Two Shots

Our main goal for this term was to complete to shots of our film. This was to show us how challenging it's going to be in the last term when we need to complete whole film.

During this term we have probably came across every possible problem. It was very frustrating at some points and we doubted that we will be ever able to do it. But we've never gave up and managed to solve every problem and learn from it. So having this experience will really help us in next term and we know that we are able to finish the film.

Although the two shots are done they still need some tweaks. For example textures on the close ups doesn't look high-res enough and we have to recreate some of the assets just for a particular shot. I'm going to spend my Easter break making sure every texture is big enough to look good in the shot.

Also it's a good idea to sit together and watch the final shot. An extra pair of eyes is priceless. For example I just spotted we forgot to remove tracking markers, so that's the next thing we need to do.

Here are the links to the shots:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HSyRHUZ-uU8&feature=youtu.be

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=N23Emh8GIWA&feature=youtu.be

Project Website

We've made a branch from our company website to only focus on our current project. Viewers can see our work so far as well as the film poster. There is also a section introducing every team member giving a brief information about their roles in this project. There is also a page with a company showreel.

Here is a link to the website:
http://liquidman.wix.com/naturesgardener

Inviting People To Degree Show

I've managed to invite only four people so far. But I know the dates of the degree shown only for couple of days, so I think it's not bad. Also all of them were invited personally. First person I invited was Justin Weyers. He's a film producer. We worked on Liar's Autobiography. Next two people I invited I met by Justin. We went to a screening of Liar's Autobiography just for animators and I met there Ashley Pay and Nina Pfeifenberger. They both work at small animation studio Mr&Mrs and they said they will gladly see student's work. The last person I invited is Sasha Damjanovski and he is writer and director.

Networking With People From The Industry

Having my website running with my showreel working, I can give my business cards without worrying about being unprofessional and risking that something is not working. I check about 2-3 times a week my website and showreel to make sure it's working. There is no excuse for something not working. The industry is very competitive and I'm sure if a client is unable to see my work he/she will not be waiting for me to fix it but will move to another person.

Ravensbourne is a great place to start networking. People who teach there are or were professionals and they have links. It's worth talking to them as they might guide you in right direction and to right people. Another benefit is guest lectures. Quite often there is somebody from the industry coming to the college to give a lecture and it's  a great opportunity to have a little chat with them and give your business card.

I have also worked on Liar's Autobiography. The film involved about 15 different animation companies and now when it's done there are screenings around London just for animators as well as parties to celebrate the completion of the film. These are great opportunities to talk to professionals and give them my business cards. They also look more friendly and more interested in me when they know I was involved in a project they were working on.

Showreel

I'm still using my old showreel that I created in 2012. My new showreel is in progress and will be done just after I'll finish my projects I'm currently working on.

Recently I updated my showreel by putting some music. When I was creating it a year ago I thought every one looking at it will turn down the music anyway, but recently I spoke with some professionals who are very often looking for people by watching their showreels and they said the music is important. It gives another dimension to the reel. I added some calm instrumental music that somehow fits to the whole showreel. They have also told me that the best work should be shown first to grab their attention and it should be around two minutes long.

Here is a link to my updated showreel:

https://vimeo.com/43630836

Business Cards

I have also made sure I have business cards. I gave them the same look as my website so there is a consistency that gives me more professional look.

For now I only printed 100 business cards just in case any contact details will change. I've just created my website and I'm not familiar with this stuff and everything can change. Once I'm sure everything is steady, I will print more cards.

I always have about 10-15 cards on me. Just in case I meet someone who might be interested in my work. I give my business cards to everyone I meet who has some connections to the industry.

Personal Website

To make myself look professional I created my own website.
http://www.kamilburniak.com/

I spoke with many people from the industry asking what they want to see in a website. They want websites to be simple and they want to see a showreel on the home page, so they don't waste any time looking through the website for a showreel. They have also said that it's a good idea to show more in-depth breakdowns and animations but they should be on a separate page.

My website is still work in progress. Right now I have only got a showreel on my main page together with short paragraph about me. I also created a page with my contact details.

Next I'm going to create Gallery page where I can show in-depth my work together with some projects I made for industry with client's recommendations.

