What's due on Wednesday's final

For the final, I'll want your fla and swf files for all the animation project's you've done this semester:

1. Abstract/Music animation
2. Characters interacting animation
3. Rotoscope animation
4. Final animation

Remember, for your final animation:

1. It should have a title and credits.
2. You should, on the top layer, have a masking rectangle (preferably black) with a hole cut into it at the exact stage size -- so that if the swf plays on a screen with a different aspect ratio than your animation's aspect ratio, no one will see all the symbols that are "offstage."

During the final, we'll screen your final animations, and I'll also screen an animated feature for your to write an in-final response to, looking at elements we've been talking about in class: shots, images, character design and acting.

End-of-term eval link

Here's a link to the end-of-term evaluation:

https://www.surveymonkey.com/s/Chris_Lanier_DART_215

Animation Final

The animation final will be at:

Wednesday (Dec. 8) 3pm-6pm

Audio resources

The Free Music Archive:
http://freemusicarchive.org/

Opsound:
http://opsound.org/

The Free Sound Project:
http://www.freesound.org/

Wednesday: four sketches and paragraph

Reminder: four developed sketches giving an idea of the style of your final animation are due at the beginning of class on wednesday, along with your paragraph describing your idea.

Due Monday( 11/01): rotoscope project and one-paragraph idea for your final animation

At the beginning of class Monday, your rotoscope animation is due.

You also need to email me a one-paragraph description of your idea for your final animation project. Please also indicate your ideas for the style/technique you will use. You can use any technique (or combination of techniques) you'd like -- rotoscope, jointed armature, etc.

The latitude for what your final animation is about is also very open. I just don't want to see things that are mainly spoofs or ripoffs of something else. It should have a personal dimension to it. That doesn't mean it has to be realistic in any way -- it just has to be your own ideas, images, characters, etc.

If you're stuck for an idea, here are some jumping-off places (some of the past sketchbook assignments could be starting-points):

What's an interesting trip you took?
What's a memorable dream you had?
What's the most embarrassing thing that's happened to you (you have to be brave to pick this one, but your cartoon might get some good laughs)?
What's something (an event, a place, a person) that you were really excited about, but when the event happened (or when you visited the place, or met the person), it wasn't at all what you expected?
Talk about your favorite daydreams.
Talk about your worst fears.
What's a story (funny or serious) that you've told time and time again, because you know it's a good story?
What was the first time you defied one or both of your parents -- or some other authority figure? And what was the consequence?
What's been the greatest achievement of your life so far (it can be rough to go this direction without looking like you're bragging about yourself, but it can be done)?
What's the most difficult decision you've ever had to make?
What was your first pet?
What's something weird you did as a young child, that seemed to make sense to you as a kid, but in retrospect seems pretty bizarre?
What's the thing you hate most about the world?

You can be funny or you can be serious. It could be as serious as dealing with the death of someone close to you, or as goofy as the most successful practical joke you've played on a friend. Just make sure the story is meaningful to you in some way -- meaningful enough that you won't mind spending about a month working on it.

Another option: pick a folk or fairy tale to adapt. That way, you'll have a whole plot laid out for you -- your trick is to invest it with your own sense of style.

Assignment for Monday, Oct. 25

In your sketchbook, I want you to create a short storyboard. As I explained in class, for your final animation project, you'll crate and show a storyboard for feedback in class, so I want to hit you with a few assignments beforehand that will encourage you to think in storyboarding terms.

For this storyboard, you can build on your prior sketchbook assignment (click here for a refresher), taking your "scary" image, and breaking it down in terms of a sequence -- as if you were making a storyboard for a series of shots in an animation or film. You should break down the sequence into a minimum of five shots. Think of how the variety of types of shots (establishing shots, closeups, and so on) and of camera movements (zooms, pans, etc.) will help you to tell the story of the sequence in the most effective way.

If you're not all that interested in expanding upon the "scary" image, you're free to build a storyboard out of some other event that happened to you -- something memorable, it could be something good or bad. Just imagine someone has decided to make a biographical movie about you, and you have to plan out all the camera angles and movements for this particular scene.

We'll take a look at your storyboards at the beginning of Monday's class.