Animation

Unfortunately I missed yesterdays session due to illness.... Not to worry; i did a course in graphic design last year and one of the modules was in stop motion animation. To show i have an understanding of how it works, here's one i made earlier;

Philips WOWvx 3D Display - The future is here!!

When i set out to advertise 3D TV for the 2020 brief, i would have never of thought the first generation of home entertainment screens would be in the shops within the year 2008, i must admit i did have something a bit more sci-fi in mind. Anyway here's the specification i took from www.dimensionalstudios.com;

3D Intelligent Dual-Mode Display
Philips 3D Solutions offers a 42" autostereoscopic 3D display family, for professional applications, that provide today's best 3D viewing experiences by using WOWvx technologies. The slanted multi-view lenticular lens technology affords full brightness and full contrast and allows multiple users to view 3D content at the same time, within a large comfort zone. Moreover a true colour representation is ensured by the lenticular lens technology.



The display is based on a high definition panel and thus enables great picture quality in 2D and 3D mode. Integrated advanced display signal-processing offers content creators and end-users full control over the quality and depth-effect characteristics of the picture. Furthermore, a flexible 3D data format, in the form of 2D-plus-depth, allows easy creation or adaptation of applications and content for the display.

The 42-3D6W01 WOW type includes a news lens design based to enable even more exciting out-of-screen experiences.

3D System Solution
The displays can be applied in a broad range of applications, since it can be operated in both 2D and 3D mode. The system solution is designed for maximum reuse of content/concepts from the 2D world. The key enabler for this is the flexible 2D-plus-depth format, that allows decoupling of content creation and content visualisation. This allows applications where different 3D display screen sizes and designs can be applied in the same system. The 3D display selects the best way to visualise the 3D content.

3D Content Visualisation
The 2D-plus-depth format is compatible with existing compression tools, where the additional bandwidth of the depth is small. The 3DS Media Player is provided with a 3D display to show the 3D content. The actual 3D content can be created via a plug-in available for popular 3D animation software packages, that allows existing and new content to be exported in this format.

There are many Digital Signage or Narrow casting software solutions in which the 3DS Media Player can be integrated easily. However, for smaller system the 3DS Media Sequencer available offers a way to create XML based play lists that can be supported with an HTML based user interface design for infotainment applications.

In addition to real-time and offline content creation tools, are are also many applications that operate on a 3D dataset. Most of these applications, such as games, design, etc, use the OpenGL or DirectX API. The OpenGL WOWvx Visualiser and OpenGL WOWvx Control support real-time extraction and useage of the depth information and thus real-time visualisation on the 3D Display.

Price: £7,325.00 (GBP)
Order yours through me if you like..
i promise i won't leave the country.

Communication Design for Print and Digital Media

We received our second brief for this module today. Basically we need to design a double page spread for a magazine and a HTML/CSS based Mini Website looking at a hobby or personal interest. This will be created using a variety of digital media and print based processes.

Course Elective

In my course elective i set my first choice as the music technology and recording techniques. I still have no news on whether or not my request was successful, regardless i am looking forward to starting the course as it will improve my knowledge of producing, recording and mastering.

SIGGRAPH 2007 Computer Animation Festival

Multi-Touch Interaction Research

Gorillaz Hologram MTV Awards - Created by Musion Eyeliner

Whilst trwalling youtube for interesting videos i stumbled across this holographic display made for Gorillaz at the MTV music awards in Lisbon. I was most impressed as this was the sort of thing that i first imagined when i decided to do my 2020 brief on three TV, cinematics and holographic display.

Digital culture and technologies - 2020; 3D TV 'could be as little as three years away'

My original idea for this brief is to create a poster advertising the release of the first 3Dimensional moving image or Holographic Display. I wanted to see if this was a feasible idea to develop, my initial research makes this project look promising;

3D TV 'could be three years away'
Wearing 3D glasses may be a thing of the past
3D television could be in homes within three years, according to a European research consortium.

Levent Onural, co-ordinator of the multinational 3DTV network, said the technology was already in place for 3D TV and cinema to become commonplace.

The consortium, funded by the European Commission, consists of about 200 researchers in seven countries, and is halfway through its four-year duration.

However, Prof Onural said holographic television was at least 10 years away.


