Understanfing Rigs and character animation in Unreal was a bit complicated. The Riging process was using node based coding which I could grasp, but keyframing the animation was time consuming.
I used Blender for my character rig and animations. For importing the animations, I imported the character model with rig first as an fbx. And then imported animations as separate actions to plugin on the character rig.
This week we focussed on weight shifts and posing.
To understand the concept of mass and action lines, I sketched some poses. While posing them on the character rig, I made sure to exagerate the action lines and keep the center of mass balanced.
For the weight shift, we made a blocking for week 5 and then spline for next week. Comparing the 1st test blocking and final spline animation, I can see the difference in movement.
Poltical commentary in visual media often focuses on themes like race, gender, equality, disability, ethics, and ecology, which are portrayed differently across documentary films, cinema, television, games, and advertising. These formats can either challenge or reinforce social norms based on political context. Animated documentaries raise questions about authenticity, as Bill Nichols suggests documentary images are linked to reality, while animation’s departure from realism complicates this. Honess Roe argues that animated documentaries don’t fit traditional molds, challenging the belief that documentaries should be objective and realistic.
Animated documentaries are an evolving form that challenges conventional notions of truth and reality in non-fiction storytelling. While documentaries are often associated with realism and factual representation, animated documentaries break away from this by using stylized visuals and creative techniques. This format opens up new possibilities for expressing complex ideas and emotions that may be difficult to capture with live-action. By offering alternative perspectives on reality, animated documentaries can deepen the viewer’s understanding of social, political, and personal issues, expanding the boundaries of what non-fiction media can achieve.
Above: Still from the animated show ‘Blue Eye Samurai’, www.netflix.com. (2023). BLUE EYE SAMURAI | Netflix Official Site. [online] Available at: https://www.netflix.com/title/81144203
The animated series Blue Eyes Samurai explores themes of social injustice, gender, physical disabilities and discrimination. The series focuses on the protagonist’s struggle for acceptance and vengeance in a world that shuns them for their mixed heritage. Born as a biracial individual with distinctive eyes, the protagonist faces ostracism, symbolizing broader issues of marginalization of “others” in homogeneous societies.
The protagonist who is a samurai and skilled fighter, also hides herself initially in the guise of a man, to be accepted by the society. The series enforces this issue of gender-based oppresions through another character of a princess who struggles the patriarch norms, forced into a marriage to unite two clans. The series also presents multiple character who overcome their physical disabilties in their story arcs. Throughout the series the protagonist is supoorted by physically chalenged characters, like an old blind man who is a master swordsmith and a boy with no hands who is a cook and friend.
Blue Eye Samurai beautifully captures these social issues with an engaging story, which challenges and influences the viewer’s understanding of these social and political issues.
For my story, I needed broken building parts reconstituting into the original state. To get the right fracture amount, I tried multiple fracture seeds and setting until it was looking as needed. For creating further damage, I added 2 or 3 levels of fractures to some assets.
I used 2 different Chaos collections to record the fracture on the dome and wall parts. Recording and then keyframing the static pose time on the Chaos Cache managers, I managed to get the rebuilding animation in the sequencer.
The auteur theory, traditionally associated with film, states arguments about who is considered the author of a piece of work. In animation, this theory takes on unique dimensions due to the collaborative and multi-disciplinary nature of the medium. While Paul Wells argues in ‘Animation : Genre and Authorship’ that animation may be consdered the most auteurist of all film formats.
On the contrary, there is a challenge in attributing singular authorship within animation due to its collaborative framework. Wells mentions that recognizing an auteur in animation often involves analyzing their recurring themes, visual aesthetics, and storytelling approaches across multiple works. Very specific themes and genres are observed in the works of animation directors like Hayao Miyazaki and Junji Ito, making them the ‘auteurs’ even with the huge production team and studios involved in their works.
Wells further explains the auteur theory through the case of Disney of whether he can be considered an aurteur or not. While Walt Disney was barely involeved artistically in major Disney works, he shaped the studio’s brand and vision. Many directors of Disney studio downplayed their contributions to promote the ‘Disney’ name. This complicates the auteur theory as it aligns with a ‘studio-driven authorship’ model. It is not always the director who is considered the auteur, rather any producer or visionary leader that guides the production team in a specific style, genre, or theme.
