Undah Pressuh Pressuh.....

The Tiger (Jan 18th Animatic) from Ezra Edmond on Vimeo.

An updated version of my thesis animatic, featuring some alternate lines (not mixed to the right levels yet), some pencil tests and rough animation, and an alternate car scene and rescue of the father. 

Now besides that, there is a flashback scene that will be included in the animatic at the end of the week. I just wanted to wait till I have some more pencil tests so it can be a big update all in one go. These next few days, I have a lot of work ahead of me because I will be attempting to complete the entire first two minutes of the film (sans flashback) leaving me two months to do the next three-and-a-half minutes, which are much more animation intensive. Hopefully all goes according to plan.

Tonight, I'll be venturing out with my own personal camera to shoot a few live action plates for the driving scene (see if my theory works), and then I'll just be animating with a big compositing and rendering day either Saturday or Sunday. For the smoke, since this film is rather smoke heavy, I will be compositing live action smoke on the screen from a folder of elements and particle effects I have, so that should add a nice touch as well as make everything much easier. Right now its just like I'm staring at a giant puzzle of 1000 pieces trying to figure out where to begin, so many elements to make and put together. But, you have to start somewhere, so okay, deep breath, here I go!

A very serious post.

Let's start this post off right.





Good. Now that all that nonsense is out of the way, let me present you with something.

An.... ANIMATIC.

"The Tiger" (New Animatic) from Ezra Edmond on Vimeo.

I've been meeting with Mistah Tom Sito a lot this week and we've been going over my shots and refining them, making them more dynamic. I think most of it is at a place that I like now. There's a lot of shots that are just pan's or stills, no animation involved, which is good, and then a lot of shots that have lots of animation. SO this will be a task, but I'm ever so excited.

I started using MAYA to help me layout my shots and it is really making them much more dynamic. Essentially, I place 3 cylinders where the characters would be if the shot was in actual 3d space, then i move the 3d camera around until I find a good composition, then I draw that in my boards. It really really has made them SO much more dynamic, as I don't tend to think in 3d space. I will do this for everything in the future with out a doubt.

Also I just realized that my story is very very very influenced by 'The Phantom Tollbooth', and 'A Wrinkle in Time', which were two of my favorite books growing up. The Lab, swallowing of the fortress (like moving the atoms) and father rescue are all resonant of 'A Wrinkle in Time' and the portal (tollbooth), mountainous adventure for a rescue (the rescue of Rhyme and Reason), and being chased down a mountain by a group of monsters after completing said rescue is all very much straight out of 'The Phantom Tollbooth". One of my favorite things is to figure out what has inspired a piece that I am doing, so it's very interesting to me to be so sub-consciously influenced by these two books for the film. "Phantom Tollbooth usually influences most epic fantasies I do, but "Wrinkle" doesn't show up as much. I suppose that was a little tangent, but I just find that all super interesting. At least I know where all my wordplay comes from now. If you read the book I wrote that this film is based on "Ezra the Tiger", you'll see 'Phantom-esque' wordplay at its most extreme,

Anyway..... Hardest part about this week - finishing animatic. Best part about this week, finishing animatic. I guess that's really it for now. Now just on to finishing animation and getting those 2 lines recorded for the Father.

You're TEARING me APART, Lisa!

This week makes me feel like:

This.


and


Like this.


But mostly.


Like this.

Well, the week began with a wondrous start. I recorded Mr. Rocky Collins and Mr. Wilder Shaw (Shan't link to them again. I've linked to them enough in past posts). The recording went swimmingly. I've got Wilder in two roles and it's impossible to tell - and on top of that, Rocky gave his own wild performance that I can't WAIT to animate to, because it's just so damn quirky.

"What?" You, the loyal and consistent reader of this blog says, "I thought you were handsome and ready to go in every way!"

And the answer is. I WAS. (Well, I'm still handsome). But, after all the recording I hurried up to my cubicle to begin work. And I did this. It took a few hours but I love it.

Ps. The sync is a lil' off, but that has since been fixed.

"Is it gone? For good?" Roughs from Ezra Edmond on Vimeo.

So. I love that. And I wanted to do more and more. BUT MY CINTIQ CABLE BROKE. UGH. AND IT HAS BEEN UDDER HELL TRYING TO GET A NEW "S-video to USB" or a "Mini din 8 to USB". Like. Bloody. Impossible.

SO. I ordered an S-Video cable off amazon and adapter. Should have arrived already, but Amazon lost it. So, they are sending it again. Hopefully it gets here. Then I ordered an 8 pin Din and USB adapter off some other site. But that still hasn't arrived. I went to 3 electronic stores, including FRYS (Which has never been helpful in my experience), and this is just plain frustrating now. I have more to rant about, but hopefully in the next 2 days I will have my Cintiq working again, and nothing to complain about - at least for a while.

So in the meantime, I've been working out shots, and editing all of my audio. That is going well. Just wish I could have been animating all this week instead of watching time drip through my hands like those artificial hands dripped through Edward Scissorhands blades.

I'll post the sound cut / with some animation n such for y'all soon.


I feel like I'm the little kid here and this counter is the thesis which I am attempting to work on. It is difficult to reach when these guys keep getting in my way.

The Tiger Animatic

The Tiger Animatic from Ezra Edmond

Ignore the hideous scratch voices please. They will be not used in the final product.