Submission

I have rendered out the entire scene two times and cant manage to have the background animating. There must be some setting that is set incorrectly so overall i am not happy with the finished piece. One way we could of sorted this problem was having everything pieced together earlier. i was ready and waiting for moses animation for me to put onto the environment two weeks before the deadline but moses didn't complete the animation until very late in the day close to submission which didn't leave me enough time to fix the problems i have encountered in rendering.

E4 Ident

After finishing of the animation of the logo and I was happy with the look of the environment and logo I did a few test render to see how they looked when rendered it appeared to work well. One big problem I later encountered was the render animation of the environment texture. it took a very long time to render out the background a and it didn't animate as well as I hoped and sometimes when playing with different players not at all. I am not sure why this has happened it severely detracts from the overall appearance of the piece.  I don't understand why the background moves when rendering out a few test frames but doesn't move when rendering out the whole piece with no settings changed.

Showreel creation

For my showreel i decided to use IDVD for the creation of the menus and overall design of the dvd. I ran in to a few problems when i was texting the software for creating dvd's, they were that every time I tried to burn the dvd or render out the piece as a disc image or video TS folder it encountered an error with scripting. To solve this problem i checked for updated to the software. After I updated it and tested it it worked fine, Lesson learned to always keep my software up to date.

I searched through my hard drive and external hard drives to find my old work and go through them to find suitable pieces for inclusion in my showreel. I decided to cover a wide range of diciplins from 2d and 3d animation to Photography. once i had collected enough material i added it into idvd and played around with different looks untill i was happy and rendered it out.

Room creation

Here is a render of the room i have modeled and textured in maya for our animation piece. i have kept the textures and models looking as realistic as possible but haven't spent too much time worrying about little details because of the style we are going to use in post production. I played around with a few different layouts but found this to be the most suitable.

For the creating of the Pastel style i have been looking at different Pluggins and techniques i could use in After effects to create the desired effect.
After research I found video gogh produced a nice effect that i was happy with.

Concept

After undertaking numerous research and brainstorming sessions moses and i decided to focus on the particular style of 2d animation we had seen in the end creditis for the robin hood movie (seen Below) The style used was coulourfull abstract and looked to have been drawn using pastels. We decided to aim for a simular style but using CGI instead of hand drawn animation.

We both came up with a few ideas of how we could relate this style to the breif for the E4 Ident. My main concern with the brief is that the piece has to be exactly 10 seconds long whitch isnt very long at all so we are quite constrained within what we could creativly produce and successfully convey to the audience.

After we had experiemented with a few different ideas we decided to use moses concept for having a cat chase the E4 Logo around a room. He was confident he could capture relevent videos for us to work from using a neighbours cat and a lazer pen.
The videos moses captured were great showing lots of different movment and angles we picked one especially that showed good movment and was exactly 10 seconds long.

Now we know what we were undertaking we split the production between us, I have the challenge of creating the enviroment, animating the E4 logo and experimenting with diffenent ways of stylinging them to our desired style.

SHOWREEL

here are some examples i have fornd of existing people and companies showreels.

Post production comapny Taylor james showreel featuring some of there past cgi works.


Autodesk promotional showreel showing what can be achieved with there products very high end stuff.

Idea generation.... Research

The main objective here is to research and collect interesting styles and ideas that i could use or could inspire me into creating somthing interesting for the brief. a key area i will look at is title sequences and end credits of movies because they sometimes have unique styles and quriky designs to liven them up.


I realy like the style used for the end credits here. Moses pointed this stye out to me, I think this would be a good different style to use for our E4 Piece

Here is a link to the end credis of the Sherlock Holmes movie another great style used.
http://youtu.be/Vr2uPF83-m0

Nice effect achieved in after effects

E Strings

I have chosen to undertake the E4 Strings competition with moses. we think that the brief has lots of potential for us to be creative and come up with some new ideas.
The competion breif...........

We want you to take our logo and create an original brand sting that smacks of E4 attitude and can be played out on our E4 telly-channel – and we’re even giving out prizes for our favourites.

It can be live action, it can be animated, it can be 2D, 3D, 4D. It can be hi-fi, lo-fi, big-budget or no-budget. Simply download the E4 logo and a soundbed your choice and get going. The only rules we are cruelly forcing upon you are thusly –

(a) We can't show anything explicit or violent in the daytime, but we might be able to after the watershed as long as it’s broadcastable. So - within reason - your idea can be quite naughty / irreverent / provocative etc. Use your common sense though, anything too grim or sexually explicit won't get shown at all.

