Knights of the Light Table

Knights of the Light Table is an animation studio who is most well known for their music videos that they animate for the different bands that exist on Youtube. Not much is known about them because they don't have an official website, but they have plenty of posts from other websites dating back to 2014, so they have been around at least for that long. Their animations are clean and nice to look at, and with their most recent work, they have really outdone themselves.

This is their most recent work:

How It Should Have Ended (HISHE)

How It Should Have Ended (HISHE) started when animators Daniel Baxter and Tommy Watson started talking about different endings to movies they watched and also talked about different ways a movie could have solved the issue at hand if they would have done one thing. In 2005, they launched there first video "How The Matrix Revolutions Should Have Ended"  and soon after in 2007 they would launched there website HISHEdotcom due to the success of there animated videos. They also joined up with Starz Digital Media to help with rights to videos they create and in 2010 they were awarded Best Animated Web Series at Streamy Awards. As of 2018, HISHE has 8.5 Million subscribers on Youtube, 200,000 likes on Facebook and 19,000 followers on Instagram and still growing.

How The Matrix Revolutions Should Have Ended

Terminator - How It Should End

How Frozen Should Have Ended

How Avengers Infinity War Should Have Ended - Animated Parody

At Home with Mrs. Hen

A bonus blog to share because:

The chicken pants
They way they walk
The way they flap their wings to express themselves.
I can totally relate to Mrs. Hen
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LBibWZOBclE

Example Flash Site

Found this website this morning and thought I'd share.
It's an information site for a video game themed restaurant in Tokyo.

It's called the 8bit Cafe, if you'd like to look it up yourself.

http://8bitcafe.net/index.html

Animation smears - Squash and Stretch

REACTING to ANIMATION SMEARS - These are SO WEIRD!!

at 2:00 skip to 2:52

This is video is from a Youtuber that specializes in art and creation. This video, he shows different animation smears from various cartoons and studio. Animation smears are also referred to as the Squash and Stretch Rule. Through that process, you can see how animation change throughout time. I enjoy this video because it shows you the different styles of smears you can use and how detail crafting an animation can be.

Blizzard Animated Short - Dragons

About Blizzard Entertainment:

Blizzard Entertainment is a game company based in Irvine, California. Blizzard released Warcraft: Orcs & Humans. Blizzard created several other video games, including Warcraft sequels, the Diablo series, the StarCraft series, and in 2004 the massively multiplayer online role-playing game World of Warcraft. Their most recent projects include the first expansion for Diablo III, Reaper of Souls, the online collectible card game Hearthstone, the seventh expansion for World of Warcraft, Battle for Azeroth, the multiplayer online battle arena Heroes of the Storm, the third and final expansion for StarCraft II: Wings of Liberty, Legacy of the Void, and the multiplayer first-person hero shooter Overwatch.

Animated Short - Dragons

https://youtu.be/oJ09xdxzIJQ

Storyboards and Animatics

By Celeste Arguello

Storyboards are an integral part in any visual storytelling. It allows you to understand what shots you need, from what angles, and how you want them to move. Artists may take a script and translate it into a storyboard or skip directly from an idea to the visuals. Dreamworks offers a few tips from their style guide to help creators make dynamic shots and help understand where your key images are in space and in relation to others.

https://www.premiumbeat.com/blog/10-tips-for-creating-storyboards-from-dreamworks/

Animatics take storyboards a step further by setting these shots to motion. A rough animated sketch could really help the members of the production understand exactly how shots flow into each other or help express difficult movements that would be confusing on paper alone.

Animatics have grown popular in fan communities specifically, taking characters from established media and telling stories through music from either the same or alternate sources. It’s a good way for fans to share their ideas without having to spend the production costs for a fully rendered scene.

https://omegafrisk.tumblr.com/post/180965435875/song-x-i-still-cant-believe-i-finished-this

Here for example, they used basic shapes for both the characters and their surroundings, and only included the essential parts of the background, as drawing too many details may become confusing in this sketch style. There are a few shots that keep appearing with slight differences to better show the change happening in between. The fight cuts much quicker between shots, showing more varied angles, depth, and closeups compared to earlier in the scene. It makes use of some of the tips listed above too, using over the shoulder looks, items at different levels in view, cutting on relevant lyrics or action, and making full use of the area by allowing Seam the cat to travel through the depth of the scene on multiple occasions. They keep faces off centered and looking to one side of the camera, or in one particular case, looking at the camera as Jevil, the smaller creature, crouches threateningly.

