StoPP Day 01

I didn't think I'd be coming back here to blog again.. but anyway here goes. This time it's for a different module and lecturer so.. Yeah.

Anyways, for Amanda, I'll be labelling the posts under StoPP.

Hmm. Got to know about our final project for this module. It was to make a short animatics for an MTV. Got into our groups. The group I'm in has Adeline, Shermin, Cheryl, and Betty. :) Hopefully all will go well. Hmm and so since we've to present our storyboards on Monday, today's task was basically to draw rough storyboards. We'll be showing them tomorrow (Friday) to each other so that we'll be able to choose/get some ideas from each other.

So far I've thought of some ideas for my own storyboard but I can't really seem to imagine it when I draw. Maybe because my mind's kind of occupied. There's Jap roleplay script problem, Jap test tomorrow, and this storyboard. Hmm.. but I think not much can be done since I'm going back to Malaysia during the weekend.. So I guess I'll have to do what I can now :\

Oh yeah. We've roughly sorted out jobs for some. But it's not really finalised.. or complete. Basically Adeline and I would be working on the storyboard. Betty will be working on collaterals. Cheryl will be helping her out? Shermin said she'd do promotional materials but somehow Adeline and I want to help her out in that too XD. Erm,.. mood board.... ....? And so, like I said, it wasn't finalised. But Betty seems to be able to take the job on collaterals. She said she was experienced in that so.. yeah :D Before that I was worrying cause I don't like doing those kind of things. Ahaha. :)

Hmm.. I think it will be kind of tough...somehow..? Ahh..I wish for Jap to end already! So that we can concentrate on this.

ANYWAY.. The song we chose was "What if she's an angel" by Steiner Tommy Shane. I read the other song's lyrics also. It was "Coward of the country" by Kenny Rogers. Seems to have more words in it, more activities, basically more things going on. While the song we chose didn't really have much going on and has shorter lyrics, but I think all of us liked how it sounded like, like what it was telling, and chose what we thought was closer to us. So yeah, no regrets I guess? :)

Lyrics:

There's a man standing on the corner
With a sign sayin "will work for food"
You know the man
You see him every morning
The one you never give your money to
You can sit there with your window rolled up
Wondering when the lights going to turn green
Never knowing what a couple more bucks
In his pocket might mean

What if he's an angel sent here from Heaven
And he's making certain that you're doing your best
To take the time to help one another
Brother are you going to pass that test
You can go on with your day to day
Trying to forget what you saw in his face
Knowing deep down it could have been his saving grace
What if he's an angel

There's a man
There's a woman
Living right above you in apartment G
There's alot of noise coming from the ceiling
And it don't sound like harmony
You can sit there with your TV turned up
While the words and his anger fly
Come tomorrow when you see her with her shades on
Can you look her in the eye

Thursday

Yesterday, went home to sleep. Was really tired. Set alarm to 9pm actually.. but phone ran out of battery so it didn't ring.. The other alarm clock,.. I have no idea why it went off.. I think my roommate turned it off >_>".

So yeah,.. woke up late..about 11.40am? Somewhere there.. Hahaha..Slept quite long.. Oh dear.. Have been some time eversince I slept that long during the block! Hmm... then read my SMSes.. Went to ask if my group's done with the video concept and all.. zOMG.. Found out it's not done yet. So, I quickly turned the PC on and started typing it out...with help of the Video. Stressed.

Then, TY messaged.. Went to school to continue typing with her. Vivien came down from her MMFund class to pass us the storyboard, script, and all. She read the concept, and went up to continue her MMFund assignment. I hope she manage to complete it! Good luck girl.. Hmm.. Did a few more and then TY went to help print and bind while I compile everything to burn into CD. Zzz. Lecturers then came in. They had to use the 3D Animationg lab. So, we were shoo-ed out of the class :(. Went to the 2D animation lab to continue. TY came back. We did some double checks on what's not in the CD to burn and all. Phew.. Good thing she came. I think my brain was kind of stuck and all, and I missed out some files.. xD"...

Panicked. We were late. Went to the General Office to pass it up.. but heard that we were actually supposed to pass it up to Wahidah in the classroom. Since my slippers had some er, problems..? >_>" Passed it to TY and she ran to Wahidah XD.. Good job girl :P Ahaha XD Anyway, yes yes, it was really a good thing Wahidah was still there! So sorry we are always late :(.. Had really hoped things like that wouldn't happen... :\...but..ah..still late.. >_>.. Sorry! Still wondering why she called me aunty though.. >_>... Heard that we were the 2nd last group to pass it up :s..

After passing it up, felt more relaxed.. but.. Still have blogs to update and all.. Yeah.. Kind of like, rushing to complete it now..because I'm going to Malaysia later >_>.. In fact, right after this, I'm going to rush back home to pack and off to the bus terminal! Heard that we'll be having hols! Yay! x) Bye!

