Monday, 27 April 2015

Papahanaumoku sound track


Creating these three videos helped me compare the different styles of music. All of these songs have a Hawaiian style to them and add a different spin on the animation.  




Wednesday, 1 April 2015

iMovie



Although I had access to the more complex movie editing programs I felt confident using iMovie and knew I wouldn't be using any effects so a more detailed program was not needed. 

Once I had imported all the frames into the program I highlighted all of them in order to alter the settings. The top right 'i' button allowed me to change the duration of each frame, I brought this down to 0.1. The frames then moved at a fast enough pace so they then looked animated when placed together. After this I needed to change the settings of the picture as they would automatically zoom in, I used the crop tool and put all the frames under the 'fit' setting. This setting kept the frame as a normal still picture. 

iMovie being an apple product also linked up with its other programs such as itunes. This meant testing out sounds tracks was very simple as everything was already loaded onto the computer and ready to go. After I found the right sound track that fitted the animation I would drag it below the frames and apply fade out setting so the track wouldn't suddenly stop as the track is fairly longer than my animation.  

After all the frames were placed together and I was happy with the final result I had to export the clip as an MP4 file so I would be compatible with all computers and not just Apples.        



Tuesday, 31 March 2015

Animating process



Youtube Video's 

I origionally planned to use my own footage for rotoscoping but as the story developed using my own footage become unrealistic. Once I had decided to incorporate animals within the animation I began looking for footage elsewhere. Youtube was the most useful source as they have such a huge libary to choose from. I primarily looked for footage taken from the Islands of Hawaii to ensure the footage was an accurate dipiction of Hawaii.
Screenshot Video


For rotoscoping I would need a large amount of frames close enough together to give the illusion of movement. For this I would press shift, command, 3 to take a screen shot of the video clips that I had put on full screen. I would use to space bar to quickly play and pause the screen for me to take the screen shots so closely together.    


Number Frames

I created a folder for each scene in order to keep everything organised. 

  
Open in gimp using two layers



For rotoscoping I would need to trace over frames that make a moving image when put together. To achieve this digitally I needed to open each frame in the gimp program in two layers. By doing this I could Lower the transparency of the screen shot and draw on the white layer. Using a tablet the process was fairly simular to tracing pictures manually. After I had completed the drawing process I would drag the transparency down to 0% leaving only the outlines I had made.  


Set transparency


In order to clearly see the pen marks the transparancy setting of the picture needs to be reduced. I bring it down to 50% as this gives me an equal visual of both the origional picture and the new canvas I will be drawing onto. After the picture is completed I will need to bring it down to 0% leaving only the new layer I have added.  


Trace over screenshot (rotoscoping)





Gradually fade out images (-10% each frame)


For each new scene added in I would need to include a transition. This involved me decreasing the transparency of the pen on the outgoing frame and increasing the transparency of the incoming. This process would take 10 frames to complete on each of the scenes makeing it a total of 20. These transition frames would take the lonest to complete as I would have to overlap images and alter the settings of the tools I was using.


Fade in next image (+10% each frame) 


Export image as pdf file


Once completed I would need to export the image. Usually Gimp would automatically save the file as an XCF file, this allows me to go back to the picture with all the settings the same as how I left them. This doesnt allow me to use the picture in editing programs such as iMovie therefore I would have to go on save as, then type in the name of the file replacing the '.XCF' with '.JPG'. This would turn the file into a picture file meaning I could use it like I would a photograph.


Final frame folder 

All of the finished frames were places in the same folder so I could highlight and put them all into iMovie at the same time.