From the get go, you can tell their cuts are motivated by the music and they fit very well, as especially seen when the song gets more intense and the visuals must step up to keep pace. The main character, Frisk, travels from the right side of the screen to the left, showing them reverting to a dangerous and hurtful path away from what is right. Arrows help clarify the motion throughout. At one point they included a grid to clarify the distance Frisk stands in an over the shoulder shot. As a primarily black and white animatic, they make use of shading and spots of color to portray meaning or draw attention to key elements. The shot where Frisk screams up to the heavens is probably my favorite because the music is building up to this and you can feel it with the dark tendrils wrapping about both them and Chara in the background, and this shot just shows so wonderfully that breaking away. You can tell this is a turning point and the low angle makes the movement even more grand.

Lost and Found (Twice!)

Wabi Sabi Studios gives us a very heart-wrenching stop motion animation short "Lost and Found" featuring two knitted animals. The 7-1/2 minutes of cuteness overload is delivered with a strong storyline. The animation uses all kind of camera angles and panning and zooming and spinning to upside-down shots and everything you can think of. 

   

The effort is backed by Screen Australia, a government agency that supports Australian film work. 

Wabi Sabi Studios is made up of a fair-sized cast of creators, led by;

Animation by Samuel Lewis

Written by Bradley Slabe

Directed by Andrew Goldsmith and Bradley Slabe

Production designer Rennie Watson

The credits fail to tell us who knitted the animals.

This story is a twist on the classic hero tale where the hero, (a knitted dinosaur) must sacrifice himself by unraveling to save his knitted love, the toy fox. The little fox tries to thwart his attempt and the tragic events that unfold are underscored by the dramatic background music. Event sounds are well cued to help create a believable world and actions.

I found this film on a YouTube channel called Short of the Week, a great place to find some wonderful animation and other film work.

Not to be confused with, but worth checking out, is another animated film with the same title:

This "Lost and Found" features a boy trying to help a lost penguin find home. It is based on a children’s book by Oliver Jeffers.

Very interesting to see the development between the book and the film! A typical length picture book (32 pages) is, in this instance translated to a 25 minute film. The lovely, but fairly simple drawings from the book are translated into richly detailed 3-D work. Amazing! 

How a Stop-Motion Animation is Planned & Worked Out

The previous blog I posted explained about the process of filming a claymation. This one is more of an explanation of how a stop-motion movie is worked out during the process of filming.

In this video, Daniel Alderson, a stop motion animator, explains the process of working on creating a stop-motion animation movie. In the video, a stop-motion animator explained is like a transition from the characters to real life to tell the story (Example of movies like Fantastic Mr. Fox, ParaNorman, The Box Trolls, and even Kubo and the Two Strings, which is shown). They have a schedule put together as a path to creating a film as a puzzle. The start of the process begins with the editor and the director to get the idea of a scene put together on how the story is created, and then once given, they act out the scene as reference to get the idea on how it’s worked out. Once done and with a reference for the filming, they work on the puppets to determine the rigging for the animation (Example in the Video: Weight support on the rig). Once ready, the filming begins working with the team to get the frame by frame performance on camera, positions, and the shots as planned, moving the puppet to get the movement for the scene. The facial animation if used during the process of filming is already worked out beforehand from a 3D printer, and they have a schedule layout of the scene for when the facial animation needs to be changed. The filming has an emotive process to it and that the people have an understanding of what the character is going through.

How the puppets are built in the movie ParaNorman:

Animator/Illustrator RDR

RDR at this time has created three fan animated music videos on his/her YouTube channel called 람다람 ( "Ram Durham" google translate). The creator seems to be more of an illustrator than an animator of information I was able to find. Not much is known of the creator and the programs used to create the animations but can be achieved in Adobe Animate.