Might edit it a little more later.. but it'll be after 12am! Like, maybe tomorrow.. but oh well, will hand in the complete one on Monday.

+

o_O... HOME!! Bus met up with a small accident when it almost reached the station.. Luckily it wasn't a big one, and no one was hurt x).. Felt like a KPC when my brothers and all went down to see also >_>.. Good thing we were there actually to wait for my mom to come fetch us x)

Couldn't really sleep when I was in the bus.. Maybe I was thinking too much. oO.. Hmm.. Well anyway, this is the end of the block, end of MOIP1, end of sem 2! ZOMG FINALLY.... Thought.. Actually thought that it would be nice if we were given another project like this..as in, you get to mix around with the others and all, know more about them.. Maybe,.. maybe not... I don't know. Okay, you can call me crazy. Like I said, wasnt completely happy with the video...which is partially my fault :\ Didn't manage to finish editing it Properly.. SORRY GROUP MEMBERS. but I also think it would have been better if things were done sooner.. As in, if only the group didn't slack at some times(it was fun though :x?), some days, and Sorry for returning to Malaysia for a few times.. :\

Arghhh...somehow this thing is disturbing me! SHOO..GO AWAY. LEAVE ME ALONE. IT'S 4 SOMETHING! Oh dear.. Thinking about lecturers having to read this trash(?)/super long blog posts of about 60 MOI students.. I pity you :x Good luck! :x Sorry if we wrote too much trash xD"..

And to readers, sorry if I offended you in any way. :s

+If you're tired of sorries, THANK YOUUUUUU :))))))))))

++Hahahah.. it's amazing how people can update so much in such a short time :x..Well, anyway, this is kind of a reflection...since I'm not asleep yet anyway. Group projects.. I think.. arguments tend to rise... somehow or rather, there's also bonding... like, you tend to get close, far, and all.. but..what if everything's over? Do you think the group will still stick together? Reading some other people's blog about still being together is making me feel something weird. Well, I doubt it will happen to us, as in my group. I think everything will go back to square one. Coming year is when we'll be in our major right? That'll bring us to another place anyway.. Wondering if there'll be another time when all MOI people will be able to gather together. When will all of us know each and everyone of us anyway? Or will that even happen? Why am I thinking about all this things? -_-. It's just the beginning! Zzz... I think I should really get to bed before my parents actually wake up and nag at me XD"..Think I slept a little too much yesterday... 

Watched August Rush :)

Day 30 - Final Presentation

Stressed. Quite a lot not finished... No sound effect for stone animation, no subtitles, many more..!! Arghhh.. Had hoped I didn't sleep at all..and yes, MSN...

Went to school to continue editing. Mouse at home is so small, it annoyed me.. Hard to control.

I think it was quite productive in school. Not sure if it's because it's reaching the time, or because it's school, or I don't know..but somehow I managed to do things faster.. Edited the credits a little. Also put in names of modules, and some pictures of our works. One of the puppet scene went wrong when I used the pc in school.. It was fine when I did it at home.. In fact, I have proof.. cause I tried rendering the unfinished one but Oh well.. can't do anything anyway, right? So, had to do some extra last minute editing also.. Erm...anyway, had no more time. Rendered the video. Heard some good news from Yuan Ming that it was okay to put it into CD if we really have no choice. BUT...it soon ended. After the video finished rendering, I tried playing it but it couldn't work! ZZZZZZzzzzz Stupid. Then, re-rendered it but a little differently.

While that, since time was reaching soon, went down to look for Wahidah... to tell her the problem and if we could put the file into harddisk... Cannot, cannot, only allowed to put into tape cause the PC there cannot handle :(. She was angry... which made me lose my mood also.. Couldn't really smile for some time..

Oh..I think it was because many groups were not done with transfering their video into the tape so the presentation delayed, changed to 1pm! OMG.. Thank you, lecturers!

Anyway, at that time, I lent the camera to Sarah's group. Yuan Ming lent hers to Gina's group. Somehow or rather, my video camera landed in Yuan Ming's hands. So, let them put it into the tape first.. My group's video's not done with rendering anyway. When it was done, tried to open it. Ahh.. finally can open.. there were some jump cuts when showcasing works though D:... but no more time.. Finally after Yuan's group's done, went to transfer the video into tape. We were some sort of just in time.. Yay.. Wasn't that happy because 1. Lecturer is angry. 2. Stressed. 3. Video was kind of incomplete in a way.. Like, still no sound effect for stone, ending song had to be cut and ya..all of a sudden kind of thing... 4. No subtitles. Aaron was supposed to help me with subtitles but..ah...he came late. By the time he came, the video was still rendering. Can't really blame him either because he slept really late. Just hope that they'll understand what we're saying when we show our video to them..

