Characters and barriers

Week 3, finding my feet.

While I meant to get this blog up and running a fortnight ago, when term commenced, I was of course struck with my usual methodology of coming up with a great idea, putting a half hours' thought into it, then promptly forgetting it in favour of doing something more appealing to my sit-around-achieving-nothing synapses (see the preceding post for more on this particular personal peril).  So, as I was feeling all enthused and intoxicated with my sense of achievement today in relation to maintaining the basic standards of human dignity and punctuality, I jumped on this blogging bandwagon and got the recalcitrant idea manifest in reality. More power to me, I think.

Moving swiftly on. Today is the start of my third week back at university, which is probably a better, calmer place to start this foray in journalism than the first two weeks, beset as they were with the shock to my system of trying to stay operational between the hours of 8 and 12 like normal people and dipping my toes into the newly restructured tutorial system and social climate at Abertay.  Upsets to my system aside, there was a certain amount of frustration in regards to timetabling and the impossible bureaucracy of the institution that would have coloured my opinions somewhat - I'll be striving for neutrality in these episodes, to start with at least.

So, for those amongst you not aware of the University of Abertay Dundee (aka: a jumped up polytechnic with delusions of grandeur thanks to some glowing praise from nouveau riche industries and the contemptible gushings of the media), their practises and perversions, and my place in the scheme of things, allow me to hit you with some knowledge. I am a 3rd year Computer Arts undergraduate student in the world renowned School of Computing and Creative Technologies, which is basically saying I'm an academic nerd of online animations and non-mainstream videogames.

On my timetable is a spread of subjects including: 

• 3D Animation, revolving around designing, building and choreographing a character in a short film, concentrating on movement, expression and personality.
• Interactive environment design; which is essentially lessons in game modding with the Unreal engine, re-skinned for our purposes to make any kind of game we fancy.
• Screenwriting, which so far has consisted of the watching of the intros to about a dozen films, learning the industry standards of script presentation and my unashamed ogling of the girls in the class.
• The Group Project, which I like to rename in my head "the Grand Unknown", a clusterhump of client  briefs from some particularly big name companies including Sony, Disney and several advertising firms, to the end of exploiting us students as free labour.
  

So, while trying to fit in continued employment at the Greaseyards, making the fats* of the land poorer, thicker and wider; attending weekly sessions of behavioural therapy to re-align my chakras and trying to attend the gym regularly, I'm just getting used to this timetable and the requirements of my useless human body for sustenance, sleep and sexual tension in a single day. So far, so much fun, as Abertay seemed to have learned the lessons of the previous years of driving nice young artists to throwing themselves off the roofs of their halls of residence and started giving far more support and tutorials in the use of the computer programs and facilities needed to succeed in these endeavours. 

I'm enjoying refreshing a few old skills, woefully inadequate as my sketching and art theory is at this stage anyway, but the sheer scale and complexity of the computer work ahead of me is cause for concern, just as it always was.  More on this, in time.


The first obstacle to cross this week however, is my choice of character for my Advanced Visualisation module - in which I must build a 3D model, animate it and create a 15-30 second animation that shows movement, personality and a change of emotions through expression and body language. 

I'm caught between a lot of temptations and rationalisations, as my choice of character will have to encompass a lot of variables. How easy will they be to make? How easy will they be to skin? How will an audience, more importantly, how will a marker react to their appearance in lieu of my skills creating them? How easy will they be to animate? To move? To empathise with? Can I think of anything convincing to do with them in such a limited brief?

Rough sketches of ideas to follow, all of which require more development...

First up, my long-running comic draft character, Strick, here shown in the nearest-to-hand doodle on my desk. I'd like to get him modeled so that I have a 3D reference on how to draw him the same all the time and to have the blend shapes needed to get his expressions right. Also, I have a full on artistic chubby for plate armour. Pros: I know this guy inside out, since he's been bouncing around the walls of my skull in various forms for a decade or so and I really want to develop him more. Cons are that I don't really want to cock him up by learning on him and any story I'd like to tell with him involves other characters and would be too long to fit the brief.

Original character developed in an animation tutorial brainstorming session, irate Italian stage magician Whizzo Fandango. Invented solely to fit into the brief of a 30 second short film displaying a character, a conflict, movement, emotional reaction and resolution. Pros: Simple, disposable character that I can work on to learn Maya; he was purpose made for the brief. Cons

Myself and forum friend Mordred, in cartoon alter ego forms. This is drawn in the kind of art style and character style I would use for Flash Animations or gag comics, as it lends itself well to exaggerated movements and meaningless, puerile slapstick. Also, it would be a cool thing to show my forum group. Pros: Lovable spoof imagery on both characters, perfectly suited to short, humorous scenes. Cons: Choosing to do myself is incredibly vain and uninspired, while Mordred's avatar is devoid of expression and therefore very difficult to fit into the brief... Unless you can get that much body language out of a diving suit.

One of my favourite creations of all time, Blunt, the main character in my second year game design project Meatship. A social outcast from a species of  Sabre-Toothed Skitterants who embarks on a juicy point-and-click quest to reactivate a dormant, living, flying, fighting, betentacled battle cruiser in a dimension of sentient meat. Pros: A totally novel concept that I personally find hilarious with a design style that I really want to indulge in more. Cons: Does not fit the brief as the animations are expected to feature humanoid-ish characters with relatable expressions - with his vertical jaws, blank eyes and only 2, appendageless limbs, he would be difficult to both emote and characterise in 3D.

So, you see my conundrum. Any commentary or advice in this regard is welcomed, as is boasting and showing off any of your own material if you happen to be a similar sort of artist or 3D modeller. In the meantime, I have some lectures to attend and great barges full of program tutorials to chew through in order to get a grounding in Maya again.