Huge workflow write-up for Spaceman Animation

jipe

Just finished writing about my workflow for the spaceman animation from several months back! It's 8 pages long and focuses less on technical junk and more on the process of developing a character's personality through motion. I tried to be candid about good and bad decisions and the mistakes I made along the way, as well as why certain choices were important.

http://jimlevasseur.com/workflow

I know we don't have a ton of animators here, but it might be useful for character artists to see how one animator thinks about his work. Plus I wanted to give back to Polycount because the shot wouldn't exist without Duncan's generosity in the first place. Thanks guys!

Cexar

Dude, big ups for this. As one of the animators I can really say that it's nice to see this kind of material. Just the reassuring part of stuff never being done but abandoned reassured me that I'm not so different, after all.

Hope that you get to it and animate more stuff like this!

rock

Wow Fella, big thanks for sharing this! By the way your showreel is amazing. Those Ideas and even more the fantastic realization really made me laugh and amazed me

Cheers

Envart

Really interesting stuff. I'm not an animator so it was difficult to pick out the subtleties of the motions. Cool article and an awesome animation.

slipsius

Awesome writeup man! seriously. thanks a lot for that! Loved the finish piece, and i absolutely agree with you, you dont always need reference to start something. I usually use imagination until I see something not working, then go to reference. if its something ive never done before, reference tends to come sooner than later though, but its definitely not needed to start. just move those controllers! see what works, what doesnt and go from there.

thanks again!

Mezz

Almost missed this post, good thing I found it, cause the write-up was awesome! Really enjoyed hearing your thoughts on the full process, since a lot matched up with the same thoughts I have during a project.

"I would never abandon George (we’re on a first name basis) but it’s safe to say I never want to open his scene file ever again." --I really loved this line. I have felt very much the same myself in the past :P

Thanks for taking the time to do this write-up, and I really loved the scene you animated!

jipe

Thanks for the feedback, guys! If anyone has questions, just let me know... I tried to keep it accessible for non-animators but I'm sure some jargon slipped into the writing.

And I'm definitely working on some more fun stuff. Hoping to share in-progress work rather than just posting the final shot!

Sukotto

This is soo awesome! Gotta give it a more thorough look-through when I have more time. As an animator myself, this is extremely helpful!

Urkie

Thanks a lot Jim, very useful!

DirtyMrDucky

I've only animated a little in college, and wish more of the instructors were as informative as this. i also wanted to say this animation and ur reel had my lawling hard, loved it!

Sukotto

Wow I didn't realize you worked on External World! I love that short! Saw it at the Ottawa Animation Festival last year.