Both RDR's  "Soda City Funk"(Song by Tim Legend) and Two time-meme( Song Two Time by Jack Stauber) uses photographs, his/her artwork and animation to create a interesting video that captures the retro feeling the music evokes. most of the animations use movie clip symbols.

Soda City Funk:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zhIScvlFn2

Two time - meme:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_LLCz1FCWrY

RDR's older animated music video  "Ghost town meme"( Song by Veorra & The Tech Thieves - Ghost Town) used less photographs and less special effects. but included moving 
foreground and background elements.

Ghost town - meme:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IX955_LTQPA

RDR's illustrations can be found on twitter.
람다람 Twitter page:
https://twitter.com/rrr001222

Mystery Skulls Animated - Ghost

This animated music video is rather interesting. Coming out back in 2014, it was something that is rather different with the characters all moving to the beat of the song throughout the video with their heads bobbing up and down. From what I've gathered, the music video, and the others that some after, are done by Ben Magnum or "MysteryBen27" which is his youtube account. As of now the man behind Mystery Skulls actually has claimed at least one of Ben Magnum's music videos as official.

What I found quite interesting about it was how well it does at visual storytelling, and also the fact that these characters have been inspired by Scooby Doo with the dog, the van, and the characters wanting to find ghosts and solve mysteries. It is done in such a way that when watching it multiple times, you find there are details that you have missed. Also, this all culminates into using the song and turning it into a story. As mentioned before, there are other videos done using the same band and each of the different songs are used to make the story more intriguing, and so far those are based around the songs "Freaking Out" and "Hellbent". Unfortunately each video takes around two years to make so we won't see anymore of the continuation until 2020.

Ghost: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YlEb3L1PIco

Here are the continuations to the story:

Freaking Out: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tUYM5WNdNGc

Hellbent: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NN_Kbltsqx4

Inside Out

The film Inside Out is made by a Vancouver Film School student Rachel Mouawad. Vancouver Film School is a private school in Vancouver for so many fields: 3D animation, acting for film and TV, Game design, classic animation, VR&AR design and so on.

This film Inside Out is a classic animation which means she drew everything in this film and animated it. This film is a little bit creepy but it has a nice atmosphere and I really like it.



Their website is really nice too. You can check out their programs.
Vancouver Film School: https://vfs.edu/

They also have a Youtube channel and it has so many films done by the students.
Youtube Channel: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UC5MkxrHWkLDDnToq_ZTYGlA

Lonewolf is a pretty popular music video director/creator in the new generation of rap and has played a part in several rappers careers by giving them pretty unique videos that appealed to the masses and gave the artists attention.His style of editing is what set Lonewolf apart from the other creatives with his unique cuts and paper effects. His style of editing is replicated with many videos giving away the secrets of his techniques, but he does not mind he and others such as cole bennett have influenced the style of trendy music videos and expanding the boundaries of whats possible, very inspirational and different in their style which inspires thousands.



Lonewolf's reel

Astartes: A fan flim

Astartes is CGI animation fan film base on the miniature wargame, Warhammer 40K. This story is base on a grim darkness of the far future where there is only war. This fan film show us one of the main factions, Space Maines or the Astartes, talking on a traitor legion of humans. There are currently part of the film right now and they are short and fill few clips of actions.

Part 1

Part 2

Part 3

There are only a few bit of story boards online, but there is a patreon so you could support this film.

https://www.patreon.com/astartesfilm/overview

https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCFMtdiQILuTZr22sKUeAOOA

ONE SMALL STEP

"One Small Step" is an award-winning short film from 2018 by up-and-coming TAIKO Studios; The is a small studio comprised of Disney, Pixar, and Nickelodeon artists, animators and sound directors and was formed only 2 years ago in 2017. The studio aims to bring western and eastern cultures together by telling stories that will have universal appeal.

Shot Progression from sketch to final product.