(b) It HAS to be EXACTLY 10 seconds long. If it’s not 10 seconds long IT WILL NOT BE CONSIDERED BY THE JUDGES. Sorry, but we’re feeling a bit strict this year. To make things easier we’re providing you with a choice of 10 second audio beds which you are welcome to use in your E Sting (but feel free to use something of your own if you prefer!)

(c) It HAS to have the E4 logo in it... But you probably knew that. (Preferably integrated into the idea rather than simply slapped on top of your piece at the end).

After we’ve received all the entries we’ll pick up to 25 of our favourites and play them out on-air to make our lovely channel look even ruddy lovelier. Once our judge-folks have mulled over this shortlist, they’ll select a first prize winner who’ll take home a whopping £2500 and a runner up who’ll get £500 – don’t say we’re not good to you. They’ll also be a little soiree in London town where we’ll announce the winners - all of the shortlisted finalists will be invited, obz.

All you need to do is submit your E Sting in one of the accepted formats (wmv, mov, mpg, 3gp, mp4, mpeg) and fill out your details on the entry form by Friday 1st July…
E Stings 2011 – Full Details and Terms & Conditions

The following are the Terms and Conditions for E4’s E Stings Competition 2011. By entering this competition you are deemed to have accepted these terms and conditions and the E4 Terms and Conditions and Privacy Policy. Failure to adhere to these Terms & Conditions may result in your entry not being considered by the judges.

The competition and prizes
E4 is once again looking for talented people to submit their own E Stings to e4.com. A panel of judges selected by E4 will review all valid entries and shortlist up to 25 finalists who will all have their E Sting broadcast within the E4 schedule. The E4 panel of judges will pick an overall winner who will receive a cheque for £2,500 and a runner up who will receive £500. 25 finalists will also be invited to an awards ceremony to be held in London.

Brief & judging criteria
Judging of E Stings will be based on creativity and originality. We’re looking for entries that encapsulate the E4 brand values and ethos.
Entry
To enter this competition you must upload your E Sting to e4.com and fill out your details on the online entry form.

Only one entry per person or collaborative group will be accepted. If you submit any subsequent entries the judges will only consider your first entry.

Entries must be submitted by 4pm on Friday 1st July 2011.

Your E Sting must be 10 seconds long and must be submitted in one of the following formats: wmv, mov, mpg, 3gp, mp4, mpeg. The file you upload must be no bigger than 20mb.

Your E Sting must include the E4 logo which can be downloaded from the entry page on E4.com.

You may also use one of the supplied audio beds if you wish, but this is not a competition requirement.

Your entry must be of broadcast quality and not contain anything that is obscene, indecent, un-lawful or offensive. Your entry must be your own work and must not contain any commercial music. Channel 4 reserves the right to edit your entry.

You (and each member of your collaborative group, if applicable) must be over 16 and a UK resident to enter the competition.

Once submitted, your entry will be viewed by a panel of judges, chosen by E4, who will decide on a shortlist of up to 25 finalists. All of the finalists’ E Stings will be played on-air within the E4 schedule.

Finalists will be notified that their entry has been selected by 5pm on Friday 5th August 2011. Finalists will have five days to respond to this notification or alternative finalists may be selected.

Only a selection of entries will appear on E4.com, however all valid entries will be viewed by the judges. 1st Prize winner will receive a cheque for £2500 and a runner up will receive £500.



If selected as a finalist you will be required to submit your entry as a broadcast-quality digibeta along with any other data and/or materials at E4’s request.

Finalists will also be invited to attend an awards ceremony in central London (dates to be decided by Channel 4) where the final winner will be announced. Travel and accommodation to the awards ceremony are the sole responsibility of the finalists and are not included in the prize.

By submitting your entry into this competition you grant Channel 4 a non-exclusive right to publish your entry on the website and/or broadcast your entry on E4 or any other channel owned by Channel 4 and/or to use the entry for promotion purposes including, but not limited to exhibiting the entry at festivals and in galleries.

Industry exercises 3 Selling Yourself

I have decided to undertake the (Third way) of the breif which is to find and complete an external brief to the broardcasting standards required. There are a few ways i could approach this but i have decided to find a sutable competition featuring a challenging breif that i can work towards completing. Throughout this process i will be considering my Showreal and try to make any content display my skills as best as possible.