Sunday, November 25, 2007

Tofurkey week is for Animating

Not been blogging this thanksgiving week. Too busy animating. Made quite a bit of progress: scene 3 is rendered and scene 4 is almost animated. And scene 5 will be the final one!


The image to the right is not from my animation, but something I created while testing rendering options in Lightwave, the software used in one of the classes I am teaching this fall. And if enough students enroll, again in Spring!

Monday, November 19, 2007

Untitled

Reviewing what I have been rendering of scene 3 so far, I found out the way I build the flower for my animation is problematic: the 3D program XSI is not consistent in resolving the solution for its leaf, making it shift in between render passes. But I have work-around for it, I think. It involves rendering one shot backwards so at least the end position of that flower leaf is consistent. The image shows a first full composite of scene 3. Have been animating quite a bit on Scene 4 as well over the weekend. But all progress is slow.


I have sort of thought up a new ending to my animation. I need to figure out how much work creating it will be. And I should probably change the title.

Grumpf.

Encountered yet another indication that now that Apple is a serious contender in the computer market again, it starts acting like a behemoth. Just Updated my Os X, including the new Apple Safari browser, and suddenly Firefox was no longer my standard browser. Bad Apple!

Tuesday, November 13, 2007

Zotheid

Finally got around to reading one of the classics that has been om my list for... dare I say decades? I bought a second hand pocket book of Erasmus his essential works a while ago, containing the one I read: "The praise of Folly". The Dutch title actually has a nicer ring to my ears: "De lof de zotheid"


Reading it, everything seemed quite familiar. Okay, the book is almost half a millennium old, so I should not be surprised. But I think that its reasoning has become so engrained in Dutch culture that reading the book is akin to meeting an old friend. And that's always enjoyable!


I did not know he was friends with Thomas More, whose Utopia is a classic still on my to read list. Time for the bookstore!

Sunday, November 11, 2007

Camera, Lights...

With scene 3 of my animation I am now in the stage where the computer has to do a lot of work for me: rendering the images. First up: the lighting passes. This means that animation-wise I'm moving on to scene 4 finally.

Friday, November 9, 2007

Wonder of the World


That's the name of the play I just saw at the Dreamcatcher Repertoire Company, where I occasionally volunteer hanging lights. A review can be read here, which I luckily read after seeing the play for it is one of those extreme spoiler reviews, albeit a very positive one. It was indeed a very fast and witty performance that had the occasional deep meaningful moment always immediately interrupted with a quirky remark. Happy to have seen this very funny play.


Image shows actress and artistic director Laura Ekstrand, from the linked review


Did I mention I spend most of today working on my animation?

Saturday, November 3, 2007

Confusion...


... is the best state to be in. Said Anthony Hopkins during today's lunchtime rerun of Tavis Smiley. I think he also referred to it as "making scambled eggs of your thoughts". Why is it a good thing? Because it makes you reassess everything, makes you get out of the usual hypnosis. I think that is what I would like my animation or videos to do: turn your brain into an omelette and serve it for breakfast