Uncanny Valley

The “uncanny valley” is a concept proposed by robotics professor Masahiro Mori at Tokyo Institute of Technology. He realized that the public had unpleasant perceptions of robots when they are too similar to humans. He paid special attention to this idea, since he suggested “uncanny valley” effect is a difficulty that has to be solved. At present, “uncanny valley” phenomenon has gained attention from the science community, thanks to new developments of robotics and computer graphic animation(Geller, 2008).

The “uncanny valley” is an effect of unpleasant feeling that the public can feel when they are in front of an object that is very similar to a human being, and behaves as one. The entertainment industry invests efforts and money to polish computer graphic technology. Thus, be able to use these resources within entertainment productions. As a result the use of especial effects for movies have brought benefits the film industry. There were film studios and large producers that did not considered the “uncanny valley” effect at moment to create a character movie and this represented a disaster on box office, nevertheless have been some success cases (Chaminade, Hodgins and Kawato, 2007). 

For instance, Matt Aitken was supervisor for Lord of the Ring movie (2001-2003) which the character “Golum” needed to be with help by computer graphic technology to recreate it of best way. Also, the most difficult was that he had to interact with real actors, therefore he should be as real as possible. Matt Aitken and his team used cam-caption technology that it works recording an actor in different angles. Then pass the information obtained to a software and represent the motion completely loyal to the realty. Thanks to render computer technology, the quality of the image was successful and the computer graphics and real life combination, almost was not perceived by the public (Geller, 2008).

However, Aitken knew that the “uncanny valley” could affect to “Golum”. This is the reason why, Aitken decided to change the proportions. Thus, that his hands and feet are unusually big, movements are tough and the most characteristic of “Golum” are his big and expressive eyes.

This was a successful example of film industry, whereas the fantasy movie “Beowulf” that used the same cam-caption and was directed to the same audience. Although that had important actors such as Angelina Jolie and Anthony Hopkins, it had commercial difficulties and it was a box office disaster. Geller from the article Overcoming the uncanny valley said the characters motions seem without life and they did not have expression in their eyes (Hodgins et al, 2010).

To conclude, the “uncanny valley” effect is a when people reject the appearance of a robot that looks similar to a human being. It is important to understand the effect and establish critical points to prevent that a design falls into the “uncanny valley”. Understanding this phenomenon help at time when a character to a computer graphic production is designed (Jentsch,1997). 

References:

Chaminade, T., Hodgins, J., & Kawato, M. (2007). Anthropomorphism influences perception of computer-animated characters’ actions. Social Cognitive and Affective Neuroscience.   2(3), 206-216. 

Geller, T. (2008). Overcoming the uncanny valley. IEEE Computer Graphics and Applications, 28(4), 11-17.

Hodgins, J., Jörg, S., O'Sullivan, C., Park, S. I., & Mahler, M. (2010). The saliency of anomalies in animated human characters. ACM Transactions on Applied Perception (TAP), 7(4), 22.

Jentsch, E. (1997). On the psychology of the uncanny (1906) 1. Angelaki: Journal of the Theoretical Humanities, 2(1), 7-16.

Quadruped Animation

Animating a quadruped is usually a challenge for an animator, due as humans we have an intuitive knowledge of bipeds moves; in the other side multi-legged animals tends to be complicated and technically demanding. Some of the techniques recommend  for starting this task according to Rocket 5 Studios is to do first a good research of the movements fo the animal frame by frame, a good page for this is Rhino House (http://www.rhinohouse.com/), simultaneously you take notes and make drawings, finally the process of animation starts (Feraday, 2012). 

Quadrupeds normally follows the same patterns of movement: dog, cats, horses, rhinoceroses,deers, etc., differing in the flexibility of the spine. The exceptions according to Eadweard Muybridge -Author of Animal Locomotion- are elephants, and animals like kangaroos. The pattern of movement is based in how hooves or paws strike the ground. Above its shown the footfall patterns according to the kind of movement proposed by Muybridge and addapted by Rocket 5 Studios (Feraday, 2012). 

Following this principles, I developed my own quadruped animation of a deer. However It's not still perfect, it helped me to undestand the basic concepts and improve in my future quadruped animations. In the first part I made the3D modelling in Z-brush, then the topology was made in Topogun, after in Maya I made the rigging and the animation itself.

References: 

Feraday, C. (2012). Approaches to Animating Quadrupeds: The walk Cycles. Rocket 5 Studios [Online] Available http://www.rocket5studios.com/tutorials/approaches-to-animating-quadrupeds-the-walk-cycles/ [Accessed:15 Decemeber 2014]

Topology principles for animation

Topology refers to the geometric surface characteristics of a 3D object, and its made to prepare an object to be animated. A clean or good topology is usually illustrated by modelers how a 3D mesh with efficient polygon distribution, proper placement of polygonal edge-loops. One of the purposes of a good topology is to minimize stretching and distorsion of the object at the moment of being animated (Slick,J ,no date) 

Bellow the topology made for one of the projects of the course.Trying to follow the principles for a good topology for animation.