We think that there will be huge interest from the movie-goers
Levent Onural, 3DTV consortium

He said: "We do think holographic 3D TV is feasible, but the technology is not in place yet.

"If you ask my opinion, it will take another 10 years to get there, but some say it will take 14 to 20 years."

However, he said that it would offer the "ultimate viewing experience".

"For example, take a football game. Viewers would be able to look at a TV that will be like a coffee table and see small-scale real football players made up from light running around on that table."

Lower-end technologies

The research consortium is looking into all aspects of 3D technology, such as capturing 3D motion scenes, computerised representation, transmission and display.

Professor Onural, who is based at Bilkent University, Turkey, said: "Lower-end technologies, such as stereoscopic 3D (a method of displaying an image that gives the impression of depth) will be commonplace in homes and cinemas in about three years."

He said the technology had been present for many years, but recent advances would mean the motion sickness that has made 3D films an unpleasant viewing experience in the past could be reduced.

The research consortium has also developed and tested 3D stereoscopic displays where the viewer can look at 3D images without special glasses.

Professor Onural said: "With stereoscopic cinema, we think that there will be huge interest from the movie-goers, and we think it will be available in regular movie houses in three years.

"We think that some people might want to purchase 3D television sets for home viewing. "

However, he admitted that he did not "yet know how the consumers will behave and what the commercial success of that project will be".

This extract was take from the BBC News Website

Alien Song

This is a good example of weight through animation, the way the character portrays emotion through body language is spot on. The movement helps the viewer sympathise with the alien character at the end in terms of dramatic irony. If the character was more realistically rendered then this would be more believable, having said that all the movements in this are human like with a finish which suits the style of animation.

Digital Animation - Newton's Cradle

Adding to the weight theme practiced in last weeks session we were required to create a "Newton's Cradle" to demonstrate an understanding of weight movement within animation... Here's my first attempt;

Evaluation for Design Communication

In general this piece sums up my hobbies, interests and a small amount of biographical information, therefore I would say it meets the requirements of the brief. I used a good range of imagery, three of the images I used I took myself and the other three I downloaded from the Internet. I expressed concern in my rationale about using imagery from the Internet as they are of a low resolution, however in the end it was some of the images I took myself which let the whole thing down. One image (the club scene) I took using a digital SLR so this is good quality image but the decks and plughole were taken with a point and shoot camera so unfortunately they’re not to my satisfaction.

I decided to go less political than first anticipated with the word “Capitalist” scribbled across the globe in a type face which is not that legible, this shows that this part of me is quite hidden yet still exists. The biographical information I included refers to the left of the image with my star sign logo, “Capricorn” and the symbol of my Zodiac sign, which is the earth dragon. I didn’t mention this in my rationale but I find myself often reading my star sign even though I wouldn’t think of myself as superstitious I decided it would be a good idea to include it in my design.

If I had the chance to do this again I would have taken better quality images and made more use of the negative space. I liked what my classmates had to say about my work and I agree with their light criticism. I must say in reply to one of the comments, I would have used some more professional turntables but these are what I use and I believe it’s not always what you use but how you use it.

Flick Book Animation

I made this short animation in a flick book in the previous session, earlier today i scanned it into photoshop and put it together by cutting each individual page out, put them in the same document on separate layers. Then, using the animation tool under window i spaced them out along a time line before the trial and error process of timing the frames.

Non-Carricula Design

Ive been spending a lot of my spare time recently designing a CD cover for a small local band, this is just a prototype as they will only be using this initially to send to producers and record labels. The way this design works is to fold into three, the middle being the front, printed on a card CD cover (like an old vinyl album) as appose to the contemporary plastic CD case with a fold out sleeve. In a way i do kind of regret creating a design like this as it can only be fully appreciated when completely folded out. Never the less, there are many benefits to designing a CD cover this way, mainly financial and environmental.

