30.12.08

A Year in Review

Well, I've been seeing a lot of these kinds of posts on other blogs that I've been subscribed to in my Reader and I thought, "Hey, why not do one for mine?". So here I am, reflecting on some of the highlights of the year and some of the things that maybe I didn't live up to.

1. Probably the biggest thing I've done this year was the creation of this blog. It doesn't seem like all that long ago, but wow, I created it way back at the end of February. Currently it's gained around 3,200 hits. I started off the blog really strong, posting nearly every day for 3 whole months. Things slowed down quite a bit however when I moved and was put into a different situation that I was before, making it harder for me to focus a lot of my time on the blog. I think this blog was probably one of the best decisions I've made for claymation related stuff and for sharing what I know and do.

2. I've learned massive amounts of information. The blog allowed me to learn a lot by needing to go out and research stuff. I've been made aware of so many more animated videos out there as well as different techniques and things to make better animations. I guess you could say that just learning about clay animation stuff is a hobby of mine. All I need to do is put some of that stuff I know to practice.

3. I've created enough projects to keep me busy for a long time. I have two websites I'd like to complete, one is just a remodel of Kramer Klaymation and the other is a site aimed at helping people learn more about clay animation. The latter will take a while to create since there are plenty of variables to think about as well as resources to find and create. I also started more work on a short I hope to do sometime called "The Hole". I was able to do some concept art, as well as some of a CG animatic in preparation for it. I would like the project to be a way to create a decent and plausible animation. I also had another idea for a stop motion that I wanted to do, but I don't think I'll be able to get that done. Maybe I can make it smaller and still do some of it. I hope to complete these projects by the end of next year, but we'll see if it happens or not.

4. I was able to do a series of short practice animations in the summer. They were a good way to put to practice some of the things I've learned and have some fun. I learned that timing really is key, and if you time things, animating in 24 fps isn't hard to do at all. I hope to be able to do another series sometime.

5. Relaxed and slacked off. Towards the end of this year, I left this blog and my ideas alone for a while. It was nice just to relax and not think about these things for a while. Hopefully I can get back into things sometime soon and finish some of the projects I hope to complete.


Well, that's probably it for the things that stick out to me. It's been a pretty good year, and a fast one at that. I want to thank all 3,200 visitors, whether they're repeated ones or not, for coming and encouraging me to keep posting information. Hopefully I'll be able to make this next one even better, even if it's in a different way, and accomplish as much as I did this past one.

26.12.08

Redesigning Kramer Klaymation

Every time I visit my Kramer Klaymation site, I'm disgusted in how it looks, so I'm redesigning it. I designed the design that's on the site right now over two years ago and I knew pretty much nothing about design back then. It's time for a new look, and not the one I displayed a number of months ago(I've learned about web design a lot since then). I also have pretty much all the material I need for the new design, so it won't be too hard to get it ready. All I have to do is design it and get the coding done and it will be ready. The new design is going to be pretty simple still since I'm stripping it of a lot of things. I want it to be more professional looking and not to complicated. So far, I have the index page designed. I'm not going to show it off so you'll have to wait until the site is unveiled. I can tell you that it will be using the new logo and it has more of a blue color scheme. I still have to do the about, video gallery, and the image gallery pages and it will be ready for coding. This would get one of my projects out of the way so that I can relax and not think about it anymore.

25.12.08

Merry Christmas!

Christmas Crown

Merry Christmas everyone! Since I don't have anything new both claymation and christmas related to show you, here's a photo I took recently with a little bit of a Christmas feel that I call "Christmas Crown". It's a splash created by some water. Hope you had/have a great one!

18.12.08

Time Warp

Here's an article I came across from Blender Nation. It may be useful to take a look at some of these videos and study them for animation purposes.

"The Discovery Channel has an interesting program called Time Warp where they film various actions like a balloon popping, cracking a bullwhip or a whip on flames, non-Newtonian fluid, a boxing blow to the head and stomach and many more, all recorded at 1,000 FPS.

There is also an interactive page where you move your mouse along the video screen to control the video playback. Reverse forward. These are nice for studying movement for animation; things you would never notice with a regular video shot at 30FPS are picked up at 1,000 FPS . It was interesting to see a stomach being hit by a fist in a boxing glove and all of the various stages of the reaction. "

Discovery Channel Site
Original Source

12.12.08

Foley

Here's another article I came across today about foley, or sound effects for movies. If you're interested in creating some of your own, you might be interested in reading this. It's not the most in depth article, but it does give a basic overview of the idea. The link to it is below.

Foley

11.12.08

55 Great Websites To Download Free Sound Effects

Here's a link to a blog post that just came out from Hongkiat.com that gives 55 places to get sound effects. I posted a few sites on here before, but 55 gives you a lot more variety. If you're in the need for some sound effects, check it out, or just save the link for later.

55 Great Websites To Download Free Sound Effects

6.12.08

Slacking

Sorry guys, right now I realize that I'm pretty much slacking on this whole website thing. Looking back at my "How not to Fail" post, I think the reasons are because I'm not trying hard enough and personal life stuff. I'm just posting this here to say not to assume that I'm working on anything right now. When I get back to working, I'll make sure to post something.

Something I've been enjoying more recently is photography and since I don't have anything else to share with you, why don't you check some of my stuff out below?



Thanks for reading.