So this week we began our final pieces of animation. We have each been given clips from creature comforts to work with between 12-25 seconds long. Mine is 12 seconds but with the added acting at the beginning and end I think its going to end up being more like 20. We have 3 weeks in which to shoot this and then we start editing our showreels! 

We are using 2 puppets for this final piece, only one of mine is talking and the other is reacting. I am using Darwin and Peg Leg Hastings from the Pirates film and because it is set at and parent & baby night I had to make some (pretty gruesome) babies. They are both sat down throughout and holding babies so its all purely character based animation. I managed to get my first 146frame shot done on thus/fri and tomorrow I start the next one.

I don't have many photos, but I did jazz the set up a bit after that one was taken!

This week we had to get our heads around lip sync! We were given two short 3 second clips which we acted out reference for and then doped it out on the x sheet. I then did a block through of the head shapes from my reference and did a first pass on just the lip sync to try to get that working right. This was easy enough on the guy in the red jumper as he only had 2 boxes of mouths but yet again I found myself with Victoria and her million mouths. I spent a whole day perfecting the lip sync on her line before actually animating through on Friday. This was surprisingly quick because I knew it was all worked out and could just animate the eyes and brows while replacing the mouth shapes according to the numbers on the x sheet.

The pictures show my mad working method. I had to make plasticine eyelids for the guy as he has a slightly pinker skin tone which I then categorised according to how shoddily made they were.

In other news, on Wednesday we were treated to cupcakes and Prosecco at the unveiling of a new golden Gromit in reception to celebrate that the Gromit unleashed project has now raised £5,000,000! Its covered in facts about the appeal and was unveiled by a neurosurgeon from the Bristol children's hospital who told us about all the amazing medical gear it has enabled them to buy.

Us jolly animation students also went to see a giant fire in Victoria park which we can only assume was meant to be there.

We learnt to walk, and then we learnt to run! We swapped puppets and I ended up with the tallest, gangliest man. I tried my best to get more than 3 strides with him across the table. My first attempt was ridiculously fast, my excuse was that I was taking my timings from the reference video we shot but others speculate that its because I walk ridiculously fast in real life :)
The initial attempt was a 6 frame stride on 1's. With his tall thin legs it was barely readable so I slowed it down to an 8 frame stride and this looked less like abject madness.

On Tuesday night I had my two 3rd year films shown at the CineMe event at Tobacco Factory which was great fun if a little scary talking about my films in front of a room full of people. It was great to see what others in Bristol are currently producing.

We also had a fantastic masterclass with Richard Williams who actually rents studio space in the same building as us. He spoke about his time making Roger Rabbit & The Thief and the Cobbler as well as regaling us of tales of his London studio and learning from Milt Kahl and Ken Harris. He also told us about his current project rather playfully named 'I hope I don't die before I finish this' which he estimates will take him 10 years to complete. We all sat listening with great fascination as he acted out each tale with the verve and passion of a man who has led a fascinating and varied life.

As you'd imagine, Aardman does Halloween in style. I was impressed by the offerings of the pumpkin carving competition but even more so by the incredible home made costumes at the company Hallloween party at the Tunnels. There was a Boxtroll, some people on a rollercoaster, three people who came as sushi and soy sauce, an angry kid and a man in full furry wolf outfit complete with plastic babies and working nipples which dispensed baileys!