Critical Studies

I had my first Critical Studies session this morning, unfortunately due to illness i could not attend last weeks session. I got a couple of briefs to start with, one of which (the image analysis essay) i posted last Friday after receiving the brief from one of my classmates. The other brief i was given is about creating a five minute power point presentation. I will have to analyze a piece of text given to me by my tutor, break it down into an artistic, cultural, historical,technological, social, political and other appropriate contexts. I will have to back up my oral seminar with a five hundred word summary and bibliography. In the session itself we spent much of the time analyzing images of advertisement and extracting their meanings.

animation

Earlier today we started what i expect will be one of the more difficult parts of the course. Seen as my drawing skills aren't exactly top notch, i might find animation quite hard. Never the less i look forward to learning about flash and image ready in more detail and i can't wait to begin learning 3D modeling programs such as Maya. 3D animation is always something that has really impressed me but i haven't the faintest idea where to start. In the first session i started by investigating animation techniques used by other people, Preston Blair is one of the most note-able, his work its great for beginner animators as it shows the different poses taken by a character through movement.

Critical Studies

Image analysis exercise

Compare and contrast Absolut advert and Meadow Hall website

Absolut Advertisement

I think that the layout for this advert works well as it’s displaying three different flavours so the background colours are the colours of the flavour of the product.
Also when you look at each section you notice the suggestion that there’s a flavour designed to cater for the style of life most suited to you. For example:

Absolut citron- looks like a tropical environment, reminding you of a summer’s day or a holiday. Giving the impression that this is quite a light refreshing drink.

Absolut raspberry- more of a down town street nightlife kind of theme in this one, aimed toward the young professional going out on the town, I guess.

Absolut vanilla- the background image looks like the upper class environment, classier than the other two flavours, possibly with an older age group in mind.

I don’t think there is one certain target audience, instead they have gone for the approach that no matter what your taste and style, Absolut is product for you with different flavours for all occasions. The advert is very colourful and illustrated but has a retro kind of art deco feel about it, the text is very simple and plain but the words ‘find’ and ‘flavour’ are much bigger than the word ‘your’. The advert doesn’t mention anything about the drink like that its vodka. I think this is because they’re trying to advertise the brand, Absolut rather than as a vodka drink.

Meadow Hall Website

The website is fairly plain and straightforward. The image on the front instantly makes me come to the conclusion the advert is aimed predominantly at women. To me it’s not sexist because the web designer obviously knows that its women that like to shop and will visit the site knowing what they want to look for, where as men would rather go to a shop and get what they need. I don’t think that men would generally look at the website for clothes as, well not in comparison.

Comparison

In Comparison of the two, I think that they are quite similar in the sense that they are both advertisements set in the interest of girls. They both use simple text to show important information. They use bright colours but the shopping centre is a simpler and has a negative space background, unlike the Absolut advert, which is filled with more colour. Even though both adverts are mainly aimed at women I don’t think that it is sexist because the Meadow Hall website is sure that its women that will be most interested in looking at the clothes. Also the Absolut advert is advertising ‘girly drinks,’ men would probably much rather have a bottle of beer, a pint or whiskey than vodka. So basically the target audience is women eighteen and over because the advertisers know they will be the majority that will use the site or be product in question.
I think they both have an old feel to the way they advertise such as the Meadow Hall one is so plain and has a scripture like type face for the subtext, the absolut advert has a retro art deco feel brought on by the symmetrical patterns.

About Me – Rationale

For this brief I am required to make a poster or flyer that would visually communicate to the rest of the class what I’m all about. The easiest way of doing this would be to list my hobbies and interests, likes and dislikes and a small amount of biographical information.

My original approach to this project is to show the side of me which most of my classmates will be unfamiliar with. I have been strongly motivated by politics throughout much of my life; I believe that the current western governments pay little if any attention to the world in which they leave future generations. I feel that our capitalist ways at present will lead to nothing but disaster over the coming years whether it be global warming, a lack of natural resources or George Bush’s War of Terror.

Ironically, if it wasn’t for this consumerist world in which we have grown up, I would never have been able to take part in many of the things I enjoy so much. Therefore I think the best way to describe myself would be by creating imagery, which can communicate the idea of a contradictory mind, stuck between my morals and beliefs and the things I enjoy most.

Many of the pictures which show my hobbies and interests I can capture myself, however there are a lot of images I won’t be able to create on my own, I will be relying on the internet and other sources of media for these pictures. The problem with acquiring images from elsewhere is the quality of them will be much lower, for example Internet images are usually compressed for compatibility (screen resolution quality-72dpi) (print resolution quality-300dpi.) If this is not taken into consideration when it comes to printing the final piece I will end up with some pixelated images.