Most Schools and institutes are places where they teach how to click buttons in 3D software’s… A short story By Clusters Animation Mentor Raghu

Most animation Schools and institutes are places where they teach how to click buttons in software’s. It has been long since people are being cheated without even knowing it. Wake up guys!! Stop from being fooled.

Forget words like "diploma", "degree", "PG", "Engineering in animation", "animation specialist professional". Animation Studios just don't give a damn to what papers called "course certificate" you have. It’s only your work that’s going to get your foot inside the doors of a big studio. Demo-reel is one of the most important things a student of should focus on. Find out what makes a demo-reel different than others.

Don’t get caught up into institutions promising to make you into animators by learning software! Don’t get carried away by people telling you learning software is animation. They'll mostly teach you modeling, rigging n Not the Real art of animation. SOFTWARE IS JUST A TOOL just as Pencil is a tool. You have a pencil in your hands since you were a child. But not everyone who can hold or scribble with a pencil is an animator. In the very same way, not everyone who can use Maya or flash or 3ds Max is an animator. Get into Animation only if you are really Passionate about it!

Watch a lot of animated movies! Understand the motion, dynamics, and acting. Also watch all types of movies, don't restrict yourself to animated ones. Get these books "The animator's Survival Kit - Richard Williams" and "The Illusion of Life: Disney Animation". Study those books, Read them, don’t just flip through looking at beautiful pictures, Don’t copy from those books. Get a pencil and start sketching.. go out.. a nearby park, a Cafe and observe people and their movements, behavior.

Search the internet for articles.

Watch a lot of movies - live action as well as animated. Watch movies more meaningful than staple Bollywood masala flicks. If you want to learn software to complement your animation skills, you can just buy tutorial DVDs from the internet and learn from it. In the end it turns out a lot cheaper, BUT remember, this is only for understanding the software which is just a pencil and paper for an animator.

If you really want to study animation and not remain jobless or work in some dingy institute, don’t put importance on the software. S/W is totally secondary.

Now is the time!!
The Internet is here at your finger-tips, make use of it.
Go to YouTube, search for demo reels of animators.
Check out blogs of animators.

So if you seriously want to learn the subject of animation go find out some nice schools where they will be concentrating more on the subject rather than giving importance to software .If you are good at subject like how things move around, on what properties and principles they act , you can do the task no matter which software/pencil you are using.

There are few art schools where you will be trained under mentors who got lot of production experience, who love what they are doing and still striving hard to master this art of animation. There are few schools in India providing proper animation training. Get there curriculum, speak with the existing students and check out their demo reels and then Join

Good Luck Guys

Regards
Raghu Varma P
email: raghu@clusters.in

Prime Focus VFX Adds Sparkle to New Moon - November 25th, 2009, 09:34 AM

Prime Focus VFX, formerly Frantic Films VFX, has completed 175 visual effects shots for the Summit Entertainment release, “The Twilight Saga: New Moon” directed by Chris Weitz. Prime Focus contributed a majority of the film’s most frequently featured visual effects, including CG water, atmospherics, CG matte painting and environment work, and the “Diamond Skin” effect on Edward and the other vampire characters. “The Twilight Saga: New Moon” is based on the popular series of novels by Stephenie Meyer.

Prime Focus’ newly expanded Vancouver studio, which has become the VFX hub for the company’s North American operations, handled the bulk of the work on “The Twilight Saga: New Moon,” which was shot on location in British Columbia. Key effects included creating apparitions of the Edward Cullen character and custom designing the “Diamond Edward” effect, whereby Cullen’s skin sparkles when coming into contact with sunlight.

Director Chris Weitz and his Visual Effects Producer Susan MacLeod tasked Prime Focus with evolving this signature Diamond Skin effect so that Edward’s skin refracted light as if diamonds were embedded under his skin.

The Prime Focus team, led by Visual Effects Supervisor Eric Pascarelli, went through extensive look development to achieve this effect, and used as its inspiration Greek Thassos marble, a very white, translucent material with flecks that reflect light very efficiently. The team even had a slab at the office for the CG artists to use as reference.

Prime Focus’ Vancouver studio also collaborated with its Digital Matte Painting department in Los Angeles (headed by Ken Nakada) on recreating the movie’s Forks High School, as well as craggy cliffs overlooking the ocean and other 100-percent CG environments depicting the movie’s Washington State locale. Prime Focus also contributed CG water for multiple scenes and two elaborate time passage sequences featuring the Bella Swan (Kristen Stewart) character in complicated multipart motion control shots.