The aesthetic of the film stays true to its premise having a simple, bright and whimsical appearance throughout a good portion of it particularly in the scenes focusing on Luna's actions and imagination as a child. While having the appearance of 2D animation the film was created as a 3D CGI animation and this is most prominently seen when the characters turn in their space or bring/swing out their arms in their environment or around each other. The most prominent scene for 3D elements is in the cardboard spaceship scene with Luna and her father zooming around space.

Despite having no speaking parts in the film the facial expressions, body language, color schemes speak volumes for the characters. The color schemes help establish the tone of the story by pairing Luna's childhood with vibrant colors, her fond memories bathed in warm browns and yellows, and her sadness in muted colors. The score in the film, or lack-thereof further adds to the tone of the scene. The music emphasizes the happiness that Luna feels and the kindness that her father extends to his daughter while the silence, and in combination with ambient sounds, plunges us into sadness and evokes loneliness.

"One Small Step" is a beautiful story about fulfilling one's dreams and a thank you to the family and friends supporting them. This short film has propelled TAIKO Studio and left many hopeful and hungry for more of their stories and work.


TAIKO Studios website which contains more information about the studio and their team.

Storyboard to Final comparison for the scene of the gif above

Studio/ Artist Exploration. Passion Animation Studios / Kyra Buschor and Constantin Paelow

Passion Pictureswhose core business is its commercial and animation. It includes Carton Network animated identity. The did the Gorillaz music videos. Passion Australia produced "The lost thing" which won an Academy Award for the best Short Film in 2011.
They also produce and make innovative films and documentaries about science and natural history. But here we are going to focus on Passion Animation Studios, which is what interests us in this subject. After taking a look at all the directors who have in their company, I have been attracted by the artists Kyra Buschor and Constantin Paeplow. They met while studying animation at the world-renowned Filmakademie Baden-Württembergin Germany and decided to get together to lead their own company Flying Stone. They are known for their animal characters who are fat, rather they look like balloons with animal characteristics. These animals created the world "Rollin 'Wild". They created a series of four clips presented at Filmakademie Baden-Wuerttemberd in 2012.

Here you have a video 
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yltlJEdSAHw


They were very successful because they touched the hearts of the audience and they were encouraged to do more series in this same line. I had already seen some of their work in Spain and it is that apparently they are quite known on You Tube. They have also created commercial spots that draw people in with endearing characters for Genius, Anchor and Motorola.

Their characters are either animals or people are endearing, usually their faces are very rounded and are usually disproportionate. Big heads, smaller bodies, give a childlike appearance that arouses tenderness. Their  characters are very expressive and in their faces they reflect fear, frustration, challenge, grief, joy, satisfaction. The eyes are very important, you know, the eyes are the mirror of the soul. I think I read that they use CGI (Computer Generated Imagery), special visual effects created using computer software. These are pickpockets that are given in their work.  Same formula with different stories, different characters to advertise businesses as disparate as a bank, a supermarket or a e-commerce company.

Here I leave the links so you can enjoy them and also laugh.

http://www.passion-pictures.com/usa/animation-studios/directors/kyra-constantin/http:

The Swiss supermarket -Migros "Finn's Parents" https://vimeo.com/301836352

Cinematic music
Mix animation with real world

Chinese e-commerce company headquartered in Beijing - JD.com"Joy and Heron" https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZQGuVKHtrxcc

An endearing story about wrong impressions, the recognition that we are wrong, the satisfaction of helping others and that everything that is given is received by others in the future.

Erste Group Bank AG is one of the largest financial services providers in Central and Eastern Europe. Erste Group "Fisrt Christmas"
https://vimeo.com/304810288

Hedgehog who feels alone only because he clicks and hurts, but it does not prevent it from being loved by its friends who find a solution.
The characters with felt appearance are made with CGI



😀Enjoy ! 

Aardman Animations Claymation

Classic claymation films like “Wallace and Gromit” and “Chicken Run”, are created at a legendary animation studio called Aardman Animations. The making of a claymation film is put into a ton of work for every frame. All of the 273 puppet-like clay characters brought to life were created by 23 different model-makers, each one involving 10 or more weeks, and 3,000 interchangeable mouths. Each character throughout the production of the filming was moved frame by frame by hand, moving the limbs, fingers, and joints from a skeleton design inside. The filming involved a stop-motion technique to take one frame of a film, making 24 frames per second in an entire film, whether a small movement is involved in a slow frame, and a big moment for a faster frame. Actions in some scenes tend to be frantic and frenetic, even though the stop motion is jittery. Sometimes animations may involve creative thinking.

