I wanted to update here with some flash animations I did for a new social networking site called MobPower.org.  Currently the site is under construction.  Biance Le Roux and I are working on getting the site finished, and we will be announcing that it will be open to the public soon.

This is an older piece of work, I put it here upon request.  Rated PG

That’s all for now.
-Nick

The Venue (Radical Entertainment)

Above is a picture of the venue, Radical Entertainment.  Beautiful building.

For those who don’t know, Industry Night is for the Digital Animation, Design Essentials, and New Media Design classes.  They all get together one night (at Radical Entertainment for the last few years) to put up a display to show off their work.  The animation students all handed out DVDs of their demo reels, business cards etc.  It’s a way to get yourself out there.  Industry people come and see what talent they can scout out.  However I was disappointed with the ammount of people who came, that actually worked in the industry.  There seemed to be just a lot of parents/friends of the students.

Me, holding my CD case

Above you can see a picture of me holding my CD case.  Biance (Biance Le Roux) helped me design the case, and stamp all 75 of them.  She helped me throughout the whole year, coming up with ideas, criticizing my work, and just making sure that my reel was perfect in the end.  So I just wanted to say thank you for all the help, it would never have beent his awesome without you.

I also want to say thank you, to all of my teachers and classmates for the help over the year, and I hope to see you in the future (perhaps working somewhere).  And thank you to my family, and my Uncle Ron (Ron Zorman) for criticing my work so that when I do go to apply for jobs, I’ll have a great chance to get hired.  I’d also like to thank him for all the links to tutorials that are going to make my animation so much better.

So what now?  I plan on finding a job somewhere (at least related to the industry) as I work on my animation skills.  I feel that the course is more directed to modeling/texturing, which doesn’t make sense to me.  I mean the class is called Digital ANIMATION.  But I understand why they did it the way they did.  They wanted to get us to try everything, 2D animation, 3D modeling, texturing, lighting, rigging, animating, even in a different 3D program (Softimage).  I definately learned a LOT in this past year, but I feel I could have learned more.

That’s just me.  I’m an animator, so the point of view will be a lot different for a modeler.  I’ll be seeking out online tutorials, and just practicing constantly until I have enough GREAT stuff to put into a brand new demo reel.

My Class

Above is my class.  A lot of the people are missing though, they had left right after packing up so we didn’t get a picture.

That’s all for now.  I’ll still be updating regularly, hopefully with some new stuff to show you soon.  It’s been a great year.
Nick Watson
nick@whatsonmedia.ca

Finally it’s finished.

This is my final demo reel from BCIT’s Digital Animation Course.

Characters:
The older character (Vernon) was completely made by me.  The modeling, rigging, and animating.
The photographer is called Blake, and he’s from HighEnd3D.com (Excellent Rig)

Audio:
Main Background Music, Funky Miracle – the Meters
Photoshoot Scene Audio, Austin Powers – The Spy Who Shagged Me
All other audio is self made, or from Garage Band
Audio was composited by Biance Le Roux

Let me know what you think.

Or contact me at :
nick@whatsonmedia.ca

My demo reel is basically done!!  All that is left is going though, tweeking anything that needs tweeking, and rerendering anything that needs rerendering!

I’m very excited to release it.

Let me know what you think of the trailer.

Fortunately being an animator, I don’t have nearly as long render times as some of the environment modelers.  But still, with a shortage of computers there is NOTHING to do while I wait, so I figured I’d make a blog post.

My demo reel is nearly finished now, basically, all I have left is the tweeking.  Then of course… rerendering the frames that need fixing.  The deadline is soon, but I’m sure I’ll make it.

It’s entertaining to watch the people in class scramble around trying to get their stuff rendered, trying to find a computer, and hearing the groans of them when something went wrong and they get to do it all over again.

Here are a few quick completed renders I have done.

All the renders will be put in my artwork section.

That’s it for now, my render is just about done.  Ahh it’s good to be an animator.

This is the walk cycle I made for one of them (I don’t have the full one, but when I do, I’ll post it here)

I think it’s one of my best (if not THE best).  I’m starting to get the hang of it!

This character is “Dee” from HighEnd3D.com, it’s the low res version of it (I’m not a fan of the fingers, which is why they aren’t animated).

Let me know what you think.

So here is a quick little walk cycle for a character I’m using in my reel (Blake, from HighEnd3D.com). I’ll be putting this in the extras section of my demo, along with a few more animations with this rig.  If you aren’t into rigging, then I reccomend this rig, it’s very easy to work with, and there are some great customizable looks.  I made him this hippy photographer for my reel, but there are many more possiblities.

I think it’s one of my better cycles, not a fan of the front view though.

So here I have 3 sequences from my demoreel (one or two are not in because I’m contemplating on whether or not to even do them).

These are just playblasts.  You’ll notice some of the animation (most of it) is incomplete. But I wanted to just upload a quick video to show my progress.
Tell me what you think.

The Vernon character (Fat, bald, one with the blue vest) was made entirely by me, rigging/texturing/modeling.
The Blake character (photographer), is off of Highend 3D, I think it’s an excellent rig, very easy to work with.

In the tutorial, I showed how to render with alpha channels, however because I’m showing how to composite online, I have to use jpegs (which do not allow an alpha channel, targa files won’t display online).

So here is how to composite:

You may use any compositing program for this.  Basically, it’s just a matter of changing the blending modes.  You can use photoshop if you are compositing just a still image.  If you use photoshop you will need to open the channels panel, ctrl + click on the alpha channel for the ball, go to Selection>Inverse Selection and then press delete.  This will delete everything except for your object.

For any other compositing program (I used Combustion), you won’t need to do anything with the alpha channel.

First step:

Import all your images into your compositing program.  Layer them like this:

1st Layer - ballPassSpecular

- file name: ballPassSpecular.tga -blend mode: Add/Linear Dodge (Add)/Screen

2nd Layer - ballPassDiffuse

- file name: ballPassDiffuse.tga -blend mode: Normal

3rd Layer - setPassShadow

- file name: setPassShadows.tga -blend mode: Difference

4th Layer - setPassReflection

- file name: setPassReflection.tga -blend mode: Add/Linear Dodge (Add)/Screen

5th Layer - setPassDiffuseNoShadow

- file name: setPassDiffuse.tga -blend mode: Normal

End Result

You should end with something like the above image.

Keep in mind that there are many different ways that you can create render passes.  This is just a nice, quick, and easy way to do it.

So here it is, finally.  I had it rendered, but I never put it up.  It’s just a simple walk cycle of Vernon.  I was just testing out the movements so that I could fix any problems that I had along the way (so when doing my reel it wouldn’t be as hard).

I put a low res version on youtube, so hopefully the quality isn’t too awful.