Happy Feet Motion Edit Reel

Almost 6 months of Happy Feet 2's release, I rented the DVD last weekend. I couldn't believe how good the movie looks!

I still remember the smell of coffee and croissant in the mornings and all great people that I have met at Doctor D. Studios.

I got that opportunity to put together my motion editor reel with my shots from the movie. As motion editor you are responsible to smooth the movements and add animation layers on top of the motion capture data, giving more appealing shapes (usually for the flippers) and believable performance for the characters.

Also, sometimes we had to create keys and pose the characters when they did not capture the movements or when the director had changed his mind about the captured performance always matching that "hand key" section to the motion capture data.

These shots were much more fun to work as we had to animate the characters in a believable way.

One good example of that is the shot that I have been working where Gloria hugs Erik, on the last sequence of the movie. 

Hope you like it,

Dan

3D Generalist Reel

Finally my 2012's 3D Generalist reel is ready!
It is a collection of my work on the past 2 years working in Sydney as 3D Generalist.
I used Autodesk Maya (version 2010/2011) as a 3D software and After Effects for all the compositions.

In all shots I was responsible for the 2D concepts, 3D modeling, shaders, textures, rendering and compositions.

"Above the clouds" - music performed by Slightly Stoopid

Hope you like it :)
Dan

3D Generalist Reel 2012 from Dancellos on Vimeo.

Happy Feet 2 - 2 TV's Spots

There are 2 new Tv's spots of Happy Feet 2 online.
Most of the new characters are introduced in these Tv spots, including the krills and Sven.

I also would like to congratulate everyone that has been working on it, the movie is coming along really well!


Hope you like it,
Dan

Happy Feet 2 Trailer

Finally, the Happy Feet 2 trailer was released last week!
Some of my friends here at Dr D. worked on the trailer shots and I think that the trailer is looking great.

The trailer is going to be showed before Kung Fu Panda 2' sessions and is introducing the new characters of the sequel.

It had been almost 6 years that the first one was released and won an Oscar for the best animated movie over Pixar's Cars.

Enjoy,

Walks of life

Before starting at Dr D Studios I was studying some personality walk cycles. The body mechanics of a walk cycle can be hard to animate. There are different forces and actions happening in the same time.
It is an "organized" fall, as we move forward our hips and will catch our body (before it falls) with the front leg, trusting the body weight on that leg, then moving the hips forward again, falling then catching with the other leg.
We are under the influence of the same Physic Laws where the Gravity is the most important one. A walk is a "fight" against the gravity, and this happens pretty much with all actions and movements of the live beings here on Earth.
However the animation principles can be applied to all characters, the timing and the way that one character walks is unique, just because our bodies and lives are not the same. Everyone walks. Everyone in a different way!
When I was studying acting, the first approach to understand a character was studying and exercising a way to express that character walking.
Considering the character's design, I came up with this 3 personalities walks using the Animationmentor's characters.

Hope that you like it,
Dan

Walks of life from Dancellos on Vimeo.

Richard Willians: "The Animator's survival Kit"
Eric Goldberg: "Character Animation Crash Course"

Plump to Penguins

A bit of time since my last post, but I couldn't let to share that I have changed jobs and I am not longer working at Plump Films but at Doctor D Studios.

Firstly, I would like to express my gratitude to all professionals that I have been working at Plump Films for almost three years. It was great having such nice and talented people giving their best to the challenging projects that we have gone trough and I am proud of the work that we have done together.

A couple of weeks ago I joined the Motion Edit Team at Dr D Studios in the Happy Feet 2's project, and is great being part of the project so far. We are working with some cool animation tools giving life to the penguins of the movie!
There are a couple of Animation mentor's students in our department and is great being surrounded by people that love animation as much as me!

I will be a bit busy in the next few months, but will try my best to keep uploading my stuff in the blog,

Cheers!
Dan


Links:
www.plumpfilms.com.au
www.drdstudios.com.au

Stuck Door

Hi there!

I've worked in this animation test in the Animation Mentor Body Mechanics's class over than 2 years ago, and decided myself adding a new animation polishing pass.
I spent most of the time fixing imperfections, mostly in the head/hands/elbows/knees ARCS, focusing on the character's body mechanics animation, especially in the section where the character is standing up from the fall, giving a more believable performance to the shot.
I added a new TIMING layer to this shot as well, where I worked with different "beats" of the body flow.

I created the character's clothes, and was responsible for the shot's concept and modeling.
Sidney Vigo was responsible for all the textures, lights, rendering and the final composition of the shot.


Hope that you like it,
Dan

Stuck Door from Dancellos on Vimeo.