The principles for a topology for animation includes (Ruramuq ,2014):

1. Relativity: The flow of the edges is relative to it's motion, it means the spaces between vertexes could increse or decrease according to the geometry course.

2. Contour-Proximity: The edges geometry near contours, curves and in general borders  must follow the shape and the relativity principle. 

3. Continuity: The end and the beginning of borders should connect and fit properly in a logical sense.

4. Singularities: Regular vertices are normally connected trough 4 edges, irregular vertices have 3 to 5 conncetions forming triangles and stars. This should be avoided and is recommended to use instead subdivitions. 

5. Flow-motion: Is specially important in animation and means that all the edges should flow in the same direction.

References:

Slick,J . (no date) Topology. AboutTech [Online] Available http://3d.about.com/od/Glossary-T/g/Topology.htm [Accessed:15 December 2014]

Ruramuq (2014). Topology principles for animation. Ruramuq Blog [Online] Available http://ruramuq.blogspot.co.uk/2009/02/topology-principles-for-animation.html  [Accessed:15 December 2014]

Lighting Workshop

Lights are an important part in every composition, through lighting an animation is staged as an important principle to begin, it includes creating a background and setting up a scene. In the other hand lights can also be used to communicate as part of the story (Kerlow, Isaac, and Kerlow, 2000).  Bellow you can see a lighting workshop made by myself, as an example of the use of lights as a thread in the narrative of the story.

This short animation shows how a character jumps from a plane at a first stage a bed and it's next to a window, each time it goes up and down you can see how the lights in this case the sun coming from the window, goes dark and bright depending on character's movement. Finally the window plane results to be  a film stage wall and falls down crushing him. 

References:

Kerlow, Isaac, V, and  Kerlow, V. (2000) The art of 3-D computer animation and imaging. John Wiley & Sons, 

Facial Expressions and Animators

Facial animation is the process of turning a characterʼs

speech and emotional state into facial poses and motion. However, animating human and characters faces still presents interesting challenges because of its familiarity as the face is the part used to recognize individuals and personality. Its importance is based in that faces have their own language where each expression is not only related to emotions, anger, hapiness, sadness, etc. but is also linked to other aspects like voice and content (Ping, Abdullah,Sulaiman, and Halin,2013). 

Capture emotions in facial expressions have always been an issue of concern for animators, includings talented illustrators of Disney and Warner Bros. Bellow is shown some pictures from 1950s legendary professionals looking themselves into the mirror to help drawing the facial expressions needed in the animation(Dovas, 2014). 

References: 

Dovas (2014). Disney Animators Study their reflections in the mirror to draw their characters right. Bored Panda [Online] Available http://www.boredpanda.com/mirror-facial-expression-disney-animator/. [Accessed:5 October 2014]

Ping, H. Abdullah,L. Sulaiman,P. and Halin, A. (2013). Computer Facial Animation: A Review. International Journal of Computer Theory and Engineering, Vol. 5, No. 4.

The making of " The Incredibles" Documental

This documental, Making of The incredibles Directed by Rick Butler, shows how Brad Bird director of " The Incredibles" revolutionized the way pixar was doing its movies. In 2000 Pixar was in a comfort situation and there was the rumor that they always did the same. Therefore, John Lasseter - creative chief Director at Pixar- called to Brad to bring new air to the studio. Bird did not arrived alone to Pixar Studios, he brought with him the best animators that worked for Disney. At the beginning this was a problem because they were 2D animators (Miller,no date). 

However, the team worked together to create another Pixar´s successful film. Brad Bird said that the ego is not important, all the opinions were listened and valued, the most important is the movie he argued. Thats why this politic was used as the core of Pixar: every person in the company proposed something to improve the project. Finally they achieved  The Incredibles film winner of 2004 Annie Award for the best animated feature, along with two 2004 academy awards, including best animated feature and best sound editing (Wikia, no date).

References:

Miller, J. (no date) Making the Incredibles. How Stuff Works [Online] Available http://entertainment.howstuffworks.com/incredibles.htm [accessed: 15 November 2014]

Wikia (no date). The incredibles [Online] Available http://disney.wikia.com/wiki/The_Incredibles [accessed: 15 November 2014]

Making of The incredibles (2005). Documental. Directed by Rick Butler. USA

Memory of a turtle Workshop

According to the Oxford dictionary a Memory is: "The faculty by which the mind stores and remembers information". The present workshop is based in a memory of one of the most longest-living creatures: the turtles. Sea turtles lay their eggs on dry, sandy beaches. New born sea turtles are not cared for by the adults, making the process of survival difficult in their way from the beach to the sea.