Render Farm

We were told that it's a good idea to use render farm in this project to speed up our workflows and allow us to continue working while rendering. Throughout the year the render farm had some issues and was not working. But recently it was fixed and I decided to do a test. For the test I used a simple scene of my 30 second piece where I animated my character to test the rig. It is very simple scene without any render layers but it's long (1100 frames) and would take over a day to render on my machine. The first two tries didn't came out because I misspelled the file name. But eventually I got it all right and everything rendered in less than 30 minutes. Here is the video:

Quality Control

We had a few hours long lecture about the quality control. This is to allow our films to be shown on different screens across the uni as well as making sure the highest quality is available.

We've learnt that we have to take into account the RGB values, that they cannot exceed 1. Also flashing images can affect health issues for people who suffer from epilepsy.

We've learnt that frame rate has to be 25 frames per second and transfer between the frames must be interlaced.

We have also learnt about different aspect ratios. When, for example, a film is created in HD 1920x1080 and it's shown in a different aspect ratio like 3:4. then some information will be cut off. Here is a diagram that shows safe area for putting important information:

Our Company

We started pretending as we were a real company. So our approach to the project was as professional as possible. This stuff was also used in our E&E unit. First of all we've created a logo.

Once we've had the logo, we compiled a showreel and created our own website. For the showreel we've used our previous work. Here is a link to the website: http://studio-phantasmagoria.squarespace.com/. To approach wider audience we've also created a Facebook page: http://www.facebook.com/StudioPhantasmagoria, as well as Twitter page: https://twitter.com/StudioPhantasma.

To make us look professional, we've used the same logo and the same colours on every page.

We have also printed some business card and made T shirts with our logo.

Social Media Website

To even further help us communicate when we are not in the college we've used Facebook. We've created a page just for this project and invited only the group members. Nowadays Facebook can be viewed on almost every device, which will get everyone up to date with our meetings, filming schedule or any deadlines.

It's also very helpful to post the images we've created to get a constant feedback or to give someone a feedback. That way the production is fully on and we don't waste any time waiting for a meeting in the college. It also gave us an easy solution if someone can't make it to the meeting or struggles with a deadline so others can take over and help.

Here is a screen print of our Facebook page:

Google Calendar

To make sure every one knows what to do and what is the deadline for each milestone of the production we've used Google Calendar. Daniel Couch has created it and invited every one in the group to join the calendar. It clearly shows the time line for each task and every one's job is clearly labelled.

Dropbox

To share our work, while we are not in uni we use Dropbox. Dropbox has allowed us to share any file of any format. We created one big folder for our whole project and then added sub-folders for anything done in the pipeline. Here is a screen print showing our shared folders:

Dropbox has really helped us in production of the film. We saved a lot of time by sending the files through Dropbox rather them giving them in person.

Our Pipeline

To make sure our workflow is as smooth as possible we have developed a pipeline. We tried to make it as efficient as possible, so everyone is working at something at any time.

We had to set up the naming conventions. They are very important if working in a group. With good naming conventions everybody can understand what is what in the scenes and really smooths the workflow.

Introduction

In this term we have to focus on marketing ourselves and network with the industry. Show our organisation and planning skills. Besides that we have to complete two shots of our film.

Our target market for the film are people aged 12+. The film is about a troll walking through the forest, looking after it and finding remains of his ancestors. So it might be a bit inappropriate for people under the age of 12.

Here is a list of things me and my group is going to cover this term:

-Set the target audience for our film and choose two shots to complete this term
-Complete those two shots
-Use Dropbox to share out project files
-Create our film poster
-Learn about quality control, so our film meets the standards and can be shown on big screens around the school
-Use Google calendar to keep every one on schedule

For my personal work I'm going to cover:
-Creating my own website
-Designing and printing my business cards
-Networking with people from the industry
-Develop my showreel
-Invite people to the Degree Show

Here is a list of all group members with their team roles:
Kamil Burniak: generalist, character development
Erwin Cruz: concept art, storyboard, animatic
Derek Ho: rigging, animation
Robert Burchett: dynamics
Daniel Couch: lighting, render layers
Guled Ahmed: compositing