My Website/Portfolio

The website I made at the end of my 1st year at college doesn't look good at all.

At the time it was a good exercise, and the 1st year of college was a lot more about covering the full spectrum of disciplines withing the digital design sector. The site basically encapsulates the 1st year course, with lots of different projects, which were all covered in a an introductory way.

The look of the site and all the work shown is miles away from I'd like it to be, and not anywhere near where it should be to get work, so the plan for my year 2 site will be different; I plan to design a single good looking page, which will house 2 or 3 QuickTime videos (if they are good enough) and/or a showreel. I may also have a few stills or storyboard images. I will try to design a new identity and base the page around that. This one spells amateur!

We won't be briefed to address the site again until nearly Easter time, so that gives me an extra reason to focus on the portfolio. My work for year 2 so far shows some promise, but I still need to work through my observer brief production, and I want to improve the look of the some of the design before I complete the After Effects production.

I see all this as positive and yet another reason to work really hard on my work.

Observer - Motion Test

Observer Motion Test from Kupon on Vimeo.

Much time has been spent this week learning enough After effects stuff to be able to proceed with my Observer brief as previously planned on paper. I have spent weeks planning, doing paperwork, drawing storyboards, designing, cutting animatics, and now it is time to move forward with production.

I have been working pretty obsessively on this, but get the feeling I will need loads more experience before I am good enough to get a decent job, but I know I am moving in the right direction. I think I know what to do now in after effects using the 3d space. This test has the right techniques used, but it currently doesn't look good yet or move in the right way, but I know that I can proceed from this point.

It would have been helpful to have a good knowledge of film language now. It would be helpful to have an idea of shots in mind. My background in music making is proving very useful, but it seems to be good at motion graphics you need to also have numerous other skills. I have realised it would help to know about:

Photography
Drawing
editing
Film Language
Animation
Design

I will have to study films and adverts and start breaking them down, getting anal(ytical) about them.


On a positive note, I have completely got the motion design bug now. I think I have found my calling, and find After Effects great fun. I think I love it, and will find a way to make it pay.

Extended Techniques - Typography 2

Charmer Typo Vid 21/12/07 from Kupon on Vimeo.

I have done another couple of 8 hour days on this, and now I have a whole 17 seconds to show for my troubles!

I am learning loads of things, as I have to work out After Effects and practical motion design as I go along. I have learned lots of basic things such as:

Basic transform and animation
Easing in and Out & the grid editor
Setting up compositions and designing in Photoshop and Illustrator for AE
some of the AE interface and a few shortcuts
audio synchronisation

I have barely touched:

Effects
Multi-layered comps
Video layers
Masks
3d
and loads more

Much of my time has been spent watching tutorials and I do have an idea of what the program does, but it will just take time to get to grips with it. Mistakes will need to get made, and an amount of trial and error business needs to happen.

I am hoping to get good enough so as not to be embarrassing before I start my work placement at BDA on the 11th Feb 2008. This is about 7 weeks away, so I feel I have to speed up and learn more ASAP.

Observer Animatic

Observer shorter animatic re-cut from Kupon on Vimeo.


Observer Animatic - Dark & Light Backgrounds from Kupon on Vimeo.

I am still rather new to this motion graphics business, and much of this last term has been spent working out how to get projects up and running; thinking, designing, paperwork, storybaords, general plotting and watching loads tutorials every day from Lynda.com (which I highly recommended btw). There's so much to it, methods to get the projects moving that I don't yet know. I have found myself getting stuck, but then just try some other angle to proceed.

The nature of moving image design involves design, sound, 3d space, cinematic thinking and animation, and I have found it odd to think about all these issues at the same time. One positive way forward was to rough out animatics to get the flow working better and the sound in place. I have read many times that women have evolved to multi-talk, and men haven't. I know I can only do one thing at a time, and it is vital to be able to find methods to work through these projects with the bigger picture in mind, but only addressing one thing at a time.

This piece uses a section of a record by Junior Boys, called "In The Morning (Hot Chip Remix)" - which has been subtlety re-edited with a few over-dubs and effects to emphasisise the theme (the head opens up and shuts) ands a line of spoken copy (by Penny Smith). The version of the music here is roughly mixed and could be slicker, but It works well enough for now.

Charmer Type Video - 1st animated part

Charmer 1st section from Kupon on Vimeo.

It has taken ages to even get this done - this is largely as I am working out what to do, and getting stuck into After Effects. I hope to complete the whole track over the next few months - as this is a good way to get stuck in and experiment.

Photo Blog by Plingrafias from Brazil

My Mate Matt has pointed out this fantastic Photo blog from some guy in Brazil. Plingrafias' blog gathers together great photos on a monthly basis. Lots of inspiration can had here, as well as lots of amazing colour palettes.

Feeling Good Type Movie

SVA student Tamara Gildengers Connolly used type characters to create this music video for Nina Simone singing “Feeling Good.” Using type in this manner seems to be a fairly typical assignment in motion graphics and design classes, but the results manage to impress in this piece.