Clip was exactly 10 minutes because I set it to 10 minutes in After Effects. ARGH.. Didn't knew we could put animations and all using Premier Pro.. Zzz.. So Sorry, group! :(

Anyway, presentation. Didn't knew everyone would be presenting today.. As in the whole MOI. So, it ended up taking some time. But before that, we had to do Peer Assessment.. 

Back to videos..
Thought that it was kind of entertaining, especially some groups like Apple's group and all. Shall comment a little on our class's groups..Don't really have much time to elaborate now..might edit it when I'm in Malaysia or something..(Read last post)

To me,..
Press to Exit(still wondering why they decided to choose this name.. didn't quite match them cause someone said Press to Play before the video started..)'s was better than the one they presented to the class the other day..

Looney Bin did it the comedy way. Somehow I prefered watching the one they presented in class also.. Still didn't quite get the ending. but Eyy.. it's not boring k :)
SNAP.. somehow, I prefered their previous one.. I have no idea why though... Didn't quite like the fact that they put quite a lot their outside of school work inside.. especially for Video..
Crewsade, great job. I think they managed to do it the epic way. It was way better than the presentation the other day when I thought it didn't really suit the theme. :) Even Mr Ronald clapped! :D

Conclusion, good job everyone :) 

+

and now that I think about it, I think it's better for a group to have a theme.. eg Epic(Raj's group), SNAP(Street style), Looney Bin(Comedy), Mole Productions(Spy),etc?

Day 29

Can't really remembered what happened..but er.. as far as I remember...

Oh.. I think I did some editing in Maya cause they said they wanted the glow.. also did a little bit on the ending credits..

Erm.. Then, went to school and continued editing the ending stop motion.. Running looked weird because I think erm, Ting Yu drew the wrong hand. Hahaha. Nevermind, girl :P.. Tried drawing in Photoshop/Flash to make it look right.. but the color is a bit off :(.. So that makes the action look off too :(.. When Ting Yu came, I showed it to her. Haven't match it with the song yet.. So,.. she edited it a little...

Aaron edited the video. He began putting in songs.. and some sound effects that Vivien found the other day.

Aaron told me to make the STONE word stand out more because Tri said it didn't really bring our group name up. In the end, she said the previous one was better. So, we ended up using that. I was fine with that. So were the rest..but I think Aaron prefered the one with the glow. Actually, I redid it but I made the wrong stone disappear so.. we couldn't use the new one I rendered.. The animation was different also.. if you get what I mean -_-.

Can't really remember what else did I do.. except for the fact that I tried editing the video also. Later, went to Aaron's pc where he also did editing and cuttings, and continued cutting the video short. Didn't like the many many many cuts, especially at the ending part.. but since we're overtime anyway.... :\ let it be. Hmm.. anyway, don't know where Ting Yu went in the evening.. She had something on I think..but glad the ending is going well..as in, better..

Well anyway for today, Aaron managed to cut it to about 10 minutes 30 seconds or less? and after his cuts, I managed to cut it to 8 minutes 45 seconds??..since the Stone intro and ending is not in yet. Somewhere there.. Later, put the intro and ending in to render so that we could put in animation and some works in After Effects + a little more editing?

Oh.. Vivien and I also did on credits..

While waiting for it to render, went to eat. Came back, continued our work. Managed to put some in.. Had to do some editing cause the timing is kind of off.. Security guard came in again... :\ Went home to do more editing because I'm the only who had After Effects. Erm, Vivien had it too... but... I can't remember. Hahaha. Oh... She had her MMFund to do : Poor girl. Wondering if she can cope... Ah.. Aaron has 2 modules this block also.. Sometimes I tend to forget that fact. So, sorry man... I think he's been skipping some lessons.. Also wondering if he did okay for it.. Hope nothing goes badly for them!

I think I got a little addicted to the song TY put for the ending.. Hahaha. Oh... and about the 3D stone, we ended up using the old one.

Anyway,.. at home...did editing.. Aaron helped edit a little on the credits... Ah.. I think it was a mistake to have MSN open when I'm editing.. D:..

Day 28

Alright.. finally got the days right I think... Edited. Let's hope I can remember what happened..

Anyway, we spent our weekend doing flash animations. Woo~ Vivien and I continued doing a little bit more of it today... OH yes... Finally completed the SPC Stone 3D Animation!

Lol.. I agree with Vivien doing quite slowly in animation..So she's assigned to do only one scene..but I don't think I have the right to blame her for that because I understand that she has another module to worry about... So..animation scene...

