Semester Reflection - Graphic Design

Semester in Review

•  Raccoon

• This project took us a few weeks, but not too many. For it, we created a raccoon using a tutorial (through it, we learned the basics of Illustrator), and afterwards put it in a "fall picture" (mine didn't look very good) and a postcard. A huge setback for me during this project was that we also had to put some fall leaves in our fall picture, but I had the idea that we had to make all the leaves in the tutorial when we actually just had to make a few. However, I'm pretty proud of the postcard I made; it was around Halloween time when we made ours, so I gave mine a Halloween theme. I never got any feedback for my fall raccoon, but I did receive some compliments on my postcard. :> I didn't really like these projects as much as the ones we did later on, since we weren't able to be as creative with them.

•  Vector Portrait

• Our second project was creating vectorized portraits of ourselves in Illustrator. For me, this project, once again, took me longer than everyone else in making it. We had another few weeks to work on it, but I spent a great deal of time after school trying to make it more and more detailed. In the picture I was recreating, I had been wearing plaid, so I had to create a different shirt for the portrait so it wouldn't take as long. I don't ever remember getting feedback on it. My personal opinion on the finished portrait would be that it looks good and bad at the same time (good: lots of detail; bad: I'm really ugly).

• Infographic
• Out of all the projects we've done so far, this is the one I'm most proud of. Our assignment was to create an infographic based on something we're interested in, so for mine, I chose the ISS because of my dream to someday go to space. I know I'm being repetitive, but again, I don't know how long we had to work on these; I know it was at least a month. In the beginning, we mainly had to do a bunch of research, but I decided to do my graphics first, which set me back later when I had to do a ton of research. During the process of making it, I received a bit of critique from some of the "full-time" graphic design students, in which they recommended that the bar of information to the side have a background that complimented the rest of the image, soooo that's what I did. I think my infographic turned out pretty well, but maybe just a little too crowded in some areas. I spent several hours after school working on this and, even though it was very tiring, I love the final result.

Time Well Spent

Because of the fact that I'm super awkward when talking to people (and therefore almost never talk), I think I'm pretty good in terms of managing my time.
When I completed my work, some things I would do to utilize my time would be to: go through Behance, work on homework, or make other things in Illustrator.
To strengthen my work outside of class, I draw a lot and try to pay more attention to ads on television or anywhere else to see what professional graphic designers use in their work.

Strengths

I've always been pretty keen on art and design, so it wasn't hard at all for me to create visually appealing images and asking a few people if what I've made makes sense or not.

Areas of Improvement

Even though I can't really help that I'm a slow worker, I would like to become a faster worker and, as my brother says, "Work smarter, not harder." I'm sure that with enough time, I'll start to improve on that.

Overall Thoughts

As I said before, my favorite thing about this semester has been creating my ISS infographic, which I am so proud of. However, if I could go back in time to stop myself from doing something, I would tell myself not to make all the fall leaves (since no one else told me). I thoroughly enjoyed learning about all the tools in Illustrator, and I hope that next semester I can make something even more impressive than my infographic.

- Brenna (っ• ◡•)っ

Portfolio Reflection

Worm

I think this was our first or second project, and it was so long ago that I barely remember what we did. However, I do know that this was our first project involving the puppet pin tool. Using it, we learned how to make an otherwise immobile object move around without having to make any more versions of that character (if that makes sense??).

We learned it through the directions, of course, but I still had a bit of difficulty when it came to actually animating it.
My worm moves faster that it actually inches and it looks really weird, but it was one of my first animations so I'm sure it's fine.
I love the worm I made (it's the one that destroyed Bikini Bottom), but for some reason this was a really hard project for me.

Walk Cycle

When we were all working on our walk cycle animations (for me, it was my sexy astronaut), I learned that you can animate characters that you draw [in separate parts] using programs like AfterEffects and how to make a character walk.

I AM SO PROUD OF THIS!!! I love almost everything about it!! The only thing I'm not proud of is the fact that I couldn't figure out how to use the pinpoint tool, so it looks like the astronaut is just marching across the screen instead of actually walking like a normal person.

