Week 7A

I've finished my animation in class. Overall, i'm very satisfied with it. I was a little torn or whether or not I wanted to add sound, but ultimately I decided not to. I altered the ending a lot which now ends with a cursor entering the scene with a neat typing animation. This wasn't in my original storyboard. I considered adding a typing sound, but I thought it would be awkward that this would be the only part that I include sound, so I decided to keep it out all together.

Week 6 Outside of Class

Outside of class I continued to work on my animation project. We were told to consider adding sound into ours, which I might do. My dilemma is that if I do add sound, there's not much that would be fitting for the beginning part. The Steam logo is usually accompanied by a jingle, but it's not enough to condense into a five second clip. I've came a little farther in the animation though. I've decided to animate many of the parts at once to make the scene more dynamic, which wasn't originally part of my storyboard. I'm trying not to stray too far from it, but i'm having a ton of new and better ideas.

 

Week 6B

In class, we had additional time to work on our animations. So far, I've been having a lot of fun with it. I really enjoy animation in general, so this project has been very enjoyable for me. Before animating, I've been looking at the original Steam logo to make sure my proportions are right. Even though it's a simple logo, it's still a lot to animate and I want it to be consistent before I get very far with it. Since my logo is very simple and full of organic shapes, there's so much I can do with it. I'll probably have to stray a little from my storyboard though since I did come up with newer and better ideas since then.

Week 6A

In class, we learned how to use a program called "Audacity" to edit audio clips. This is helpful, as we are able to include audio in our animations. I did use Audacity in the past for personal use, so it was pretty easy to understand and I knew most of what was demonstrated. I do plan to add audio to my animation though, as the official Steam logo is presented with sound at times. I also created a new and improved digital sketch. This is originally the idea I wanted to do that I believed would be more challenging. I enjoy this idea much more, as it's much more dynamic and creative than my other idea.

Week 5 Outside of Class

Outside of class, I digitized one of the sketches I had done. It's very rough since I didn't finish it, but it gives a basic idea of what I plan to do. Sometime, I plan to finish and polish it completely. I am slightly conflicted though, as i'm not completely sure if this is the idea that I plan to go with. There is another idea that I think i'd rather do, but i'm unsure how to go about it. If I can work it out and it is realistic and doable, I will create another digitized sketch and post it here.

Week 5B

In class, I had sketched out different ways that I could animate my logo. I had decided to use the "Steam" logo, as I figured it was the most interesting to do. Since the shape is very organic and simple, there are a lot of creative things I can do with it compared to the previous two I had mentioned. I have plenty of ideas, although i'm unsure how possible they are since I am pretty new with Adobe After Effects. I did look up a few tutorials for some of the more advanced animations I had in mind, though.

Week 5A

In class, we critiqued our word animation assignment. Even though I had tried to keep mine simple and not include as much motion to keep the feeling of urgency and seriousness, I was advised to make it more dynamic. Some of the other criticism I received was

• More motion
• Change type-face (too generic)
• Add "..." for foredshadowing
• Find a good middle ground between static and dynamic animation

I was given positive feedback as well, as my animation was very easy to read, creative black and white transition, and successfully gave off the serious feeling I was aiming for.
We were introduced to a new project where we must animate a logo. It must be either an opener or an end tag. We must determine the context and type of animation it will be. I have a few ideas. Since I really enjoy the style of comics, I first thought of animating the blue Marvel logo. I would create a "slap" effect of the Marvel logo being placed on the foreground, followed by a graffiti effect which writes the "Comics" part.

              

My second idea would be a little more complicated. It would animate the Batman logo as if he were spreading his wings to reveal his name inside. I'm unsure how I would do this, so it's unlikely that i'll choose this. I've been playing with the idea thinking of different things I could do since I really enjoy this logo. 

                                                  

Lastly, the idea I will most likely go with is the "Steam" logo. I already have a pretty great idea of what I'd do with it and I know how I'd do it. I plan to animate the logo step by step, making it very fluid. It'll start out as a white background with a black symbol, but as it reaches its peak, the colors will invert themselves. I could also have the word "Steam" grow and swing around towards the bottom of it.