Intro when puppet pops up - Vivien
Intro when puppet falls - Ting Yu
When puppet looks at photographs - Me
Storyboard and walking pass - Me
When puppet flies past the paintings - Ting Yu
Puppet pulling of credits - Me

Dropped some parts of animation.. We actually simplified the ending part. Instead of animating the painting, we animated the chibi puppet pulling it instead.. :) Hmm..I think we reshot my part where I talk about Animation... and then TY talking about Drawing Essentials..?

Hmm.. anyway, did some er,.. stop motion? or whatever it's called. We actually took pictures of the drawing TY did, with little help from me and Vivien in tracing it. We had Vivien hold the notepad, and TY flipping the pages. As for me, all I did was take the pictures :P, helping them flip when they encountered a problem, and adjust Vivien's hands when it goes off the frame. It took quite some time, but after seeing the end product, we felt kind of happy :) and er, at least, it's easier than the stop motion of the real mannequin.... >_>.. I guess we are not to that standard yet, and we have not much time to do it.

Let's see.. Aaron edited the video.. Cutting it short. When I went over to see what he's done(if I got the day right..), the program actually hanged... :\ and Aaron had to cut it short again. Didn't know what happened.. Well,.. it's a good thing he didn't have to redo the whole thing... but anyway,.. since I think it's partially my fault, Sorry D:

Vivien went to look for sound effects. TY and I transferred the photographs into the computer. Oh dear.. Had to resize them all because the pictures were too big and er ya, Flash couldn't handle it. :( When we were done with that, I went back to animating the chibi pulling the credits. All of us stayed till about 12. Went back to adjust the flash thing a little... Added a frame of the puppet looking up in photoshop, and added some frames because the running action looked weird... but the color is a bit off.. D:

Oh yes,.. talked to Aaron about another way of putting things into the video... which was what I was trying to say last time.. but.. yeah.. it's already too late anyway.. and I think.. Sometimes I am a little like, want things to go MY way..(Bad, I guess) which is why, sometimes, I think, it's best for me to do individual work I think..? Shalalalala.. nevermind. Things will be over soon! Oh and he did say why it's done that way.. reliving the experience......

Saturday

Woke up late but lol still earliest to reach >:D..

Hmm.. went to do some flash of the chibi(small in japanese) puppet. TY then came, followed by Aaron, and then Vivien. Went over to buy lunch. After eating, started filming. Filmed the part where Aaron holds the storyboard in his hands. Also filmed the part where all 3 of them talk about 2D Art Fundamentals. After that, recorded some voice overs for photography. It wasn't a very productive day as all of us actually reached school later than the arranged time. :\ We wanted to film my part but by that time, the doors were already erm, locked? As in we can't get in even when we tap our cards.

Bleh... Anyway, managed to transfer the filming and voice overs into the computer. Eh wait... did I transfer the voice over? O_O".. Shall check later... lol. Hmm.. since we don't have premier pro, we couldn't edit the video :( So, all we could do was flash o.o...... Yep, went to eat dinner, then went to Aaron's workplace.. Did some flash.. Also some sort of assigned tasks for the animators. Hmm... but we still need to film, and still need to animate, still need to edit :\

Tsukareta :\..

Friday

Er..went to school and tested the video if it could be rendered.. It couldn't. This time Wahidah had another lecturer(Peng?) to help us out. It finally rendered...but it's without audio and it's a super big file O_O".. Rendered out some short clips that needed animation..

Video was still about 16 minutes long. Thought we had to cut it short. Told them I thought the part where we filmed the lecturers teaching in class was kind of draggy, long, a little boring... Some other parts like the part where Vivien, TY, and Aaron talked about 2D Art Fund is a little too long also. Didn't knew if I should say it out because none of them said a thing. :\

So,.. things to be done.. 

1. Talk about animation fundamentals :(

2. Voice over for photography?

3. Storyboard. Previous one had some reflections(lights)

4. Reshoot picture for Ideation works.

5. Talk about drawing essentials

6. Take pictures of A3, A4 sketchbook? Like,..to..showcase...

7. Continue cutting short Video Fundamentals video OR film a talk about it, like Drawing Essentials.

8. Talk about 2D Art Fund..?

9. Ending. Take photos.

10. Animation!! CHIONG AH...?

MIGHT retake 2D Art Fund works because there's no shake :( If not, we'd just use the ones we have right now.

Showed group members except Aaron(forgot) the short stone animation. Roommate actually said it looked like potato :((((.. Need to do some changes to it. Vivien, TY, and I took turns outlining the mannequin drawing for Ending.. But at the end we noticed some frames were not there... or there's just some error?? Hmm... 

Reshot the door for intro today. Sholleh, thanks for the tape... and lol,.. took pictures too...

Was also thinking of adding "Overall, it was a fun journey" maybe before the credits come in? Might be weird.. I dunno... Thought of doing it a little like the way Meet The Robinsons did it. Hmm... Also wondered if we needed to tell the audience what subject are we talking about and all..like, label..