For the cliff scenes, Nakada and his team designed the entire landscape using several locations in Vancouver’s Whytecliff Park as reference material. The team also provided on-set VFX supervision for MacLeod and Weitz on a greenscreen shoot at Vancouver Film Studios of a stuntman jumping 70 feet off a tower as a camera rig does a 270-degree tilt, following him from the top of the cliff until he hits water. Additionally, Prime Focus created several digital doubles and did face replacement for the actors jumping off the cliff.

Overall, a team of 45 across Prime Focus Vancouver and Los Angeles were brought onto “The Twilight Saga: New Moon.” Prime Focus’ key software packages included Autodesk Maya, Autodesk 3ds Max and Autodesk Mudbox for 3D modeling, eyeon Fusion for compositing, Prime Focus Software’s Krakatoa for particle rendering, Prime Focus Software’s Flood and Flood: Surf for fluid simulation.

About Prime Focus

Prime Focus is a global Visual Entertainment Services group that provides creative and technical services to the film, broadcast, commercials, gaming, internet and media industries. The group offers a genuine end-to-end solution from pre-production to final delivery - including previsualisation, equipment hire, visual effects, video and audio post-production, digital intermediate, digital asset management and distribution.

Prime Focus employs more than 1200 people with state-of-the-art facilities throughout the key markets of North America, the UK and India. Using its ‘worldsourcing’ business model, Prime Focus provides a network that combines global cost advantages, resources and talent pool with strong relationships and a deep understanding of the local markets.

RELATED LINKS:

www.primefocusworld.com

www.newmoonthemovie.com/worldoftwilight

New Deal Create Minature Effects For Watchmen

The much-anticipated release of Watchmen features high-tech mechanical and pyrotechnic effects created by New Deal Studios (NDS). The award-winning effects team at New Deal engineered a water tower to collapse onto a burning miniature tenement rooftop, spilling water onto the fire and allowing a split second window for the superheroes to save the day. A team of 60 artists from design, fabrication, effects photography, and digital combined their artistry to orchestrate the thrilling fire effects and bring the whole sequence to life.

According to Ian Hunter, NDS Co-Founder/Visual Effects Supervisor, this sequence required exact precision of the burning flames to match principal photography. “Our flame effects needed to be controlled and choreographed to the production’s pre-vizualization,” he explains. “A rooftop and a partial wall with windows was built and plumbed with propane lines for the fire effects. One shot required that the camera move around the entire miniature building and pass over the roof through the fire, so the flames had to be very controllable. The balance of the building below the rooftop was extended digitally.”




The planning of the photography for this sequence was crucial because of the pyrotechnics. The NDS art department sent CAD accurate models of the backlot and miniature to the digital department where Supervisor Robert Chapin and CG Artist Jeff Benoit positioned them along with models of effects equipment, huge screens, articulated camera crane and track. Using camera moves from the production provided previz, the NDS team created a real-viz version of the shot.

Camera moves as well as model, crane and screen placement were exported and used by production for the set-up of photography. “We had an extremely difficult camera move which had to cover 180 degrees over the width of the entire set which was going to be engulfed in flames. Not only did we want to match our previz on set, but we needed to make sure our camera rig didn’t go up in flames,” said Chapin. Having real information of all the elements involved with photography matched with the previz allowed the effects and photography team to plan out the difficult photography, saving time and money.


The digital models created of the miniature in the design phase were then used to generate blueprints which gave the fabrication crew the exact measurements needed to construct the 1/3scale tenement roof and wall. Leading the design and miniature fabrication was crew chief, Forest Fischer. Fischer’s team built the 16 ft. x 40 ft. long rooftop and 4 ft. diameter by 8ft. tall water tank within a nine week period. The model had substructures built of lumber double-sheathed with a drywall fire barrier. Model makers laminated walls with sheets of brickwork cast in hydrocal, then lined the roof with sheet metal and cut fire pits into the roof for the propane jets that would provide the fire effects.




Lead pyrotechnician Kelly Kerby led a team of four to lace the miniature with propane lines and over 30 gas jets that would be timed to camera for the flame elements. There were additional fireboxes used to simulate the flames from unseen windows that were later created digitally. Each propane jet was equipped with a valve so that the height and intensity of the flame could be controlled. This allowed the fire effects team to bring the flames up to the desired performance level when the camera rolled and then to a safe “idle” position between takes.

