PEPMIN THE ELEPHANT: Lets get RIGGING

Right so previously I was in the starting point of texturing. However I thought it would be better and safer time wise to start now and worry about making him pretty later on. so here is the joint layout of him so far.

Just need to get the naming down and sort all the fidgety parts of the rig and freezing parts so that nothing is effected later on when so many hours have been done to it.

Next step is to get the tail and trunk hard rigged but in a way to get a nice 'curl' and 'sway' to both body parts.

it's been a while since I rigged but the memories are flooding back and I think this character is going to do well being animated for his shot on the big screen.

SPECIAL TALK: Business of Masterclass

During our business studies we were introduced to 3 people, each with amazing and well lived backgrounds towards the business world.

our main topic was about your IP about the usual of whats your rights towards something that you own and how to make sure you keep your creative idea without another taking it from you using your weapon of ownership.

There was plenty of discussion with the certain key points about how to start and run a business and how to run a business smoothly whilst sharing ownership of an IP with another. Going deeper into collaborations there was also the case of backup plans incase another partner takes full credit so using  good ideas to keep your own is the basics of always signing your work and perhaps putting it in a safe place or get a lawyer to keep it for a fee.

These points interested me a lot in the guest talk. At some point in my future, I would like to do some collaborations in my spare time with others whilst being in the industry so that I can improve on my own skills and have creative freedom.

After that talk we moved on to Helen Howles from HO HO entertainment who helps with the marketing and merchandise to big up the very popular brands and helps within production. She helped on a series of children s programs and programs for S4C. I was very interested in knowing the ins and outs Helen had to go through for other brands even from outside Europe such as Pokemon, Yu-Gi-Oh! and 4Kids. She even helped towards the video game industry such as 'Little Big Planet'

Listening to this overall talk I was pretty excited about starting a business or even an animation series for a number of reasons and now more positive reasons are added to the list of reasons to start. I do like the idea of working in a company but I also love the thought of starting something that no-one else has done yet and hopefully in the future things happen.

THE CAT CHASE ANIMATION PROGRESS 2: polishing the works

The semi-final update to 'The Cat Chase' project. Theres been a lot of fixing errors with the mesh of the cat since the poly is short numbered. But all in all it's pulled through and the characters are doing just fine.

Heres the Semi-Finals to the animation, just need the final feed back from my director and fingers crossed it's all ok.

Cat Animation: Run cycle

This is the cat animation, I have added facial movements to the cat so it has a similar animation style  such as the toon squash and stretch but since the cats face is much closer I too more attention to the movement in the cats face. Thanks to our helpful rigger and big supporter he was able to rig  the front paws and enlarge them so a nicer perspective can be noticed in the camera angle.

Policeman Animation: Run Cycle

Heres the policeman's animation. His character was a challenge to begin with but now I think he is one of my favorites so far. I love the squash and stretch and the hat really works well with character bouncing up and down. My only concern mainly was him holding the baton, it seems to be rigid and wiggle in the air.

Cat climbing the building scene

This scene has been through the works with changing the timing positioning and other option to make the cat seem more frantic. I have even given myself the task of adding the smaller things to make the animation more pleasant to look at for when I capture this at a closer distance in my own time.