Applied 2 has been such a great module for me, as I was able to spend a long time learning and experimenting with a new technique that I have always wanted to investigate. Because this was so new to me, it was also great being able to work with someone else who had an interest in this technique, as we were both willing to put more effort into the production outside of regular uni hours. I feel like I have learnt an abundance of skills throughout these past few months, and I have honestly really enjoyed this area of animation which is completely out of my comfort zone. As someone who likes to work outside of the classroom as well as inside, this module pushed me to use more of the college’s resources and also communicate with my teachers more, so that I could reach the best of my ability.
Despite having already worked with Hayley in our OUAN504 module, it felt like I was working with someone new because the whole process and technique that we were using was foreign to us. Because of this, we had to constantly communicate, share ideas and methods in how we were going to approach our work, so that we could find a happy medium that would allow us to produce good results. I felt like we were never that badly behind in our work, and we stayed on schedule, which left us a lot of time to comfortably work on post production and the final touches. I also feel like I am more comfortable working in a team now, because I have more experience handling duties and pressures.
I found that pre-production was my least favourite part of the module, which has made me realise that this is perhaps not an aspect of animation that I should go down in my future career to focus on, as I didn’t enjoy it that much. This could be due to the amount of times Hayley and I had to re-record our audio and write the script, which in the end did benefit us, but at the time was very frustrating and made me worry a lot on how our animation as a whole would turn out. The only part of pre-production that I enjoyed was creating the models and the mouth shapes. Again, I was so worried to start this process, as I felt like I would completely ruin the image Hayley had set up for the project. Since i’ve never modelled a character before, I felt like I didn’t know what I was doing, but I carried on, and in the end I loved how my characters turned out and I was so proud of what I had achieved! Then once I begun to animate them, as they came to life I was even more surprised and began to feel more confident in myself.
Therefore the actual animating part of this project was by far the best stage for me. I loved moving the characters and seeing them become like real life animals. I had to look at reference videos, as well as act out simple, subtle actions so that I could reflect that into the character. There was so much caution and planning when animating them, but this was fun for me, because it was so technical and intricate. What did surprise me the most about this module however, was how much I enjoyed directing. Though I am assertive outside of uni, I have never been so when at school or college, so naturally, I was not at uni either. I always felt wrong to ‘boss’ people around, however when it was Hayley’s turn to animate, it felt so natural to direct which way the model’s eyes should turn, or which way the hand should go, that I didn’t even realise I was directing until she told me! I loved being particular about each frame because I felt like it would make all the difference, and I wasn’t afraid to keep telling her if something didn’t look right. I am not sure if I would ever venture out to be a director, but I did surprise myself, and I think it has allowed me to grow and not be afraid to tell someone how something should go if I don’t think it fits!
This project has also allowed me to explore post-production, which I have done briefly in every module, but not to this degree. Within Applied 2, I had to fix lighting, stabilise frames, adjust formats and do various bits of cleaning up, which was not as stressful as I thought it was going to be. Because Hayley and I had finished our animation around a week before the deadline, instead of rushing to tweak the animation, we could take our time. This meant I was able to learn how to stabilise a shaky animation properly, as well as how to fix flickering lighting, which was quite time consuming. I feel like these are really beneficial, not even for just animation but for any type of video making, so I think I will be able to make good use of these for years to come! Not once in this project was I not learning something new, which I find very fulfilling to say!
Overall, though Applied 2 was scary and not very enjoyable to start with, it ended up being the module where I really jumped out of my comfort zone and took a big risk with a new technique that could have gone horribly wrong. I really didn’t know what I was doing to start with, and I always felt like I was going to let Hayley down, but looking back I have developed so much and feel silly for even thinking that! I hope I can do this technique next year at some point because it was so much more enjoyable that simply sitting in front of a computer for hours. I was able to use new resources, physically make things and see small models come to life! OUAN505 has been a really great module for me, and I am so proud with what I have achieved!
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