I assure you that I will be proud of this project even after I've been dead for millions of years. I know this is so stupid, but this was my favorite project from this semester.

Scenery Animation

I had never known that there were several layers of scenery used in old animated movies and cartoons to make the setting seem more realistic. We learned how to do just this: how to create a moving landscape.

The bad thing about working in Photoshop (for me) is that I always forget to switch layers if I want to draw on one of them, and of course that happened here. I don't remember where this happened, though, since it was such a long time ago, but I can assure you it happened. I don't really like the stuff that moves across the background, but at least the clouds look nice.

So far, this has been my second favorite project, only surpassed by the sexy astronaut, since it involved a lot of drawing and actually looks pretty nice compared to my other projects.

Ice Cream

When we made our ice cream, I wasn't really looking at the directions to figure out how to get the ice cream texture on my ice cream (I just went to Google Images instead), so that was kind of a lost opportunity. However, I did learn how to use the timeline in Maya and how to rotate objects for the timeline.
I learned this by constantly asking for help with things I should have been able to figure out on my own, but I'm stupid lol. I also got some of the directions...from the directions (surprise!).

We did not pick this project, it was assigned to the class. However, we did get to put a bit of creativity into the project by coloring our ice cream however we wanted, and by making our own ice cream "shops" (they were more like rooms than shops).

Sadly, I'm one of those people who has a lot of trouble finding things that are right in front of them, so I kept having to ask people where certain tools would be found and I'm sorry to them. I also couldn't figure out how to get the shadows to show up, even though I know how to now. BUT I did do a good job with color scheme and making things look nice, I think.

Literally the only thing I would change about this would be to add shadows.

This was kind of an in between project for me; it wasn't really hard, but it wasn't really easy.

Pen

For this project, we had to create a pen that we owned in Maya, so we had to do a lot by scale. I constantly had to hold the pen up to my screen to make sure it was the right size. From this, I learned how to scale things properly and, additionally, how to create new vertices using the "Insert Edge Loop" tool.

I learned how to use the edge loop tool thanks to someone else who was having trouble in class; if he hadn't spoken up, I don't know if I would have ever learned how to do it. As for scaling properly, that just seems like common sense to me. It wouldn't make very much sense to make a pen that looks just like the actual pen, but shorter...or something like that.

I didn't really have a choice in choosing this project or the pen that I ended up modeling. I mean, I'm really happy that it was a fairly simple pen, otherwise I'm sure I would have had wayyyy more trouble making it than I already did.

I'm pretty proud of myself in the sense that if I didn't know what to do, I would either do it my own way or look it up instead of just complaining about it like I usually do. Although, I kept getting kind of angry when I couldn't even do that and asked people around me for help and they couldn't help me. Even though it wasn't their fault, I just couldn't help but get irritated when they could help someone else but not me. :<

Maya, unsurprisingly, is a lot easier for me to use now than it was when I first started using it. I've learned a lot from it [and don't cry as much about it as I used to haha].

Hopefully, if I every get Maya on my home computer, I will be inclined to make more objects like this and keep improving. Well...not really like this, but better things like dogs or something.

I am very much a perfectionist, so it really bothered me when I had already made the thing on the end of the pen (where you push it and the point comes out at the top) because it was slightly larger than the actual one, and it still really bothers me. I would definitely change it if I could.

This was probably one of the projects that I'm most proud of in this class, even if it was just making a pen. I think it looks a lot better than a lot of the other things I've made in this class! :>

- Brenna (っ• ◡•)っ

Hayao Miyazaki vs. A.I.

Main Idea
The article "The Director of "Spirited Away" Called Animation Made by AI an "insult to Life Itself" " (sorry for the title being so long) discusses the opinion of Hayao Miyazaki—a well-known Japanese animator—on A.I. drawn animations. His reaction, as you can imagine, was not positive.