The big finale of the sequence was the water tower collapse. NDS’ Mechanical Effects Supervisor, Scott Beverly, designed and engineered the effect in the software program Solidworks, which allowed him to run simulations of the action and find any weaknesses in the design before moving forward with fabrication. The water tank had a steel frame lined with bender board and waterproofed with sprayable urethane with one side of the tank made of breakaway material so that it would crush when it hit the rooftop. The tank was mounted on a hydraulically controlled weak knee which allowed the mechanical effects team to choreograph the movement and control the fall rate of the tower to provide a performance as designed in the previz by the Director and VFX Supervisor.

The camera rolled at 54 frames per second and Director of Photography, Tim Angulo, covered the tank collapse with a Technocrane move that swung the camera toward the tank. Two additional cameras were used to capture a close-up and a higher angle. NDS Supervisor Ian Hunter triggered the button that collapsed the tank and sent thousands of gallons of water across the set in a split second. And that’s how a few unseen visual effects heroes used a bit of movie magic to save the day.




About New Deal Studios:

New Deal Studios was founded in 1995 by Matthew Gratzner, Ian Hunter and Shannon Blake Gans. This artist owned and operated, independent company is housed in two buildings in Marina del Rey, California. NDS has developed over the years into a full-service production and visual effects studio unlike any in the world. NDS contributes to each project by using a diverse palette of artistic tools that range from the art department, workshop, production, to the digital department and DI suite. Creativity and solid management practices are the foundation upon which NDS has grown over the years and why all major studios continue to entrust NDS with high-profile projects such as Iron Man, Hancock, Batman: The Dark Knight and upcoming films Night At The Museum 2, Whiteout, 2012, Alice in Wonderland, Terminator: Salvation and Shutter Island.

Exploit yourself is a Spec commercial inspired by NIKE

Directed by Carl Rinsch, Expliot yourself talks about your own limits.

The project is hot off the press and is intended to speak for the studio. You know, so much hard work never tasted so good for us once we saw the final outcome. Our wish was to show off the nerve and spark and freshness of the city with the strength and power of modern sport competition, all in a whole 3d environment. It had to be striking new and spirited, and yet dramatically credible.

We wanted to blend a robot state-of-the-art technology with the fresh elegance of the sport make, all set on the cutting edge stage of the more current TODAY. The bionic guy owns the skyscrapers and fifty meters jumps among metropolis concrete towers are just second nature to him. This is the place where he feels at home, and this is the feeling of freedom and force we wanted to convey .

‘Exploit Yourself’ talks about pushing your limits just for the sake of it. We see no competition or race but the one we all got within, still we keep trying to beat ourselves up. Faster runs, quicker movements, higher jumps: strength, pain, muscle, sweat, determination, thirst. Trying one’s best, never give up, create an enemy when there’s not one, the feeling of suffering for self beating. Winning in front of your eyes, winning for your eyes only, and never stop making you BETTER. Who said life at the city was placid?

The Runner -Exploit yourself- from BLR_VFX on Vimeo.

The Making Of Exploit Yourself

MakingOf -Exploit Yourself- from BLR_VFX on Vimeo.

James Cameron's Vision Featurette

Digital Domain’s Game Face for ‘Assassin’s Creed II’

Digital Domain forces viewers to stare deep into the faces of the freshly deceased in “Eyes,” a television commercial for “Assassin’s Creed II,” the new third-person action-adventure video game from Ubisoft. Directed by Andrew Douglas of Anonymous Content via ad agency Cutwater, the spot demonstrates Digital Domain’s expertise in working with the contours of the human face.



But instead of creating a fully computer-generated version à la The Curious Case of Benjamin Button, Digital Domain applied digital production techniques to give the live-action actors a haunting, hyper-photorealistic quality.

In “Eyes,” a bell tolls as the spot opens on a close-up shot of a pair of very still and vacant eyes. The camera pulls out to reveal that they belong to the macabre face of a recently slain medieval soldier. Other crime scenes follow, showing the just-murdered faces of corrupt noblemen, criminals and other victims. The final face is that of a cloaked man, his skin dewy and his eyes moist. The Assassin Ezio, who is the main character in the game, blinks and turns, taking viewers seamlessly into Assassin’s Creed II game footage.