Video of how Claymation movies are made:

Aardman Animation History: https://www.aardman.com/the-studio/history/ 

Video of a production of a Wallace and Gromit movie: 

Website with Interactive Animation

Ultranoir is a website of French Awards Winning Digital Agency. On the website, they talk about lots of industries: fashion brand, jewelry, e-commerce, media and tourism; they support  a lot of industries when they come up with their new projects by making post of them.

There are so many kinds of interactive animation they put on their website, and they are all so neat and unique. As you hover your cursor onto their pictures or videos in the background, they skew, and it differs how fast you move your cursor. And the transition when you scroll  is also amazing; it is smooth but unique.

I found it crazy how they can put so many complicated interact animations onto one website and make it really cool and neat.


And here is the website:
https://www.ultranoir.com/en/


And here is an interview of a web designer of ultranoir:
https://youtu.be/kdxUnA3a2To

CGMeetup

   CGMeetup is a leading online platform to showcase and discover creative work such as computer graphics, art, 3D and VFX animation. CGmeetup was founded in 2011 the site has evolved into one of the premier games, film, media & entertainment website in the world, offering the latest news, an inspirational gallery, jobs, 3d models and hundreds of free tutorials on a variety of subjects. CGMeetup also serves as a networking resource for CGI professional. Professionals use CGmeetup to exchange ideas, knowledge and Job opportunities.
https://www.cgmeetup.com


CGI 3D Animated Short Film: "Darrel"

                                    

Studio Exploration: Titmouse Inc.

LINKS:
https://titmouse.net/

https://twitter.com/TitmouseInc

Titmouse, Inc. Is an american animation studio that produces various animated television shows,
feature films, music videos, title sequences, commercials, and short films. The studio opened in 2000
and has offices in New York, Los Angeles, and Vancouver, Canada.

Founder Chris Prynoski began working at MTV on shows such as Daria and Beavis and Butthead
before opening Titmouse together in early 2000. They originally got their start as a T-shirt business
before going into animation as they had gotten more requests for cartoons than for t-shirts.
Since 2000 they have expanded from “just us and a few friends we paid to help us out with projects
” to a full scale contender in the animation business, boasting 3 studios across North America and
over 400 employees.

Some of the better known shows that Titmouse has produced are Venture Brothers, Superjail!, Metalocalypse, and Big Mouth.
They also did the opening sequence for Avatar: The Last Air Bender. They have done numerous short videos
and other animated assets for clients ranging from Disney, Sony, ESPN, and Nickelodeon.
They’re considered one of the most verastile animation studios in the business for creating cartoons
and assets for television shows, movies, commercials, theme parks, video games, promos, and
the internet.
Here are examples of Titmouse's animation and works.

2018 Animation Reel.

Season 6 trailer of Venture Brothers

Motorcity animation previews, using Animate CC to go from rough composite to final.

Fire in Cardboard City

     Fire in Cardboard City is a 2017 stop motion animated short by New Zealander Phil Brough. This short has won numerous awards and has been invited to screen at top film festivals, and for good reason. It’s unique in concept, well executed, and so, so, funny!

Fire in Cardboard City Trailer

     I have long been a big fan of Nick Parks and other claymation artists, but Phil Brough gives us a new twist on stop motion art by using cardboard as his medium. It’s hard to imagine the work that went into the construction of the elaborate city scenes, vehicles and characters, even before the labor-intensive film production work could begin. The decision to use cardboard is obvious based on the title, but how he transforms a 2D material into 3D action is astounding.

     The film uses modern film cinematics to great effect, with zooming and panning, extreme angles and forced perspective to enhance mood. I wonder if there was a sort of rotoscoping going on to create, in cardboard, the action in the car scenes including roll over crashes. There’s almost a sense that the creators are making a parody of typical Hollywood car crash scenes and disaster movies. 

