Tuesday, January 27, 2015

The Business of Animation

This week we have our very own James Caswell, who will offer us the fruit of his years of experience in the animation business.

Jim covers much of the groundwork for setting up and running a viable small business in the animation industry including: the pros and cons freelancing; what to look for in a contract; and dealing with your taxes. Not to be missed.

As usual the lecture is at 11 AM in S235; the workshop is in A151 at 2 pm.






Friday, January 23, 2015

Fibonacci Zoetrope Sculpture


Watch this beautiful animated sculpture, fractal designed and 3D printed, by artist/inventor John Edmark of Stanford University.  The artist uses the sequence of Fibonacci numbers (1, 2, 3, 5, 8, 13, etc) to create spatial patterns that seem to swirl endlessly when spun under a strobe light.




from the Vimeo page:

"These 3-D printed sculptures, called aniforms, are designed to animate when spun under a strobe light. The placement of the appendages is determined by the same method nature uses in pinecones and sunflowers. The rotation speed is synchronized to the strobe so that one flash occurs every time the sculpture turns 137.5ยบ—the golden angle. If you count the number of spirals on any of these sculptures you will find that they are always Fibonacci numbers.
For this video, rather than using a strobe, the camera was set to a very short shutter speed (1/4000 sec) in order to freeze the spinning sculpture.
John Edmark is an inventor/designer/artist. He teaches design at Stanford University."


Thursday, January 22, 2015

Last Year's Industry Day Commercial -- Milestone #2

Here's last year's Industry Day Commercial.  It really shows off the range and artistry of our program. It was compiled from the workflow test shots done for Milestone #2.

https://vimeo.com/89344536







Tuesday, January 20, 2015

WINTER 2015 - MENTOR DROP IN HOURS



Here are the public Mentor Dropin Hours for all the 4th Year mentors this semester.  Feel free to drop in on any mentor if you have questions about their area of specialty, be it Maya, music or whatever. Or if you just want a general discussion of the state of your project.

This page will be updated regularly. 


Stephen Barnes   - Thursdays 10-11; Thursdays 12-2
Nancy Beiman    - Mondays 9-10:30; Wednesdays 1-2:30
Trevor Davies     - Thursdays 4-7
Bruno Degazio    - Mondays 2-4 Thursdays 12-1
Blair Kitchen       - Mondays, 9-12; 4-6
Tim McCormack - Thursdays 10-11, 12-2
Kaj Pindal             - Mondays, 1-3
Mark Palowich     - Wednesdays 11-12 Thursdays 12-2
Chris Walsh          - Mondays 12-3 Thursdays 10-11
Maury Whyte       - Mondays, 1-2,  Wednesdays 12-1, Fridays 2 -3 pm

Invitation to influence the future of the Bachelor Of Animation program - Tuesday, January 27th, 5 pm

Coming up soon is a special opportunity for 4th Year BAA students  to voice their view of coming changes to the Bachelor of Animation program, from the vantage point of nearly completing it.

The opportunity takes the form of a student focus group meeting on Tuesday, January 27th (5 pm - 7 pm) in the President’s Boardroom (2nd floor, B Wing).  You don't need to prepare anything, just bring your memories and experience as a student. In the words of our Associate Dean Angela Stukator, " We need to get a sense ... of what’s working, what’s not, and how the new (program) map might address learning gaps in the program."

A free dinner will be served.

Attendance is by invitation, and there's room for only 5 students from 4th Year, so email me right away if you are available on that day and are interested in discussing the program.


-------------------------- 

Bruno Degazio, 
Professor, Academic Advisor
Faculty of Animation, Arts and Design,
Sheridan College, Oakville, ON
degazio@sheridancollege.ca
website: http://www-acad.sheridanc.on.ca/~degazio 

The Art of the Music Spotting Session

The Art of the Music Spotting Session

In two weeks the U of T musicians will be visiting us, with their purpose in mind being specifically to work out the details of the musical score for your film. This important meeting between film-maker  and composer is traditionally known as the the "Music Spotting Session."

To help you prepare for this meeting, Wednesday's Lecture and Workshop are both oriented to an explanation of the Music Spotting Session.

(You might want to also read this recent blog posting  by Mark Kennedy, Disney's Head of Story.  He talks about the importance of spotting temp music while working on the Leica reel, links to some interesting examples of the use of musical score. Thanks to ames Caswell for pointing out this blog to me.)


LECTURE
A while ago I wrote the music for Chris Walsh's stop-motion film,  True Family Story.  We recognized our collaboration as a "teachable moment", so I saved the files I created as the score developed. These files now make a very  effective demonstration of the collaborative process between a film-maker and a composer.

This year I'm supplementing the talk with examples from a more recent project, Save Our Bees, a Public Service Announcement animation, with music in the style of the Warner Bros classics.

During the lecture (11 am, S235) I'll walk you through the three stages of the Music Spotting process as it took place in recent work, and play for you some famous and not-so-famous historical examples of "Temp Music" and musical scores.


WORKSHOP 
The 2 pm workshop (A151) gives you a chance to "spot" your own film with me and the other students. Consider it practice for the real spotting session with the U of T musicians when they visit on February 4.

This is also an opportunity to bring & discuss any demo music that you might have already received from your composer or other musician working on your film.  Copyright issues relating to the use of pre-recorded music will also be discussed. 

Tuesday, January 6, 2015

Advanced Colour Design For 4th Year Films

Advanced Colour Design For 4th Year Films - Michael Hitchcox

Please forward your background paintings to Michael so he can illustrate his lecture with examples from your work.  

Please send your files to mhitchcox@cogeco.ca before Tuesday January 13. 








Happy New Year, 2015

Greetings and best wishes for the New Year!

There's a lot coming in the next few weeks. You can take a look at the outline for the semester here (pdf): It lays out the production and post-production timeline for the coming semester.  Especially important is the Scene Workflow test, which is due in Week 2. I'll explain this one in our first lecture on Wednesday January 14.)

You can also take a look at the Lecture and Workshop schedule here. Please note that many of the bookings are still tentative and subject to change.

================================

For now, please take a look at this list from Joshua Dennenberg at U of T.  It lays out the partnerships between Sheridan animators and U of T composers, as understood from their end. (Note that the list is not entirely complete because two students did not respond to Joshua's inquiry.) If your name is missing or in the wrong place please let me know ASAP so I can try to clear things up with Joshua.


COMPOSERSANIMATORS->
Alex ChangValerie Ng
Adrian LingTerra Zhang
Alex LambermontYolanda LiuRaymond LaFebvreKen House
Babak TaghiniaHuifangMara Soriano
Cara TorsAlex BiasuttiChelsea TierneyRichard Kosner
Dinuk WijeratneJane Li
Eleanor HartKelsey Ryan
Fintan Quinn
Joshua DenenbergDaniel FountainNicole Turner
Kirk RussellMara SorianoDan FountainYanjun
Kenzie YangoAndrew BromfieldAnn WGSteph GarthMaria NguyenVictoria E -KokoMaria NguyeBen SzaboNathan Alcee
Kristina Orel
Liam GallagherJordan RuttleClaudia TanjungCody Forkes
Liam WestAnna hau yin ChanAshley AdamsKaitlin SutherlandPeter Holland
Michael le RuggieroMargaret PerrieJonathan Chan
Mouna BenhadjtaharDarik SmithKaitlin Sutherland
Ross AuKhoebe MangsaysayYanju LiuXiying Zhai
Sarah BascianoKat PurificatoDidi Wang
Sae Lon LeeAlison ChanHelen Bohee Seong
Xintong WangMelody WangSam Lloyd