Progress!

Hey everyone!

So to start things off, I want to present this sketch of Pranav's post-apocalyptic character and his pet dragon, which I haven't yet gotten the chance to color in but that will happen sometime en el futuro:

Bob and his dragon. Snazzy.

Not gonna lie; it was really fun to draw. I also wanted to show you guys this draft watercolor version I did of Tia's hipster dude character:

Whoaaa color!

And some more pieces here and there:

An elderly man I saw at Starbucks

I kissed a piece of paper with lipstick on and then
painted over it... don't judge me

Anyone else stay up at night thinking of the
pronunciation of words? Yes? No? Okay

Watercolor madness, woo

The Art of Deflecting Compliments
by Daria Bazzi
(get it)
((the ART of deflecting compliments))
ha
haha

So now that we're all warmed up, onto the progress I've made with the animation! Here's a lil sneak peak at what I have so far, no sound or anything:

It took several hours. Fifty seconds. Woo. Thank goodness it's tons of fun.
Lemme know what you think of it!

And to wrap things up, of course,  a short or two.

Here's a super adorable one about stuff being all fun and games until someone (metaphorically) loses an eye:

(it's not really about stuff being all fun and games until someone metaphorically loses an eye)
((it's more just a cute lil thing about a dude and his wife being sweet and stuff))
(((and it's melodramatically comedic)))

But ANYway; onto the next short, High Tide, from a student at the School of Visual Arts, about friendship and learning and conquering differences:

Question: If you've been watching the shorts, what's been your favorite so far?

Well, that's it for today. I hope all you lovely folks are carrying along well.
Don't forget to brush your teeth.

Getting Down to Business

Hey guys!

I'm so sorry I'm late with this blogpost. But a lot has happened.

Let's start off with these characters I drew based on Zach, Navya, and Tia's answers to question number one on my last post:

Survivors of the apocalypse. Hardcore.

I haven't finished Pranav's answer yet (I will soon!) and you'll see where the answers to question two come into play in a future post.

With that said, on Saturday, I visited the Otis College of Art and Design. While on the plane ride back, I had some play-doh with me, and my father and I started making little animations with it.

First off, I remembered that my mentors had told me that one of the assignments given at RISD for first-years in animation is to have a ball roll on screen, turn into something, and then roll off:

My father saw what I was doing and became eager to try, at which point I took hold of the camera:

Then it was my turn again:

And then I felt bad because mine had been 78 frames or so, so I told him to do another one:

We had a fun time.

In other news, last week I finally got the thing I ordered to attach my phone (which I'll be using for the stopmotion, using the app iMotion) to a tripod!

The tripod. And underneath, to its right, the
limbs of paper puppets past...

I also had to remake my puppets last week. I tried working with the old ones, I really did.

I soon discovered that this work was going to
require that my hair not be in my face

However, I noticed that since I'd painted the paper with watercolor, the limbs were all bent out of shape after drying. SO I decided I'd have to make new, non-colored puppets.

RIP, old puppets.

And I did make new puppets!

Puppets 2.0 - Now with longer legs

So now I'm happy to say that everything is set and I can finally start in earnest. I'll give you a sneak peak into what I've done this Saturday!

Question: What's your favorite magical/mythical creature?

And then, of course, can't forget the shorts.

The Cat Piano (warning: it has some dark/violent themes), a very poetic piece regarding, surprise surprise, music and cats:

And then another animated piece with a very different style (but with some dark/violent themes as well, though in a different and more cartoon-y way): 

Lastly, I'd just like to mention this cool article/video that I read/saw regarding Pixar's really cool software for animating, Presto! It's super impressive.

And that's it for today! I hope you're all having a marvelous week. 

I'm Back

Hey gang!

Yep. You're part of the gang. The people-who-read-Daria's-silly-blog-posts gang.

So last week I fell sick, unfortunately, and didn't get as much work done as I wanted to. Though I did get a bit of work done, I decided to count it as my spring break, and I shall go over the things I did last week and this week right now!

First off, some productive procrastination based on your answers to my questions last post about favorite colors and odd hobbies:

~Sophia~
Fave color: Royal colors (...I tried red, it came out kinda orange...)
Odd hobby: Collecting receipts

~Tia~
Fave color: Blue
Odd hobby: Book pressing flowers

~Megan~
Fave color: Light blue
Odd hobby: Ordering physical copies of photographs

~Pranav~
Fave color: White
Odd hobby: Collecting coins

And then some other pieces I did:

I bought new watercolors this week
and took the liberty of painting
my hand...

And I painted these colorful peeps!

Alrighty, onto my project.

The first week, when I got sick, my mentors were kind enough to lend me their light table.

Ze la-eet tay-buhl

Here's a video of me tracing over a frame to make a new frame:

And here's how my bed looked after a while:

Beautiful, right?

However, I then met with my mentors Sunday of that week, and we decided that doing a hand-drawn animation was definitely going to take too long. If I wanted to finish the whole animation, paper animation might be a better choice.

Which is why I have to inform you all that I am switching over to a paper animation stop motion.

So that night I doodled a bit for concepts of how my characters would look:

Needless to say, I did not go with the circular one.

And then I started cutting out things:

It's a pile of limbs and torso and such.
Pretty morbid stuff.

But... how the heck was I gonna keep these pieces together, let alone have them move?

Michaels would have the answer!

Mmmm pretty paint...

No! Can't get distracted. Gotta keep going.

And then... I found them.

In English they're called Brads.
In French they're called Parisian attachments.
In Spanish they're called German attachments.
Where are they from? 

Mini brads. 

So many mini brads.

I proceeded to assemble the puppet and to experiment a bit with movement: 

I might've also messed around a teeny bit with the brads:

Anyhow, after that was all settled I started making more puppets and painting them with watercolors! 

I was originally going to go black and white with my drawn
animation but with paper I decided I'd add a lil color.

I'm going to be starting the film as soon as possible. I just need to figure out what I'm going to do for the facial expressions (switch out faces, maybe?) and then I'm set!

I'd also like to mention as a side note that animation has made me less fearful of critters. I was at Starbucks the other day, someone opened the door to the front of the store, whoosh, plop, there was a bug on my table. 

Instead of being horrified, I whipped out my phone and... filmed it... for future reference... for animation purposes... 

ANYHOW. 

I'm not weird. 

Questions. 

Yes I am.

1. If you were writing a post-apocalyptic novel, who would your protagonist be? Give a description, including physical traits as well as their overall demeanor/attitude towards life (are they confident, shy, nervous, paranoid, etc.). Feel free to defy stereotypes of what a post-apocalyptic novel protagonist should be if you so please!
2. Where is somewhere that you've never been that you really wish you could visit? 

Finally, here's an adorable lil animation from students at Ringling College of Art and Design:

And here's a bit of a longer one from students at the School of Visual Arts: 

That's it for today! 

Thank you for bearing with me and I hope you're having a shwankin' time.