Through his analysis, Paul Wells raises points for further discussions about authorship in animation, which is often a less regarded field of film practices. Animated film can be collaborative at larger scale and individualistic at smaller scale, making it complicated to define the true auteur of a piece.
The task this week was to fix the errors in blocking and create spline animation.
The first try was not right, particularly the ball motion was easing at each bounce and following asymmetric arcs. To fix that I went back to clean up the ball first and revised the tail accordingly.
This week was for learning material and texturing in Unreal. As having worked with node based materials in Blender, this was relatively easier for me to understand.
I created a master material. I added the following controls as parameters to modify for different instances-
Using this master material, I created multiple instances changing the parameters and getting materials for different surfaces.
I picked the music video “The Wolf” by Siames, directed by Fer Suniga & RUDO Co. Analysing it within the 4 criterias, it was evident that the animaiton is a ofrm of conceptual abstraction, representing the lyrical theme of music.
Above : stills from The Wolf music video, SIAMES (2017). SIAMÉS ‘The Wolf’ [Official Animated Music Video]. YouTube. Available at: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lX44CAz-JhU
The music video is a narrative-driven conceptual abstraction. The animation has a unique storytelling style using minimal designs of characters and visually appealing transitions which complement the musical rhythm. It tells a loose story involving a group of characters haunted by a wolf-like manifestation of their internal fears or desires. The tone is dark and suspenseful, blending noir and thriller elements.
The video’s objective is to visually amplify the song’s themes using stylized animation and metaphorical storytelling. The animation functions to complement the music’s rhythm and lyrics, emphasizing tension and release. The limitations are inherent in its abstract approach, which leaves much open to interpretation, allowing each viewer to derive their own meaning.
The director uses 2D animation with a graphic novel aesthetic, marked by sharp contrasts, bold lines, and minimal character designs. The animation uses dynamic camera angles and flowing transitions to intensify the music’s emotion. The ‘wolf’ is represented in a free form, with multiple limbs and solid black color with red eyes. Its movement is stylized to represent an uncontrolable impulse or rage, creating a direct relation the lyrics of the music.
The use of space and composition is cinematic, creating tension through tight framing and dramatic perspectives. The color palette relies on high contrast, dominated by blacks, whites, and reds, reinforcing the ominous tone. Movement is fluid and energetic, mirroring the music’s rhythm, with pacing that syncs perfectly to the song’s beats. Transitions are sharp yet cohesive, matching the shifts in tone and energy. The audio and visuals are tightly integrated, each enhancing the other’s impact.
This music video exemplifies experimental animation through its conceptual storytelling, stylized aesthetics, and effective fusion of sound and image.
‘Animation’ has a broad meaning which has evolved over the years. As mentioned by Paul Wells in ‘Understanding Animation’, 1998 the term to animate is derived from the Latin verb animare, which means ‘to give life to’. Translating this to the context of 3D computer animation, the act of moving inanimate objects in a virtual space to create an illusion of life is animation.
Some artists changed the methods through their experiments with different mediums, while technology acted as a catalyst to rapidly transform the techniques and styles in animation. The oldest device of Phenakistiscope, using a series of images on a circular disk or the Praxinoscope, using a cylinder and mirrors, was rotated at fast speed to create the illusion of movement. These were the earliest bricks for the massive structure that animation has become.
The avant-garde movement embraced animation as a medium for experimenting with abstract shapes, space, and time, offering more freedom than traditional painting. Many artists transitioned from painting to animation to break away from classical art rules. Movements like Futurism used animation to explore political and ideological themes, paving the way for Dada and Surrealism, which adopted film as an artistic form, strengthening the connection between art and cinema. Ultimately, avant-garde artists used animation to push creative boundaries and challenge traditional artistic conventions. Now, animation includes frame-by-frame animation, flip books, stop motion, claymation, motion graphics even virtual reality and visual projections. While some people refer to animation as ‘cartoons’, and the Japanese animations are called ‘anime’. They are all included in the broad umbrella of animation.
The exercise for this week was to learn anticipation, and more enhanced use of overlapping actions, using a ball with a tail.
Bill Tytla – “Any animation consists of anticipation, action and reaction”
Going through the Animator’s Survival Kit, I tried to understand the overlapping action for this exercise.
The task was to work on the blocking only, with movements on each bone for every keyframe. This was slightly complicated to fix timing of the animation. It took multiple revisions to get right. I tried to add anticipations for each jump to relate to the jump height and distance as well.