'The pool' Animation
An animation about a Cube Dude at the pool.
The making of ...
I learned a lot by making this movie.
And I tried to keep it simple.
But I am glad I have reached the finish line.
Telling a short story in a logical order is difficult.
Even if you have some sort of script in mind.
To keep render times low, I decided to keep low poly's for all objects. After all, A high poly model can easily be added later on. That said, I've created 30 Blender animation scenes. So changing all those files with higher definition of poly models, will be a lot of work. Each scene varies in number of frames, ranging from 40 to 190 frames. The total movie is about 2700 frames.
Most of the scenes start where the previous scene ended. I changed only the camera position.Some cut scenes where introduced, to give the story a flow of logic. Or, I hope so.
I tried to follow the "12 Animation principles", but I quickly recognized that sometimes I used it too strong. I needed more subtle movements or gestures. leading to more render nights. And I did this a lot. Viewing, analysing the animation and render it again.
I must say Blender (2.79) is stable and robust. But I discovered also three blender bugs, which caused delay in my project.
I estimate that I have spend more then 80 hours on this project. And many nights of Blender render. I had some frustration, but most of the time it was all fun. But I really glad that the story is complete.
There are still some issues left. For you to discover.
Stress ball 'The pool' animation
The second movie with simple objects.
I tried to add some emotions into simple geometric figures. Using the 12 Principles of Animation from Disney.
An important role is played by the ball. Which actually gives the cube a purpose.
All other props provide visual support to the story.
Rubber duck an animation asset
The inflatable rubber duck.
I needed this asset to make the Cube feel like a beginner, a junior.
The duck can be used to give the Cube more expression capabillities.
Also the tree to give an indication of height and to fill the composition of the scene.
As I worked on this film, it became clear to me that it was not possible to add more details.
Due to slow hardware.
This was before Blender Eevee was introduced.
My goal was to learn a bit about the animation process and not modeling.
About this still
The grains of sand in the front of the scene are particles. Which slows down the rendering process.
For the dunes at the back I made an image texture based on the particles in front.
Then the particles in the front gradually fused into the back texture.
Using weight paint to adjust the particle distribution.
Stress Ball
A study on how to add emotion to simple objects. Blender 2.79.
This was before Blender Eevee. Trying to focus on simple and fast render sequences. To make an animation with simple lifeless objects. And what to do with them in a simple story.
So this video clip emerged, which was the start for The Pool animation.
The animation was based on simple scenes which I reused several times in the Blender video editor.