     

     The sound editing is perfectly set up to give life to the cardboard world. Not only do sounds like helicopter rotors, roaring fire, and screeching tires make Cardboard City seem real, there’s a well-done music overlay to ramp up the emotion. In addition, the fire effects are just so spot on. In the scene of the skyscraper burning, the flames reach out individual windows, with plenty of smokes, sparks, and occasional explosions to get the full experience of the disaster.

     The sort of child-like execution of the art almost hides the sophistication of the animation and production technique. But this juxtaposition of the seemingly crude art and the clever use of it to tell the story makes it all the more humorous. It’s particularly appropriate, when (spoiler alert) the film breaks the fourth wall. While the film is extraordinarily amazing as a piece of animation, what makes it perhaps most compelling is that the story is beyond funny, in concept and in innumerable little details, like this one:

     “Jim’s stupid bombs and fireworks shop” is one of many little reminders showing how ridiculous it is to live in such a highly combustible city. The hapless inhabitants do their cardboard best to deal with the horror, but they are sadly at the mercy of wicked Phil Brough and the other Kiwis on his team.

Fire in Cardboard City (Full Short- about 9 minutes)

Guldies' Stop Motion

Stop motion is an intricate form of frame by frame animation that involves the manipulation of materials across a sequence of photos compiled to form an animated scene. Guldies' video below shows a miniature cottage environment using all sorts of supplies like clay, foam, wood, and fishing lures to name a few. Watch the animation through first, and I'll point out a few examples of the principles and tricks incorporated.

The first thing I'd like to note is the use of sound to emphasize the actions shown. Including sfx noises like the chopping wood or the clinking of the plate add credibility and help the viewer better grasp what is happening. The creator also made a point to shake the camera a bit with each hit on the tree to exaggerate the action. It makes the scene much more readable.

Around 0:50, we see the axe prepare to chop the wood. Guldies first establishes the weight of the axe by propping it against the trunk before going to swing. This also makes use of anticipation so we understand what they are about to do. Guldies explains in their behind the scenes video that in order to provide the illusion of weight, they took advantage of timing and drag. They took small steps between frames where the ax is inching off the tree stump, and bigger changes as the ax fell. In moving the ax, they moved the handle first and allowed the axe head to follow.

At 1:19, we see the water pull up and splash around in its bucket. This is a rather exaggerated response to add interest to the scene. As shown in a separate video, Guldies added an artificial sway to the bucket and molded very large movements in the water.

I particularly admire their attention to detail throughout this piece. They made sure to include little things that slipped my eye the first time such as wood chips flying away from he tree as it was chopped down, the little embers floating about the fire, and the movement of the miscellaneous food on the plate as the fish was stabbed and dropped back on as bones.

I encourage you to watch the video again with an eye for more examples and an appreciation for the little details and decisions made throughout. Also, feel free to check out the behind the scenes videos linked above or their channel for more stop motion examples.

Spider-Man Into the Spider verse

                Spider-man into the spider-verse is not only a visually  

stimulating and entertaining movie for all movies goers but also a great resource for animators to see the twelve principles of animation in action. For example Squash and Stretch is used on Spider-Ham a lot to give him a super cartoony feel while the other more human character stay rigged most the time. 

           This scene right here is a great example of using" Anticipation" in tandem with "Follow Through and overlapping action".

Its also using "Anticipation" in two different ways. We anticipate the punch and secondly the way the car just flys back is almost reverse Anticipation, we expect it to maybe stop but the joke made way more funny by it subverting our expectations. 

                 Another thing worth pointing out is the frame rate of this movie. Where most CGI movies are animated on the 1s, this movies was animated mostly on the twos. The thinking behind this was not only to give it an original look but to show case the amazing art work that was put into this movie. Animating on the 2s allows us the viewers alit more time with the image almost as if it were a frame in a comic book. 

The Twelve of Animation as Illustrated by Alan Becker

I would write about this resource and why I am sharing it and how it is good and useful.