Robots = Bad, Imagination = Good

In this article, Miyazaki argues that animations produced by A.I.s to be used in movies is an absolutely terrible idea and is "an insult to life itself". However, this isn't all that surprising considering how much depth he has put into his characters. I know it says something similar in the article, but I feel that way too.

Argument

Since robots lack imagination, Miyazaki, as I just said, doesn't think that it would be okay at all to use robots instead of actual people. He wasn't thinking in terms of producing movies faster, but taking time to make animations that matter. His only source was himself, but you can't really use a source for something like this.

Strengths and Weaknesses
I don't think this article really has any weaknesses, since it wasn't written by Miyazaki himself but only a person who wanted people to know how he felt. As far as I know, there aren't any typos or anything like that in the article. So...nothing really.

As for strengths, I thought it was very informative but not repetitive at all, so I thought that was pretty good.

Author's (Miyazaki's?) Conclusion
The author ended the article with a quote from Miyazaki that I'm sure many people would feel sad reading: "I feel like we are nearing to the end of times. We humans are losing faith in ourselves." I'm sure I'm not the only one who feels worried about the future when reading that.
Significance
Almost anything that Hayao Miyazaki says sounds important, even if he's just talking about a food he likes. After reading the quotes from this article, I'm sure many people will be inclined not to create things like this out of respect for him.

Author's Opinion
For about the billionth time, the author doesn't really argue about anything at all; she just talks about Miyazaki's reaction. However, she does drop some hints that she doesn't like the idea of the invention with vocabulary like "creepy" for the A.I.'s animation. However, Miyazaki's arguments about how a person's imagination should create instead of a machine definitely supported his claim of the drawings being disgusting.

Makes Sense
The "evidence" Miyazaki gives for why AI animation is horrible would relate more to someone who has more of a romantic mindset than a logistic one. Miyazaki, in this case, has the former.

For People Who Are Worried About This Kind Of Thing
I don't think it's very likely that robots are going to start taking over a ton of jobs in the future for this reason, so don't worry about that. 

Confusing?
There was a sentence in the article that read, "Referring to his experiences with a disabled friend...'Now, thinking of him, I can't watch this stuff and think it's interesting.'" I have read that sentence multiple times but I still don't really understand what is trying to be said. This seems to me like something everyone else but me would understand, but as usual, I'm probably thinking way too hard about it.

Afterthought
I honestly don't know why everyone has been making such a big deal about this lately, I mean it's not all that surprising (to me anyway).
Also, sorry, it seems to me like I've just been saying the same things over and over again.

- Brenna (っ• ◡•)っ

Cheng, Selina. "The Director of "Spirited Away" Called Animation Made by AI an "insult to        Life Itself" " Quartz. N.p., 10 Dec. 2016. Web. 13 Dec. 2016.

"Red"

Please Watch Before Reading!

Story Elements

Basically, this was a retelling of the classic story "Little Red Riding Hood", but in this case, a twist was added so that the wolf is actually a boy with a crush on Red Riding Hood. The whole story has a sweet tone to it, even when Red Riding Hood is being attacked, because even when she's in danger, the wolf boy is still there to protect her.

For My Own Work...
For my future projects, I would try to use character appeal similar to this one; I love drawing in styles like this. Also, it seemed pretty concise, which for me is difficult to do; I just get to detail oriented. I could definitely learn from this video in that sense.

I Know
It's kind of a given that if I wanted to make an animation I would have to give my characters...well, some character! Pretty much everybody knows how to do that. Other than that, as freshmen we learned about some of the basics of animation, like squash and stretch, and I could see some of these principles being used throughout this animation (squash and stretch, anticipation, appeal, etc.). We haven't gone into animating by hand in class, so I can't really say anything about that.

Nice!
The art style used in this is so cute! If I was the one who made this, I would be so proud of myself. Also, I really like that the creator left sketch marks on some of his frames, even though I don't usually like that. It just makes it seem cuter.

