following along with tutorials I find online.

I know some of the basics but tell me to model a car or a plane and I wouldn't really know where to begin.
Click to expand...
Just follow a beginner modelling tutorial on Youtube. Then slowly move upwards until you feel comfortable enough to go on to more intermediate/Advanced stuff.
 
C

CyclopsRock

Member
Don't be afraid to go off piste when it comes to tutorials. Not all of them are the best way to do things, and even where they are, it's all digital so it's logical. Follow your nose and brain, and you can learn to do basically anything!

Edit: I know there are more Maya people here than Max, but I'm thinking of doing some Maxscript tutorials for artists (ie not programmers). Would anyone be interested in this?
 
B

Bömb

Member
Hey folks, I would love to get some feedback on my reel. [Animation/rigging] https://vimeo.com/50519679

It's been in circulation a few months now but I haven't been able to land a job yet. I'm working on a few rigs and animations that I hope will turn out great.
 
S

Shin Johnpv

Member
Bömb;47395752 said:
Hey folks, I would love to get some feedback on my reel. [Animation/rigging] https://vimeo.com/50519679

It's been in circulation a few months now but I haven't been able to land a job yet. I'm working on a few rigs and animations that I hope will turn out great.
Click to expand...

So a few questions for you first. Are you looking to go into commercials, features, television, or games? Depending on your answer for that can really change the critic of the reel, and what should be kept on it and kept off it.

One thing I will say right off the bat, get rid of the music. I can't tell you how many recruiters I've talked to who have blatantly said "if you put music on your reel, and I don't like the music, I'll turn your reel off." It may seem harsh and unfair, but realize there's a lot of us applying for a few positions, recruiters are in the luxury here to do that.

If you want to sell your self as an animator and rigger, I wouldn't even mention the other stuff you did in some of those shots. Like I wouldn't have the modelling piece on there, or mention that you did the modelling/dynamics/lighitng/shading on those other pieces. If you want to sell yourself as a generalist then yeah totally keep that on there. It all depends on what you want to do, and where you want to apply.

I would also say to make your reel a bit shorter too, and only include your best stuff. Again I know a ton of recruiters who say things like "If you don't catch me in the first 10 - 15 seconds I'm turning your reel off" or "If you have great stuff and then questionable stuff on there too I'm gonna question your eye and pass on you". It's a tough industry and you really need to just sell your A game and that's it.

I'm sure some others will have different feelings/thoughts on it, but that's just based on my experience.

That said, if you know what you want to focus on and the type of places you want to apply I may have more feedback for you on what to keep and what to not keep.

I take it you're just recently out of school? It's not a bad reel at all, I think overall you just need to pair it down to your best stuff of what you most want to do.
 
B

Bömb

Member
Shin Johnpv said:
So a few questions for you first. Are you looking to go into commercials, features, television, or games? Depending on your answer for that can really change the critic of the reel, and what should be kept on it and kept off it.

One thing I will say right off the bat, get rid of the music. I can't tell you how many recruiters I've talked to who have blatantly said "if you put music on your reel, and I don't like the music, I'll turn your reel off." It may seem harsh and unfair, but realize there's a lot of us applying for a few positions, recruiters are in the luxury here to do that.

If you want to sell your self as an animator and rigger, I wouldn't even mention the other stuff you did in some of those shots. Like I wouldn't have the modelling piece on there, or mention that you did the modelling/dynamics/lighitng/shading on those other pieces. If you want to sell yourself as a generalist then yeah totally keep that on there. It all depends on what you want to do, and where you want to apply.

I would also say to make your reel a bit shorter too, and only include your best stuff. Again I know a ton of recruiters who say things like "If you don't catch me in the first 10 - 15 seconds I'm turning your reel off" or "If you have great stuff and then questionable stuff on there too I'm gonna question your eye and pass on you". It's a tough industry and you really need to just sell your A game and that's it.

I'm sure some others will have different feelings/thoughts on it, but that's just based on my experience.

That said, if you know what you want to focus on and the type of places you want to apply I may have more feedback for you on what to keep and what to not keep.

I take it you're just recently out of school? It's not a bad reel at all, I think overall you just need to pair it down to your best stuff of what you most want to do.
Click to expand...


Thanks! I really appreciate it.

Firstly, I have been a bit conscious about narrowing down to much on a single place of work and position. And it seems like, based of yours and others comments, that it hasn't been advantageous.

I'm open to commercials, features, tv and games. But considering my education I should really remove games from the equation. But I guess right now that I rather be working on commercials.

About the music, I have no problem changing it. Do you talk to a lot of recruiters? It's nice to get a glimpse into that aspect.

Right now I'm really most interested in being a rigger and animator. Although I would love to do dynamics in the future. I have been mostly looking for jobs in Sweden recently and here it's easier to land a job as an generalist. I've also been feeling that it'd be nice to show companies that even if I want to be a rigger/animator that I still have a grasp about other subjects. But it seems like most people think that I look to indecisive.

I'm a recent graduate, yes. And thanks. I really do apprichiate you taking the time and effort to critique my work and I will think about all you have said.
 
B

B.K.

Member
I haven't posted an update for this in a few months.

bgHelHg.jpg
Click to expand...

I think that's got the block out finished. I cant start refining and detailing now. That piece was a lot harder than I thought it was going to be. I didn't have any good references. I've only got three or four pictures from the game and the rest of the references are cosplay props and no two props are built the same.
 
K

Kikarian

Member
B.K. said:
I haven't posted an update for this in a few months.



I think that's got the block out finished. I cant start refining and detailing now. That piece was a lot harder than I thought it was going to be. I didn't have any good references. I've only got three or four pictures from the game and the rest of the references are cosplay props and no two props are built the same.
Click to expand...
It's coming along well!

I'm going to start something similar maybe a Katana from a game or something?
 
C

CyclopsRock

Member
You're using turbo smooth aren't you? If you flick the iteration count to 0 and put the previous number into the render iteration box, it'll only apply the smoothing at render time.
 
B

B.K.

Member
I don't really like Polycount. I've gone to the site before, but all there people there really come of as assholes, to me.
 
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