Animating on Part 1 is now completed!!

It’s been a crazy last 2 weeks, I started it off by making the set for the van dashboard with the built in Sat nav. To make this set I  took the dash board out of the old car I used fort the full size van and melted it , cut it up, added parts and painted it to get final design. 

I spent the next 3 days animating and editing on that set and removing blue screens. I used the same over sized hand for Viv that I used for the shots when they are picking up the cleaning props.  To add in the sat navs screen I had to go on photo shop and repainted over the entire blue screen.  I did this so when I removed it would have a reel screen look to in and not as fill it had jus been painted over. 

The scenes with the sat nav were the last shots I had left to animation form the footage IV all reedy animated. So now I finally get to animated new scenes that IV been really looking forwould to animating. Before I can go ahead and animated new scenes in the messy house, I had to remake the puppet for the Old Woman. I did the beause the puppet I used before I did not had a good full wire frame in it and I wanted to give it the same one as Viv & Mandy have. 

Now that the new puppet was completed it was time for me to animate the big reveal shot were you first see the Old Woman in full. I animated all the shot facing the Old Woman firs and spent 3days on them. I have grate fun when I get to animated with Old Woman from using the voice track I have been able to get some really good acting in to this character that I think u all will really enjoy watching.  

When all the shot face the old woman was completed I then did a very big wide shot were you will see the hole set. to get the shot I had to put two sets togever the hall way set and the front door on the street set , this mad it the biggest set I have used and it took up most of the work shop  not letting me have much room to get in and animate. 

After the big wide shot was completed I then went on to do all the shots facing Viv & Mandy. This was the first big scene I got to animated with Viv & Mandy talking to each other for a long time, and had a really good time getting in some good acting in them, in a way I have not done before and I now think that this scene has some of the best acting and performances I have put in to them.   

I then had to separate  the hall way set from the street set so I could get the camera in so I can animate the Old Woman walking other to the siding doors. I then when on to animate the close up on Viv & Mandy saying the finale line of Part 1 of the story. 

All the animating for Part 1 is now completed and all that left for me to do now it editing , sounds ,fx, music and add a title sequence  and end credits, the relsice date for that will be told soon so all keep ya eyes out for that 1!!!!.

Thank you for reading my blog and I hope u will enjoy ‘Viv & Mandy in the Big Clean up’ when it’s out.  See ya in 2 weeks

Daniel James

Still going strong

Sins my last post I have been very busy with animating on Viv & Mandy. I stated the last 2 weeks off with animating all the scenes with Viv & Mandy looking and walking up to the messy house and knocking on the door. I spent 2 days animating on them shots, after they were completed I stated setting up for the Boy & Girl talking to Viv & Mandy. Playing the boy is my little brother, and playing the girl is my step sister.

All the shots facing the Boy & Girl talking to Viv & Mandy were shot over 2 day with the boy talking 1 day and the girl talking the next day. So I could get the right depth and space I wanted to the shots I had to place the camera fare back in the street set looking out the door and have a very large set on its side so it took up almost all the studio. I did come across many problems have the set like this when animating these scenes, manly getting reaching over to the puppets so I can animate them with out knocking props and parts of the set.

After completing all the shots on the street with the Boy & Girl I spent the next day doing the shots of Viv & Mandy going into the house and the letters been posted and falling to the floor. After that I spent the next day repainting the hall way of the messy house set. I did this because I never did think that the first way the set was painted never did show the level of mess what I wanted to. I repainted the walls, the photo frames, all he wood work and the sliding doors.

After the set was completed to a standard I was happy with I then had to make the 8 piles of newspapers that will be scattered around the hallway. To make theses I had to a full newspaper cut it in to long strips fold them, stake them up on top of one and other and tie them up. In total it took me over 7 hours to make the piles of newspapers. As I was using normal newspapers the size and scale of the text was not right for the set. To get passed this I made a newspaper on photo shop and gulled it to the top paper of the pile.  

Now that set is completed I final got to spent he next two days animating the first scene with the old woman on the phone to Mandy. The shots I used for this scene were very tight close up shots of the mouth and the phone, as the shots were so close up the lip sync had to be spot on. As the old woman has no teeth I really had to use the shape of the mouth to show what she was saying, I I spent to days working on this scene and had to reshoot a line at one point I do feel that this is the best and most detailed lip sync I have done to date. 

After the to days of animating the Old Woman on the phone I then when on o animate the Old Woman walking up to the Door and picking up the post. As the puppet of the Old Woman did not have the final completed wire framing that hero puppet will have. To animate it leaning down and going back up took 3 take in the end to get it looking right.

Now I have edited in all the footage I shot this week the total animation now last 4 mins and 15 secs. With the animation running well I now have to tack a brake and make a new set for the car dashboard with a built in Sat nav. I’m still making this set and there will be images of this set in my next post. To day I spent 3 hours making 8 different cover for magazines. These are the front page that will go at the top of each of the 8 piles of newspapers.