“Our goal was both to give Douglas’ shot footage a hyper-photorealistic treatment, but to also make the actors appear so believably dead, it really takes the viewer aback,” said Vernon Wilbert, visual effects supervisor, Digital Domain.

“We found this aesthetic by re-lighting and adjusting the live-action faces, treating them so they had a waxy, plastic and synthetic feel to them, while retaining the essence of the photography. From our experience creating digital human characters, we built an intimate knowledge of how light affects human skin. What’s interesting about this project is, we reversed it, using digital tools to relight the skin to take away the appearance of life.”



For an even more unsettling effect, Digital Domain meticulously extracted all movement from the actors such as twitches and blinking, while digitally adding in atmospheric movement like candlelight flickers, water ripples and flies buzzing about.

To achieve the closing shot of the actor playing Ezio as he seamlessly morphs from live-action into an in-game character, Wilbert and his team walked the director through a virtual set within the game, as Douglas evaluated lighting and scenery as if doing a virtual location scout.

“It’s interesting how the same issues that happen on a live-action set can also happen within the game engine,” added Wilbert. “The light in the video game would change, or we’d have to wait for the moon to come back into scene, or the shadows would shift. Andrew Douglas was a great collaborator, and was completely at ease directing action in the virtual world. This converging of the techniques and tools of moviemaking and gaming is something we’re going to be seeing a lot of in the future.”

Digital Domain is an Academy Award®-winning digital production studio with a reputation for innovation and artistry. The studio has created visual effects for 75+ movies that have collectively generated more than $12 billion in worldwide box-office sales, including most recently, The Curious Case of Benjamin Button for which it won the Academy Award for Visual Effects.

A creative giant in advertising, Digital Domain works with a stellar group of A-list directors including David Fincher, Mark Romanek, Joseph Kosinski, Carl Erik Rinsch and more. Industry recognition for Digital Domain’s advertising work includes many Clio, AICP, and Cannes Lion awards and other industry honors. The company is continually pushing into new territory and is being recognized for its pioneering work in photo-real digital humans and productions that bring the worlds of movies, games, advertising and the web closer together.

The 10 Best Companies Supporting the Arts in America

Arketype, an advertising and design firm based in Green Bay, Wisc., will receive one of the BCA TEN awards at a Nov. 19 gala at the American Museum of Natural History in New York.

BCA stands for Business Committee for the Arts, a division of Americans for the Arts that each year honors 10 companies whose policies and actions have been most beneficial and friendly toward the arts. The BCA TEN have been named every year since 2005.

In addition to Arketype, the following corporations will also be honored on Nov. 19:

Adobe Systems, San Jose, CA
Applied Materials, Santa Clara, CA
Brainforest Inc., Chicago, IL
Dollar Bank, Pittsburgh, PA
Duke Energy, Charlotte, NC
Hanesbrands Inc., Winston-Salem, NC
Reliance Standard Life Insurance Company, Philadelphia, PA
UMB Financial Corporation, Kansas City, MO
Williams & Fudge Inc., Rock Hill, SC
In a statement, J. Barry Griswell, chairman of the BCA executive board, said, “These businesses are being recognized for their exceptional involvement in the arts throughout the workplace and in their communities. They provide the arts with significant financial and in-kind support, and they incorporate meaningful arts-related programs into lives of millions of Americans. This year’s extraordinary honorees are corporate leaders who are developing and sustaining arts and arts education programming in towns of all sizes across the country.”

All the corporations on the list will release statements soon, but Arketype’s seemed sincere and endearing:

“The arts and creative thinking have been fundamental to our business and to our mission since our beginnings in 1992. Arketype continues to put its wholehearted support behind the arts because of its tremendous power to educate, enlighten and build a powerhouse culture that creates a successful community.”

Per the press materials, Arketype delivers “high-concept design, custom animation, and video” and “partners with a variety of likeminded clients, big and small, and transforms market insights into compelling, stimulating, and even disruptive communication that gets its brand partners noticed. The firm is the leading catalyst behind ‘Better by the Bay,’ an economic branding initiative for the greater Green Bay community.” To learn more, click here.

The BCA was founded in 1967 by David Rockefeller to bring business and the arts together. The group’s mission is to ensure that the arts flourish in America by encouraging, inspiring and stimulating business to support the arts in the workplace, in education and in the community. Americans for the Arts is the leading nonprofit organization for advancing arts in America