The animation of the present workshop starts with the born of a turtle in a clean, beautiful beach. Many years later when the turtle comes back to put her eggs in the same beach she was borned; she finds a very different beach from the one she had in her memories. 

The result of the exercise is a 3d modeled scene of the animation, which shows the moment in which the principal character, the turtle, comes back to her home beach and finds it contamined with chemical waste. The model basic form was made in z spheres and then it was detailed and finished in Z-brush.

Fantastic animation of Evan Viera that inspired my work  (2013)

12 Principles of Animation

The 12 basic animations principles were introduced by Disney Animators Ollie Johnston and Frank Thomas in their 1981 book The Illusion of Life: Disney Animation. Based in the work of Disney from the 1930s onwards, the principles make an effort of producing more realistic animations; its main purpose is to produce and create the illusion of physical laws into characters. Following a recount of the principles (Vanhemert, 2014)

1. Timing and Spacing: The illusion of moving in object animation is created through Timing and spacing following the laws of physics. Timing refers to the number of frames in-between two poses. The spacing refers to how those individual frames are placed (hallucinationrain, 2014).

2. Squash and Stretch: The purpose of this principle is to give sense of weight and flexibility to drawn objects. It can be easily apply in a bouncing ball but also for more complex objects as human face musculature. The example shows how A is a ball bouncing with a rigid, non-dynamic movement. In example B the ball is "squashed" at impact, and "stretched" during fall and rebound(Ratner, 2013). 

3. Anticipation: This principle is used to prepare the audience for an action which is about to happen,it gives to the movement a belivable feeling. A common example is a beisball player throwing the ball, bending his knees and preparing all the body to the pitch (EVL, no date). 

4. Ease-In and Ease-Out: All objects or persons which moves, comes to a stop. Therefore it needs to be a time for acceleration and deceleration. Without ease in and ease out or slow in slow out, movements become very unnatural and robotic (EVL, no date).

5. Follow Through and Overlapping Action: Follow through is the idea that individual body parts will continue moving after the character has come to a stop. Overlapping action means that different parts of the body will move at different times. For example, in the first case when a character stop walking the body part don´t stop inmediately the arms may continue forward, in the same way in the second case if a character raises their arm up to wave, the shoulder will move first, and then the arm, etc.(EVL, no date)

6. Arcs: Real-life objects normally moves in some type of arcing motion, and in animation following this ensure the animation is smooth and moves in a realistic way. An exception of it is mechanical movement which follows a straight line form (EVL, no date).

7. Exaggeration: it is used to push movements further to add more appeal to an action. is normally used in cartoons,and incorporated more restrictively in realistic actions. Whether is the case it should be employ in an animation(hallucinationrain, 2014). 

8. Solid Drawing: It means taking into account forms in three-dimensional space, like volume and weight,thinking about the balance and anatomy in a pose. Despite now animators not only relied in their drawings is important to have the drawing skill and undestand the basics concepts of it(EVL, no date).

9. Appeal: In character design it correspond to create thinking to connect with viewers feelings, making it interesting for the audience(Vanhemert, 2014).

10. Straight Ahead Action and Pose to Pose: Straight ahead means creating each pose in a linear approach, one animation after another. Pose to Pose is more methodical and recalls to create and action from the key poses(Ratner, 2013).

11. Secondary Action: Secondary actions gives a scene of life, and can help to support the main action. An example is a person walking -primary action- who can simultaneously swing his arms as a secondary action (Ratner, 2013). 

12. Staging: It refers to the background and foreground prepared for placing the characters, lights, space, camera angle, etc.(Ratner, 2013). 

Based in Principles of Animation, I  did some examples of them in the folowing exercises:

References:

Ratner, P. (2013). 3-D human modeling and animation. 3rt edition. Wiley: John Wiley & Son.

hallucinationrain (2014). Principles of animation- exaggeration & timing [Online]. Available https://hallucinationrain.wordpress.com/2014/03/06/principles-of-animation-exaggeration-timing/. [Accessed:08^th November 2014]

EVL (no date). Follow Through and Overlapping Action. Electronic visualization Laboratory, EVL [Online]. Available https://www.evl.uic.edu/ralph/508S99/contents.html [Accessed:08^th November 2014] 

Vanhemert, K. (2014) Disney's 12 principles of Animation. Wired [Online] Available http://www.wired.com/2014/05/12-principles-of-animation/ [Accessed:08^th November 2014] 

Red Chase Blue

Red chase Blue is a short animation which started from a creative exercise of red and blue colors. The animation is based in a black novel aesthetic, in which detectives and murderers are chasing each other. The principal character is a caucasian strong features man which starts the animation firing a gun in an act of murder, the background of the scene is a dark alley ambiented with red flashing neon lights, connoting an urban underground sphere. Afterward the Blue lights enters in the scene with the sound of a police siren connoting a police car chasing the crime. Finally, the man escapes from the alley before the police arrives. 