Thanks for reading my latest blog post pleas come agene in 2 weeks for a new post on how the production is going on the new Viv & Mandy.

I meant to say this in my last post

It’s hard to remember what I did over a 2 week period and here are things I forgot to put in my last post. On a Saturday I had a recording session with the woman who will be play the old woman (Catherine) and also with the girl who is playing a little girl who lives on the street. On Monday I will be have a second recording session getting the voices for the little boy will be with the little girl and I will also recording new lines for Viv & Mandy.

I also meant to say you may have spotted that the layout of this blog has had some changes made to it. Not all the pages have been fully set up yet but the photo gallery and concept art pages will be updated soon. So keep coming back and cheeking for any updates to them pages and the production of the all new Viv & Mandy.

Busy two weeks and got many more to come!!

It has been a busy 2 weeks here at, I started it off by picking up were I ended the last post. I finally got the large size houses street set finished, I add the fences to the street with clay and wood I then painted them so they are the same colour as the small size full street set. 

Now that he basic look and colour to the street was completed it was now to time to the more detailed painting the sets. This manly consisted of adding the mess and dirt to house number 6 and the fencing. When I was happy with the paint job I gulled the house to the set so it won’t move around when I’m animating. 

Now that the set was completed it was time for me to start animating. The first thing I animated on this set was the close ups of the post man posting the letters. I did this as it was tight close ups and would give me a good length of time to get used to working on this set. I hat to shoot three letter boxes, the first one was done in one day and the last two were done on next day.

After I finished animating the posting letters were completed I redid the full postman puppet. I had to remake the full size puppet because with the new street set design it did not fit in with the scale of the set. It took me over 4 hrs to make the body, and it took me 3 more hrs the next day to make the head.    

  

After the postman was completed, I when online and ordered 8 new super strong magnets so the puppets will stay still and for walk cycles. After I ordered the magnets I went into the work shot / studio and started to animate my first scene with the new postman puppet. i spent the rest of the day animating all the shots of the postman going up to and waking away from the all the clean houses. 

 

The next day I picked up from were I left of the day before and shot all the shot of the postman going into and from the messy house. To get the shots were the camera will see the houses on the opposite side of the street I had to use the small scale houses and use perspective so hey don’t look to small and out of place.

The next day the magnets arrived in the post, when I opened them I went into the studio and set up the full scale house set for the postman puppet and the magnets. When every thing was set up I spent the rest of that day animating my first walking scene with magnets.

When the walking shot was completed I then exported all the completed shots and edited them in to the final animation shot so fare. With the new animation added in I now how the opening sequence of the film completed lasting over 50 seconds, I now have 4 minuets over all completed.

With all the shots with the postman completed and edited I can now start shooting with Viv & Mandy them selves. This will be the first time I have animate with then sins April and the first time I have done any animation with lip sync sins before Christmas. Before I can do any of that I needed to spend almost 4hrs getting them ready for animating. As of now this is how Viv & Mandy are in the studio reedy for a full day of animating with them tomorrow.

So that’s you all up to date!, please do come back in 2 weeks time were I will do another update on the production of the all new Viv & Mandy.

Now In full production!!

I left college last Friday with the finally grade of DDD (distinction, distinction, distinction) the most I can get on BTEC course. So now I have been in full production on Viv & Mandy for a full week.
All this week I have been making a set of two houses and the street that are at the right scale of Viv & Mandy.

This is the largest set I have made as to date, the set is not yet completed as it taken such a long time to do but will be bye the middle of next week.

Here are some images shows how I have made this set.

I got the wood and marked out were all the parts of set will go and were the holes that are need to fix the puppets to the set will go.

From there I went on to add the long over grown grass that would be outside one on the house. To do this I had to sit there and glue in the grass blade by blade I don’t know how many are there but as u can see from the image there a lot.
 

From that a started making the two houses for the street, one will have a big role in film and has to have a working door and be decorated on the inside, the other one is there for close ups and wide shots so not as much detail on the door and the inside is needed.

I used the same wood as I did for the street, marked out and cut out the wood into the shape of the houses. As you can see one house has the full outer house cut and the second one only has the first floor cut out.
I then glued on the sides and painted the houses.

To make the door so it fully works I nailed in a small set of hinges to the door its self and nailed in the he other side into the door frame on the inside of the house so it would work as a reel door.

I then painted the doors on the houses, the second house dose not need to open so its only wood gulled the house. In cut and panted strips of wood and uses them for the window and door frames on the houses inside and out.

For the house that will be used a lot in the story I decorated hen inside of it with wall paper and skirting boards, there will be more details added when the set I glued to the street set.

With houses now completed it was time to glue them to the street set and do all the final touches with paint and set design. To the insides of the hoses and the street it’s self. These are not completed and will be finessed off next and I will begin animation on this very large set.

So come back in 2 weeks time when I will do a new post and see were I am in the production of the new Viv & Mandy.