Improvements

Something that really bothered me while watching this was that there were sound effects for movements you would barely hear in real life. However, in moments like when the monster's horn was stuck in the tree, there was no noise at all; it just felt very unbalanced. Also, just for the record, I don't think that anything would still be alive (or at least uninjured) if they were thrown into a tree that brutally.

As a Conclusion

I'm a little nervous that this wouldn't be considered as a "professional animation" considering all of the film shorts I've seen, but considering this was made by just one person, I think it's pretty good.

- Brenna (っ• ◡•)っ

Red. Dir. Hyunjoo Song. YouTube. N.p., 29 June 2010. Web. 12 Dec. 2016.

How to Use the Puppet Tool

What is the Puppet Tool?

The "puppet tool" used in the program AfterEffects helps to make whatever you're animating come alive. This tool allows you to create a mesh on your character so that you can more fluidly animate it. I was too embarrassed to ask for help with it when my class was still frequently using AfterEffects, so it took me a long time before I actually learned what it was. This tutorial is for anyone who's interested in learning about AfterEffects and might be having trouble figuring out what to do.

What to Do

1. To start off, you need to select the Puppet Pin tool, which is in the upper left-hand corner of the screen.
2. After it's been selected, put as few pins on each separate layer of you character as you can, but don't put too few.
3. That last step was the easiest. Now, it's time for the hardest part. At the bottom of the screen is the animation timeline. On the left side is your layers, which includes your character. Under one of your character layers, choose Effects > Puppet > Mesh # > Deform > Puppet Pin #. Create a point in your timeline, then drag the time indicator to another point in the timeline and move a pinpoint on the screen. If you press play, you'll be able to see it move!

Just In Case You Need Some Pictures

Step 1: Put the pinpoints Bonus(?) Step: Add a Null Object to the
on the object. object you're animating if you want it to
move across the screen.

Step 2: Create a keyframe in Step 3: Move the pinpoint
one spot. into a different position &
create a new keyframe.
After you've made several keyframes, animate it!

Sorry it's bad, but I hope you get the point.
Helpful Websites (Maybe)

• Animating with Puppet tools
• After Effects: How to use the Puppet tool | lynda.com tutorial (this is kind of long, but I think it's kind of helpful)

- Brenna (っ• ◡•)っ

Ice Cream Animation

Generally,
Our job for this project was to create an ice cream "shop" where an ice cream cone, bowl, and a scoop would be rotating on a Lazy Susan.

The Process
Our first priority was to create the stars of the animation, the cone, bowl, and scoop. Afterwards, we had to use Blinns and Lamberts to color everything BUT the ice cream, but I didn't get the message until later, so I didn't change anything haha...Anyways, we then had to put a backlight, a fill light, and a key light into the frame, including shadows. Unfortunately, many shadows wouldn't show up, and I couldn't figure out how to get them to. Lastly, we had to render out 120 frames of the Lazy Susan spinning and make it into a GIF/video.

What I Learned
In technical terms, I learned how to group and rotate objects in Maya, along with rendering several frames out all at once.
Professionally, I learned that I STILL need to get over my personal pride and ask people for help if I can't figure out what to do. I'm getting better at it, but I still need to work on it.

Should Be Different
Instead of just leaving it the way it was, I should have made more divisions in the Lazy Susan so that it didn't have edges. I also should have used the cloud thing (???) on my ice cream instead of just picking up images off of Google. Along with that, I should have worked harder to find out what was going on with my shadows.

It's Fine the Way It Is
I'm actually pretty proud of show smooth the animation is, except for a barely noticeable stop when it loops, but other than that I think it's pretty good.

Past Experiences ➡ Future Betterment
I know I should have taken more notes on certain procedures in Maya, but some like pressing "R" for the timeline to show up is something that I will definitely remember. I think it will be especially helpful since we pretty much know the basics of animation and won't just be making stills anymore.

Just Letting You Know...
Even though I already have the GIF on here, I would really appreciate it if you could watch the video too, please (it has music ♪)!



- Brenna (っ• ◡•)っ