Animation-Evaluation

My initial idea when I first got the brief was to produce a simple but effective piece of animation that communicated emotions clearly with good anticipation and weighting. I wanted to produce something that was visually appealing as well as being produced using good technique.

At the start we learnt many different animation techniques and I became interested in the production of animation using Maya as I had never used the program before. I began to play around with the technique of making someone walk as I had created storyboards of characters that resembled people walking around interacting with each other. This turned out to be much harder than I anticipated and after struggling for a while I decided that I needed to move on from this idea. I began making storyboards of simple character forms and I eventually came up with the idea of two chess pieces, a King and a Bishop, interacting with each other in what seem to be a fight between the last two remaining chess pieces. I soon came up with my final storyboard and began work on the animation, once I had created the characters, which were to the standard that I had wanted. I began well but started struggling with the key framing of the animation so decided to do one of the tutorials and soon my animation was coming together. As my skills improved I wasn’t happy with the movements of the pieces and I began to look for ideas of different ways they could move around the board. After doing another tutorial the idea that I came up with took shape and my final animation was complete. I think the technique I used portrayed better emotion, weighting and anticipation.

If I were to do it again I would make the scene a bit more interesting as the movements get a bit repetitive and your focus is lost during the end of the animation. I would also have move interaction between the two pieces maybe even some interaction between them and the board.

Overall I’m very happy with my final outcome as it turned out how I originally had thought. 

I think overall I responded to the brief in the way that I intended so I am pleased with the final animation. I have learnt a lot of different techniques during this brief, which I hope will transfer into different areas.