The animation was made by photographies composition joint with hand-drawed vector illustrations. In a first moment the photographies were export in different layers to generate deph, the colors were modified to create a dark aesthetic but at the same time it used hight saturation to highlight the intensity of it. Blur effect was used to make the planes were farther than others. The character and elements were hand-drawed in vectors in Illustrator and then passed into Affter effects to be animated and finally joint with hte photographies composition.

Skeleton Character Redesign from Jason and the Argonauts Film

The Redesign of Skeleton character inspirated in Jason and the Argonauts film of 1963 tries to explore a Sci Fi style.

It  maintains the iconic shield but with a more minimalistic aesthetic. The redesifn Skeleton is wearing an ancient armor which combines soft textures of clothes with hard elements like tubes connoting sicentific testing and advances. The new character is provided with lights in the clothes and coming from his hand dennoting some mystics but at the same time sci fi power.

In the original movie Jason and the Argonauts the Skeleton Character plays an important role, taking place in an iconic fight in which Jason the principal character - a mythical greek hero- have to fight with an army of seven skeletons to get the golden fleece, the emblematic scene was produced using stop motion technique and took three monts to film (MailOnline, nodate). In the original design the shield are adorned with Harryhausen's creatures- associate producer and stop motion expert of the movie-, including an Octopus and the head of Ymir from 20 Million Miles to Earth(Clark, 2013).

References:

MailOnline (no date). Famous sword fighting skeletons scene from Janson and the Argonauts [Online]. Available http://www.dailymail.co.uk/video/news/video-1007489/Famous-sword-fighting-skeletons-scene-Jason-Argonauts.html. [Accesed: 20 November 2014]

Clark, N. (2013). Ray Harryhausen, the visual effects master famed fro skeleton battle in Jason and the Argonauts, dies aged 92. The Independent [Online]. Available http://www.independent.co.uk/arts-entertainment/films/news/ray-harryhausen-the-visual-effects-master-famed-for-skeleton-battle-in-jason-and-the-argonauts-dies-aged-92-8606777.html [Accesed: 20 November 2014]

Sony Pictures and Blue sky remake Popeye and Peanuts to 3D life

Surprising Popeye and Peanutes remakes  are going to be launched in 2016 and 2015 respectively by Sony Pictures and Blue Sky studios creating huge expectations in fans of these classic histories. Despite Animation Studios could make totally new franchise films like Pixar and Dreamworks have done in the past with Toy Story and Monsters Inc. Another Studios like Sony Pictures and Blue Sky prefer the safe road and remake classics recalling to an already existing audience.

Starting at November of 2015, Blue Sky studios- 20th century Fox's division- is expecting to go big with its Peanuts Movie. Featuring the classics characters Charlie Brown, Snoopy, Linus, Peppermint Patty and the rest of the Peanuts gang. The official trailer show us to Snoopy and his friends in the background of christmas season in a new story in which dreaming big is the thread through exciting adventures in famous venues like Paris (Wikia, no date). The production all made by 3D CGI animation, reveals an interesting aesthetic which mixes the traditional 2D drawings of Peanuts an its characteristic style including the particular eyes and facial expressions with 3D aesthetic, edgy perspectives and volume only possible by this technology (Kosur,2014).

In the other Hand Sony Pictures Animation is going to start 2016 with Popeye, since the first appearing of the Sailorman Popeye in 1929, the iconic character have had its own comic, cartoon and movie in 1980; this time Sony Pictures with the help of Genndy Tartakovsky the director, pretends to present a new 3D Animation image of the Iconic character but not loosing its traditional focus shown in the trailer with its classic physical humor, slaps, punchs and Olive screaming once again for Popeye's help is only a few details of the escence that Tartakovsky wants to mantaine (Moran, no date).  

References:

Kosur,J. (2014). Peanuts movie trailer debuts, Charlie Brown and Snoopy go 3D.Business2community [Online].Available http://www.business2community.com
/entertainment/peanuts-movie- railer-debuts-charlie-brown-and-snoopy-go-3d-01071678 [Accessed 30 October 2014]

Wikia (no date). The Peanutes Movie [Online]. Available http://peanuts.wikia.com/wiki/The_Peanuts_Movie. [Accessed 30 October 2014]

Moran, S (no date). Sony Reveals CG Animted "Popeye" Movie Test Footage. ScreenRant [Online]. Available http://screenrant.com/popeye-cg-animated-movie-preview-video/ [Accessed 30 October 2014]